that their mission was God’s plan. But it was a lie, a heinous fabrication, and the march on Cairo was an utter disaster. Al-Kamil took pity on the Christians after they foundered for several days in the Nile valley. Many thought he would slay them all. Pelagius too; I think he hoped for martyrdom.”
Brother Francis snorted. He rubbed one hand over the other, and Raphael noticed black streaks across the backs of both of the monk’s hands. Shadows of char that did not smear under Brother Francis’s ministrations. “The fool knows nothing of martyrdom,” he muttered. “He knows nothing at all.”
Realizing he had spoken aloud, he visibly brightened and changed the subject. “Here we are,” he announced, indicating the end of the path. “The closest you can get to God and still have your feet upon the ground.”
Brother Leo had warned Raphael that Brother Francis’s tiny cell was precariously constructed, but in Raphael’s opinion, Brother Leo had failed in his estimation of the true danger. The structure was not much more than a lean-to built from scraps of wood. Open at two sides, it sat on the very edge of an immense drop-off. One step too many, and a man would plunge a very long way to a rather unpleasant death. Fluffy clouds drifted close by, not more than a hand’s width or two above the peak of the shack, which was oriented in such a way that it never received direct sunlight.
His eyes, Raphael realized. The light pains him. How hard must it be for him to pray here, so close to Heaven, when the darkness of a cave would be so much more comfortable?
Brother Francis ducked into the misshapen shack, folding his legs beneath him. He knocked his walking stick about, rattling it off the walls and off the sides of a squat chest shoved in one corner. Once he was comfortable, he patted the bare ground next to him. “Don’t stand,” he said to Raphael. “It makes me nervous. God would not bring you so far and then have you stumble.”
Raphael didn’t need further prompting, and he stripped off his baldric in a smooth motion, holding his scabbarded sword in his hand as he tucked himself under the overhang. He arranged himself on the ground, his sword an impediment that he was tempted to throw over the cliff’s edge.
“There,” Brother Francis said once they were both settled. “Peaceful, isn’t it?” He cocked his head as if he were listening.
Raphael did the same, and heard nothing but the gentle sigh of the wind as it caressed the clouds drifting overhead. “It is very peaceful,” he said.
“I have been working on a new draft of my Rule,” Brother Francis said. He rubbed the backs of his hands again. “I feel my time is running out, and there is so much I want to say yet. So much I wanted to accomplish.” He turned his head toward Raphael. “Does the idea of an untimely death frighten you?”
“Of course,” Raphael replied.
“You have fought on the field of battle. More than once.”
“I have.”
“Do you not feel death close at hand every time you draw your sword?”
Raphael shifted awkwardly. “It is…my training that gives me the necessary courage,” he said.
“What about God? Does He not give you courage too?”
Raphael did not answer.
“Hmm,” Brother Francis said, returning his gaze to the cloud-strewn sky. “I carried a sword once,” he said. “I wanted to be a chevalier, a French knight. Did you know that?”
“Brother Leo mentioned something to that effect,” Raphael admitted.
“Did he tell you about Perugia? The Battle of Collestrada?” Brother Francis grunted when Raphael nodded. “He is an old gossip, Leo. It is a good thing he is also the kindest man I have ever met. Otherwise he would be insufferable.”
“He is kind,” Raphael agreed. “I…when I arrived, I was a rather undignified guest…”
Brother Francis offered him a smile. “We all are, at one time or another, here in God’s house.” His hands began to rub one another, his fingers working the dark smears on his skin. “How many of your brothers-in-arms were lost in Egypt?” he asked.
“All but three of us,” Raphael said.
“I am truly sorry.”
“I could have saved them all,” Raphael admitted. “If I had just given the legate what he asked for. I could have saved them.”
Brother Francis was silent for a moment, his gaze drifting idly across the open sky. “The prophecy,” he said finally, having found the memory he was looking for. “He wanted you and Eptor to give him a prophecy. I remember it now. When I returned from my stay with the Sultan, he was insisting that Eptor’s gift was nothing more than heretical possession, the touch of the Devil among his camp.”
“I refused to give him what he wanted,” Raphael said. “He wanted a witness, someone who would have given credence to a lie of his devising. If it hadn’t been for your intercession, we would have been branded as heretics and tossed out of the camp.”
A hard lump of laughter worked its way out of Raphael’s chest. “As it was, he simply waited six months and tried again. This time, you weren’t around to intercede. Nor was Sir John. The legate kept insisting; when I refused, he had me flogged. He took Eptor and tried to make my friend tell him what he wanted to hear. It didn’t work, of course. That was not Eptor’s…gift. All Pelagius succeeded in doing was distressing Eptor to a point that he retreated further into his illusion. And somewhere in that fog in his mind, he saw something he did not like. Something that frightened him. Something he could not look away from.”
Raphael’s voice grew hoarse. “He screamed all night. I could do nothing to calm him. It was awful to listen to, but I couldn’t leave him. Nor could I bring myself to end his misery. I sat with him; I was the only friend he ever had. I sat with him until his fear burst his heart.”
Brother Francis stopped rubbing his hands, resting them calmly in his lap. “You cannot carry that blame,” he said. “I would have done the same in your stead.” Raphael opened his mouth to protest otherwise, but the monk stopped him with a sidelong glance. “You should consider that possibility, my son,” the monk said. “Consider that I might be more at fault than you. In some convoluted fashion that only God could truly apprehend, am I not to blame?”
“What?” Raphael asked. “How?”
“Did I not abandon you and Eptor to the legate? Did I not fail to convert Al-Kamil to Christianity, to find a peaceful resolution to the enmity between the Church and the Sultan? Have I not spent my entire life preaching nonviolence, calling out each and every day for each of us to fill our hearts with nothing but peace? And has my personal crusade lessened the violence that surrounds us?”
Raphael could not bring himself to vocalize agreement — the idea seemed so enormously reprehensible in its cruelty — but he could not verbalize any cogent argument to the contrary. His throat was too tight for any words to escape.
Brother Francis offered him a kind smile. “I have been here for many weeks,” he said. “Every day I ask God this question: What have I really accomplished? What have I done that has made any difference?”
Raphael nodded, hearing an echo of those questions in his own heart. “Has He offered you an answer?” he asked.
Brother Francis idly rubbed the back of his hand again, and Raphael noticed that, even in the gloom of the shack, the shadows on the backs of the monk’s hands remained. “He has,” Brother Francis said. “Rather, He will. Soon.” He smile again, and this time his smile was free of any sorrow. “I have faith.”
Raphael wanted to touch the other man’s face, to trace his fingers along the curve of that smile in a vain effort to understand how it was formed. After everything he had seen, how could he still cling to his faith?
After everything I have done, how can I be worthy of such faith?
Brother Francis twisted around and grabbed the edge of the chest. He pulled it closer to him and fumbled with the lid. He took out a ragged scrap of parchment, and rooting around inside the box, he located several shards of charcoal. “Do you know much about the Muslim faith?” he asked as he smoothed the piece of parchment flat. “Their holy book is called the Qur’an, and it contains a list of the names of God. Ninety-nine of them, in fact. The Sultan, Al-Kamil, told me about this when he and I met in Egypt. He is an incredible man, and to this day, I wish the mean and petty differences of our cultures did not prevent us from being better friends.” He sighed.
“I was born in Acre,” Raphael said, “as was my mother and her mother.”
Brother Francis eyed him. “And yet you are a Christian man?”
Raphael struggled with his answer. “The only vows I have ever sworn — the only ones I will ever keep — are
