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Tremblay’s vision collapses into grey and black and brown and
Oh I’m fucked, I’m completely fucked, I’m-
Tremblay is fluent in six languages and can hold a conversation in another four, and he silently swears in all ten of them as his colleagues stare
and stare
and stare
and stare at him like he’s a car crash too horrific to acknowledge but too breathtakingly awful to look away from and they're staring at him with
confusion
disgust
fear
pleasure
as
Sister Agnes curtseys before leaving the dining hall, a power move in the guise of polite subservience, as if everyone owes her their soul and she has all the time in the world to collect her debts and
Cardinal Tedesco clutches his vape but doesn’t ignite it, a calm recalibration to mask his failed outburst that disintegrated on the cold implacable rock that is Thomas Lawrence and Tremblay twitches, because thinking about Lawrence makes his cardiac muscle hurt and the thick middle layer of his heart erupts in
flashing lights and screaming sirens but Tremblay doesn’t
move,
doesn’t speak,
doesn't blink,
his existence is collapsing into black cairns to be kicked and scattered by opponents who’ll scuttle out of the woodwork, and the well-stocked chamber of his brain where his brilliant oratorical ability lives lets out a death rattle of your eight friends have a black line through their name and they’ll be safe behind their dark shields but not you, your name’s been exposed and is being boiled to the bone and you’re still in the spotlight Joseph, there’s a
scorching white light bleaching your vision and injecting third degree burns into your cells so catastrophic they’re painless, the damage they’re doing could be irreversible, there is treatment available to dam the flood and repair the damage but you’re not taking it, you’re
absorbing it, you’re
allowing yourself to be frozen by the heat these judges radiate, you’re
scalding hot and dangerously cold, a medical monstrosity where heatstroke and hypothermia combine in unholy union to drain you of life while leaving your outer shell untouched, a barren husk allowed locomotion but denied communication and you’re
running out of time, there’s a choice to be made to stagger back to
your table as if you’re a facsimile of life, looking over your shoulder as if you’ve split away from your physical body to pretend this isn’t really happening, that you’ve somehow slipped out of time and demoted yourself to observer status but you know that will never be true, you’ve never been an observer, it’s not what your soul is made for, your precious soul that’s teetering on the edge of a
void
you’re partly responsible for, but,
but,
you’ve never let anyone position your centre of gravity so why start now, don’t start now, you should remove your thumb from the scales, you should adjust your stance so your head’s in alignment with your heart, you should
Fight back.
Throw one last punch before the Kessel closes its collective jaws around you.
You may break bones and cough up blood as you go down swinging, but you’ll go down with one fewer regret embedded in your soul and without that weight you might rise again quicker.
“Judas.” Adeyemi’s voice is thick with pain. “Traitor.”
Adeyemi turns and stalks away and Tremblay blinks, his reality returning to playing at a regular speed but it feels like lightspeed and Adeyemi is going, going, once he’s gone you’ll be gone as well, you know this to be true just as you know that-
“I am not!” Tremblay yells.
The raw emotion in Tremblay’s voice freezes Adeyemi as he’s halfway out the door. It animates everyone else. There’s low murmuring and rapidly exchanged looks in the thick red sea of infection that Tremblay’s fighting not to drown in.
Tremblay’s ears are buzzing. His throat is raw and his tongue is dry from vomiting up those three syllables. He tries to swallow. He fails. He can’t return anything now.
“I didn’t know what you did,” Tremblay says slowly, into the thistle sharp atmosphere. He wishes his words were for Adeyemi alone. But he must make the best of what he’s managing to cling to in the midst of this maelstrom. “Which means I didn’t choose to expose it. Which means you’re wrong.”
Adeyemi spins around. He’s still enraged and heartbroken - at Tremblay, at losing his chance of becoming Pope, at the entire ecclesiastical machine that’s still impassively grinding away as he’s reduced to ash beneath its colossal treads - but lines of curiosity have appeared in his face. Which is progress.
Tremblay holds his hands up, as if in preemptive defence against Adeyemi’s next verbal onslaught.
“I’m many things, I don’t deny that. But I had no idea about your connection with Sister Shanumi,” he says, fighting back the exhilaration at not only being allowed to speak, but being listened to.
Shanumi’s face suddenly explodes into his mind and dominates his entire vision. She’s a canvas of restrained colour painted on a brick wall, a silent scream of humanity. He’s never thought of her seriously before; she was just a name and a factor within a plan. It was how the late Holy Father thought of her. What must she think of the Late Pope? What must she think of him? What must she think of all of them?
Tremblay winces. He makes a fist and is tempted to thump his chest to increase the pain spreading through it. But he doesn’t. Now is not the time to be selfish.
“I still don’t know the details of what happened,” Tremblay continues, his voice a sludge being squeezed through a keyhole, “and I don’t want to know. It’s none of my business.”
“You arranged for her to come here,” Adeyemi says hotly. He doesn’t deny that he had scandalous history with someone forbidden. Tremblay’s admiration and disparagement for him enter into brief battle with each other. When it ends, there is no clear winner.
“I did,” Tremblay admits. “But only because the late Holy Father asked me to. I refused him nothing. If I had, then I would swallow the name Judas and willingly choke on it. I swear to God I didn’t know your history.”
The muttering of the blood red sea changes in pitch and volume. It feels blunted. It tastes less acidic. The Cardinals know Tremblay’s faults. They know his strengths. They know how devout he is, and how he’d never invoke God’s name lightly.
Tremblay is also fluent in reading a crowd’s mood, and he capitalizes on it. “I swear to God I didn’t set out to defeat you like this. I bribed. I never blackmailed.”
Adeyemi walks back through the dining hall, each step solid and loud, an echo of the dignity and power he’ll allow no-one to destroy. The dining hall’s clinical lighting, artificial atmosphere, spotless floor, pristine table settings and decadent food remain unchanged as its quake’s epicenter enters into a different state of flux.
Adeyemi looks at Tremblay unblinking and unmoving, his mind running hot with emotions and detached calculations. Tremblay’s always found it easy to slip into someone else’s mindset. It’s one of the qualities that make him an excellent politician, a delightful friend, and a disgusting competitor. He knows that Adeyemi is wondering how far the late Pope manipulated everyone, and to what extent Tremblay’s been injured as the Holy Father’s shadow war runs rampant over the living Earth. Adeyemi is wondering how he’ll benefit from extending forgiveness to Tremblay. He’s wondering if he wants to.
A line of warmth, weak but undeniably there, appears as a faltering sunrise in Adeyemi’s eyes. Tremblay’s overworked heart pumps harder and it hurts, but it’s the good kind of hurt that makes you want to savor it.
“No,” Adeyemi says slowly, “your tactics are more direct. More…materialistic in nature.”
A smile flashes onto Tremblay’s face for less than a second before it vanishes. He wants to bolt it in place for everyone to see. But more than that he wants Adeyemi to know he’s sincere.
“I never considered approaching you with an…offer,” Tremblay says. This level of honesty feels raw and uncomfortable and invigorating, like stepping slowly into an ice bath. “It would have been a waste of my time. It would have been insulting to you.”
“But you did to others. Others who are in this room.”
“Yes,” Tremblay says. He makes a supreme effort not to look at any of the Cardinals who accepted his cash ‘donation’ for a ‘charity or project of their choice.’ He seriously wonders why he’s not throwing them all under the bus. Possibly because he now believes he has a real chance of not being excommunicated before he’s officially excommunicated. His motives for keeping silent are selfish. But if others believe he’s choosing the moral high road by giving his conspirators a second chance, he’ll let them. If it can work for Lawrence, it can work for him.
Tremblay makes another great effort to stay quiet. He knows how advantageous it can be to let someone else fill a silence and determine the destination. He’s an excellent backseat driver. He smiles wryly before he can help it. Excellent may be the wrong word.
Adeyemi’s expression darkens and Tremblay’s collapses. He feels six inches tall.
“You must have…suspected the request to transfer Sister Shanumi here was not for altruistic reasons,” Adeyemi says.
Tremblay nods. “It was too irregular to be benign. But I didn’t investigate why, I swear I didn’t. Joshua I swear to you I didn’t. I was too busy with my…own campaign, my…”
Tremblay sighs. Decides to spit it out. “My bribery scheme turned out to be more work than I’d anticipated. My recipients became demanding. Fickle. Needy. I’ll wait while someone finds a violin and plays a sad tune for me.”
There’s a scattering of laughter throughout the hall.
Tremblay’s chest hurts afresh with how much he loves this, his ability to connect with his fellow humans through humour and joy. He needs it like he needs water and oxygen.
Adeyemi continues looking at him with undisguised calculation. “I’ve known you for a long time, Joseph. I know that you know at least a few details about my…history.”
Tremblay glances at Lawrence before he can stop himself. Adeyemi catches it immediately. So do a handful of sharper Cardinals, who are lucky enough to have line of sight and are sensible enough not to already be on their second glass of wine.
“Dean Lawrence let some information slip to you?” Adeyemi says, heartbroken all over again.
“Dean Lawrence eagerly shared some information with me,” Tremblay corrects. “As if it was part of a speech he’d been rehearsing.”
Tremblay hesitates. Then he leans down and whispers in Adeyemi’s ear the words Lawrence had thrown at him: “He said that you’d given in to temptation 30 years ago. But, to my knowledge, no-one else apart from Sister Agnes knows even this. Sister Shanumi’s angry outburst added more colour. But it will never be a picture. It’s all just rumour. I will never help it grow.”
Tremblay straightens. Adeyemi nods. In sync, they both turn their heads and look at Lawrence, a brittle but united force against a common foe. Tremblay realizes he needs this more than anything else his body and soul can consume.
Lawrence looks like he’s been slapped. His rapid ascension to the moral high ground allowed him mere minutes to enjoy the view before an avalanche activated beneath his feet. He’s still standing behind his table, as usual putting something between his actions and the reality he’s influencing.
“For someone so reluctant to become involved in the Conclave’s human machinations,” Tremblay says dryly, “he has no problem running his mouth when it suits him.”
The crowd’s buzzing spikes. Several Cardinals drain their wine glasses and reach for a fresh bottle.
“You should have spoken with me in private,” Tremblay tells Lawrence.
“I did speak with you in private,” Lawrence says sharply.
“Not about the bank statements! You didn’t come to me when you discovered those.”
Lawrence rubs the back of his neck, hard. “You shut down our initial conversation. You shut down me.”
“And your counter move was this,” Tremblay says flatly, glancing around at the brown folders and white sheets of paper that contain his professional, moral, and emotional death certificates. His eyes are wet, but he dares not wipe them.
Lawrence works his jaw, defiant. “Everyone needed to know about your crimes. I needed to-”
“Publicly humiliate me. And what an excellent job you’ve done, Thomas, well done. You do your office proud.”
Lawrence briefly closes his eyes. He opens them and glances down at Benetiz, who’s been eating quietly at his side. The double take Lawrence does is almost comical. Because Benetiz is looking disapprovingly at him.
“I was unaware this is how transgressions are addressed in a Conclave,” Benetiz says, unimpressed and unsurprised.
Lawrence raises his hands. “I apologize,” he tells Benetiz quickly. His palpable desperation is pathetic. Tremblay wants to vomit. Not from disgust, but from envy.
“This unfortunate chapter has now been resolved,” Lawrence continues, as if soothing an abandoned cat he’s decided to take responsibility for regardless of the cat’s own wishes. “The next vote will be taken as planned, according to convention.”
Benetiz stands up in a way a supreme judge does before they pass an irrevocable sentence upon the guilty. “Nothing has been resolved.”
The dialogue of the dining hall has evolved again. The Cardinals’ muttering is now discernable. Chairs scrape. Cutlery clatters. Glasses clink. Laughter is spat out like steam from an overworked engine.
Benetiz glides across the floor and looks up at Tremblay.
“I wasn’t suspicious of you when you arrived,” Tremblay says, remembering the openly suspicious look he’d given Benetiz when Lawrence introduced him to everyone at their first dinner.
Tremblay’s eyes widen. Oh, no, he hadn’t meant to say that. He hadn’t meant to say anything. Why couldn’t he stop himself from blurting out a confession the moment Benetiz made eye contact with him?
Once again his chronic addiction for attention is going to hurt him. But he’s started, so he’s not going to stop. He’s always prided himself on seeing something through to the end, even if it should have been derailed and put out of its misery as soon as it left the station.
Benetiz looks up at him, hands clasped together, grounded and impassive. Only now does Tremblay want the floor to collapse and suck him down with it.
“I felt uneasy with you being here because of how you were brought here,” Tremblay explains, his tongue thick and clumsy. “I loved the Late Holy Father. Despite knowing how…cunning he could be. How distrustful he was. How much he looked down on some of us.” Tremblay swallows glass. “How much he looked down on me. I didn’t know if you were secretly made a Cardinal because you were a favourite of his, or because you were a vital piece being moved into position. Maybe both. I never investigated, so I don’t know. And I never will. And I accept that. I accept everything I’ve done. I…apologize for exposing you to the worst of what happens here. I’m sorry for what I allowed myself to become.”
Tremblay’s soaked in sweat, as if he’s run a marathon under the blazing noon sun.
Benetiz tilts his head. “Machinations motivated by money is nothing new. And it is hardly the worst thing I have, or will, experience here. Nevertheless, I thank you for your apology. It cannot have been easy saying what you did.”
Tremblay bows his head. It’s ridiculous how much better he now feels. A part of his defrosted brain reminds him that Benetiz didn’t accept Lawrence’s apology. The pleasure he feels about this is deep and petty. But he doesn’t feel too guilty, because he’s never going to tell anyone.
He knows how to keep a secret.
At the next vote, Tremblay does something he thought was impossible: he’s going to vote for someone else and hope they win. He writes Vincent Benetiz’s name with a steady hand and a stable heart. He wishes Vincent success. He wishes peace for himself. He wishes crushing defeat for Thomas.
Tremblay watches Thomas walk slowly up to the table to deposit his vote. It’s clutched tightly in his hand. His eyes are skyward. His mind is in turmoil. It’s uncharitable to hope that Thomas trips and crashes into the table. He’d scatter the voting equipment and scare the Cardinals and cause a scene. He’d embarrass himself in public.
Then a window explodes and Thomas is thrown to the ground and Tremblay’s reminded why he sometimes hates himself.
In the softly lit blue auditorium, Tremblay accepts a clean cloth from his neighbor with a nod of thanks. He takes off his glasses and carefully wipes as much dust and grit from them as possible. He tilts them left and right, inspecting the damage. The left lens is cracked beyond repair. It’s a ridiculously small price to pay to have survived an explosion.
The Cardinal sitting behind Tremblay taps him on the shoulder. Tremblay tilts his head back to look at him, squinting.
“Do you have a spare pair?” the Cardinal asks him. “If you don’t, you can borrow mine.”
“Or mine,” the Cardinal to Tremblay’s left says. “If you go to the doctors you’ll wait a year.”
“And be given the wrong prescription,” the Cardinal behind him agrees.
Tremblay smiles. “Thank you both. But I do have a spare pair. Do not worry about me.”
His neighbor Cardinals shrug. In lowered voices they resume complaining about the subpar treatment they receive for the various ailments they suffer from. Tremblay sits up straight and puts his glasses back on. Someone cracks a joke, and a lot of people laugh too loudly. They’re venting their fear in a way Tremblay knows well. He could join in. He could lead it.
He keeps his mouth shut. He doesn’t want to overplay the hand he now holds. He doesn’t want to appear ungrateful to God for the peace he’s been given during such a horrific time.
Dean Lawrence enters the auditorium and everyone shuts up.
Clutching a report, Lawrence stands in front of everyone. He catches Tremblay’s eyes and nods. Tremblay returns the gesture.
After the explosion sent everyone to their knees or to the floor, when glass and debris rained down on them, Tremblay was one of the first to react. He’d bolted from his seat and gone straight to Lawrence. He’d helped him to his feet and used his large frame to shield him from possible further attack. He hadn’t hesitated. He hadn’t thought of how his action would repair some of his reputation. Maybe that’s why it has helped repair some of it.
Tremblay has a thousand strategies at his fingertips for transforming his newfound hero status from temporary to permanent. It feels weird to feel no desire to deploy one. It’s like he’s had a tooth removed, and the gaping hole is still a painless, puzzling novelty.
Lawrence clears his throat. He explains what caused the explosion and how many people died.
Tremblay puts a hand on the Bible resting on his lap and prays for the victims.
Tedesco erupts with full-blown fire and fury against the Church’s enemies. Cardinals cheer. Bellini counters with a familiar dose of diluted half-measures. Other Cardinals cheer. Tedesco points and shouts and Bellini points and shouts and Lawrence looks exhausted, he looks utterly miserable. Tremblay grips his Bible in one hand and the arm of his chair in the other. He slowly rises to his feet.
He stands straight, head back, chest out, chin up, tall and solid and roars, “EVERYONE SHUT YOUR MOUTH!”
Everyone shuts up. Everyone gapes at him.
Tremblay knows he’s used inappropriate and disrespectful language, but he doesn’t care. He’s going to be fired and banished from the Church soon enough, so why not say what’s on his mind. Why not indulge himself one last time. Why not do what’s right.
In the ringing silence, Tremblay eases himself back down.
And in the void he’s fully responsible for, a soft voice even more powerful than his own fills it.
Benetiz speaks of war and openness and community. Of a family moving forward. Of love. Of hope.
It makes Tremblay’s skin erupt in goosebumps. He’s certain other Cardinals are experiencing the same thing.
Benetiz is elected Pope with an overwhelming majority.
Tremblay applauded enthusiastically, one of the first to stand. He’d felt an unequal blend of disgust and pleasure at seeing Bellini’s polite but passionless applause, and Tedesco’s sulking abstinence. The name Benetiz chose for himself is perfectly fitting. Innocent.
One of the few things Tremblay’s never told anyone about himself is the name he’d choose if he was elected Pope. He’d brushed off the commonly asked question with lighthearted quips about it being bad luck to jinx it. Now no-one will ever know. He wears this knowledge like a freshly laundered robe, a comfortable weight exuding a pleasingly neutral fragrance.
Tremblay is milling around and chatting with Lawrence and a handful of Cardinals, waiting good-naturedly for the new Pope to be presented to the world. Lawrence looks two decades younger. Tremblay cracks a joke and Lawrence actually laughs out loud. It’s one of the best sounds Tremblay’s ever heard. He’s never been friends with Lawrence. But he’s known Lawrence for years and knows he’s a good person, and he doesn’t want to part on bad terms.
Then Ray O’Malley appears, and the laughter dies.
He radiates anxiety and displeasure, despite his efforts to conceal them. His face is sallow. His mouth a thin line. His eyes are dilated from the adrenaline sloshing through his system. He clutches a report tightly.
Ray injects himself into the group and positions himself at Lawrence’s right hand side. He looks at Lawrence and says, “The Holy Father wishes to meet with Cardinal Tremblay first.”
Lawrence and Tremblay look at each other, both startled and suspicious. The other Cardinals break away into excited muttering.
Ray looks Tremblay up and down slowly, impertinently, as if scanning for contaminants that need eliminating. If Tremblay had been elected Pope, he would have prayed intently for guidance on whether to banish Ray or promote him.
Tremblay bows his head. “I am at the Holy Father’s command.”
Ray hesitates. Then he puts his hand on Lawrence’s arm and Lawrence bends his head. Ray whispers something into Lawrence’s ear and Lawrence’s eyes widen. Lawrence straightens.
Ray removes his hand and loudly says, “The Holy Father will meet with you immediately after, Dean Lawrence.”
“Of course,” Lawrence says, half-distracted by whatever it was Ray had said.
Ray looks at Tremblay, but with less hostility. As if he can now live at peace with himself.
Ray leads the way to the Room of Tears.
The Room of Tears is small, its walls a dark and intimate red. Like the lonely but overworked chamber of a heart.
Benetiz sits on a small bench, hands clasped in his lap. Tremblay steps cautiously into the room, and the door is closed behind him.
“Please, sit,” Benetiz says. Tremblay does, his mouth dry.
“There is something I wish you to know about me,” Benetiz says calmly. “You will be the fourth. I informed the late Pope. O’Malley has discovered it, as evidenced by his body language when I asked him to bring you to me.” Benetiz’s tone warms. “Which means it is likely Dean Lawrence also knows.”
Tremblay feels a kick to the stomach that says, None of this sounds good. It was one thing to enjoy a mystery when you had the opportunity to benefit from it, but this one feels like a weight around your neck. But your Pope has summoned you, and you will carry whatever it is he wishes to impart. You will pay attention to the most important person in this room.
Tremblay leans forward, gaze intense, posture open and committed. He slips naturally into the position that makes the recipient of his attention feel like they’re the most important person in the world. Most people think it’s a persona he adopts like a professional actor, where he radiates artificial interest in order to manipulate and control. Most people are wrong. He rarely bothers to explain that he genuinely loves interacting with people and listening to them, since he’s rarely believed. The depth and breadth of humanity is endlessly fascinating, and every interaction he enters into has rewarded him richly in knowledge, entertainment, and education.
“I decided against receiving medical treatment at a clinic in Geneva.”
Tremblay’s eyes widen. He wasn’t expecting this. His projected thoughts had touched on potential scandals involving money, power, and forbidden relationships. The bread and butter of scandals. Because Tremblay knows with absolute certainty that Benetiz is incapable of anything worse.
Tremblay taps a finger on his knee, an arrhythmic melody that will never be complete. “Why are you telling me this?”
“It would have been a laparoscopic hysterectomy.”
Tremblay freezes. He has a violent flashback to how he felt in the dining room, of being a living statue trapped inside flawed stone that will never be permitted to feel the sun. His mind races. Its wheels spin and whine, but are unable to keep traction on the greasy road. He frowns deeply. “I don’t understand.”
Benetiz inhales slowly. He places his hands on his knees so deliberately lightly it’s obvious he wants to squeeze them. He exhales slowly. His gaze is open and level. He explains his condition in detail.
Tremblay listens attentively. He literally bites his tongue to prevent himself from interrupting.
When Benetiz finishes, Tremblay immediately says, “I understand what intersex means. But I don’t understand why you expect me to care.”
Benetiz blinks.
“Because you do,” Tremblay says. “You’re expecting a reaction, either positive or negative. Probably negative. And I’m not delivering.” Tremblay feels his stomach hollow out, as if he’s failing an exam he didn’t know he was supposed to sit.
“I was expecting something from you, yes,” Benetiz says carefully. “But I was hoping I wouldn’t receive it. And I haven’t.” He clasps his hands together and leans forward, his eyes bright, shedding five years. “Hope always triumphs. I am often wrong.”
Tremblay feels a headache unfolding at the back of his skull.
Two likely possibilities slither into Tremblay’s mind, and now he does feel uncomfortable. He clears his throat. Looks at his feet. Looks at the wall. Clutches his cross and releases it as if it’s scalding. Heat floods his neck and face. “You’re worried I’m going to blackmail you. It’s only a matter of time before your condition is known to the world. After my demotion and excommunication I’ll use this knowledge to take revenge. Not on you personally, but on the Church as a whole. I’ll use it to salvage whatever scraps of my career I can find. Or that I’ll sell your story to a tabloid and pocket a generous fee.”
Tremblay looks at Benetiz with soul deep intensity. “I swear to you and God that I will do neither.”
Benetiz nods, slowly. “I believe you.”
Tremblay’s heart is shunted back into a regular rhythm. “Thank you.”
Tremblay has the strongest suspicion that Benetiz is now fighting back a smile. “There is something I want you to do for me.”
“Hand in my resignation and fade away without a fuss.”
"I want you to be my Cardinal Secretary of State."
Tremblay inhales and tries to speak at the same time and ends up choking on his own spit.
He bends over coughing and hacking. He rubs his chest. Removes his glasses and wipes his eyes. Breathes freely again. Puts his glasses back on.
Benetiz sits serenely as he waits for Tremblay to compose himself. Deep kindness and empathy radiate from his pores. His eyes are stained with a faint but undeniable ribbon of dark pleasure.
Benetiz blinks and the ribbon is shredded. "Are you alright?" he asks.
Tremblay isn't sure what the honest answer is. So he says so.
"Perhaps." Tremblay straightens. Its flow of oxygen restored, his mind snaps back to what Benetiz wants from him. He rapidly cranks through Benetiz’s possible motivations for extending such an offer. Tremblay feels uncomfortable with all of them. Which is unexpected. Instead of being banished, he's being offered the job of Secretary of State.
SECRETARY OF STATE.
He feels like he’s eaten contaminated food and is moments away from breaking into a cold sweat that heralds a week of violent illness.
"Why?" Tremblay asks.
"You look troubled."
"You're avoiding the question."
Tremblay wants to punch himself in the throat.
"Because of that," Benetiz answers.
Tremblay opens his mouth. He closes it. He decides to take a shot at figuring this out.
"...because I will be direct and honest with you without being intimidated?"
Pope Innocent smiles. It’s so radiant that Tremblay holds his breath for fear of dispelling it. He feels it on his skin like spring sunshine through dappled green leaves, a natural warmth that gives and sustains life.
He swallows thickly. "And because I...deal competently with the political machinations the Vatican runs on?"
"You deal with them excellently. Please, continue."
Never in his life has Tremblay felt uncomfortable talking about his positive qualities, but he does now. It's horrible. And unexpectedly liberating. Maybe he finally understands the cost of selling himself, and not just its value.
"I have little left to lose. I am fearless most of the time. I know when to speak up and when to stay silent. I am entertaining company. I will defend you. I will be loyal to you.” Tremblay corrects himself. “I am loyal to you.”
Innocent nods. He doesn't smile. His eyes have darkened again, this time in grave expectation. He sits regal and fierce, an iron core bedecked in flowers of vibrant colours. Some of these captivating petals are smaller and brighter than the rest. Nature’s warning system for danger is both obvious and complex.
Tremblay imagines Innocent on the throne, a white and gold pillar with roots connecting to the core of Earth and filaments joining the vault of Heaven. It’s almost overwhelming.
“Soon I will be surrounded by enemies,” Innocent states.
Tremblay nods. Benetiz has lived and worked in war zones for years, and knows well the many faces war chooses to wear. Innocent is about to be assaulted by many of them for the first time.
Tremblay slowly sinks to his knees, upon the cold and spartan floor. “I will fight them.”
He looks up at his leader, at his Father, at his glorious and unexpected salvation. “And I will defeat them.”
Tremblay bows his head. Innocent gently cups the back of his head and speaks softly, his words pure nourishment.
Tremblay receives the Pope’s blessing, and his vision explodes in gold.