As the disguised party marches with the pilgrims, Jakob endures constant pain from old and new wounds. The strain makes him reflect on past campaigns, especially a brutal retreat across the steppe, where he learned both the worst and the best of human nature. That memory has left him deeply skeptical about people and about himself, but it also taught him the rule that matters most: keep moving.

Bishop Apollonia of Acci comes to meet Jakob and Brother Diaz while walking among the company as if she were an ordinary pilgrim. Brother Diaz flatters her, while Jakob responds with blunt cynicism about theologians, saints, sin, and suffering. When Apollonia notices Jakob's injuries, she recommends the Shrine of Saint Stephen and speaks of healing and redemption; Jakob answers with weary honesty, making clear that his hurts are not easily cured.

Apollonia then asks Jakob what he thinks of the so-called Blessed Company. Jakob studies the pilgrimage as a seasoned soldier would assess a force on the move: it contains rich pilgrims, the sick, the poor, prisoners doing penance, and a tail of opportunists including beggars, thieves, prostitutes, and a moneylender. Seeing greed, hierarchy, and vice alongside piety, Jakob concludes that the company is really society in miniature and remarks that calling it blessed is a stretch.

When Apollonia asks what sin Jakob is atoning for, Alex intervenes to protect him and the group's cover. She invents identities and sins for the others, presenting Brother Diaz as a papal agent escorting notorious sinners toward redemption. Alex describes Balthazar as a merchant compromised by pirate dealings, Baron Rikard as a man with a drinking problem, Vigga as a former pagan Viking raider converted to the faith, and herself as a repentant thief.

Apollonia accepts Alex's framing, praises hope and redemption, and warmly commends Brother Diaz for guiding such damaged souls. She then draws him toward the front of the column and invites him to give a reading at midday prayers, further absorbing the group into the pilgrimage's religious routine. After she leaves, Vigga, Alex, Balthazar, and Jakob exchange darkly comic remarks about titles, lust, and Brother Diaz's interest in the bishop, ending on Jakob's bleak conclusion that everything ends in tears.