Gaspar sat, shell-shocked, amid the charred remains of his mentor's house. All around his hunched frame lay the burned and scattered remains of one man's lifetime of work; books, scrolls, drawings and maps, paintings and wooden carvings, shelves full of manuscripts and tables littered with paper fragments of unfinished novella, poetry, and data. An exquisitely detailed mantelpiece on the far side of the room, carved from fine Lebanese cedar, now lay upon the floor in ashen ruin. The great wolf's head above it fared little better, bearing now a hideous black scar across its proud countenance. Ash and dust rained slowly but steadily from above, where sunlight now poured through a yawning hole in the roof and rested on the blackened floorboards around the young man. He did not feel its warmth. 

In his mind Gaspar was still reliving the events of the previous night, the running, the heat, and the fear. Whatever it was that had befallen his fair town, be it beast or god, it had struck fast and without warning. From sleep he had been awoken to the roof collapsing beneath what could only be described as a pillar of flame, likened to that sent by God to protect his Hebrews from the hordes of Egypt. But this was no blessing. Somehow Gaspar had survived the onslaught long enough to reach the palace; Adalberto Silva had not been so lucky.

Gaspar stirred as footsteps approached in the hall, wiping away the tears that had gathered and begun running down his cheeks. Two guards in disheveled and muddied leather jerkins entered the room, one coughing the ash from his lungs. They had just removed Adalberto's body.

"Are you kin?" the tall one asked with a grimace, wiping his brow with a bloodied glove.

Gaspar took a moment before answering, his voice quiet. "No. Just a student." 

"Then I'll have to ask you to be off, lad." Gaspar nodded in response and took his leave of the dismal house, still reeling at the memories that were breaking against his mind like waves.

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Corpses lay strewn across the wet cobblestones like fragments of discarded meat alongside piles of parched rubble and the choking remains of great fires. Both men and women could be heard weeping in every corner and alley. Making his way slowly through the streets without a clear direction in mind, Gaspar could not help but feel as though nothing less than God's wrath had been visited on the town. It was surely as close a vision of hell as he could imagine, barring the scenes of battle so eloquently and vividly described by the likes of Herberstein and Krantz. But was not war itself but an arm of God's retribution against the wicked? The infernos of the night prior had reminded Gaspar of his readings on war machines; of the great trebuchets that hurled flaming stones into cities. 

The sound of his bare feet slapping against the cobblestones was a reminder of just how quickly everything had been lost. In his haste to escape the burning house, his sandals had been left behind, along with many other things. His blue tunic with the elegant yellow trim was burnt in several places and soaked with sweat, his cotton pants torn and muddied. He toted a small chest in a cart behind him, containing what remained of his possessions. It felt very light. 

Firmin Leclair had fallen along with many others, burned alive or trampled to death in front of the palace gates when the throng of fleeing townsfolk had grown too thick. Gaspar had seen it with his own eyes. The images brought fresh tears, and he struggled to quell the shaking in his limbs.

 “Your Count begs your attention, for the sake of Portugal!" The crier's words drew Gaspar's attention, though his listless expression betrayed little interest. At the mention of an opportunity to travel the world, however, and a reward offered for doing so, his eyes widened. Perhaps for no other reason than pure curiosity, he began making his way to the palace. 

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Gaspar left the courtyard briefing with his mind made up. He had met the idea of an adventure with trepidation, especially following on the heels of such a tragedy, but there could be no doubt in his mind now. The expedition would offer noble work and a chance at wealth, something even his rattled brain could appreciate. His hopes for travelling to Rome were dashed with the death of Leclair, and his town lay in ashes around him. He was not wise or hardened, but he could certainly be of some use. The family was doing well, they would not need him-

-but ah, the family! Gaspar ceased his walking in a moment of panic. He would have no time to see them in Almoçageme before the ship set sail. The thought nearly drove him to abandon any notion of leaving. It was then that God answered his plight, in the form of a familiar black hair-bun and round face bobbing up the street towards him.

"Mama!" Gaspar cried out as Eduarda ran to him and they embraced deeply.

"Gaspar, my son! You live!" The portly woman kissed him on the cheek, then began wiping the grime from his face. "We came as soon as we could. Oh, Gaspar! The sounds that we heard were so loud, and the glow in the sky! We feared that the Spanish were attacking from the coast, and I would not let the younger ones come." The words continued to spill from her mouth as Gaspar hugged Monica, the oldest of his three sisters. "We were stopped by men on the road, they did not want us to come near, because it was not safe! We almost were unable to!" His mother cried openly then, and he pressed her to his chest as tears spilled from his own eyes. They all three embraced in the middle of the road for several minutes, until finally Eduarda wiped her face dry and smiled. "But you are alive, God is good!"

"Yes, God is good." Gaspar was not smiling. "But many were not spared. Mama, Adalberto is dead." She cast her eyes down then, still holding dearly to Gaspar's shoulders. Monica gasped and crossed her chest. "I escaped where he did not."

"The Lord's will was done." his mother said, firmly but with a quiver in her lip. "I only thank him now that you were not harmed. That I should not have to bury another of my children."

With a nod, Gaspar looked back at the palace. "There is something else, mama. I saw..." he faltered. "Leclair is also gone. He is dead."

"Oh, my boy!" Eduarda searched the face of her son, feeling the pain that she saw in his eyes. "But what of Rome? Oh Gaspar."

 "I may yet sail." Gaspar still was not smiling, but a spark had returned to his eye and a hope to his voice. "Mama, they are organizing a voyage to Morroco to help relieve our brothers there. They have also been struck by this terrible thing. It will be a good cause, mama, and they offer a reward! I could be paid richly!"

"No! Of course, no!" Eduarda fumed. The pair stepped aside as a foreign-looking woman with her four children ambled past. "You can't be thinking of this, it's mad! I forbid it!" She grabbed hold of her son's shirt almost desperately, pulling him closer to her.

"Mama, what if this really was God's punishment?" Gaspar spoke quietly but with a certain urgency. "They are saying that the Lord found us godless and so sent fire. What if this is true? Was it God who spared me, when Adalberto was burned alive? He was a good man, mama. Pure! I say that I cannot have survived the fire for my own sake. I am one of the judged!" His eyes were wide now, and Eduarda grimaced. "If what they say is true then this mission to help others may be my atonement."

His mother was silent for a while. The townsfolk moved on the street around them, carrying the dead and wounded on stretchers. The air held a sort of living torpidity as moisture began to return to where the fires had parched it dry. Water, earth, ash, and blood mixed on the ground under their feet. Smoke wafted by in waves, carried by the salty see wind. At length she spoke.

"I know you want to travel, Gaspar. You write beautifully. But my son, you don't know a thing about the world! Tell me when you have sailed, or gone farther than Lisbon in the east or Fontanelas in the north?" Her tone had softened, though she spoke sadly. "You are a good boy, God smiles on you. I know that." She placed a hand on his neck reassuringly, then took a deep breath and quickly surveyed the scene around her, as if to ground herself. "I know He will go with you, but you will have to be more than you are now. Do you understand that?" 

Gaspar looked into his mother's eyes intently before he answered. "Yes."

She smiled once again as the tears returned. "Well, if I knew you were leaving so soon, I would have brought you your brother's sword!"

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The sun had crept low enough in the sky by the time he arrived that Gaspar had to squint as he looked up at the proud galleon. He had never been in anything larger than a rowboat before, and never had he been out in the open sea. The sounds of creaking wood and gentle waves lapping against the hull, though familiar to him, now caused an undue amount of stress. The great masts tilted every so slightly to and fro with the undulations of the water, the vast stretches of canvas that hung from them billowing now and then in the evening breeze. The great many ropes that weaved across the deck and tied the craft to the dock groaned in quiet protest as the beast, eager to be off, threatened to pull away of its own accord. This image left a distinct impression on him, an impression not unlike fear. 
 
With a deep breath Gaspar turned and headed for the gangplank. There was an upsetting hustle and bustle on the docks, as he should have expected of a ship being loaded for voyage. He kept his head down as he tried to make his way through the crowd without getting in anyone's way, all the while carting his small chest of belongings behind him. At one point he squeezed past a large, stony-faced man with a stark black mohawk, who looked like one of the illustrations in Adalberto's books on the New World. He blanched as the man looked at him, and hurried onward to the deck of the ship.

Gaspar soon found himself simply standing in the middle of the deck as crew mates moved about him, feeling the unfamiliar and unwelcome tilting of the floor beneath his feet. Feeling a slight tremble in his extremities, he tried his utmost to steel himself against the doubts that would soon flood his mind. He had only to stay aboard a few hours longer and then there would be no going back. The matter would be settled for him. 

Looking around for the captain, Gaspar eventually spied the man who had given them their speech in the courtyard. A tough-looking man with a sharp countenance. It looked as though he was busy getting the ship in order, and so Gaspar decided against introducing himself, instead heading below decks to stake out a bed.