Rose of Fire

4

For months on end Edmond de Luna worked on the project for the great labyrinth of the books, making and remaking the plans, never satisfied with them. By then he had realised than that he no longer cared about the payment, for his immortality would be secured by that prodigious library and not from some legendary magic elixir. The emperor, patient but concerned, kept reminding him that the final siege of the Ottomans was drawing nigh and there was no time to waste. When, at long last, Edmond de Luna solved the mighty conundrum, it was too late: the troops of Mehmed II the Conqueror had besieged Constantinople. The end of the city and of the empire were imminent. The emperor marvelled when he received the plans, but realised that he would never be able to build the labyrinth under the city that bore his name. So he asked Edmond to try to escape the siege together with so many other artists and thinkers who were about to set out for Italy. ‘Dear friend,’ he said, ‘I know you will find the perfect place to build the labyrinth.’ In gratitude, the Emperor handed him the phial with the blood of the last dragon, but a shadow of concern clouded his face as he did so. ‘When I offered you this gift, I was appealing to your avid mind, to tempt you, dear friend. I now want you also to accept this humble amulet, which one day will appeal to the wisdom of your soul if the price of ambition is too high…’ The emperor removed a medal that hung round his neck and handed it to him. The pendant contained neither gold nor jewels, just a small stone that looked like a simple grain of sand. ‘The man who gave it to me told me it was a tear shed by Christ.’ Edmond frowned. ‘I know you’re not a man of faith, Edmond, but faith is found when one isn’t looking for it and the day will come when your heart, and not your mind, will long for the purification of the soul.’ Edmond did not wish to contradict the emperor so he hung the insignificant medal round his neck. With no more baggage than the plan for his labyrinth and the scarlet flask, he departed that very night. Constantinople and the empire would fall shortly afterwards, following a bloody siege, while Edmond traversed the Mediterranean in search of the city he had left in his youth. He sailed with a group of mercenaries who had offered him a passage taking him to be a rich merchant whose pouch they could empty once they attained the high seas. When they discovered that he carried no riches upon him they decided to throw him overboard, but Edmond persuaded them to let him stay by narrating some of his adventures in the manner of Scherezade. The trick consisted in always leaving them craving for another morsel, as a wise dweller of Damascus had once taught him. ‘They will despise you for it, but they will want you even more.’ In his spare time he began to record his experiences in a notebook and in order to keep it from the prying eyes of those pirates, he wrote in Persian, an extraordinary tongue he had learned during the years he had spent in ancient Babylon. Half way along the journey they came across a ship that was sailing adrift with no voyagers or crew. It carried large amphorae of wine which they took aboard and with which the pirates got drunk every night while listening to the stories recounted by Edmond – who was not allowed to taste a single drop of it. After a few days the crew began to fall ill and soon one after the other the mercenaries died, poisoned by the stolen wine. Edmond, the only survivor, placed them one by one in sarcophagi the pirates carried in the ship’s hold – the bounty from one of their pillages. Only when he was the last man left alive on the ship and feared he might die adrift on the high seas in the most terrible solitude, did he dare open the scarlet bottle and sniff its contents for a second. An instant sufficed for him to glimpse the chasm that threatened to take possession of him. He felt the vapour creeping up from the phial over his skin and for a moment saw his hands being covered in scales and his nails turning into claws, sharper and deadlier than the most fearsome sword. He then clutched the humble grain of sand hanging round his neck and prayed for his salvation to a Christ in whom he did not believe. The dark abyss of the soul faded away and Edmond breathed anew, seeing his hands becoming normal human hands again. He closed the bottle and cursed himself for being so naive, realising then that the emperor had not lied to him. He also knew that this was no payment or blessing of any sort. It was the key to hell.

5

When Sempere had finished translating the notebook, the first light of dawn peered through the clouds. Shortly afterwards the inquisitor, without uttering a word, left the room and two sentries came in to fetch Sempere and lead him to a cell from which he felt sure he would never emerge alive. While Sempere was being flung into the dungeon, the grand inquisitor’s men were sent to the ship’s hulk where, hidden in a metal coffer, they were to find the scarlet phial. Jorge de Leon was waiting for them in the cathedral. They had not managed to find the medal with the supposed tear of Christ which Edmond’s text referred to, but the inquisitor was unconcerned because he felt that his soul did not need any cleansing. With his eyes poisoned by greed, the inquisitor grabbed the scarlet bottle, raised it above the altar to bless it and, thanking God and hell for that gift, downed the contents in a single gulp. A few seconds went by and nothing happened. Then the inquisitor began to laugh. The soldiers looked at one another, disconcerted, wondering whether Jorge de Leon had lost his mind. For most of them this was the last thought of their lives. They saw the inquisitor fall to his knees as a gust of icy wind swept through the cathedral, dragging with it the wooden benches, knocking down statues and lighted candles. Then they heard his skin and his limbs cracking, and amid agonising howls Jorge de Leon’s voice was lost in the roar of the beast emerging from his flesh, rapidly growing into a bloody tangle of scales, claws and wings. A tail punctuated by sharp edges, like the blades of an axe, fanned out like a gigantic snake and when the beast turned and showed them its face lined with fangs, its eyes alight with fire, they had no courage left to turn and run. The flames surprised them as they stood there, rooted to the ground. It ripped the flesh off their bones like a hurricane tearing leaves off a tree. The beast then spread its wings and the inquisitor, Saint and dragon all in one, took flight, passing through the cathedral’s large rose-window in a storm of glass and fire, then rising over the roofs of Barcelona.

6

For seven days and seven nights the beast sowed panic, knocking down churches and palaces, setting fire to hundreds of buildings and dismembering with its claws the trembling figures it found begging for mercy under the roofs it ripped off. Every day the scarlet dragon grew, devouring all it found in its path. Torn bodies rained down from the sky and flames from the beast’s breath flowed down the streets like a torrent of blood. On the seventh day, when everyone thought the beast was about to raze the city and kill all its inhabitants, a lone figure came out to meet it. Barely recovered, Edmond de Luna limped up the staircase leading to the roof of the cathedral. There he waited for the dragon to catch sight of him. The beast emerged from black clouds of smoke and embers, flying low, close to the roofs of Barcelona. It had grown so much that it was now larger than the church from which it had sprung. Edmond de Luna could see himself reflected in those eyes that resembled huge pools of blood. Flying like a cannonball over the city, tearing off terrace roofs and towers, the beast opened its jaws to snap him up. Edmond de Luna then pulled out that miserable grain of sand hanging round his neck and pressed it in his fist. He recalled the words of Constantine and told himself that faith had at last found him and that his death was a very small price to pay to purify the black soul of the beast, which was none other than the soul of all men. Raising the fist that held the tear of Christ, Edmond closed his eyes and offered himself up. In a flash, the jaws swallowed him and the dragon rose high above the clouds. Those who remember that day say that the heavens split in two and a great brightness lit up the firmament. The beast was enveloped in the flames that poured out through its teeth and as it flapped its wings it formed a huge rose of fire that covered the entire city. Silence ensued and when they opened their eyes again, the sky was shrouded as in the darkest of nights and a gentle rain of bright ash flakes was falling from on high, covering the streets, the burned ruins and the entire city of tombs, churches and palaces with a white mantle that melted when one touched it and smelled of fire and damnation.