Work Text:
Venite adoremus.
The words fell familiar from his lips, carried in the remnants of a baritone that he had enjoyed some modest fame for, once upon a time.
Oh come let us adore him.
A sense of warmth was spreading through his chest, a soft glow of certainty like he had not felt in years. Adoration, devotion, service, not carried into endless, hollow silence, but heard, accepted, answered.
Before the eyes of the world, Pope Innocent XIV celebrated his first Christmas mass. The eyes of Thomas, Cardinal Lawrence, never left the new Holy Father. He would come. He would adore.