The Orphan King by Sigmund Brouwer Page A

wondered the same. Yet because we don’t know where she hid him to raise him, nor when she died, we cannot make assumptions.What if his teaching was barely begun? What if she died when he was still far too young for the passage of rites where a boy is trusted with knowledge of our cause? And what if they found him instead?”
    William closed his eyes in thought. “If not from her, then how could he know of me? Magnus fell long before his birth.”
    “I pray, of course, that he acts upon Sarah’s instructions,” Hawkwood agreed. “Yet the enemy plays a masterful game. It is equally if not more conceivable that he has been sent forth to lure us, that he is one of them. Did you hint anything of our plan to him?”
    William shook his head. “I played the fool. As demonstration of my ignorance, I told him I needed proof he was the specter.”
    Their next moments of contemplation were interrupted by a high-pitched cry several hundred yards away. “Wiiiilllliam!”
    “The pickpocket,” William said. “We do have little time.”
    “He is a bright one,” Hawkwood said. “It served my purpose to let him steal the coin, for I then had reason to visit you. But his fingers are so light, I almost did not detect his actions. He is crafty and has spirit. If this were the old days, we could consider teaching him in our ways.”
    “I have an immediate affection for him too,” William said. “Except for now, because he searches for me, and it seems you have much to say. What of Thomas? What of the girl?”
    “Wiilliaammm!” came the boy’s voice.
    William paused. “Will we meet soon?”
    “In Magnus. If he is following all that Sarah taught him, Thomas will take you there. I shall go ahead and wait for your arrival.”
    “The girl? You said the girl—”
    “Watch her closely, William. Would not the enemy expect us to arrange to have you rescued from the hanging?”
    “Yes.”
    “Would it suit the enemy’s purpose more to guard against the rescue and have you killed, or to let you escape and see where you lead them?”
    William took a breath and said in rueful tones, “I am more valuable to them alive and in flight. Thus, they would need some method to track my flight.”
    “Yes. Is it the pickpocket boy who watches you? Or the girl? Or Thomas? That is why I spent long hours waiting for the proper moment to appear as an old hag. I cannot afford to be seen.”
    “Wiillliamm!” The boy was near enough that they could hear the crashing of underbrush.
    “Guard yourself, and do what Thomas demands,” Hawkwood said with urgency. “If he is not one of the enemy, he will desperately need our help.”
    “I will guard myself carefully,” William vowed, “and wait for you to greet me in Magnus, whatever your guise when you next appear.”
    Hawkwood began to edge into the shadows.
    “My friend,” William called softly. “If I discover Thomas belongs to the enemy?”
    “Play his game until you have learned as much as you can,” Hawkwood whispered back. “Then end his life.”

C ompline . Already.
    Three bundles lay beside him. One, a small sack of gold and silver given by the monks. The second, the materials he had taken from the cave. And the third, the bundle of stilts and cloth he had used at the gallows at the beginning of the day.
    Thomas could do no more to prepare for his next test. Yet the waiting skimmed too quickly. He merely had to turn his head to see the distant gallows etched black against the light of the moon when it broke through uneven clouds.
    If I could pray , Thomas thought, I would pray for the clouds to grow thicker .
    The gold was not in place yet. He had chosen this place to hide because it was near the road from Helmsley. It would let him see how many men the sheriff sent to guard the gold on its short journey.
    Not for the first time in the last few cold hours did Thomas wonder about the mysterious old man who had confronted him at the gallows. In front of the panicked crowd, he had taken