Traitor Angels (17 page)

I remembered the rock lying in the pool of glittering water—was it a piece of a star fallen from the heavens? Had it landed with such force that it had sheared through the ground, coming to a rest within the cave? Since ancient times, we have thought meteors result from atmospheric disturbances, like lightning. What if these harmless-looking bits of rock and metal actually come from the skies? And what if some of them possess medicinal or disease-causing properties?

I rode to the cave, filled a vial, and raced to Padua. One of my friends was already buried, but the second still lay in his home, taking his last breaths. Under cover of night, I crept into his house. He seemed as one dead to me: I felt no pulse in his wrists, heard no air rasp between his lips. Frantic, I pried his mouth open and poured the liquid down his throat.

He opened his eyes—

The page ended there in a jagged rip. I turned the paper over, but there was nothing written on the other side. “It can’t end like this!”

“It didn’t,” Antonio said grimly. “Signor Galilei or your father wouldn’t have torn the page. Which leaves . . .”

“The king,” I whispered. Icy fingers trailed down my spine. “Why would he rip off the bottom of the paper? Does it contain information he wants to suppress? Or maybe he wanted to give it
to someone who could make better sense of it than he could,” I realized. “The king is an amateur natural philosopher; he has no real knowledge to fall back on.”

Antonio took the book from me and set it on the table. “Who are these Royal Society men? Would the king have given the paper to them?”

“I don’t know. And I still don’t understand how this discovery could threaten kings.”

Together we studied the page again. Our original theory that my father’s secret revolved around the Stuart monarchy’s claim to the throne had to be wrong—there was nothing in Galileo’s writings hinting at kingly accession.

“Signor Galilei wrote that his friend appeared dead,” Antonio said. “But the drink revived him—it brought him back to life.”

“That’s impossible,” I said. “There’s only one being in history who returned from the dead, and his rebirth signaled that he was divine. Christ himself.”

My voice faded on the final word and all the air seemed to go out of the room. No. This couldn’t happen. An ordinary person couldn’t be pulled back from beyond the black edge of death. The ability to rise from the dead belonged to Christ alone—didn’t it? I raised my gaze to meet Antonio’s. He looked as shaken as I felt.

“No one is supposed to have the power to rise from the dead except for Jesus,” he said hollowly. “According to the Bible, the only other person who did was Lazarus, and he was brought to life by Jesus’s hand. Therefore, if this elixir can turn the dead into the living—”

“This could prove Jesus came back to life because of a medicinal cure,” I gasped. “He, too, could have drunk from a pool permeated by a meteor’s shower! Or there could be dozens of
reasons he returned from the dead, all of them rooted in natural philosophy. He might . . . he might . . .”

“He might have been human,” Antonio said in a low voice. “His divinity, his triumph over death, is the rock upon which all of Christianity is built. Crack that stone, and the entire building falls.”

The room seemed to shrink, whitewashed plaster walls closing in on me until I could no longer breathe. My thoughts seemed to be made of ice: frozen, unmoving. All I could think was:
blasphemy, blasphemy, blasphemy
. I gripped the edge of the table, the wood pressing into my palms.

“We’ve been wrong about everything,” Antonio whispered. “This treasure hunt isn’t about politics. It’s about religion.”

“If this story gets out and others begin to question Christ’s divinity, then the Christian faith is no more.” A band had drawn itself around my chest, pulling tighter and tighter. Gray dots danced in front of my eyes. I forced myself to take a few deep breaths, feeling the air travel down my throat.
Concentrate
, I ordered myself.
Don’t fall apart
.

“Why did your father believe this discovery could topple kings from their thrones?” Antonio frowned. “The Italian city-states have no kings, but we are ruled by dukes and the Papal States are overseen by the pope. I can understand how Signor Galilei’s story could loosen the pope’s grip on power, but the dukes shouldn’t be affected.”

“The root of kings’ power supposedly comes from God himself,” I explained. “It’s a doctrine called ‘the divine right of kings.’ King Charles the Second believes in it, as did his father—that’s why English kings engage in the Touching for the King’s Evil,
because they think they can heal the sick with their hands, just like Christ. Kings are seen as all-powerful and as Christ’s ambassadors on earth.”

“So an assault on religion is an assault on the king himself.” Antonio looked grim. “I can see why every Christian monarch would do anything to suppress this discovery. If Christianity is disproved, countless governments will crumble. Signor Galilei’s discovery won’t just topple kings from thrones.”

“It could lead the way for revolution!” My pulse pounded. “New governments could spring up—governments composed of ordinary citizens, just as my father has always wanted. Countries could be ruled by their people, like true democracies. And religion would have no place in government, as my father has advocated for decades. This could change the whole world!”

And it could transform my family’s lives. Once again, my father could be an important, respected member of the government. No more living in fear, keeping his mouth shut, his ears attuned for the knock on the door that meant the king’s men had come for him again. For the first time in years, we would be free. Joy flooded my chest.

But Antonio looked steadily at me. “Or, instead of revolution, there could be countless groups battling one another for supremacy. Like your royalists and parliamentarians twenty years ago. The world could descend into . . .”

He trailed off. But he didn’t need to say the next words. I already understood.

We could have revolution and progress . . . or worldwide war.

THE DIVIDED EMPIRE

So farwel Hope, and with Hope farwel Fear,

Farwel Remorse: all Good to me is lost;

Evil be Thou my Good; by thee at least

Divided Empire with Heav’ns King I hold

By Thee, and more than half perhaps will reigne;

As Man ere long, and this new World shall Know.

—John Milton,
Paradise Lost,
Book IV

“YOU ARE SAYING EVERY CHRISTIAN NATION
could plunge into anarchy?” I asked at last. “That’s true, but eventually some sort of order is bound to—”

The ringing of footsteps in the corridor silenced me. I froze.

They came closer. The clatter of heels and the shuffle of leather. Both stopped directly outside the laboratory door. As I listened, I was able to separate the sounds into two distinct sets of footfalls.

Before I could even think, Antonio had grabbed my hands and dragged me to my knees. Together we crawled beneath the table. I had to bend nearly double to keep my head from rapping its underside. Our breath crashed in our ears; it sounded horribly loud. The black cloth draped over the table enclosed us in our own night.

The door groaned open. Two sets of footsteps entered the
room. They drew nearer, stopping next to the table. In the gap between the black cloth and the floor I could see scuffed brown leather riding boots and a pair of elegant heeled shoes tied with ribbons.

“My son returned last night.” It was the king. A chill skittered down my spine. He was so close. All I had to do was reach out my hand and I could touch his shoe. His voice reminded me of snowflakes, cool and soft, melting on a river’s surface. “What can you tell me about his movements?”

“The friend whose Yorkshire estate he was supposedly visiting was seen in London yesterday, shopping for clothes on Paternoster Row.” I recognized the deep timbre of this man’s voice.
Buckingham.
I had to bite my lip so I didn’t make a sound.

“We have been friends all our lives,” Buckingham went on, more quietly. “During your years of exile, I stayed by your side. No matter what happens, I’ll remain loyal to you, Charles. You know you can trust me to tell you the truth, even when it is unwelcome. Your son must be watched carefully.”

“I know it.” The words sounded as though they had been torn from the king’s throat. “But I can’t bear to think Robert and I may have become enemies. He’s my
son,
my oldest boy—”

“He’s a liar,” Buckingham growled. “He may be your eldest child by a number of minutes, but he can’t be your heir and he will never belong to the house of Stuart. The most you could have hoped for from him was devotion. Now all you have left is deception. I say we lock him in the Tower until he tells us where he’s been for the past week.”

“Never. I can’t—” The king faltered, then managed to say, “I can’t imprison my son. Even when we know he has lied to me.
Bucks, for all we know he has spent the week chasing lightskirts and losing money at dice.” There was a hopeful note in his tone.

“Maybe,” Buckingham said gently. “I pray it’s true. If you won’t arrest him, then we’ll need to make sure he’s watched carefully at all times.”

They suspected Robert! I pressed my hands to my chest, feeling the wild thumping of my heart through the fabric. In the darkness beneath the table, I saw the whites of Antonio’s eyes widen.

“Very well,” the king said so softly I barely heard him.

Buckingham barked out a laugh. “Let’s adjourn for a drink. Send for some of your pretty girls to keep us company, won’t you, Charles? I need someone to dull my mind and sharpen my senses.”

The king’s laugh sounded halfhearted. “Very well. Fetch me that jar first. Yes, the one with the purple liquid. I want one of my natural philosophers to inspect it.”

There was the sliding sound of glass on wood. “Why?” Buckingham asked. “What does this liquid do?”

My heart beat faster. A liquid? Was it Galileo’s elixir?

“So far, nothing at all.” The king sounded irritated. “I placed a rat’s carcass in it, just as I was instructed, but the animal hasn’t regenerated. There isn’t so much as a whisker moving on its body. I’m surrounded by charlatans, Bucks.”

“Not all of them are.” There was an edge to Buckingham’s voice I couldn’t understand.

“No, not all of them.” The king sighed. “Why do the cleverest of my men have to die?”

“You don’t know they’re dead,” Buckingham said quickly.

“They had better be. Only their deaths could excuse their lateness.”

What were they talking about? My eyes met Antonio’s, and he shook his head a fraction, as confused as I.

The men’s footsteps crossed the room. As the door shut behind them, I let out a breath, but it didn’t ease the burning in my chest. The burning that nothing, I feared, would ever lessen.

For the door hadn’t merely closed on a duke and the king, but on a duke and my father’s version of a modern-day Satan—a man who was hunting the very substance that could destroy our faith forever . . . and the world as we knew it.

Antonio and I remained under the table for several breathless minutes, listening for footsteps in the corridor. I hugged my knees to my chest, needing something to hold on to so I didn’t fly apart. My mind moved as ceaselessly as a river’s current. Galileo’s elixir could cheat death. It was an abomination—wasn’t it?

In the warm, sheltered darkness, Antonio shifted beside me, his arm bumping mine. “I don’t hear anything. I think we should go now.”

Without a word, I slid out from under the table. Together we slipped from the room. The corridor was empty, and we walked without speaking, keeping our heads down. I prayed no passing courtiers would call out to us in greeting.

When we had finally gone through the gates into the bustling city streets, we melted into the jumble of people: farmers walking their cattle to market, housewives and servants carrying baskets of vegetables and fish, nobles rolling past in carriages. The sight should have seemed familiar, but it felt strange, as though I were
caught in a dream, walking through an altered landscape. I kept my gaze on the ground, tracing the lines of mortar between the cracked stones.

Antonio’s hand fastened around my wrist. Before I could react, he pulled me into an alley. Here the walls sagged toward each other so closely they blocked out the sunlight, and all I could see were the whites of Antonio’s eyes as they focused on my face. My hands felt icy in his warm ones.

“You look like your heart is breaking,” he said.

“Because it is.” My voice sounded half strangled. “If anyone can come back to life by drinking this elixir, then our religion is discredited forever. Anyone can drink this liquid, becoming a god or an imposter depending on your definition.”

Antonio’s hands tightened on mine. “We don’t know if Christ drank a similar substance. There’s no proof that he was human. All Signor Galilei’s discovery does is call his divinity into question—and, truly, does it matter how he was brought back to life? Shouldn’t we care more about how he lived than about how he died?”

I stared at him.

“Jesus’s teachings upended all the values of the world,” Antonio said gently. “He taught others about love and compassion and mercy. He believed the meek, not the greedy, would be raised high. He shared his table with the lowliest members of society—prostitutes and tax collectors and lepers. Aren’t his lessons more important than the manner in which he might have been resurrected?”

This was heresy. His words should have been knives, cutting my ears. But they were as soft as velvet.

Because maybe he was right.

I gave him a small smile. Together we walked out of the alley into the sunlight, following the curving streets to Piccadilly, and I let my thoughts unfurl in my mind, promising myself I wouldn’t be afraid of them anymore, no matter where they took me.