Just minutes ago they were talking about death warrants and gallows, now they were suddenly offering me houses and money. Had my wits finally fled and I’d become as mad as the unseen prisoner? Perhaps I was imagining all this and the priests were just hallucinations. I jerked my hand and felt the iron shackle cut into my wrist – the pain was certainly real enough.
‘Are you saying I’ll be released … with no charge? Will there … will there be a penance?’ I asked anxiously.
I had witnessed the ghastly humiliation of those the Church forced to do public penance for their crime and always thought I’d rather die than suffer that. Although now that it had come to just such a choice, I realized I would do anything to stay alive, even endure public shame.
‘We feel that the task you will undertake will involve sufficient hardship so as to render any further penance unnecessary. You might say that what the Church requires of you is in the nature of a pilgrimage.’
‘You mean to Compostela or the Holy Land?’
The abject fear that had gripped me was beginning to ease a little. Pilgrimages could be quite jolly affairs, or so I’d been told. True, the journey could be a little rough at times, but if one had plenty of money there was always good food, desirable women and juicy entertainment to be had in the inns along the way.
‘I fear the pilgrimage you are about to embark on is to somewhere a little colder and damper than the Holy Land.’ The young priest glanced round the dungeon at the water marks on the pillars and the puddles of sea water on the floor. ‘But after this place such a journey should be no hardship. We want you to go to Iceland … you have heard of Iceland?’
‘Somewhere in the North, isn’t it? Nothing there but cod and sheep, so I heard. Why would I go on pilgrimage there? Are there even any shrines in Iceland?’
‘It’s not the destination that makes the pilgrimage, Cruz, it is the journey,’ the older priest said. ‘A pilgrimage is a journey you undertake to purify the soul, but in this case it is a journey you will make to purify the Holy Church, and Portugal, even the young king himself.’
The older priest glanced behind me again, as if he was seeking confirmation from someone standing just out of my sight in the shadow of the pillar. Whatever answer he got seemed to be a signal to continue, for he nodded briefly and returned his gaze to me.
‘A young girl has arrived in Belém. She has been making inquiries about ships bound for Iceland. We believe she means to go there to capture a pair of gyrfalcons which she intends to present to King Sebastian. It is vital for the future of Portugal that she does not succeed. You will sail with her and use your considerable skill at charming women to befriend her. We want you to ensure she does not return with the white falcons.’
I don’t know quite what task I’d been expecting them to charge me with – delivering a package to someone, or even stealing a holy relic for them from a shrine – but stopping a girl capturing a couple of birds was definitely not what I expected to hear.
‘I can’t imagine why a gift of a few birds should affect the future of Portugal,’ I said. ‘Why don’t you just tell her the king doesn’t like birds and suggest she stitch him a nice shirt instead?’ I tried to grin, but my lips were too cracked and sore.
The two priests regarded me with an icy contempt. It was a look that reminded me that my life still dangled precariously in their hands.
I added hastily, ‘What I mean is, Father, if … if you don’t want the girl to go and find these birds, why don’t you arrest her or simply forbid her to leave?’
‘She must be seen to go to Iceland, and she must be seen to fail in her quest. If she is arrested or if she should fall mortally sick before she has a chance to sail, there is a danger that His Majesty, being at an impressionable age, might express a certain sympathy towards her and her family. This he must not do. You must see that she is well away from these shores before any … accident befalls her. What happens after that we will leave to