"(NARRATOR READING)" "NARRATOR:" "Juan Borgia is a hero." "(SPEAKING LATIN)" "RODRIGO:" "Let Christoforo Castanea be damned." "And Juan Borgia, praised." "NARRATOR:" "And immoral." "Franceschetto." "There is one significant item." "Your wife." "NARRATOR:" "Lucrezia Borgia is betrothed." "Your uncle has made a better match." "Don Gaspare de Procida." "NARRATOR:" "And confused." "At first, I found Don Gaspare repulsive." "But now, part of me is taken by him." "NARRATOR:" "Cesare Borgia is Bishop of Valencia." "But I do not want to be a priest." "I do not have the soul for it." "NARRATOR:" "And in love." "CESARE:" "There is a girl." "My passion for her is too overwhelming." "NARRATOR:" "Rodrigo Borgia is respected." "We are all one family." "Salute." "NARRATOR:" "And hated." "Pope Innocent VIII is dead." "CESARE:" "The peasants, believing they, as the children of God, are the heirs to the wealth will steal whatever they can." "Since Roman lust for plunder is never satisfied, the mob will attack the palaces of every cardinal in Rome." "(HAWK SCREECHING)" "ALESSANDRO:" "At least the rioting has stopped." "For now." "Until the rabble sobers up." "And drinks some more." "(WHIMPERS)" "We've killed these men." "Now we must bury them." "ALESSANDRO:" "And pray for their souls." "And pray for our own." "I'm sorry." "I did not mean to..." "No, I'm finished." "Praying for divine guidance during the Conclave." "Yes." "Cardinal Costa and I were just..." "Yes, Cardinal Costa." "but he did not seem to know what I was saying." "I'm certain His Holiness took great solace in your presence." "I know I do." "RODRIGO:" "You must go to your husband, Giulia." "You do not know what lying with that creature is like." "Then do not lie with him." "If I refuse, he'll rape me." "Then I'll have him castrated." "Oh, fine." "I still will have been raped." "Oh, my love, if only we could be together." "In truth." "What can be done?" "You have a husband and I am a cardinal." "Who could be pope." "Yes." "Twice I have failed to get elected." "I had given up hope." "But these past few days, I studied the competition, the circumstances, and I think, maybe, if I'm just clever enough, if God grants it." "Then you and I will marry?" "Marry?" "When I am pope?" "Saint Peter was married." "La Bella, even if I dared, you still have a husband." "Husbands die." "I'm a priest." "I do not kill." "(WHISPERING) I have heard that when you were but 10 years old, a boy spoke poor of you." "So you plunged a knife through his heart." "How dare you!" "Repeating such lies." "I'm no murderer." "And for you to..." "I meant nothing." "Be gone from my sight!" "Juan, I've come, since entering Rome, to trust you as a friend." "Why must you go back to Spain?" "As a part of my uncle's master plan." "And what of me?" "Bajazet wants me dead." "Another pope may agree to expedite the matter." "That's why hiding you in this room high above the Sistine is so smart." "You can hear every utterance." "And what if I hear a name other than Borgia called to the throne?" "Then you'll contact Gacet, who will help you escape before anyone else finds you." "And sells you to your brother." "Stay but a few days more..." "No." "When Uncle's uncle became pope, he opened the gates of Rome to a horde of distant, greedy relatives." "I believe he even made a nephew into a cardinal, did he not?" "He did." "Which is why Rodrigo now needs to show his colleagues that he's nothing like Pope Calixtus." "So I am off to Gandia." "Cesare is returning to the studium in Pisa and Lucrezia is going to the country." "Sometimes I'm bitterly cold and sometimes burning hot." "Then this sojourn to Subiaco will do much good." "Many of the monks were at the abbey when you were born." "They will care for you as if you were their daughter." "Do they still have the head of that young girl?" "Saint Petronilla." "The daughter of Peter, the first pope." "Pray before the shrine of Patronilla that our separation will be brief." "I fear moving her in this condition." "'Tis best to delay our trip." "No." "I want you all out of Rome immediately." "As I go into my first Conclave," "I will miss your strength, my friends." "(LAUGHING)" "You will be impacting history, Giovanni, while Alessandro and I will merely be studying it." "And drinking with Remolino." "Lucrezia has departed without saying goodbye?" "Then I shall go to Subiaco." "No, Don Gaspare." "Cardinal Borgia forbids you to be within 20 leagues of the abbey." "But I am Lucrezia's fiance!" "Even so, there must be no scandals before the Conclave." "Where is the Lady Giulia?" "I must speak to her!" "She's gone as well." "To Bassanello." "We must all sacrifice, Don Gaspare, for the good of our souls." "Yes, Excellency." "I see that you leave for Pisa." "But my eyes will be everywhere." "Watching." "Have you seen my uncle?" "Has he not come to bid you adieu?" "Well, he is busy preparing for the Conclave." "You are dismissed, Cockroach." "If we are to reach the seminary by tomorrow, we must leave at once." "We will wait another moment to see if Rodrigo comes." "Look, can we just finish this?" "You as Dean of the Sacred College and I as Vice Chancellor of the Curia are required by canon law..." "Yes." "To decide which nine cardinals will perform the nine requiem masses for Pope Innocent." "An honor which raises those chosen above the others." "Yes." "I just..." "We have four names, we need five more." "But we must tread carefully." "One of the nine will, in all likelihood, become pope." "Yes." "Jorge da Costa seems to be gathering some support, as he sits smugly in judgment of us all." "Our Portuguese colleague is rich, rich enough to bribe every cardinal." "Rich, but miserly." "And moral." "Besides, he has not spent much time around the Vatican." "True." "But Rome is bigger than its city." "Yes, to Costa." "And Sforza, as he drags his long silk coat through the halls?" "The Sforza family rules Milan with a heavy hand." "But the next pope must reach out with a gentle one toward Naples." "I propose for balance." "We give one mass to Cardinal Sforza, and another to Cardinal Carafa." "GIULIANO:" "Agreed." "Milan and Naples must both be represented." "And you make eight, if you have lost count." "And you are the ninth." "MONK:" "The blessed head of Saint Petronilla." "Martyred for refusing to marry the Roman patrician, Flaccus." "She refused to marry?" "Rather than subject herself to life with a pagan, she died for her faith." "Her father, the pope, let her die?" "ADRIANA:" "Of course." "I mean, Saint Peter was martyred as well." "My head aches so..." "Lucrezia." "Must be the heat." "Or the fever." "Carry her to the guest house." "Send for the doctor." "(COUGHING)" "We must quarantine the guest house so the fever she carries does not spread to the monastery." "But, dottore, will she survive?" "(LUCREZIA COUGHING)" "(HORSE APPROACHING)" "(LAUGHS)" "Finally, my two testicles return." "You are a eunuch no more." "One of you hangs low." "A drink will raise his spirits to the heavens." "In vino, divinity." "I will see you at supper." "Cesare, you are turning your back on a chance to reach heaven?" "If Pisa were heaven, we would all have wings." "Let us drink and see halos." "(SNIFFING)" "RODRIGO:" "Each of us a mirror and a candle." "I have found the palace bell tower to be the most suitable location." "Meet your valet for the Conclave." "Petronio." "Clever boy." "Inquisitive." "Inquisitive?" "In what area?" "Sforza's valet, I'm told, likes the back of a woman more than the front." "Ah." "Learning such facts is helpful, but only if you know when to use them." "Do you keep secrets, boy?" "Yes, Eminence, as if I were a mute." "If you ever repeat a single word you hear from my lips," "I will cut out your tongue." "How did you fare in the meeting with della Rovere?" "Carafa and Piccolomini are two of the nine." "Both have promised to drop out of the running once the Conclave convenes, and throw their support to me." "With Orsini, Savelli, de Medici and the two Spanish cardinals, you'll have eight votes going into the election." "Six short of victory." "No." "We have received word that due to a storm in the Mediterranean Sea," "Mendoza and my cousin will not reach Italy in time." "I'm down to six." "If you lose two, you must add two." "Shut up." "Why?" "He is exactly right." "RODRIGO:" "Neither the French nor the German cardinals will arrive before we are sealed inside the Sistine." "Coupled with the loss of the Spaniards, we need more electors." "But the two you suggest, one is old and the other slow." "They were named in petto." "And perhaps in silence they were meant to remain." "Pope Innocent had every intention of elevating them publicly." "Only his death stood in the way." "Federigo San Severino has served Novara with honor and sanctity." "San Severino is 17 and a mule." "Maffeo Gherardo has a letter from the Doge extolling his virtues." "Gherardo is nearly a 100." "Who eats as if two men of 50." "And is afraid of his own wind." "Of what wind are you afraid, Giuliano?" "None." "I agree to Gherardo and San Severino if you get Ardicino della Porta to leave his monastery." "ARDICINO:" "And how is Rome?" "The city burns." "From the heat?" "The unknown." "Ardicino, when I convinced Pope Innocent to let you step down from your archdiocese and become a monk," "I told you that the time might come when the church would need you to walk once more with your fellow cardinals." "Now is the moment." "The era of reform has arrived." "As it does when each pope passes, and then all we do is move gold from one strongbox to the next." "You are a prince of the church." "A church in which His Holiness created this year alone fifty-two new positions in the Curia, not because they were needed, but in order to sell them for 62,000 ducats apiece." "And to whom did he peddle these appointments?" "Men who pay the bribe, knowing that they will have their hands on the papal seal and then be able to demand bribes from others." "You and I have worked hard to raise the Vatican's moral standards." "How many priests, how many cardinals betray their vow of chastity?" "And why do they get away with such a crime?" "Because our Holy Father allowed his bastard son to live in the Apostolic Palace." "(SIGHS)" "Serving this pope, I lost sight of God." "My soul was in agony." "Here, I'm at peace." "What if the person chosen to succeed Innocent could actually bring about the change for which we have both so ardently wished?" "Then the Holy Ghost will not need me to find him amongst those gathered." "Does not the Holy Ghost rely on us to act as His surrogates?" "Just as we stand for Christ at every Mass?" "Come back, Ardicino." "Not just for the church, but for the city, for Rome." "(BELL TOLLING)" "We need to get our children off their knees." "(HUMMING)" "I was afraid you had forgotten me." "Fiametta, my every thought is of you." "(LAUGHS)" "Your belly grows." "Our child." "He kicks like a bull." "Like a Borgia." "So, Fiametta was not able to reignite your dampened spirits?" "She is a joy." "But I'm haunted by the specter of a certain vice chancellor." "When he learns that I've impregnated a woman, he will eat my heart." "Nonsense." "There are worse things than procreating." "Mmm." "Rodrigo Borgia is a monument to reason, not saintliness." "Your existence is testament to that." "Rodrigo Borgia rules with his word, not by his example." "True, but..." "Why does he ever have to know?" "He has spies in every pantry." "If Rodrigo already knew about the girl, he would not have sent you back to Pisa." "After he is elected, tell him he is a grandpa as well as il Papa." "No." "While my mother was ill, in her delirium she revealed to me a secret." "On the morning I was born, the good cardinal made a sacred and irrevocable pact with God." "My life would be dedicated to the Holy Word, my days lived without sin, without lust." "With absolute purity." "And in exchange," "Rodrigo would become pope." "I have broken the bargain." "Rodrigo may not know, but the Almighty does." "And He will take revenge." "Not only on my father, but our entire family." "(CHORAL SINGING)" "O God, the creator and redeemer of all the faithful, grant to the soul of Your servant," "Giovanni Battista Cibo..." "Giovanni Battista Cibo, the pardon which he has always desired." "Absolve, O Lord, his soul from every bond of sin." "And by the help of Your grace, enable him to escape judgment and punishment." "And enjoy the bliss of everlasting light." "The day is new, one in which we, the guardians of the church, must abandon rivalry, ambition, and all ill will." "We must turn the church from the whore of Babylon, which she has become, back into the Bride of Christ." "Look." "The sun!" "A miracle!" "(CROWD EXCLAIMING)" "RODRIGO:" "If we do not elect a vigorous and holy shepherd..." "An omen." "Wolves from outside will one day soon devour our flock and us with a terrible vengeance." "Rodrigo has found the Holy Spirit." "Or maybe the Spirit has found him." "In either case, it has been a while since the Spirit was last among us." "Find out who wrote that speech." "(BELL TOLLING)" "Three suns, you say?" "While you were preaching." "The hand of God." "Hmm." "Or His middle finger." "Is God telling me I will receive only three votes, instead of the 14, which I need?" "Three suns, my ass." "An optical illusion, a refraction of light." "Still, the peasants are superstitious." "They believe Borgia will triumph." "The peasants do not vote." "(BELL CONTINUES TOLLING)" "I'm nervous." "Are you nervous?" "No." "And you needn't worry." "Be my friend?" "(SPEAKING LATIN)" "You have warned each cardinal's valet?" "Yes." "Under penalty of death, neither they nor the cardinals are to have any contact with the outside world." "All meals are to be delivered through this hatch, prepared by each cardinal's own household." "I shall have guardsmen standing here, morning through night." "Nothing but food will get inside." "I must speak with you, Rodrigo." "Just before we entered," "I received my official instructions from the King of Naples." "I'm to vote not for you, but for Carafa." "Carafa?" "No, he is to drop out." "Since my family has a contract with King Ferrante," "I am bound to follow his command." "At least during the first scrutiny." "But Carafa has sworn that he, too, will vote for me." "Hmm." "Perhaps Naples is afraid you cannot beat Milan." "Carafa." "I enjoy sardines." "The taste of salt on my tongue." "Maybe because I grew up by the sea." "Not like those pigs from the north who put sugar on shit and call it chocolate." "Since the death of His Holiness," "I have survived on bread, water, and the Holy Ghost." "(LAUGHS)" "I'm glad you came to see me, Rodrigo." "You were very helpful to Naples when Innocent was alive." "I expect your support again." "And I yours." "King Ferrante led me to believe I had your vote." "(LAUGHS) Excuse me?" "Are you suggesting that you could be elected?" "I possess five votes already." "One more than that Milanese fraud, Sforza." "I have seven votes." "Do you?" "Are you certain of that?" "I cannot breathe." "Calm yourself." "I know the journey from Venice was difficult." "Why did I come?" "Why did you convince them to make me a cardinal?" "The air is foul." "This time of year, Rome kills." "I want to go home." "You cannot leave, Gherardo." "You are the oldest and are therefore required to oversee each vote." "Cardinal Severino and I will take care of you." "Are there any more sweets?" "Your next meal will not be till morning." "Do you have any bread?" "The sooner we finish, the sooner you can return to Venice." "You remember who you are to vote for, yes?" "A little piece of bread?" "(SIGHS)" "Without guilt holding man in his place, we would reach a higher plane." "Guilt is the final barrier between each of us and the divine." "So your theorem is that the feeling of guilt is unnatural?" "Yes." "Joy, pain, these are clearly present in lower creatures of nature and, therefore, are obvious creations of God." "But the sensation of guilt is present solely in man, hence is a device of man, not our Lord." "Cesare, you shall act as arguenti." "Guilt was created for what reason?" "For man to enslave himself?" "No." "Without the sensation of guilt, the hierarchy are afraid the individual would run free and there would be no order." "Without order, there is no power." "Guilt forces each of us to surrender our will, our souls to those who should not possess them." "So are you saying that the men who are in power do not deserve to rule?" "His Eminence, Cardinal Borgia?" "No." "Then do you believe the kings and the cardinals are correct?" "That without guilt there would be hell on earth?" "Without guilt, there would be heaven on earth." "Man could be who he wants to be, love who he loves." "Cesare, if you could excise guilt from your life, here and now, with whom would your relationship be changed?" "God?" "Or Rodrigo Borgia?" "Vannozza, His Eminence has forbidden you to visit Lucrezia." "Call to him, yell with all your might." "See if His Eminence can hear you." "Mother?" "Yes." "I am here, my sweet girl." "Where is Goffredo?" "Is he well?" "He is fine." "Home." "With my husband." "I am so sorry." "About little Ottaviano." "About not coming when you were ill." "Hush." "We are together now." "Lucrezia." "Fever." "Worse." "(BELL RINGING)" "Sforza has gained another vote." "Who?" "I'm sworn to secrecy." "There are all sorts of secrets." "You have lost San Severino." "(KNOCK ON DOOR)" "Come in." "Federigo..." "Go away." "I have heard enough from you." "About you." "I know the truth." "Whose?" "My truth?" "Or Sforza's?" "You have stolen the papal treasury from the Castel Sant'Angelo." "Nonsense." "I have safeguarded it." "I do not want to hurt you." "Go." "My dear Savelli, I'm down to six votes." "You, de Medici, Piccolomini, della Porta, Gherardo, and myself." "Tomorrow morning, we vote." "I will be out before I have a chance to get in." "How many votes does he have?" "Jorge Costa?" "Three?" "Four?" "His capitulation could get you to nine or even 10 in the first round." "(COSTA PRAYING)" "Jorge." "Vice Chancellor." "Portugal and Spain sit side-by-side on the Iberian Peninsula." "Shall you and I be collaborators or competitors?" "We two are the only non-Italians here." "You should align with me." "Or you me." "There is a wall around Rome." "And there is another wall around the wall." "Made of hands." "Hands grabbing for coins." "The poor have empty hands, my dear Costa, but their palms are small." "Not so small that they cannot pick up knives and clubs, which will happen if we do not reform the church." "We shall be murdered in our beds." "I agree." "That is why, if chosen," "I will, like a potter at his wheel, mold a new church." "Yes." "With your big hands." "Always reaching beyond your grasp." "You have no chance of being elected." "I am a Borgia." "I leave nothing to chance." "ALL:" "I promise upon the death of my soul to trust the Holy Ghost, and the Holy Ghost alone, for inspiration and for this election." "(ALL ARGUING)" "Quiet!" "(GROANS) So hot." "We have been at this all day." "The notion is a good one." "Good, yes, but not of the moment." "This is the moment." "The only moment." "The streets are awash with blood." "The people think there is no God if there is no pope." "Yet we remain mired discussing Costa's rules." "Yes, rules, Colonna." "We all acknowledge that elements in Holy Mother Church are corrupt, that the papacy itself is rotted to the core." "Unless we impose rules upon the next pope, the disease will spread." "But we must be careful not to cure the disease and kill the body." "I support the restrictions on papal authority." "But an oath?" "Yes." "A vow?" "To make whoever sits on the throne beholden to us." "As if he is a child." "(BOTH LAUGHING)" "You cannot bind the Supreme Pontiff of the universal church any more than you can the wind." "I would not be able to endorse any candidate who does not support Costa's mandate." "First and foremost, a limit on the number of cardinals." "Yes." "Too many have bought their way into this chapel." "(ARGUING RESUMES)" "All agree we must have change!" "The rest is simply a question of law." "There are only 10 laws." "The Holy Commandments." "And few of us honor those." "How dare you." "How dare I?" "I earned my red biretta." "I wasn't simply handed an archdiocese because my name is Orsini or Colonna." "Costa." "You go too far." "No, not far enough." "If we expect a lowly, starving peasant to follow the Word of God, then why not us?" "The pope is the Word of God." "Then let the man who will be pope give us his word before he takes responsibility for God's." "I say we pray for guidance." "Exactly." "Guidance." "Let the new Sovereign Pontiff receive guidance from us." "Guidelines." "Guidelines are an excuse to do nothing." "He is relentless." "Even a mule stops kicking after a while." "(SCATTERED LAUGHS)" "To give man-made laws to a man who will no longer be a man is..." "Is ridiculous!" "Even a Portuguese should recognize that!" "RODRIGO:" "Let us pray." "Yes, pray for a cool breeze." "For divine help in writing guidelines." "Non-binding guidelines." "On Judgment Day, you will be called into account for this." "All of you." "GIULIANO:" "Enough!" "Because of this bickering, we have not had a single vote on the only real reason we are here, to fill Saint Peter's shoes." "I say we put aside Costa's motion." "I second." "All in favor." "CARDINALS:" "Yea." "Opposed?" "Nay." "Nay." "Abstentions?" "Let us move on to the first ballot." "(BELL RINGING)" "Della Rovere, eight." "Sforza, eight." "Borgia, six." "Carafa, four." "Make an offer to Piccolomini." "And Costa..." "Costa, one." "Not sufficient for election." "(KNOCKING)" "The Italians have treated you like an old whore." "I no longer want to be considered." "Spread the word." "I know you are most able at doling out bad news." "My dear Costa, why do you not see that I'm your ally?" "I believe in the same goals as you." "In voting for my rules, you abstained." "In order to remain neutral." "Yes, you are the ultimate bureaucrat." "A part of the Curia for over 30 years." "You are the whore." "Look, I do understand that the past cannot be the future." "I repeat, I will change the church, Rome, if elected." "And in God's name." "In God's name, you should recuse yourself from the race." "You received one vote, I am guessing your own." "There are six among us who think I should be pope." "(BELL TOLLING)" "There will be more." "(CHORAL SINGING)" "Cesare." "A boy." "(BABY CRYING)" "I have chosen a name for him." "Cesare." "So that when you are far, you are also close." "And I tell you, we must find a different doctor, not one of these country butchers, who believes the cure will come from a potion made of goat's blood and crushed sea shells." "We could send to Rome for the pope's physician." "The pope's physician killed him." "I've already lost one child to this fever," "I will not lose another!" "We must ask for the intercession of Saint Petronilla." "Expose Lucrezia to the sacred relic..." "Superstitious claptrap." "Unless it works." "(MONK PRAYING IN LATIN)" "Kiss the lips of Saint Petronilla." "You must." "Do not be afraid." "See?" "(KNOCKING)" "RODRIGO:" "Come." "We are in trouble." "Della Rovere has a letter, a 30-year-old letter from Pope Pius, rebuking you for attending an orgy." "Della Rovere had the letter smuggled in?" "That is forbidden." "He says Piccolomini came to him." "(SIGHS)" "My old friend Piccolomini." ""We have learned, Rodrigo," ""that in Siena you spent the afternoon with several women." ""That the most wanton dances were performed," ""filled with amorous allurements." ""In order to give free rein to your lusts," ""the husbands, fathers and brothers of the young women were not admitted." ""We leave you to judge whether you can indulge yourself" ""in every kind of perversion" ""without surrendering the sanctity of your high office."" "The words of my uncle, Pope Pius, indict you." "June of 1460?" "I was in Siena, yes." "At the home of Giovanni Bichi." "His son's baptism." "Are you denying Pius' accusations?" "I am sorry, Francesco." "Though we've been friends for over 30 years," "I can no longer protect you." "This letter is a forgery." "No!" "I was there when my uncle wrote the damn thing." "Then why wait until now to show it?" "Twice before I have endeavored to win the papacy and you happily carried my banner." "I wonder what could have caused this change in my dear colleague's heart?" "I hope you have been well paid." "You were a man I always looked to for the truth." "(BELL RINGING)" "My brothers, it is time for the afternoon vote." "(BELL RINGS AGAIN)" "Sforza, eight." "Carafa, five." "Borgia, five." "Della Rovere..." "Nine." "Della Rovere is on the rise." "Be ready." "We may need to run." "Not sufficient for election." "For Cardinal San Severino, who perspires with worry." "(KNOCKING)" "Come in." "Some relief, if only brief." "Give your cardinal my thanks." "He looked me straight in the eyes." "He was like a man, full-grown." "Was he blessed like all Borgias?" "He was already as big as you, Alessandro." "(BOTH LAUGH)" "My son is the most extraordinary creation on God's earth." "God." "(SIGHS)" "Give God a rest for the night." "Who are you?" "Do you not know me, sweet Lucrezia?" "Cesare?" "No." "Your one, true love." "Rumor from Rome." "Della Rovere leads." "My fault." "Cesare, you are not responsible for the fate of Rodrigo Borgia." "After taking the vow of celibacy, he sired seven children." "You have but one." "But there's no going back for either of you, so be like him, move forward." "That is what I fear." "Because of me, my lust, we Borgias shall not move forward." "To think of Rodrigo's fierce gaze, or worse, his frigid indifference." "No." "We live at a momentous time, which calls for supreme sacrifice." "The ultimate sacrifice." "To prove to God that we are worthy of His blessing." "I must act, and at once." "To rectify the sin I have committed." "CESARE:" "Father, if You are willing, take this cup from me." "But then not my will but Yours be done." "ADRIANA:" "Lucrezia?" "Lucrezia?" "Already the room is too hot." "Gherardo's breathing grows labored." "If he dies, we might have a tie." "I cannot wait until the others arrive." "I could not sleep." "I could not think." "The King of France has given 200,000 ducats to one of us in order to buy his election." "CARDINALS:" "What?" "SAVELLI:" "Which man?" "Giuliano della Rovere." "Impossible!" "On what basis have you made this accusation?" "A list of each cardinal and how much they are to receive, including Piccolomini, who was paid to reveal Pope Pius' letter, with French money." "Never!" "I despise the King of France." "As do I. When I saw this," "I could no longer bite my tongue." "Let me see the document." "To see it is to accept it." "SEVERINO:" "At first, I wanted to destroy the letter." "And perhaps I should have." "Perhaps the Lord held back my hand." "Are you an agent of King Charles?" "He shakes his head like a French marionette." "My uncle was pope." "No matter how the Conclave came to choose him, he was never traitor to Italy." "Discharge of an old man is a frightening sight." "I have shown them the letter." "You gave him this?" "Yes." "How did you come by it?" "There are many in the French court who fear a della Rovere papacy." "Liar!" "I am the liar?" "You are a hypocrite." "I will kill you." "(ALL YELLING)" "Stop!" "Charlatans!" "This is my first Conclave and I have tried to keep silent." "We refuse to write down Costa's simple rules, but we pass letters door-to-door through the night." "While a city, a world, waits for us!" "RODRIGO:" "The young Cardinal of Florence is right." "No more letters." "Pity." "Only words." "Spoken and true." "More than our words, our actions must speak true." "Sforza, eight." "Carafa, seven." "Della Porta, four." "Della Rovere, four." "Four?" "Four, you say?" "Borgia, four." "Not sufficient for election." "I had not expected to lose a vote, but to gain some from those who deserted della Rovere." "They're angry at him for the betrayal and at you for exposing it." "Was that letter a forgery?" "The actual parchment, yes, but the details were true." "Has della Porta abandoned me?" "And which four cardinals voted for him?" "I will find out before the next scrutiny." "Do not give up hope." "Hope?" "On my last trip back from Spain, almost 20 years ago, our vessels hit a violent storm off Pisa." "One ship sank to the bottom." "Two hundred souls, including three bishops were drowned." "And then, as if God meant to punish me further, we were attacked by Muslim pirates." "I was beaten, robbed of 30,000 ducats." "I survived not out of hope, but because I do not know how to do anything else." "Besides, there is a certain sweet revenge in being tied with della Rovere for last place." "CESARE:" "So Abraham rose early in the morning and took his two servants with him and his son, Isaac." "He said to the servants," ""Stay here." ""I and the lad will go up further and worship and come again to you."" "And Isaac said to Abraham," ""But where is the lamb for the burnt offering?"" "Abraham replied," ""God will provide Himself the lamb for the burnt offering."" "And the angel of the Lord called down from heaven and said," ""Because you have done this" ""and you have not withheld your son," ""your only son," ""I will indeed" ""bless you."" "(BABY CRYING)" "Cesare, where is your son?" "Where is the baby?" "Do you want to die?" "Cesare." "There is a man and there is his word and the two must be the same." "(BABY CRYING)"