Chapter LXXXVI: Into the Room
4 April 1610
“I don’t like this one bit,” Colonel Santiago chewed into some stiff bread as he hung around the stone-grain railing of the tavern balcony. The spring air was still chilly in Madrid but Colonel Santiago seemed to be single handedly warming up the world with his fiery temper. “It’s been months now and we’ve barely heard any news from The Room.”
“Peace, young Santiago, you’ll give us away to the crowds below,” was a voice that sighed in an exasperated wisdom. Santiago took another rip out of his food before pushing himself into the room where the elderly Andronikos was turning pages through a book as leisurely if he was picking roses in the meadow.
“As much as I enjoy getting paid to lounge around here in the capital, there is a war going on just over the mountains,” Santiago complained, his voice a bit more amicable to the intellectual air of the elderly man.
“And guarding this old sack of bones is not exciting enough for you, my young commander?” Andronikos asked with a laugh without even bothering to look up from the script.
“With all due respect, Excellency, I’d rather be leading men into battle on the field.” It was Santiago’s turn to be exasperated. “I just don’t understand how someone could poison the Cardinal-Substitute.”
It was at that mentioning that the Metropolitan looked up from his work. Colonel Santiago was remarking some parchments left on a side table and narrowed his eyes at them as if obscenities had taken the place of Greek letters. The young man, capricious and energetic, appeared to have forgotten what it was he was just complaining about. Metropolitan Andronikos would have chuckled at it despite his ailing age, but the comment the man made was still lingering in his mind like a moldy vapor.
“With all due respect yourself, Colonel,” the Metropolitan said to the soldier’s back as he stretched on his cushioned seat, “I did not ask for any protection. Even having those boys in the other room taste my food and drink disturbs me. I’d rather be poisoned.” Of course by ‘boys’ the old man had meant the young soldiers that were now part of his unofficial household; some of the best guards under the direct command of Colonel Santiago. The past few months since they arrived in Madrid and reported on all that had happened in the north had been filled with a kind of anxiety. The Cardinal-Substitute had been poisoned—rumored already dead. The surgeons of the Room had not given anyone word except that the Cardinal was “recovering.” It was a fact not supported by the vacuum of power within that chamber beneath the streets.
There was a knock on the door. “Señor Alvaro de Guzman,” one of the guards at the door announced.
“Let him in,” Colonel Santiago ordered evenly.
At the entrance of the man, Colonel Santiago eyed him warily with eyes that chafed against anyone who had given him this slothful assignment. In his head, he blamed the man for the current situation. He did not miss the respective tip of his hat, however. It was the Metropolitan that mustered energy into his old joints to rise.
“Look at you!” the older one said with a gusto that surprised Santiago enough to check if a younger doppelganger had not replaced his charge. “Already a grown man! Come come! It’s been forever since I have seen you but Father Julio writes often of how proud he is of how you’ve grown, Alvaro!” The Metropolitan offered Alvaro a seat which he took willingly.
“It has been a very long time, Excellency,” Alvaro said to his unofficial uncle while giving a sturdy nod to Santiago.
“Do you come with news?” Santiago cut into the reunion with the usual soldiers’ arrogance that even pit him against the Cardinal’s secretary. It did not matter to him—they were in the tavern and not the Room; there was less to get him put into the dungeons here.
“I’m afraid nothing but bad news,” Alvaro sighed out as he visibly slouched in his chair tiredly. His hand rubbed the back of his neck with the collar already loosened. “I’m sorry we could not see each other sooner, Excellency, I’ve been very busy with preparing Raul’s mission a few months ago and then now with the Cardinal in danger of his life.”
“And how is he?” the Metropolitan asked slowly with consoling eyes. The wrinkles on his forehead threatened to avalanche elderly skin over his face as he managed a frown.
Alvaro looked at him with a steadiness and tautness that conveyed all he needed to the cleric. Andronikos nodded. “In that case, although this old man would like to think that he alone is the reason for your kind visit,” the Metropolitan began, “I know from your somber nature, young Alvaro, that there is something more.”
The cleric had a penchant for exaggerating youth—perhaps an attribute of his advanced years comically consoling themselves. Indeed, Alvaro was almost a decade older than Santiago, but to the aged in the Room, Alvaro was definitely one of the younger fellows.
“I have come to ask you to come back into the Room with me tomorrow, Excellency,” Alvaro asked quietly. Colonel Santiago turned his back at the mention of that kind of politics but, despite pretending to read the papers, listened as carefully as he could.
“Me? What would an old Orthodox bishop be doing in the most powerful chamber in Christendom?” the cleric said with a low chuckle. It was no matter for jokes, but the enigmatic request required a more delicate touch to unravel.
“Ever since the Cardinal has been poisoned and no Janus yet named… this extended vacancy has already put pressure on the Room. The Duque de Lerma has convinced King Felipe that he should take temporary hold of the government until order is restored.
Andronikos contracted his wrinkles uncomfortably. “Even an associate like myself knows how disastrous this could be… Especially with the War being prosecuted…”
“Exactly why we need to consolidate the Room’s resources,” Alvaro nodded slowly as if his words required the gentleness of gestures so that the older ears could better absorb them. “It is a good thing to have you here. With everyone’s help we can stop a complete disaster from befalling our great nation.”
Santiago was not impressed. Perhaps it was the rough soldier in him that survived winters in Russia that pushed him against such high and mighty rhetoric. The only ones speeches would hear were those of his chaplains calling the sons of Spain to beseech God for victory; it was only these that he found worthy of investing words in. There was something else, however; something in the woody eyes of Alvaro that churned Santiago’s insides in revolt. He had noticed it when the young man walked in—as if these pitiful expressions had already been practiced in front of a glass.
Whenever he was present in the Room, he had only known of Alvaro as the Cardinal’s secretary. He knew a little about the de Guzman burghers and their part in the debacles in the last half of the 16th century. It was not until now that he actually heard the man talk with such emotion.
Metropolitan Andronikos was deep in thought and his hands—usually the paragons of clerical gentleness as if they were a mere extension of his soft and flowing garb—were now fists of tense tendon and bone.
“The Duque de Lerma is the King’s favourite,” Colonel Santiago managed to say, pushing himself into the considerations finally—after all, there was nothing much else to do in his current assignment. He gave enough respect to turn around to face Alvaro as he spoke. “It will not be easy to convince the King to put him aside.”
Alvaro marked the Colonel and stared at the younger man for a second. “We must try nonetheless,” Alvaro explained. “de Lerma is too incompetent. He’s already proposing to debase the currency to help pay for the war.” He turned back to the prelate. “Father Julio has been summoned as well.”
“Out of retirement?” was the immediate reaction from Andronikos. The thought of his friend brought an intense pain into his chest and joints partly from his doing and partly from the machinations of his thoughts. “But Father Julio should not—”
“He has already agreed to it,” Alvaro cut off the older one with a finesse that obscured any rudeness in his interruption. “He and I already talked of it. He agrees that perhaps working in this time of crisis will help to heal him from the horrors you and he have witnessed.”
That word: horror; it was an understatement that Andronikos forgave the naïve boy readily for. If anyone wanted to test the proof of the truly horrific and traumatizing sights that he and that—then—young priest saw, they need only go to that hidden depth in a blighted portion of Eastern Europe where… No, he could not think of it now.
“I will go…” Metropolitan Andronikos finally said releasing the grip from his curled fingers. It produced a solemn nod from Alvaro. “But only if Colonel Santiago is allowed to accompany me.”
The notion surprised both of the other men in the room, but Alvaro was quick to hide it with an obsequious nod. “It will be arranged.”
As Alvaro exited the room, he gave his usual salute to the guards who had escorted him and continue to stand in place at the doorway. Walking away, his form had a kind of giddy gait to it. Everything was unrolling according to scenario. His masters would be very pleased to know that everyone is coming together in one very convenient spot.
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It was already sometime between midnight and dawn when Willem slumped down onto a seat in the hospital chamber that had both Madeleine and her uncle on two beds next to each other. He had spent a good hour of the evening evading unknown assailants after getting off that hollowed out ship. It was after they had commissioned half of the crew of their own vessel to attend to guarding the hospital did he finally feel some degree of safety within those walls. But it was not safety for him; it was for that lady that was now as pale as a Greek statue. Riku had similarly been put to work that afternoon, but if he was exhausted he did not show it as openly as the soldier.
Willem’s darkened eyes wandered around the chamber. Raul was not asleep—instead, that young man held one knee against his chest with his arms while sitting on a far bench. The strangest sight, however, was the contraption set up next to the sleeping Viceroy. An animal’s bladder, only half filled with blood was tied to a post next to the bed. Its end was sealed tightly by rope and the other end was tied onto a quill which was lodged into one of Renault’s arms. Arturo and his mother were cleaning some instruments in the sink nearby before approaching the tired young men.
All rose to their feet in attention—albeit slowly. “How is he, Señora?” Willem was the first to ask.
Señora Ortiz’s face matched the palette of her hair and her tired hands visibly shook. Arturo stayed at the instruments on the table and could not bear to bring his eyes to meet the gentlemen’s.
“Sirs, I’m afraid…” she took a moment to turn to the other bed, her eyes discerning in the dim candlelight that the young Madeleine was fast asleep. She turned back and continued. “I’m afraid that his chances are small.”
“What do you mean?” Riku asked quietly also shooting a glance at where Madeleine was sleeping.
“He should be better by now,” she explained. “We’ve administered the medicine, bled him a little bit and then added Madeleine’s blood. We have not yet seen recovery… I’m also afraid to draw any more from Madeleine… the girl has already given too much. There is still a chance Señor de Fronsac will survive, however. We will have to see in the morning if he is better. I will try drawing from Madeleine again then…”
With that, she gave a short and fatigued bow to the others before stepping out of the room with Arturo in tow to the chamber the young men had prepared for her down the hall. The three pairs of eyes followed both figures as they left as if something of theirs was pulled out of the room with the passing of
La Doctora and the young and somber assistant.
Willem looked to the others and they exchanged glances. “Like I was telling you earlier,” Willem said with a grunt revealing just how in need of rest he was, “the assassins are after Madeleine as well. The marines and some of the crewmen will not be enough.” The other two nodded to the soldier’s analysis.
“In that case,” Riku said authoritatively as if the lack of visible exhaustion crowned him leader that night, “Raul can stay with the Ortiz and I’ll patrol the grounds.”
“I’ll stay here with Madeleine,” Willem volunteered. It did not seem to register to the others that he had said the young girl’s name and not the dying uncle. The young men acknowledged the plan and two of the three stepped out of the room. Willem watched them carefully as they exited before stepping towards the middle of both beds. On his left, the slumbering Renault made no noise. There was not enough force in his breathing to generate his much gossiped snoring. On the other end, Madeleine’s sleeping form was a snow white landscape of linen and pale skin. Like the dawn at the horizon, at the very top of this wintry scene were the wavy rays of the golden crown that radiated out onto the pillow spilling colour onto it. It was this pillow that now caught Willem’s eye. Underneath, like some dark cavern where a treasure hid, pieces of parchment stuck out. The instructions Renault left, Willem remembered.
He pulled his eyes away from them and found Madeleine’s face once again. Her visage was still beautiful, he thought. But it was a beauty that was drained of itself. Only her hair which still held colour like the resilience of roots in the winter when the rest of the plant dies—it was there that Willem tried to reassure himself that Madeleine would bloom again. Nothing but a figure of death greeted him, however. Would her hair be as radiant if she lay in a coffin? He could not bear the thought and wrenched himself to turn from the bed.
From deathly pale to deathly purple, only Renault greeted him now with an elderly stillness that seemed to suck youth from Willem’s face. A chance he would survive yet, Willem remembered in his mind. Yet a chance he could die anyway. “What would you do?” his lips wanted to ask the man. “Would you make the sacrifice?” A stuttered wheeze came out of Renault’s lips that shocked Willem enough that he snapped his teeth together. Did Renault try to say something to him?
“I love her,” he wanted to say to the man. Staring at the moonlike face with its craters and seas for a few moments did not do his thinking much good. But he was a soldier, after all. He could not be as sophisticated in his plans or motives as the others. That’s perhaps why when he took his dagger out and penetrated Renault’s flesh, his newfound resolution was all he needed.
Pablo pressed the knife against Tom’s cheek harshly enough that it visibly cratered at the edge but did not break. Already, Rodrigo was at the door and Captain DeWitt had a pistol trained on Pablo’s head. “Give me the Keys and he lives,” Pablo repeated for the second time.
“You do not know what you’re asking,” Rodrigo attempted to explain taking another step forward. It only made the knife paint more of Taguchi’s blood against Tom’s cheek. Perhaps it was better that Tom was still unconscious for this, Rodrigo thought. “Many of us would rather die to protect those Keys,” Rodrigo said instinctually.
“That’s maybe what you’d do,” Pablo spat back immediately, “But what would he do?” once more manipulated the weapon on Tom’s skin. “Would he make the sacrifice?” As Pablo spoke, he edged himself closer to the open window while still holding Tom’s unconscious body up with his other hand.
Rodrigo’s eyes were fixed on where the bloodied blade was making contact with Tom’s face. He could no longer tell if it was Taguchi’s blood that stained the young man’s visage or if it was newer liquid from the irritated cheek. “I’m sorry, Tom,” Rodrigo said out loud as he looked directly towards the unconscious one. Rodrigo waved his hand to Captain DeWitt who understood the signal.
Chapter LXXXVII: The Signal (coming soon)
