_I am mortally wounded_, she thought. _I feel now only a shock, a numbness. The pain will come._ The only reason Daoud would tell Simon where to find her had to be that he was dying and wanted Simon to protect her. Daoud truly must be dead. Simon's anguished look, as if he were begging for something, confirmed it. But to be sure, she had to hear it. "Has David been killed?" Simon nodded slowly, his eyes huge with pain. "I was with him when he died. I even know now that he is not David but--Daoud." He hesitated, pronouncing the unfamiliar name. _I was with him when he died._ _Daoud!_ She wanted to scream, but she hurt so much inside that she could not even scream. She could not make a sound. Daoud was _gone_. She had seen him, she had spoken to him, she had loved him for the last time. But she _had_ to see him again. Her cold hand fumbled at her neck, pulled the locket up from her bosom by its silver chain. She turned the screw that opened it and stared at the spirals and squares. Nothing happened. The pattern, to her eyes a jumble of shapes representing nothing, remained inert. Even his likeness was gone. How had he died? She looked up at Simon to ask him. And then she did scream. Sordello crouched in the semidark behind Simon, his two-edged dagger, reflecting red firelight, poised horizontally to slash Simon's unprotected throat. His eyes glittered. His mouth shaped a slack-lipped smile, as if he were drunk, baring his gleaming, broken teeth. Sordello seemed not even to notice her scream. Without a sound, unseen by the other three, who were all staring at Sophia, he raised his left arm to seize Simon and his right hand to strike with the dagger. Sophia's hand dove into the bag at her waist. The loose dart could scratch her, and a scratch might be enough to kill her, but that did not matter. Her fingers found the dart. She wrapped her fist around it and flung herself out of the chair, straight at Simon. Simon tried to fend her off, but she darted under his hands, twisted around him, and drove the dart into Sordello's throat. Blood spurted over her hand. Sordello seemed neither to see her nor to feel the dart. His eyes stayed fixed on Simon's neck. He slashed at Simon. But Sophia's lunge had pushed the two men apart. Sordello's blade scratched Simon's neck just under his right ear. Then it fell from the bravo's fingers. Sordello, the dart still hanging from his throat, staggered backward, his knees buckling. His body folded, and he lay sideways on the floor. The four living people in the room were as still as the dead one. Then Simon touched his fingertips to his neck and winced. Sophia saw a rivulet of blood running down into his mail collar. Friar Mathieu tore away a piece of the bedsheet and dabbed Simon's wound with it. He took Simon's hand as if he were a puppet and pressed his fingers against the rag to hold it in place. Then he knelt over Sordello's body and whispered in Latin.