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Bertrand listened with only a portion of his attention as Thomas continued his tale of his journey, nodding now and then with encouragement. But the tale interested him not. It was this man before him who commanded his thoughts.
Brother Thomas was a man of some interest, with an unusual background for a friar, although not for more worldly men. The Prior General of England, Richard Thorseby, had been extremely reluctant to admit Thomas Neville into the Order of Preachers—the Dominicans—and had examined Thomas at great length before finally, and most unwillingly, allowing him to take his vows.
Men like Thomas were usually trouble.
On the other hand, Thomas could be extremely useful to the advancement of the Dominicans—if he was handled correctly.
Bertrand smiled politely as Thomas told an amusing anecdote about ship life with the rowdy merchants, but let his train of thought continue.
Why had Thomas chosen the Dominicans? The mendicant orders, of which the Dominicans were the most powerful, were orders which took their vows of chastity, poverty and obedience very seriously. Indeed, “mendicant” was the ancient Latin word meaning “to beg”. Friars remained poor all their lives, were not allowed to own property or live luxurious lives…unlike many of the higher clergy within the Roman Church.
If Thomas had chosen to join the more regular orders of the Church, Bertrand thought, he could have been a bishop within two years, a cardinal in ten, and could have aspired to be pope within twenty. Yet he chose poverty and humbleness above power and riches. Why?
Piety?
From one of the Nevilles?
From what he knew of the Nevilles, Bertrand could not believe that one of their family would have chosen piety above power, but then one never knew the wondrous workings of the Lord.
“And so now you hope to continue your studies here,” Bertrand said as Thomas’ tale drew to a close.
“My colleagues at Oxford— ”
Bertrand nodded. Thomas had spent two of the past five years teaching as a Master at one of the Oxford colleges.
“—spoke of nothing else but the wonders of your library. Some say,” and Thomas spread his hands almost apologetically, as if he did not truly believe what some had said, “that Saint Angelo’s library is more extensive than that administered by the clergy of Saint Peter’s itself.”
“Nevertheless, you are here, Brother Thomas. You must have believed some of what you had heard.” Bertrand shifted slightly on the hard bed. His hips and shoulders ached in the chill air of his cell, and he berated himself for wishing this young man would leave so he could crawl beneath the blanket.
“But it is true,” Bertrand continued. “We do have a fine library. For many generations our friary has been well funded by successive popes—” Bertrand did not explain why, and Thomas did not ask, “—and much of this benevolent patronage has been put to building one of the finest libraries in Rome and, I dare say, within Christendom itself. You are welcome, Brother Thomas, to use our facilities as you wish.”
Thomas bowed his head again, and smiled. “You are weary, Brother Prior, and I have taken up too much of your time. Perhaps we can talk again in the morning?”
Bertrand nodded. “We break our fast after Prime prayers, Brother Thomas. You may speak with me then. Do you wish Daniel to show you your cell now?”
“I thank you,” Thomas said, “but Daniel has already pointed out its location to me, and there is something else I wish to do before I retire.”
“Yes?”
Thomas took a deep breath, and from the expression on his face Bertrand suddenly realised that it was piety that had impelled Thomas to take holy orders.
“I would pray before the altar of Saint Peter’s, Brother Prior. To prostrate myself to God’s will before the bones of the great Apostle has always been one of my dearest desires.”
“Then for the Virgin’s sake, brother, let Arno see to your feet before you go. I’ll not have the pope say that it was one of my brothers who left blood smeared all over the sacred floor of Saint Peter’s!”
After the celebrations of the day, Rome had darkened and quieted, and the streets were deserted. Thomas walked from the friary over the bridge crossing the Tiber—more comfortably now that Arno had daubed herbs on his ice-bitten feet, and wrapped them in thick, soft bandages inside his sandals—then halted on the far side, staring at the huge rounded shape of the Castel St Angelo from which the friary took its name. Thomas had heard that it was once the tomb of one of the great pagan Roman emperors, but the archangel Michael had appeared one day on its roof and from then on the monument had been converted to a more holy and Christian purpose: a fort, guarding the entrance to the domain of the popes in Rome, the Leonine City.
Thomas turned his head and stared west towards St Peter’s Basilica built into the hill of the Leonine City, and surrounded by lesser buildings and palaces housing, once again, the papal curia and the person of the Holy Father himself. Lights glinted in many of the windows in the papal palace, but even the excitement of a once-again resident pope could not diminish Thomas’ wonder at seeing the great structure of St Peter’s Basilica rising into the night.
Thomas’ eyes flickered once more to the Castel St Angelo. Legend had it that a long-dead pope had caused a tunnel to be built from the papal palace next to St Peter’s into the basements of the fort; an escape route into a well-fortified hidey-hole, should the Roman mobs ever get too unruly. Given the widespread reputation of the Romans for spontaneous and catastrophic violence, Thomas wondered if the first chore Gregory had undertaken once ensconced in his apartments was to personally dust away the spider webs and rats’ nests from the tunnel entrance.
Thomas grinned at the thought, then automatically—and silently—castigated himself for such irreverence. He looked at the gate in the wall of the Leonine City. It was closed, but several guards were on duty, and Thomas hoped they’d let him through.
They did. A single Dominican could harm no one, and Thomas’ obvious piety and insistence that he be allowed to pray before St Peter’s shrine impressed them as much as it had Bertrand.
The pressing of a coin into each of their hands dispelled any lingering doubts.
Beyond the gate Thomas walked slowly up the street leading to St Peter’s.
The Basilica was massive. Since the Emperor Constantine had first erected the Basilica in the fourth century, it had been added to, renovated, restored and enlarged, but it was still one of the most sacred sites for any Christian: the monument erected over the tomb of St Peter, first among Christ’s Apostles. Here pilgrims flocked in their tens of thousands every year. Here the penitent begged for their salvation. Here kings and emperors crawled on hands and knees begging forgiveness for their sins.
Here was the heart of functional Christendom now that Jerusalem was lost to the infidels.
Thomas faltered to a halt some hundred paces from the atrium leading to the Basilica, and his eyes filled with tears. For so long he had wanted to worship at St Peter’s shrine. Initially as a child, having watched his beloved parents die from the corruption of a return of the great pestilence; through all the years of his youth—years wasted in blasphemy and anger—and finally, to this man grown into the realisation that his life must be dedicated to God and furthering God’s mission here on earth.
It had been a long, difficult, fraught journey, but here he was at last.
At last.
Thomas resumed his slow walk towards the Basilica. At the end of the street thirty-five wide steps rose towards a marble platform before an irregular huddle of buildings: several huge archways, a tower, and tall brick apartments with colonnaded balconies. These buildings formed a wall to either side of the entrance archways into the vast court that served as the atrium of St Peter’s.
After an instant’s hesitation, Thomas climbed the steps and crossed the platform. Immediately before him were the three archways, the paved atrium stretching beyond them.
Normally, Thomas knew, it would have been full of stalls and traders selling pilgrim badges, relics, genuine holy water, splinters from the true cross and threads from Christ’s robe, but tonight the stalls were empty, their canvas roofs flapping in the breeze. For this day, at least, the pope had ordered the Leonine City emptied of traders, street merchants and hawkers.
The court was even empty of pilgrims, and Thomas’ spirits rose. He would have St Peter’s to himself.
As he approached the entrance into the Basilica he prayed that the pope had retired to his private apartments.
Thomas did not want to share St Peter’s shrine even with the Holy Father himself.
His heart thudding, Thomas entered the building.
It was massive, but what caught Thomas’ eye was its layout, used as he was to western churches constructed in the form of a cross. Constantine had built the Basilica in a roughly rectangular form, modelling it on the Roman halls of justice. The very eastern wall, where stood the altar over St Peter’s tomb, was rounded, but the rest of the Basilica was laid out as an immense hall with four rows of columns supporting the soaring timber roof and dividing the interior into a nave with two aisles to each side.
For long minutes Thomas could not move. His lips moved slowly in prayer, but his mind could not concentrate on the words. His eyes, round and wondrous, roamed the length and height of the Basilica, stopping now and then at a particularly colourful banner or screen, or lingering on the statue of a beloved saint.
Finally, he stared at the altar at the western end of the nave. Even from this distance he could see the exotic twisted columns guarding the altar, covered with a canopy hanging from four of the columns.
Thomas raised a hand, crossed himself, then slowly, and with the utmost reverence, walked down the length of the nave towards the altar. There were a few worshippers within the Basilica kneeling before some of the side shrines, and barely visible in the flickering light of the oil lamps, but there was no one before the altar itself.
Tears slipped down Thomas’ cheeks, and his hand grasped the small cross he wore suspended from his neck.
He had walked all his life towards this moment, and he could now hardly believe such was the munificence of God’s Grace that he was finally here.
Again Thomas’ steps faltered as he reached the altar. He knew that to one side steps led down into a chamber from where he could view through a grille the actual tomb of St Peter, but for now all Thomas wanted to do, all he could do, was to prostrate himself before the altar.
He slumped to his knees, his eyes still raised to the altar, then he dropped his head and hands, and lowered himself until he lay prostrate in a cruciform position before the altar.
It was cold and horribly uncomfortable, but Thomas was filled with such zeal he did not notice.
Holy St Peter, he prayed silently over and over, grant me your humbleness and courage, let my footsteps be guided by yours, let my life be as worthy as yours, let me be of true service to sweet Jesus Christ as you were, let me ignore hunger and pain as you did, let me immerse myself in the true wonder and joy of God. Holy St Peter…
Hours passed unnoticed, and the Basilica emptied of all save the friar stretched before the altar. Thomas’ muscles grew stiff with the cold and the fervour of his thoughts, but he did not notice his discomfort. All Thomas wanted was to be granted St Peter’s grace, to be accepted to serve—
Thomas.
Thomas was lost in prayer. He did not hear.
Thomas.
One of Thomas’ outstretched fingers twitched slightly, otherwise he showed no outward sign of hearing.
Now the voice grew more insistent, more terrible.
Thomas!
Thomas’ entire body jerked, and he rolled onto his back, his eyes blinking in surprise and disorientation.
Thomas!
He jerked again, and rose on one elbow, staring down the nave of the Basilica.
Perhaps a third of the way down, on the left wall of the Basilica, a golden light exuded from one of the side shrines.
Thomas!
Thomas scrambled about until he was on his hands and feet. He lowered his face to the stone floor. “Lord!”
Thomas, come speak with me.
Shaking with fear and wonder, Thomas inched his way across the floor, his breath harsh in his throat, his eyes wide and staring at the stones before him.
Thomas…
Thomas crept to the entrance of the shrine, daring a quick look.
The shrine consisted merely of a niche in the wall, large enough only for a statue of an angel, arms and wings outstretched.
Thomas supposed that the statue was of some alabaster stone, but now it glowed with a brilliance that made his eyes ache. The face of the statue was terrible, full of cruel righteousness and the power of the Lord.
Thomas averted his eyes in dread.
“Lord!” he said again.
No Thomas. Not the Lord our God, but His servant, Michael.
The archangel Michael…
“Blessed saint,” Thomas whispered, his fingers clawing forward very slightly on the floor.
Blessed Thomas, said the archangel, and Thomas felt a brief warmth on the top of his bowed head, as if the angel had laid his hand there in benediction.
Thomas began to cry.
Do not weep, Thomas, but hark to what I say. There are few men or women these days who can be called of brave heart and true soul. You are one of them.
“I would give my life to serve, blessed Saint Michael!”
I do not think you shall have to go that far, Thomas, for you are of the Beloved.
Of the beloved?
“Blessed saint, I am a poor man with a great sin on my soul. There was a woman who I—”
Think you I know not every deed of your life? Think you that I cannot see into every corner of your soul? The woman used you. She was a whore. What you did was right and caused a great rejoicing among my brethren.
A great weight fell from Thomas’ mind. For so long he had laboured under the burden of his sin…and now to hear from St Michael that it was no sin at all…
“I thank you,” he whispered. He had been right to do as he had. Alice was indeed a whore, for she had betrayed her husband to sate her lustful cravings.
All women are vile. Their flesh leads to temptations. Never forget that it was a woman who betrayed Adam.
“I will never forget it, blessed saint.”
You have passed the first test, Thomas. Now comes one much greater.
“Saint Michael?”
Evil roams among your brethren, Thomas.
Thomas shuddered. “Among the fellows of my holy order, Saint Michael?”
It well may, but I speak of the wider community of mankind. For many years now evil incarnate in the form of Satan’s imps have walked unhindered, wreaking havoc and despair. The world is altering, Thomas, and turning away from God. You are Beloved of both the Lord God and my brethren, and it is you who shall head His army of righteous anger.
Thomas felt all the disparate elements of his life fall into place. When he’d been closest to despair, unable to see the meaning and course of his life, the Lord had all the while been guiding and training him. He’d thought his life before entering the Order worthless and empty. Now Thomas knew differently.
Exultation filled his soul. He was to be a soldier of Christ…and the enemy was evil.
“What should I do? I am yours, blessed saint, mind and body and soul!”
Study. Pray. Grow in understanding. In time, and only when the time is right, I will return to give you further guidance.
“But—”
Thomas got no further. Suddenly the glow and warmth was gone, and Thomas found himself alone in St Peter’s Basilica before a lifeless statue, its face once more cold and impassive.
He struggled into a sitting position, tears still streaming down his cheeks, his hands clasped before him, staring at the statue of St Michael.
