by Eric Flint
“I am afraid we may have admitted the last cardinal we may hope to see.”
“Well,” put in another voice, “not the very last, I hope.”
Ruy shook his head, turned. Bedmar was standing behind him, hands on hips, wearing the almost ankle-length frock of a Church scribe. Ruy could not keep a mischievous curl from bending the left side of his mouth. “Your Eminence,” he said with a bow.
Bedmar laughed, but returned the bow for the benefit of the scores of befuddled—and a few bemused—on-lookers. “A rascal as ever,” he snickered. “I would ask you how you have been, Ruy, but you would report the same rude—nay, satanically gifted—health that you have always enjoyed. Besides, such a query would delay the most pleasant part of this reunion: reacquainting myself with your wife, Ambassadora Nichols.”
Sharon came forward with a wide smile, but Ruy knew the look: it was disarming, and yet, a bit guarded. Her contact with Bedmar had been scant, but she had heard many stories of the years that Ruy and Bedmar had spent together. “Your Eminence,” she said with a slightly formal bow.
Bedmar was nothing if not perceptive. His smile was almost apologetic. “And I can tell from the look in your eye, Ambassadora Nichols, that my old friend has now given you a full account of our times together. As a good husband should.” He blew out his cheeks, exasperated. “I can only hope there shall be an opportunity for us three to dine together, that I might improve your opinion of me. And I shall further hope, when formal courtesies are no longer necessitated by this public setting, that our conversation shall be more relaxed. But, for the nonce, I must convey my congratulations on your security. Ruy, you have, if anything, become a more accomplished war-dog with each passing year.”
“I avail myself of new insights wherever I might find them,” Ruy replied, with a brush at his moustache. See, he didn’t do it that often—did he? “And ready access to the full collection of books in Grantville has been uncommonly enlightening. You are to be congratulated on your own precautions, Your Eminence.”
Bedmar sighed. “I wish I could take credit for that ploy, my dear Sanchez, but since lying was still a sin when I consulted my breviary this morning, I must give credit where it is due.” He turned to the oldest of the three men who had emerged from the sedan chairs. “May I present, Captain Achille d’Estampes de Valençay, knight of the Sovereign Order of Malta. And in your timeline, Ambassadora, eventually the general of the papal army under Pope Urban.”
Ruy extended a hand and put a winning smile on his face as he mentally consulted the dossiers that Sharon had reviewed with him. Urban had sent a secure document to Malta half a year ago, informing de Valençay that he had been made a cardinal in pectore: “close to the chest,” and so, undisclosed. Urban had sent out many such notifications, most of them following patterns of loyalty he had observed in both this world and, evidently, the other. There, Achille d’Estampes de Valençay had been given a biretta in 1643. And this was not the only way in which the arrival of the up-timers had been favorable to his fortunes: since the disruption in the original progression of the Thirty Years’ War had prevented the Battle of Castelnaudary from ever being fought, he had not taken the side of Gaston’s ally, Henri II de Montmorency in an attempt to strip Richelieu of his royal influence. Nonetheless, the Grey Eminence, familiar with the up-timer histories, had taken the precaution of ensuring that the much-honored Achille be deprived of an appropriate command, resulting in his return to Malta.
Achille stood at least three inches taller than Ruy’s own medium height, and if the hidalgo had a pantherlike build (well, perhaps only a cheetah now—but still as swift!), de Valençay was decidedly a tiger. His rapier was of the heaviest kind—almost a longsword—and his service as a colonel and even a fleet commander had not leeched any of the taut, lean readiness out of his body. At forty-three, he wore his heavy cuirass and helmet with the indifferent ease of men half his age. Ruy found himself assessing the way this chevalier wore his sword and moved: an old reflex for assessing possible opponents, working out optimal tactics in advance. But this time, there was a faint twinge of jealousy, of being the older rooster meeting a younger one who might be every bit as capable in a fight. Not as polished, probably, but strength and size might offset that difference.
Ruy almost had to physically shake himself out of the competitive mindset. “Captain, your reputation precedes you, and your most recent ruse adorns it even further.”
Valençay bowed as they finished shaking hands. “And you, sir, are becoming something of a legend. I welcome the chance to make your acquaintance. Allow me to present my traveling companions, and fellow-protectors of His Eminence Cardinal Bedmar: my brother Léonore and Giovanni Carlo de Medici.”
Ruy peripherally noticed Sharon stand a bit straighter beside him. And for good reason: Giovanni Carlo de Medici, or Giancarlo, was not merely one of the most able young nobles—and eligible bachelors—in all of Italy, but was the nephew of Bernhard’s wife, Claudia de Medici, although only six years younger than she. And he was fairly sure he knew what his wife was thinking: here is a prime scion of the royal house of Tuscany acting the part of a cardinal’s bodyguard, when he himself might need protecting against assassins’ knives. Borja’s agents had learned that he, too, had been fated to become a cardinal in later years, and for him to be at Urban’s colloquium was akin to volunteering for a death sentence. Léonore was, by comparison, decidedly less tigerish than his older brother, just as his eyes were less piercing and his handshake less viselike.
Ruy turned back to Bedmar. “You are singularly fortunate in your retinue, Your Eminence.”
Bedmar nodded, but his face had become grave. He turned to the others, who were almost his peers, and asked them, graciously, if they would be so good as to spread word that the entourage would be moving soon again. The three exchanged knowing looks, proffered bows to Ruy, Sharon, and then Larry, who had not yet come forward, and set about ordering their small group; it responded and moved with the precision of a military unit.
“I see you are taking no chances in your travels,” Ruy observed with a pointedly flat tone once they had left earshot.
“Quite true,” Bedmar countered. “Although, in point of fact, we are all helping each other. Achille received a summons from Urban, I am told, and I can well guess its nature. Giancarlo, having had the promise of a biretta in your world, has now attracted the baleful attention of Borja in this one. So just as I am made safer by having three such soldiers with me, I offer a measure of protection to them.”
Sharon nodded. “Because unless someone after them also has orders to kill you, they can’t take a chance of exceeding their…authority.”
Bedmar smiled at the euphemism. “And so, here we are, arrived in safety, due in no small measure to your excellent network of aerodromes. In fact, so far, there is only one disconcerting aspect of my reception here.”
Sharon leaned forward. “Please, tell me.”
Bedmar smiled. “That my brother in faith has not stepped forward to greet me.” He shot a quick glance over Sharon’s shoulder at Larry Mazzare, who stood, hands folded, ten feet behind her.
“I did not want to interrupt what was sure to be a reunion of friends,” Mazzare said quietly. And Ruy also detected a hint of caution and reserve.
So, apparently, did Bedmar. “Your Eminence, when last we met in Venice, circumstances ineluctably made us enemies. Respectful and honorable, yes, but enemies nonetheless.”
Larry did not change position or posture. “Indeed, Your Eminence. And now?”
Ruy saw Sharon suppress a start: clearly, Larry had not informed her that this was the tack he intended to take upon Bedmar’s arrival.
Bedmar folded his hands, studied Larry carefully. “And now,” he repeated, “I find you a changed man, and us in very changed circumstances. We have always been brothers in the Church, Your Eminence; we are now fully peers, as well.” Bedmar smiled. “Indeed, you may have the advantage of me.”
Larry raised an e
yebrow, his tone no less wary. “In what way?”
Bedmar put out appealing hands; they were large hands, almost comically so, given that he barely stood five foot six in thick-heeled boots. “Surely you see that, by coming here, I am not endearing myself to Philip of Spain, and even less to his minister Olivares. I am the only Spanish cardinal who has not proclaimed for Borja. Now, I am an honored guest in the camp of his mortal enemy. What level of favor do you expect I enjoy in Madrid?”
Larry nodded. “Reduced, certainly—but not irredeemable. In fact, it may yet prove advisable for at least one of the ‘Spanish cardinals’ to remain unsoiled by support of Borja. That lack of unanimity could become a fig-leaf of legitimacy if Philip eventually wishes to claim that he did not expressly order his cardinals to declare for the homicidal madman currently maintaining a rule of terror in Rome.”
Bedmar looked down, frowned. “And you presume I am so farsighted?”
Larry folded his arms. “I don’t know; are you?”
Sharon almost gasped. “Lar—Cardinal Mazzare!”
“No,” Bedmar interrupted. “He is right. And it confirms what I have heard of Cardinal-Protector Mazzare. He has risen to his august position not merely by dint of being the senior Catholic among you up-timers, but by his shrewdness.” Bedmar stood straight. “Very well. I may not divulge the full details of the political circumstances under which I have traveled here, but let me make this very clear: I come to you—first, foremost, and only—as the cardinal-protector of the Spanish Lowlands, and of Fernando, the king in the Lowlands. And his desires match the mandate of both my conscience and my vows: to safeguard Mother Church, and, if it is possible to do so without compromising her, to put the sectarian strife with the Protestants to an end.” He paused to let his words sink in. “Is that clear enough?”
Mazzare nodded slowly and stepped forward. “It is, Cardinal Bedmar.” He looked sideways at Sharon. “My regrets, Ambassador, but I am a son of the Church first—even before I am a citizen of the USE and Grantville.”
Sharon nodded slowly, her eyes calm—but if Ruy was any judge of his wife, she would be taking Larry Mazzare aside at some time in the very near future for a forthright and lively exchange of opinions.
Bedmar closed the remaining distance to Larry and offered his hand. “I apologize for the liberties I took when we first met in Venice. It is an old military instinct to put a potential adversary on the back foot, to push him in conversations, to test limits and boundaries, all under the guise of diplomatic banter. I did so there. I will not do so here—with you, or anyone. Times have changed. I will not claim that I have as well, but I am reformed in some of my least dignified habits. These days leave no room for pettiness if we are to caretake the future well-being of Holy Mother Church and the innocents who might yet die in sectarian strife.”
Larry offered his hand in return. “We are certainly agreed on that.”
Bedmar nodded soberly. “I think you shall find that, since you and I last met, we are in agreement on much, much more.” He put his other hand atop theirs and then withdrew towards his entourage. “I suspect it is not part of your protocol to keep vulnerable persons loitering about as easy targets.”
Of the many things Ruy had ever imagined, or knew, Bedmar to be, “vulnerable” or “an easy target” were not among them. “Yes, let us go.”
Chapter 5
As the sand in his hourglass passed the two-o’clock mark, Javier de Requesens y Ercilla put down his midday meal—a small, fantastically expensive roll—and glanced up at the thick, almost basilicate, bell-tower of St. Paul’s. When he had started reviewing the reports to synopsize for his next transmission to Madrid, it had been eleven AM. The tip of the church’s shadow had been upon the sill of his window as he opened the cedar shutters upon a day in which the sun proved elusive, capriciously flitting in and out of the clouds like a coquette changing dance partners at a court ball.
However, despite his lesser grandee origins, Javier had not spent much time at any court or attending balls. Which was a pity, because he was quite sure that his graceful footwork, deft conversational skills, and ability to convince dull social superiors that they were in fact every bit as fascinating and compelling as they believed (or hoped) themselves to be would have won him much favor in any of the ducal courts or even those at Madrid itself.
He looked out his window, ostensibly the best view (and room) in L’Auberge de Boucle d’Argent. Beyond St. Paul’s bluff sides and steeple, beyond the curtain wall that encircled Besançon, he stared at the northern horn of the River Doub’s oxbow curve. The water was streaked and speckled by white, there: the current picked up speed as it flowed around the corner and made for the Pont Battant. It was truly a shame, he thought with a sigh, that instead of a life as a courtier, he had be compelled to make his way in the world by serving as an incognito factotum for any one of a dozen intelligencers to whom Olivares commended his services. His education at Salamanca and facility with languages made him an excellent foreign agent, and his aristocratic background and ambitions made him somewhat less susceptible to outright treachery, although it was presumed that a man in his position would of course accept the gratuities and gifts that, in any other line of work, would have been known by a more distasteful (if accurate) term: bribe.
It wasn’t very hard work, gathering intelligence and relaying orders with reasonable subtlety. And what was often the greatest inconvenience of all—relocating and establishing a legitimate reason for being in the environs to which he’d been assigned—had been unnecessary this time. One of Olivares’ innumerable section chiefs had been tasked with developing a portfolio on the new power in what had formerly been the Imperial city of Besançon, but which Bernhard had then grabbed during the extraordinary cascade of unforeseeable developments that had followed the up-timers’ arrival at more or less the epicenter of the Thirty Years’ War. It had been, in their world as well as here, not so much one war as a flurry of separate disputes that roared, sputtered, and roared again in rhythm with the changing fortunes and desires of various states and faiths, all of which draped themselves in high-sounding language and testimonies of holy purpose.
But by late 1634, those guttering fires had all but burned out and Bernhard seized Besançon as his capital. That it had been, for centuries, a free city of the Holy Roman Empire under the protection of the Hapsburgs had not served as a brake upon his ambitions.
Subsequent political events proved Bernhard’s usurpation to have been as canny as it was bold. The city had passed from Spanish to Austrian oversight at the end of the last century, and the Austrians were now preoccupied with the looming likelihood of an Ottoman incursion. Between that concern, their decision not to garrison the city with foreign troops, and the expanses of very rough—and unallied—terrain between their country and Burgundy, the Austrians had accepted its loss with something approaching aplomb.
This put the onus of a decisive reaction back upon Spain’s shoulders. But the same turmoil that had allowed Bernhard to grab Franche-Comté had cut the famous Spanish Road which had led from Spanish holdings in Italy all the way through to the Lowlands. Now interdicted at multiple points by multiple potential antagonists, Madrid had conceded that for any foreseeable future, and perhaps for all time, the overland artery that had fueled her European possessions with the blood of once-feared Spanish tercios had been irreparably severed.
However, that did not mean Spain ceased to have any interests in Besançon. There was no shortage of Spanish money and trade still invested in the city, as well as loyal allies who lamented the recent passing of the Hapsburg dominion over the place. And besides, Bernhard was unlikely to remain sated with the scope of his conquest for long. Like a shark, he was likely to die if he did not keep moving and devouring more of the land that provided the sustenance sought by all rulers: resources, taxes, young men who would take an army’s coin.
And so, Javier de Requesens y Ercilla had arrived in Besançon in late September, 1634, shortly afte
r the open hostilities between Bernhard’s forces and those of the Swedish general Horn had diminished to sullen border-watching and occasional skirmishes when patrols led by overly ambitious young officers blundered into each other. War was, Javier affirmed as he organized the reports he had been busy emending for maximum brevity, a very foolish business.
However, if it were not for the acquisitive nature of kings, who knows what employ he himself might have? He was but the fourth son of a branch of the Requesens that had watched their fortunes fall along with their increasing distance from the House of Zuñiga, one of the twenty-five families made Immemorial Grandees of Spain and a frequent source of Madrid’s leading ambassadors and intelligencers. Indeed, if Philip IV had not called Don Pedro de Zuñiga out of retirement in 1632 to provide a practiced Anglophone perspective upon the newly arrived up-timers, Javier feared he might have wound up overseeing some miserable collection of fincas where tenant farmers tilled the soil on one of his family’s dwindling tracts.
But the senior Zuñiga had remembered his family’s connection to both the Requesens and Ercillas, and accordingly asked for Javier: a suitably tactful individual, fluent in four languages, and eager to advance but without the delusions of grandeur that would make him more a liability than an asset. And so he had been plucked from his nuclear family’s fate of increasing obscurity and became an object of pride. Javier’s branch of the Requesens might still be counting fewer silver coins every year, but now, one of their number was once again carrying out important business for the Empire, had put the family name back on the lips of counselors and courtiers in Madrid. In the status-obsessed society of seventeenth-century Spain, that was almost as good as currency itself.
Javier glanced at the sundial; it would be time to turn on the radio soon. But not to relay information to the obscure factotum that Zuñiga trusted with matters in Besançon. Rather, Javier was scheduled to communicate with his second, surreptitious employer: Cardinal Gaspard de Borja y Velasco. How the would-be pope learned of Requesens’ fortuitous presence in Besançon was as great a mystery as how he had learned, earlier than most, of Urban’s establishment there. But that was immaterial to Javier. Borja paid good coin for the simplest of services: to relay reports from, and convey coded orders to, some creature of his who was currently in the city.