She heard him gasp. She was hurting him. What a fool she was! "Forgive my clumsiness, David. I am so sorry." He gently squeezed her hand as she drew away from him. "Your arms feel like an angel's wings." Ugolini called his steward, Agostino, and rattled off a list of necessaries for treating Daoud's wounds--water, a pot and a brazier, clean cloths, medicine jars from the cardinal's cabinet. Sophia walked beside the litter as Ugolini's men carried Daoud to his room on the third floor. Her hand rested lightly on his shoulder. Her feelings alternated between agony, as she imagined what he had gone through, and singing elation that he was back with her. With joy she felt movement and life in the hard muscle under her fingertips. "Tilia and I did what we could for you," she said when the men had deposited him on his bed. "I know," said Daoud. "Ugolini told me about your visit to the contessa. Had she not sent for d'Ucello when she did--as you persuaded her to do--I would be dead now." She sat on the edge of his bed and put her hands over her face and wept for joy. It had all meant something, her rushing to Tilia before dawn, her going with Ugolini to the contessa, her falling to her knees before the old woman. As the men-at-arms left, Ugolini came in with Agostino and two servants bearing a brazier and a tripod, pots of water, cloths, and jars of ointments and powders from Ugolini's shelves. Two other servants brought a table into Daoud's room, and Ugolini had the medications arranged on it. "He also let me go because the Ghibellini from Siena are about to besiege the city," said Daoud. "He wants my help in surrendering to them." "A pity the Sienese could not have gotten here in time to catch the Tartars and de Verceuil," said Sophia when the servants had left. Ugolini looked up from the powders he was mixing for poultices and frowned. "Catch them? Why?" Sophia stared at Ugolini. Then the news had somehow missed him. She felt sorry for him. Even though Tilia was very much alive, this was going to be a terrible shock. Daoud said, "In the dungeon I heard something had happened at Tilia's house." Ugolini's eyes grew huge. "Tilia! My God, what was it?" "Tilia is well, Cardinal," Sophia said quickly. "Luckily for her, she was here when it happened." She wondered how much Daoud knew about what had happened, and how he felt about it. Her heart still ached for poor Rachel. Where was the child now, right at this moment? Somewhere on the road to Perugia. Being abused, perhaps, by that beast of a Tartar. "When _what_ happened?" Ugolini cried. "In the name of Christ and the Virgin, speak out!"