He stared out over the city and thought, somewhere out there was another enemy. Even if, as Sordello reported, Cardinal Ugolini were not behind this attack, there might be someone behind both the Filippeschi and Cardinal Ugolini. Ever since he had come to Orvieto, Simon had sensed the presence in this city of a hidden enemy. An enemy who knew him and watched him, but whom he did not know. The one—Simon was sure of it—who had killed Alain.
I am waiting for you, he said, gripping the red bricks of the battlements.
Every old soldier Simon had ever talked to had said that war consisted more of waiting than of fighting. Simon found the combination of boredom and fear well nigh unbearable.
De Puys sat with his back against the battlements and dozed like a large cat. De Verceuil also sat, his helmet on the tower floor beside him, reading from a small leather-bound book, whispering the Latin words. Simon supposed it must be his office, the prayers every priest was required to say every day. The cardinal would have to get today's office read quickly; the light was fading fast.
Capitano Teodoro preferred to be busy. He kept shuttling back and forth between the tower and rooftop two stories below, where his men were deployed. Teodoro would make a circuit of the tower battlements, frowning down at his company of archers. Then he would go down and order six or so men to change position. He would inspect everyone's weapons. He inspected the bows of even the eight Armenians, in their bright red surcoats, who would fight beside the Venetians. The friction between the Armenians and the Venetians, Simon had noticed, had lessened considerably after he promoted Teodoro. He was a good leader. At the contessa's request Teodoro inspected the Monaldeschi men-at-arms, who were mostly stationed at the two gates and in the hallways and apartment windows.
After each inspection tour, Teodoro would come back up, study the situation, then go down and rearrange the men, likely as not returning them to their earlier positions.
But staying busy made sense. It kept everyone alert.
Simon left the tower once to visit his four knights on the rooftop, each one stationed, with six men-at-arms, by a stone caster at a corner of the roof. So that their missiles would clear the screening he had built over the battlements, the long-armed machines were set well back from the edge of the roof. The knights did not like supervising the stone casters. They wanted, they told him, a chance to charge the enemy during the attack. Simon tried to be good-humored about insisting that they remain within the palace, but it was hard giving orders to men who were older than himself and combat veterans. He missed Alain, realizing only now how much he had relied on his young friend as a go-between for himself and the other knights.
Returning to the tower roof, Simon kept pacing from one corner to the other. He fingered the jeweled hilt of his scimitar. He tried to divert himself by thinking of Sophia, by imagining how he would phrase his marriage proposal to her. He dreaded the fighting, but wished it would start.