those I swore to Athena Promachos.”
“‘She who fights in the front line,’” Brother Francis said. “Those are hard vows to keep.” He laughed. Not from a place of pity or arrogance, but from simple clarity. “You may be a stronger man than I, Raphael of Acre,” he admitted.
He showed Raphael the sheet. It was covered with a number of skewed lines of Latin, and Raphael read a few: “ You are Good, all Good, supreme Good… ”
“It is but a pittance,” Brother Francis explained. “A distraction, perhaps, from what I am meant to be doing, but for some time, it has been something I have been yearning to write. In fact, it is only now, meeting you again, that I understand the source of this desire.” He turned the page over and, peering at Raphael’s face for reference, quickly sketched a figure at the base of the page. The man seemed to be lying on his back, looking up at the lines of text over his head. He squinted at Raphael’s hat and shook his head, drawing instead a peaked cap reminiscent of the style worn by Muslims. With a practiced twist of his hand, he inscribed a letter rising from the figure’s mouth.
“Do you know what this is?” he asked Raphael, pointing at the letter.
“The tau,” Raphael said.
“Do you know what it means?”
“I have heard it is used to represent the Cross upon which Jesus died.”
“The Cross upon which he was resurrected,” Brother Francis corrected him. “Our lives are not spent waiting for death, but waiting for life.”
Raphael acceded this interpretation could be equally valid, though the subtle distinction was one that he would have to consider more fully. “I have brought death to many,” he said quietly.
“And have you not given others life?” Brother Francis asked.
Raphael shrugged. “How can one ever atone for the other?”
“Only God can answer that question for you, Raphael of Acre,” Brother Francis said. “But you have to let Him. You have to have faith that He will.”
Raphael nodded, hearing the monk’s words. His mind struggled to accept them, to let them sink into his heart where they might take root.
“Give this to Brother Leo,” Brother Francis said, offering the page to Raphael. “Tell him it is more important than any other legacy of mine.” His face tightened, a brief spasm of pain that seemed to rise from nowhere and flee just as quickly.
“I will,” Raphael said, accepting the page. He glanced at the words written on the back page, the text that floated on the page over the prostrate figure. “‘May God smile upon you and be merciful to you,’” he read aloud. “‘May God turn his regard to you and give you peace.’”
Brother Francis laid his hands in his lap and let out a long sigh as he closed his eyes. “God has blessed my life — time and again — and I have not always been able to see or appreciate it,” he said. His fingers twitched, and Raphael saw a dark blossom growing in each of the monk’s palms. “But now, now I understand it.”
He groaned then, his body twitching under his robe, and then his back straightened. His hands relaxed, his fingers uncurling, and in the center of each palm was an unmistakable sign. He opened his eyes and gazed at Raphael. “You are worthy of forgiveness,” he said reverently. “Your heart is stronger than you know. Never stop loving them. That is the only way you can save them. That is the only way.”
