The Mongoliad: Book Three

CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT

Cast Out

Father Rodrigo seemed to hear Ferenc’s desperate plea. The priest relaxed, his hands slackening on Ocyrhoe’s neck. The girl took a huge, loud draw of breath and was about to let it out when a spasm shook Father Rodrigo’s body. His hands tightened again around her throat; she fought at his grip with furious desperation. Ferenc wrenched Rodrigo’s neck more, until he felt it reach its limit.

Father Rodrigo bellowed with pain as he struggled against Ferenc’s grip, but Ferenc’s hands continued to squeeze. Ocyrhoe’s face turned purple, her tongue protruding from her mouth.

“Stop it, Rodrigo. Rodrigo Bendrito!” Ferenc begged. “Father Rodrigo Bendrito! Listen to me!” He felt tears start from his eyes.

It was unfair to have this choice forced upon him. He and the priest had survived Mohi; they had traveled together for so long. He had built fires to warm the man’s body when the warmth of the fevers had fled; he had foraged for tiny streams within rocky clefts in the high mountains for cool water to cool Father Rodrigo’s burning skin. He had brought the priest to Rome so that his message-the last shred of his faith that had kept him alive throughout their journey-could be delivered. Once in Rome, a land as foreign and strange as any he could possibly imagine, he had found someone who could communicate with him. She used the same finger language as his mother, and almost instantly, this tiny girl had become so important to him.

And now he had to choose between them.

This is what was, his mother had told him, showing him the old roots. This is what will be. She patted the soil where she had recently planted the seeds. What grows is what we remember, what we bind ourselves to.

It is the choices we make.

Father Rodrigo continued to strain in Ferenc’s grip, and from some unearthly source of dreadful strength, he began lifting Ocyrhoe’s thin body off the ground.

“Stop it!” Ferenc was screaming now, his lips against the priest’s ear. “You saved my life at Mohi; let me save yours now! Put her down! Let her go! Rodrigo!”

Father Rodrigo shouted, his voice an octave lower than his normal speaking voice; Ferenc almost expected a demon to slink out of his mouth. Ocyrhoe’s eyes began to roll up.

“Stop it! You are killing her!” Ferenc screamed. “Take the Grail and go!”

“She is the Devil; she must die, or she will follow me forever!” Rodrigo shouted, again in a demonically thundering bass.

Ferenc’s body convulsed with sobs. There was no time, no time to think this through, no time to try some other way. Muttering rapid prayers for forgiveness, he made his choice. Closing his eyes as if that somehow made a difference, he shot his left arm forward and snapped his right arm back, twisting Rodrigo’s head at an impossible angle over his right shoulder. Immediately the priest gasped and shuddered, releasing Ocyrhoe. When Ferenc relaxed his arms, Father Rodrigo made a tiny sound, almost like a sigh of relief, and collapsed at Ferenc’s feet.

Ocyrhoe’s terrified coughs and gasps were so loud and painful that Ferenc did not realize for a moment he was gasping too; he turned away and vomited into the grass, then fell to his knees beside Father Rodrigo’s now lifeless body, sobbing like an orphaned child.

A unruly mob swarmed the streets of Rome. As far as Cardinal Fieschi could tell, the mob was leaderless- agitated citizens with no clear purpose or direction. By the time his carriage reached the Vatican, he was certain the swarm of citizenry milling about the streets was simply there to delay his return. Yet another obstacle he had to endure.

His first stop had been the Orsini estate where he learned that the Senator had been summoned to the Vatican-an unwelcome piece of news for who, other than himself, would summon the Senator? The interminable ride through the crowded streets of Rome did little to dispel his apprehension.

He dismounted quickly from the carriage, angrily rejecting the ostiarius’s offer of a helpful hand. “Senator Orsini,” he snapped. “Is he still here?”

“I believe so,” the porter replied. “He asked to be taken to the main receiving chamber.”

“And the other Cardinals?”

“They are preparing to announce the new Pope,” the ostiarius said.

“And who is the new Pope?” Fieschi asked, secretly fearing that some other reversal had occurred in the time he had been absent.

“Celestine IV,” a woman’s voice provided.

Lena, the Binder from Frederick’s camp, stood on the broad steps. She descended to his level and offered him a respectful bow. “Cardinal Fieschi,” she said. “I had hoped to meet you before I departed.”

“What do you want?” Fieschi snarled.

“How was your visit with the Holy Roman Emperor?” Lena asked, oblivious to his agitation. “I don’t see the girl with you. Were you able to successfully negotiate the return of your missing priest?”

Fieschi grabbed the front of Lena’s cloak and drew her to him. “I know you are working with the Emperor, Binder, in a way that violates your precepts.”

Lena remained unruffled. Up close, he could see there was no fear in her eyes. Only a steadiness of resolve that gave him pause. “You know nothing about me or my sisters, Cardinal Fieschi,” she said quietly. Her eyes flicked down at his clenched fists. “Your hands, Your Eminence,” she pointed out. “Are you sure you want to dirty them again? So soon after the last time?”

Fieschi released her, a very un-Cardinal-like oath threatening to spill out of his mouth. “You are not welcome here,” he said, forcing the profane words aside. “You and your sisters. If I see any of you or hear word that you are in my city, you will be marked as spies and treated accordingly.”

“Your city?” Lena noted.

“Yes,” Fieschi snapped. “My city.” He gestured at the buildings around them, especially the rounded dome of St. Peter’s Basilica. “My church.”

“Of course it is,” Lena said, a mixture of admiration and revulsion in her voice. “I will be sure to tell my sisters they are no longer welcome here. When they are released from wherever the Senator has them imprisoned, that is.” She offered the Cardinal a hard smile. “It would be disappointing if we were not allowed the freedom to meet your demand that the Binders quit Rome.”

“Take them,” Fieschi said. “Take all of them with you. I left one with the Emperor already.”

“Yes,” Lena said. “Good. I appreciate you taking her to Frederick. That was very helpful.”

“Helpful?” Fieschi choked, instantly disliking the idea that he had been, in any way, helpful to this woman.

Lena reached up and extracted a tiny chain from beneath her cloak. She closed her hand over whatever was suspended from the end of the silver loop and broke the chain with a sharp jerk of her hand. She laid her still-closed hand over her heart. “Cardinal Sinibaldo Fieschi, I am bound to you with a message.”

“What nonsense is this?” Fieschi sputtered.

“A message from Pope Gregory IX,” she finished. She opened her hand and held it out to him. Resting on her palm was a small gold ring. A Greek letter, broken in half, was stamped on its surface. “He wanted this ring delivered to his successor.”

His heart pounding, Fieschi reached for the ring, but Lena closed her hand suddenly.

“Thus delivered of my message, I am like the fox,” she said, “unbound here and everywhere. Do you agree, Cardinal Fieschi? I will deliver your late Pope’s message because that is what a Binder does, but in doing so, I am freed. Unencumbered by all.”

“Yes,” Cardinal Fieschi said. “Yes. Give it to me.”