"The ambassadors from Tartary and their guards, as they were leaving
Orvieto to follow the pope to Perugia. The French Cardinal de Verceuil
was there and, far from trying to prevent the wickedness, urged them on.
It seems you dislike the Tartars with good reason."
The podesta paused. He still hoped, Daoud realized, to provoke or invite
him into letting something slip.
If it was the Tartars, they must have come for Rachel.
D'Ucello picked up the flask of Greek Fire from the table, where it had
stood these many hours, where Daoud could plainly see it. He had, most
of the time, avoided looking at it.
"Were any of the women taken away?" Daoud asked. That, too, should be a
safe question. Every moment he and d'Ucello talked, d'Ucello hoping he
might yet learn something, was another moment of wholeness and life.
_But I must not deceive myself. These are only moments. I affirm that
God is One. God be merciful. God receive me. I die as Your warrior._
"Yes," said d'Ucello, eyeing him thoughtfully. "Did you have reason to
think someone would be carried off?"
It hurt Daoud's neck to turn and try to look into d'Ucello's face. Daoud
let his head fall to the table on which he lay.
"I visited there often. I made friends with some of the women."
D'Ucello snorted. "From now on you will have no need to go to
bordellos."
To gain another moment, Daoud said, "I marvel that you possess Greek
Fire. The making of it is a great secret, and it is too dangerous to
transport far. If a bit of it gets loose on a ship, that ship is seen no
more."
D'Ucello squinted at him. "If you were truly only a trader from
Trebizond, you would be too terrified to wonder where I got this stuff."
"Allow me at the last a bit of dignity," Daoud pleaded, looking up at
d'Ucello. He saw guilt in d'Ucello's shifting eyes.
"A member of the Knights Templar back from the Holy Land let me copy the
formula," said d'Ucello. "Out of curiosity, I had an alchemist make it
for me."
"Curiosity is a worthier motive than torture," said Daoud, hoping he was
undermining d'Ucello's resolution and making the podesta feel ashamed.
But the dark eyes flashed angrily. "That is enough. Turn him on his
back, Erculio. You should have done that already."
_I pushed him too far_, Daoud thought despairingly.
"Yes, Signore." Erculio beckoned the guards. "Here, you two. Help me."
When his arms and legs were untied, Daoud groaned at the sudden release
of the tension in stiffened muscles. A savage pain tore through the
numbness in his limbs.
"Be still, whoreson!" Erculio snarled, clamping a hand over Daoud's
mouth. Daoud felt the glass ball pressed against his lips, and opened
his mouth to receive it.
The ball was not large, about half the size of a pigeon's egg, but it
felt huge in his mouth. Thinking about the swift death it held within
it, Daoud wondered if it would be easy or hard to break the glass.
They were tying his hands again, and he had the ball under his tongue.
If he tried to speak now, d'Ucello would know he had something in his
mouth. No more delaying by talking to the podesta.
"Strip off his loincloth," said d'Ucello, and Erculio tore it away.
Holding the flask in one hand, d'Ucello leaned forward, peering at
Daoud's groin. Daoud could feel his penis and scrotum shrinking.
_What fools we men are to be so proud of our members, and think them
such sources of power. How truly vulnerable is that little bit of
flesh._
One moment he was able to think, the next he was adrift on a sea of
terror. His naked body shook violently as d'Ucello scrutinized him. He
struggled to keep his Sufi training in mind. Only that could help him
now to die bravely.
"He is circumcised," said d'Ucello, his black eyebrows twisting in a
frown.
_Oh, God! Cloud his mind._
"What do we know of that place he comes from?" said Erculio. "Trebizond?
Maybe all the men in Trebizond are circumcised."
"Only Jews are circumcised," said d'Ucello. "And Saracens." He brought
his face closer to Daoud's. "Speak, man. Why is your foreskin cut off?"
"How could he be a Saracen or a Jew?" said Erculio. "He looks like a
Frank."
"Shut up," said d'Ucello impatiently. "I want to hear his answer."
Daoud lay motionless, praying that God would let d'Ucello kill him and
be done with it.
"Are you part of some Jewish plot?" d'Ucello demanded.
Daoud almost smiled at that, but he only looked up at the blackened
ceiling beam and said nothing.
"Answer me!" d'Ucello growled. He shook the flask at Daoud.
Daoud closed his eyes. Now the fire would come.
He heard a hammering at the wooden door on the other side of the
dungeon. One of the guards went to open it at d'Ucello's command.
Another delay! Now he was almost frantic for it to end. He was tempted
to bite down on the little glass ball. Why must he wait and wait for
that terrible flame to burn away his life?
"Signore!" Daoud turned his head and saw the clerk called Vincenzo in
the doorway of the dungeon. Beside him was a man in orange and green,
the colors of the Monaldeschi family. Daoud remembered the thick black
brows and the stern face, the grizzled hair. He had seen this man the
night of the contessa's reception for the Tartars.
"The Contessa di Monaldeschi's steward brings a message from her,"
Vincenzo said.
With a sigh d'Ucello set the flask of Greek Fire on the table beside
Daoud. In the sigh Daoud heard, not impatience, but relief. D'Ucello was
glad to put off doing this unspeakable thing, but it meant only that
Daoud would have to endure a longer wait.
_Because he does not want to torture me, I suffer the more._
D'Ucello was still hoping the waiting would break him. And it might. In
spite of all his training, in spite of the Soma that kept him calm and
held the pain away, Daoud felt himself at the very edge of his
endurance. He just might break.
The podesta, the clerk, and the contessa's steward muttered together by
the door of the dungeon. Turning his head, Daoud could watch them.
D'Ucello was jabbing his hands furiously toward the steward. He was
having trouble keeping his voice down.
"This is intolerable!" he cried.
The steward took a step backward, but he kept his face set. He spoke in
a voice too low for Daoud to hear.
"Fires of hell!" D'Ucello shook both clenched fists over his head.
He turned and pointed at Daoud. "Keep that one there on the rack till I
return, Erculio."
"Where is my Signore going?"
D'Ucello opened his mouth. His face grew redder in the torchlight, and
he closed it again.
"I will not be gone very long," he said. "I have to _persuade_ someone
of something."
"Shall I torment this fellow while you are gone?"
"Do as you please. At least see that he gets no rest."
He strode across the room to glare down at Daoud. "You will keep your
manhood for another hour or so. By God's grace you have more time to
think. About what will happen to you and how you can save yourself. Do
not think you have escaped. I will be back."
He lifted his hand. A bolt of panic shot through Daoud as he thought
that if d'Ucello hit him hard enough he might break the ball of poison
in his mouth. He held himself rigid.
D'Ucello lowered his hand.
"Damn you!" he snarled, and turned away.
Now Daoud wished d'Ucello _had_ broken the glass ball. He would have to
lie for hours longer now, waiting for pain and death. The thought of
those hours was in itself more agonizing than all the tortures he had so
far suffered. But God had chosen to let him live a little longer, and he
must accept these moments of life.
* * * * *
"According to Vincenzo," Erculio whispered, "the contessa ordered the
podesta to stop torturing you. Your allies must have gotten to her."
The guards and the clerk had left, but Daoud heard their excited voices
beyond the partly open door. Erculio now had a chance to take out the
poison ball. The inside of Daoud's mouth ached from holding the delicate
orb, and he sighed with relief.
"There is more," Erculio said. "An army of Sienese Ghibellini passed
through Montefiascone this morning. We have known that the Sienese were
marching against Orvieto, but we were not aware they were almost upon
us. The contessa and the podesta must discuss the defense as well as
your fate."
Lorenzo was with that army, Daoud thought. Lorenzo might be able to
rescue him if he got here in time.
"I fear it will be no better for you than before," Erculio went on.
"D'Ucello knows how to make the contessa see things his way. He will
probably persuade her that you must be tortured. And since he suspects
you of being a Ghibellino agent, he will want you dead before the
Ghibellini army comes."
"As God wills," Daoud croaked. A numbness had come over him as if he
were already dead. This was older and simpler and more effective than
the techniques of Sufi and Hashishiyya. This deadness was his body's
final answer to a night and a day of unbearable pain and fear.