Shadow of the Lion hoa-1

by Mercedes Lackey

  Kat watched as Maria tensed that strong jaw. "Oh, Aldanto promises that about once a week," Maria said dismissively. "Doesn't he, Kat?"

  Kat chuckled, as if caught by a memory which was half-fond, half-exasperated. The sort of sound a woman might make, thinking of a lover. "He is a liar. Not that he doesn't make up for it in bed."

  Alessandra's face went from absolute white to blossoming little spots of red fury on her cheeks. "You lied to me, Katerina! You little thieving bitch!"

  Kat shrugged and paid off the scores of the last six years. "You lied to me, too. You should have heard him laugh about you this afternoon."

  "You lie! You lie!" screamed Alessandra. "I was with him this morning. Then he had to go to work this afternoon--God, I hate you. Thieving slut!"

  Glancing to the side, Kat could see that her grandfather and Madelena were standing in the corridor just outside the salon. And had been there long enough, apparently, to have overheard the exchange. Just as she and Maria had planned. But . . .

  The shocked, pale look on his face made her nervous. She suddenly remembered, a bit guiltily, that Lodovico Montescue was an old man, with an old man's heart.

  Enough, she thought. I'd better not let this go any further.

  "Calm down, Alessandra. I lied."

  But Alessandra's mouth had a mind of its own, it seemed. "Yesss," she hissed. "You lie all the time. Caesare is mine. Mine! Always has been--for years and years." She glared at Maria. "And he does what he promises for me, too. So you aren't long for this world, you bitch!"

  Lodovico finally entered the room, moving shakily. "I cannot believe what I'm hearing," he whispered.

  But Madelena did. The tiny little woman stalked forward, pushing past her master.

  "You--puttana! You have betrayed the memory of your husband Alfredo!"

  Alessandra was in full virago fury by now, knowing that she'd already said too much and betrayed herself. But she seemed still determined to cow them, to shock them into submission.

  "Oh it wasn't just his memory I betrayed. Alfredo thought he was such a lover, but I needed a real man." She gestured crudely.

  Lodovico straightened imposingly. He was a big man, with big shoulders, despite his age. "You will get out of my house," he said between gritted teeth.

  Alessandra sniffed disdainfully. "Ha! As if the Montescue are going to throw me out. As if you are going to tell the world Caesare Aldanto cuckolded your precious grandson."

  "If that is what I have to do to get this viper out my house's bosom, then I will," said Lodovico Montescue with a leaden voice. "You will go and you will go now."

  "Can I throw her out for you?" offered Maria, advancing on her purposefully.

  "You keep away from me, bitch!" shrilled Alessandra. "This is all your fault." And she swung wildly at Maria with an open hand.

  Maria did not swing wildly, and she swung with a fist.

  Kat's sister-in-law was slammed against the wall next to the window. Stunned, she put her hand to her cheek. A heavy bruise was already distinct against her fair skin. "You hit me . . . You hit me! You are going to die for this. Caesare will kill you."

  Then she turned on Lodovico, still standing by the doorway. Except for the cheek where Maria's blow had landed, her face seemed as pale as a sheet. But not from fear, Kat realized. Her sister-in-law was consumed with an almost insane rage.

  "Just as he killed your precious grandson!" Alessandra shrieked. "And you thought it was Valdosta or the plague. Ha!"

  Everyone stood as if they had been frozen.

  Lodovico's next words came in a growl. "I must know. Did he also kill your child? My pride and joy. Little Lodo? Did he?"

  Alessandra started. "No! Even if he cried all the time." There was guilt in that voice.

  "So what did you give him to keep him quiet?" asked Maria caustically. "Grappa? Henbane?"

  Alessandra stared at her. Then looked away, almost furtively. "I never dosed him. Never!"

  "She used to give him some stuff in a blue bottle," said Madelena suspiciously, "when she went out with him to her relatives."

  Kat gaped at Alessandra. "Laudanum? You gave your baby opium in alcohol?"

  "The bottle is still in her cupboard," said Madelena. "She told me it was for the wind . . ." Madelena stared at Alessandra. "Is it bad for babies?" she whispered.

  Kat nodded. "Marco says it is dangerous even for adults."

  There was a long silence.

  Then Lodovico said: "I have changed my mind. I was going to throw you out. To go and be the harlot you were born to be. Now you will stay. And answer to the Signori di Notte."

  Alessandra smiled pure malice at him. "I don't think so, old man. I'll go to my dear Caesare. He's a rising man, not like the has-been Casa Montescue is. And he owes me for all the information about your business I've given him over the years."

  Kat screamed. "No, Madelena! NO!"

  Chapter 82 ==========

  Darkness was falling like a soft shawl across a busy Venice. Out on the lagoon the bargees were busy pulling out the last of the stakes that marked the safe channels. Only an invader who knew his way could come across the lagoon.

  The Arsenal would not sleep tonight. Queues of citizens waited for the issuing of weapons.

  In campos across the city, citizens of the new militia were drilling under Schiopettieri instructors.

  Venice was preparing to fight for her life, and also to strike back.

  Harrow was wrestling with a decision. The boys had both signed up. Benito would be going off to the Polestine forts. Marco was headed for Fruili. An ugly face and a bit of hard leaning had let him see both lists. He was sure of it. His inclination said, go with Marco, but he was sworn to guard both boys. He couldn't be in both places at once. And the Polestine galleys would be leaving first. At last he decided to go and see Luciano Marina. The man made him uncomfortable, always appearing to have the light behind him. But suddenly it felt very urgent. Very, very urgent.

  He walked into a noisy Barducci's. He'd forgotten what taverns were like. This was, if anything, noisier than usual, with people who might be going to die having that last drink at their favorite watering-hole. It fell quiet around him, as he walked across to Claudia. "Need to talk to you. Need to see someone." It was playing hell with his cover . . . but right now he felt cover was less important than decisive action. He felt the build-up of great and terrible things.

  Claudia recognized him. "What the hell do you mean by coming in here, you fool," she hissed.

  "Need Luciano," he croaked. "Can't find him."

  Claudia looked at him. Her eyes narrowed. She put the mandola down, and got up. "Come."

  She led him out of Barducci's and at a jog-trot down towards the Calle Farnese, into Cannaregio. Up to a largish salon next to the Rio San Marcoula boatyard. Luciano was at drill practice too, with the Strega's tiny but grim-faced arm-militant. To Harrow's surprise, he realized that the eleven people--a mixture of men and women--were very good. Of course they'd be at a disadvantage with brassbound wooden staves, against swords or axes.

  "Come about Marco," croaked Harrow.

  Luciano looked alarmed. "We've been watching over him. Our best people have met to scry his movements, his danger. The scryings show nothing."

  "He's signed up to go to Fruili with the volunteer militia. And Benito is going to the Polestine. I don't know what to do."

  Luciano turned on Claudia. "And you brought him here, now, about this?"

  Claudia lifted her hands defensively. "He came into Barducci's. He said he needed you. You said . . . well, I thought it must be urgent."

  Harrow felt as he were blundering about in a thick cottony fog. "It is urgent! Well . . . it feels it! Must come to you. Must."

  A wary look came over Luciano's face. "Chalk."

  "There is none here," said one of the black-clad men.

  "Make a pentacle of those staves, then," snapped Luciano.

  Not two minutes later the ward-candles, hastily contrived from
oil lamps, burned inside the circle. Invocation was begun. Harrow watched as a nimbus of light began to dance around one slight woman. Harrow's scalp crawled.

  "Treachery," she said in a hollow voice. "The inner council is betrayed. It is fogged from within. Go, Luciano. The lion's cub is in need."

  Luciano's faced grew pale. "Betrayed?" he whispered. "No wonder the scrying circles have failed." He rubbed his face, looking now like a very old man. "I have been a fool."

  He dropped his hand. "How could I have been so complacent? Of course the enemy would fight us magically as well. I should have foreseen it."

  "Who could do this?" demanded Claudia. "Who knows enough--" She broke off suddenly, her eyes widening.

  "Lucrezia Brunelli, who else?" replied Dottore Marina wearily. "She advanced far enough to learn most of our secrets, before we cast her out."

  He turned his head, staring to the northeast. "She is working for Grand Duke Jagiellon now, be sure of it. A second string to his bow, which I missed completely. In the end, the demon-nun Ursula and her cohorts in the Servants of the Holy Trinity are . . . not quite a diversion, but almost. A clear and obvious danger to the Strega--to all of Venice--which disguises the more subtle one. The naked dagger, distracting our eyes from the cup of poison."

  He shook his head vigorously, the way a man does to clear his mind. "No time to waste! The Basque priest was right. I finally understand the Evil One's plan. And it is more horrid than I'd ever imagined."

  He began striding off, gesturing for the others to follow. "And he was right about having a second string for our own bow," he murmured, too softly to be heard by anyone.

  Luciano's Strega moved more cautiously than their leader, if as fast as possible, because they did not want to encounter either Schiopettieri or the new militia. The staves were relatively innocuous-looking, true. But they didn't need delays just because someone decided they looked threatening as a group. So they'd split into twos and threes, walking perhaps thirty seconds apart. Any troublesome Schiopettieri would soon find himself outnumbered. If there were too many Schiopettieri, the others would melt back and go another way.

  * * *

  Lodovico looked at the roughly bandaged Alessandra. The woman moaned weakly. "We need a doctor who can hold his tongue," he said grimly.

  "Marco," said Maria immediately.

  Kat looked at her sister-in-law and took a deep breath. "He'll be at Dorma. It's no use sending a messenger, even if we could find one tonight. Dorma won't let him come out, not to something that could be a trap."

  Lodovico nodded. "Go. Bring the Valdosta boy here. Bring both of them if you can. It will give me a chance to make the apology I owe to both of them. And if she dies I want her sunk in a canal far away from here--and the younger boy has the practicality to do that. If she lives, she'll testify to the Senate about this Caesare Aldanto. The devil take the shame to the house! I want him to meet the headsman's axe. Both of you go, but take pistols, loaded and cocked. I'll stay with the hell-bitch. If she should regain consciousness, I want to hear what else she has to reveal about her treachery to my Casa."

  Guiseppe went to get Lorenzo, he who had been their gondolier the night that Kat had smuggled Maria home. Maria found herself once again being hastily dressed from Kat's wardrobe. "Ladies" were much less likely to be interfered with, and tonight there were certain to be a fair number of drunken roisterers about. The floor-length dress, bulked with petticoats, wasn't going to show her feet. Ten minutes later they were headed for Marco at Casa Dorma.

  * * *

  Marco was packing up his books and medical gear rather more slowly than was strictly necessary. It seemed to him that Rafael was lingering similarly over his brushes and paints. Both of them were destined to join their Volunteer units in the morning. Both were headed for Fruili and would face some weeks of drilling and training before being flung into combat. Marco wanted to get back to see Benito before the boy went off with the galleys headed for Polestine. On the other hand, he didn't want to leave this apartment. It represented fulfillment of one of his dreams.

  He sighed. He'd have left it on the instant to see Kat. But the head of Casa Montescue had made it absolutely clear. Never again. Petro Dorma had said the same, if less directly.

  * * *

  Petro Dorma was facing Katerina Montescue at that moment. He had in fact been about to step out when he had overheard the doorman saying: "No, Milady Montescue. Milord Marco Valdosta is not at home. Neither is Milord Benito."

  "We'll see Petro Dorma then," said a young woman, decisively.

  "Milord Petro is not available, signorinas."

  Better to deal with it, he decided. Montescue was only one vote, but once that Casa had been a real bastion against the Montagnards. The daughter of the house was plainly still besotted with Marco. The old man could become an enemy if this was handled wrongly. And even one vote in the Grand Council could be of huge value.

  He stepped out. "I'll see them, Paolo. Escort them to the Blue Salon."

  "We just need to find Marco . . ." said the other woman, nervously, in far from refined tones. She sounded like a canaler.

  Petro turned his back. "I'll speak to you in the Blue Salon."

  * * *

  Kat thought it was a terrible shade of blue. She wanted, desperately, to see Marco again. Even if she couldn't have him. She was also afraid that she might see Angelina Dorma. Her hands crooked into claws at the thought. She might not be able to restrain herself.

  But only Petro was there. "You must understand," he said gently, "that I cannot allow you to see Marco. Your grandfather would not permit it."

  Kat handed him the letter that Lodovico had written. "It's addressed to Marco, but my grandfather said we could show it to you, if need be."

  Petro took the letter doubtfully. It carried the Montescue seal. He cracked it open and read the brief, polite letter Lodovico had scrawled.

  "Well." He bit his lip. "This puts something of a different complexion on the matter, but . . ."

  "I'm not going to run off with him," snapped Kat. Even though I would like to. "My grandfather has discovered that he was entirely mistaken about the Valdosta involvement in our House's loss. He wants to apologize to the Casa Valdosta."

  Her voice quavered slightly. "He is an old man and he, and they, may not live through this war. And we have someone who is injured we would like Marco to see. That's all. Word of a Montescue."

  Petro nodded. "He's over at his apartment near the Accademia, packing up. He should be back soon, if you'd care to wait."

  The other woman stood up, giving Petro a glimpse of her bare feet. The unexpected sight--the dress was very fine--startled him.

  "We'll get him there," she said. "Come, Kat. I know where it is. You--Dorma--tell Benito that Maria says he's to come to the Casa Montescue. And don't you tell that stinking Caesare Aldanto."

  Petro was plainly unused to being addressed like this. But he'd picked up on the name. "Maria?"

  Maria nodded defiantly. "Yep. That's me. Come, Kat. We'd better move, or that woman'll likely die on us. I should have thought to stop at the Accademia on the way over."

  * * *

  Marco took a last look around. "Time for leaving." He started to pick up his bags. There were more of them than could be easily carried. Dorma could send someone over for the bulk of them in the morning, he decided.

  Rafael nodded. "I'll walk with you as far as the Traghetto."

  Laden with the things that he felt he couldn't leave behind--his books and instruments--Marco walked in awkward silence down the stairs and out into the narrow calle. The first inkling he had of trouble was the boom of an arquebus, followed immediately by what felt like a bull hammering into his chest. The sheer force of it winded him, knocking him down. It sprayed the precious books it had struck into the street.

  "Finish him!" yelled someone. "Make sure he's dead!" A group of dark-clad figures stood up from the cover where they'd been lurking in wait.

  "Help!" yelled Rafa
el. "A rescue!"

  And to Marco's amazement a rescue came, running down the darkened street.

  "A Mercurio! Lux ferre!"

  That was Luciano's voice! The entire street danced with witch-fire, showing the mottled, scarred face of Harrow and several others with him, the weird light gleaming on brass-bound staves. The five waiting assassins were trapped in the cul-de-sac. Swords and knives were drawn to meet the challenge.

  One of them ignored the fight and came on at Marco, who was struggling--with Rafael's help--to get to his feet. It was Francesco Aleri, rapier in hand.