The Palace

Gelata tossed her head, eager for a gallop. Ragoczy tightened the reins and leaned forward in the saddle. The gloom of the stable was relieved by one candle only and its light revealed Ruggiero's dark-dyed face near the door.

"How long will Fra Sansone sleep?" Ruggiero asked as he prepared to draw back the bolt on the door.

"He should be awake by midmorning, and I will be back long before then. If he gets restless in the night, burn some of those dried leaves I gave you in a little brazier in his chamber. That should be enough to keep him out." He drew his dark cloak more tightly around his shoulders. "I'll leave by la Porta Corsa del Prato. That gate is open all night for the privy workers. I'll come back by another gate." He checked his boot and found the knife there. "I'm ready. Draw back the bolt."

Ruggiero hesitated. "What do I say if you are asked for? One of the Domenicani may call."

"Tell them I am at prayers and cannot be disturbed. And make certain that none of them see that there are cases packed. They'll know we're leaving if they see that."

"Depend on me," Ruggiero said, as he had so many times before.

"With my life, old friend." He moved forward in the saddle as the door swung open and was away into the night before Ruggiero had bolted the stable door again.

Fiorenza was ghostly under the cold stars. Ragoczy rode through the empty streets, listening to the rattle of his mare's hooves as she trotted toward la Porta Corsa del Prato on the west side of the city near the Arno. Once he pulled her to a walk as they passed near Santa Maria Novella, for a few of the monks' cells showed the glow of candles and echoed with the murmur of prayers. The delay was a minor one, and in a few minutes he had passed through la Porta Corsa del Prato, past the privy workers who took the night soil from the city, and was away into the darkness.

It was treacherous to ride at a gallop through the night. Too many dangers attended on it, so Ragoczy held Gelata to a strict trot, while he studied the road for hazards. Once the mare shied at the howl of a dog, and once he thought he heard pursuers and urged her into a gallop. But then they were far into the hills and the old castle was around the next bend. Ragoczy let the mare drop to a walk and he looked about, seeking out a new hiding place for her. At last he dismounted and pulled her into the shelter of a boulder. The distance to the castle was greater than before, but he feared that as the day of the auto-da-fe neared, the vigilance of the Domenicani would increase. He tied Gelata to a thick tree root that was deeply embedded in rock, and then he made his way, secret as a shadow, toward the bulk of the castle.

This time the stones were dry and his desperation gave him speed. In less than a quarter of an hour he was pulling himself over the stone frame of her cell's high window. He dropped swiftly to the floor, calling to Demetrice as he moved toward her. His voice was low and he was not entirely surprised that she did not hear him.

She was huddled on her pallet against the wall. Ragoczy dropped to one knee beside her and leaned toward her, touching her shoulder gently to waken her.

With a painful gasp she opened her eyes, eyes that were bruised and puffy, the lids abraded, beneath a badly cut forehead where the blood had only recently dried. "No..." she whispered.

Ragoczy's eyes narrowed as fury burned in him. His hands were deliberate in their care, ministering to her terrible bruises and wounds as efficiently as possible. He longed for a candle or a lantern but knew that he courted disaster if there should be light seen in Demetrice's cell. Rage and anguish warred in him every time Demetrice moaned, every time he found a new swelling or cut or burn.

When at last he had done all that he could, he tried again to wake her. The back of her hands were raw, and so he placed his kisses on her palms, whispering her name again.

This time her lids fluttered and opened as far as the swelling would allow. Her eyes were agonized and bright and she brought up one hand to protect her face. "No more. No more. I said what you wanted. I said it. I said it." Her voice was rising and her body twisted. She smothered a shriek as she cringed away from him.

"Demetrice, no. It's San Germano. Demetrice. Demetrice." He moved nearer, and pain keen as steel stabbed him as she shrank away, horror in her beaten face.

"I'll say it again. I will. Anything. But no more. No more." She started to cry, thin, wailing sobs that were the worse for being quiet. "No more. No more."

"Demetrice," Ragoczy said again, sinking back away from her so that she need not be afraid. "It's San Germane It's Francesco, amica mia. I've come back, as I said I would."

He hadn't truly expected her to hear him, but she blinked suddenly and then began to weep as a child does, with a kind of determination, and it was a moment before Ragoczy realized it was for relief.

"San German'," she said when her sobs had stopped. Cautiously she extended her hand toward him, saying as sadness thickened her words, "I told them I was a heretic. I said that I had profaned the Cross and mixed the Host with excrement." She shook her head slowly in disbelief. "I had to tell them. They wouldn't have stopped if I hadn't."

He took her hand, being careful not to touch where the skin had been torn away. "It's not important," he said in as reassuring a tone as he could manage. He knew that was true. Her confession was expected. The auto-da-fe was now less than two days away and Savonarola was eager for victims, for his last gesture of defiance against the authority of Roma and the Pope. He longed to take her in his arms, to cradle her there, protecting her from the hideous sentence that had been passed upon her.

"But I'll burn," she said calmly. "They told me that. I will burn in this world and the next." Her eyes closed in a momentary spasm of distress, but this was quickly mastered and she went on resignedly. "Your petition didn't work. But nothing would have, would it, San Germano?"

"Probably not," he allowed, remembering his interview at Santa Maria Novella two days before. In the dark he could not see the full effect of the bruises on her face, but he knew they were ghastly from the large areas of darkness on her fair skin.

Her eyes were melancholy. "Well, we've shared love." She was silent a moment, then added, "You know how much it distressed me at first, but I'm sorry now there were so few chances..."

Ragoczy's eyes brightened. "There is one last chance."

"Yes. I'm glad of that." She tried to lean back but the stones hurt her and she was forced to sit upright again. "I'm afraid of the flames, San Germano. I wish I had resisted them longer, and died today." Ordinarily such an admission would have revolted her, but after her ordeal all the terror had gone out of suicide. "I'm not a martyr, Francesco," she said, using his name for the first time.

"What?" he said absently as he turned away from his racing thoughts. For a moment he was uncertain as to whether he should tell her what had filled his mind. Then he put such concerns behind him. He moved a little nearer to Demetrice so that she could see his face in the wan square of light from the window. "Demetrice, listen to me. I can't save you from death, not entirely. But there is something I can do. I can give you a kind of... deliverance."

She stared at him, bewildered. "Deliverance? How?"

Again he took her hands, and this time she let them lie in his. "Do you remember my warning? That if there was too much love between us you might in time become like me? Do you remember that there is another way to change? If you share blood with me, then your change is assured. Now. Tonight."

"But there is still the stake," she said softly, not daring to hope that he might save her.

"Not if you're already dead. Then they'll take you to be buried away from sacred ground, and the first nightfall after that, you will wake again. Into my life." He was talking quickly now, the words almost running together.

"But how would I die? If they torture me again in the morning, it might happen..." There was a sickness in her face that told more than the anguish in her voice how much she dreaded what might happen.

"No. Not that way." He felt the knife in his boot. "I will show you how. Two little cuts, Demetrice mia. Two little cuts and the Domenicani cannot touch you again." He caressed her face with gentle fingers. "Share blood with me, Demetrice. Accept my life. Save yourself. Please."

She heard the sincerity in his soft words and though she tried to build disgust in her heart for the thing he suggested, she found it was impossible. Every movement hurt her and tomorrow it would be worse. They had promised her the rack tomorrow, and she had seen for herself what it would do. Suddenly she shuddered and pressed her hands to her face.

"No, Demetrice," Ragoczy pleaded, fearing he had lost her. He was reluctant to reach out to her and possibly give her more pain. There was little more he could say if she refused him. He wished he had told her more gently, so that she would not be frightened.

In a low voice she asked, "What do I have to do?"

He breathed deeply, gratefully. "Let me love you as I have before, Demetrice. But this time, you will do as I do. I will make a small cut. You need taste very little. And when that is done, I'll show you how the other..." He caught her in his arms and felt his embrace returned. "I must be hurting you," he murmured to her hair.

"It doesn't matter," she told him before she kissed his mouth. If her wounds were not forgotten, at least they seemed less important. She tore her penitent's robe from neck to hem and pressed his head against her breasts.

His hands were kind and sure, and where they went, his kisses followed, tracing out the loveliness of her, salving her bruises with tenderness, warming her, succoring her. The intensity of his desire was revealed only in the slight tremor of his hands. He spoke softly as he sought out her joy and his beautiful voice was as sweet as the deep strings of a lute. "There was a woman like a star who burned white-hot in the vastness of the sky. Like Venus hung in the sunset she was radiant with a splendor that was all her own. When she walked the trees shook for love of her and the humble earth caressed her feet. To lie beside her was to fill your temples with the pulse of the tides which are ever drawn to worship the moon. To savor her lips was to taste eternity and be nourished by it. Who can say all the extent of her glory?"

The wildness of her response surprised Demetrice, for previously she had been accepting, almost passive, waiting for Ragoczy to waken the passion that slumbered in her. But now, with his words tolling through her, she reached anxiously for him, yearning for his unendurable sweetness. Her mouth sought his to stop the hymn, then lingered where he had opened his riding mantle.

He made the nick high on his chest, then slipped the knife back into his boot. With urgent open lips he kissed her again, then leaned back. "Come to me, Demetrice. Come to my life."

Before his compelling words had reluctance faded. As her mouth touched the wound he breathed sharply, pleasurably. He drew her nearer and at last she lay atop him, pressing his body with her own, desiring to blend her flesh with his until they became wholly united in rapture.

When at last he moved she accommodated him, exulting as his sharp kisses loosened the last bar against her joy. Nurtured by his love, glorified by his lips, she surrendered the inmost part of herself and was filled with triumph.

She was still trembling with the force of her victory when he spoke to her again. "Demetrice, are you ready?" She heard the question as she sometimes heard thought, in a majestic awesome sound. Without speaking she held out her hands.

"The great women of Roma, when the Caesars ruled there, would have their musicians play to them as they died this way. We have no musicians here, and no perfumed bath. But I will hold you, amica mia, and if you like, I will sing to you." He tried to read her face in the gloom, but could not.

The little knife was cold so he held it to warm it. The cuts were quickly made, two neat incisions slid in under the wrist tendons. After making sure that the arteries were indeed severed, Ragoczy braced himself against the wall and pulled her into his arms, holding her close to him. "You must keep your hands down, amante mia. Press your palms to the floor so that the cuts stay open." His arms tightened and there was a distant look in his eyes. Somewhat later he began very softly to sing, not the melancholy laments of lost love or the soaring lyrics of passion, but Laurenzo's time-haunted praise of fleet, brief youth. "Quant'e bella giovinezza/ Che si fugge tuttavia/ Chi vuol esser lieto, sia;/ Di doman no c'e certezza."

Dreamily Demetrice recognized Laurenzo's words, and she felt a tug at her soul as she remembered the happily sleepless nights in his arms. For a moment the memories were so real that Laurenzo's presence was almost tangible. And then she felt Ragoczy's small hand smooth back her hair, and she wondered at his generosity that gave her not only his love to comfort her, but Laurenzo's as well. She tried to smile, but it was too much effort. Instead, she snuggled closer to his chest and with a contented sigh closed her eyes.

Text of a letter from Febo Janario Anastasio di Benedetto Volandrai to Marsilio Ficino, written December 10, 1497, and delivered on April 19, 1498:

To his most deeply revered master and teacher, Febo Volandrai sends his respectful greetings from Paris.

This will come to you through the good offices of Rene Benoit Richesse, a fellow student of mine who is journeying to Mantova and Roma to continue his studies. He has agreed to deliver this in exchange for an afternoon in your company, learning from you. I trust that for my honor you will agree.

I have heard only recently of my sister's arrest, and I find myself quite helpless. How did she come to be so accused? I thought that all was well with her and that she was still under the protection of the foreigner. I can only assume that she is still studying alchemy, which I warned her was unwise. Of course, the whole matter is foolish and I am certain that a few questions will have settled the problem long before this reaches you.

But that brings me to the reason for this letter. I need your advice, dear master. I have been uneasy in my mind for some time about my sister's situation there as the housekeeper for the foreigner. She assures me that there is no fleshly dealing in their association, and with the foreigner gone so many years now, I believe that if there was earlier, the passion by now must be over. Yet she continues in his care. It is not good for her to be thus beholden to him. Foreigners are often unaware of the difficulty they impose on others in cases like these, and it is in general preferable that the matter be solved.

My studies are such that I cannot interrupt them just now, but if you think it wise, I will send for my sister and find some appropriate employment for her here in Paris. With the stigma of heretical accusations attached to her reputation, life in Fiorenza may be quite difficult for her. In another six months I will have a break in my studies and then I may journey again to Fiorenza to find Demetrice and bring her away with me.

Of course, if you think it would be possible, it would be more convenient for me if she remained there in Fiorenza, but not, of course, if there is any real danger to her. I trust to you to tell me in what danger she stands and to suggest what solutions will be the best for all concerned.

You realize, I'm certain, that I feel very much in Demetrice's debt. It was she who provided the funds for my continued studies here, and I'm very grateful. But she would be the first to tell you that such hard-won education should not be treated lightly. Remember this when you write to me of her. Most certainly I'm aware of my obligations to her, but I know she would be greatly disappointed if I despised the sacrifices she has made for me only to rush to Fiorenza to find all this has been a minor disruption or a foolish mistake, long since explained and resolved.

Should her benefactor return to Fiorenza, I urge you to speak to him as my deputy and suggest that he cut his association with her, since it is largely from that association that this, current difficulty springs. I am sure you will know how best to say it so that he will understand what is expected of him. It's unfortunate that he had to take her in, for it was inevitable that there would be some trouble arising from that. But vision in retrospect is always so much clearer. Had I realized how very much compromised she was by her situation, I would have insisted that she join me in Wien. But no one told me and I have had little opportunity to consider her particular situation until recently.

I pray you will write to me as soon as is practical for you. Unless there is genuine danger, don't interrupt your work unnecessarily. Demetrice is most competent for a woman and no doubt would resent interference from you or me if she was able to deal with it herself.

With the hope that you are well, my dear master, and that your fears for Fiorenza have proved groundless, I commend myself to you and express in advance my gratitude for your good counsel, and your kindness to my sister.

Febo J. A. di B. Volandrai

In Paris, at the Universite, December 10, 1497