Rachel's limbs turned to ice. "Does he think he owns me?"
Colder than the rain pouring down on her was the terror of being torn from the few friends she had, to be used for pleasure by a man who could not even speak to her. She put her hands to her face and started to sob heavily.
A burst of loud laughter from John made her look up. At first she thought he was laughing at her tears, but he was pointing at Cassio's dangling body. Still chuckling, he said something to Friar Mathieu.
"He says that man used to be the stud bull hereabouts. Now he is dead beef."
Rachel shook her head. "He has no pity for Cassio—nor for me." Filled with revulsion, she thought she would rather die than spend the rest of her life with that brute.
Friar Mathieu looked off into the distance. "That is how it is with the Tartars."
Rachel shuddered. To John, Cassio was just a bundle of rags to be laughed at, and she was a plaything to be dragged through the world.
"Please help me get away," she begged Friar Mathieu. "I think I will kill myself if I have to stay with him."
Friar Mathieu closed his eyes in pain. "Do not talk that way, my child. Every person's life belongs to God."
Another voice boomed down at them from above, speaking a language Rachel had heard before but did not know. The sour-faced man with the big nose peered at them out of a cavernous hood. The French cardinal. He towered over them on a great black horse. Rachel shuddered at the sight of him.