The Sheen on the Silk (7 page)

ZOE DID AS MICHAEL HAD REQUESTED, THEN SHE TURNED her mind to revenge. She had not forgotten the bitter lesson of her own brush with death. There was no time to wait.

The eunuch Anastasius was exactly the tool she needed. He had intelligence and the kind of honesty to his profession that made people trust him. She was quite aware that he did not trust her, and there was also this hunger in him to know about Bessarion’s death. One day Zoe would take time to find out exactly why that was.

In the meantime, there was a delicate balance of irony in using him to trick and ruin Cosmas Kantakouzenos, whose family’s greed had robbed Byzantium of some of its greatest art.

Zoe was dressed in a tunic the color of dark wine in shadow and an even darker dalmatica, burgundy warp shot with a black weft, which caught the warmth of reds in the firelight as she passed through the glow of the torches.

She crossed herself and stepped out into the night, Sabas following behind her, for safety in the shadows of twilight and for their return in the dark.

She stood for a moment in the street, reciting the Ave Maria to herself, hands folded. Then she started to walk again.

She drew a deep breath into her lungs. This was her vengeance at last. By tomorrow, the first of those whose emblems were on the back of her crucifix would be dead.

She left Sabas outside as the servant showed her in to Cosmas’s house. Even the entrance hall was magnificent, especially the marble bust of a Roman senator on a plinth, his elderly face lined with the emotion and experience of a lifetime. Blue Venetian glasses stood on a table, the light making them look like jewels. An Egyptian alabaster dog with huge ears took pride of place on a carved wooden table.

When she was shown into his room, Cosmas was sitting in a wide chair, staring at an inlaid table on which stood a jug of Sicilian wine, which was now more than half-empty. Beside it was a dish of dates and honeyed fruits. He was a short man with a curved nose and heavy-lidded eyes, red-rimmed in shadowed sockets.

“I don’t owe you anything,” he said sourly. “So I assume you have come to see what you can plunder.”

She wanted to do more than gloat; she needed a quarrel, one that could be escalated into violence.

“You are a wretched judge of character,” she replied, still standing. He did not rise. “I have not come to make financial profit out of you. I will buy icons to give to the church so all may worship them there and be blessed. I will pay you a fair price.”

His shoulders straightened and his head lifted a little.

“But I will see them first,” she added with a slight smile.

“Of course. Wine?”

“With pleasure.” She had no intention of drinking anything in his house, but she wanted the glass. A pity to break it-it was exquisite.

He rose stiffly, knees creaking, and fetched another glass from a cupboard. He poured it half-full for her and set it within her reach. “Let us talk money. The icons are on the wall in there.” He indicated an archway leading to a dimly lit room beyond.

She accepted the invitation and walked through. Then she stopped, her heart pounding. There were still half a dozen icons left, images of St. Peter and St. Paul, of Christ. One icon of the Virgin was in gold leaf and green-and-azure enamel, and blue so dark as to be almost black. She was somber-faced, with a tenderness that held the viewer in amazement.

Others had jewels encrusted on the clothes of the figures or were inlaid with ivory. There was such beauty in them that momentarily she forgot why she was here or why the hatred scorched inside her.

There was a sound behind her, and she froze. Very slowly she turned. He was there in the doorway, fat and soft, full of good living and the savor of profit.

“I would rather destroy them than be robbed,” he said between his teeth. “I know you, Zoe Chrysaphes. You do nothing without a reason. Why are you really here?”

“The icons are beautiful,” she said, as if that were a reply.

“Worth a great deal of money.” His merchant’s heart was in his face.

“Then let us haggle,” she said, unable to keep the contempt out of her voice as she brushed past him, accidentally touching the protrusion of his belly as he stood in the middle of the archway. “Let us argue how many byzants the face of Mary is worth.”

“It is an icon,” he said with a sneer. “The creation of man’s hands, made of wood and paint.”

“And of gold leaf, Cosmas; never forget the gold leaf or the gems,” she responded.

He frowned at her. “Do you want to buy one of them or not?” he snapped.

“How many pieces of silver, Cosmas, for the Mother of God? Forty seems an appropriate number.” She took a small purse of silver solidi out of her robe and placed the coins on the table.

Temper flared up his face. “It is an icon, you stupid woman! An artist’s work, no more. It is not Christ I sell!”

“Blasphemy!” she shrieked at him, her fury only in part pretense. She lunged for one of the glasses, her hand sweeping high, making clear her intention to smash it and use it as a weapon.

He darted forward first and seized it, dashing off the lovely golden rim of it and leaving jagged ends bristling from the stem. He held it out like a dagger, his eyes wide, flickering with fear, his lips parted.

She hesitated. She had borne pain before, and she hated it. Body’s ecstasy and agony were equally deep for her, right on the cliff edge of the unbearable. But this was revenge-what she had lived for over the long, arid years. She pushed forward again, using the end of her cloak to dull some of the cutting edge when he struck her.

He jerked upward at her with the ragged stem, impelled by fear.

She felt the glass cut, and she twisted away and grasped it with the other hand, screaming out, intending the servants to hear her. Afterward, she would need their testimony. He must be the aggressor, only one glass broken, she merely defending herself.

He was caught by surprise. He had expected her to fall backward, bleeding. Instead she pressed on up to him, turning the stem against him with her weight and her other hand over his. The broken edge caught him, a thin, slashing cut.

Then she drew back, allowing surprise into her face as servants came rushing into the room.

“It’s nothing!” Cosmas said angrily, shouting at them but still looking at her. His face was red, his eyes blazing.

Zoe turned toward the two men and the woman, forcing herself to sound apologetic. This was what they must remember. “I dropped a glass and it broke,” she said with a charming smile, rueful, just a little ashamed. “We reached for it at the same moment and… and bumped into each other. I am afraid we both grasped for the glass, and have cut ourselves on its shards. Perhaps you would bring water, and bandages.”

They hesitated.

“Do it!” Cosmas yelled at them, clutching the wound where the blood was already staining his robe.

“I have a tincture to ease pain,” Zoe said helpfully, reaching inside her tunic for the fold of oiled silk with the antidote in it.

“No,” he refused instantly. “I will use my own.” There was a slight sneer in his voice, as if he had seen her trick and sidestepped it.

“As you please.” She emptied the powder into her mouth and took a sip of the wine from his glass, still whole on the table.

“What’s that?” he demanded.

“A powder against the pain,” she replied, holding up her bleeding arm. “Do you want some?”

“No!” There was derision in his eyes.

The servants returned and carefully washed the wounds of both of them.

“I have a salve…” Zoe reached with her other hand for the porcelain jar of ointment with its painted chrysanthemums. She put a little on her wound. It was mildly soothing, but she relaxed her body, as if it had brought great ease. She held out the open jar to Cosmas; her face was composed, as close to indifferent as she could make it.

“Master?” one of the servants offered.

“Oh, do it,” Cosmos told him impatiently. Now that the servants were returned, being seen to be afraid demeaned him.

The servant obeyed, using it liberally.

Both wounds were bound, and the servants fetched more wine, more glasses, and a blue porcelain dish of sweet honey cakes.

Within fifteen minutes, Cosmos began to sweat profusely and have some difficulty in getting his breath. The glass slipped from his hand and spilled wine onto the floor, rolling away with a hollow sound. He put his hand to his throat as though to loosen a tight garment, but there was nothing there. He began to shake uncontrollably.

Zoe stood up. “Apoplexy,” she said, looking down at him. Then she turned and walked unhurriedly to the door and called the servants. “He is taking a fit. You had better send for a physician,” she told them.

When she had seen them leave, their faces white with panic, she went back to where Cosmas was collapsed, half-fallen to the floor. He should live for another hour, at least, but the poison was working rapidly.

Cosmos gasped and seemed to recover a little. Although she found it revolting to touch his fat body, she bent and helped him ease his position to one where he was better able to breathe. She might have to explain it afterward if she had not.

“You did this to me!” he gasped, curling his lips in a snarl. “You are going to steal my icons. Thief!”

She bent even closer to him, the fear draining out of her and vanishing. “Your father stole them from mine,” she hissed in his ear. “I want them back in the churches so pilgrims will come here and make Byzantium rich and safe again. You, your family, and your blood are the thieves. And yes, I did this to you! Know it and taste it, Cosmas. Believe it!”

“Murderer!” he spat back at her, but it was no more than a sigh.

She went into the room with the icons. After lifting the one of the Virgin off the wall, she wrapped it in the folds of her cloak.

She smiled and walked on to the door where the servants were waiting to let her out.

Revenge was perfect, richer than laughter, sweeter than honey, more lasting than the scent of jasmine in the air.

ON THE LAST DAY OF APRIL IN THE FOLLOWING YEAR, 1274, Enrico Palombara was standing in the central courtyard of his villa a mile beyond the Vatican walls. The sunlight had the limpid clarity one sees only in spring. The arid heat of summer was still far away. The walls were ocher-colored, and the new leaves of the vines made a lacework of green against them. The sound of falling water was a constant music.

He could hear the chattering of birds in the eaves as they worked. He loved their ceaseless industry, as if they could not imagine failure. They did not pray, as men did, so the answering silence would not frighten them.

He turned and went inside. It was time for him to walk to the Vatican and present himself to the pope. He had been sent for, and he must make certain he was there well in time. He did not know the reason Gregory X wished to speak to him, but he profoundly hoped that it would be the chance of office again-and not merely as secretary or assistant to some cardinal or other.

He increased his pace along the street, his long bishop’s robes swirling. He nodded to people he knew, exchanging a greeting here and there, but his mind was on the meeting ahead. Perhaps he would be sent as a papal legate to one of the great courts of Europe, such as Aragon, Castile, Portugal, or, above all, the Holy Roman Empire. Any such position would offer vast opportunities out of which could be carved a superb career, possibly even elevation to the papal throne itself one day. Urban IV had been a papal legate before his election.

Five minutes later, Palombara walked across the square, up the wide, shallow steps of the Vatican Palace, and into the shade under the huge arches. He reported his presence and was conducted to the pope’s private apartments, still fifteen minutes before the appointed time.

As he expected, he was kept waiting. He did not feel free to pace back and forth over the smooth marble floor as he would have liked.

Then suddenly he was summoned, and the next moment he was in the pope’s chamber, a formal room still, but brighter and more comfortable. Sunlight streamed in through the window, making it seem airy. He had no time to look at the murals, but they were in softer colors, muted pinks and golds.

He knelt to kiss the ring of Tebaldo Visconti, now Gregory X. “Your Holiness,” he murmured.

“How are you, Enrico?” Gregory asked. “Let us walk in the inner courtyard for a while. There is much to discuss.”

Palombara rose to his feet, noticeably taller and leaner than the rather rotund figure of the pope. He looked down into the pope’s face with its large, dark eyes and magnificent nose, long, heavy, and straight. “As Your Holiness pleases,” he said obediently.

Gregory had been pope for two and a half years already. This was the first time he had spoken with Palombara alone. He led the way out through the wide doors into the inner courtyard, where they were observed but not overheard.

“We have much work to do, Enrico,” Gregory said quietly. “We live in a dangerous age, but one of great opportunity. We have enemies all around us. We cannot afford dissension within.” He glanced at Palombara sharply.

Palombara murmured a reply to show his attention.

“The Germans have chosen a new king, Rudolph of Hapsburg, whom I shall crown Holy Roman Emperor in due time. He has renounced all claims to our territories, and to Sicily,” Gregory continued.

Now Palombara understood. Gregory was clearing all threats one by one toward some further great plan.

They crossed into a brief open space, and Palombara shaded his eyes against the sunlight so he could read Gregory’s expression.

“The power of Islam is increasing,” Gregory continued, his voice growing sharper. “They hold much of the Holy Land, all Arabia south and east, Egypt and North Africa, and up into the south of Spain. Their trade is expanding, their science and their arts thrive, their mathematics, their medicine, lead the way in thought. Their ships sail the eastern Mediterranean, and there is nothing to stop them.”

Palombara felt a chill in the air in spite of the brilliance of the sun.

Gregory stopped. “If they move north toward Nicea, and they well could, then there is nothing to stop them taking Constantinople, and the whole of the old Byzantine Empire piece by piece after that. Then they will be at the very gates of Europe. Disunited, we will not stand.”

“We must not permit it to happen,” Palombara said simply, although the answer was anything but simple. The two-hundred-year-old schism between Rome and Byzantium was deep and had resisted all previous attempts at reconciliation. They were now not only doctrinally apart on many issues, most intractably the issue of the Holy Spirit proceeding from the Father and the Son or the Father only. They were also culturally different in a hundred patterns, beliefs, and observances. These distinctions had become a matter of human pride and identity.

“The emperor Michael Palaeologus has consented to send delegates to the council I have called in Lyons this June,” Gregory continued. “I wish you to come also, Enrico. Listen carefully to everything that you hear. I need to know my friends, and my enemies.”

Palombara felt a surge of excitement. Healing the schism would be the greatest single achievement for Christianity within the last two centuries. Rome would control all the land and command the obedience of every soul from the Atlantic to the Black Sea.

“How can I serve this cause?” Palombara surprised himself with how honestly he meant it.

“You have a fine mind, Enrico,” Gregory said smoothly, the harsh lines of his face softening. “You have great skills, a nice balance between caution and strength. You understand necessity.”

“Thank you, Holy Father.”

“Do not thank me, it is not flattery,” Gregory said a trifle tartly. “I am merely reminding you of the qualities you possess which will be needed. I wish you to go to Byzantium, as legate of the Holy See, with special duties to end this quarrel which divides the Christian Church.”

A smile curved Gregory’s wide lips. “I perceive you have grasped the vision. I knew you would. I know you better than you imagine, Enrico. I have great faith in your skill. As always, of course, you will be accompanied by another legate. I have chosen Bishop Vicenze. His abilities will be the right complement for yours.” There was a flicker of amusement in his eyes, almost too slight to be seen, yet for an instant it was unmistakable.

“Yes, Holy Father.” Palombara knew Niccolo Vicenze and disliked him profoundly. He was single-minded, unimaginative, and dedicated to the point of obsession. He was also completely without humor. Even his pleasure was ritualistic, as if he must follow a precise order or lose his control over it. “We will balance each other, Holy Father,” he said aloud. It was his first lie of the encounter. If he were pope, he too would have sent Niccolo Vicenze as far away as possible.

Gregory permitted himself a wide, generous smile. “Oh, I know that, Enrico, I know that. I will look forward to seeing you in Lyons. I think perhaps you will enjoy it.”

Palombara inclined his head. “Yes, Holy Father.”

In June, Palombara was in the central French city of Lyons. It was hot, dry, and dusty underfoot. He had watched and listened all week as the pope had commanded, and he had heard a score of opinions, most with little presentiment of the danger from the east and south that Gregory perceived so sharply.

The promised delegates from the emperor of Byzantium were not here yet. No one knew why.

Now he walked up a flight of shallow steps to the thoroughfare above. Ahead of him was a cardinal in purple, his robes vivid in the June sun. Lyons was a beautiful city, dignified and imaginative, built upon two rivers. This month, the men and women in the streets and byways were used to the sight of princes of the Church and they took no more notice than a polite bow or curtsy, and moved on about the business of their lives.

Palombara turned, hearing a disturbance in the street ahead, movement, men stepping aside. There was a flowing of color, purples and reds and whites, and flashes of gold, like wind in a field of poppies. King James l of Aragon came out of one of the great palace entrances, surrounded by courtiers. Everyone made way for him.

He was totally unlike the bold and arrogant Charles of Anjou, king of the Two Sicilies, which in effect meant all Italy from Naples southward. Charles was as unsaintly as possible, yet it could be he who would lead the crusade that the pope so badly wanted. It was an interesting contrast in the holy and practical, one that Palombara was contemplating with some indecision.

That evening, he attended the Mass in the Cathedral of Saint Jean. Work on the building had begun nearly a century ago and was still far from finished. Even so it looked magnificent, severe and elegantly Romanesque.

The sweet perfume of incense filled his head, and it all swelled in a complex rhythm, carrying him along toward that exquisite moment when the sacrament of bread and wine would become the body and blood of Christ, and in some mystical way they would be united, cleansed of sin and renewed in spirit.

Was there such a thing as communication with God? Did these men around him experience it? Or was it just the music and the incense, the hunger to believe, creating the longed-for illusion?

Or was it the lies and the doubts Palombara allowed to poison his soul that rendered his ears deaf to the voices of angels? Memory returned with a jolt of sensual pleasure and emotional guilt. As a young priest, he had counseled a woman whose husband was distant and humorless, not unlike Vicenze. Palombara had been gentle with her and made her laugh. She had fallen in love with him. He saw it happening and enjoyed it. She was warm and lovely. He had lain with her. Even as he stood here in this cathedral, while some cardinal offered up the Mass, the incense in his nose and throat was gone for a moment and he could smell the fragrance of her hair, feel the warmth of her flesh, and see her smile.

She became with child, Palombara’s child, and they had agreed to let her husband believe it was his. Was that wrong? Wise or not, it was a coward’s lie.

Palombara had confessed to his bishop, chosen his penance, and received absolution. Better for the Church, and so the welfare of the people, if it was never known. But was penance enough? There was no peace inside him, no sense of having been forgiven.

Standing here with the music, the color and light, the rapt faces of men whose minds could be as far from God as his own, he had a sense of not having tasted the fullness of life, and the beginning of a terrible fear came to him that maybe there was no more than this. Maybe real hell was the fact that there was no heaven?

The embassy of Michael Palaeologus finally arrived in Lyons on June 24. They had been delayed by bad weather at sea and were too late for much of the discussion. They presented a letter from the emperor, signed by fifty archbishops and five hundred bishops or synods. Their good faith could not be denied. It seemed victory for Rome had come easily.

On June 29, Gregory celebrated the Mass in the Cathedral of St. Jean again. The Epistle, Gospel, and Creed were sung both in Latin and in Greek.

On July 6, the emperor’s letter was read aloud and the Byzantine ambassadors promised fidelity to the Latin Church and abjured all the propositions it denied.

Gregory held the world in his hands. It was all accomplished; unworthy bishops had been deposed, certain mendicant orders suppressed, and the orders of St. Francis and St. Dominic warmly approved. The cardinals would no longer be able to dither and delay the election of a new pope. Rudolph of Hapsburg was recognized as the future monarch of the Holy Roman Empire.

In spite of the death of Thomas Aquinas on his way to Lyons, and of St. Bonaventure in Lyons itself, Gregory’s cup of triumph ran over.

Palombara felt as if there was nothing left for him to do.

Still, Gregory wished both Palombara and Vicenze to return briefly to Rome and then prepare to sail to Constantinople. If they met with the same weather the Byzantine envoys had, this could take as long as six weeks. They would not arrive until October. But they had something priceless to deliver: an embassy of hope for the unity of the Christian world.

It was August and miserably hot in Rome when Palombara, returning from Lyons, walked across the familiar square toward the great arches in front of the Vatican Palace, the enormous building stretching left and right to either side, windows glinting in the sun. As always, people came and went; the wide steps were dotted with the colors of pale robes, purple hats and capes, touches of scarlet.

This was to be Palombara’s last audience before departing again. He already knew their purpose was to make sure that the emperor Michael Palaeologus kept all the great promises he had written to the pope, that there was indeed substance behind the words. It might become necessary to warn Michael of the cost to his own people should they fail. The balance of power was delicate. Another crusade led by Charles of Anjou might not be far away. Men and ships would sail for Constantinople by the thousand, armed for war. The city’s survival depended upon them coming in peace, as brothers in Christ, not as invading conquerors of an alien faith, as they had been at the beginning of the century, killing and burning, destroying the last bastion against Islam.