“Good. I’d like to keep it here.”

Tom nodded and went to the door.

It occurred to him that if he did not ask about Agnes now he probably never would. He turned back. “Father?”

“Yes?”

“My first wife… Agnes, her name was… she died without a priest, and she’s buried in unconsecrated ground. She hadn’t sinned, it was just… the circumstances. I wondered… Sometimes a man builds a chapel, or founds a monastery, in the hope that in the afterlife, God will remember his piety. Do you think my design might serve to protect Agnes’s soul?”

Philip frowned. “Abraham was asked to sacrifice his only son. God no longer asks for blood sacrifices, for the ultimate sacrifice has been made. But the lesson of Abraham’s story is that God demands the best we have to offer, that which is most precious to us. Is this design the best thing you could offer God?”

“Except for my children, yes.”

“Then rest easy, Tom Builder. God will accept it.”

II

Philip had no idea why Waleran Bigod wanted to meet him in the ruins of Earl Bartholomew’s castle.

He had been obliged to travel to the town of Shiring and spend the night there, then set off this morning for Earlscastle. Now, as the horse jogged toward the castle looming up out of the morning mist ahead of him, he decided it was probably a matter of convenience: Waleran was on his way from one place to another, passing no nearer to Kingsbridge than here, and the castle was a handy landmark.

Philip wished he knew more about what Waleran was planning. He had not seen the bishop-elect since the day he had inspected the cathedral ruins. Waleran did not know how much money Philip needed to build the church, and Philip did not know what Waleran was planning to ask from the king. Waleran liked to keep his plans to himself. It made Philip highly nervous.

He was glad to have learned, from Tom Builder, exactly what it would take to build the new cathedral, depressing though the news was. Once again he was glad Tom was around. Tom was a man of surprising depths. He could hardly read or write, but he could design a cathedral, draw plans, calculate the numbers of men and the time it would take to build, and figure out how much all that would cost. He was a quiet man, but despite that he was a formidable presence: he was very tall, with a bearded, weather-beaten face, keen eyes and a high forehead. Philip sometimes felt slightly intimidated by him, and tried to conceal it by adopting a hearty tone. But Tom was very earnest, and anyway he had no idea that Philip found him daunting. The conversation about his wife had been touching, and had revealed a piety that had not previously been apparent. Tom was one of those people who kept his religion deep in his heart. Sometimes they were the best kind.

As Philip approached Earlscastle he felt increasingly uncomfortable. This had once been a thriving castle, defending the countryside all around, employing and feeding large numbers of people. Now it was ruined, and the hovels clustered about it were deserted, like empty nests in the bare branches of a tree in winter. And Philip was responsible for this. He had revealed the conspiracy being hatched here, and had brought down the wrath of God, in the shape of Percy Hamleigh, upon the castle and its inhabitants.

The walls and the gatehouse had not been badly damaged in the fighting, he noted. That meant the attackers had probably got inside before the gates could be shut. He walked his horse across the wooden bridge and entered the first of two compounds. Here the evidence of battle was clearer: apart from the stone chapel, all that remained of the castle buildings was a few charred stumps of wood sticking up out of the ground, and a small whirlwind of ashes blowing along the base of the castle wall.

There was no sign of the bishop. Philip rode through the compound, crossed the bridge at the far side, and entered the upper compound. Here there was a massive stone keep, with an unsteady-looking wooden staircase leading up to its second-floor entrance. Philip gazed up at the forbidding stonework with its mean arrow-slit windows: mighty though it was, it had not protected Earl Bartholomew.

From those windows he would be able to look over the castle walls and watch for the bishop. He tied his horse to the handrail of the staircase and went up.

The door opened to his touch. He stepped inside. The great hall was dark and dusty, and the rushes on the floor were dry as bones. There was a cold fireplace and a spiral stair leading up. Philip went to a window. The dust made him sneeze. He could not see much from the window so he decided to go up to the next floor.

At the top of the spiral stairs he faced two doors. He guessed that the smaller one led to the latrine, the larger one to the earl’s bedroom. He went through the larger door.

The room was not empty.

Philip stopped dead, shocked rigid. There in the middle of the room, facing him, was a young woman of extraordinary beauty. For a moment he thought he was seeing a vision, and his heart raced. She had a cloud of dark curls around a bewitching face. She stared back at him out of large dark eyes, and he realized she was as startled as he. He relaxed, and was about to take another step into the room, when he was seized from behind and felt the cold blade of a long knife at his throat; and a male voice said: “And who the devil are you?”

The girl moved toward him. “Say your name, or Matthew will kill you,” she said regally.

Her manner showed her to be of noble birth, but even nobles were not allowed to threaten monks. “Tell Matthew to take his hands off the prior of Kingsbridge, or it may be the worse for him,” Philip said calmly.

He was released. He glanced back over his shoulder and saw a slight man of about his own age. This Matthew had presumably come out of the latrine.

He turned back to the girl. She appeared to be about seventeen years old. Despite her haughty manner she was shabbily dressed. As he studied her, a chest against the wall behind her opened up, and a teenaged boy got out, looking sheepish. He held a sword. He had been lying in wait, or hiding, Philip could not tell which.

“And who are you?” Philip said.

“I am the daughter of the earl of Shiring, and my name is Aliena.”

The daughter! thought Philip. I didn’t know she was still living here. He looked at the boy. He was about fifteen, and resembled the girl except for a snub nose and short hair. Philip raised an inquiring eyebrow at him.

“I am Richard, the heir to the earldom,” the boy said in a cracked adolescent voice.

Behind Philip, the man said: “And I am Matthew, the steward of the castle.”

The three of them had been hiding here since Earl Bartholomew was captured, Philip realized. The steward was taking care of the children: he must have a store of food or money hidden away. Philip addressed the girl. “I know where your father is, but what about your mother?”

“She died many years ago.”

Philip felt a stab of guilt. The children were virtually orphans, and it was partly his doing. “But haven’t you got relatives to look after you?”

“I’m looking after the castle until my father returns,” she said.

They were living in a dream world, Philip realized. She was trying to live as if she still belonged to a rich and powerful family. With her father imprisoned and in disgrace, she was just another girl. The boy was heir to nothing at all. Earl Bartholomew was never coming back to this castle, unless the king decided to hang him here. He pitied the girl, but in a way he also admired the strength of will that sustained the fantasy and made two other people share it. She might have been a queen, he thought.

From outside came a clatter of hooves on wood: several horses were crossing the bridge. Aliena said to Philip: “Why have you come here?”