HARRY TURTLEDOVE

THE SEVENTH CHAPTER

Rules were made to be broken, so the adage goes. But what about vows? A vow
should never be broken--but observe how far they'll sometimes bend ...

The snow was falling harder now. Kassianos' mule, a good stubborn beast, kept
slogging forward until it came to a drift that reached its belly. Then it
stopped, looking reproachfully back over its shoulder at the priest.

"Oh, very well," he said, as if it could understand. "This must be as Phos
wills. That town the herder spoke of can't be far ahead. We'll lay over in --
what did he call it? -- Develtos till the weather gets better. Are you
satisfied, beast?"

The mule snorted and pressed ahead. Maybe it did understand, Kassianos thought.
He had done enough talking at it, this past month on the road. He loved to talk,
and had not had many people to talk to. Back in Videssos the city, his clerical 
colleagues told him he was mad to set out for Opsikion so late in the year. He
hadn't listened; that wasn't nearly so much fun as talking.

"Unfortunately, they were right," he said. This time, the mule paid him no
attention. It had reached the same conclusion a long time ago.

The wind howled out of the north. Kassianos drew his blue robe more tightly
about himself, not that that did much good. Because the road from the capital of
the Empire to Opsikion ran south of the Paristrian mountains, he had assumed
they would shield him from the worst of the weather. Maybe they did. If so,
though, the provinces on the other side of the mountains had winters straight
from the ice of Skotos' hell.

Where was he? For that matter, where was the road? When it ran between leaf-bare
trees, it had been easy enough to follow. Now, in more open country, the pesky
thing had disappeared. In better weather, that would only have been a nuisance
(in better weather, Kassianos reminded himself, it wouldn't have happened). In
this blizzard, it was becoming serious. If he went by Develtos, he might freeze
before he could find shelter.

He tugged on the reins. The mule positively scowled at him: what was he doing,
halting in the cold middle of nowhere? "I need to find the town," he explained.
The mule did not look convinced.

He paused a moment in thought. He had never been to Develtos, had nothing from
it with him. That made worthless most of the simpler spells of finding he knew.
He thought of one that might serve, then promptly rejected it: it involved
keeping a candle lit for half an hour straight. "Not bloody likely, I'm afraid,"
he said.

He thought some more, then laughed out loud. "As inelegant an application of the
law of similarity as ever there was," he declared, "but it will serve. Like does
call to like."

He dismounted, tied the mule's reins to a bush so it would not wander off while 
he was incanting. Then, after suitable prayers and passes, he undid his robe and
pissed -- quickly, because it was very cold.

His urine did not just form a puddle between his feet. Instead, impelled by his
magic, it drew a steaming line in the snow toward more like itself, and thus,
indirectly, toward the people who made it.

"That way, eh?" Kassianos said, eyeing the direction of the line. "I might have
known the wind would make me drift south of where I should be." He climbed back
onto his mule, urged it forward. It went eagerly, as if it sensed he knew where
he was going again.

Sure enough, not a quarter of an hour later the priest saw the walls of Develtos
looming tall and dark through the driving snow. He had to ride around a fair
part of the circuit before he came to a gate. It was closed and barred. He
shouted. Nothing happened. He shouted again, louder.

After a couple of minutes, a peephole opened. "Who ye be?" the man inside
called, his accent rustic. "Show yerself to me and give me your name."

"I am Kassianos, eastbound from Videssos the city," the priest answered. He rode
a couple of steps closer, lowered his hood so the guard could see not only his
blue robe but also his shaven head. "May I have shelter before I am too far gone 
to need it?"

He did not hear anyone moving to unlatch the gate. Instead, the sentry asked 
sharply, "Just the one of you there?"

"Only myself. In Phos' holy name I swear it." Kassianos understood the
gate-guard's caution. Winter could easily make a bandit band desperate enough to
try to take a walled town, and falling snow give them the chance to approach
unobserved. A quick rush once the gate was open, and who could say what horrors 
would follow?

But Kassianos must have convinced the guardsman. "We'll have you inside in a 
minute, holy sir." The fellow's voice grew muffled as he turned his face away
from the peephole. "Come on, Phostis, Evagrios, give me a hand with this bloody
bar." Kassianos heard it scrape against the iron-faced timbers of the gate.

One of the valves swung inward. The priest dug his heels into the mule's flanks.
It trotted into Develtos. The sentries closed the gate after it, shoved the bar
back into place. "Thank you, gentlemen," Kassianos said sincerely.

"Aye, you're about this far from being a snowman, aren't you, holy sir?" said
the guard who had been at the peephole. Now Kassianos could see more of him than
a suspicious eyeball: he was short and lean, with a knitted wool cap on his head
and a sheepskin jacket closed tight over a chainmail shirt. His bow was a
hunter's weapon, not a soldier's. He was, in other words, a typical small-town
guardsman.

"Want I should take you to Branas' tavern, holy sir, let you warm yourself up
outside and in?" asked one of the other guards. But for a back-and-breast of
boiled leather and a light spear in place of a bow, he was as like the first as
two peas in a pod. He glanced toward that man, who was evidently his superior.
"Is it all right, Tzitas?"

"Aye, go on, Phostis, we'll manage here." Tzitas showed his teeth in a knowing
grin. "Just don't spend too much time warming yourself up in there."

"Wouldn't think of it," Phostis said righteously.

"No, you wouldn't; you'd do it," said Evagrios, who'd been quiet till then.
Tzitas snorted.

Phostis sent them both a rude gesture. He turned back to the priest. "You come
with me, holy sir. Pay these scoffers no mind." He started off down the street.
His boots left pockmarks in the snow. Still on muleback, Kassianos followed.

The tavern was less than a hundred yards away. (Nothing in Develtos, come to
that, looked to be more than a quarter mile from anything else. The town barely
rated a wall.) In that short journey, though, Phostis asked Kassianos about
Videssos the city four different times, and told him twice of some distant
cousin who had gone there to seek his fortune. "He must have found it, too,"
Phostis said wistfully, "for he never came back no more."

He might have starved trying, Kassianos thought, but the priest was too kind to
say that out loud. Videssos' capital drew the restless and ambitious from all
over the Empire, and in such fast company not all could flourish.

Even with Phostis', "Here we are, holy sir," Kassianos could have guessed which
building was Branas' from the number of horses and donkeys tied up in front of
it. He found space at the rail for his mule, then went in after the sentry.

He shut the door behind him so none of the blessed heat inside would escape. A
few quick steps brought him to the fireplace. He sighed in pure animal pleasure
as the warmth began driving the ice from his bones. When he put a hand to his
face, he discovered he could feel the tip of his nose again. He'd almost
forgotten he still owned it.

After roasting a bit longer in front of the flames, Kassianos felt restored
enough to find a stool at a table close by. A barmaid came over, looked him up
and down. "What'll it be?" she asked, matter-of-fact as if he were carpenter
rather than priest.

"Hot red wine, spiced with cinnamon."

She nodded, saucily ran her hand over his shaved pate. "That'll do it for you,
right enough." Her hips worked as she walked back to the tapman with his order; 
she looked over her shoulder at the priest, as if to make sure he was watching
her.

His blood heated with a warmth that had nothing to do with the blaze crackling
in the fireplace. He willed himself to take no notice of that new heat. Celibacy
went with Phos' blue robe. He frowned a little. Even the most shameless tavern
wenches knew that. Clerics were men too, and might forget their vows, but he
still found an overture as blatant as this girl's startling. Even in the jaded
capital, a lady of easy virtue would have been more discreet. The same should
have gone double for this back-country town.

The barmaid returned with his steaming mug. As he fumbled in his beltpouch for
coppers to pay the score, she told him, "You want to warm up the parts fire and
wine don't reach, you let me know." Before he could answer, someone called to
her from a table halfway across the room. She hurried off, but again smiled back
at Kassianos as she went.

Before he lifted the cup to his lips, he raised his hands to heaven and intoned
the usual Videssian prayer before food or drink: "We bless thee, Phos, lord with
the great and good mind, by thy grace our protector, watchful beforehand that
the great test of life may be decided in our favor." Then he spat in the rushes
to show his rejection of Skotos. At last he drank. The cinnamon nipped his
tongue like a playful lover. The figure of speech would not have occurred to him 
a moment before. Now it seemed only too appropriate.

When his mug was empty, he raised a finger. The girl hurried over. "Another,
please," he said, setting more coppers on the table.

She scooped them up. "For some silver --" She paused expectantly.

"My vows do not allow me carnal union. What makes you think I take them
lightly?" he asked. He kept his voice mild, but his eyes seized and held hers.
He had overawed unrepentant clerics in the ecclesiastical courts of the capital;
focusing his forensic talents on a chit of a barmaid reminded him of smashing
some small crawling insect with an anvil. But she had roused his curiosity, if
not his manhood.

"The monks hereabouts like me plenty well," she sniffed; she sounded offended he
did not find her attractive. "And since you're a man from Videssos the city
itself" (news traveled fast, Kassianos thought, unsurprised), "I reckoned you'd
surely be freer yet."

Along with its famed riches, the capital also had a reputation in the provinces
as a den of iniquity. Sometimes, Kassianos knew, it was deserved. But not in
this ... "You are mistaken," the priest replied. "The monks like you well, you
say?"

The girl's eyes showed she suddenly realized the hole she had dug for herself.
"I'm not the only one," she said hastily. "There's a good many women they favor
here in town, most of 'em a lot more than me."

She contradicted herself, Kassianos noted, but never mind that now. "Are there
indeed?" he said, letting some iron come into his voice. "Perhaps you will be so
good as to give me their names?"

"No. Why should I?" She had spirit; she could still defy him. 

He dropped the anvil. "Because I am Kassianos, nomophylax -- chief counsel, you
might say -- to the most holy ecumenical Patriarch Tarasios, prelate of Videssos
the city and Videssos the Empire. I was summoned to Opsikion to deal with a
troublesome case of false doctrine there, but I begin to think the good god Phos
directed me here instead. Now speak to me further of these monks."

The barmaid fled instead. Eyes followed her from all over the taproom, then
turned to Kassianos. The big man whose place was behind the bar slowly ambled
over to his table. As if by chance, he held a stout club in his right fist.
"Don't know what you said to little Laskara, blue-robe," he said casually, "but
she didn't much like it."

"And I, friend, did not much like her seeking to lead me astray from my vows,
and liked even less her telling me the monks hereabouts are accustomed to
ignoring theirs," Kassianos answered. "I do not think the most holy Tarasios,
Phos bless him, would like that either. Perhaps if I root out the evil, it will
never have to come to his attention."

At the mention of that name, the tapman sat down heavily beside Kassianos, as if
his legs no longer wanted to support him. The priest heard him drop the bludgeon
among the dried rushes on the floor. "The --Patriarch?" the fellow said
hoarsely.

"The very same." Kassianos' eyes twinkled. Most of the time, being nomophylax
was nothing but drudgery. Sometimes, as now, it was fun. "Suppose you tell me
about the lecherous monks you have here. Your Laskara thought I was of the same
stripe as they, and tried to sell herself to me."

"Aye, we have a monastery here, dedicated to the holy Tralitzes, Phos bless his
memory." The tapman drew the good god's sun-circle over his heart. Kassianos had
never heard of the local saint, but that hardly signified: every little town had
some patron to commemorate. The tapman went on, "But the monks, lecherous? No,
holy sir -- they're good men, pious men, every one."

He sounded sincere, and too shaken to be lying so well. "Do they then conform to
the rules set down by the holy Pakhomios, in whose memory all monks serve?"
Kassianos asked.

"Holy sir, I'm no monk. Far as I know, they do, but I dunno what all these rules
and things is." The fellow was sweating, and not from the fireplace's being
near.

"Very well, then, hear the seventh chapter of Pakhomios' Rule, the chapter
entitled 'On Women': 'To ensure the preservation of the contemplative life, no
brother shall be permitted to entertain women.'" 

"I dunno about any of that," the tapman insisted. With a sudden access of
boldness, he went on, "And it's not me you should ought to be going after if
you've got somewhat against our monks. You take that up with the abbot -- Menas,
is name is."

"I shall," Kassianos promised. "Believe me, I shall."

The Holy Tralitzes' monastery lay a couple of miles outside Develtos. Monks
working in the snowy fields and gardens looked up from their labors as Kassianos
rode toward Phos' temple, the largest building of the monastery complex. It was 
further distinguished from the others by a spire topped with a gilded globe.

An elderly monk came out of the temple, bowed courteously to Kassianos. "Phos
with you, holy sir," he said. "I am Pleuses, porter of the monastery. How may I
serve you?"

Kassianos dismounted, returned the bow. "And with you, brother Pleuses. I have
come to see your abbot -- Menas is his name, is it not? I am Kassianos,
nomophylax to Tarasios. Would you announce me to the holy abbot?"

Pleuses' eyes widened. He bowed once more. "Certainly, holy sir. Menas will 
surely be honored to entertain such a distinguished guest." He shouted for a
younger brother to take charge of Kassianos' mule, then, bowing a third time,
said, "Will you come with me?"

The abbot's residence lay beyond the dormitory that housed the rest of the
monks. "Wait here a moment, will you?" Pleuses said at the doorway. He went in
and, as promised, quickly returned. "He will see you now."

Kassianos was expecting a leering voluptuary. The sight of Menas came as
something of a shock. He was a thin, pleasant-faced man of about forty-five,
with laugh lines crinkling the comers of his eyes. Among the codices and scrolls
on bookshelves behind him were many, both religious and secular, that Kassianos
also esteemed.

The abbot rose, bowed, hurried up to clasp Kassianos' hand. "Phos bless you,
holy sir, and welcome, welcome. Will you take wine?"

"Thank you, father abbot."

Menas poured with his own hands. While he was doing so, he asked, "May I be
permitted to wonder why such an illustrious cleric has chosen to honor our
humble monastery with his presence?"

Kassianos' eyes flicked to Pleuses. Menas followed his glance, and dismissed the
porter with a few murmured words. The abbot was no fool, Kassianos thought.
Well, abbots were not chosen to be fools. The two men performed the usual
Videssian ritual over wine, then Menas returned to his own seat and waved
Kassianos to the other, more comfortable, chair in the room. The abbot's
question still hung in the air.

"Father abbot," Kassianos began, more carefully than he had intended before
meeting Menas, "I came to Develtos by chance a few days ago, compelled by the
blizzard to take shelter here. In Branas' tavern, a chance remark led me to
believe the monks practiced illegal, immoral cohabitation with women, contrary
to the strictures of the seventh chapter of the holy Pakhomios' Rule."

"That is not so," Menas said quietly. "We follow the Rule in all its
particulars."

"I am glad to hear you say that." Kassianos nodded. "But I must tell you that my
inquiries since I came here made me think otherwise. And, father abbot, they
make me believe this not only of your flock but of yourself."

"Having once said that I adhere to Pakhomios' Rule, I do not suppose that mere 
repetition will persuade you I speak truly," Menas said after a moment's
thought. He grinned wryly; shaven head and gray-streaked beard or no, it made
him look very young. "And, having now once said something you do not believe, I
cannot hope you will accept my oath." He spread his hands. "You see my
difficulty."

"I do." Kassianos nodded again. He thought better of Menas for not gabbling
oaths that, as the abbot pointed out, had to be thought untrustworthy. He had
not expected or wanted to think better of Menas. He had wanted to get on with
the business of reforming the monastery. Things did not seem as simple as he'd
thought. Well, as nomophylax he'd had that happen to him often enough.

"I will follow any suggestion you may have on resolving this difficulty," Menas
said, as if reading his thoughts.

"Very well, then: I know a decoction under whose influence you will speak truth.
Are you willing to drink it down and then answer my questions?"

"So long as you are asking about these alleged misdeeds, certainly."

Menas showed no hesitation. If he was an actor, he was a good one, Kassianos
thought. But no one could dissemble under the influence of this potion, no
matter how he schooled himself beforehand.

"I shall compound the drug this evening and return to administer it tomorrow
morning," the nomophylax said. Menas nodded agreement. Kassianos wondered how
brash he would be once his lascivious secrets were laid bare.

The abbot peered curiously at the small glass flask. He held it to his nose,
sniffed. "Not a prize vintage," he observed with a chuckle. He tossed the drug 
down, screwed up his face at the taste.

Kassianos admired his effrontery, if nothing else. He waited for a few minutes,
watched the abbot's expression go from its usual amused alertness to a fixed,
vacant stare. The nomophylax rose, passed a hand in front of Menas' face. Menas'
eyes did not follow the motion. Kassianos nodded to himself. Sure enough, the 
decoction had taken hold.

"Can you hear me?" he asked.

"Aye." Menas' voice was distant, abstracted.

"Tell me, then, of all the violation, of the holy Pakhomios' Rule that have
occurred among the monks of this monastery over the past half a year."

Menas immediately began to obey: the drug robbed him of his own will and left
him perfectly receptive to Kassianos' question. The nomophylax settled back in
his chair and listened as Menas spoke of this monk's quarrel with that one, of
the time when three brothers got drunk together, of the monk who missed evening
prayers four days running, of the one who had refused to pull weeds until he was
disciplined, of the one who had sworn at an old man in Develtos, of the monk who
had stolen a book but tried to put the blame on another, and on and on, all the
petty squabbles to which monasteries, being made up of men, were prone.

Kassianos kept pen poised over parchment, ready to note down every transgression
of chapter seven of the Rule. Menas talked and talked and talked. The pen stayed
poised. Kassianos wrote nothing, for the abbot gave him nothing to write.

Menas, at length, ran dry. Kassianos scowled, ran a hand over his smooth pate.
"Do you recall nothing more?" he demanded harshly.

"Nothing, holy sir." Menas' voice was calm; it would not have changed had
Kassianos held his hand to the flame flickering in the lamp on the table beside
him. The nomophylax knew he was deeply under the influence of the potion. He
also knew the monks of the monastery of the holy Tralitzes had illicit congress
with a great many women of Develtos. His inquiries in the town had left him as
certain of that as he was of Phos' eventual victory over Skotos.

Kassianos hesitated before asking his next question. But, having failed with a
general inquiry, he saw no choice but to probe specifically at the rot he knew
existed: "Tell me of every occasion when the monks of this monastery have
transgressed against the seventh chapter of the holy Pakhomios' Rule, the
chapter which forbids the brethren to entertain women."

Menas was silent. Kassianos wondered if the abbot could somehow be struggling
against the decoction. He shook his head -- he knew perfectly well it was
irresistible. "Why do you not speak?" the nomophylax snapped.

"Because I know of no occasion when the monks of this monastery have
transgressed against the seventh chapter of the holy Pakhomios' Rule, the
chapter which forbids the brethren to entertain women."

The rotelike repetition of his words and the tone of the abbot's voice convinced
Kassianos that Menas was still drugged. So did the reason he gave for staying
quiet before. If someone under this potion had nothing to say in response to a
question, he would keep right on saying nothing until jogged by a new one.
Which, depressingly, was just what Menas had done.

Kassianos sighed. He neither liked nor approved of paradoxes. Knowing that
because of the decoction he was only being redundant, he nevertheless asked, "Do
you swear by Phos you have told me the truth?"

"I swear by Phos I have told you the truth," Menas replied.

The nomophylax ground his teeth. If Menas swore under the drug that the monks of
the monastery of the holy Tralitzes were obeying Pakhomios' Rule, then they
were, and that was all there was to it. So act as though you believe it,
Kassianos told himself. He could not.

He was tempted to walk out of Menas' study and let the abbot try to deal with
the monastery's affairs while still in the grip of the potion. He had played
that sort of practical joke while a student at the Sorcerers' Collegium.
Regretfully, he decided it was beneath the dignity of the Patriarch's
nomophylax. He sat and waited until he was sure Menas had come around.

"Remarkable," the abbot said when he was himself again. "I felt quite beside
myself. Had we been guilty of any transgressions of the sort you were seeking, I
would not have been able to keep them from you."

"That, father abbot, was the idea," Kassianos said tightly. He knew he should
have been more courteous, but could not manage it, not with the feeling
something was wrong still gnawing at him. But, not having anything on which to
focus his suspicions, he could only rise abruptly and go out into the cold for
the ride to Develtos.

He kept asking questions when he got back into town. The answers he got set him
stewing all over again. They were not given under the influence of his
decoction, but they were detailed and consistent from one person to the next.
They all painted the monks of the monastery of the holy Tralitzes as the lechers
he had already been led to believe them.

How, then, had Menas truthfully asserted that he and his flock followed
Pakhomios' Rule?

The question nagged at Kassianos like the beginnings of a toothache for the rest
of the day. By this time the snowstorm had long since blown itself out; he could
have gone on to Opsikion. It never occurred to him. After taking his evening
meal in Branas' taproom, he went up to the cubicle he had rented over it.

There he sat and thought and fumed. Maybe Menas had found an antidote to his
potion. But if he had, it was one that had eluded all the savants at the 
Sorcerers' Collegium for all the centuries of Videssos' history. That was
possible, but not likely. Was it likelier than a deliberate campaign of slander
against the abbot's monks? The nomophylax could not be sure, but he thought both
ideas most improbable. And they were the best ones he had.

He pounded a fist against his knee. "What can Menas be up to, anyway?" he said
out loud. Then he blinked, surprised at himself. "Why don't I find out?" 

Normally, he would have dismissed the thought with the same automatic discipline
he used to suppress the longing of his flesh for women. Spying sorcerously on a
man who had proven himself innocent under drugged interrogation went against
every instinct Kassianos had. On the other hand, so did believing Menas.

If the abbot is blameless, Kassianos told himself, I'll perform an act of
penance to make up for the sin I commit in spying on him like this. Having
salved his conscience, the nomophylax set about preparing the spell he would
need. 

The law of similarity was useless to him here, but the law of contagion applied:
once in contact, always in contact. Kassianos scraped a bit of skin from the
palm of his right hand with a small sharp knife -- because that hand had clasped
Menas', it still held an affinity for the abbot.

As Kassianos' incantation built, a cloud of smoke grew in his cubicle. It was no
ordinary cloud, though, for it formed a rectangle with edges so precise they
might have been defined by an invisible picture frame. The analogy pleased
Kassianos, for when he spoke a final word of command, the smoke would indeed
yield a picture of what Menas was about.

He spoke the word. The trapped smoke before him rolled, grew still. Color began
seeping into it, here and there. The first thing the nomophylax clearly made out
was the roaring fire in one corner of his magical image. He frowned; the blaze
was bigger than any the hearth in the abbot's dwelling could contain.

Of itself, of course, that meant nothing. Menas could have any number of
legitimate reasons for not being in his own quarters. Kassianos waited for more
of the picture to emerge.

Blue ... Surely that was the abbot's robe. But it lay on the floor, crumpled and
forgotten. Where was Menas, and why had he thrown aside his vestments?

Within moments, Kassianos had his answer. He felt a hot flush rise, not just to
his cheeks, but to the very crown of his shaven head. He turned away from the
image he had conjured up, yet still he saw body conjoined with body, saw that
the man straining atop his eager partner was the abbot Menas.

Kassianos spoke another word, felt his sorcery dissolve. His face remained hot,
now with fury rather than embarrassment. So Menas thought he could play him for
a fool, eh? He imagined the abbot telling his paramour how he had fooled the
fellow from the capital, and both of them laughing as they coupled. That thought
only made the nomophylax's rage bum hotter.

Then he caught himself wishing he had not turned his back quite so soon. He had
not thought he could be any angrier, but found he was wrong. Before, his anger's
flame had extended only to Menas and his still unknown lover. Now it reached out
and burned him too.

Kassianos stamped grimly through the snow toward the monastery of the holy
Tralitzes. He had left his mule behind on purpose, accepting the walk as the
beginning of the penance he would pay for failing to root out the corruption in
the monastery at the first try. His footprints left an emphatic trail behind 
him.

The pale, fitful sun gleamed off the gilded dome topping Phos' temple ahead.
Kassianos turned aside before he was halfway there. Scanning the landscape ahead
with a hunter's alertness, he spotted a blue-robe strolling toward a small
wooden house several hundred yards to one side of the monastery. He was not sure
whether hunter's instinct or sorcerer's told him it was Menas, but he knew.

The nomophylax's breath burst from him in an outraged steaming cloud. "Phos
grant us mercy! Not content with making a mockery of his vows, the sinner goes
to show off his stamina," Kassianos exclaimed, though there was no one to hear 
him.

The abbot disappeared into the little house. Some men might have hesitated
before disturbing the occupants of a trysting-place, but not Kassianos. He
strode resolutely up to pound on the door, crying, "Menas, you are a disgrace to
the robes you wear! Open at once!" 

"Oh, dear," Menas said as Kassianos withered him with a glare. "You do take this
seriously, don't you?" Now the abbot did not look amused, as he had so often
back in his study. He looked frightened. So did the woman around whose shoulder
he flung a protective arm.

The night before, her features slack with pleasure, she had seemed only a symbol
of Menas' depravity. Now Kassianos had to confront her as a person. She was, he
realized slowly, not a whore after all. Perhaps ten years younger than the
abbot, she had an open, pretty face, and wore an embroidered linen blouse over a
heavy wool skirt: peasant garb, not a courtesan's jewels and clinging silks.

Even without what his magic had let him witness, the way her hand reached up and
clutched for Menas' would have told Kassianos everything he needed to know. It
told him other things as well, things he had not thought to learn. It had never
occurred to him that the cleric's illicit lover might feel all the same things 
for her man as another woman would for a proper partner.

Because the woman confused him, Kassianos swung his attention back to Menas.
"Should I not take your perjury seriously?" he said heavily. "It only adds to
the burden of your other sins."

"Perjury? I gave you my oath on Phos, holy sir, under the influence of your own
drug, that I truly obey my vows. I do; I am not forsworn."

Kassianos' eyes narrowed. "No? You dare say that, in the company you keep? Hear
once again, then, wretch, the seventh chapter of the holy Pakhomios' Rule. As 
you know, it is entitled 'On Women.' I hope you will trust my memory as I quote
it: 'To ensure the preservation of the contemplative life, no brother shall be
permitted to entertain women.' Standing where you are, with the person whose
house this must be, how can you tell me you are no oathbreaker?"

To the amazement of the nomophylax, Menas' "companion" burst into laughter.
Kassianos stared, thunderstruck. The woman said, "As you guessed, holy sir, this
house was my husband's till he died six years ago, and belongs to me now. And so 
my dear Menas cannot entertain me here. I entertain him, or at least I hope I
shall." She smiled smokily up at the worried abbot, stroked his bearded cheek.

Kassianos felt his jaw drop. He became aware that he had not blinked for some
time, either. In fact, he realized his expression had to resemble nothing so
much as a fresh-caught perch's. Pulling himself together with a distinct effort
of will, he said slowly, "That is the most outlandish piece of casuistry I've
heard in a lifetime of theological study."

He waited for his pompous wrath to burst forth in a great, furious shout. What
came out instead was laughter. And once free, it would not let itself be
restrained. Kassianos laughed until tears ran down his face into his beard,
laughed until he doubled over. Now Menas and the woman ' were staring at him
rather than the other way around.

Slowly the fit passed. Kassianos straightened, felt the sudden pain of a stitch
in his side, ignored it. He wiped his eyes with his sleeve, then, more or less
in control of himself, asked Menas, "Your monks are all, hmm, entertained
themselves, and do no entertaining?"

"Of course, holy sir." The abbot sounded genuinely shocked. "Did we act
otherwise, we would violate our vows."

"Hmm," Kassianos said again. "How long has this, ah, custom existed at the
monastery of the holy Tralitzes?"

"Truly, holy sir, I do not know. Since before I entered as a novice, certainly,
and before the novitiate of the oldest brothers there at that time, for they
knew no different way."

"I see." And, curiously enough, Kassianos did. Develtos was just the sort of
back-country town where a spurious practice like this could quietly come into
being and then flourish for Phos only knew how long before anyone from the
outside world noticed it was there.

Menas must have been thinking along with him, for he asked, "Holy sir, is it not
the same everywhere?"

"Hardly." Kassianos' voice was dry. "In fact, I daresay you've found a loophole
to appall the holy Pakhomios -- and one untold generations of monks have prayed 
for in vain. I suppose I should congratulate you. Oh, my." He wiped his eyes
again.

"Perhaps you should, but I doubt you will," Menas' ladylove observed. "What will
you do?"

The nomophylax eyed her with respect: no fool here. "Well, an inquisitor's court
might fight its way through your logic," he said. Both the woman and Menas
looked alarmed. Kassianos went on, "I doubt that will happen, though."

"What then?" Menas asked.

"First, I'd guess, a synod will convene in Videssos the city to revise the holy
Pakhomios' Rule so no further, ah, misunderstandings of the seventh chapter will
occur. That being accomplished, word of the corrected Rule will be sent to all
monasteries in the Empire --including, I am comfortably certain, this one."

"And what will they do to us for having contravened their interpretation of the
Rule?" Menas asked; Kassianos noted the slight emphasis the abbot put on
"interpretation." He smiled to himself. In Menas' sandals, he would have tried
to appear as virtuous as possible, too.

He answered, "While I cannot speak for the synod, I would expect it to decree no
punishments for what is here a long-established, even if erroneous, custom. I
would also expect, however, that an epoptes -- a supervising monk -- will come 
out from the capital to make certain the monastery of the holy Tralitzes
diligently adheres to the seventh chapter as redefined."

Neither Menas nor his companion looked very happy at that. The nomophylax had
not thought they would. He went on, "I mean what I say. If you continue to flout
the Rule after it is changed to mean in letter what it does in spirit, you will
not enjoy the consequences."

He had intended to impress them further with the seriousness of the situation.
But the woman said, "Then we will just have to make the most of the time we have
left." She shut the door in Kassianos' face.

He knew he should be angry. Instead, to his own discomfiture, he found himself
admiring her. He realized with sudden regret that he had never learned her name.
He raised his hand to knock on that closed door and ask. After a moment, he
thought better of it.

Shaking his head, he turned and slowly started walking back to Develtos.