al-Malik paced up and down, his brow furrowed in an expression of concern. The room was a small one, requiring barely more than a dozen paces to go from one side to the other. "We know that the wizard and the Crusader knight are here, within the walls of Damascus, but there has been no sighting of them." He stopped his pacing and focussed his attention on Leah. "How can you be so nonchalant - so accepting of this situation?"

Leah lifted another date to her lips. "Because I am not a warrior. I am a hunter. I stalk my prey. I lay traps. For me, inaction is the merely the moment before I strike." She sucked the date into her mouth, then began to chew it.

"I am no warrior either!" al-Malik's sudden retort was loud. Leah looked up at him, and tilted her head to one side in reproach. al-Malik bowed his head and held up both hands in apology. "I merely meant to say that I am but an agent of the Brotherhood. However, I am frustrated at the lack of information."

With a deft movement, Leah discreetly spat the stone from the date into her hand, then placed the offending object onto the earthenware platter on the low table in front of her. "What would you have me do, al-Malik?" She wiped her hand on a cloth napkin. "Should we be in the city, scouring the streets for a chance sighting of those two? Should we be asking at every hostel, every lodging to see who has arrived recently? No." Leah shook her head and selected another date from the heap of fruit arranged in front of her. "We have the advantage here. We know where they wish to go. All we need do is wait for them to find it."

al-Malik lowered himself onto a cushion opposite Leah and leaned forward, until his was uncomfortably close to the woman's face. "Then why do we not give them some sign as to where your wizard can find what he is looking for? Even better - why not lay a false trail for them, and lure them into a trap of our own choosing."

Leah spat the date stone into al-Malik's face, causing him to recoil and almost fall backward. She laughed at his discomfit, and it sounded like glass bells chiming. "Once again you question me. Then I shall explain to you. You do not know these two like I do. You have not fought against them, nor have you tasted the bitter gall of defeat.

"To answer your first question, do you take them for fools? Would you trust the bearer of gifts, no matter how much you desired them, if they were placed before you for you to take as you pleased? Neither will the two we hunt. It is better if they find their own way.

"To answer your second question, it would indeed be a master stroke if we could do this. But, believe me, the wizard knows what he is looking for. He has knowledge at his disposal - secret knowledge! - which would allow him to determine that he had been tricked. Then what would he do?"

Leah took another date. "I trust that you see the wisdom of my actions. And that you will confine any further questions to clarifications only. I would not wish Master Sargon to be disappointed in either of us."

al-Malik wiped his face with the napkin, then threw the piece of cloth to one side in disgust. "Very well. I shall continue to accede to your wishes. But, should you prove to be wrong in any way, I will be more than happy to convey the news to Master Sargon myself."

"I would not have it any other way." As Leah reached for another piece of fruit, there was the sound of feet hurrying up the stairs that led to the upper storey of the dwelling. Both Leah and al-Malik paused in their bickering and assumed expressions of calm. The sound of the footsteps stopped, to be replaced by a hurried knocking at the rooms' door.

"Enter," al-Malik called out. Azif - al-Malik's assistant - peered through the door.

"I have news!" the younger man declared breathlessly. "Two men resembling those you are looking for have been seen at the gate to the Umayyad mosque." Leah flashed al-Malik an 'I-told-you-so' smile, which al-Malik made a point of ignoring.

"Thank you, Azif. When was this?"

The younger man beamed, obviously satisfied that he had done his best. "The news has just arrived. I came up here to inform you as soon as I heard."

"Indeed?" al-Malik begrudged Azif the slightest of smiles. "And who brought this news?"

"It was Vahid."

"A reliable source?" Leah asked al-Malik.

"A most reliable individual," al-Malik replied. Then he turned back to Azif, who was standing in the doorway, fidgeting like a puppy desperate to please its master. "And did you leave Vahid in the shop?" There was a bantering note to al-Malik's question.

"I did. Do you wish me to reward him?"

"No, you dolt!" al-Malik rose to his feet, suddenly and swiftly. "Get back down there before some bazaar thief makes away with our stock! Go! Quickly! Idiot!" al-Malik pushed Azif out of the door and into the passageway, slapping at him as he went. It was only when the sound of footsteps clattering down the stone stairs faded away that al-Malik returned to the room. "Do we act now?" he asked Leah.

"We act now," she replied. "And we shall do so without hesitation." The woman rose to her feet. "Gather your men, and take them to the mosque. I shall follow. Do nothing until I have joined you."

al-Malik nodded. All traces of his previous belligerence had vanished. "We shall move swiftly." Then he followed Azif down the stairs.

Leah did not follow him. Instead, when she left the room, she went down the passageway and into the room that had been given to her cohort, Hassan. Thick curtains had been drawn across both the room's door and window to block out the outside world. A lamp - little more that a dish filled with oil and a rush wick - flickered at the centre of a pool of yellow light. In the bed beside the lamp, a single figure lay motionless. Leah crept to the pallet and knelt down beside it.

"Hassan?" she whispered, and stroked the shoulder of the bed's occupant. "Hassan. Come. It is time for you to show the strength of your new-found loyalty. Arise."

The figure in the bed sat up. In the light of the oil lamp, its face was a mass of shadows and lines. "I am ready," Hassan said in a monotone. "What do you wish me to do?"