Chapter 14

"To display my good faith to the Ghibellini, I have decided to free you."

"Why should the Ghibellini care, one way or the other, what happens to me?" said Daoud. Slowly he rolled over on his side, to make it easier to look at d'Ucello. Pain flared in his arms and legs, in his back and chest. His hands barely had the strength to pull the blue cloak with him.

"You still deny that you are of that party?" d'Ucello asked.

"I am David of Trebizond."

D'Ucello rose to answer a knock at the door. Daoud lifted himself on one elbow to see who it was. In the shadowed corridor a white-robed friar, taller than d'Ucello, was peering in, trying to see Daoud.

"We are not quite ready for you, Fra Bernardino," said d'Ucello, half-closing the door.

"Wait, Signore," the Dominican said, putting out a pale hand. "Cardinal Ugolini has come here with men-at-arms and is demanding that you release this man David to him at once."

Ugolini, here? Daoud felt a lightness in his heart. Freedom was that much closer.

"Make sure the cardinal is comfortable and is offered refreshments, Fra Bernardino," said d'Ucello, "and tell him he will not have to wait long."

_Better and better._

When the door was shut, d'Ucello walked over to the bed and stared into Daoud's eyes. "If I let you go, will you speak on my behalf to the Ghibellini?"

Daoud smiled. "In my capacity as a trader?"

D'Ucello clenched his fists. "Damn you! You are too stubborn."

"So"--Daoud kept the smile fixed on his face--"you have arrested and tortured me for a night and a day. You very nearly did to me something so horrible, even now it hurts me to think about it. And you would have done it, too, if the contessa's summons had not delayed you. Now, because you have stopped doing these things to me, you expect me to be overflowing with gratitude and glad to help you make peace with the Ghibellini."

D'Ucello smiled back. "For my sparing you from torture, from mutilation, from death, you should be grateful, yes."

_If he were another kind of man, he would have destroyed me with Greek Fire and let this city be ruined while he fought the Sienese. In spite of what he did to me, this is a wise man, and he deserves to live and to rule here._

But Daoud could not resist another thrust. "What I should do, if, as you think, I have influence with the Sienese, is have them do to you what you have done to me. And not spare you at the end." He felt himself getting angry as he thought of all he had been through, even though he knew anger was foolish. "I know where you keep your flask of Greek Fire."

D'Ucello's black eyes held Daoud's. "Yes. You could do that. But I think I have come to know something about you during these hours you have suffered at my hands."

"Yes?"

"I do not know what you are, but I know that you are much more than you seem to be. And you are not the sort who takes revenge on a man for doing his duty."

Daoud did not care to haggle anymore. "Allow any messenger of mine freedom to come and go through the city gates."

"Agreed."

The podesta was right, he thought. He would not seek revenge after d'Ucello surrendered to the Sienese any more than he would kill a prisoner of war. Men like Qutuz did that sort of thing, to satisfy their vanity. Men like Baibars did not. He thanked God for making him more like Baibars.

And he thanked God for bringing him alive and whole out of the valley of death.

* * * * *

Her first sight of Daoud was a cruel blow to Sophia's heart. His blond hair, dark with dirt and sweat, spread in lank locks on the pillow. His bloodshot eyes looked at her out of blackened lids. His lips were cracked. His face looked hollow, as if he had grown thinner just in the day d'Ucello had held him.

She ran to him across the tiled floor of Ugolini's reception hall.

He was alive, but how badly hurt was he? She prayed that when she lifted the blanket that covered him she would see that his body was sound.

He raised his hands to her as she bent over the litter. She saw that the fingernails were blackened and bloody, and her own fists clenched as she felt what they must have done to his hands. She slid her arms around his shoulders and pressed her face against his. Perhaps the men-at-arms and servants should not see the cardinal's niece embracing the trader from Trebizond, but at that moment nothing mattered to her but to hold his living body in her arms.

She heard him gasp. She was hurting him. What a fool she was!

"Forgive my clumsiness, David. I am so sorry."

He gently squeezed her hand as she drew away from him. "Your arms feel like an angel's wings."

Ugolini called his steward, Agostino, and rattled off a list of necessaries for treating Daoud's wounds--water, a pot and a brazier, clean cloths, medicine jars from the cardinal's cabinet.

Sophia walked beside the litter as Ugolini's men carried Daoud to his room on the third floor. Her hand rested lightly on his shoulder. Her feelings alternated between agony, as she imagined what he had gone through, and singing elation that he was back with her. With joy she felt movement and life in the hard muscle under her fingertips.

"Tilia and I did what we could for you," she said when the men had deposited him on his bed.

"I know," said Daoud. "Ugolini told me about your visit to the contessa. Had she not sent for d'Ucello when she did--as you persuaded her to do--I would be dead now."

She sat on the edge of his bed and put her hands over her face and wept for joy. It had all meant something, her rushing to Tilia before dawn, her going with Ugolini to the contessa, her falling to her knees before the old woman.

As the men-at-arms left, Ugolini came in with Agostino and two servants bearing a brazier and a tripod, pots of water, cloths, and jars of ointments and powders from Ugolini's shelves. Two other servants brought a table into Daoud's room, and Ugolini had the medications arranged on it.

"He also let me go because the Ghibellini from Siena are about to besiege the city," said Daoud. "He wants my help in surrendering to them."

"A pity the Sienese could not have gotten here in time to catch the Tartars and de Verceuil," said Sophia when the servants had left.

Ugolini looked up from the powders he was mixing for poultices and frowned. "Catch them? Why?"

Sophia stared at Ugolini. Then the news had somehow missed him. She felt sorry for him. Even though Tilia was very much alive, this was going to be a terrible shock.

Daoud said, "In the dungeon I heard something had happened at Tilia's house."

Ugolini's eyes grew huge. "Tilia! My God, what was it?"

"Tilia is well, Cardinal," Sophia said quickly. "Luckily for her, she was here when it happened." She wondered how much Daoud knew about what had happened, and how he felt about it. Her heart still ached for poor Rachel. Where was the child now, right at this moment? Somewhere on the road to Perugia. Being abused, perhaps, by that beast of a Tartar.

"When _what_ happened?" Ugolini cried. "In the name of Christ and the Virgin, speak out!"

Sophia told the cardinal and Daoud how she and Tilia had gone to Tilia's house, and of the death and destruction they had found there. It hurt her to see the anguish in their eyes. Especially Daoud's. He _must_ feel a terrible guilt about having sent Rachel there in the first place. Now he had to suffer that, along with pain d'Ucello had inflicted on him.

"The Tartars and de Verceuil!" Ugolini shouted, shaking clenched fists. "May God send a flood to drown them on the road to Orvieto! May all the devils in hell roast them!" He paced the floor furiously, his red robes rustling. "I must go to Tilia at once," he cried.

"No," said Daoud. "Too many people would see you."

"But she has no one to protect her."

"She has hired guards," said Sophia. "And those who ruined her house are gone."

Daoud's head fell back against the pillow, and his eyelids closed. His face looked masklike to Sophia, almost as if he were dead. She realized, with sudden anxiety, that he might be suffering terribly, without complaint. That would be like him. And she and Ugolini stood here talking. She must see to Daoud's hurts at once. He might have injuries within, injuries from which he could not recover.

"Send some of your trusted men-at-arms to protect Tilia," said Daoud without opening his eyes, his voice faint. "Riccardo and some others. Do not go yourself."

"Of course," said Ugolini, looking abashed. "Even though you have been tortured, your head is sounder than mine. But, you understand, _I_ am tortured by the thought of what has happened to Tilia."

"I, too," said Daoud. "And to her people. And to Rachel."

"Tomorrow you can tell me what happened to you," said Ugolini at the door. "I will let you rest now." He drew a breath, hesitated, bit his lip. Sophia wished he would go.

Daoud raised his head and opened his eyes. "You want to ask something. What is it?"

"Did you--did d'Ucello--learn anything?"

"God willed that he learn nothing from me," said Daoud, sinking back again.

"_Your_ will had something to do with that," said Sophia.

_He held out against them. What a magnificent man._

But what price had he paid for his strength?

"God's will is my will," Daoud whispered.

"God be with you, then," said Ugolini, and left, pulling the door shut behind him.

Daoud's eyes opened. The sight of his eyes woke a warmth in her breast as if a small sun had risen inside her.

"Do you want to sleep?" she asked him.

"Yes, with you beside me."

Joy blazed up inside her at those words. She had been so afraid that torture would somehow destroy his caring for her.

"Oh, yes," she said. "Nothing would make me happier."

"But first I need you to wash and dress my wounds."

Daoud gritted his teeth and winced as first she lifted off the purple cloak that covered him, then inch by inch drew the yellow tunic up from his body and over his head. He groaned aloud when, with her propping up his heavy body, he raised his arms.

"O Kriste!" she whispered. She wept anew as her eyes traveled over the golden body she loved and saw huge, broken blisters and patches of red skin; swollen black bruises the size of hen's eggs; long, deep lacerations filled with crusted blood; the many little black scabs of puncture wounds.

"When Lorenzo and the Ghibellini get here, we will have d'Ucello and his torturers torn to pieces," she raged. She went to the table, folded a linen cloth, and dipped it in the water.

"I do not hate d'Ucello," said Daoud as she began, very carefully, to clean his wounds. "He has his work and I have mine. As for his torturer--Erculio is his name--d'Ucello does not know it, but his torturer is one of us."

Sophia's hand, moving the cloth lightly over a long, shallow cut that ran across the smooth, almost hairless skin of his chest, paused. Was he delirious?

"One of _us_? The torturer?"

Daoud looked amused. "I do not know where Erculio comes from, but he is a good servant of the God of Islam and of the sultan, who placed him there for my protection."

"For your protection? You mean he would have killed you."

Her body turned to ice as she faced the reality of how close she had come to losing him.

"Yes," said Daoud. "I thought I would never see you again." He reached out his arms, grimacing with pain. She put down the cloth and let him hold her. Her heart swelled up in her throat and tears burned her eyes.

And suddenly, as if a curtain were lifted, she saw that life with this man would always be this way. Whenever she was with him, there would always be a yesterday in which some miracle of good fortune kept him alive. There would always be a tomorrow in which he must face death yet again.

Her head rested on his chest for a moment; then she wiped her face and went back to cleaning and covering his wounds. Never mind her pain. Whatever he was feeling must be much worse.

He told her how to make poultices for his burns using wet cloths and powdered medicinal herbs Ugolini had prepared. It was like what she had done for his arrow wound, only now there were many more hurts to treat. Silently, in Greek, she cursed d'Ucello and cursed the torturer. She did not care whether Daoud forgave them. She would never forgive what they had done to her man.

When he was in the cellar of the Palazzo del Podesta being tortured, had he grieved at the thought of losing her, as she had sorrowed for him?

She worked her way down his body from head to foot, tying the poultices in place with strips of cloth. Thank God, they had done nothing to his manly part. That was often the first place a torturer went for. When would they make love again, she wondered. That depended on how long it took him to recover. Perhaps weeks, perhaps even months.

When she was finished with his front, he turned over with her help. Again she could not hold back her tears. Pain, not bodily, but real just the same, struck her at the sight of his tormented flesh. For a moment her eyes were covered with darkness. The skin of his back and buttocks had been whipped away in large red slashes. She shook her head violently, spoke a few more curses in her mind, and went to work. Daoud, who had endured most of her healing efforts in silence, cried out when she put a wet cloth on a torn spot.

"What more can you tell me about Rachel?" he asked. She suspected he wanted to take his mind off the pain.

She repeated everything Tilia's women had reported, ending that looking out the windows they had seen Rachel riding off in a cart with the old Franciscan who interpreted for the Tartars.

"I am glad to hear that old priest still lives," said Daoud, sighing. "Ah, Sophia, Rachel is a slave to that Tartar only because she had the ill luck to cross my path. I have brought destruction to many, many people."

Slowly, painfully, he turned on his back again, with Sophia helping. Lovingly she stroked the few patches of his skin that were not torn or burned or bruised.

When he was settled, he looked up at her and smiled in what she thought was a strange way. She did not see the cause of his smile at first, until he looked down at himself, and she followed his eyes. She saw that his key of life had begun to raise itself.

"Daoud! After all you have been through?"

"I want you, Sophia, _because_ of what I have been through. Because of what I nearly lost. I will tell you more tomorrow about what, God be thanked, did not happen. For now"--he reached out a hand to her--"come to me."

She understood. He must feel like a man who had come back from the dead. Life was more precious to him than ever--and love. Tired and pain-racked though he was, he wanted this moment of being with her again, which must seem to him like a gift from God. And, indeed, perhaps that was exactly what it was.

He lay back on the bed, his tortured body naked except for the cloth wrappings tied over the worst of his wounds. His beautiful circumcised phallos pulsed as it grew larger. She wanted to be naked with him, and she threw off her outer tunic, unbelted her red silk gown, and pulled it over her head. Her shift followed. Then she stepped out of the purple felt slippers and stood before him, her arms held away from her body, to let him see her.

She felt the warmth of her own desire for him spread through her.

He said, "You are a spring that gushes out of barren rock. I thirst for you."

Carefully she climbed on the bed, straddling him. Slowly, so as not to hurt him, she lowered herself over him, guiding him into her with gentle fingers. A long sigh escaped him. She moved for both of them.

The instant after he groaned and reached his peak of love and pleasure, he fell asleep, still lying on his back. He had just enough strength to couple with me, she thought.

She rose from him and blew out the candles on the bedside table. The night was cool, and she closed the casement windows of his room.

There was space between Daoud and the wall for her to lie beside him. She stretched out there and stayed awake only long enough to kiss his bare shoulder.

* * * * *

Forcing himself to wake up seemed as much torture for Daoud as anything Erculio had done to him. He could only lie there and struggle against the agony he felt in every part of his body. His head ached. His tongue felt like a lump of dried camel dung. His throbbing muscles and bones begged him to sink back into unconsciousness. How long had he slept? Only an hour or two, he was sure.

The yellow glow of a lighted candle filled the room. Lorenzo was standing near the bed holding the candle, glowering at Daoud from under thick, dark brows as if he were angry at him.

_Lorenzo._

Daoud wanted to laugh and leap out of bed and throw his arms around Lorenzo. He managed only to sit up, too quickly. Fires shot from his joints into his neck to coalesce in a burst of agony in the back of his head. He did not want to cry out in front of Lorenzo, but a groan forced itself through his cracked lips.

Sophia, wearing her red silk gown and standing by the bed--_How did she get out of bed and dressed before Lorenzo got in here?_--took Daoud's shoulders gently and lowered him back to the bed.

Lorenzo set the candle on the table beside Daoud and sat beside him.

"What the devil did those bastards do to you?"

Daoud saw the rage in the penetrating dark eyes, and it delighted him, because Lorenzo was furious for his sake.

"Nothing that I will not recover from. More quickly, now that I see your infidel face. Have you come here to parley with the podesta?"

"Yes, Duke Rinaldo has sent his son, Lapo, and me to meet with d'Ucello here at Ugolini's."

Lorenzo had accomplished everything Daoud asked of him, and more. His timely arrival had saved Daoud's life. To think that Daoud had once wanted to be rid of him. Except for Sophia, he had never in his life felt so happy to see anyone as this grizzled Sicilian.

Sophia said, "I have tended your wounds enough for tonight, David. I leave you in Lorenzo's care." She smiled at Lorenzo and put her hand briefly on his shoulder.

As she went to the door, Lorenzo scooped something from the floor, jumped up, and handed it to her. "I believe this is yours, Madonna." He held out her red leather belt.

Sophia swept it from his hand. "Thank you, Messere," she said coolly.

"Good night, Sophia," said Daoud with a smile. "You have brought me great comfort tonight."

"Good night, David," she said, and shot him a burning look that he hoped Lorenzo did not see.

After the door closed behind her, Lorenzo chuckled softly as he sat down again. "Tending your wounds with her gown off, was she? And no light in the room till I brought this candle in? You and she are not as discreet as you were before I left."

_We could never fool Lorenzo_, thought Daoud ruefully.

"The pope is gone, the Tartars are gone, the French are gone," said Daoud. "There is no one left in Orvieto that we need deceive. Find some soft cloths on the table to bind my feet." Creating the barrier between his mind and the pain, Daoud swung his legs over the edge of the bed. Lorenzo stared at him, his mouth falling open.

"What in the name of hell are you doing? You cannot get up! What wounds are under those bandages?"

"I do not mind the pain," said Daoud. "I want to meet this duke's son. Where is your army camped?"

Lorenzo's grin stretched his thick black mustache. "In the valley to the north. You should see it. After I climbed up to the main gate of Orvieto I looked down and saw the hundreds of campfires twinkling. It was as if the world had turned over, and I was looking down into the starry sky."

Daoud wished he could go to the city walls to see what Lorenzo had described. But he had barely strength enough to walk from his room to Ugolini's cabinet.

* * * * *

Four men--Daoud, Lorenzo, Ugolini, and Lapo di Stefano--sat around Ugolini's worktable discussing the fate of Orvieto. The servants had moved the table to the center of the cabinet and had replaced the cardinal's usual clutter of philosophical instruments with platters of meat, loaves of bread baked fresh in the cardinal's kitchen, and trays of steaming pastries. Daoud had no appetite and was in too much pain to eat.

"When does your King Manfred intend to come up from the south?" Lapo asked Daoud. He twisted the carcass of a roasted pigeon between thick, juice-stained fingers. His nose had been broken in some accident or fight; air whistled in and out of the flattened nostrils. Daoud judged him to be about twenty, the same age as Simon de Gobignon.

As far as Lapo knew, Daoud was an agent of the king of southern Italy and Sicily. It might have shocked him to discover that he was dealing with a Muslim from Egypt.

Daoud had to evade Lapo's question. He had no idea what plans Manfred had, if any. He could only hope that when he met with Manfred at Lucera he would be able to persuade him to invade the Papal States.

"King Manfred would come from the south much more quickly," Daoud said, "if he could count on being recognized by the cities of the north as king of a united Italy."

"That must be between my father and him," said Lapo, and his breath wheezed through his nostrils as he bit into the pigeon's breast. "After all, no such title exists. There has never been a king of Italy."

And yet there easily could be, thought Daoud, seeing the shape of the peninsula in his mind. And if that single ruler were a man like Manfred, what a strong barrier Italy could be between the Abode of Islam and the barbaric kingdoms of Christian Europe.

But in fact, thought Daoud, for all that Lapo di Stefano wore the Ghibellino symbol, the black, two-headed Hohenstaufen eagle, on the breast of his red silk surcoat, he and his father might still prefer that Manfred stay where he was. As long as Manfred remained cut off from the northern cities like Siena by the band of the Papal States running across the center of Italy, the Ghibellini of the north could do as they pleased.

"When the French invade," said Daoud, "a united Italy can keep them out. If the cities of the north are divided, the French will take them over one by one."

"How do you know the French will invade?" Lapo asked. "We have heard that King Louis has no desire to wage war in Italy."

Daoud was beginning to feel a strong dislike for this coarse young nobleman who seemed both very sure of himself and very ignorant. He was about to reply when a man-at-arms entered and whispered to Ugolini.

"D'Ucello is here," Ugolini said.

"Have him wait below until we send for him," said Daoud quickly. He turned back to Lapo.

"I do not wish d'Ucello harmed."

Lapo stared coldly at Daoud. "Who are you to give orders?"

Lorenzo answered before Daoud could speak. "Let me remind you, Signore, that it was David of Trebizond whose gold made possible your capture of Orvieto."

There was too much conflict building up here, Daoud thought. "No, Lorenzo. Siena had the will, the fighting spirit. That was what made this victory possible. I contributed only money."

He turned to Lapo. "I do not give orders, I make recommendations based on my knowledge of this town. I recommend that d'Ucello continue as podesta. If you leave enough men under his command, he will keep the feuding families under control. Orvieto will prosper and pay you tribute that will make this expedition worth your while."

"The army of Siena has marched against Orvieto because Orvieto is a Guelfo stronghold," said Lapo. "We intend to replace the governments of all the cities near Siena with rulers favorable to us."

Daoud thought he understood Lapo, gauging him as a man who had little experience of war but who enjoyed bloodletting. He was probably disappointed that the city might surrender without a battle, without an excuse for looting and massacre. He might be hoping, as a substitute, to find someone who could be put to death publicly in some hideous way to demonstrate his power over the city.