Relics

'For ridding me of Sir Hugh. And I also owe you my abject apology. I did not think they would attempt to steal our relic from the shrine, and I certainly did not believe that Kervezey would be with them when they did.'

'As I was foolish enough to volunteer for the task, no apologies are needed,' I reminded him. He looked rueful.

'But what about Kervezey's ship?' I asked suddenly. You knew about that?'

'No. That is, I knew he must have a fast ship, because he beat us to Koskino, but not an armed galley. His father has deeper pockets than I ever suspected. No, we saw Kervezey's red lantern on the mountain, then your light, and we realised something was amiss. I put out from Hrinos to take you off the island or to reinforce Pavlos, and it was lucky I did, for we saw the galley coming down the channel towards us. It would have surprised us at anchor otherwise, and we might not be taking our ease now if that had happened.' 'I am sorry about Cordula. I failed you after all.'

He smiled and shook his head. 'No, no. The outcome… I could not have wished for a better one. We are rid – you have rid us – of a dangerous enemy. And we at least have the false saint.' He noted my look of surprise. ‘We had a fair wind, so after we took you off the beach we sailed around to the town, just in time to catch three very surprised Franks, standing on the dock with a long bundle. They took one look at Dimitri and handed it over with great haste.'

It was then that Anna, who had crept up the ladder in fine disregard for Nizam's warnings, added her information about the fire of the Greeks.

'But what is it?' I asked, despite myself. I still did not want to dwell on what had happened.

'I am not giving up any more secrets,' laughed the Captain. 'But very broadly speaking, it is a fire that, once lit, burns even on water and will destroy anything that it touches. Two pots of it, dropped on their deck just as they were about to ram us, and they were lost. And so were we, almost. The men had to row like devils in hell to pull us away in time.'

'It was incredible,' Anna broke in. 'The whole deck went up in flames. The-' She stopped. 'Really, it was horrible,' she went on, sober now. 'The men at the oars couldn't get out. I think most of the deck crew got off, but the oarsmen… only a few got free. They screamed and screamed. But it was over quickly. She burned to the waterline in minutes.'

She had taken my hand and was gripping it. Our knuckles were white.

What about the others on the island?' I asked. It was the question I had dreaded, but since the mood had turned to horror…

'Kilij will limp until his dying day – may it be far off. Zianni is a little cut about, but he will be strutting in a week. The others are fine.' He shrugged. 'Kervezey's men died, except for your friend.'

'I met him only once, under bad circumstances,' I protested weakly. 'But I'm glad. What happened to him?'

'He proved himself an honourable man. He would only defend himself, not attack, and when they disarmed him he revealed that he had been indentured to Sir Hugh by the Bishop and had been planning to escape. He did not know of Kervezey's tomb-robbing plans, it seems. In any case he satisfied me. He came aboard for a while, you know. We talked for a long time. He will do us a service, and in return will get his freedom and a nice purseful.' I raised the eyebrow that could move. 'Go on.'

We put him ashore at Ragusa. He will travel on to Jerusalem, which he genuinely wanted to see, poor fellow, and send word from there to Balecester, a letter that will tell the Bishop that his son perished of a quartain fever on Samos. Or did we say Samothrace? It doesn't matter.' 'But why bother?'

'Because,' trilled Anna, We still have business with my lord the Bishop.' Later that day, Nizam steered the Cormaran with great care between the rocky walls of a bay on a tiny nameless islet, a hump of rock lost amongst the tangle of islands off Zadar. It was a remote place out of the sea lanes and populated only by cicadas. Not even fishermen came there. It was crowned with a thatch of stunted pine-trees, and there was one building, a stone dwelling that had been empty for years but which still had a roof of sorts. Inside there was nothing, Anna told me, save a flaking icon painted on the wall and a big stone trough.

'Perfect: I told you,' said Gilles, when he saw it. The Captain chuckled and nodded. We'll start at once,' he said.

The men went to work hauling sacks up from the hold and over to the hut. I practised walking on the little beach with Anna, who never left my side, and sometimes with Zianni, whose left arm had been 'filleted like a mullet', as he never tired of telling me. Isaac's needlework had saved it, and the physician had been to work on my leg as well, and under my arm. It was he who had insisted on my stay on the steering deck: he had a strange idea that fresh air was good for recovery, but I never saw fit to question his judgement after I had healed. The salt water must have done me some good, too, he said. I told him that if I had been at home I would have been daubed with white mercury and cat shit and left to die in a sealed room. Isaac had nodded soberly, and offered to collect some of Fafner's droppings if it would make me feel better. I decided to trust him from then on.

We passed an idle month on our islet. The sun shone every day and I could feel it soaking into me, knitting me back together and lifting my spirits. One morning I felt strong enough to go for a longer walk, and so Anna and I set out from the beach and into the carpet of herbal scrub that blanketed the island. We held each other around the waist and I leaned on a carved stick that Dimitri had found for me.

Where are we going?' asked Anna, as if there was any choice in this Spartan place.

To the hut, of course. I want to see what they are doing there.'

Anna paused. 'How strong do you feel?' she asked me gravely, searching my face with her great brown eyes.

'Strong as an ox,' I told her. I met her gaze. I was definitely feeling better. A tremor of desire flickered, then another. It had been a long time since we had even kissed. I felt another stirring, and realised it was not lust I felt. 'Anna, I love you,' I told her. 'Do you, my little shepherd? My brave little shepherd?'

She was mocking me again. I opened my mouth to answer, but she closed it with a cool finger.

'I've been waiting rather a long time for you to confess that, Petroc. I love you too.'

'Since Bordeaux?' She nodded. 'Since the hermit? I've loved you since then.'

'Since the hermit, my Petroc. Since the beginning.' She was crying. We were both crying like little children. She sniffled and wiped her nose with a sleeve. 'There,' she whispered. 'That wasn't so hard, was it?'

After that, it was a while before we reached the hut. A fresh, well-beaten path led through the tangle of head-high trees to the remains of a wooden gate. One olive tree and one fig grew in the yard before the hut, a squat cube of stone with a roof of shattered pantile patched with furze. Anna knocked and put her head around the door, then beckoned me inside.

It was gloomy in there, and at first I could make out nothing at all. The room was filled with an intense, astringent mineral smell. I wrinkled my nose. A beam of light from the one tiny window angled down and sparkled on what lay heaped the length of a long wooden table in the middle of the room. Someone stepped out of the shadows.

'Step over to the table, Petroc,' said the Captain. 'There is something I wish you to see.'

Moving closer, I could see that the table carried a vast burden of what looked like coarse salt. 'It is natron,' the Captain told me. 'Useful stuff. We carry a few tons as ballast. It is a salt from the lake called El Kab, in Egypt.'^ 'Useful for what?' I asked.