Petronella shuddered as the words poured out, unbidden, from some secret place where the truth of the future is held in keeping. On a terrible night such as this, her family’s legacy of feminine prophecy was a most unwelcome gift.
PART ONE
The Time Returns
There exist forms of union higher
than any that can be spoken,
stronger than the greatest forces,
with the power that is their destiny.
Those who live this are no longer separated.
They are one, beyond bodily distinction.
Those who recognize each other
know the unequaled joy
of living together in this fullness.
THE BOOK OF LOVE,
AS PRESERVED IN THE LIBRO ROSSO
I am not a poet.
And yet I have been blessed to live among the best of them. The greatest of the poets, the most gifted of the painters, the loveliest of women . . . and the most magnificent of all men. Each has inspired me and there is a piece of the soul and essence of all of them in every image I paint.
I can only hope that my art will be remembered as a type of poetry, for I have tried to make each piece lyrical and full of texture and meaning. I have long struggled with the thought that perhaps it is against the artist’s laws of conduct to reveal the inspirations, symbols, and layers beneath the works that we create. And yet Maestro Ficino has found evidence as old as ancient Egypt that such artist’s codes were kept in secret diaries, so I will instead say that I am part of this timeless tradition.
As I am a humble member of the Order of the Holy Sepulcher, all that I paint is done with the inspiration and glory of those divine teachings. They are intrinsic to every figure I paint; they infuse the colors, the textures, and the shape of my work. Every piece of my art, regardless of its patron or its worldly purpose, serves the teachings of the Way of Love. Every image is produced to communicate the
truth.
In the pages that follow, I will reveal the secrets behind my work that they may one day be used as a teaching tool, for those with eyes to see.
So while I am not a poet, here is what I am: I am a painter. I am a pilgrim. I am a scribe.
Most of all, I am a servant of my Lord and my Lady, and of their Way of Love.
Our Master is fond of repeating the words of the first great Christian artist, the blessed Nicodemus, who said that “art will save the world.” I pray that this is so, and I have endeavored to play some part, no matter how small, in that very worthy venture.
I remain,
Alessandro di Filipepi
FROM THE SECRET MEMOIRS OF SANDRO BOTTICELLI
New York City
present day
MAUREEN PASCHAL had planned her schedule in New York City carefully. Having worked tirelessly in preparation for the release of her new book, she hoped to reward herself with a few blissful hours of recreation at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Art was her second-greatest passion, trumped only by history, which was why the books she authored were colored so richly by both. To spend even limited time in one of the world’s great museums was a balm to her spirit.
Spring was alive in its most glorious form on this early March morning, rewarding her for making the rigorous walk along Central Park to the Met. Maureen loved New York. She decided to enjoy it to its fullest today, trying not to rush despite her crammed schedule. Walking up Fifth Avenue, she took a detour into Central Park. At the northern edge of the sailboat pond stood the enormous bronze sculpture from Lewis Carroll’s masterpiece Alice in Wonderland. There was a whimsical magic and beauty to this piece of art that touched the eternal child in her. A larger-than-life Alice was depicted at her unbirthday party with her friends from Wonderland gathered around her. Quotes from the children’s classic, the most beloved piece of literature from Maureen’s childhood, surrounded the base of the sculpture. Walking the perimeter of Alice’s party, she read the quotes from the book and from the poem “Jabberwocky.” Her own favorite quote from the book, the one that Maureen displayed on a plaque over her computer at home, was not represented here.
Alice laughed. “There’s no use trying,” she said; “one can’t believe impossible things.”
“I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
Like the White Queen, Maureen had learned to believe as many as six impossible things before breakfast. And now, with the arrival of Destino in her life, the number was often far more than that. Maureen mused on this, laughing a little at the sculpture as she stood in admiration of it. Her life had become something to rival Alice’s most fantastic adventures. Here she was, a savvy and educated woman of the twenty-first century, about to embark upon a trip to Italy—to take lessons from a teacher who called himself Destino and who claimed to be immortal. And yet like Alice before her, she accepted this extraordinary character as an almost natural part of the strange landscape that her life had become.
Maureen allowed herself a few more precious minutes at the sculpture before heading back toward Fifth Avenue and the entrance to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Her time was limited at the Met, as she had to prepare for her book launch, so she would focus on one area of the museum and give that her full attention rather than try to see as much as possible.
After purchasing her ticket and attaching the Met button to her collar, she made the determination that today she would focus on the medieval gallery. Her research into the grand contessa, Matilda of Tuscany, had instilled within her a new fascination for the Middle Ages. Further, her prolonged excursions to France had given her a strong appreciation of Gothic art and architecture.
It was a sublime choice. She took her time, really giving each piece its due. She was particularly taken by the extraordinary wooden sculptures from Germany with their unequaled craftsmanship and delicacy. A number of the treasures reminded her of the life-changing experiences that had shaped her destiny while in France. Maureen sighed deeply her contentment, taking in the beauty of it all and enjoying the brief respite that art brought to her life.
As she entered the second large gallery, dominated by an enormous Gothic choir screen, something drew her attention to the far right of the room. While most of the artwork in this gallery was sculpture, one painting was displayed at the far right from the corridor entrance. Moving to get a closer look, Maureen gasped as she found herself standing, transfixed, before the most beautiful life-sized portrait of Mary Magdalene she had ever seen.
Notre Dame. Our Lady. My Lady. For Maureen, there was no escaping her. Not now, not ever.
Her eyes welled with tears, as they often did when confronted with a beautiful image of this extraordinary woman who had become her muse and master. As Maureen stood eye to eye with her, she realized quickly that this was no ordinary religious icon. This Magdalene sat enthroned, majestically beautiful in her crimson robe and flowing red-gold hair. In one hand she held the alabaster jar with which she was said to have anointed Jesus; the other, cradled in her lap, held a crucifix. She was surrounded by angels, trumpeting her glory. Moving closer, Maureen bent her knees to better view the lower portion of the painting. Kneeling at the Magdalene’s feet were four men in pristine white robes. Hoods covered their heads completely, with only the narrowest slits where the eyes should be. There was something cultish and bizarre about their appearance. The kneeling figures were strange characters at best, sinister at worst.
Maureen could feel her heart racing and that strange sensation of heat around her temples that she had come to recognize when something pricked at her subconscious, something that should not and could not be ignored. This painting was important. Terribly important. She scanned her memory for any mention of this work in her research, but none came. While writing her books she had become familiar with dozens of paintings of Mary Magdalene in the world’s major museums. That such
an important work could exist in the Met—and that she had never heard of it—was fascinating.
Maureen bent to read the title card. The picture was identified as “Spinello di Luca Spinelli—Processional Banner from the Confraternity of Saint Mary Magdalen.”
The official Met description, displayed to the side of the work, read
During the Middle Ages laymen often joined religious confraternities in which they met for devotions and performed charitable acts. Their hooded robes rendered such acts anonymous, in conformity with Christ’s injunction that good works should not be done for vain praise. This extremely rare work was commissioned in about 1395 by the Confraternity of Saint Mary Magdalen in Borgo San Sepolcro and would have been carried in religious processions. It shows the members of the confraternity kneeling before their patron saint, who is serenaded by a choir of angels. Mary’s ointment jar decorates the sleeves of their robes. The lightly drawn features of the face of Christ are modern. The original was removed and is now in the Vatican. The banner is otherwise remarkably well preserved.
Something was wrong with that description; Maureen could feel it instinctively. It was very clean, very pat, for a painting that looked and felt so mysterious. The hooded men surrounding their saint’s feet weren’t merely anonymous, they were downright unsettling. The hoods they wore seemed a most emphatic statement, as if it were a life-or-death matter that their identities be concealed. When she looked very closely, she saw that some of the men had openings in the back of their robes. Pentitents. The openings were there so they could flog themselves and draw blood as part of their penance and to wash away their sins.
Maureen had always found the penitential practices of the Middle Ages disturbing. She was relatively sure that God did not want us to flog ourselves for his—or her—greater glory. And given her extensive study of Mary Magdalene, the Queen of Compassion and great teacher of love and forgiveness, she was certain that she would never have condoned such practices.
The composition of the painting made it all the more provocative, as it appeared to be an imitation of some of the more famous Holy Trinity images from the early Renaissance. These images depicted God the Father enthroned, holding the crucifix in his hands and on his lap to represent the son. The Holy Spirit was usually present as a dove above the other images. This icon of Mary was painted in an identical way, only in this case she was the enthroned figure holding Jesus, denoting a place of extraordinary authority. Thus the hooded figures appeared to be worshipping Mary Magdalene on her throne as the Queen of Heaven, which would be a heretical concept even today. In the Middle Ages, such worship would likely have been punishable by death.
Then there was this curious phrase within the description: “The lightly drawn features of the face of Christ are modern. The original was removed and is now in the Vatican.” There was evidence of destruction to the banner: a patch covered the cut where the face of Christ had been on the crucifix, ostensibly the original piece that was surgically removed and taken to Rome in. But why? Why would anyone deface a rare and exquisitely beautiful painting by an Italian master?
If there was one thing Maureen had learned in her search for the truth about the secret aspects of Christian history, it was to never take anything at face value—and never trust the first and most obvious explanation, particularly in the symbolic world of art history. Removing her cell phone from her bag, she switched it to camera mode and photographed the painting in segments, storing them for future reference.
The digital readout on her phone was a harsh reminder that her time at the Met was coming to a close. Maureen slipped the phone back into her bag and stood before the painting in quiet appreciation. The questions that had run through her head so many times while following the clues left in religious art repeated themselves with resounding force.
What stories can you tell me, Lady? Who painted you like this and why? What did you really mean to those who carried this banner? And finally, the question that haunted Maureen every day of her life: What do you want from me now?
But today Mary Magdalene was silent, gazing back at her with quiet authority and an enigmatic expression that would have made Leonardo da Vinci weep with envy. The Mona Lisa had nothing on this Magdalene.
Maureen returned to the official description again and gasped. In the second reading, she caught this reference to the banner’s origins: “commissioned . . . by the Confraternity of Saint Mary Magdalen in Borgo San Sepolcro.”
Borgo San Sepolcro. An easy translation from Italian. It meant the Place of the Holy Sepulcher.
Maureen glanced down at the ancient ring on her finger, the one from Jerusalem with the seal of Mary Magdalene. It was the symbol of the Order of the Holy Sepulcher—the Order that gave Matilda to the world, the Order in which the purest teachings of Jesus and the Book of Love were preserved, and the Order of which Destino was the
Master—and into which she was about to be indoctrinated. Was it possible that there was an entire town in Italy devoted to the Order of the Holy Sepulcher with Mary Magdalene at its center?
Maureen had often described her research and writing as similar to the process of creating a collage. There were many different little pieces of evidence, which individually didn’t amount to much. But when you began to arrange the pieces together, see how they all could fit, which complemented the other, then you began to develop something beautiful and whole. And here was what appeared to be a central piece of the stunning mosaic Maureen was crafting.
She looked around at the visitors wandering the gallery. Only a few passed by to give the processional banner a cursory glance before continuing on. Part of her wanted to scream at them: Don’t you see this? Do you have any idea that this painting may hold one of the keys to history and you’re walking right past it?
But she wasn’t sure of that yet. Where was Borgo San Sepolcro?
What other attachments did this artist, Spinello, have that might connect him and this masterpiece to the heretical cultures of medieval Italy? After doing her own due diligence, she would call the experts in France and Italy to get their take on it. Beginning, of course, with Bérenger.
After all these weeks apart, the thought of Bérenger Sinclair suffused her body with warmth. Maureen missed him so much. She closed her eyes and allowed herself to get lost in that rich, delicious sense of remembering the last time they were together. She sighed heavily and then shook it off. There were new discoveries looming here, and sharing them with him would make them that much sweeter.
She bid farewell to the artistic glories of the medieval gallery and made her way to the front of the museum, stopping briefly in the gift shop to see if there was a postcard of the fantastic Magdalene banner. There was not even a mention of the rare work in the Met visitor’s guide. Searching through a vast assortment of art books, she found one that contained a brief mention of the banner’s artist, referring to him as Spinello Aretino. The passage explained that “Aretino” indicated that he was from the town of Arezzo. In Tuscany.
Tuscany. If there was one place Maureen was certain was rife with heretical secrets in the early Middle Ages, it was Tuscany. She smiled, knowing it was not a coincidence that she was currently in possession of a plane ticket to Florence and the following week would be on her way to the heart of the heresy.
Nothing.
There was nothing on the Internet about the rare and wonderful Magdalene banner at the Met. Even on the Met’s own website it took a concerted effort to find information, and there was nothing other than the description Maureen had read earlier at the museum.
Two hours of searching through Magdalene art pages were fruitless. No amount of googling brought up anything new on the piece itself, so Maureen went after it from a different angle, looking up other details from the description: the artist, the locales. She found some general information online about the artist and also on Borgo San Sepolcro that might prove helpful later. She made the following notes:
SPINELLO ARETINO—given name Luca (Lu
ke), as was his father’s, also a painter, after the saint for whom the painter’s guild was named. The name “Aretino” means “from Arezzo,” which is a province in Tuscany. Primarily a fresco painter, he worked in Florence at Santa Trinità.
Maureen paused. Spinello painted at the church in Santa Trinità, which was a sacred location for the Order of the Holy Sepulcher and had been one of Matilda’s strongholds. This was a good sign that she was on the right track. Her mosaic was beginning to take shape. She read on.
BORGO SAN SEPOLCRO—now known as Sansepolcro, it was founded in the year 1000 by pilgrims who had returned from the Holy Land with specific reverence for the Holy Sepulcher and with priceless relics. One of these pilgrims was known as Santo Arcano. It is in the province of Arezzo and is the birthplace of the master fresco painter Piero della Francesca.
Maureen squirmed with pleasure at this discovery. She was right! There was an entire town in Tuscany dedicated to the Holy Sepulcher. But there was one sentence that gave her a more immediate rush of excitement:
One of these pilgrims was known as Santo Arcano.
Santo Arcano. Maureen laughed out loud. It appeared here that the Church was saying that there was a saint named Arcano. Her Latin wasn’t fluent, but it was serviceable, and she had certainly used it to read between the lines many times in her research. Santo Arcano was not a reference to an obscure Tuscan saint. It meant “Holy Secret.” If she were to translate all this into English and make sense of it, what the description really said to Maureen was, This town, named after the Holy Sepulcher, was established based on the Holy Secret!
Now she was getting somewhere.