the-secret-crusade-oliver-bowden

for them to rule by proxy, you see.’
‘I suppose so. But how long can it last? The Bull and the Templars do
not exactly see eye to eye on matters of faith.’
‘Ah, the less you say about that the better,’ rejoined the first.
Altaïr let them go past, then moved on, the corridor darkening. Maria
had said the castle was well defended, and it certainly was if you had
raised an army and planned to storm its walls. For a lone Assassin,
though, penetrating the fortress by stealth was an easier task. Especially
when you were the Master. When you were Altaïr.
Now he found himself in a vast banqueting hall. At the opposite end
stood two guards and he took out two throwing knives. He flicked them:
one, two. In moments the men lay twitching on the stone and Altaïr
stepped over them, knowing that he was near now, that Moloch couldn’t
be far away.
He wasn’t. Altaïr came to what looked like a dead end and turned,
checking behind him – why had this been guarded? Then he saw a
trapdoor. Bending to it, he listened, then smiled. He had found the Bull.
Very gently he lifted the trapdoor and lowered himself into the roof
beams below. He was in the rafters of the castle’s place of worship, a
large empty room lit by the fire of a large brazier near the altar.
Kneeling before the fire, tending it, was Moloch.
Maria’s description of him had been accurate. He was a bear of a
man: bare-headed, drooping moustache, bare-chested, apart from a
medallion, and with the tree-trunk arms she’d described. Sweat glistened
on him as he stoked the fire, chanting an incantation that sounded as
much like a growl as it did pious devotion. Absorbed in his work he
didn’t move from the fire, didn’t look away from it, bathing his face in