The King's Agent Read online

  “To your knees, Battista.” Aurelia braced herself against the wall. “Pull on it until you drop to your knees, pray for those in Purgatory.”

  “Sì, sì, yes, yes,” Battista mumbled, nodding with understanding. With a flex of his arms and a stretch of his neck to either side, he sucked in his breath and launched his body once more. This time, as he gripped the lever, he lifted his calves, legs forming an L, allowing his weight to carry him, and the lever, all the way down, until his knees skimmed the hard floor.

  The angel’s wings flapped harder, the air a gale force. It hit the flaming swords, extinguishing the fire, setting the room into virtual darkness. Behind them, the stone door shuddered and fell away.

  “Run!” Battista cried, jumping to his feet, reaching out behind him.

  Aurelia pushed herself off the wall, barely regaining the breath knocked out by the driving thrust of the wind. She took his hand, a natural instinct, and they rushed together through the portal, both expecting it to close behind them at any instant.

  Panting and wheezing in the next chamber, they stared—almost disappointed—as the egress remained clear. They laughed together at their unnecessary urgency.

  She felt it then, as she thought he must, the reweaving of the bond they had formed in Hell; Aurelia saw it on his lovely face and she reached out. “I—”

  Battista turned, stepping away and up the gradient path before them. She could see nothing but his back, nothing of the reason for his denial. With a pang of disappointment wedged in her heart, she followed.

  It was a short climb to a perfectly square terrace, the most room-like chamber encountered since they had entered the grotto. Man, not nature, had formed this space, its walls distinct—smooth and straight—with two squares carved into the floor, a matching design chiseled upon them, the straight, even lines of a cross atop the curled pagan coil.

  “We have no need to search for a door.” Battista crossed the floor and stood before the clearly demarcated portal, one without latch or keyhole. “But how do we open it? You would think a painting would hang in a room such as this. It would look at home upon these walls.”

  Impatience sharpened his voice as his fingers traced the crack of a door.

  “These two squares,” Aurelia mused aloud. “Perhaps they are the key.”

  With a scowl, Battista joined her in the middle of the room between the carved tiles. He stepped on one, the resulting click loud in the tranquil chamber. Excited, Aurelia stepped on the other, and with a matching clack the door slid sideways, disappearing into the wall, revealing another climbing pathway on the other side.

  Without discussion, they stepped off the tiles, heading for the door. The instant their weight lifted from the squares, the door shuddered to a close, Aurelia and Battista still many paces from the closed portal.

  “We have to run for it,” Aurelia said, heading back for the tile.

  “We’ll never make it,” Battista groused.

  Aurelia rolled her eyes and shoved her hands onto her hips. “What is yo—”

  “Did you see these pots?” Battista ignored her, giving her no ground to continue.

  There were indeed two terra-cotta pots, one in each corner flanking the door. A ribbon of design encircled each at its fattest point, a chain of the same motif found on each tile.

  “I think if we place a pot on each spot, we will keep the door open.”

  Battista grabbed one as Aurelia did the other, placing them on the tiles simultaneously. But no click did they hear; the door budged not an inch.

  “They’re not heavy enough.” Now it was her turn to sound petulant, but she no longer cared, and turned to the puzzle before them.

  “Humph,” she muttered from the back of her throat. Stepping to one pot, she removed the doubletlike jacket of her travel costume and the small chain she wore around her neck, and stuffed them in the pot’s bottleneck. She added the small band of fine leather around her waist and ... click.

  Battista stepped to the other pot, pulling out a fine dagger from his pouch and an odd lock, a silver tool, and a small coin purse, and plunked them all in. The tile lowered but with no answering sound.

  “Too much, you have given too much ... you must take some back, for only with equal giving can another rejoice in the gift,” Aurelia said, leaning over to peer into the containers. “Dante tells us, through Virgil, that the value of material possessions decreases with sharing while the value of spiritual possessions increases, but only if of a balanced nature, so that one does not feel beholden to the other.”

  She offered a profound commentary for their situation, its every ordonnance. Aurelia looked at him pointedly, surprised to find him staring back.

  Without a word, he reached into the pot and drew out the dagger and the purse and returned them to his satchel. As the pot inched up, the click resonated and the door shimmied open.

  Battista bowed with little gallantry in the gesture, and she stepped across the room and through the opening.

  In this tight silence, they climbed once more, the path winding up and up, around and around. Dust, settled for years, kicked up in the air, covering them with a light coating of fine clay-colored particles. Infesting their throat and their nostrils, the smell and taste of dirt clogged their senses.

  As they trudged onward, the path became muddled, infused with smoke as the passageway widened. Through the thickening haze, it appeared as if the trail split into three paths, but the air became too murky to see clearly. The higher they climbed the smokier it became, the vapors turning from white to gray to black. The miasma burned their throat and their eyes, tears poured down their faces.

  “We must cover our eyes,” Aurelia croaked. Reaching beneath her skirt, she pulled on the thin linen of her underchemise. With a grunt and a great tug, the entire skirt portion ripped from the seam at her waist. Grabbing each side of a seam, she pulled and tore it into strips, handing one to Battista, bunching the other over her own bloodshot eyes, and tying it behind her head, sighing with the relief.

  “And how are we to see?” Battista asked with no mention of thanks as he blindfolded himself.

  Grateful he couldn’t see her, knowing the tale of her irritation was written plainly on her features, she told him, “It is not a time to see, but to know.”

  Reaching out blindly, she found his hand and pulled it to her.

  “Put your hand on my shoulder. I will lead you.”

  “I see no—”

  “Just do it, Battista! Trust me!”

  Aurelia made the desperate plea in this moment and in the entirety of their shared experience.

  He said naught; his large hand covered her shoulder, fingers closing firmly on her small bones.

  Aurelia breathed deep, freed by his faith. In the infinity of sightlessness, she inhaled again, listening as the air entered her body, feeling her lungs expand with it. In the sound—in the sensations—she found the stillness she needed, and started forward.

  She sensed his hesitation, reached up, and placed her free hand calmly upon his. His movement gained sureness and they advanced together. For a truly blind moment, her instinct faltered. Aurelia veered to the left.

  Instantly a terrible anxiety possessed her; her stomach churned into knots, her head ached, and she shivered in a cold sweat. She turned away, straightening her course, and all fretfulness flittered away.

  “We must keep going,” she said, as much to herself as to Battista, and her throat burned as smoke entered her mouth and lungs. They had not passed the vapors and she walked on.

  Without visual stimulation, the sounds of the cave grew ever more distinct. Amidst the trickles and dripping of water, within the swooshing of air through stone concretions, moans—like those of voices, both low and high—chanted rhythmically. Had these sounds been here all along? Had she and Battista refused to hear them in the name of self-preservation?

  The mantra led them onward; Aurelia’s instincts clung tenaciously to the keening. Time slowed in the darkness and ye
t her confidence grew. As the voices became louder, another sound joined in.

  The whoosh of rushing water floated toward them on a fresh mineral scent. Aurelia and Battista drank it in in large draughts, cleansing the filth of the smoke from their bodies.

  “Can we—”

  “Just a short bit more,” Aurelia answered, knowing what Battista longed for.

  She directed them to the right, answering the insistence to put them snug against the rock wall they bumped into, and took several more paces forward. The dogged assertion that they stop and remove their eye coverings tore into her.

  “Now, Battista,” Aurelia told him, and pulled the strips of cloth from her eyes.

  “Merda!”

  Vista revealed, Battista cursed, splattering his body against the cold rock at his back.

  The small tunnel had poured them out into an enormous cavern like the flow of wine through the long neck of a wide-bottomed bottle. They found themselves perched upon a slim path traversing the circumference of the chamber, hundreds of feet above the lake bottom. Across from them, a frothing waterfall fed the lake, the water so pure—moving so fast—it churned blue-white, a chill breeze drifting from the cool liquid.

  As Aurelia surveyed the room, she put her hand upon her heart, closing her eyes once more in silent thanks. To their left, the two other paths ended abruptly, no path beyond the egress, nothing but a sheer drop to the bottom.

  “I cannot believe we have climbed so high. The mountain did not look this large from the outside.”

  “Perhaps we have passed beyond any physical confines,” Battista replied calmly.

  Stepping around her, he took the lead once more. “I can see a hollow on the other side. It must be the way forward.”

  The path before them expanded wide enough to be easily negotiated, and the wall it hugged curved outward, allowing more sureness of step. They moved quickly in the absence of impediments.

  Battista took the first step away from the tunnel and onto the suspended path and the entire mountain began to shake, as if the earth itself quaked.

  “What now?” cried Battista.

  “Hang on!” screamed Aurelia, pushing her body against the wall to their right for stability.

  The simple path became a fatal obstacle course. They hurled themselves forward as the chamber shuddered around them, the tremors dislodging huge boulders from the cliffs above, sending the projectiles crashing down on the path around them.

  Moving in fitful starts and stops, they jumped ahead of one rock, screeched to a halt before another. The propelling boulders pounded downward—crashes ringing in their ears—to splash into the lake below with a smash and a starburst of water.

  “Back, Aurelia!” Battista screamed as another massive stone pelted down over the path before them, his body thrusting in reverse, one booted heel grinding into hers.

  Aurelia jerked back in pain.

  Battista rushed forward in the boulder’s wake.

  Four, maybe five feet separated them.

  Aurelia, recovered, rushed to catch up.

  The boulder passed her, just inches away, smashing onto the path, breaking off a chunk just as Aurelia made to step upon it.

  She screamed as she fell, falling so quickly, she couldn’t comprehend what happened to her body. As inertia pulled her downward, her hands flew up, and the grasp, when it came, jerked her to a stop, halting her descent and swinging her against the hard wall, knees scraping painfully upon the jagged stone.

  “Your other hand, Aurelia!” Battista cried, teeth bared with exertion, broad shoulders leaning back to offset her weight at the end of his arm. He reached out his other arm. “Give me your other hand!”

  With a push off the wall, she swung her dangling limb with all her might, and found him, hands clasping forearms.

  With a growl of straining effort, Battista pulled as Aurelia found toe-sized footings, pushing upward with her legs and feet.

  The edge scraped her face as it rushed by, dug into her gut, and tore against her legs. With a last yell, Battista pulled her over the edge, the impelling force carrying her forward against him, and they tumbled to the ledge, air whooshing from Battista’s lungs as his back hit hard stone.

  Aurelia held on to him—in the safety of his embrace—but they could not linger. The chamber continued to quake, the boulders continued to fall.

  Jumping up, he pulled her to him like a sack of feathers. “Stay with me!” he cried.

  She had no time to answer. He latched onto her hand and yanked. They ran again with erratic progress, heads bent, hurtling toward the dark orifice and the safety it teased them with.

  Wheezing with exertion, they flung themselves into the dimly lit tunnel and stopped, breathless and safe ... for the moment.

  “You ... saved ... me,” Aurelia puffed, doubled over, only her hands upon her knees keeping her from falling. “Mille grazie, uomo buono. You are indeed a good man.”

  Swigging deeply from the goatskin, he handed her the soft-sided flask, drawing closer as she drank. “I have never been so frightened as when I saw you falling.”

  The naked honesty in his voice pulled her up. Aurelia found the emotional truth in his eyes, but unlike the chasm, she knew not how to cross the space between them.

  “Come.” He slung the strap once more about a shoulder and began climbing yet another incline, another swirling path upward, Aurelia close on his heels.

  “Hell may have been more dangerous, but this seems to be taking forever,” Battista grumbled as they trudged along, impatient with the unbroken ascent. “It feels as if it will never end.”

  “No doubt the lost souls stranded in Purgatory feel the same,” Aurelia replied, hoping to ease the burden with the contrast of a harsher reality.

  His voice took on a hard edge. “I am sure your own soul will not be so tortured. You, by your own words, are free from sin.”

  Aurelia cut a look at his back, as if to see the puzzle of his words deciphered upon it. “I have never been free to sin.” She laughed softly with a shrug. “If given the luxury of choice, would I have still chosen the righteous path? I don’t know. The first real decision I have made on my own has been to come with you. My first taste of temptation and I have been lured away.”

  She stopped; her own thoughts created the hurdle she must overcome.

  “What makes you think you made the wrong choice?” He held, heel grinding in the dust and dirt.

  “I do not know if it is the right thing. I know only that it is what I wanted ... to have an adventure, to be actively purposeful.” Aurelia chuckled. “I suppose only time will tell if I have sinned in doing so.”

  “Perhaps the old woman you snuck away to visit in Florence warned you against me, against this quest.”

  His words hit Aurelia with the full force of his fury, knocking her into silence. She stared at him, at the truth of his ire finally revealed.

  “You followed me?” she croaked, choking on anger.

  “You kept secrets from me?” He jumped forward. Toe-to-toe they stood, his released anger splotching his ruddy skin.

  “I ... y-y-you ...” Aurelia stammered.

  Battista laughed a nasty guffaw, spinning back round and trouncing upward once more.

  Aurelia followed, feet stomping like a child having a tantrum, hands fisted by her sides. She fought against the red-hot fury, willing herself to see the situation as he did. Why wouldn’t he follow her? She had snuck from the house without telling anyone and had said nothing about her visit. She chewed on her top lip as she remembered the occasions she had denied knowing anyone in the city. He had a right to his anger, and an explanation.

  “Battista, I ... I ... needed to ask after my guardian,” she sputtered a confession of sorts, one given uneasily but with true remorse. “He had been unwell for some days before I left and ... and I have a care for him. I owe him much.”

  Battista pivoted round, jaw flinching; he gave her a cold eye and pursed mouth.

  “Do you love him?�
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  Her brows flew up her forehead; of all the responses she had imagined, she never expected this.

  “No ... I mean, yes. But it is the love of a brother, of a caregiver.”

  Battista’s shoulders drooped, but he did not let it rest. “Why did you not tell me?”

  She raised her face skyward, wagging it at her own foolishness. “I did not think you would approve. I feared you would think it too dangerous. I—”

  He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook. “I trusted you with my life. I took you into my home, and you betrayed me with your secrets.”

  Aurelia pushed a hand against his chest, his condemnation only too real to be debated, though he did not know the depth of it. “I would do nothing to hurt you, Battista, ever.” She gave him that truth willingly.

  “I want to believe you.” He lowered his puckered brow, his face stripped of anger, wreathed with vulnerability. But as she reached out, he drew away. “I long to believe you.”

  He resumed the climb, Aurelia quick on his heels.

  “We are united by the desire to help our fellow man. You can be—”

  But the words died on her tongue, dried up by a blast of scorching air that battered them as they reached another plateau.

  Pushing against it, they turned right, following the path as it narrowed and flattened, as it opened into yet another cavernous room. But this one held them as none before had.

  The room burned as if alive with flame; waves and waves of it burst up from the floor and out from the walls, a maze of fire. But at its end, perched somehow safely, a painting, though one too distant for them to tell for certain if it was a part of the triptych, yet how could it be anything else?

  Their anger put aside, they stared at the blasts of flame, perspiration bursting on their skin, soaking their clothing. The explosions burst with jarring arrhythmia, only the most meager hint of a path carving its way through the fire.

  Battista looked down at her with naught but concern. He held out his hand and she took it gladly.