Dark Fires, page 8
Once again Justin had to wait outside. He spent the time examining the majestic wall hangings that adorned the waiting room that was empty because the prelate was sick and only rarely held episcopal audiences anymore. Now if he did anything, he did it through his secretary, Brother Carlito, a Franciscan Monk at odds with the Dominicans in town.
Justin walked the long hall, pausing before each work of art. He admired the subtlety and complexity of design but it struck him that the depicted themes celebrated earthly pleasures rather than the suppression of the flesh that the church taught. There were many biblical scenes of excesses, of the wrong things to do, and even angels were presented in a sensual tone. The present Bishop wasn’t much for the arts, but his predecessor had been, and was responsible for many of the frescoes and fine windows sparkling with color.
When after a considerable stretch of time Master Conti emerged from the audience, his face was dark with concern, and his long steps carried them down and out of the palace like a wind blowing through a fold of forest land.
“Master...?” Justin ventured, trying to keep pace with him.
“It’s better you do not know,” the Master snapped, to head off any questions.
“You taught me that things we don’t know can hurt us...”
“Sometimes things that you know can hurt you more.” His steps became even longer. He was running away from something, Justin thought.
Crossing a small park nestled among the press of buildings, they encountered a man wearing a large yellow cross on his tunic, who, on first sight, scurried out of their way.
“I know that man,” Master Conti remarked darkly. “Enzio Strapa, a skilled glass blower who has made himself rich with the fine quality of his work. On summer evenings we often played chess together, drank wine and disputed over books and the state of the world. An educated, well read man. Look at him now, afraid of me and even his own shadow.” Master Conti was hot with anger. “He’s a pious man, never a wrong word from him. He was generous to the church always, never letting the collection basket pass without putting silver in it. And such a man they call a heretic? His misfortune is that someone’s pain or envy implicated him, and now he has implicated someone else to earn his own freedom. That’s devilish, I tell you. That’s how Satan sows discord, turning one believer against another.”
They arrived home, filling the house with the Master’s foul mood. He snapped at Marcello to get his robe ready and in a clipped, strained voice, ordered Pia to bring his supper to his room as he wouldn’t be coming down for dinner. He stormed upstairs, his displeasure echoing hard on the stairs.
“What’s ailing him?” Opal asked; she wasn’t used to seeing her father act so prickly.
“Something upset him in the Bishop’s palace. We practically ran all the way home.”
The next day, a nun, Bernice Molnay, had a vision of hell fires consuming Fiora, and demons wearing yellow crosses walking the streets fanning the flames, persecuting the people of the town. That the town already felt under a cloud of doom, made it ripe for Bernice’s nightmare and it was repeated in many versions, having so captured the imagination of the inhabitants. One couldn’t go anywhere in public without running into it. The immediate upshot was that people became less tolerant of yellow crosses, and a number of those forced to wear them were chased and beaten up.
Overnight six more women reported similar visions, two of them in dreams and one in the middle of drawing water from the well: when she had looked into its depths, she saw all the way down into hell, a demon enticing her to jump in.
“Why do only women see such things?” Sergio asked much puzzled.
“Because they’re more apt to become hysterical,” Opal replied.
Marcello, who was cleaning ashes from the fireplace, looked up disapprovingly. “They are all pious, God fearing women. No cause to belittle them, Mistress.”
“I didn’t intend to, Marcello,” she hastened to amend. “I meant they have more sensitive imaginations.”
After Marcello left, she looked at Sergio and Justin. “Now what do you think of that?” Both youths shrugged their shoulders. Why worry about something so unimportant?
All of these untoward events brought out the end-timers predicting the coming of the Riders of the Apocalypse, the end was nigh. Among them was a hermit Piero Borgas who also preached of the approaching end, but offered the consolation that the Lord Jesus Christ would come back and save the righteous from these horrors. From one day to the next, he suddenly disappeared, and the rumor started that he too was dragged off to the East Tower. He wasn’t the only one. The cantor, the bell ringer and the grave digger at San Boniface Church were taken, as well as the town’s only known Jewish money lender.
When after a few more days these accounts started to die down, Rosa Monteverdi, a child of six, woke screaming in the middle of the night, fighting the Devil. Both parents swore that they saw his shadowy substance grapple with their little girl and described an unholy stink that so invaded the small alcove where the child slept that even days later, the sulfurous odor lingered. This again reignited the narrative and the Devil was seen all over town, even in a mirror the priest of San Giorgo Chapel reputedly saw. The stories became so prevalent that the priesthood had to sprinkle holy water all over town to drive out the Devil with his host of evil spirits.
During these days not one yellow cross dared to show themselves in public. They hid, fearful for their lives as enraged neighbors hurled curses at their doors.
In the afternoon, Justin dragged Sergio off to the riverbed for a bit of practice, first with Viper, then with the sling. After a long hour of slinging stones, they got better at it, if not quite hitting the target, then coming close to it.
On the way home, out of the corner of his eye Justin saw something jump into an alleyway they were just passing, but when he stopped and went to look, there was no one there. Thinking suddenly of all the stories that were floating around town, he crossed himself and murmured a quick paternoster.
Sergio watched him incredulously. “You’ve never been religious, why start now?”
“I dunno, with so many people having seen something, there must be a reason for it...”
“Yes! They’re all crazy!”
Sunday morning churchgoers were greeted by the ominous sight of three pyres set up in the middle of the church square.
“What’re they for?” people asked, not wanting to believe the obvious.
“Maybe they’re going to burn more books.”
The church bell rang once, as a procession entered the square led by a black Dominican holding a crucifix. Not far behind came the head man, Brother Alvarez, surrounded by black monks swinging smoking censers. Behind them came a contingent of the Watch with flashing helmets and wicked looking halberds. Trailing last was a wagon with a driver and three hooded figures.
“Who are they? Can you see?”
“Not until they take the hoods off.”
The wagon stopped by the pyres, and the three condemned were taken off, where they stood, trembling with fear. Brother Alvarez, a thin, tall man, mounted the wagon to tower over everyone. His face was hard and unyielding as he looked over the assembled. He threw his robe back and filled his chest to speak.
“Gentle folks of Fiora, The Holy Father himself has charged me with the task of exterminating heresy among you. Pope Sixtus the Fourth cares about your immortal souls and entrusted me with the safekeeping of them. So I have come among you, like a husbandman to the harvest, to weed out and exterminate the poison plants growing in the midst of you. And my dear people,” he held up one bony finger for emphasis, “it hurts me to say that I have found heretics among you. Yes, people you have known, often masquerading as pious men and women, filled with the lies and poison of their master, Satan himself.” He pointed at the three men standing petrified in front of him. “These three have betrayed you and the Church, held and taught seditious doctrine, and worshipped their master with black masses. They have been interrogated and have confessed all their transgressions. They have refused to recant when it was offered, and have given us no choice but to condemn them to perdition as they themselves have done by their actions. The only way to get rid of their kind is by burning. Fire alone will purify the evil that they were hosts to, and keep us safe from their pollution. These are the tares the good book talks about, that have to be cast into the fire.” In the black raiment and flowing robe, he looked like a vulture perched above them, waiting for death to strike. “People, this is a problem for all of us, and to exorcise the evil is the duty of everyone.” Alvarez made a small gesture with his hand, and guards took the prisoners and forced them onto the wood piles, chaining them to pillars in the center of the pyres. “And because it is a communal exercise of justice, take a stone from the pile, and throw them at these wretched purveyors of evil.”
At first no one moved and people regarded each other with horrified stares, unwilling to do as asked.
“I know that it is sometimes hard to administer justice, but you have to harden your hearts and see the evil within them and then do the right thing.” Still no one moved. The pitch of his voice rose as Alvarez screeched, “Do you hesitate because you’re one of them? We have scribes here to take your names and invite you to the East Tower to prove your loyalty to the Church.” Reluctantly a few moved, picked up a stone and cast it at the bound figures at the stakes. Then more took their turn; sick of heart they threw the stones, pelting the condemned men who shook and struggled against their ties at each impact. Yet they were strangely silent.
Master Conti led his family to the pile, picked up a stone and lobbed it. He had to force his daughter to do the same. Then Justin, feeling like a murderer, and then a grim-faced Sergio.
Alvarez waited until the pile of stones was gone before signaling again. Three men climbed up to the condemned and tore off their hoods. Each had his mouth bound, with only the horrified eyes showing above the winding of cloth. Their heads were shaven, and bruises covered their exposed skin.
Alvarez nodded again, and three men with black hoods moved in and threw burning torches onto the wood piles soaked with oil. Like a rapacious beast the flames flared and blossomed into a terrifying flower. The upsurge of smoke hid the three men; only the desperate and futile rattling of their chains was to be heard. The wood crackled, the smoke swirled in the updraft, and the horrible smell of burned flesh filled the air.
The crowd reeled back, away from the intense heat the flames radiated, away from the choking smoke, and away from the dreadful smell. Opal fainted into Justin’s arms, and he held her. He dared not leave, with Alvarez watching them all. Around them other women fainted too, sobbed or wailed in uncontrolled reaction. Men were seen grinding their teeth and turning away, unable to look.
Justin kept his eyes away, reciting numbers silently in desperation to keep the images of what he’d seen out of his head. He did not know how much time had passed. Opal came to, then fainted again when she realized where she was. Justin held her, grateful for the pain caused by her weight pulling on him for so long. He closed his eyes and was far away remembering his uncle with the hot poker burning his chest.
He became aware when Sergio nudged him lightly. People were drifting off, not daring to hurry from the scene of horror. Justin risked a quick look; the fires had collapsed to an ash bed of embers, and only wisps of smoke yet trailed into the sky. There were only charred remains still hanging from the blackened chains attached to the iron stakes. But the horrid smell was ever present.
Master Conti led, and Justin and Sergio half carried Opal home between them. They stuck her into bed and covered her to her chin. Pia stayed with her, praying the whole time and daubing the comatose girl’s face with lemon scented water.
Master Conti disappeared into his room. Sergio and Justin settled in the front room, keeping an anxious eye on the street. Justin’s insides felt frozen and he didn’t know what to think and where to put the memory of the day. It’s Sunday, the day of the Lord, a day to celebrate, not to drown in horror.
Then to free his mind he thought of Pup, feeling more comfortable with the anger rising in him. He fed it like fire, fanning it to push back the memories of the square. Then he thought of the pervert. He should have been the one to be burned and exterminated. How many others had he mistreated like Pup? There was still that task awaiting.
“Poor buggers, I don’t care what they’ve done, it’s a hard way to go,” Sergio said in a dark baritone.
“And hard to watch,” Justin added, realizing, as he said it, that there had been no church service that day. Maybe the burning fires were now the new liturgy.
Opal didn’t come downstairs for two days, and when she appeared she was pale and uncertain. At meal time, she barely touched her food and sat there listless, staring vacantly out the window. Master Conti tried to draw his daughter out, animate her somehow, but she remained withdrawn. Justin read the shock in her eyes and felt her pain. He tried to think of something consoling to say but nothing came to mind. In silence they all ate, until, “We’re all Christians, taught to forgive one another, practice charity. Are we not?” Opal lifted tear-filled eyes to her father.
“The Old Testament talks of public stoning for blasphemies and unnatural acts.” Master Conti tried to find a context that she could accept. “Jesus preached about gathering the tares and burning them. About cutting off the offending arm...”
“But people we know?” She was blinking back tears. “One was Dante Corelli. I’ve been to his house, played with his daughter. How is... was he so evil? I never heard him say an unkind word.” All movement came to a halt as they listened, even Pia and Marcello paused in their tasks. “What will happen to them? The wife and the children? Who will provide for them?” Her father didn’t answer; he put down his eating utensils and stared at his plate.
Marcello, however, did answer. “Missy, evil has to be gotten rid of. How can the righteous live with the unrighteous? We don’t put dirty clothes in with the fresh laundry, we don’t place rot among the healthy whole. If an animal is sick, we separate it from the herd, and if need be, we kill it. That’s what happened in the square the other day.” It wasn’t said unkindly, but the effect was still chilling and killed all conversation afterward.
Later in the evening, when Master Conti came down into the front room, his face was more composed. He shut the door, with just him, Opal, Justin and Sergio there.
“What we saw the other day was wrong. Those men were tortured and a confession extorted from them. I don’t believe they were guilty.”
“Then why are we silent, father?” Opal asked in the plaintive voice of a child who has only just discovered pain and the harsh realities of the world.
“Because... because to speak now is to accuse oneself and risk one’s family and trade places with those men burned. We live in dangerous times. All over the country, tribunals are sifting through the population, in the name of cleansing the Church. It’s so in Verona, Pisa, Ravenna, and in most big cities.” He looked earnestly at each in turn, his voice sunken to a bare whisper. “It’s bad here because our archbishop is sick and too weak to stand up to the likes of Alvarez. And I feel it will get worse. Alvarez is a zealot, consumed by ambition, sees sin and corruption in every shadow and can no longer recognize humanity.”
“But what can we do, father? There must be something we can do.”
“The storm is here and if we stand against it we’ll be destroyed for certain. Anyone who resists now will be destroyed.” He paused to let it sink in. “We must flee. First to Venice, where the madness hasn’t reached yet. And on to Augsburg in Germany, if we have to.”
“Why there?”
“There is a renowned library there, and my reputation will be welcomed.” He spoke longer, outlining a future away from the coming mayhem and horror.
“Doesn’t seem right to desert our neighbors in their time of need.”
“Can’t be helped. To protest now would be to throw our lives away. You’re the last of my line, I can’t risk that. Would you want to risk Justin and Sergio here? And Pia? To what effect? What becomes of a stone caught in an avalanche? It’s buried and won’t see daylight ever again.”
Weakly, Opal nodded her hand, convinced perhaps but not at peace. Justin let out an explosive breath. He felt both sides, the daughter’s pain and the father’s desperate reasoning.
Master Conti outlined his plans. “I’ve already sent my most precious books and papers ahead. You pack, but secretly, only the most essential and valuable items. We must travel light, not burdened with extras. Is that understood?” They all nodded, feeling like criminals fleeing from discovery.
“Good, we leave two days from now.” With that they adjourned.
Justin and Sergio had little to pack and were soon back in the front room.
“I knew it was too good to last. Just when I started feeling comfortable, fate or the Devil rips the floor out from under me. It looks like we’re going on the road again.” Sergio struggled to come to terms with their future.
Justin was still preoccupied with the past. “With darkness closing in all around us like poisoned mist, we forget about evil of another kind.”
“What are you talking about?”
“About Pup and what happened to him. The world has forgotten him, just another corpse pulled from the river and hidden underground.”
“What...what’re you intending to do?”
“Seek payment for the evil done. The account is long past due.” Then he explained how he had kept an eye on the house on Summerside and knew its routines. No one lived with Calvino Molinelli, so that he could freely pursue his strange, unnatural vices in the dark of night. Servants came as needed and then left. It would be so easy to surprise him. “The question is, are you with me or not? Pup was your friend too.”
