Leaning against the wall of the palace, Captain de Montalhac and I began to laugh. No one could hear us, and we stood there for a while in the sun, mouths open, eyes watering.
Is this really hell?' I asked the Captain, suddenly. He frowned, and then started to laugh again. A couple of Franciscans, late for Mass, scowled at us as they hurried by. -
'Oh yes’ he said at last. 'Yes, my friend. This truly is hell’
Historical note
This is a work of fiction, and as such is constructed from a jumble of what if?'s. But here are some facts:
The Crown of Thorns was taken to Venice in 1237 by one Nicholas Querini as security for a debt of 13,134 pounds of gold.
King Louis IX of France, through the agency of Andrew of Longjumeau and James of Paris, redeemed the Crown from Venice for 135,000 gold livres, half the annual worth of the kingdom of France. He built the Saint Chapelle in Paris to house it, and went on to buy most of the other items in the Pharos Chapel.
Baldwin de Courtenay did not return to Constantinople until 1240. He was always desperate for money, and at one point was reduced to mortgaging his own son to Venice.
John Vatatzes' successor finally took back Constantinople in 1261. The Franks had crippled Byzantium beyond repair, though, and it finally fell to the Ottoman Turks on 29 May, 1453
Baldwin spent the rest of his life as an emperor without an empire, wandering about the courts of Europe in the vain hope that someone would get Constantinople back for him. No one did. He died in Sicily in 1273.
In 1238, the Abbot of San Giorgio Maggiore, Pietro Querini, obtained the body of Saint Eustichius from Constantinople.
In 1310, the Querinis, together with the Tiepolos, attempted to overthrow the Venetian Republic and set up a despotate. Their rising failed, and the Querini Palace in San Polo was confiscated and turned into a slaughterhouse.
The Mandylion of Edessa vanished sometime after the Franks sacked Constantinople in 1204. Nicholas Mesarites saw it in 1201, and Robert de Clari says it was in the Bucoleon Palace in 1205. Then it disappears from history.
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
PART THREE
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
PART FOUR
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
PART FIVE
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Eight
PART SIX
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four