by Jana Petken
David pushed his way through a horde of people blocking the entrance to the Roman theatre and pulled Mariano, the man he had met earlier, behind him. He wasn’t enamoured by the man’s devoutness to the church, but he would be useful, David had thought, when Mariano offered to guide him through the auto-de-fé.
The Roman amphitheatre sat within a dip in the land below the south-east gate, next to the ruins of Diana’s temple. Monumental in scale and decoration, it and remained an impressive sight, even to those who had lived in the town all their lives. Semicircular in shape and with rows of raised seating, it had been well plundered by Sagrat’s rulers. And over the centuries, many of the stone steps once housing spectators had been transported and used to build parts of the castle and some of the town’s houses.
David wanted to take in every detail and every moment. After all, he thought, this would be a day he would remember and detest for the rest of his life. Casting his eyes towards the galleries overlooking the ancient arena, David saw that there were still plenty of empty spaces. No one would want to sit on the higher levels, for they wouldn’t see much or hear anything from there. Noting the sections which had long since been chiselled away and dug out, he deduced that during the Roman occupation, the theatre might have been able to accommodate up to eight thousand spectators. Not even half that amount of people would find a seat today, but there was still plenty of room for those wanting to rest their arses and have their macabre curiosity satisfied by the goings-on in the arena.
Forging through the crowd to a good position amongst one of the front rows of spectators, David now had a good view of the two scaffolds which had been erected in the centre of the arena. The smaller of the two was decorated with an altar bearing gold chalices and candles. The larger, packed with men, was adorned by lengths of red material hanging above and behind the scaffold, presumably to shelter the occupants from the biting cold.
David had not seen the dignitaries arrive, but he observed them now, seated comfortably on red velvet thrones on the largest scaffold. The inquisitor sat like a king in the centre. The man sitting on his left was also an inquisitor, David believed, judging by his thick purple robes embroidered with gold threads. They were almost identical to the robes worn by Gaspar de Amo. A man who appeared to be an important nobleman was dressed in an even more decorative mantle than the two inquisitors, and he was the only man who had not removed his hat, which sported tall multiple-coloured plumes. He sat on De Amo’s right.
And then David saw the duke’s head of brown curls. As one would have expected, Peráto was not sitting right next to his most important guests or the inquisitors. He was tucked in the row behind them and barely visible.
“Who is he?” David asked Mariano, pointing to the elegantly dressed nobleman to the right of De Amo.
“He’s the viceroy of Valencia, a fine man, a man of vision, and almost as rich as the king. They say the monarchs have given him free rein to rule Valencia.”
That was not surprising, David thought. King Ferdinand rarely set foot in Aragon.
Facing the scaffolds were two rows of ten wooden benches, which is where the prisoners sat. The men sat on one side of the aisle and the women on the other. David searched for his parents. His mother’s agony as she’d limped by him was engraved in his mind. And his father’s stoic yet resigned expression made David want to kill every one of the smug aristocrats sitting on that grand podium. He couldn’t see them, but he knew they were there. He’d watched them traipse into the arena with the other penitents.
Feeling his chest tighten with nerves, he asked Mariano, “What happens now?”
Mariano stroked his goatee, peppered with grey, and smiled with what could only be considered malignant joy. “Now we will celebrate Mass and listen to a sermon. Then a notary will come forward and call out the prisoners’ names one by one. The penitents will raise their candles at the mention of their names and say yes to confirm their presence.”
After the Mass, just as Mariano had predicted, the notary read out every name on his long list. David listened intently but wasn’t able to hear a word of what was being said. When the notary sat back down, the bishop and Father Bernardo passed through the rows of prisoners and made the sign of the cross twice on each forehead. “Receive the sign of the cross, which you denied and lost through being deceived,” David managed to hear the Bishop say to a penitent wearing the black sambenito.
Looking up at the spectators in the gallery, David wondered what satisfaction they were getting. They certainly couldn’t see what he was seeing or hear a word of Mass or the sentencing to come. “What now?” David asked again.
“The moment you have been waiting for has arrived,” Mariano said gleefully. “The prisoners will now be given penance, and you, lad, will learn your parents’ fates.” Mariano, who had not uttered a word since the beginning of Mass, seemed to be in a state of elation. With his rosary beads perpetually turning in his fingers, he looked as though he had just been taken up to heaven and was savouring its ecstasies. David wanted to slap the pious man, but instead he nodded in understanding and kept his feelings to himself.
He was desperate to find out his parents’ fates, but he was also terrified of what he might do should their sentences be anything other than exile. “My parents were accused of refusing to eat boar meat. What do you think their sentence will be?” David asked.
“Oh, lad, that’s the sign of a Judaist if ever I saw one. You say they are not wearing black sambenitos or marked for the lash?” Mariano asked, pensively stroking his goatee again.
“No, they are wearing yellow tunics, and there are no ropes knotted around their necks.”
“Hmm. In that case, they could perhaps be sentenced to four or five years in prison, which, in my opinion, does not seem harsh at all.”
Wanting to hit him, David said, “Really?”
“Yes, really. I’ve heard of many prisoners being incarcerated and then being transferred to a hospital or monastery because the prison was overflowing. There are even rumours of penitents being sent home before their sentence has been completed! But back to your parents … Hmm. Your father may be sent to the king’s navy to row in the bowels of one of his galleys. Or both might be ordered to wear a tunic of shame.”
“What’s that?” David asked, dreading the answer.
“A white sambenito emblazoned with a red cross on the front and back. It is worn by the penitent for an entire year, in private and in public. And every townsperson must shun such sinners when they walk past them.”
“God give me strength,” David couldn’t help but hiss with anger. “And what other sentence could they receive?”
“Well, they might be exiled from this place, but no matter where they go in Spain’s realms, they will never again be allowed to hold certain positions.”
David’s heart leapt at the thought of exile. They had been planning to leave before their arrest. Lifting an inquisitive eyebrow, he asked, “What does ‘certain positions’ mean?”
“It means that none of the penitents here today will be able to become shopkeepers, moneychangers, vegetable or fish merchants, or hold any official post whatsoever. And they will never be permitted to wear silk, the colour scarlet, or any jewels. If they break any of these rules, they will be burned. And no matter what their punishment is this day, whether a public lashing or shaming by the wearing the sambenito for a year, they will have to go in processions for six Fridays; they will discipline their bodies with scourges of hemp cord, bare-backed, unshod, and bareheaded; and they will fast for those six Fridays.
Dear God in heaven! There had to be a way to help his parents, David thought. No, he was a fool to think he could do anything, he then told himself. He had a dagger hidden on his person, but what use was it? What did he think he was going to achieve? Get them to safety using a short blade? Run with them through the crowd unnoticed?
Chapter Fifty-five
Just as the first penitent rose from the bench to hear his sentence, a volley
of arrows and longbow darts flew over the spectators’ heads towards the scaffold. A nobleman pinned to his chair by a dart, which had gone through his chest and into the upholstery, died instantly. The Inquisition’s magistrate, standing at the edge of the platform with documents in his hands, was also killed by an arrow that pierced his throat and came out the back of his neck.
Luis, in relative safety because he was shielded by those sitting in the front row, leapt from his chair and crawled until he was at the back of it. Crouching on his knees, he covered his head with his arms. De Amo, slow to move, was struck in the stomach with a longbow dart. Crying out, he fell to the floor and lay there moaning, his fingers wrapped around the length of dart, protruding from his belly. The viceroy, appearing to be unhurt, had also leapt from his chair and was running down the scaffold’s steps with two other visiting noblemen.
Inquisition men-at-arms, Paco, Tur, and the duke’s entire escort leapt onto the platform and shielded their masters with their bodies. The inquisitor’s familiars, positioned right at the edge of the scaffold, were more exposed than the duke’s militiamen, who were situated behind the second row of chairs and took the brunt of the attack with only their buckler shields to protect them.
Paco, looking up at the eastern part of the small hillock, which was only a few feet taller than the theatre’s highest seats, was blinded by the sun just clearing its crest. Squinting in the brightness, he managed to see men’s heads bobbing up and down and the steel arrow tips in their bows poking above the top of the rise. He was just about to shout his observations to Tur, but instead he held his breath as the scaffold’s wooden floor rumbled and shook under the weight of men now on it.
Seconds later, most of the platform’s wooden beams and supports collapsed and crashed to the ground ten feet below. Although it was not a great distance, the splintered wood, chairs, and sheer number of men tumbling through the scaffold’s floor at the same time caused serious injuries to those who had landed first. Soldiers and nobles mingling together in a messy heap, winded and engulfed in a thick fog of dust, lay dazed for a moment. Some cried out in pain, whilst others were pinned down and couldn’t move or utter a sound.
Paco’s eyes rolled upwards. His head was spinning. Spitting, he tried to clear his mouth of dirt. Pain shot up and down his right arm. He looked at it and pulled a splintered piece of wood from his lower forearm. Freeing his legs, which were trapped by a thick beam, he crawled away from the mound of men who were also beginning to untangle themselves from the heap.
He looked dazedly at the scene and gasped in horror. People were screaming and howling like beasts while surging uncontrollably towards the theatre’s exit. There were hundreds of them running down the spectators’ stone steps, being trampled on or struck by arrows by attackers who were no longer hiding but standing on the ridge and training their bows directly at the scaffold.
In the arena, people were being trodden on by those callously running over the fallen bodies as though they were a bridge. The arrows and darts were still raining down on the area where the dignitaries had sat, trapping the noblemen and clergy, who were crouching or lying on the ground.
Paco caught a glimpse of the penitents. Only a few remained. Some were dead where they sat. Others cowered between benches, and for some strange reason, they were not even attempting to run away. The air grew heavy, with a grey mist rising up from the other side of the hill. Paco’s nose followed the smell of burning, and his eyes found the wall of smoke.
The soldiers and men-at-arms, partially shielded by the debris, concentrated on freeing their masters and getting them to safety. The visiting inquisitor and the viceroy were unscathed, apart from a few cuts to their faces, legs, and arms. Paco could hear the viceroy, a short distance away, screeching like an old woman, “Get me out of here!” The visiting inquisitor was shouting for his merciful God to save him from the devil. The duke was demanding to know if De Amo lived, and he sent a man to check on his condition. De Amo was alive but unconscious. The longbow dart in his stomach had snapped in the collapse, and only a ragged inch or so of its length protruded from his skin.
Paco, shielding Peráto’s body with his own, kept his eyes peeled on the hill. Militiamen and men-at-arms were climbing the stone steps towards the top of the arena’s back wall but were being pushed back by spectators trying to descend. The arrows had stopped flying. The glinting arrow tips and marauders had disappeared from sight.
Observing the chaotic scenes in the arena, his mind searched for a reason. Was this an attack on the Inquisition, the duke, or a rebellion? Had it been an assassination attempt? No, no assassin would use so many men to kill one in such a public display. Were the attackers targeting the viceroy? Was this the work of the duke and Garcia’s marauders?
“Paco! Morales, listen to me!” Tur shouted, jolting Paco from his thoughts. “We have to move now. Escort the duke and his guests to safety. I’ll remain here with the men.”
Luis, cowering behind his escort, sat up and gave Tur a furious look. “Captain, my entire escort will accompany me back to the castle, all twelve of them. Your only concern is to make a safe path for me, my guests, and the Inquisition council.”
“The people need our protection,” Tur shot back. “Would you have us leave them to a terrible fate?”
Paco glanced at Tur’s bright red face, looking as though all his blood were about to burst forth from his skin. He was studying the theatre’s exit. People were still bolting towards it. Paco guessed that Tur was considering the chances of getting the dignitaries through the mob of citizens.
“Captain, your orders?” Paco asked tentatively.
“You will not ask your captain for orders! You will listen to me!” Luis shouted, looking at his guests and their men strewn on the ground. “Hear me, every soldier and man-at-arms. These are your orders. Take your masters to my castle. Protect them with your lives. Move aside every person blocking your way, by force if need be!”
“Your Grace, you and your guests have enough soldiers between you to see you safely to your door,” Tur insisted. “Leave me here with my men. We must protect the townspeople from further attack.”
“You will follow my orders, Tur,” Luis said angrily. “Or by God, I will have you for treason! How can I serve my people if I am dead, you fool!”
“How can you serve a town when it has been burnt to the ground?” Tur countered.
“Still your tongue or I will have it cut from your mouth. I am your duke!”
“You’re no more a duke than the boil on my arse!” Tur shouted. “You’re a disgrace!”
Chapter Fifty-Six
David looked briefly at the soldiers attempting to climb the first level of the spectators’ steps towards the marauders. He opened his mouth and gasped at their useless attempt to reach the assailants’ positions. At least a thousand people were trying to get into the arena from the galleries. Those in the higher seats were pushing against the people beneath them, causing the panicked crowd to tumble over each other in a stampede to get to the bottom. The sound of people screaming was deafening, but David could only imagine that they were panicking not because of the threat of arrows but because they were being trampled on. “God help them!” he uttered. God help them all!”
He flicked his eyes back to the arena. The scaffold’s platform was overcrowded. Just about every soldier on guard duty was either on or positioned around its base. He spotted Tur, Paco, and his other brothers-in-arms. Then he gasped in horror as the scaffold collapsed and the men upon it dropped to the ground as though they had all fallen through a trap door.
He rushed forward against the flow of escaping prisoners, looking like a swarm of bees in their yellow and black tunics, and in their midst, he saw his father and mother. His father was carrying his mother in his arms, struggling to hold on to her as others pushed and shoved them out of the way.
After reaching them, David’s first reaction was to rip the yellow sambenitos from their bodies and toss them to the ground. Then he
took his mother from his father and carried her like a sack of wheat over his shoulder. There was no time for embraces, instructions, or to tell his parents that he loved them. For the moment, the soldiers were preoccupied with marauders and noblemen, but soon they would regroup and focus their efforts on recapturing the penitents.
David looked at a wall of people trying to leave. They were like a pack of rabid animals surging towards a prey. Prisoners still wearing their telltale tunics rushed alongside townspeople and visitors to Sagrat. A large contingent of Dominican monks, tripping over their habits as they ran and seemingly dismissing the idea of helping the aged or infirm, demanded a path be made for them. And there was not a longbow man, pikeman, or single swordsman guiding or protecting the terrified crowd.
With his mother balancing precariously on his shoulder and his father behind him, David continued to push his weight against the crowd. Not caring who he shoved aside, he pushed his powerful body like a barrier ram against all those in his way, until the crowd thinned and he caught sight of the road outside the arena.
When they had crossed to the other side of the stone path, David stopped for a brief moment, flicking his eyes in all directions. One day a week, a public grassland situated next to the Roman theatre was used as a livestock market. This day it was filled with closed and open carriages, carts, horses, and mules belonging to people attending the auto-de-fé.
David observed the chaos and saw that some spectators had already found their animals and were riding at top speed down the hill. He looked at his parents, appearing exhausted and physically weak. His mother’s mouth was ulcerated. Her lips, ragged and blistered, were twice their normal size. His father’s eyes, sunken into his cheekbones, were filled with pain. But as much as he wanted to, David could not give them any kindness. There was no time for rest or the indulgence of a drop of water.
