Alain was quiet a long moment, scanning Altair's face closely. "And why would they do that," he asks aloud, although he's talking to himself as much as to Altair, "and yet tell none of us they had such an ally? Why risk our slaying him?"

A suspicion is growing in his mind, still nascent, still uncertain. He has seen men hypnotised before, and there is no denying that the Capitol has that power.

"And why, if you were not in the Capitol, was I told to send you on a mission there?"