the-secret-crusade-oliver-bowden

43
Maria was gone. Taken by Crusaders. While Altaïr had been battling at
Kantara Castle, soldiers had attacked the safe-house and, despite a
battle, had made off with some prisoners, Maria among them.
Markos, one of the few who had escaped capture, was there to greet
the Assassin, worry etched into his face, fretting as he babbled, ‘Altaïr,
we were attacked. We tried to fight them off but – but it was no use.’ He
dropped his eyes, shame-faced.
Or was he feigning it?
Altaïr looked at the door to the drying room. It was open. Beyond, the
door to the barred cell hung open too and he pictured her there,
watching him with her almond eyes, her back against the wall and boots
scuffing in the rushes strewn on the stone.
He shook his head to rid himself of the image. There was more at
stake than his feelings for the English woman: he had no business
thinking of her before the concerns of the Order. But … he had.
‘I wanted to stop them,’ Markos was saying, ‘but I had to hide. There
were too many.’
Altaïr looked at him sharply. Now that he knew of Barnabas’s
duplicity he was reluctant to trust anybody. ‘This was not your fault,’ he
said. ‘The Templars are crafty.’
‘I’ve heard they harness the power of a Dark Oracle in Buffavento.