"Wereyour houseguests, Madama?" Ugolini asked. So, he had noticed it too.
She sighed. "Yes, they and that boorish French cardinal left for Perugia this morning, not long before you came. They chose a bad day to leave. This morning's storm is not the end of the rain. Another storm is coming. Every joint in my body aches."
"These storms clear the air," said Ugolini.
The contessa held up a sticklike finger. "Exactly as the storm yesterday in the Piazza San Giovenale did."
Now she was bringing up her grievance, Sophia thought. Evidently she had offended a number of cardinals with the massacre of the Filippeschi.
A servant brought a small table of some shiny black wood and set it in their midst. Its legs were carved in the form of twisting, wingless dragons. Perhaps it was a gift to the contessa from the Tartars. Sophia had seen such furnishings in Constantinople and knew they came from the distant East, where the Tartars ruled.
Another servant brought a tray with small sweet cakes filled with a paste made of crushed white raisins. A third poured the pale yellow wine of Orvieto into silver goblets for them. Sophia sipped her wine, but her stomach churned with fear for Daoud, a fear held rigidly in check. She could not drink much, and she could not eat at all.
Every so often she glanced at Vittorio di Monaldeschi, and each time she did, she found his eyes fixed on her.
Ugolini wiped his mouth after finishing off a cake. "As Fortune's wheel turns, all of us need friends at one time or another."
"How true," said the old lady.
"I come before you today to presume upon our friendship to ask you a favor, Madama," said Ugolini.
"We need each other, as you have said, Your Eminence."
Sophia prayed that the contessa would agree to help.
Ugolini told how the podesta's men had arrested Daoud the previous night. Sophia watched the contessa's face for some sign of sympathy, but the old lady remained as expressionless as a bird.
"I am shocked that the podesta would arrest your houseguest," she said. "But what can I do? After all, Signore d'Ucello holds the office because he has our confidence."
Which means that he stands aside while you murder your enemies.
Ugolini spread his hands. "Precisely because he has your confidence, dear Madonna, I know he will listen to you. We have had no word of what has become of our guest and friend."
"I wanteveryonepunished who had anything to do with the attack on my palace," said the contessa, clenching her bony fist.
And what if the contessa were to discover that the man they were talking about had incited that attack and used it as cover for his own attempt to murder the Tartar ambassadors, Sophia thought. She would want him torn to bits in the piazza. New waves of terror washed over her.
And she would want those who helped him punished along with him. Sophia glanced at Ugolini and saw that he was sweating.
Dear God, do not let him falter now.
"Of course, Contessa," he said. "That is why I have come to you. Because you, and not the podesta, are the one truly injured. But the arrest of David is a terrible mistake. I place before you my belief in this man's absolute innocence. I am prepared to swear to it. He was not even here in Orvieto when that dastardly attack occurred. He was in Perugia. There are countless witnesses. I know this man. He is agoodman, a merchant, not a warrior."
"I remember him," said the contessa. "A very good-looking blond man. I heard his conversation with the Tartars and I began to wonder myself about the wisdom of allying ourselves with them."
"It is probably because David did testify against the Tartars that the podesta thinks he might be connected with the attack on your palace," said Ugolini. "But such a man as David would have nothing to do with such mascalzoni as the Filippeschi. I, too, have opposed the alliance, and yet you and I are friends. It is one thing to disagree in a civilized way. It is another to turn to behave like a scoundrel. David has the same horror of murder that we all do."
Remembering what she had heard about the killings in the cathedral plaza, Sophia wondered if the contessa had any horror of murder at all.
"I am sure that is true," said the contessa. "But the podesta must have good reason for detaining this David."
Despair overwhelmed Sophia. The tears that had been falling in her soul sprang to her eyelids and began to run down her cheeks. She should not show her feelings like this, she thought. But what did it matter, when Daoud was dying and no one would lift a hand to save him?
"Why are you crying, child?" said the contessa. Sophia heard sympathy in her voice.
"Forgive me, Contessa," she said, sobbing. "This is very rude of me."
"Does this man mean so much to you?" asked the old lady, her rasping voice softened.
In her anguish, Sophia was still clear-headed enough to see that she might use that anguish. She threw herself down on the terrazzo floor and clasped the contessa around the knees.
"Sophia!" She could hear Ugolini's chair scrape as he stood up. The boy took a step toward her.
"It is all right," said the contessa. "You love this man, do you not?" She patted Sophia's hair.
"Yes," Sophia wept. "And I swear to you, he is innocent."
He is, too, because he believes that everything he is doing is right.
"Your Eminence?" said the contessa. "You approve of your niece and this man from Trebizond?"
"Oh, certainly," said Ugolini waving his hands. "He is a fine man."
"Hmm," said the old lady. "That night at my reception I thought you and the young Count de Gobignon were attracted to each other."
Sophia felt a strange stab of guilt.
"Oh, he is too far above me, Contessa," she said. "A count. David is a merchant. We are right for each other."
It is true that David and I are much more suited than Simon and I.
"It makes me feel young for a moment to see a beautiful woman in love." The contessa stroked Sophia's cheek with dry, rough fingers.
Sophia opened her eyes wide and looked the contessa full in the face. "Please help us, Contessa, for the sake of love."
The contessa sighed and smiled. "I will send for d'Ucello. I will request that he stop questioning your friend." She looked across at Ugolini. "You must give me your word, Your Eminence, that this David will not leave Orvieto until all doubts about him are settled."
"Oh, thank you, thank you!" Sophia kissed the shiny knuckles, wetting the blue-veined hand with her tears.
"Sophia, stand up," said Ugolini, touching her shoulder. "This is embarrassing."
Vittorio helped her to her feet, holding her waist more tightly than was necessary.
Embarrassing? If not for my outburst, there would be no hope of freeing Daoud.
But I must live in terror awhile longer. Until I know he is well. That they have not done anything to him. Oh, God, let him come back to me healthy and whole.
Rachel sat on a divan by the window in her room. She had drawn the curtains back and pushed the shutters open so that she could see out and feel the cool breeze. She held a small leather-bound book in her hand,Geography of the World, by Yucaf ibn Faruzi, a Spanish Jew. It was one of the small store of books Angelo had owned, written in Hebrew, that she had kept with her to help her pass the long hours she spent alone. Besides enjoying reading, she felt she was somehow pleasing Angelo, who had taught her to read Hebrew.
She was reading about Egypt when the second storm of the morning struck Orvieto and the window no longer admitted enough light to read by. A few water droplets blew in through the open window to fall on the open pages. She carefully blotted them up with the hem of her satin robe, but she was afraid more rain would damage the vellum pages. So she shut the book, and watched the lightning flash and listened to the thunder.
Tilia's house was built halfway down an incline, so Sophia could see water foaming in the ditch that ran through the center of the street. So heavy was the rain that waves were flowing down the cobblestones. Where a raindrop struck the water, the splash was like a little crown.
A dark shadow appeared at the high end of the street, a hooded figure. Another followed, and another. They rose higher and higher, until she could see that they were riding horses. What were men doing out in a storm like this? Were they coming here?
They were. The first men reined up their horses outside Tilia's front door, dismounted, and moved to the shelter of the overhanging houses across the street. More men on horses, some on mules, and many more on foot, gathered outside the house. All wore hoods or broad-brimmed hats to keep the rain from their heads. Rachel'sheart began to thud in her chest when she saw there were too many for her to count. She saw the gleam of helmets under some of the hoods, the wet glitter of mail when an arm or leg emerged from a cloak. A train of mules carrying heavy packs came down the street and stopped.
Rachel began to tremble. These men had not come for pleasure. There were too many of them, and their dress and manner was full of menace. She was glad that the heavy rain forced them to keep their heads down; otherwise, one of them might have looked up here and seen her. She drew back a little from the window.
A line of covered carts drawn by pairs of mules pulled up behind the crowd of armed men. The cart in the lead was bright yellow and red, and its paint glistened wetly.
Did anyone else in the house know this crowd was out there? Perhaps no one else was looking out a window. She ran to the door of her room, just as she heard a pounding from below.
Then there were shouts, bangs, and crashes, the shrill shattering of glass and porcelain, the heavy thumps of bodies falling. Rachel opened her door. Other doors swung open along the shadowy third-floor corridor. Someone stepped out with a candle. Frightened women's faces were white in the candlelight. She saw Antonia, Angela, Gloria.
She did not see Tilia. She must still be with Sophia, wherever they had gone this morning.
Oh, if only Sophia had taken me with her as I begged her to. I knew something terrible was going to happen.
"What is it?" the women cried to one another. "Who is down there? Wounds of Jesus!"
Cassio emerged from Francesca's room, tying the drawstring of his hose. He was a big man, his bare chest matted with black hair, and the sight of him comforted Rachel until she looked into his face as he hurried past her and saw that it was tight and pale with fear. And he was carrying a naked shortsword.
But Cassio's appearance emboldened the women, and they left their rooms to crowd toward the top of the stairs that led to the lower floors. Rachel joined them.
"I saw a lot of men outside," Rachel told the others, her heart battering against her breastbone. "Armed men, with horses and mules and wagons."
Antonia, a round-faced woman, hair dyed red with henna, pulled her robe around her. "Another party setting out for Perugia, I suppose. They probably stopped by for a little farewell fun."
"Then why are they fighting downstairs?" Francesca said, anxiety sharpening her voice.
Thunder shook the house, drowning out the clamor of the brawling two stories below. Then Rachel heard the clang of steel and Cassio's voice crying out angrily.
The carpeted stairs at the end of the corridor shook under heavy feet. Women's screams, mingled with the cries of men, arose on the lower floors. She pushed her way to the head of the stairs and looked down.
A group of men were coming up. They had thrown back the hoods of their brown cloaks, and their pointed helmets reflected the candlelight. Rachel backed away as she saw that the half-dozen men with helmets were brandishing long broad-bladed daggers.
The women around her started screaming and darting back into their rooms. Rachel bolted for her own room.
"Rei-cho!" The man's shrill cry shot an arrow of terror through her. That was John's voice.
She turned in the doorway of her room and saw the Tartar standing at the head of the stairs, his soft black cap hiding most of his white hair. Beside him was a stocky, middle-aged woman, and flanking them were the swarthy men with their daggers. John and the other men were all smiling, as if, as Antonia had said, they had come only for a bit of pleasure. But the tumult downstairs, shaking the house more than the thunder, belied that.
John spoke to the woman and she called to Rachel. "Signore John must go to Perugia." Her Italian was strangely accented. "He wishes you to come with him. He will give you many costly gifts."
Rachel took a step backward into her room. "No. I do not want to go."
Not now. Not when Sophia had just come to tell her they were going to take her south with them. South to Manfred's kingdom, where Jews were treated like everyone else. Where she might yet find a place for herself and forget that she had sold her body.
John and the woman advanced down the corridor, their guards with them. Some of the swarthy men pushed open the doors of the rooms they passed and looked in. The doors could not be barred from the inside. Tilia had always insisted on that, so no client could lock himself in with a woman and harm her. The men with the daggers grinned at one another and talked in a strange language.
"No, I don't want to go!" Rachel screamed. She darted into her room and slammed the door. Frantically, she looked around for something to hold it shut.
The door started to open, and she threw herself against it. Itclosed for a moment. Then she was hurled away from it as it swung inward, John behind it. She screamed in fear.
The Tartar, who was not much taller than Rachel, strode into the room. He walked with what appeared to be a swagger because he was slightly bowlegged. He was talking rapidly in his language, advancing on Rachel and smiling. He held out his arms. The stout woman stood in the doorway, watching without expression.
Rachel backed away from them, her body rigid.
"You must come with him now. He is in a great hurry. An army of the pope's enemies is less that a day from Orvieto, and they want to take Signore John and Signore Philip prisoner."
"Then let him escape," Rachel cried. "I do not want to go with him." She was standing before her bed now. The woman spoke to John and he answered quickly, still smiling.
"He says you are precious to him and he cannot leave you," she said tonelessly.
She had to get away now, or be John's prisoner for the rest of her life.
Panting more from fury than from exertion, Rachel made a sudden jump to her right, and when John stepped in that direction to grab her, she darted to the left and ran out the door. John's translator made no effort to stop her.
That would not have fooled him, except that he was not expecting me to do anything, she thought as she ran down the corridor.
She held one thought in her mind—she must get out of this building. She heard screams and sounds of struggle from the rooms of the other women. She saw Francesca fighting with a helmeted man, and her eyes met Francesca's over the man's brown-cloaked shoulder. Only one of the dagger-wielding men was in the corridor now, and she had surprised him. He shouted at her and ran after her.
Gathering up the skirt of her robe, she raced down the stairs, taking the last four in a leap. The dark man with the dagger was right behind her, and behind him she could hear John's shout. There was anger in the Tartar's voice now. That terrified her even more.
He did not think I would get away from him this easily.
The dark man grabbed her flying robe, and she felt the silk tear. She had nothing on underneath the robe. She would not let that stop her from running. She must not let anything stop her.
She heard the man behind her calling as she ran down the stairs to the first floor. She was in the corridor now, and she saw that it was swarming with men in helmets and mail, struggling with Tilia's women. Some of the men had their breeches down.
She saw tall, beautiful Maiga striking out with her fists at thehelmeted men. But they were wrestling with her and forcing her onto her back. Agonized pity for Maiga blazed up within her, but she ran on.
One of Tilia's black African servants was lying on the floor across the corridor. His eyes were open and he was not moving. Again she felt a surge of pity.
But then terror gripped her.
They are killing people here! My God, what are they doing, what are they doing?
Instead of going on down the stairs from the first floor gallery to the ground floor, she leapt over the body of the black man and ran into the crowd of men and women struggling in the hall.
I am small and I am quick, she thought, and that gave her the courage to keep running. The men in the hall were not interested in her, and she slithered past them while John and his bodyguard stumbled along behind.
The bodyguard's voice sounded far away. Other men were shouting at him.
"Catch her yourself, you damned Armenian ape!" These men were speaking in Italian. "We've already got ours."
Rachel reached the stairs at the other end of the corridor. They led down to the same place as did the main stairs, the reception room on the ground floor. But her pursuers would not know that. Sure enough, they were following her through this first-floor corridor. She glanced back and saw that the crowd of Italian men had gotten in their way, so that half the corridor was between them.
Run, Rachel!
Frantically she ran down to the first floor. There, horror greeted her. More of Tilia's black men—she could not count—were sprawled around the reception hall.
She saw blood spattered over the frescoes. She saw a black arm lying by itself. One body had no head. She heard a scream of horror and knew it was her own voice. Why were they doing this? What devils drove them? There was blood all over the floor. Puddles of it. She had to dart around them, over them.
Terror streaked through her as a tall man blocked her path. His hood was thrown back and his cloak was open, and a jeweled cross glittered on his chest—like the one Tilia wore, only three times bigger. Their eyes met; his were staring and full of rage. His nose was big, and his mouth was small and cruel. He pointed a long finger at her, a fortune in jeweled rings glittering on his gloved hand.
"You! The one we came for! Stop!"
She stood paralyzed as a recollection of the dread face before her flashed into her mind. Dinners for John and Philip—Tilia had given elegant dinners, three or four of them—with musicians and the companionship of her ladies, Rachel included.
And this was how they repaid her courtesy.
This man had been a guest at those dinners. He was a man of very high rank, a cardinal in the Christian Church. He was French, she remembered. His Italian words were heavily accented.
What will they do to me if I don't obey him? Will they burn me for being a Jew?
And there was the other Tartar, Philip, standing beside the French churchman. He looked like John—round head, brown skin, slitted eyes—except that his beard and mustache were black. He was carrying a bow in one hand and had a quiver full of arrows slung over one shoulder. Rachel froze, like a rabbit trapped by two wolves.
The tall Frenchman reached for Rachel—but another figure appeared between them, one of Tilia's black men. He blocked the tall man with the cross, giving Rachel a chance to jump for the door.
Out of the corner of her eye Rachel saw Philip, strong white teeth gleaming in a brown face, raise his bow. She heard the thrum of the string, and then a piercing scream. Anguish for the black man welled up in her.
Her torn robe was flapping as she ran out the door. She almost fell as someone seized the back of her robe and yanked on it. She twisted out of the robe and ran on, naked.
She heard John's shrill voice. He had reached the ground floor.
She was out of the house. In an instant her bare body was rain-wet from head to toe.
A group of big men holding horses stood across the street, under the overhang of the house opposite Tilia's. They were wearing swords and purple surcoats over mail shirts. They looked at her gloomily and made no move to stop her.
She had no idea where to go, but downhill was the easiest direction. Maybe hide in an alley. Knock on a door and beg for help. Try to get across town to Sophia.
Anywhere, if only she could get away from John.
Many times she had nightmares of running from something that was trying to kill her. Sometimes a monster or a demon. Sometimes from crowds of roaring people carrying torches. Always in those dreams she could not make her legs move. It was like trying to run through water. Always she tried to scream for help and no sound would come from her throat but a whisper.
Now she was able to run full speed away from that house wheredeath and destruction were running riot. And running as fast as she could was not enough! It would not get her away fast enough from John and his armed men and that horrible cardinal. She was able to scream at the top of her lungs, but to no avail. Nobody would come to rescue her. Nobody would help her.
She had also had nightmares about running through the street naked, with hundreds of people watching. In those dreams she had been horribly embarrassed. Now she was really doing it, and she did not care about her nakedness.
She darted past the carts and the horses and mules and their drivers that filled the street from side to side. She was running naked and barefoot over the cobblestones.
She ran past the red and yellow cart at the head of the line of wagons and saw sitting beside the driver a man with a full white beard. He was looking down at her. For a moment she thought he was a rabbi. Then she saw his shaven scalp and brown robe. One of those Christian begging monks. He opened his mouth to say something to her, but she was past him already.
She heard hoofbeats behind her, and gooseflesh broke out all over her naked body.
Dear God, is he chasing me on horseback?
But she could dart into a quintana, the space between two houses. It would be too narrow for a man on horseback to follow her. She saw an opening on her left and made for it, begging God to help her run faster.
She felt something whip around her body, tearing her skin. She was jerked off her feet. She fell on her back on the wet cobblestones. She lay helpless, stunned and gasping for air. A rope was cutting into her chest just below her breasts, pinning her arms above the elbows to her sides. The rope burned her. Her back felt scraped and bruised. She saw a horse's legs beside her. John was grinning down at her, holding the other end of the rope. The rain pouring down in her face stung her eyes.
Now that she knew she was caught and helpless, her terror was transmuted into rage. What right had he to treat her this way?
"May God strike you dead!" she spat. He might not know the words, but she was sure he could hear the hatred in her voice.
He tugged on the rope to make her climb to her feet. She felt she would rather lie there and make him drag her, if he wanted her so badly, but she realized that would only hurt her worse.
She took a grip on the rope to haul herself up. The cold rain beat down, plastering her hair to her head. She wanted to wipe her face, but her arms were pinioned. Her back felt as if it were on fire.
She looked at Tilia's house and saw that a man's body was swinging, sodden and limp, above the door.
Her stomach turning at the sight, she recognized Cassio's features in the swollen, blackened face. They had hanged him from Tilia's crenellated balcony. And she had always thought he was such a big, tough man. She felt a stab of pity for him, even though he had never been especially nice to her.
Her heart grew heavier and colder in her chest as the horror sank in. These men had destroyed Tilia's house, killed the men and raped the women with the gleeful cruelty of small boys stoning a bird's nest.
Another jerk on the rope started her walking back up the street. She kept her eyes down to avoid the sight of Cassio's body.
As they passed the yellow cart, a voice called out to the Tartar, and he answered briefly in what seemed to be his own language. Again the voice, and there was command in the tone. John reined his horse to a stop.
Apprehension filled her. What new indignity would she have to suffer?
Very slowly, the brown-robed Christian priest climbed down from the cart. He pulled his hood up against the rain. Rachel put one hand between her legs and tried to cover her breasts with her forearm, lest he be offended. Fear and the cold rain beating down on her naked flesh made her shiver violently. She could not hope for kindness from this white-bearded man. After all, as a priest he must condemn her as a harlot. And if he found out she was a Jew, he would despise her all the more.
The priest reached up into the cart and took down a long walking staff and a gray blanket. Leaning on the staff, he approached her slowly. Looking at her very sadly, unconcerned about the rain soaking his robe, he draped the blanket over her head and shoulders. She gripped the edges of the blanket and pulled it across her. As long as John's rope stayed slack, the blanket would cover her, although it was already cold and heavy with rainwater.
The kindness in the seamed, bearded face warmed Rachel, and she dropped to her knees before him.
"Help me, Father," she begged. "Do not let him take me away from here."
"Get up, child." Leaning heavily on the staff with one hand, he used the other to help her to her feet, and she saw how stiffly he moved and heard him give a little groan of pain.
"You are hurt, Father."
"Just a few old broken bones," he said. "It has been months, and they are mending well enough."
He reached under the blanket that covered her, and she shrank away from his hand.
"Forgive me," he said. "I mean no harm." Without looking at her, and hardly touching her, he managed to loosen the rope around her chest so that it fell to the ground. She stepped out of the loop, and it slid away from her. She looked up and saw John coil the rope and tie it to his saddle. His face was reddened and his mouth compressed with anger.
"It is useless to try to outrun a Tartar on horseback," said the priest. "They are like centaurs. What is your name, child?"
As she told him, Rachel felt a glimmering of hope. The priest had spoken to John in his own language, and the Tartar seemed to have some respect for him. At least he was no longer trying to drag her away.
"I am Friar Mathieu d'Alcon," said the white-bearded priest. "What does this man want with you?"
Rachel felt a blush burn her face.
"He has lain with me, and he paid money to me and Madama Tilia," Rachel said, barely able to choke out the admission of her shame. "Now he is leaving Orvieto, and he wants to take me with him."
Friar Mathieu sighed and shook his head. "And so young. Jesus, be merciful." He turned to John and spoke to him in a soft, reasonable voice. Rachel sensed that the priest was chiding the Tartar gently. John's answer was a series of short phrases, shrill with anger. He finished by slicing the air with his hand in a gesture of flat refusal. Rachel's heart grew heavy with despair.
"He will not listen to me," said the friar. "He thinks he has a right to take you. His customs are not ours."
"But you are a priest. Does he not have to do what you tell him?"
"Sometimes he does what I tell him to, because heisa Christian, and I have been his companion and confessor for some years. But he is more Tartar than Christian, and Tartars keep many women."
Rachel's limbs turned to ice. "Does he think he owns me?"
Colder than the rain pouring down on her was the terror of being torn from the few friends she had, to be used for pleasure by a man who could not even speak to her. She put her hands to her face and started to sob heavily.
A burst of loud laughter from John made her look up. At first she thought he was laughing at her tears, but he was pointing atCassio's dangling body. Still chuckling, he said something to Friar Mathieu.
"He says that man used to be the stud bull hereabouts. Now he is dead beef."
Rachel shook her head. "He has no pity for Cassio—nor for me." Filled with revulsion, she thought she would rather die than spend the rest of her life with that brute.
Friar Mathieu looked off into the distance. "That is how it is with the Tartars."
Rachel shuddered. To John, Cassio was just a bundle of rags to be laughed at, and she was a plaything to be dragged through the world.
"Please help me get away," she begged Friar Mathieu. "I think I will kill myself if I have to stay with him."
Friar Mathieu closed his eyes in pain. "Do not talk that way, my child. Every person's life belongs to God."
Another voice boomed down at them from above, speaking a language Rachel had heard before but did not know. The sour-faced man with the big nose peered at them out of a cavernous hood. The French cardinal. He towered over them on a great black horse. Rachel shuddered at the sight of him.
"Pardonnez-moi, votr'Eminence," said Friar Mathieu calmly. He went on, in what must have been French, to say something which she supposed from his gestures was about John and her.
The cardinal's reply seemed as loud as thunder. He pointed at Rachel, and she cringed away. What was he saying, that she belonged to John?
Feeling hopeless, Rachel stood weeping silently while the priest and the cardinal argued what was to become of her in a language she did not understand.
Has God abandoned me because I have sinned?
She looked at Tilia's house, at the horrid sight of the hanged man above the door, cries of women barely audible over the rumble of thunder and the pounding of rain on the pavement. She saw men carrying boxes and bundles of cloth out the front door and realized that they were ransacking the place.
Cold horror swept her as she realized she was going to lose everything. Everything she had earned by her shame was in a chest in Tilia's room.
Friar Mathieu cried out something in French. In the midst of her misery, Rachel was shocked to see a beggar-priest publicly chastising a cardinal.
The cardinal stared at the friar, seemingly also shocked. He blinked as lightning flashed overhead.
Rachel said, "Good Father—"
The cardinal found his voice and roared back at the friar, jabbing a bejeweled finger at Rachel and turning on her a glare of utter contempt. His look hurt Rachel as much as if he had hit her in the face with dung. She pulled the soaking blanket tighter around herself. She saw that, staunch as the friar might be, all the power was on the other side.
"Father," she said, "if nothing can stop them from taking me, at least let me get the things I own from the house. My clothes and books." She did not mention the bags of gold ducats in Tilia's chest, though John might know of them. "Let me take them with me and travel with you."
Friar Mathieu nodded and spoke again angrily to the cardinal.
The cardinal yanked on the reins of his horse, turning the black head around, up the street. He flung his answer over his shoulder.
Friar Mathieu turned a sad face toward Rachel. "He says you and I and John can go back into the house and get what belongs to you. And you can travel in my cart. But I am not to interfere if the Tartar desires you." He shook his head. "I promise you, child, as long as you are with me, John will not touch you. I was a knight before I was a priest. They can make me stand by and witness murder and robbery. But not rape."
Rachel looked up to see John grinning at her with proprietary pride. Like Rachel, he had not understood a word of the argument between the friar and the cardinal, but he understood well enough that Rachel was still his prisoner.
She felt a little better for having an ally in Friar Mathieu. But she promised herself that whatever John might think, he would never take her back to his country. She really would kill herself first.
The storm had passed over Orvieto by the time the cart carrying Rachel was bumping along the road to Perugia. As she sat on a bench beside the old priest, looking out through the open front end of the cart, Rachel saw patches of blue sky above the hills to the northeast.
John had gone with Friar Mathieu and helped him find her chest in Tilia's room and the key to the padlock, hidden under Tilia's mattress. He had ordered two of his Armenian guards to carry the chest out for Rachel and load it in the back of the cart, along with another chest of her books and clothing. He himself had smilinglyhanded her the key. As if he expected her to be grateful, she thought.
So she was still a wealthy woman, Rachel thought bitterly, even though she was also a prisoner.
With Friar Mathieu sitting on the bench up front beside the driver, she had gone to the back of the cart and opened both chests to make sure everything was there, even hefting the bags of gold. Then she had dried herself off and put on a bright blue linen tunic.
On the outside she was more comfortable now; within, desolate. Even though Tilia had sold her to the Tartar, Tilia's house had been home to her for nearly a year. She had come to know the men whom today she had seen murdered, and the women who had been forcibly taken by the Tartars' bodyguards. They and Sophia, David, and Lorenzo were the only friends she had known since Angelo was killed. Now she would never see them again.
She had not felt so wretched since the night of Angelo's death.
To comfort herself, she took out the Hebrew prayer book Angelo had given her. To have light to read by, she would have to go to the front of the cart and sit beside Friar Mathieu. The sight of her prayer book might turn the old priest against her. She remembered Angelo telling her how priests at Paris had burned a thousand or more volumes of the Talmud. Tears had come to his eyes at the thought of so many holy books, lovingly copied by hand, destroyed.
But Friar Mathieu had been kind to her even when she admitted that she had lain with the Tartar for money. He did not seem like the kind of man who would despise her for being a Jew.
Right now she desperately needed to be able to trust someone, and she decided that she could trust Friar Mathieu.
Balancing herself against the swaying of the cart, she climbed on the bench beside the old priest.
Her book was a collection of writings and prayers, including passages from the Torah. Some rabbi, or perhaps more than one, with quill pens and parchments, had taken years and years to copy it out. She had marked the Psalms with a ribbon and turned to them now.
For lowly people You save, but haughty eyes You bring low ...
For the first time since she had seen those hooded riders approaching Tilia's house, she felt some measure of peace.
After a moment she realized Friar Mathieu was reading over her shoulder. Fear chilled her.
"One rarely finds amanlearned enough to read Hebrew," said Friar Mathieu gently. "In a woman as young as yourself it is positively miraculous."
She smiled timidly in answer to the kindliness in his eyes. "Myhusband was a seller of books. He taught me to read the language of our ancestors."
"Your husband?" His eyes, their blue irises pale with age, opened wider. "You have been married?" He shook his head. "People never cease to surprise me. I would like to know you better, child. Will you tell me about your life?"
His gentle tone gave her heart. Not since Sophia had talked to her on the road from Rome to Orvieto had anybody been interested in who she was. Talking to this good priest about her past, she could forget for a while the terror of present and future. She would tell him everything.
Daoud suddenly realized that droplets of moisture had appeared on the grayish-yellow wall near his face. How long the water had been forming he did not, could not, know. Long enough for some of the droplets to coalesce and run down the wall, where they joined a line of dampness where the floor met the wall.
He wondered where the water was coming from. It might be raining outside, above this dungeon. It would take, he thought, a very great rainstorm for the water to seep through down here.
He lay on his stomach on the rack table, his stretched arms and legs feeling like blocks of wood. He had no idea how much time had passed since d'Ucello left him with the threat that when he returned he would burn Daoud's manhood away with Greek Fire. Most of that time he had been awake, but had been dreaming of the paradise of the Hashishiyya.
Erculio had slept on a pile of rags in a corner of the dungeon, leaving it to the guards to make sure that d'Ucello's order was carried out and Daoud remained awake. The guards were, as Erculio must have known they would be, halfhearted about carrying out their mandate. They poked and struck him with sticks at intervals, but they did not try to injure him. Daoud was even able to sleep for brief periods between their proddings. They let most ofthe candles in the dungeon go out, leaving the great stone chamber in semidarkness.
Erculio managed to talk to him when the two guards were dozing. He held up what looked like a large pearl.
"There is a swift-acting poison sealed inside this glass ball. When he comes to burn your prickle off, I will slip it into your mouth. When you feel the fire, break the ball with your teeth and swallow. It will look as though the pain killed you. If you can manage it, swallow the glass, too, so they do not find it in your mouth after you're dead."
So calm did Daoud's Sufi training keep him that he was able to wonder where Erculio had got such a thing, and how the poison was sealed inside the ball, and what kind of poison it was. He could even think calmly about what it would feel like when the poison was killing him.
Erculio was taking a huge chance, he realized. D'Ucello might well discover that poison had killed Daoud; the podesta was a very clever and knowledgeable man. And if he did discover the poison, he would, of course, reason that Erculio had done it. In the midst of his calm, Daoud felt admiration for the little bent man's courage.
Inevitably with the passing of so many hours, the pain of the cuts and bruises and burns he had already suffered, and the ache of lying in the same position with his limbs stretched beyond endurance, would at times break through the mental wall he had built up against it. Remembering the words of Sheikh Saadi—If pain comes despite your training, invite it into your soul's tent as you would a welcome guest—he allowed the pain to wash over him. And when the first acute shock of it had passed, he was able to restore the wall.
From time to time he would think of what was soon going to happen to him. And it would be like a spear of ice driven into his heart. Again, he let himself feel the terror, the anguish, the agonized wondering,When will he come?and then, when his mind was numbed by the horror of it, cast it out again.
If he had not had the training of those two great and very different masters, Sheikh Saadi and Fayum al-Burz, he would have been mad with terror by now. Each time the door to the dungeon opened, the spear of ice pierced him again. Would it be now that he would lose his manhood in pain beyond imagining, pain so great that he would gladly die at once?
When no one was nearby, Erculio came close, cursed at him loudly, punched him, and whispered, "He is gone much longerthan he said he would be. It is late afternoon. I told you he does not want to do this."
But he will do it, Daoud thought.
Sometime later—Daoud could not tell how long—the door swung open and d'Ucello strode in. Daoud let the cold fear flood into him. He even let himself whimper a bit. The tide of maddening terror reached its height and then receded, and he was in command of himself again.
The two guards snapped to attention, and Erculio scurried over to him. The podesta's face was set, and when he came close to Daoud, there was pain in his eyes.
"Has he spoken?" he said to Erculio.
"Not a word, Signore, and I have made him suffer greatly."
I shall be leaving this world just moments from now. I will fix my thoughts on God.
"I gave you more time than I intended to," d'Ucello said to Daoud. "There was a small battaglia at a bordello on the east side of town. A place you are familiar with. The house run by that fat old whore, Tilia Caballo. Where, according to her testimony, you were when the French cavaliere was murdered outside Cardinal Ugolini's. Your putana friend has been despoiled, I fear, and many of her menservants killed and her women hurt."
Rachel.
He desperately wanted to know whether Rachel had been hurt, and he dared not speak of her to d'Ucello. Anguish for Rachel cracked his armor against fear. He saw what was going to happen to him, felt the liquid fire, saw his death. Cold sweat broke out on his body.
He tried to turn his mind back to Tilia's house.
And Tilia, what of Tilia?
It surprised him that his anxiety for Tilia was so strong. She had come to be his friend without his ever realizing it.
He thought of Francesca, who had comforted him so during his first months in Orvieto. Of the women who had helped him initiate Sordello. All of them no doubt raped, and perhaps hurt in other ways besides.
The savages! This would never have happened in El Kahira.
It was safe enough to ask, "Who did it?"
"The ambassadors from Tartary and their guards, as they were leaving Orvieto to follow the pope to Perugia. The French Cardinal de Verceuil was there and, far from trying to prevent the wickedness, urged them on. It seems you dislike the Tartars with good reason."
The podesta paused. He still hoped, Daoud realized, to provoke or invite him into letting something slip.
If it was the Tartars, they must have come for Rachel.
D'Ucello picked up the flask of Greek Fire from the table, where it had stood these many hours, where Daoud could plainly see it. He had, most of the time, avoided looking at it.
"Were any of the women taken away?" Daoud asked. That, too, should be a safe question. Every moment he and d'Ucello talked, d'Ucello hoping he might yet learn something, was another moment of wholeness and life.
But I must not deceive myself. These are only moments. I affirm that God is One. God be merciful. God receive me. I die as Your warrior.
"Yes," said d'Ucello, eyeing him thoughtfully. "Did you have reason to think someone would be carried off?"
It hurt Daoud's neck to turn and try to look into d'Ucello's face. Daoud let his head fall to the table on which he lay.
"I visited there often. I made friends with some of the women."
D'Ucello snorted. "From now on you will have no need to go to bordellos."
To gain another moment, Daoud said, "I marvel that you possess Greek Fire. The making of it is a great secret, and it is too dangerous to transport far. If a bit of it gets loose on a ship, that ship is seen no more."
D'Ucello squinted at him. "If you were truly only a trader from Trebizond, you would be too terrified to wonder where I got this stuff."
"Allow me at the last a bit of dignity," Daoud pleaded, looking up at d'Ucello. He saw guilt in d'Ucello's shifting eyes.
"A member of the Knights Templar back from the Holy Land let me copy the formula," said d'Ucello. "Out of curiosity, I had an alchemist make it for me."
"Curiosity is a worthier motive than torture," said Daoud, hoping he was undermining d'Ucello's resolution and making the podesta feel ashamed.
But the dark eyes flashed angrily. "That is enough. Turn him on his back, Erculio. You should have done that already."
I pushed him too far, Daoud thought despairingly.
"Yes, Signore." Erculio beckoned the guards. "Here, you two. Help me."
When his arms and legs were untied, Daoud groaned at the sudden release of the tension in stiffened muscles. A savage pain tore through the numbness in his limbs.
"Be still, whoreson!" Erculio snarled, clamping a hand over Daoud's mouth. Daoud felt the glass ball pressed against his lips, and opened his mouth to receive it.
The ball was not large, about half the size of a pigeon's egg, but it felt huge in his mouth. Thinking about the swift death it held within it, Daoud wondered if it would be easy or hard to break the glass.
They were tying his hands again, and he had the ball under his tongue. If he tried to speak now, d'Ucello would know he had something in his mouth. No more delaying by talking to the podesta.
"Strip off his loincloth," said d'Ucello, and Erculio tore it away. Holding the flask in one hand, d'Ucello leaned forward, peering at Daoud's groin. Daoud could feel his penis and scrotum shrinking.
What fools we men are to be so proud of our members, and think them such sources of power. How truly vulnerable is that little bit of flesh.
One moment he was able to think, the next he was adrift on a sea of terror. His naked body shook violently as d'Ucello scrutinized him. He struggled to keep his Sufi training in mind. Only that could help him now to die bravely.
"He is circumcised," said d'Ucello, his black eyebrows twisting in a frown.
Oh, God! Cloud his mind.
"What do we know of that place he comes from?" said Erculio. "Trebizond? Maybe all the men in Trebizond are circumcised."
"Only Jews are circumcised," said d'Ucello. "And Saracens." He brought his face closer to Daoud's. "Speak, man. Why is your foreskin cut off?"
"How could he be a Saracen or a Jew?" said Erculio. "He looks like a Frank."
"Shut up," said d'Ucello impatiently. "I want to hear his answer."
Daoud lay motionless, praying that God would let d'Ucello kill him and be done with it.
"Are you part of some Jewish plot?" d'Ucello demanded.
Daoud almost smiled at that, but he only looked up at the blackened ceiling beam and said nothing.
"Answer me!" d'Ucello growled. He shook the flask at Daoud.
Daoud closed his eyes. Now the fire would come.
He heard a hammering at the wooden door on the other side of the dungeon. One of the guards went to open it at d'Ucello's command.
Another delay! Now he was almost frantic for it to end. He was tempted to bite down on the little glass ball. Why must he wait and wait for that terrible flame to burn away his life?
"Signore!" Daoud turned his head and saw the clerk called Vincenzo in the doorway of the dungeon. Beside him was a man in orange and green, the colors of the Monaldeschi family. Daoud remembered the thick black brows and the stern face, the grizzled hair. He had seen this man the night of the contessa's reception for the Tartars.
"The Contessa di Monaldeschi's steward brings a message from her," Vincenzo said.
With a sigh d'Ucello set the flask of Greek Fire on the table beside Daoud. In the sigh Daoud heard, not impatience, but relief. D'Ucello was glad to put off doing this unspeakable thing, but it meant only that Daoud would have to endure a longer wait.
Because he does not want to torture me, I suffer the more.
D'Ucello was still hoping the waiting would break him. And it might. In spite of all his training, in spite of the Soma that kept him calm and held the pain away, Daoud felt himself at the very edge of his endurance. He just might break.
The podesta, the clerk, and the contessa's steward muttered together by the door of the dungeon. Turning his head, Daoud could watch them.
D'Ucello was jabbing his hands furiously toward the steward. He was having trouble keeping his voice down.
"This is intolerable!" he cried.
The steward took a step backward, but he kept his face set. He spoke in a voice too low for Daoud to hear.
"Fires of hell!" D'Ucello shook both clenched fists over his head.
He turned and pointed at Daoud. "Keep that one there on the rack till I return, Erculio."
"Where is my Signore going?"
D'Ucello opened his mouth. His face grew redder in the torchlight, and he closed it again.
"I will not be gone very long," he said. "I have topersuadesomeone of something."
"Shall I torment this fellow while you are gone?"
"Do as you please. At least see that he gets no rest."
He strode across the room to glare down at Daoud. "You will keep your manhood for another hour or so. By God's grace you have more time to think. About what will happen to you and howyou can save yourself. Do not think you have escaped. I will be back."
He lifted his hand. A bolt of panic shot through Daoud as he thought that if d'Ucello hit him hard enough he might break the ball of poison in his mouth. He held himself rigid.
D'Ucello lowered his hand.
"Damn you!" he snarled, and turned away.
Now Daoud wished d'Ucellohadbroken the glass ball. He would have to lie for hours longer now, waiting for pain and death. The thought of those hours was in itself more agonizing than all the tortures he had so far suffered. But God had chosen to let him live a little longer, and he must accept these moments of life.
"According to Vincenzo," Erculio whispered, "the contessa ordered the podesta to stop torturing you. Your allies must have gotten to her."
The guards and the clerk had left, but Daoud heard their excited voices beyond the partly open door. Erculio now had a chance to take out the poison ball. The inside of Daoud's mouth ached from holding the delicate orb, and he sighed with relief.
"There is more," Erculio said. "An army of Sienese Ghibellini passed through Montefiascone this morning. We have known that the Sienese were marching against Orvieto, but we were not aware they were almost upon us. The contessa and the podesta must discuss the defense as well as your fate."
Lorenzo was with that army, Daoud thought. Lorenzo might be able to rescue him if he got here in time.
"I fear it will be no better for you than before," Erculio went on. "D'Ucello knows how to make the contessa see things his way. He will probably persuade her that you must be tortured. And since he suspects you of being a Ghibellino agent, he will want you dead before the Ghibellini army comes."
"As God wills," Daoud croaked. A numbness had come over him as if he were already dead. This was older and simpler and more effective than the techniques of Sufi and Hashishiyya. This deadness was his body's final answer to a night and a day of unbearable pain and fear.
The woman's shoulders shook, and she rocked back and forth. She could not speak. Tilia sat on Sophia's bed holding the sobbing woman in her arms.
Tilia, calling her Francesca, tried to calm her. Sophia at first had thought Francesca was a madwoman. Her tunic was torn and rain-wet, her long black hair not bound up and covered but in wild disarray.
"You are safe now, piccione," Tilia kept saying. "Calm down and tell us what happened." Tilia herself was pale, her wide mouth drawn tight.
Seeing even Tilia's face grim, Sophia felt a chill of apprehension and an even greater anxiety to know what this was all about.
"I know I should not come here, Madama. Forgive me. But I did not know what else to do. I walked so far to get here, and I kept getting lost, and I was afraid to ask anyone where Cardinal Ugolini's mansion was."
"How did you know I was here, Francesca?" Tilia asked.
"Cassio told me just before—before—" Francesca was convulsed with sobs.
Tilia turned to Sophia. "I have never seen her like this."
"Your house is destroyed," said Francesca, choking and gasping and wiping her nose on her sleeve.
"Destroyed!" Tilia and Sophia stared at each other. A shock of fear swept through Sophia. Already terrified for Daoud, she was now swept by dread for Rachel and pity for Tilia.
Any more of this, and I will lose my wits.
"And they hanged Cassio."
"Oh, my God!" Tilia screamed.
Another jolt of terror. Sophia thought of that day in Constantinople when the Franks had run riot, burning whole districts and murdering townspeople. Was this another such day?
"And they—and they killed Hector and Claudio and Apollonio and the other menservants."
"Who did this?" Tilia was on her feet, standing over Francesca, shouting. "Who? Who?"
Was the whole world turning against them, Sophia wondered. Was it the podesta's men? The Monaldeschi?
Francesca put her hands over her face and wept softly for a moment, then continued. "The Tartars and that French cardinal who always came with them. They came with armed men, dozens of them. They were after Rachel."
Rachel!
The horror of it all was like a spear driven through Sophia's breast. She sat down on her bed as the room went black around her.
"Oh, no," she heard herself saying. "Oh, not Rachel!" Fear stopped her heart. She slumped on the bed, her hand pressed to her chest.
"When Cassio tried to stop them, they went mad," said Francesca. "The men-at-arms killed every man in the house, and they raped all the women. Some of us over and over again. And they tore the house apart and stole everything they could carry. What they could not take, they smashed. And all the while they kept laughing, Madama. They kept laughing."
Sophia felt bile burning in her throat. If she had to hear any more horrors, she was going to vomit.
Tilia sat looking stunned, shaking her head from side to side.
"What happened to Rachel?" Sophia managed to choke out.
"She tried to run away. She got out of the house. The white-haired Tartar, the one who beds with her, chased her. He must have caught her, because I heard the cardinal shouting that they had found the one they came for and they must get on the road or they would be fighting the Sienese."
Rachel wanted to come here with me this morning, Sophia thought.If only I had brought her here, we could have saved her.She sobbed aloud. Her stomach hurt.
"May God rot all of them with leprosy," said Tilia. She hugged Francesca hard, and then stood up.
"I must go to my house."
Going back to Tilia's would not help Rachel, Sophia thought. They had probably lost her forever. Despair dragged her down.Rachel, Rachel!What were they doing to her?
"First David is arrested. Now this," she said, tears running steadily down her cheeks.
I had trusted Daoud to foresee danger and guide us through it, Sophia thought.And now Daoud—
She still did not know whether Daoud was safe, or even still alive. Would the contessa be able to stop whatever was being done to Daoud? That had been quite enough to be terrified about.
Francesca's tear-reddened eyes widened. "David has been arrested?" Something in her tone told Sophia there had been something between Francesca and David.
Of course, she told herself.Did you think the man slept alone until you gave yourself to him?
She and Francesca shared some of the same grief. Sophia wanted to console her.
"Cardinal Ugolini has persuaded the Contessa di Monaldeschi to intercede for David," Sophia told her, "and the cardinal has gone to the Palazzo del Podesta, hoping to bring David back here again."
"It may be hours before David is released," said Tilia, raising a cautioning hand. "Ifthe podesta does agree. Or he may persuade the contessa that he was right to arrest David."
These were the very thoughts that had been tormenting Sophia. She needed to do something.
"If you want to go to your house, Tilia, I will go with you." It occurred to her immediately after she spoke that the streets might be dangerous for both of them. But she could not stand the agony of sitting here, waiting for the possibility of still worse news.
"Sophia, you and the cardinal must not be linked to Tilia Caballo's bordello," said Tilia.
"I will keep myself hidden," said Sophia.
Sophia made Francesca comfortable in her own bed, then went down with Tilia to the great hall of Ugolini's mansion and sent for Riccardo.
Hand in hand, Sophia holding a lighted candle, the two women made their way through the tunnel that led to the potterymaker's shop.
Riccardo met them with another hired cart, like the one that had taken them from Tilia's to the cardinal's this morning. This was a covered cart full of big urns of olive oil. The air, much cooler than before the storm, felt refreshing on Sophia's face. Getting into the cart, Sophia looked up and saw big black clouds rolling across the sky, their rounded edges outlined by the red light of the setting sun.
The cart, pulled by an old draft horse, bumped over cobblestones and splashed through puddles. Tilia and Sophia sat on a bench behind Riccardo, under the cart's canvas cover, so they could not be seen from the street. All around them Sophia heard church bells ringing for the Angelus. She could close her eyes for a moment and imagine she was hearing the bells of the three hundred churches ofConstantinople. She longed to be in the Polis again, among civilized people.
That is why I am here, is it not? To keep the barbarians here, and away from there.
She saw torchlight ahead. This was Tilia's street, farther up a hill that slowed down the elderly horse.
From this distance the house looked undamaged, but what was that hanging above the door?
"Merciful God!" Sophia whispered.
She saw the body of a man suspended from a rope tied to the balcony above the doorway.
"Oh, God," said Tilia. "Oh, poor, poor Cassio." She dabbed at her eyes with the sleeve of her gown.
Now, by the torchlight, Sophia could see several men, dressed in the yellow and blue of the commune, gathered in front of the house. The podesta's watchmen.
The street was full of common folk, who had to back up to give the cart room to move forward. As it approached the front door, one of the podesta's men raised a hand to stop it.
"I will be right back," Tilia said, squeezing Sophia's arm. She clambered out of the cart with Riccardo's help. Riccardo tied the cart to a hitching post on the side of the street.
Tying her scarf across her face, Sophia watched from inside the cart. The man who had stopped the horse barred Tilia again as she started toward her house. He was a slender, middle-aged man with a prominent arch to his nose and heavy-lidded eyes. Riccardo moved toward him, but Tilia put her hand on the servant's arm. Tilia would not want the cardinal's man brawling with an officer of the watch.
"I am Tilia Caballo, and this is my house," she said in a commanding voice. "How long have you been here?"
What a brave woman Tilia was, Sophia thought. Could she herself face an officer of the watch and speak to him sternly like that?
"Since the hour of None, Madama. The podesta was here, but he had to leave."
"And what are you doing? Just standing about? Have you left that poor man's body to hang there since mid-afternoon, where women and children could see it? Take him down at once. Are you not Christians? How can you treat the dead with such disrespect?"
In the midst of her own horror, Sophia took comfort from Tilia's display of strength, and wondered how the stout little woman felt inside.
Sophia had hated her at times, and still thought Tilia had done a horrible wrong to Rachel. But what she felt for her now was mostly admiration.
After all, all of them were equally guilty of what had happened to Rachel. The blame should not fall on Tilia alone.
The beak-nosed officer called orders to others nearby. But his expression as he turned back to Tilia was surly.
"There might be some question about whetherhewas a Christian, Madama. This is, after all, a house of ill repute."
"Illrepute!" Tilia blustered. "This is—this was—the handsomest house of pleasure in Orvieto. And our patrons occupied the very highest levels in the Church. You would be wise to have a care how you speak of my house."
Sophia felt herself smiling. Amazing, when there was so much to weep over.
"Would I?" The officer thrust his nose at Tilia. "Perhaps you can tell me why such a splendid bordello with such fine customers needed a torture chamber in the cellar? Or why you had to keep piccioni on the roof?"
Sophia's body went cold. If they found out those were carrier pigeons and where they went, the trouble here might be deep indeed.
"So that is what you have been doing!" Tilia stormed. "Looting my home! And how much did you steal after the Tartars left? And no doubt harassing my ladies, as if they had not been through enough already. And leaving my Cassio to swing from a rope. My God, there has been murder, kidnapping, rape, and theft done here, and you prattle of piccioni. What have you done about catching thebestioniwho did this?"
Now the officer did look intimidated. "Madama, we are not certain who did these things—"
"Not certain!" Tilia shook her fist at him. "Everyone in Orvieto knows who did this. It was the French cardinal, Paulus de Verceuil, and the Tartar ambassadors to the pope. Why are you here, standing about like fools, when you could be pursuing them and bringing them to justice?"
The French, thought Sophia. If Simon had been here, would he have allowed this to happen? She felt a twinge of guilt, remembering that she had betrayed Daoud by not telling him where Simon was going.
"What you tell us is but hearsay, Madama."
"Hearsay! Every lady in that house is a witness."
"In any case, those you accuse are beyond our reach."
"Because youletthem get beyond your reach," Tilia retorted. "Oh, you feckless man! Let me by."
And then Sophia was alone in the cart and frightened, because she knew she was surrounded by the podesta's men and by townspeople who might well be hostile. For reassurance she smoothed the scarf over her nose and mouth and patted the small dagger that hung at her belt, concealed under her outer tunic.
She heard a creaking noise above her and looked out to see the podesta's men hauling Cassio's body up to the balcony. Tilia, she thought, was taking charge. Left to themselves, the watchmen would probably have just cut the rope and let the poor man's corpse fall to the ground.
Sophia thought of Rachel, helpless, carried off by the Tartar, and Daoud, equally helpless, in the Palazzo del Podesta. She had no idea what was happening to either of them, and horrors filled her mind. Her hands twisted together, her fingers crushing one another, and she started to cry again.