The Poet Prince by Kathleen McGowan Read Free Book Online

appeared to darken all around them, turning nearly to black, as the white light against it took form for the briefest instant before fading away.
    Maureen was then plunged into the fire of another city, another time, and another victim.
    The faces in this crowd were angry, in contrast to the previous vision. And they all belonged to men, at least it was only men who were immediately surrounding the scaffolding. These men were the source of the jeeringshe had heard when the dream began. The riled mob threw things into the fire, objects Maureen could not identify, shouting in anger as they did so. A strange word she did not recognize, chanted over and over again. For a moment she thought they were saying “pig nose,” but it seemed absurd to her, even in the surreal dream state. Again, she could not see the victim as the flames here burned even higher than in the first vision. But the atmosphere in this city was markedly different. This victim was despised and those who turned out for the execution were determined to watch the hated one die in this terrible way. This was controlled chaos, but it appeared to be on the verge of getting out of control as the flames grew hotter and higher. Just as Maureen felt the images start to fade, began to feel her consciousness calling her out of the dream state, she had one last vision of the final, terrible execution. At the edge of the square, far enough away to be safe but close enough to be scarred forever by what she was witnessing, was a little girl. Her dark eyes were enormous as she watched the fire and the angry mob that surrounded it. She was a fine-boned little thing like a tiny bird, no more than five or six, and desperately undernourished. And yet for all her fragile physical appearance, this child did not appear weakened or even afraid. It was the look in the little girl’s eyes that Maureen would be left with long after the dream was over, as there was nothing of fear in them. Her eyes reflected the flames before her, and in them Maureen saw something she could not quite identify, yet she knew that it was something she did not like.
    In the child’s eyes was something terrible, something not so far away from madness.
    Confraternity of the Holy Apparition
Vatican City
present day
    “Y OU ALLOWED THIS to happen!”
    Felicity de Pazzi hissed at her granduncle as she threw the bookacross the desk at him. Her heavy black eyebrows were a harsh frame to huge dark eyes, which flashed with the heat of anger in her narrow face. She didn’t care that he was old, ill, and feeble. He was supposed to stand for something. And he had failed, failed miserably when they needed him most.
    “Calm yourself, my dear.” Father Girolamo de Pazzi held up one trembling, palsied hand in an effort to reach his outraged niece. He loved her like a daughter and had played a strong role in raising her to be the power behind the confraternity now that he was no longer physically able to deal with day-to-day operations. Her unbridled passion for their cause made her an unstoppable and infinitely holy force. It also gave her an extreme temper. She had been well named, as inspired by God. Her mother had had a dream of the great Saint Felicita while pregnant with this, her only daughter. Throughout her pregnancy she had had further visions of that blessed saint who had been brave enough to sacrifice all seven of her sons to prove her unwavering faith. It was clear to everyone in the de Pazzi family when this child was born on the tenth of July, the feast day of Santa Felicita, that she had brought her name and her identity with her.
    At boarding school in Great Britain, she adopted the English version of the name, Felicity. It had stayed with her, even after she was expelled from several British establishments for “aberrant behavior.” While in her early teens, she had begun to have visions that possessed her totally, events that proved deeply problematic for the British schools. She was brought back to