Bowls of scented water were being passed for us to wash our hands.
The first course had been taken away and I’d scarcely noticed it, and now came the servants with platters of roasted fowl and steaming vegetables. And we were once again piling the food on our plates. There were no forks, but that didn’t surprise me. We ate with our fingers and with the aid of gold knives. Again and again, I drank as the boys refilled our goblets, and my eyes were drawn back to the area before me when a great painted backdrop of streets and buildings was wheeled noisily into place, transforming the flagstones into a more elaborate stage.
I couldn’t make out the subject of the drama that followed. I was distracted by the undercurrent of music, and finally just too sleepy to pay much attention to any one beautiful thing.
Another round of applause drew me out of my daze. Suckling pigs were being brought in now and the aroma was overpowering, though I did not want to eat anymore.
A sudden alarm brought me to my senses. What was I doing? Why was I here? I’d meant to grieve and mourn for Lodovico and my own failure to save him, yet I was banqueting with strangers, and laughing with them at lavish theatricals that made little or no sense to me at all.
I wanted to speak but the man who’d brought me here was talking with the one next to him, and saying in the most earnest voice. “Do it. Do what you want to do. You will do it, anyway, won’t you? So why torture yourself about it, or about anything, for that matter?”
He stared forward and drank from his cup.
“You didn’t tell me your name,” I said, touching his sleeve.
He turned and flashed one of his tenderest smiles at me. “It has too many syllables,” he said, “and you have no need to know it.”
The meat was being offered to us. He cut a large piece from the platter and put it on my plate. With a giant gold spoon he scooped up the rice and the cabbage and gave me a helping of this as well.
“No, no more,” I said. “I must leave, actually. I have to get back.”
“Oh, nonsense, you mustn’t. They’ll be dancing soon, for everyone. And then more entertainment. The evening’s only just begun. These celebrations go on all night.” He pointed to a group at the distant tables that flanked the right side of the hall. “See there, those are guests of the Cardinal from Venice. He’s doing his very best to impress them.”
“That’s all fine and good,” I said. “But I have to see what’s happened to Vitale. I think I’ve been here too long.”
I heard a lovely light riff of laughter near me, and I turned to see that incomparably beautiful Leticia bending her head towards the man beside her. “Surely she doesn’t know that Niccolò has lost his brother,” I said.
“No, of course, she doesn’t,” said my companion. “Do you think the family is going to publicize the disgrace, that the idiot took his own life? They’re burying him and leave them alone to do it. Let them do their sneaking off by themselves.”
I felt a cold anger come over me. “Why do you talk of them like that?” I asked. “They’re suffering, all of them, and I’m here to help them in their suffering, I’m here as an answer to their prayers. You sound as if you don’t approve of them or their prayers!”
I realized I’d raised my voice. It seemed brazen. I was confused. Was I talking to an angel?
He stared at me, and I got lost suddenly in studying his face. His eyebrows were high placed and dark and straight, and his eyes themselves very large and clear. His mouth was soft, full and smiling as though he thought me entertaining, but he didn’t seem scornful or disdainful at all.
“Are you the answer to their prayers?” he asked gently. He seemed so very concerned. “Are you? Do you really think that is why you’re here?” He seemed to be speaking very softly, too softly for this immense place, and too softly to be heard over that urgent and beautiful music coming from both sides of the hall. But I could hear every word he said.
“What if I told you that you were not the answer to anyone’s prayer, that you were the dupe of spirits who would have you believe this for reasons of their own?” He appeared worried, and he laid his warm hand on my left wrist.
I was terrified. I said nothing. I just looked at him, at the soft thick waves of his long hair, at his steady eyes. I wasn’t terrified of him, but of what he had just said. If that was so, the world was meaningless and I was lost. I felt it keenly and instantly.
“What are you saying?” I asked.
“That you’ve been lied to,” he offered with the same tender solicitude. “There are no angels, Toby, there are only spirits, discarnate spirits and the spirits of those who’ve been alive in the flesh and are no longer alive in the flesh. You weren’t sent here to help anybody. The spirits who are manipulating you are feeding off your emotions, feeding as surely as the people in this room are feeding off these plates.”
He seemed desperate to make me understand this. I could have sworn tears were coming to his eyes.
“Malchiah didn’t send you here, did he? You have nothing to do with him,” I said.
“Of course, he didn’t send me, but you must ask yourself why he can’t stop me from telling you the truth.”
“I don’t believe you,” I said. I tried to rise, but he held fast to my arm.
“Toby, don’t go. Don’t turn away from the truth. My time with you may be shorter than I hoped. Let me assure you, you’re locked in a belief system that is nothing but the stage machinery of lies.”
“No,” I said. “I don’t know who you are, but I won’t listen to this.”
“Why not? Why does it make you so afraid? I’ve come here out of time to try to warn you against this superstitious belief in angels and gods and devils. Now let me please try to reach your heart.”
“Why would you do this?” I asked.
“There are many discarnate entities like me in the universe,” he said. “We try to guide souls like you who are lost in the belief systems. We try to urge you back on the path of real spiritual growth. Toby, your soul can be trapped in a belief system like this for centuries, don’t you realize it?”
“How did I get here, how did I travel back five centuries in time if this is all a lie?” I demanded. “Let go of me. I am going to leave.”
“Five centuries back in time?” He laughed the softest, saddest laugh. “Toby, you haven’t traveled back in time, you’re in another dimension, that’s all, one your spirit masters have constructed for you because it suits them as they harvest your emotions and those of the beings around you for their own pleasure.”