«I understand, Grandma, the important thing is to believe in the good entity, which loves us and helps us, whatever its name.»
Contrary to what Lucia expected and what she had heard from those who feared the so-called witches, the ritual took place in complete tranquillity. No goat came forward to claim her virginity, nor did any of the participants try to torture her or make her sign oaths with her blood. The path to Colle del Giogo had not been easy. After the Moje lock, the path along the bank of the river Esino was often lost in the bush. Lucia could not understand how her grandmother could not get lost and find the trace of the ancient path even after having groped for several leagues in the woods, without apparent landmarks. At a certain point they had to ford the river and continue uphill along a dirt road that climbed up the hollow dug by a rushing torrent that descended from the mountain. They arrived in Apiro at lunchtime and were hosted by a young married couple, Alberto and Ornella, who offered them black bread and dried venison. The two had a little girl of about three years of age, two big blue eyes and flowing brown curly hair; she played with a rag doll near the fireplace, having fun dressing her in tiny coloured clothes, made of simple pieces of cloth. She seemed dont care about what her parents were preparing to do, together with the new arrivals, for the evening.
«What are you going to do with the baby?» Elena asked the young couple.
«Oh, thats all right, at seven oclock the little girl is already in her strawberry tree. Anyway, we asked our neighbour Isa to come and take a look at her. Shell do it gladly.»
Lucia, who had always slept in a comfortable bed, couldnt understand how these people slept in those piles of woven straw.
Theyll be full of fleas! she thought, shuddering at the very idea that the next night she would have to sleep there too. Better dead than lying in one of those things.
The initiation ceremony of the new adept took place according to an ancient ritual. It was late at night when Lucia and her grandmother, in the company of their guests, immersed themselves in the stinging cold of the mountain. The fields were still covered with a light layer of snow and the path was illuminated by the bright disc of the full moon shining huge in the sky, as the girl had never seen before. Going up towards Colle del Giogo, at certain points one could sink into the snow up to the knee and it was tiring to go on, but when they reached the clearing to which they were heading, Lucia was amazed at how the place was almost completely cleared of the white blanket and the lawn was dotted with small and numerous colourful flowers, white, lilac, fuchsia, purple, yellow ...
«They are called snowdrops because they are the first flowers to appear as soon as the snow begins to melt, but their real name is Crocus and their dried stigmas can be used both as a condiment in the kitchen and for their medicinal properties.»
«Grandma, why does the temperature in this place seem more pleasant?» asked the curious girl.
«They say this is a magical place, but in reality the temperature is tempered by a hot spring. Here the subsoil is rich in sulphurous springs, which is why the temperature is a little higher. From now on, you will learn that most of the phenomena that ordinary people indicate as magical actually have a logical, rational explanation: just know how to look for it. They point us out as witches, but all we do is exploit ancient knowledge and natural phenomena for our own purposes. You see, a legend tells that about three hundred years ago one of the wives of Frederick II, the Emperor of Swabia, came to this remote place to hide something that her husband had told her to jealously guard, because she came from the Holy Land, from Jerusalem. Legends and traditions say that this object was a magic stone, a stone that the archangel Michael would give to Abraham or, perhaps, even the so-called philosophers stone that the ancient alchemists were looking for. This is a fairy tale, youll know the truth in a moment. And now, let us enter the cave. Lets not be kept waiting!»
The oldest of the participants was a woman with long grey hair, her face skin wrinkled with wrinkles. She wore a long blue tunic with a golden talisman on top of it at chest height, secured to her neck by a chain also made of gold. He had lit a bonfire inside the cave, occasionally throwing dust into the flames, which from time to time caused a blaze of a different colour, sometimes yellow, sometimes green, sometimes blue, sometimes deep red. For each blaze that illuminated her face, she pronounced strange words, which the others present interpreted by arranging themselves around the bonfire, now holding hands and rotating in circles, now moving away and bowing to the will of the Wise Old Woman, now taking bunches of herbs and throwing them in turn into the fire, now sitting on the ground in complete silence. At one point, the only person left standing was the old teacher. She was holding a large book in her hand, on the cover of which stood out the drawing of a pentacle, just like the one in the family diary that her grandmother had given her some time ago, and the gothic inscription Clavicula Salomonis.
«By virtue of the powers conferred on me by this coven, I, Sara of the Bisenzi, welcome novice Lucia Baldeschi into our community. She is the chosen one, the one who will replace me one day and will be destined to lead all of you. Therefore, Lucia, come closer and swear obedience and fidelity to this book, written by the ancient King Solomon in his own hand, and brought here among immense perils by Jolanda, who lost her life once she reached her final goal. It is only thanks to his daughter Anna that the book and its teachings have been handed down to us and, from time to time, one of us has the task of preserving and protecting it.»
So saying, the old woman took off her medallion and gently passed the chain around Lucias neck. The golden talisman represented a five-pointed star, the seal of Solomon. The same design was drawn on the ground by the old woman using a pointed rod and the girl was made to stretch out so that her head, her hands at the end of her arms outstretched and her feet at the bottom of her legs apart corresponded exactly to the points of the star. Sara took some olive oil, marking with it in sequence Lucias left hand, left foot, right foot, right hand and forehead.
«Water, air, earth, fire: you know how to govern the four elements. They can be invoked and used separately by each one of us, but only your spirit is able to unite them and strengthen their powers and qualities to the maximum. Remember, Lucia! You will use your powers only for good and you will fight, even sacrificing your own life, against anyone who wants to abuse you and your abilities for evil purposes.» Then he poured water on the girls left hand, still lying down, blew on her left foot, threw a handful of earth on her right foot and brought a burning stick to her right hand. Finally he kissed her forehead. «And now stand up. Your long journey has begun.»
The initiation ceremony was therefore very simple, not as traumatizing as the girl had feared. The rite had taken place in the manner handed down from ancient times, without constraints, without violence, without the intervention of strange figures resembling goats or other beasts. The Devil was certainly not hidden among the participants in the rite. Lucia was disorientated, but she was beginning to understand many things, which her grandmother would help her to define in the following months. Magic, witchcraft, as she had conceived it up to that moment, did not exist. Her grandmother would explain to her what the frontiers of human thought were, how each individual was endowed with enormous potential linked to the use of the same, but that only someone was able to perform certain functions, both by innate ability and through exercise. But then, Lucia asked herself, was the floating sphere that materialized in her hands pure fruit of her imagination, of her suggestion? Yet she was able to visualize it! Yes, but only she, the others couldnt see it. Anyway, he had experienced its devastating effects by throwing a fireball at that little girl, Elisabetta, who had found herself surrounded by flames. And she could read the thoughts of those in front of her, and she could hear the voices of the spirits, and she could predict the future somehow. How did she explain all this?
«Theres a rational explanation for everything», Grandma told her one night in front of the burning fireplace. «Some of our followers, in the light of what had already been done in the past by ancient scholars, some of whose texts escaped the fires of the ecclesiastical authorities, opened the skulls of corpses of men and women to study their contents, their brains. The surface of our brain is not smooth, but it has many folds, which are called circumvolutions by anatomy scholars and which are able to increase by many times the useful surface of this important organ of ours. It is not the heart, as everyone says, the seat of our feelings, but the brain is their repository. As well as all our memories, near and far, are set aside here. It is the brain that allows us to recognize sounds, colours, smells, makes us associate objects with a name, makes us learn the symbols of writing so that the most intelligent people, or the luckiest if you like, are able to read, write and count. It is also the brain that sends dreams to our eyes while we rest. And if all this already seems like a lot to you, know that a very small part of the brain surface is used for all this. The rest is enormous potential, but unknown to most people. Thus, those who manage to train the unused areas of their brain can perform activities that ordinary mortals dont even dream about. And here you can hear speech spoken in one place even in ancient times. Every word spoken leaves its trace in the air, nothing is lost. If you can pick up these speeches, these words, its not that youre talking to spirits, you cant talk to people who have been missing for months, or years, or centuries, but you can listen to what they said even a long time ago.»
«What about foreknowledge?»
«Thats a little more complicated, but even here some scholars have speculated that those who predict the future will pick up the brain waves of someone who is already planning to act. Thats why prescience is limited to the short term, and its not possible to predict the future in the long term. Whoever claims to be able to do that is a charlatan!»
«What about being able to move objects, levitate them, or turn on a lamp with the power of thought?»
«Well, even these are potentials of the human brain unknown to most individuals. By exercising and training the areas of the brain that are able to use the elements around us to our advantage, we are able to do anything. We are accustomed to using the five senses that we know, sight, touch, hearing, taste and smell, without even imagining what the actual power of our brain is. The ancients knew very well how to use certain powers, so that they could build enormous works without the slightest effort. You see, the Romans, when they came to conquer Egypt, couldnt explain how the Egyptians, long before their arrival, had built colossal works, such as the pyramids and the sphinx. The enormous blocks of stone with which they had been built could not be moved even by hundreds of slaves working together.»
«You mean to say that...»
«I dont want to say anything. You draw your own conclusions.»
Lucia was more fascinated by her grandmothers speeches every day, but she was even more interested in curing illnesses with herbs. During the spring, she went several times with her grandmother Elena to Colle del Giogo, but also to the countryside and woods around Jesi to collect medicinal herbs. Each time her grandmother explained to her the properties and use of a certain herb: Henbane, Turpentine, Licorice, and the dangerous Belladonna. Elena had promised Lucia that, starting from late summer and for all the following autumn, she would teach her how to recognize mushrooms, how to distinguish between edible and poisonous ones, how to prevent and treat intoxications due to the latter, and how to use the spores of certain mushrooms on infected wounds. But in those last days of spring, the course of history had taken her to assist the young Franciolini, wounded by the enemies of the city.
It had been more than ten days since Lucia was busy around Andreas bedside when the boy regained consciousness. He opened his eyes and Lucia felt immediately observed in a strange way. She read in those eyes the bewilderment of the young man, who perhaps believed he was already dead, that he had reached heaven and that he had an angel at his disposal to take care of him. Certainly, he was a nobleman and, as he had servants on Earth, his head certainly led him to think that he would have servants there in Paradise too. But then, little by little, Lucia realized that Andrea was beginning to recognize the walls, furniture and ornaments of his room.
«Who are you, taking care of me, without even knowing you? And what happened to the rest of my family? And my servants? Wheres Ali? Damn that miserable Turk! When hes needed, hes always able to disappear, maybe youll find him with his ass in the air praying to his God...», Andrea began to say, with his cheeks inflamed with fever, shaking so much that a convulsive coughing fit managed to interrupt his speech in half. Lucia took the hand of the young man among her own, trying to calm him and, at the same time, enjoying that physical contact.
«You must be quiet, or you will plunge back into unconsciousness and feverish delirium. And you must not rage against Alì. Only thank to him, youd already be in the ground! As for me... Well, I would be Lucia Baldeschi, your betrothed.» In uttering these words, a slight redness took hold of the girls cheeks, which could then sink her hazel eyes into the young mans blue, magnetic eyes, which attracted her face, her lips all over her body to him.
«I did not imagine that the Cardinal would want to reserve such a gift for me. But you are not lying to me? The enemy overwhelmed us just before we reached the Cardinals palace, and I believe he is no stranger to ambush!» With the force of anger, he pulled himself up a little, and Lucia hastened to place the pillows behind his back to help him sustain himself. «I should have guessed it was a trick, nothing but a political marriage! Your uncle made arrangements with his enemies, to kill my father, me, disperse my family and centralize civil and religious powers, once the invaders had been liquidated with money. But what invaders? The Duke of Montacuto and the Archduke of Urbino certainly agreed with him! I bet even not anyone knows where is my mother, perhaps kidnapped, or perhaps killed by the enemy. And you?» After having passed to the you of respect, he went back to speak to Lucia calling her as one did with the servants. «Youre not Cardinal Baldeschis niece. You cant be. Hed never allow his niece to be here beside me. Youre a servant, a tramp sent by the Cardinal because Im not dead yet and you must take the opportunity to finish me off. Come on, then! Where do you hide the dagger? Put it in my chest and lets get it over with, because these wounds will kill me in a few days. Then I might as well cut the suffering short.»
So he grabbed Lucias arm and pulled her towards him. They found each others faces very close, each felt the others panting breath touching their cheeks. Lucia read in young Franciolinis eyes the fear of dying, not the wickedness. Her instinct would have been to withdraw, and instead she did the opposite, she gently placed her lips on those of him. She didnt even have time to feel the roughness of the beard that hadnt been shaved for a few days, which was swept away in a vortex of tongues tangled together, hands looking for naked skin under her clothes, caresses that would isolate her from reality to reach heavenly heights, and then sensations never felt before, until she reached an intense pleasure, accompanied however by a deep pain. Now the blood was hers, and it came from her intimate parts violated by that sweet encounter; she had never felt anything like it in her life, but she felt satisfied.