Three Fires by Denise Mina EPUB & PDF – eBook Details Online
- Status: Available for Free Download
- Author: Denise Mina
- Language: English
- Genre: Historical Thrillers
- Format: PDF / EPUB
- Size: 2 MB
- Price: Free
THE CONFESSION
The Great Hall, Palazzo della Signoria
Florence, Wednesday 18 April 1498
It’s late afternoon as Fra Girolamo Savonarola shuffles onto the raised stage at
the front of the Hall of the Five Hundred. He drags his sandalled feet, scuffing
the stone floor with a shush, shush, shush.
Savonarola commissioned this chamber, currently the largest room in
Europe. It was built to hold the five-hundred-strong Grand Council, part of
the new Republic of Florence established under his authority. The vast walls
are plain, not yet frescoed. Through the high windows a clear spring light
floods into the room from the west.
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The full council watch him walk on in silence. They are seated in neat
rows, but standing behind them and around them are a substantial portion of
the male population of Florence. Everyone is perfectly still and listening. It
hasn’t rained in Florence for a week and the men have walked dust from the
street into the room. It floats above them like a scum on a broth, swimming in
the warm air, rising high.
Savonarola looks out at the gathered crowd and admits that God is not
talking to him. He made it up.
He has been lying to them for years.
He admits that his prophecies were so accurate because he knew certain
things in advance: anyone could see that Lorenzo de’ Medici was desperately
ill, that Pope Innocent VIII was obese and spectacularly debauched, that the
King of Naples was very old. Accurately predicting their deaths was a cheap
trick that he did to get power for himself. He didn’t foresee the French Army
invading Brescia six years before war was even declared, he just got lucky. He
didn’t foretell the coming of plague, famine and war to Florence. It was a
coincidence that those things happened years after he said they would.
There is no mention of the Charles the Affable prophecy because that’s
impossible to explain.
The shocking announcement reverberates around the room, echoes over
the heads of the gathered crowd. Some of them are here because they couldn’t
believe he was actually going to do this. They still cherish their belief in him,
have given up so much for him; they needed to hear it themselves to really
take it in. Others have always known he was a fraud and a liar and have been
waiting years for him to own up. But even among them the mood isn’t
triumphant. Even they feel something die.
Savonarola hangs his head and sags with shame.
He is not speaking these words himself. They’re being read out by one of
his inquisitors from his confession, extracted under torture, written down by a
scribe and signed by him. But he’s standing there and he’s not disputing it.
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