Poul Anderson - Death and the Knight

He glanced downward at the dead man. "We had our duty," he whispered. "I think you'd've understood."

While his team hastened upstairs, he sought the strongroom. The clumsy lock would have yielded to almost any burglar tools, but those in his pouch were special and it clicked directly over. He swung the door aside.

Hugh Marlow lurched out of lightlessness. "Who're you?" he choked in English. "I heard — Oh, the Patrol." His gaze found the knight. He forced back a shriek. Then he went to the body and knelt beside it, heedless of the blood, shuddering with the effort not to weep. Everard came after and loomed above him. Marlow looked up.

"Did — did you have to do this?" he stammered.

Everard nodded. "Things happened too fast. We didn't expect we'd find him here."

"No. He. . returned. To me. He said he could not leave me alone to face. . whatever was on the way. I hoped. . against hope. . I could talk him into fleeing. . but he wouldn't desert his brothers, either—"

"He was a man," Everard said. "At least he — I'm not cheerful about this, no, but at least he's been spared torture." Bones crushed in the boot or hauled apart on the rack or the wheel. Flesh pulled off them by red-hot pincers. Clamps on the testicles. Needles — Never mind. Governments are ingenious. If, afterward, Fulk had recanted the confession twisted out of him and denied the dishonor in it, they would have burned him alive.

Marlow nodded. "That's some consolation, isn't it?" He leaned over his friend. "Adieu, Fulk de Buchy, Knight of the Temple." Reaching out, he closed the eyes and held the jaw shut while he kissed the lips.

Everard helped him rise, for the floor had gone slippery.

"I'll cooperate fully and freely," Marlow said, flat-voiced, "and I won't ask for clemency."

"You did get reckless," Everard answered, "and it'll lead to the fleet escaping. But that was 'always' in history. It just turns out that this was how it came about. Otherwise, no harm done." Aside from a death. But all men die. "I don't think the Patrol court will be too hard on you. No more field assignments, obviously. However, you can still do useful work in compilation and analysis, and that way redeem yourself."

How smug it sounded.

Well, love doesn't excuse everything by a long shot. But is love in itself ever a sin?

The men were descending with their plunder. "Let's go," Everard said, and led them away.

THE END