The voice was unfamiliar. It was not someone he had already met during the investigation and trial. It sounded gentle, but this might easily be a trick. He was well acquainted with the hypocrisy of priests. His worst problems had been with those who seemed understanding and helpful and then suddenly showed their pitiless faces.

"Why do you think that?" asked the prisoner, stretching numbly on the dirty, worn blanket that was his only bedding.

"I watched you twitch restlessly in your sleep."

"You watched me in the total darkness?"

"Eyes get accustomed to the dark if they are in it long enough and can see quite well there."

"There are eyes and eyes. Some get accustomed to it, others don't. I got here because I refused to get accustomed to the dark."

The fingers in the lap slowly interlaced, and the prisoner suddenly realized that they looked ghostly pale because he was wearing white gloves. They were part of the church dignitaries' vestments, which meant that the man in the cell with him was not an ordinary priest who had been sent to escort him to the stake. So, it was not time yet.

"Do you think that you will dispel the darkness with the brilliance of your fiery stake?" His tone was not cynical; it sounded more compassionate.

"I don't know. I couldn't think of any other way."

"It is also the most painful way. You have had the opportunity to witness death by burning at the stake, isn't that right?"

"Yes, of course. While I was at the monastery they took us several times to watch the execution of poor women accused of being witches. It is a compulsory part of the training of young monks, as you know. There is nothing like fear to inspire blind loyalty to the faith."

"Yes, fear is a powerful tool in the work of the church. But you, it seems, have remained unaffected by its influence?"

The prisoner rubbed his stiff neck. He could still somehow put up with the swill they fed him, the stale air and the humidity that surrounded him, and the constant squealing and scratching of hungry rodents that he'd been told were able to bite the ears and noses of heedless prisoners. But nothing had been so hard in this moldy prison as the fact that he did not have a pillow.

"What do you expect me to answer? That I'm not afraid of being burned? That I'm indifferent to the pain I'll soon be feeling at the stake? Only an imbecile would not be afraid."

"But you are not an imbecile. So why didn't you prevent such an end?"

"I had no choice."

"Of course you did. The only thing you were asked was to publicly renounce your conviction and repent, which is the most reasonable request of the court of the Inquisition when serious heretical sins are involved. If you had done that, you would have kept your title of royal astronomer and been allowed to continue teaching students."

"Who would attend the lectures of a royal astronomer who had renounced his discovery out of fear?"

"There is a question that comes before that. Why did you have to announce it in the first place? What did you want to achieve by that?"

"What should I have done--kept it a secret, all for myself?"

"You were aware that it goes counter to the teachings of Mother Church. You should have expected her to take all measures to protect herself."

"Of course I expected that. But I was relying on her hands being rather tied."

"It doesn't look like that, judging by the sentence you were given."

"Oh, you know perfectly well that the stake is not what the church wanted. It was a forced move after all attempts to talk me into cooperating failed."

"Based on your condition, I would not say that they tried all possible means. You do not look like someone who has been given the Inquisition's full treatment."

"Well, I'm not a witch. They didn't have to force me to agree to some meaningless accusation. I did not deny my guilt. That is why the whole investigation proceeded like some kind of friendly persuasion, even though, probably just to impress me, in the background stood the power of all the devices to mutilate, quarter, cut, break, and crush. But I was not even threatened with one of them, let alone put into any device. You do not torture someone who is valuable to you only as an ally. What good would it be if the royal astronomer were lame or blind?"

"Not even after the alliance has been irrevocably called off? The Inquisition can hardly boast of the virtues of forgiveness and compassion."

"That is why it is renowned for its patience and acumen. The sentence was made, but I have not been burned yet. There is still time. Attempts to win me over to the church's side will continue to the very end. In any case, that is why you are here, isn't it?"