Rora

by James Byron Huggins

  With a sigh, Pianessa stood. He gazed upon her from his immense stature. "Even if Gianavel dies, he will win, Duchess. The only way to defeat him is to make him kneel."

  The duchess blinked. "But you said you did not care if he knelt before the Inquisitors."

  "I didn't," Pianessa agreed, "until today. But now I understand that Gianavel must, indeed, kneel before the Inquisitors. Not because of their Church, which means nothing. No, Gianavel must kneel because if he does not, then his people will fight long after he is gone. If I do not break his spirit, then his children will rise up and fight again. They will use his name for a battle cry. Everything will be an occasion for courage, and I will never know peace."

  Silent, the duchess looked away.

  Pianessa s dark eyes became opaque, utterly impenetrable and hardened against any light of the world. His face was the purest image of grim purpose. "I must destroy his faith," he said at last.

  "But how will you do that?"

  Without removing his eyes from the darkness, Pianessa’s teeth parted. "By finding what Gianavel loves with all his heart. Then I will destroy it ... and destroy the man."

  ***

  Despite torches that moved steadily through the village, Gianavel could not help but sense the pale of pain that smothered the spirit of the people.

  Although the troops had been repelled before they reached the more heavily populated brick and stone structures that comprised the richest area of Rora, the outlying homes, sprawled across surrounding hillsides and fields, had all fallen.

  Gianavel shut down pangs of guilt. He had been forced to instantly select a site to make a desperate last stand against the battalion. He had chosen the bridge because it was the only ground where Captain Mario could attack six men abreast. He could not change what he had done, nor would he have done anything differently. And to lament what he could not have changed would do no good.

  The carnage inflicted by Pianessa s troops, though brief in execution, was severe. Virtually every family lost someone, and the death toll was made even more horrible by the means in which they died. Babies had been thrown onto pitchforks, women and children raped, men set afire and dismembered and then set afire again and on and on.

  It was shocking that the attackers had been so discontent to merely kill. No, simply killing was not satisfying enough. They had been determined to kill in the most hideous means possible, exhausting their imaginations for cruelty. Not only were the means of murder excessive, they surpassed any law on the Continent.

  Even if, as law allowed, governments sentenced a man to die, there were codes of conduct and procedures established by tradition and common moral sentiment. No one, not even the quick-tempered Spanish, tortured prisoners to death en masse. It outraged the common people and achieved no purpose of justice. Even burning, prescribed for witches, was inflicted only because the penitent soul could not achieve salvation if the body were not utterly destroyed.

  When Gianavel and his men reached the poorer village after the battle, they found parents and grandparents holding slaughtered children, weeping and wailing. Other children, now orphans, were being taken into the homes of survivors.

  After leaving the section where the greatest part of the slaughter occurred, they stripped and loaded the bodies of their attackers into oxcarts, then took the bodies to be burned in a lowlying depression west of the bridge. Bertino, smoldering in anger, suggested spiking their heads along the valley rim, but Gianavel overruled. Being forced to kill a man was one thing, but to desecrate the body was a line he would not cross.

  Insuring that his orders were strictly enforced, Gianavel felt both dismayed and heartened at the suffering and the courage of the people. The older generations bore it stoically and wasted little time on words. They knew pain would not fade quickly—experience had taught them that. The best way to deal with a tragic loss was to simply endure and forget what could be forgotten. By their example, those less experienced also set their hands to needful tasks and said little.

  When Gianavel turned to the bridge, the dead soldiers, possibly two hundred in number, were gone. But the street was draped in black and heavy with the scent of copper. Angry pock holes scarred the buildings and bridge rails.

  Stern with the violent emotion of battle and the heaviness of command, Gianavel approached Hector, whose white hair was now blackened with powder, and asked, "Are you certain we have left no one in the poorer sections?"

  Hector nodded. "Oui, we have gathered the dead, and the soldiers are being burned."

  "Burn the bridge as well."

  Hector pointed to three of his men, who gathered buckets of coal oil and moved toward the bridge. In a matter of minutes, the village glowed and cracked with flames that reached hundreds of feet into the azure night. Heat from the conflagration warmed the streets, blistering them to a black that flaked and swirled at a rising wind drawn by the flames themselves. Then, in another hour it was over, and the bridge was a heap of blackened chunks heaped in the fast-flowing creek that plumed with white geysers of smoke, hissing like a volcano.

  Gianavel watched as new gabions were planned and suitable men were appointed to maintain them. He turned into the village again, aware of the fearful eyes and glances that were lifted.

  He understood what they were feeling.

  When the din of battle faded and ragged banners waved drearily over the dead, who even now clutched broken swords, and survivors remembered the fury of the fight against the rightness of the cause, it was difficult to find any meaningful purpose. Even if their cause was just, it did little to lift the horror of the fight because the fight was all too horrible.

  He turned as a diminutive figure—Jacob—came racing across the square, holding a chunk of bread. He stretched out his arms when he was still far away, and Gianavel smiled as he lifted him. He held him close to his chest as Angela ran forward with the girls.

  Her face was wet with tears that she hastily wiped on her sleeve. She embraced and kissed him fervently and then stood back, looking him over for wounds. There was blood on his sleeve—evidence of a cut gained by an action he did not remember—and she gazed into his eyes.

  "It's nothing," he whispered and kissed her again. He hugged each of the girls in turn and lowered Jacob to the ground. "Where are you and the children staying?"

  "Hector's home," she answered. "His daughters and about fifty more from the valley are with us. But some fled to the caves."

  Gianavel's face twisted. "The caves can't be defended as well as the town. How many?"

  "About twenty." Angela stood closer. "Should we send someone after them to—"

  "No," Gianavel said curtly. "The fields are alive with Pianessa's troops. Even reaching the caves would be difficult. And if Pianessa's men discover them, they'll just build fires in the entrance and suffocate them." He released a hard breath. "There's nothing we can do for them right now. We have to fortify the town."

  He gazed around and saw none of his men were close. Then he sat down wearily on a low wall, laying his rifle beside him. The children were close as he checked each of them for injury, but there was none.

  Angela allowed the children to be comforted by Gianavel's presence; then she found a small chore that would occupy them for a moment and put them under the care of Hector's wife, known to everyone as far back as Gianavel could remember as Aunt Felice. Finally Angela was alone with him for the first time since the battle.

  "How many did we lose?" Gianavel asked somberly.

  "We don't know for certain. I know we lost more than fifty children." She paused as he closed his eyes. "I think we lost forty men and women, but some weren't killed."

  "Where are they?"

  "We're doing what we can for them." She shook her head, a monumental sadness emerging. "But there's little we can do. If God is merciful, He'll let them die quickly."

  Gianavel drew Angela's head to his chest, and her arm wrapped around his back. There was not so much to say that they could not rest together.

>   Eventually the children wandered past, each toting an armful of food, wine, and blankets. Gianavel watched them until they entered Hector's house—a large, white one-story structure of poplar and stone—located diagonal to the fountain. It was one of the oldest homes in the valley, having stood for five hundred years.

  Lifting her face, Angela looked over the people. "Everyone keeps asking me what is going to happen," she said quietly. "I don't know what to tell them."

  Gianavel gazed over the people, aware that some were watching him also. "I don't know," he said. "We beat them back again, but they'll return."

  "Tonight?"

  He shook his head tiredly. "No."

  "Why not?"

  Gianavel sighed. "They can't climb the Pelice in the dark, and they lost nearly a thousand men. Yes, they'll be back, but they'll need time to reorganize."

  "Meaning ... more men."

  He nodded, stared. "Yes. When Pianessa attacks again, he'll use his entire militia."

  "How many men is that?"

  Gianavel paused. "Maybe twenty thousand." He looked across the square at the villagers and shook his head. "There's a chance that I could take us over the mountains—-just you, me, and the children. We might make it if we avoid the passes and move quickly. But there's no way to bring everyone with us."

  Angela stared at him a long time, then at the people. She shook her head and whispered, "No."

  They sat together in comfortable silence until Felice emerged from her house and the children sprinted across the square. When they were together again, Gianavel rose and they walked toward a small room off the house that Angela had prepared for them.

  "A few hours," Gianavel said as he removed his weapons, laying them on a pile of hay. "Wake me before the moon rises."

  "Sleep," she said and gave him a heavy wool blanket that he laid over straw. His hands lifted the trailing of his black cloak as Jacob ran forward and insinuated himself within it. And Gianavel laughed, lying back. Then the girls were there, too, and they piled together against their father.

  Together they lay upon the straw, all of them close against Gianavel's chest as the night rumbled with a distant storm like an angry volcano—a force of nature that would soon darken the air with burning ash that would flood black through every home, every window and doorway and room where all the frightened held one another in their fear, destroying all those who lay within its wrath.

  ***

  Emmanuel reined his horse at the gate of the castle of Cardinal Fabio Chigi, calling down to the papal guards who stood against him with halberds. Then the gate was pushed open, and in another minute the Duke of Savoy entered a cavernous library that rivaled the secret archives of St. Peters. He saw Fabio Chigi, gray eyes staring without surprise, seated behind a dark desk heaped with opened tomes that were almost too heavy for a single man to transport.

  Emmanuel did not remove his dust-caked riding cloak as he entered the warmth of the blazing fire. Cardinal Chigi gestured demurely to a silver platter with two silver goblets and a beautiful canter of red wine.

  "Something for your thirst, Savoy," he said distinctly. "It is a long ride from Turin."

  Emmanuel uncorked the canter, poured a goblet.

  "It was," he replied curtly.

  "Is your escort also accommodated?"

  Heedlessly wiping his mouth with his sleeve, a move more fitting to Pianessa's manners, Emmanuel lowered his goblet. "I brought no escort."

  Fabio Chigi's slow smile was rich with amusement. "So, a secret enterprise. Or are others positioned in the alcoves?"

  A frown turned Emmanuel's mouth.

  Cardinal Fabio Chigi had been Simon's friend since as long as Emmanuel could remember, and when Simon spoke to him in the Great Hall of Turin, Emmanuel knew what he must do. Just as he realized, this visit was not a surprise. Fabio Chigi was never surprised, which is one of the reasons he had risen, in this age of covert alliances and misleading public poise, to the position of cardinal.

  No, Cardinal Fabio Chigi had never publicly supported the Waldenses, but what he said in secret was unknown. Emmanuel was willing to risk much for the truth.

  With uncommonly imperial bearing—uncommon because he had never felt comfortable as a monarch—Emmanuel stood over the aged priest.

  "Not surprised?" he asked coldly.

  Fabio Chigi smiled before he leaned back, placing the tips of his fingers before his face in a pyramid. "It is not often that I receive royal visitors in the night, Savoy. But no, it is not a surprise."

  Emmanuel removed his cloak and draped it over the chair. He stared with distinct melancholy at the old man. Finally, "Well, if you're not surprised, then you know why I've come."

  "Yes, Savoy, I know why you have come." He studied the young prince. "Nor am I surprised that you came by night, as did Joseph of Arimathea— a powerful ruler who also knew the truth but was unable to speak it during the day."

  Emmanuel acknowledged the appropriateness of the allusion. "I know I am young, Cardinal Chigi, but—"

  "Wisdom is not a benefit of years, but the soul."

  Emmanuel paused. "What can I do?"

  Fabio Chigi nodded, sighed. "What can you do?" he repeated slowly. "Indeed, Savoy, what can you do?" He rose stiffly and strolled around the desk. "Perhaps a better question, Savoy, is what will you do?"

  "I want to end this war against the Waldenses."

  "Why?"

  "Because ... " Emmanuel hesitated, " ... because they are my people."

  "Your people..." Cardinal Chigi repeated with a penetrating stare. "Yes, Savoy, they are, indeed, your people. And that is second evidence of your wisdom."

  Emmanuel had ridden nearly thirty miles through a war-torn land without bodyguards. But if he had brought an escort, then word would have spread of his secret rendezvous. And, as Simon had taught, never reveal your mind until it is too late for your enemy to alter your designs. When he looked again at the cardinal, the old man stood before the fireplace.

  "It is one thing to claim power over the dead," he mused. "It is another to make bones rise up and walk. A lesson, sadly, that the Church has never learned."

  Emmanuel knew his thoughts were as nothing compared to experiences of the cardinal. It was not for lack of subtlety that he had vanquished both despots and tyrants to gain his kingdom.

  To some, his alliances might have appeared the dealings of the devil. But Emmanuel knew better—knew that Fabio Chigi had forged the strongest alliance of fools because fools would not have joined him under the banner of wisdom. Or, as Simon had so eloquently put it, even the devil was deceived for the glory of God.

  Fabio Chigi continued, "It was within these very halls that I first learned the nature of power, young Savoy. Lessons I learned beside Simon, who has trained you well." His gaze was cryptic. "So you realize things are not as they seem?"

  "Yes," Emmanuel said openly. "I know that what you say in public and what you say in private are not the same, Holiness."

  "Then you know a great deal more than most," he laughed. "Very well, then speak to me of the Waldenses. And speak freely—half-truths are not worthy of midnight confessions."

  Emmanuel settled into his chair; his legs were truly beginning to ache as his body cooled. "I believe these Inquisitors want the land of the Waldenses. I believe that gold and power are their goals, not the glory of God. And I believe that you know these things, too. Just as I think you wanted me to say them to your face before you told me your mind. Now, Cardinal Chigi, with my own words you have cause to either destroy me or help me. I am within your power."

  Fabio Chigi laughed. "My dear Savoy, now I understand why Simon had such hopes for you at such a young age. You were, and remain, worthy of his efforts."

  Emmanuel did not move.

  "Very well," the cardinal resumed, slightly ponderous, "let me explain your peril—it may be greater than you may suppose." He focused on Emmanuel. "Your greatest threat, at the moment, is that the Inquisitors will not return lands assumed in th
is war. This would initiate a war with France and would likely destroy Piedmont. So, after removing a sizable treasure, Cardinal Benedict will graciously return all lands to your jurisdiction, insuring Piedmont’s political stability."

  Emmanuel sipped his wine.

  "Next we will proceed with your throne," the cardinal continued. "For certain, your House cannot be deposed as the capital of Piedmont. Nor will the Inquisitors, within any scenario that I anticipate, attempt to establish a new prince. However, they might hope to gain a stronger foothold in your policies and decisions, which would be the same thing." He stared. "You are aware of these possibilities?"

  "I'm aware."

  The cardinal began once more to pace. "Good, now we will proceed to the third, and most difficult, consideration: How do you end this war against the Waldenses?"

  "I don't know," Emmanuel said and sighed wearily. "I only know that I am tired of watching my people get slaughtered. On either side of this war."

  "You are no longer a boy, Emmanuel. You have become a monarch. And as a monarch you must accept the responsibility that men die by your commands."

  "I accept my people dying for a cause, Holiness. Not for a senseless war that neither side can win."

  "Then know that you must kill even more men to end this killing," the old man said calmly. "That is, tragically, the curse of war. To end the killing, you must kill. But you cannot fight like the rest; you must strike at the head." He paused. "Imagine the arms of an octopus, Savoy. The arms are many, and you could very well fight them forever before you were victorious. But that would be foolish. If you wish to end the fight, you must strike an octopus between the eyes. Strike for the brain, and the arms will die. An army is the same. If you wish to defeat a superior force, strike he who commands it— not in the field, but in truth. Strike for the man behind the general. Do you understand these things?"

  Emmanuel was frowning. "Yes."

  "Good, then let us proceed." He paced calmly, as if the steps improved his powers of reason. "Cardinal Benedict is not the fulcrum of this war."

  "Who, then?"