Later, I ducked out of the festivities and went back up to the papal apartments alone, where I rifled through my sketches until I found the stack I wanted. Then, in my room of miracles, under my Heliodorus wall, I took out a bucket and lit a fire. Once the flame was blazing, I dropped in each of those sketches—one by one. I’d never bothered to copy them. As far as I knew, no one had ever copied them. They could never be brought back. But that night, I kept my promise to Felice that I’d made during the Roman riots. That night, I watched Michelangelo’s sketches burn.

And when I went back outside to join the rest of the courtiers watching fireworks to celebrate the pope’s victory—“to celebrate miracles called forth by the brush of Raphael,” declared the pope—I believed, for the first time in many, many years, in the existence of miracles.

Because I believed in my ability to create them.

Chapter LI

Chapter LI

It makes me tremble with fright,” said Cardinal Riario, shaking his jowls. “Brrr.”

“I cringe,” said Cardinal Bibbiena, screwing up his face, “as if he might step out of that painting and strike me over the head at any moment.”

“I’ve never seen such ferocity in a portrait. The Warrior Pope, indeed,” said Bramante, patting me proudly on the shoulder.

I nodded, but . . .

Were we looking at the same painting?

Oils on wood. His Holiness sitting on a throne with finials of golden acorns, a tribute to the della Rovere family. Dressed in a red papal cape and hat. White cassock. Body and face turned three-quarters. Ringed fingers. Scraggly white beard. Simple green background. Yes, it was indeed my official portrait of Pope Julius II.

But what were the others seeing?

When you put a painting out into the world, you have no control over how it’s received, do you? You spend all of your time worrying about every shadow, every hair, every crook, every wrinkle. You convince yourself that the angle of the head, the turn of a knuckle, the number of folds in a drapery will be considered and counted; you convince yourself that it’s all so meaningful, but . . . Then, people see what they want to see. A drooping mouth becomes a snarl. Downcast eyes become a glare. Age becomes youth. Weakness becomes strength, and you question why you wasted so many nights lying awake, worrying about the turn of the sitter’s knees when, apparently, no one takes the painter’s choices into consideration.