ride one of the horses, although the sacred weight they pull is great enough already on them. Fortunately, we have seen no signs of infidel soldiers on the road.
Your most humble servant in Christ,
Br. Kiril
April, the Year of Our Lord 6985
Your Excellency, Lord Abbot Eupraxius:
We have left the city some weeks behind us and are now riding openly in the territory of the infidels. I dare not write our location, in case we should be captured. Perhaps we should have chosen the sea route after all, but God will be our Protector along the way we have chosen. We have seen the burned remains of two monasteries and one church. The church was smoking as yet. Five monks were hung there for conspiring to a rebellion, and their surviving brothers are scattered to other monasteries already. This is the only news we have learned, as we cannot talk long with the people who come out to our wagon. There is no reason to think one of these monasteries is the one we seek, however. The sign will be clear there, the monster equal to the saint. If this missive can be delivered to you, my lord, it shall be as soon as possible.
Your most humble servant in Christ,
Br. Kiril
June, the Year of Our Lord 6985
"When Stoichev had finished, we sat in silence. Helen was scribbling notes still, her face intent over her work, Irina sat with her hands folded, Ranov stood negligently against a cabinet, scratching under his collar. For myself, I had given up trying to write down the events described in the letter; Helen would catch everything anyway. There was no clear evidence here of a particular destination, no mention of a tomb, no scene of burial - the disappointment I felt was choking.
"But Stoichev seemed far from downcast. 'Interesting,' he said, after long minutes. 'Interesting. You see, your letter from Istanbul must lie between these two letters here, chronologically. In the first and second letters, they are traveling through Wallachia toward the Danube - that is clear from the place-names. Then comes your letter, which Brother Kiril wrote in Constantinople, perhaps hoping to send it and the previous letters from there. But he was unable or afraid to send them - unless these are just copies - we have no way to know. And the last letter is dated June. They took a land route like the one that is described by the Zacharias "Chronicle." In fact, it must have been the same route, from Constantinople through Edirne and Haskovo, because that was the major road fromTsarigrad into Bulgaria.'
"Helen looked up. 'But can we be sure this last letter describes Bulgaria?' "'We cannot be absolutely certain,' Stoichev admitted. 'However, I believe it is very probable. If they traveled from Tsarigrad - Constantinople - into a country where monasteries and churches were being burned in the late
fifteenth century, it is very likely that this was Bulgaria. Also, your letter from Istanbul states that they intend to go to Bulgaria.' "I couldn't help voicing my frustration. 'But there's no further information
about the location of the monastery they were looking for. Assuming it even was Sveti Georgi.' Ranov had settled at the table with us and was looking at his thumbs; I wondered if I should hide my interest in Sveti Georgi from him, but how else were we going to ask Stoichev about it?
"'No.' Stoichev nodded. 'Brother Kiril would certainly not have written the name of their destination in his letters, just as he did not write the name of Snagov with Eupraxius's titles. If they had been caught, these monasteries might have suffered extra persecution, eventually, or at least might have been searched.'
"'There is an interesting line in here.' Helen had finished her notes. 'Could you read that again - that the sign in the monastery they sought was a monster equal to a saint? What do you think this meant?'
"I looked quickly at Stoichev; this line had struck me, too. He sighed. 'It might refer to a fresco or an icon that was in the monastery - in Sveti Georgi, if that was indeed their destination. It is difficult to imagine what such an image might have been. And even if we could find Sveti Georgi itself, there is little hope that an icon that was there in the fifteenth century would still be there, especially since the monastery was probably burned at least once. I do not know what this means. Perhaps it is even a