the-secret-crusade-oliver-bowden

Collect any remaining writings and add them to the piles in the streets.
When you’re done we’ll send a cart to collect them that they may be
destroyed.’
The scholars left. And now the courtyard was empty. A beautiful
marbled area for ever tarnished by the obscenity of the fire. Jubair paced
around it, gazing into the fire. Every so often he cast a nervous glance
around him, and appeared to be listening carefully. But if he heard
anything it was the crackle of the fire and the sound of his own
breathing. He relaxed a little, which made Altaïr smile. Jubair knew the
Assassins were coming for him. Thinking himself cleverer than his
executioners he’d sent decoys into the city streets – decoys with his most
trusted bodyguards, so that the deception should be complete. Altaïr
moved silently around the rooftop until he stood directly above the
book-burner. Jubair thought he was safe here, locked in his madrasah.
But he wasn’t. And he had executed his last underling, burned his last
book.
Snick.
Jubair looked up and saw the Assassin descending towards him, blade
outstretched. Too late, he tried to dart out of the way as the blade was
sinking into his neck. With a sigh he crumpled to the marble.
His eyelids fluttered. ‘Why … why have you done this?’
Altaïr looked over to the blackened corpse of the scholar in the fire.
With the flesh burned away from his skull, it was as though he was
grinning. ‘Men must be free to do as they believe,’ he told Jubair. He
withdrew the blade from the other’s neck. Blood dripped to the marble.
‘It is not our right to punish one for thinking as he does, no matter how
much we disagree.’