‘To what end? What difference will it make?’ She was trying to sound severe but there was a twinkle in her eye that Berren had come to recognise. One that said we are more than just a teacher and her student. One that said they were friends.
‘You want to know too!’
For a moment, Tasahre’s sword wobbled, actually wobbled, and Tasahre’s sword never wobbled. It took Berren a moment to realise why. She was trying very hard not to laugh.
‘What?’
She shook her head and then she couldn’t stop herself from smiling. ‘Of course I do. But it is forbidden.’
‘Forbidden? Why?’
‘A sword-monk does not dabble in such things.’
They stared at one another. Berren glanced at the glass on his sword: five minutes left.
‘But shouldn’t you be there? I mean one of you? Sword-monks can smell a lie — that’s what they say!’
‘Yes, Berren, we can, as you very well know, but from the living, not from the dead.’ For a moment he thought he caught a slight stiffening in Tasahre’s face. She was always hard to read, but there was an air of unease to the way she stood.
Two minutes on the hourglass. Berren watched the sands trickle down. ‘I’m going to go and listen,’ he said.
‘They will not let you in.’
Which made him laugh. ‘I know more ways to get about this temple than the rest of you lot put together. I was raised a thief, Tasahre. There’s nowhere I can’t go.’
She raised an eyebrow. ‘And here we are, teaching you swords too? I shall begin to wonder if that is wise if you continue to say such things.’
He shrugged and beamed. ‘I could say nothing. Wouldn’t make it any less true.’ One minute. ‘Tasahre?’
‘Berren?’
‘Come with me.’ Thirty seconds. His shoulder was starting to go, the tip of his waster just beginning to wobble. Behind Tasahre, the great gates to the temple dome were opening and there was Justicar Kol and his cart. Berren watched it roll slowly inside and the doors close again. The last grain of sand trickled through the hourglass. Berren didn’t move. After another minute, Tasahre gently lowered her own sword.
‘I cannot.’ She stepped smartly away. ‘Now! Guard!’
Berren lowered his waster. ‘You’ll have to catch me first!’ He dropped it and bolted across the yard, dodging around Tasahre and heading for the dome.
‘Berren!’ It took her a moment before she was after him, swift as the wind. He ignored her, pelting past the closing doors of the dome and round to the back where the bulk of the temple joined it, the dormitories and the teaching cloisters and the kitchens and the priests’ tower. He sprinted for the kitchen, up onto the roof of a low drying shed and then shimmied to the top of the teaching cloister. He smiled. Tasahre was right behind him. Somewhere under his racing feet, Sterm was teaching a class full of novices. Telling them all about some saint who simply didn’t matter any more, most likely.
‘Berren!’ Tasahre called him again. ‘Stop! You cannot!’
Oh yes I can! His smile spread through him, making him run even faster. He vaulted a chimney block and then hurled himself at the high roof of the dormitory, gripping the edge with his hands and swinging his legs up onto the tiles a whisker of a second before Tasahre could reach him. He paused for a moment and looked down at her. ‘Admit it — you can’t catch me!’
She jumped, a standing jump, high enough to reach the edge of the roof with her hands while the rest of her followed in one fluid movement. Berren dashed across the top of the sloping roof towards the dome. There was a walkway that ran around it, an easy climb from the dormitory. He vaulted up and ran to the little door that led into the inside, to a catwalk that ran high around the dome above the altar. No one ever guarded the temple rooftop.
At the door he skidded to a stop.
‘Berren! Don’t!’ But she wasn’t close enough to stop him. He opened the door and slipped inside, creeping now. Below him, the centre of the temple dome was filled with people, forty or fifty of them. The cart was empty now. There were soldiers, the Emperor’s men in their pale silver, carrying Velgian to the altar of the sun. Berren moved quickly and silently away from the door and then crouched to watch. There were shadows up here. If he was still, no one would see him, even if they thought to look up. He just had to be quiet, that was all.
‘Berren!’ Tasahre came through the door. She hissed at him but she didn’t shout; instead, she came quietly to crouch beside him and grabbed his arm, tugging him. ‘Come! You cannot be here! It is forbidden!’
‘Why?’
‘They will expel you! I cannot be here!’
‘Then go away!’ Berren jerked his arm away from her.
‘Berren!’ She was getting angry. He’d never seen that, not once in all the time he’d been with her. She grabbed his arm again.
‘Get off!’ Below, the soldiers had Velgian on the altar now. They stepped back, leaving space around the dead thief-taker. The Overlord in his golden robe was standing beside an old man in sunshine yellow, the Sunherald of Deephaven himself. The Emperor’s soldiers and the temple guardsmen eyed each other with twitching suspicion. But it wasn’t the Sunherald who stepped towards the body, it was a woman, dressed in the same brilliant yellow robes as the Sunherald.
‘Who’s that?’ asked Berren.
‘The Sunbright,’ whispered Tasahre. Her grip on him eased.
‘What, Ansinnas?’
‘Yes.’ She let go of him. It seemed odd to Berren that with so many of the Emperor’s soldiers in the temple, the priests hadn’t called in their sword-monks. But they hadn’t. Apart from Tasahre, he couldn’t see a single one.
‘Is that usual?’
‘I wouldn’t know. I have never seen such a thing as this.’
‘When the warlock made the Headsman talk, he said she was the one he’d met with.’
Tasahre hissed. ‘And you would believe the spirit of a dead murderer, conjured by a warlock?’
Berren didn’t say anything. He could feel her unease, though. She wasn’t sure. There was doubt in her, just a crack of it, but enough to make her stay. ‘This is all a farce!’ she growled.
The Sunbright bent over Velgian. Light flowed from her hands, bathing him.
‘What’s she doing?’
‘Berren! I do not know!’ He’d never seen Tasahre so tense before.
The Sunbright stepped away from the body. The light faded from her fingers.
‘I have spoken to the spirit of the murderer,’ she said, loud and clear enough for everyone in the dome to hear. ‘He could not stand the decadence and the arrogance he saw. It was his decision to try and to kill Prince Sharda Falandawn. His alone.’
A rumble of discontent swept the men below. The overlord was shaking his head and looking at Kol. The justicar was shaking his head too, harder, almost trembling with anger. The Sunherald was smiling.
‘It’s not true!’ shouted Kol. ‘He wouldn’t! I know him — knew him. Someone paid him!’
‘He acted alone,’ said the Sunbright again.
Berren hissed. ‘It’s not fair! She’s lying! She must be! He told me there was a purse full of emperors …’ He looked at Tasahre, but the sword-monk had gone white. She was staring down at the Sunbright and at Velgian’s body. In the corner of her eye, a tear crept loose and began to roll down her cheek. She touched a finger to her nose.
The Overlord and the Sunherald were glaring at each other, exchanging quiet heated words. The soldiers around them stirred uneasily. Hands slipped to sword-hilts.
Tasahre stood up, very slowly. She moved to the edge of the catwalk and leaned over, where anyone who looked couldn’t fail to see her. Kol was pushing his way towards the Sunbright, his face bright with fury. Temple soldiers moved to be in his way and grabbed at him. Kol went for his sword. Around them, the Emperor’s men began to move. Another sword came out of its sheath.