The Orphan of Florence

by Jeanne Kalogridis

  I was more than willing to lift my dagger overhead and rush at him, faster than requested. In the next instant, my knee buckled and I fell hard on my rump.

  “How did you do that?” I gasped.

  He extended a hand and pulled me onto my feet. “If you want to learn, you’ll have to be more polite. Slowly, I said.”

  I wielded my blunted dagger overhead and took a step toward him. He didn’t bother to draw his weapon. Instead, he grabbed my knife-wielding arm with the left-handed overhand grip we’d practiced so many times.

  And then he turned his body slightly sidewise to mine, taking a broad step so that he now stood on the outside of my right leg. His bent right leg moved behind my left, with his heel catching the inside of mine.

  “Now,” he said, “watch what happens when I straighten my leg.”

  He straightened his leg—only a bit, thankfully, because the instant he did, my left knee began to buckle.

  He grinned. “Even if you lose your weapon, you can make your opponent lose his balance and, with luck, fall.”

  “Then what?”

  The corners of his mouth lifted up even more. “Then you run like hell.”

  It was my favorite move, making Niccolo fall, although he always recovered too quickly and gracefully to suit me.

  “Just swear,” he kept saying, “never to use it on me.”

  On the last day of practice, Niccolo and I ran through our performance from start to finish, which included his retractable dagger, my padded vest and dramatic fall, and—in order to make the rehearsal of my “death” complete—a bladder full of pig’s blood hidden on top of my vest, beneath my tunic. The tip of Niccolo’s dagger would pierce the bladder to make my gory end thoroughly convincing.

  Ser Abramo insisted on coming up to the weapons room and watching our little drama in its entirety: my handing off an imaginary letter to Niccolo and beginning to turn away, my spinning around as he drew his dagger and I mine, and my skilled if vain efforts to stop his weapon from reaching my heart.

  At its end—after my piercing shriek and skillful fall, and my perfect (I thought) death stare—I waited, hoping that the Magician would applaud, or offer words of approval, or both.

  But he said nothing. Only stared, his expression faintly troubled and faintly accusatory, at Niccolo, who had ended our exhibition with an actor’s sweeping stage bow, expecting, like me, to receive praise.

  Instead, Ser Abramo’s withering gaze stayed fixed on Niccolo as he responded grudgingly: “Simple enough. Fiore’s dagger, first master, first and second plays. And I suppose you’ve taught him no alternative moves, in case something goes amiss?”

  Niccolo’s features hardened; stiffly, he said, “I taught him a defensive move.”

  Ser Abramo gave him the Magician’s omniscient, piercing stare.

  “The leg move,” Niccolo prompted me, and I nodded.

  We grappled again. This time, I moved my swift little pickpocket’s feet to the outside of my opponent’s right foot, and put my leg behind his, forcing his right knee to bend. Down he went, his dagger held carefully away from his body and from me as he fell onto the padding.

  Ser Abramo finally spoke, though the heaviness in his voice remained. “I’ve never seen that one before. It’s not Fiore, is it?”

  Niccolo shook his head, unable to repress a self-satisfied grin. “I came up with it myself. Works like a … well, a talisman, I suppose.”

  Abramo didn’t smile. I unstrapped my baldric and wiped my sweating face on my sleeve while Niccolo retrieved his cloak. As the latter moved past the Magician on his way toward the door, Ser Abramo spoke again, his tone challenging.

  “What if the blade jams?”

  Niccolo drew the dagger from his baldric. “This one’s different,” he replied coolly. “Better than the others; I worked with the smith myself to be sure the design was right. But to answer your question, if the blade jams, I’ll take care not to pierce the vest. The sight of blood over his heart will convince them.”

  Ser Abramo gave the slightest shake of his head.

  “We shouldn’t be risking him,” he said, so softly that he must have thought only Niccolo heard him.

  Niccolo sighed—a sound of honest worry, not for me, but for his mentor. “Watch your heart, old man, and I’ll take care of the lad’s.”

  * * *

  Before he left at the chiming of the midday bells, Niccolo made me repeat the location where our little play was to take place: The Oltrarno side of the entrance to the Ponte Vecchio, the Old Bridge, on the eastern side of the street beneath the guard tower, at the first peep of dawn the next day. After I saw him off, I found Leo settled by the kitchen door, his chin resting on his forelegs, his normally smooth brow furrowed with vague worry. I wandered through the rooms calling Abramo’s name—even going so far as to lift the hatch and call down into the cellar—but there was no reply. The Magician had left the palazzo.

  He’d never left before without telling me, but I shrugged it off and helped myself to the contents of the ever-simmering cauldron in the kitchen, then went upstairs to my chambers to study and rest.

  The chambermaid had drawn me a bath—a luxury that happened on an astonishingly regular weekly basis. Leo followed me inside and lay politely down beside the tub as if he’d done so every day of his life. I let him stay, and since Ser Abramo was gone, I left the door unbolted and slightly ajar in case Leo had a mind to wander off again. Abramo always knocked anyway, and if I heard him coming up the stairs, I had plenty of time to cover myself and shut the door.

  The drills with Niccolo had left me exhausted and sweating. When I’d eaten, I’d cooled off to the point of feeling chilled. The water in the tub was deliciously hot, and after soaping and rinsing myself, I lay sprawled in the round wooden tub, my legs hanging out one side, my head lolling out the other.

  It was difficult enough to engage in swordplay at all, much less to engage in it with one’s breasts tightly bound. Unwrapping them brought great relief, as did the warmth of the tub …

  I must have dozed, because in the next instant, Ser Abramo was charging through the door as Leo sprang up to greet him, and I found myself thrashing in the water. I managed to reclaim my balance and clutch the nearby towel, which I pressed against my breasts and my decidedly un-male privates.

  Ser Abramo and I gaped at each other. His lips were parted, and his gaze, though fixed on my unexpected breasts, held not a whiff of lasciviousness, but only the shock felt by a man warned to expect the impossible but who, upon discovering it, cannot fully believe it.

  I bleated. He backed up to the doorway and flung an arm out as if to clutch the jamb to keep from falling. He failed and sank down to his knees at the threshold, then collapsed onto his rump. There he sat, dazed as a drunkard, his gaze unfocused, his chest heaving as he struggled to catch his breath.

  By that time, I’d clawed my way out of the tub, wrapped the towel around my critical parts, and hurried over to him.

  I thought that the shock had provoked a spell of apoplexy or some other dangerous fit. When I saw that his color was good and that he was merely startled out of his wits, I began to make my case.

  “It doesn’t matter if I’m female,” I said urgently. “I’m still just as capable of working with Niccolo. I’m still just as smart, just as worthy of being your apprentice. I’ve survived two years on the streets, and I don’t want to go back there ever again. And don’t you dare try to marry me off to anyone!”

  He seemed not to hear me at all. His jaw worked for a while until words finally came out, but he still didn’t meet my gaze. “The silver talisman,” he gasped. “Do you still have it?”

  It wasn’t the question I expected at all. It was still hanging around my neck; I held it up for him to see.

  He shook his head. “No,” he said. “Not that one.”

  There’s an indescribable thrill—not the good kind—that comes when the body reacts to a shock before the mind can properly interpret what’s going on.
Like the unpleasant tingling jolt one experiences when stepping unawares on a hissing viper or looking up to find oneself directly in the path of a fast-approaching runaway carriage.

  Not that one.

  Thunderstruck, I sat down hard beside him on the floor, forgetting the fact that I was dripping wet and dressed only in a towel.

  “The talisman,” I whispered. “You remember my talisman. You really do know my parents.”

  “I thought Lucrezia was mistaken … but she was right about you. Your name … tell me your real name.”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “The nuns called me Giuliana.”

  He pushed himself to his feet and offered me a hand up; being a gentleman, he averted his gaze.

  “Do you still have it? The talisman?”

  “Yes.” I began to shiver, and not just from the chill of water evaporating on my naked skin. “I mean, no. Not exactly. My friend—the little boy, Tommaso—I gave it to him to wear. It saved his life when—”

  He waved me silent. His one eye was blinking rapidly; he opened his mouth to speak but closed it again, his expression one of agonized confusion. It took him a moment to regain his calm and state, with conviction, “We’re going now to get it. I must see it. Others must, as well.”

  Stung, I lifted my brows. “You don’t believe me? You think I would lie about this?”

  He didn’t take offense; he didn’t respond to the questions. His mind was already elsewhere.

  “Get dressed,” he said crisply. “You’re taking me to see your friend Tommaso.”

  * * *

  With his white wig, skillfully hunched shoulders, and feigned reliance on his deadly cane, Ser Abramo walked slowly from the Oltrarno, over the bridge, and into the city proper. I walked beside him, my new dark blue mantello swathed around me, covering my head and my heretically short hair, my hand solicitously cupping his elbow as though I was supporting him. Any observer would have sworn we were grandfather and grandson taking an aimless stroll together. Grandfather and grandson from a wealthy banking family. I’d never worn such fine, soft clothing in my life.

  The day was in fact unseasonably pleasant, perfect for a walk; the sky was cloudless, and the sun strong enough to feel pleasant on my face. The streets were crowded with pedestrians whose formerly pained expressions had eased into faint smiles.

  Delicious though the weather was, it failed to cheer me. I was preoccupied with the image of Tommaso, who looked pleadingly up at me with a stricken expression, his blue-green eyes filling with tears as I was forced to leave him again. Yes, there was a man walking beside me with a stiletto that had come perilously close to the skin of my throat, and yes, I was worried that something would go wrong with Niccolo’s retractable blade the next day. But I dreaded them far less than the encounter I was about to have with a six-year-old boy.

  My uneasiness grew as we passed the Duomo and Baptistery and finally arrived at the potter’s shop next door to the Porco Tavern, marked by a boar’s head painted on the wooden sign hung over its entrance.

  I paused in front of the shop, girding myself mentally, when Ser Abramo said, “One night.”

  “What?” The perplexing words drew me out of the near future into the present.

  “Tell your little friend I only need the talisman for one night.”

  I nodded and pushed open the door; tinkling bells announced our arrival.

  The balding potter, his face still red from the kiln, was haggling with a customer over the price of a large tureen near the back of the store; his grizzled wife stood beside him, reminding the would-be buyer of her husband’s fame and skill. She glanced up as we entered and broke away to intercept Ser Abramo, clearly thinking he was a customer and that it had been coincidence that we’d come in together.

  She never smiled at me. She hated me because she thought I’d made Cecilia pregnant with Ginevra, then refused to marry her. But Ser Abramo elicited her toothiest grin.

  Ser Abramo played along. While I made for the stairs, he took a wobbling step toward her, forcing her to look at him instead. “I need a gift for my daughter-in-law, and I’d like to take a look at your merchandise.” He gestured at the largest, most expensive vase in the store, painted with pastoral scenes in vivid blue and yellow. “That one.”

  Her face brightened; she clasped her hands over her heart in unintentionally comical delight. “Of course, signore. Let me show you.”

  She led him off. I bolted up the steps and passed through the first room into Cecilia’s. The door was closed but she answered on the first knock and stood in the doorway, tall and buxom with her pale skin and hair, the latter done up in braids coiled beneath a linen veil. Her worn too-big gray kirtle was gone, replaced by a slightly used but better fitting one of heavier brown material. She was chewing, with her hand covering her mouth. An incredibly delicious smell permeated the room behind her.

  “Giuli!” she whooped, spewing food in my face as she grabbed me and pressed me to her. Neither of us cared. She’d recently bathed and still smelled of soap, and when she finally eased her grip on me enough so that we could pull back and look at each other, I was pleased with what I saw. The sharp angle of her jawline had softened somewhat, and her cheeks had plumped. She’d put some of the florin to good use.

  In the room behind her, the bed was now covered with a heavy blanket and two new pillows; nearby, a fat iron cauldron rested on a sturdy four-legged table, just large enough to serve as a small dining table. There were three solid chairs tucked next to it, one of which had clearly just been vacated. Tommaso sat in one of the chairs feeding himself and Ginevra, who sat on his lap sporting a new long dress, and when he caught sight of me, his face grew brighter than a flame at midnight.

  “Tommaso!” Cecilia called, but she needn’t have.

  In a thrice, baby Ginevra was sitting bewildered on the bed and Tommaso was flinging himself at me with the speed of an arrow loosed from the quiver. Despite my feeling of heaviness, I laughed aloud with Cecilia at the fact that he’d nearly knocked me off my feet.

  “I missed you!” Tommaso shouted over us. The faint accusatory note in his tone was overpowered by joy. “You were gone forever, but I knew you’d come back! I knew it! And you’re getting fatter!”

  “So are you,” I said smiling. The once deep hollows beneath his cheekbones were almost gone; I could scarcely feel his ribs under his tunic, a brand-new one of bright green wool. His pale hair was still damp and neater than I’d ever seen it. Cecilia must have recently trimmed it.

  “Look!” he commanded, and curled his lip to reveal his pink upper gum, and the emerging crescent slivers of white enamel where his front teeth used to be.

  “Big man,” I said approvingly. “Look at you, with grown-up teeth.”

  “They’re coming in fast,” Cecilia chirped.

  I dug in the pocket of my cape until my fingers found four soldi Ser Abramo had recently given me as a reward for studying hard. “I brought you a present,” I told Tommaso, and ceremoniously dropped one of the silver coins into his unusually clean, pink palm. Cecilia had even cleaned under his nails.

  His mouth opened in awe, though not quite so wide as his eyes, as he stared down at it. I put the other three coins in Cecilia’s hand. “I’ve got another florin coming,” I told her as an aside.

  “Wonderful,” she said automatically as I rose, gently extricating myself from Tommaso’s grasp. “You’ll come sit with us now, and have some soup. Real soup, with good sausage. The landlady is letting me use her kitchen hearth.”

  “Is that what I smelled?” I kept my smile fixed, even though I was unhappy about what I needed to say next. “I’m sure it’s delicious. But I only came to give you the money, and to ask—”

  “You’re staying now, aren’t you? You’re not leaving again?” He stared up at me, his huge eyes already brimming with tears. The corners of his mouth were trembling.

  “I have work to do,” I said firmly. “I came by to give Cecilia the soldi and to ask a favor.”

>   “What do you need, Giuli?” Cecilia’s tone conveyed that whatever it was, I would get it.

  “I need…” The words didn’t want to come out of my throat. “I need the talisman, the one Tommaso is wearing. Just for a day. I’ll return it tomorrow. I swear.”

  Tommaso let go a long wail, followed by great wracking sobs. There was no theater in them, no calculation as to what effect his performance might have on me or anyone else. He was brokenhearted; defeated, he staggered to the farthest corner of Cecilia’s room—the farthest he could get from me—and sank to the floor, his face to the wall.

  I followed and crouched behind him to put a hand on his shoulder; he pulled it away.

  “I’m sorry this upsets you,” I said, my tone brisk and no-nonsense, “but I’m not deserting you. I’m working so that you and I never have to play the Game again. We’re going to be rich and have a fine house, and we’ll never have to go hungry again, ever.” I paused. “You’ll see me tomorrow.”

  He sobbed silently all the while, shuddering, his lips pressed shut, until his face turned an alarming shade of red. Finally he sucked in a breath, and said, in a small, trembling voice, “You said you were coming back last time. But you’re not. You lied.”

  Before I could answer him, he tore something from his neck, turned, and flung it over my head. I heard a faint clatter as it struck the floor on the other side of the room.

  The silver talisman, the thong that held it now torn in two.

  He turned his face back to the wall and wouldn’t look at me. “I won’t ever wear it again,” he said, his voice still shaking but now grown cold. “Never. I hate it. I hate you. Go away.”

  He curled into a little ball on the floor and wept quietly.

  I tried to pick him up, and he landed a punch square in my stomach. It took my breath away.

  “Tommaso!” Cecilia snapped, but I waved her silent.

  “I’ve got to get going,” I said, my voice annoyingly husky. “I’ll be back tomorrow.”