Fear began to rise in him again. Fear, and a desolating sorrow. Never to see Sophia again. Never to do even the simplest things, get up and walk, see, breathe. It was more than he could bear.
He fought to find his balance.
I cannot save myself from dying. But I can decide how I will use these last moments of life.
He wanted to tell this man, who had been his greatest enemy all along, how he had tricked him and how close he had come to thwarting their grand design of an alliance of Christians and Tartars to destroy Islam. It would make up, in a small way, for all today's defeats. For himself, that was all he wanted now. Very soon now, he would go up to paradise.
But Sophia and Lorenzo, Ugolini and Tilia, would have to struggle on in this world after he was gone. He must protect them.
"Tell me," Simon prompted.
"My father was the Sire Geoffrey Langmuir of Ascalon," he began. "My mother was Lady Evelyn." He told de Gobignon of his capture by the army of Egypt, his rearing as a Mameluke in a barracks on the Nile. He tried to explain what a Mameluke was, and what code he lived by. He told of his acceptance of Islam, his first battles.
As he spoke, his eyes wandered, and he saw the red sun half hidden by the wooded western hills. He felt the air growing colder, and he shivered. The chill was not in the air alone. His arms and legs were numb, as if they were freezing.
"Give me your cloak, Valery," de Gobignon said, and in a moment a red cloak was being spread over him.
"You were at Mansura, where my father fought," de Gobignon said.