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suffered by
Grolsachers so frequently demonstrated.
    Principatè Doneto suggested, "Let's break this up. We've done His
Holiness's bidding. We agree that punishing Clearenza may be more
painful for us than them. Hecht, put together the best show you can.
Ghort, catch your traitors. Donel. Wake Mongoz so he can close this
officially."
    Several Principatès wanted to protest but were not inclined to argue
with the Patriarch's cousin.
    PRINCIPATÈ DELARI  TOLD HECHT, "COME WITH ME, please."
    Hecht did so, though he wanted to stay with Ghort, to manufacture a
scheme for catching the fugitives. He was uncomfortable being alone
with Muniero Delari. Despite his intellectual confidence that the man
was not interested in him. He was far too elderly. He was thirty-five.
    Principatè Delari sensed his discomfort. And did nothing to allay
it. "It's time to bring you into the inner circle."
    "Your Grace?"
    "The Collegium is more than a clatch of doddering old farts
squabbling over bribes." A popular notion underlying an entire cycle of
contemptuous jokes.
    "Well, of course."
    "We occasionally do things we hope will do some good for humanity.
Some of us. Sometimes. Even people here in the Palace don't realize."
    "All right."
    "You sound skeptical."
    "Your Grace, I judge only by what I've seen."
    "And that is?"
    "What the man in the street thinks. Only more so. Because I've met
the beast face-to-face."
    Delari chuckled. "And that isn't far off the mark. Particularly my
brethren from the Patriarchal States. They exist to indulge their own
pleasures. They have their capes and miters because they bought them.
Or because they're Brothens whose families always have members in the
Collegium. If for no better reason than to make sure the Patriarch is
always Brothen."
    "Yes. I've never understood how Ornis of Cedelete got elected."
Hecht meant Worthy VI, the first Anti-Patriarch. Worthy VI was elected
legitimately—then run out of town by the Brothen mob. The people of the
Mother City believed the Patriarchal seat was Brothen by right and
preeminent over the Chaldarean world. In fact, however, the earlier
Brothen Patriarchs had been but one of nine equal Fathers of the
Church. The Praman Conquest overwhelmed five. Three others went with
the Eastern Rite in the schism after the Second Synod of Hypraxium.
    "He was elected because an angry Collegium, including Principatès
from the Five Families, were fed up with a string of arrogant Bruglioni
Patriarchs."
    Hecht did not comment.
    "The lesson seems to have gone to waste."
    Hecht held his tongue. Delari held Honario Benedocto in high disdain.
    The Principatè led him to the baths for which the Chiaro Palace was
infamous. In Hecht's eye. He used them himself only to avert suspicion.
The way he ate pork and broke countless other religious laws. So he
told himself.
    Never again would he be the hard, razor-edged warrior who had
captained the best company of special fighters ever fielded by the
Sha-lug. Brothe had ruined him.
    Delari's boy Armand awaited his master. He smirked as he helped
Delari disrobe. "Would you like someone to assist you,
Captain-General?" The boy's voice had yet to break. He was an excellent
singer.
    "Herrin and Vernal will be along." Those being the youngsters who
bathed him regularly. He made no personal demands on them—though the
rules did not permit a bather to force himself on the orphans who
served there.
    The baths were a sort of charity, providing employment for Brothe's
more comely orphans.
    The rules were tested occasionally. Principatè Delari was in mild
violation by bringing his own catamite in. There would be no
complaints. The whole Chiaro Palace feared Muniero Delari. He was
reputed to be a powerful sorcerer.
    Principatè Muniero Delari was famous for, and sometimes hated for,
his determination to do what best served the Church as a whole.
    Hecht was repelled by Delari unclad. The man was a pallid old stick
figure veined with ugly blue, like an Arnhander cheese. He