by Mary Gentle
The argument went on for an hour at the least, becoming increasingly
mathematical. Rekhmire’ joined in, not disputing Honorius’s tactical
assessments, but digging deeply into the same question – which my
father declined to answer: How many of your men do you need to stay safe from danger on the roads?
I stopped speaking and let them go at it, treasuring an idea that came
into my mind.
When both fell breathlessly silent, I spoke again.
‘The answer to “How many men?” is “All of them”,’ I said. ‘It has to
be. I’ll tell you why. Father, your concern is that when Videric’s spies see
you and your men leave, they’ll kill me—’
‘ No, you can’t come with me!’ Honorius interrupted. ‘I’ve seen the
sewing-work on your belly: there’s no way you’re riding a horse or being
strapped into a litter – or puking your guts up by sea! I know how long it
takes men to recover from battlefield wounds; you’re still weeks from
ready, no matter what the Turk said—’
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‘Yes, but I don’t think anyone else knows that.’ I walked across the
room and rested my hands on his shoulders, standing behind his chair.
‘Go with all your men, banners flying. Ensign Saverico is about my
height and build, although he’s fair-haired. Put him in my green
travelling cloak and a skirt. Any spies will report to Videric that I’ve left
Venice.’
‘A battle double.’ Honorius glanced up, the dawning of amusement in
his gaze. ‘Well thought of! But not good enough. Am I supposed to leave
my son-daughter and Onorata to that whoreson Federico, or any other
ruffian who can make his way to Venice?’
‘You’ll lose your estates!’
He looked away from me. ‘My reputation – which you and the
Egyptian both seem to think I have – should mean I have no difficulty in
earning more money, and buying more land. If it’s not in Taraco . . .
then it’s elsewhere.’
‘You are the worst liar!’
Honorius grinned, and reached for the seal on a wine bottle.
‘Honorius – Father—’
It was my first experience of a long and pointless argument as a free
individual rather than as a slave.
It was no less aggravating, and I seemed equally powerless. True, no
man threatened to whip me when I threw a shoe at Honorius’s head. But
that was solely because it made him laugh, and then wipe at his eyes as if
he were deeply moved.
‘Stupid soldier!’ I snarled.
He crossed the room and put his arms about my shoulders. As ever, he
seemed to have no hesitation in touching me. He wept a little.
‘Must have been hanging out with too many damned English
mercenaries,’ he muttered, wiping his face. ‘All the English are far too
emotional, always have been!’
I stated it as plainly as I could. ‘If you have to fight to be paid again,
you might be killed. I don’t want that.’
‘I am going nowhere until you’re safe!’ He scowled at me. ‘And – what
is safe? If you and the child could travel, I wouldn’t take you with me.
You and Videric in the same kingdom? There’d be men waiting at every
corner to cut your throat!’
‘Then I’ll stay in Venice!’
‘That’s no better!’
The tense silence snapped, broken by a diplomatic cough from
Rekhmire’.
‘There’s Alexandria,’ I said, and translated for Honorius: ‘Constanti-
nople.’
‘“Constantinople.” ’ Rekhmire’ wrinkled his upper lip at the Frankish
name for his city. ‘I had wondered, if I can find Herr Mainz, or if the Pharaoh-Queen sends a new ambassador for Venice, whether I could
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wait a month or so until the weather is clearer, and then take a ship down
through the Aegean to Alexandria. But, such a long voyage . . . ’
Honorius scowled. ‘Onorata is still very small. Travel might kill her.’
‘Alexandria is far enough from Taraco that Ilario should be out of
Videric’s reach. And Ilario will have friends and protection there.’
Rekhmire’ had his chin on his hand, where he sat at the large table; his gaze only glanced across me.
‘I won’t risk such a young child,’ Honorius grumbled.
He looked over at me, but I paid no attention. Fear turned my bowels
hot and cold while he spoke to me, and I realised in a flash why.
If, in guilty waking moments, in the early hours of the morning, I held
the unvoiced thought that it would be better, kinder, if the sickly child didn’t survive – or better if the responsibility weren’t left to someone as
completely unfitted for it as I – the thought of someone else taking her made the bottom of my stomach drop away with fear.
All the time it was me, alone, there was no concern if I fell into debt
and was sold back into slavery. I’ve lived as a slave before; I can do it again.
But slaves have no say in whether their babies are taken from them.
Their children are sold on, and they never see them again.
‘You’re not rich enough to buy all three of us,’ I whispered to
Rekhmire’, trying for humour and not achieving it.
‘If it comes to it, I’m perfectly capable of embezzling the funds of any
Alexandrine House,’ the Egyptian said, as if it were not only obvious but
sensible. ‘However. I strongly suggest we don’t let it come to that.’
He exchanged a glance with Honorius, as if both of them could come
to a conclusion without words.
‘Let the weather improve.’ Honorius grumbled. ‘Give it a few months
for the child to thrive. I’ll sail to Alexandria with you. Then, when you’re
safe, Ilario, I’ll sort out Rodrigo Sanguerra.’
‘Honorius.’ Breathing deeply gave me some control. ‘I read what
Hanulf wrote, and I know what the King dictated to him. I worked for
Rodrigo Sanguerra for nearly a decade. I know the man. He won’t wait! ’
Honorius smiled, lines spidering his face at the mouth and eyes. ‘Let’s
sit, eat. Discuss this like sensible men. You can protest how you like,
Ilario. I won’t leave Venice while you need me.’
‘Damn it—!’
The rest of the discussion was as fruitless as any I have ever had with a
noble of King Rodrigo’s court set on going his own way – and being a
freed slave rather than the King’s Freak did not appear to help me in the
slightest.
Gazing at Honorius while he ate delicate flakes of white fish as if they
were about to give way to famine, I thought, Even his affection might fade if acknowledging me ends by robbing him of everything he’s earned in his life.
*
23
My body had returned to as normal a state as I thought it now could
achieve, and I was watching Onorata blink sleepily at the spring sunshine
from her cradle when Neferet bustled her way into the ground-floor
room that looked out into the courtyard, an expostulating Rekhmire’ and
Honorius in her wake.
‘Ilaria!’ She had not given up calling me by a female name, as most of
the household inhabitants had when not outside in Venice itself. ‘Ilaria, I
need your help.’
I have been your guest: that imposes obligations. I sh
ot a look at the two men behind Neferet, who were both yelling loudly enough that I could
understand what neither was saying. Obligations, but not without caution.
‘What do you need?’ I asked, standing up, my fingers resting on the
wooden hood of the cradle.
‘The Council of Ten are holding Leon’s trial tomorrow.’
Neferet’s face was lean, tight, intense. She fixed me with brown-black
eyes, and what I thought was a flush under her reddish skin. ‘They’ll
torture him; I know he’ll be executed, because he won’t say . . . anything.’
I wanted to interrupt with some commiseration or sympathy; she
didn’t permit it.
‘His family have disowned him,’ she said sharply. ‘It’s not worth their
while to sink with him, is what they mean! I spoke to his father – no
matter. We have to do something tomorrow – I have to – you have to help me!’
The Frankish season of Lent was on the house: I didn’t suffer from
diet restrictions, since I’d had to regain my health after the birth, but I felt the abstinence going on all around me, and had abandoned wine for
the time. That was a mistake, I thought. I have a feeling I could do with a flask of Falernian right about now.
‘What?’ I began.
‘He’ll be convicted. Sentenced.’ Neferet’s eyes seemed to gleam in her
intense face. ‘I can’t do anything about that: the gods they know I’ve
tried! But he’s bound to be sentenced to execution. I need . . . I would do
this myself, but it’s the one thing I can’t do. I can’t do it.’
She shook her head. She looked oddly dignified for a moment, the
spring sun showing up every line worry had cut into her soft face over
the past weeks.
‘I can’t think of any plea of leniency they might listen to, except this.’
She stepped forward, reached out, took my hand, and closed her other
hand over my knuckles. ‘I need you to go to the Doge’s palace tomorrow,
and plead for his life.’
‘ Me? ’
Neferet made an impatient sound. In the doorway, Rekhmire’ and
Honorius fell silent. My father’s mouth was a white line. The Egyptian
had his arms crossed firmly across his chest.
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‘You.’ Neferet looked down the inch or two of height she had on me,
into my face. ‘You have to go to them, and plead your belly.’
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5
If I stared as incoherently as I felt, it was no wonder she began to speak
in slow, plain words, as if to a village idiot.
‘Tell them this is Leon’s child.’ She jerked her chin toward the cradle,
never taking her eyes off my face. ‘Tell them he visited Tommaso Cassai
in Rome. And seduced you, while he was there. You followed him here,
pretending to be a widow. It’s why you’re here. You need a father for your child. You need them to commute the sentence from execution. It
doesn’t matter to what. Anything, so long as he lives! We can aid him
later. But you have to go there and do this for him; it’s the thing that I can’t do.’
Rekhmire’ came up behind her and put his hands on her shoulders.
She didn’t let go of my hand.
I could see the man under her disguise – or the false pale body that
held her female ka, as she would say. She stood with a kind of exhausted,
humiliated dignity, gazing down at me.
If I didn’t much like her, still, pain for her wrenched through my belly.
‘Of course I will.’
‘I won’t have you put yourself into danger!’
Honorius and I spoke at the same time.
Rekhmire’’s great hand tightened on the shoulder of Neferet’s long
Alexandrine robe. His grave dark gaze met mine.
‘You can take your father’s armed escort,’ Rekhmire’ said. ‘No man
would think the less of you, not after you were attacked by a madman.’
The last few words let me know what story had been given out about
Ramiro Carrasco’s attempt to murder me.
Honorius glared. ‘I don’t like it! The boy Leon – nice enough boy –
wouldn’t have him in a company of mine, and the world doesn’t need
more lawyers – but I’m not risking my son-daughter for him!’
His protectiveness made me smile. It’s frightening, because I’m not
used to it, and what one learns to value, it may pain one to lose. But it still made me warm.
Freeing my hands, I bent over the cradle and picked up Onorata. She
had grown, but she was still smaller than any new-born should be. I slid
my finger over her palm, and she made an infinitesimally tiny sound and
closed her small perfect fingers on me.
‘I haven’t taken her out of the house,’ I said.
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Honorius erupted into a fine amount of oratory, Rekhmire’ speculated
about what Alexandrine physicians might advise, and Neferet said
nothing at all. She continued to look at me.
I have seen the expression before, on slaves’ faces, before they break
down and beg.
Hurriedly, I said, ‘We’ll take the midwife. And . . . your Father
Azadanes?’ Who, privately, I thought would be of more use to Neferet as
a friend than to me as a Green priest. ‘And the wet-nurse. And the
soldiers.’
My father gave me a furious look.
Knowing him, I knew that Neferet’s distress had already lost him the
argument he would still have with me.
I looked from Honorius to Rekhmire’ – the Egyptian’s expression
heavy with thoughts I shared – and then at Neferet. ‘You do know how
small a chance this is, don’t you?’
The Alexandrine eunuch dressed as a woman gave me that inclination
of the head that, outside of Frankish lands, passes as a bow.
‘I know,’ Neferet said. ‘Nonetheless.’
The great medieval palace of the Doges was in the process of being
demolished – rather, demolished and re-built – so I spent my time
leading us between scaffolding-covered walls, and treading close enough
to the heels of the Doge’s soldier that I wouldn’t lose him as he led us inside. Every so often I looked inside the fold of my cloak to find Onorata
still breathing.
No love connected us, but I would wake two or three times in the
night, convinced she had died as she slept, and must crawl to the foot of
my bed and look at her in her chest-cot, and feel her breath against my
finger, before I could go back to sleep.
The Council guards escorted us into the main chamber of the Doge.
They will see through me.
The thought echoed through my head clearly enough to down out the
ringing footsteps on the flagstones, and the echoes that came back from
the Gothic vaults. I had no time to look at the ducal splendour of
Foscari’s half-rebuilt palace, in the new Classical style. I could only think
I will join Leon Battista Alberti in prison!
I thought sardonically that I ought to have been barefoot, with my skirt
hems worn to frays, and the baby in my arms wrapped in faded linen.
That would make them believe the poor seduced woman come to get
justice from her ravisher . . .
Looking up, past the semi-circle of white-faced old men under
Phrygian caps, all identical to me in this state of fear, I caught Leon
Battista’s eye where he stood between four armed guards.
His eyes bugged out of his head.
‘He’ll give it away!’ I muttered.
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Honorius gave me the same look he gave disobedient young recruits.
‘Steady.’
On my other side – and I was beginning to wonder when they had
constituted themselves my bookends – Rekhmire’ leaned on his crutch
and suggested, ‘Will you take the baby?’
Honorius spoke across me. ‘Not for a moment. Let them see us.’
I might not be a grubby-faced ex-whore with snow on my feet and a
baby in my arms, I reflected, wondering if I could paint that in any way
that these rich fat men would believe.
What they must see in front of them in this dark and torch-lit hall was
a young woman in silks and satins, clearly of good family, her father in
knight’s armour, her Egyptian scribe at her elbow, her armed escort
clattering across the stone floor behind us, and the nursemaid with the
child two formal paces to my rear.
Like it or not, this stands more of a chance of presenting them a picture they’ll buy.
‘This is my daughter—’ Honorius stuttered over the word, in a way I’d
never heard him stutter over ‘son-daughter’. ‘—Ilaria. I demand
compensation for her! I demand justice!’
All of the ten men at the council table looked at Honorius, except for
the middle-aged man with alert brown eyes who took in my appearance
in an instant, and slightly lifted a brow.
‘Messer Captain-General Honorius.’ It was the keen-eyed man who
spoke: I realised this must be Foscari. ‘We have read the evidence you
put before us. What claim have you on this man’s estate, except the
testimony of this woman?’
Onorata was wrapped up with swaddling bands, very loosely, for the
look of the thing. Being fed, I had every hope she’d sleep and look sweet.
With her arranged in the crook of my arm, I stepped forward and waited
until Honorius finished repeating verbally what he had dictated to any
number of the Doge’s secretaries.
‘Lords, seigniors, illustrious Duca.’ I let my Iberian accent come out, and caught Leon Battista’s eye as I looked up as modestly as I could. ‘If
the late Tommaso Cassai, artist in Rome, could speak to you, he would
tell you about the truth of this—’