“We can fear all manner of things, real and unreal,” she replied. “The sack of the city again, if there is another crusade.” In the corner of her vision, she saw the impatient gesture of his hand brushing away the idea. “The forced union of the Church with Rome,” she went on, and this time he stood perfectly still. “Violence in the city if that should happen,” she added, measuring her words as precisely as she could. “Possible attempts to usurp Michael’s power over the Church.” Her voice was shaking a little now. “By those who are passionately against union.”

The silence was so intense, she could hear a servant drop a fork on the tiled floor two rooms away.

“Usurp Michael’s power over the Church?” he asked at length. “What on earth do you mean?” He was very pale. “Michael is emperor. Or do you mean usurp the throne?”

Her heart pounding, she met his eyes. “Do I?”

“That’s ridiculous! Stay with your medicine,” Demetrios snapped. “You know nothing about the world, and still less about the relations of power.”

“There is something that disturbs your mother,” she lied, her mind racing. “Something keeps her from sleeping and takes the pleasure from her food so she eats it badly and too fast.”

“I suppose that’s better than saying her illness is caused by sin,” he conceded dryly. A sudden, very real sadness crossed his face. “But if you think my mother’s a coward, then you are a fool. I never saw her afraid of anything.”

Of course you didn’t, Anna thought. Eirene’s fears were of the heart, not of the mind or the flesh. Like most women, she feared loneliness and rejection, losing the man she loved to someone like Zoe.

A CEILING IN THE PAPAL PALACE IN VITERBO HAD CAVED in, splintering to a thousand shards of wood, plaster, and rubble, killing Pope John XXI. The news reduced Rome to stunned silence, then slowly spread to the rest of Christendom. Once again, the world had no voice for God to lead it.

Palombara heard the news in the Blachernae Palace at an audience with the emperor. Now he stood in one of the great galleries in front of a magnificent statue. It was one of a few that had survived with only the slightest chip in one arm, as if to show that it too was subject to time and chance. It was Greek, from before Christ, preserved here in this seldom used corner, beautiful and almost naked.

Anna was in the same corridor, returning from treating a patient. She saw Bishop Palombara, but he was deep in thought and as unaware of her as if he had been alone. She read in his face in the unguarded moment a vulnerability to beauty, as if it could reach inside him effortlessly past all the barriers he had built up and touch the wounds beyond.

Yet he allowed it. Some part of him hungered for the overwhelming emotion, even if it was so threaded through with pain. Yet its reality eluded him. She knew that when he turned to her, only for an instant she saw it in his eyes.

Then, as if by mutual agreement, he walked away, back toward the main gallery, and she was ashamed of having intruded, even though it had been unintentional.

She heard a noise of swift footsteps and swung around sharply, as if she had been caught somewhere she should not have been. Why should she feel so exposed? Because she had experienced a moment’s empathy with the Roman?

This was the immediate razor edge of the Schism, not arguments about the nature of God; it was the poison in the nature of man, where the lines of enormity were drawn in the ground and one was afraid to stretch out the hand across them.

FROM MAY TO NOVEMBER, THERE WAS ANOTHER LONG VOID in struggle between Rome and Byzantium until Pope Nicholas III was elected toward the end of November. He was Italian, passionately so. He dispossessed Charles of Anjou of his position as senator of Rome, so he could vote in no future papal elections, thus considerably reducing his power. He packed the high offices close to him with his own brothers, nephews, and cousins, gaining a stronghold on Rome.

He also required yet another affirmation of the union between Rome and Byzantium. This time it was not Michael and his son who should sign the promises of the new restrictions, it was all the bishops and senior clergy in what remained of the empire.

Anna found Constantine in despair.

“I shouldn’t have done it!” he said hoarsely. “But how could I have been wrong?” He seemed almost on the edge of tears, his eyes hot, beseeching escape from a reality he could not bear. He flung out his hands in a gesture of pleading. “Pope John forced the emperor into signing the promise to obey Rome, and a month afterward-just a month-the ceiling of his palace fell in on him. It was an act of God, it had to be.”

She did not argue.

“I told the people so,” he went on urgently. “Even the cardinals in Rome must have seen it. What more do they need as a sign? Do they not believe it was God who brought down the walls of Jericho on the sinners within?” His voice was rising in a wild plea. “I told them it was the miracle we had waited for. I had promised them that the Blessed Virgin would save us, if only we had faith.” He choked, gagging for breath. “I have betrayed them.”

She was embarrassed for him. This was the sort of crisis of faith one should have alone and afterward be able to pretend had not happened. “No one said it would be easy,” she began. “At least no one who tells the truth. Or that it wouldn’t hurt, and we would always win. The crucifixion must have looked like the end of everything.”

He breathed out heavily. “We must keep on fighting, to the death, if necessary. We must find new heart somehow. If we haven’t the truth, then we have nothing at all.” The faintest flicker of a smile touched his eyes, and he moved absently to straighten his robe. “Thank you, Anastasius. Your faith in me has given me strength. This is a setback, it is not a defeat. Tomorrow will see the resurrection, if we have faith.” He straightened his shoulders. “I shall begin immediately.”

“Your Grace…” She reached out as if to touch him, then dropped her hand at the last moment. “Be careful,” she warned, thinking of his arrest, perhaps worse. “If you speak out too clearly against the union, you will be thrown out of office,” she said urgently. “And then who will minister to the poor and the sick? You will end up in exile, like Cyril Choniates, and what good will that do?”

“I have no intention of being so impractical,” he promised her. “I shall walk quietly and keep the faith.”

Constantine was on the steps of the Church of the Holy Apostles. A crowd was pressing forward anxiously, looking to Constantine, waiting for him to speak and reassure them, tell them that their ancient comforts were not empty. He was not aware of Anna in the shadow a few yards behind him. His eyes and his mind were on the eager faces in front of him.

“Be patient,” he said quietly. In order to hear him, they ceased talking to one another, and gradually the silence spread. “We are entering a difficult time,” he went on. “We must be outwardly obedient, or we will cause dissension in the community, perhaps violence. Old ways vie with new ones, but we know the truth of our faith, and we will practice virtue in our homes, even should it become impossible in our streets or churches. We will keep the faith and abide in hope. God will yet rescue us.”

The panic ebbed away. Anna could see the faces begin to smile, the jostling cease.

“God bless the bishop!” someone called out. “Constantine! Bishop Constantine!” The cry was taken up and repeated like an incantation.