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ceased to watch for his reappearance by the time he heard a distant bellow from the ruins far behind him. He
turned. He could make out the distant figure of the woodcarver standing atop one of the mounds. Fingo was
waving his arms and vigorously nodding his head in affirmation. Francis waved back, then hiked wearily on his
way.
Two weeks of near-starvation had exacted their tribute. After two or three miles he began to stagger. When
still nearly a mile from the abbey, he fainted beside the road. It was late afternoon before Cheroki, riding back
from his rounds, noticed him lying there, hastily dismounted, and bathed the youth’s face until he gradually
brought him around. Cheroki had encountered the supply donkeys on his way back and had paused to hear
Fingo’s account, confirming Brother Francis’ find. Although he was not prepared to believe that Francis had
discovered anything of real importance, the priest regretted his earlier impatience with the boy. Having noticed
the box lying nearby with its contents half-spilled in the road, and having glanced briefly at the note in the lid,
while Francis sat groggy and confused at the edge of the trail, Cheroki found himself willing to regard the boy’s
earlier babblings as the result of romantic imagination rather than of madness or delirium. He had neither visited
the crypt nor closely examined the contents of the box,guild wars power leveling, but it was obvious, at least, that the boy had been
misinterpreting real events rather than confessing hallucinations.
“You can finish your confession as soon as we get back,” he told the novice softly, helping him to climb up
behind the saddle on the mare. “I think I can absolve you if you don’t insist on personal messages from the saints.
Eh?”
Brother Francis was too weak at the moment to insist on anything.
4
“You did the right thing,” the abbot grunted at last. He had been slowly pacing the floor of his study for
perhaps five minutes, his wide peasant face wearing a thick-furrowed muscular glower, while Father Cheroki sat
nervously on the edge of his chair. Neither priest had spoken since Cheroki had entered the room in answer to his
ruler’s summons; Cheroki jumped slightly when Abbot Arkos finally grunted out the words.
“You did the right thing,” the abbot said again,gw gold, stopping in the center of the room and squinting at his prior,
who finally began to relax It was nearly midnight and Arkos had been preparing to retire for an hour or two of
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sleep before Matins and Lauds. Still damp and disheveled from a recent plunge in the bathing barrel, he
reminded Cheroki of a were-bear only incompletely changed into a man. He was wearing a coyote-skin robe, and
the only hint of his office was the pectoral cross that nestled in the black fur on his chest and flashed with
candlelight whenever he turned toward the desk. His wet hair hung over his forehead, and with his short jutting
beard and his coyote skins,cheap guild wars gold, he looked, at the moment, less like a priest than a military chieftain, full of restrained
battle-anger from a recent assault. Father Cheroki, who came of baronial stock from Denver, tended to react
formally to men’s official capacities,buy l2 adena, tended to speak courteously to the badge of office while not allowing
himself to see the man who wore it, in this respect following the Court customs of many ages. Thus Father