In three days, the Muscovites would be here.
All in all, it was a very simple equation. He would have to save Venice, as he had promised.
Taking a deep breath he rose, steadied himself, and went back up the stairs.
He found Newton as he had left him.
“Well,” Ben said, “it seems you are correct.”
“This girl meant something to you, I take it?”
“She was a person, so she meant more to me than to you.” He winced at his tone and held his hands up. “Let it pass,” he whispered. “I will find her. I have something else to speak to you about.”
“Oh? And will you remonstrate with me further?”
“I don’t know. That depends upon you, sir.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning, what are your plans now?”
Newton looked steadily at him. “I promise you, Benjamin, I will not leave you again. This time, we shall go together. Somewhere safe, where I can carry on my work.” He brightened a bit. “Look! See you my talos?” He waved at the man-thing.
“Oh, indeed, I did see it, and have seen it before,” Ben replied dryly. “A useful servant, I should think—perhaps a replacement apprentice?”
“No, no. Benjamin, it is more than it looks. It is the key to the wisdom of the ancients. To describing the malakim!”
“I see.”
“No, you do not. But I can teach you, Ben. Many secrets are in our grasp now, many new systems. It is more than ever I dreamed.”
Ben felt a bit of hope stirring, but he had heard Newton speak so before. “Listen to me, sir,” he said. “Know you that the Muscovite fleet comes here now?”
“Here? Why here?”
“It is too long in the telling. They come to conquer Venice; that is enough.”
“Well then, we must flee immediately.”
“No!” Ben snapped, amazed that he could be so angry at Newton for planning nothing more or less than what he himself had been contemplating an hour before: find Lenka, convince Cotton Mather to sail, and leave Venice to her fate. He couldn’t do that now, because Lenka was here somewhere, and suddenly he felt a tower of righteousness. It was astonishing what was lying there below his pragmatism, and he marveled to hear it come out.
“I have fled Boston, I have fled London, I have fled Prague. By God, sir, here, for once, I stand and fight.”
“With what? You saw the ships at Prague.”
“I did see—and I know, sir, that you must have noted that they are propelled by caged malakim.”
“Yes. Mrs. Karevna must have thieved away my design.”
“Be that as it may. You made these things, sir. Can you not unmake them? Loose the affinities that bind the malakim to their service and let them fly free, so the proud Muscovite ships plummet earthward?”
Newton’s eyes widened as if he had never thought of that, and for a long space Ben watched the problem churn behind the master’s eyes. At last the philosopher looked up at him. “Perhaps,” he replied. “But it is too dangerous. I will not risk myself so for a city I owe nothing to.”
“Tell me,” Ben snarled. “I shall do it. I care not what the danger might be.”
“But I do, Benjamin, and I will not expose you to it.”
“But you would expose me, unprotected, to the bombs and shot of the Muscovites? For I swear to you, I am standing with King Charles in this.”
“I would expose you to nothing. I would have you travel on with me.”
“I have friends who will not abandon me at their slightest fear,” Ben mocked. “I have friends who love me and whom I trust. You are not one of those, Sir Isaac. You are not one of those, and I would rather take my chances with musket fire in defense of my friends than escape with a man I do not trust and do not like!”
“Benjamin—” Newton began, and then again, “Ben—our work is more important than this. You must believe me.”
Ben let out a measured breath. “Oddly, sir, I do believe you. But I must do what I must do.”
“Then I cannot help you.”
“Is there nothing I can do to stop the ships?”
Newton shrugged. “Perhaps. You have always been the handy one with contrivances, Benjamin. Perhaps you will invent something. Now, if you please, my talos will show you back down. I must ready for another flight, it seems.”
Ben paused as he approached the stairwell, but did not turn as he said, “You best fly quickly. Charles was talking of having you bombarded, so as to keep you from Muscovite hands. Farewell, sir. I do not think we shall meet again.”
His only reply was the faint bell of the talos’ feet on stone.
Red Shoes shook his head to clear it, glad to be back in the open air, even the fetid air of Venice. His initial impression of the city had only been confirmed. The paths of water between the houses, the sinking, decaying buildings, the smell! He found himself always looking for enemies. Whatever had attacked him in Algiers was here: he knew it, could feel it. Below the waters of Venice, something dread waited to claim him.
He had meant to try and sort out what the “quiet” council had agreed, but he found he could not force himself to care. No matter what was said or done, a battle would be fought here, and he, Red Shoes, was going to be a part of it. Ostensibly, it remained to hear from Benjamin Franklin what plans he had for attacking the flying warships. In truth, it was decided.
Europeans could not bear to be alone, among aliens. It was a sentiment he could understand. Away from his people, what was true and right began to lose its meaning; and he was fast becoming a chip of wood, tossed about on the water, weighed down by it, closer to sinking each day. Nairne, Mather, Bienville—even Blackbeard—might be from different nations, but it was clear that they thought themselves a sort of tribe apart from the Muscovites and the Turks. Venice might be ruled by the Turks, but in their hearts they thought of it as the last remaining part of a world that had once held England, France, Spain. Venice was all that endured of the Europe they knew, and they would fight to save her, he was sure. The Americans would not let Riva and King Charles die. Even Bienville now saw a chance to save his doomed colonists, and he would take it. But for the final decision they waited for the sorcerer Benjamin Franklin. Red Shoes had decided to wait outside.
It was perhaps because he strained so for warning of a sor-cerous attack that he did not sense the physical one until the last instant. A cudgel slapped him across the shins, and he collapsed in agony, grasping for his pistol or ax and realizing that he had never retrieved them after the Divan. Fighting the pain, he lashed wildly with his legs and had the satisfaction of striking someone, hearing them gasp. Then three sharp points dug into his flesh at neck, ribs, and kidney.
“Be still,” someone hissed in heavily accented English. “Make no sound or you die.”
His hands were yanked roughly behind his back and bound there, and a blindfold tied over his eyes—though as they rolled him he caught a glimpse of four men in black hats and bizarre masks.
“Avant’! Prest’!” a man with a voice like a jay squawked. They hauled him to his feet.
“Walk,” the English speaker said. Red Shoes tried to comply, but found himself mostly dragged along. Not much later, they put him in a boat. He could feel its motion—hesitating between pole strokes, winnowing slightly upon the thin skin of the underworld. In the shadows behind his eyes lurked movement, and he stabbed out with his ghost vision just in time to see it vanish, a figment in the corner of his vision. Coward! he shouted in the silent language of shadow. Coward, come try me! But no answer came.
Frustrated, he settled into the forest of sound around him: the chattering of a hundred nearby mouths; the plaintive whine of a cat; the cooing of pigeons; harsh grating of metal; and, farther still, the windy strains of a song played on an instrument unknown to him.
Finally, the boat came to a rest.
“Now,” his captor said, “I want you to listen very carefully. I’m going to tie a rope around you, and after that I�
�ll drop you in the water. Hold your breath, and don’t struggle. If you follow my directions, you will most probably live. If you do not, you will die. Do you understand?”
His mouth went dry as the man’s words sunk in. “I can’t swim,” he said.
“That’s what the rope is for,” the fellow grunted. “Like I said, listen to me or die.”
Red Shoes nodded, stood, and kicked hard at the sound of the voice. His foot grazed someone and he was rewarded, first by the sounds of chuckles, then by a powerful slap across his face. He reeled back—and someone caught him by his shirt—and he realized that light was seeping in through the rags over his eyes. The slap had moved the blindfold just enough for him to see the face of his captor, a darkening, canalside alley, and a hanging yellow sign with the picture of a bee on it. Then rough hands were all over him, and the blindfold tightened painfully.
“You’ve got spirit,” the voice said, disembodied no longer. Red Shoes now had an image of a narrow, tapering face, an aquiline nose, mussed brown hair. “You could almost be a Venetian. But don’t try that again. Now, take a few deep breaths.”
Red Shoes fought back his panic as they tied a rope beneath his arms.
“Now a very deep breath.”
He sucked in air until he could find no more room in his lungs, and they threw him into the water. It was cold, amazingly cold, and terror roared through his body in a wave, an explosion that was almost sensual in its intensity. He tried to summon the detachment that had allowed him to grasp the burning iron; but this was different, a thing he had never even considered inuring himself against. He summoned images of dry earth—of hunting deer in the small, bright prairies of his homeland, of the bald ridge of a hill he knew—but all these came in disjointed flashes, drowned before they could afford him any comfort. His panicked lungs heaved futilely. Then, finally, he caught an image that brought some solace, that calmed him, afforded a measure of dispassion as the rope tugged him through the black water. It was no pastoral scene, no sunlit landscape; it was the face of his captor, the look of surprise as an ax split it in two.
He came up gasping, and someone gripped him below the armpits and hauled him from the water and marched him along. The rotten stink of the canals clung to him, but by the stillness of the air and sandy smell of wet stone, he knew he was in an enclosed space. He counted paces, but there were only fifteen before he was forced roughly to sit. His bonds were cut, but an instant later cold manacles replaced them. His blindfold remained.
Someone said something authoritative to him that he did not understand, and then he heard footsteps recede. He could not decide if there were enough leaving to account for all his captors, but he suspected that at least one had remained as guard. He tested the chains and manacles anyway; they were solid. He might escape them with the aid of a shadowchild, but that would wait until he had thought for a few moments.
Who had kidnapped him, and why? He remembered Riva and his talk of the Masques, the extreme Venetian faction. His captors had been masked—it seemed reasonable to assume that was who they were. But why?
“Wer sind Sie?” He started at the sound of the woman’s voice. He did not understand her words, though they were clearly a question.
“I don’t understand,” he replied. “Do you speak English?”
“Nein. Parlez français?” she asked.
“Yes,” he replied in French. “I speak French.”
“Very little, I. You are captive also?”
“Yes. And you?”
His answer was a rattle of chains.
“Do you know what they want?” he asked.
“No. No. But they make me write letter.”
“A letter?”
“Yes—to—friend of mine, Benjamin. You know him?”
“Benjamin Franklin?” he asked. “We just met today.”
“That Benjamin, yes. My name is Lenka.”
Ben paced over what seemed to be one of the few solid streets in Venice, thinking furiously. How could one combat ships of the air? They could fly well out of range of the most powerful cannon, wreak havoc by dropping stones, mortar shells, and arcane weaponry. He had pinned his hopes on dissolving the bonds of the malakim and thus depriving the ships of support, but he couldn’t formulate a method for that on his own, not in three days’time.
So deep in thought was he, that he didn’t notice the street urchin running toward him until the guard Charles had sent with him suddenly interposed himself between Ben and the young fellow. The guard barked something in Italian.
“Per Benjamino,” the boy said, waving what looked like a letter. “Benjamino Franco!”
“What?” Ben grunted. “Let me see that.” He took the sheet, made somewhat grubby by the boy’s dirty fingers.
He broke the seal—nothing more than a spot of wax—and quickly read two short notes. The first was in English.
For the honorable Mr. Franklin.
We have taken into our protection a foreigner in our city, a Mrs. Lenka. She publishes that you are a dear friend of hers. We will keep her safe for you until such time as the Moscovados are defeated. Before your reunion, we would very much like to discuss with you matters Turkish and Venetian.
Humbly yours,
The Masques
The second was in German, and bit longer.
Dear Benjamin,
I am captive of some men who say they will deliver this letter to you. It was imprudent of me to reveal our acquaintance, and I fear they may have misunderstood the depth of our friendship.
I never finished the story I was telling you, the one about the man whose great-grandfather was Johannes Kepler. He believed, you see, that Kepler had flown to the Moon in his fabled airship, and was determined to do so himself. He flew off, the court bidding him bon voyage, and his little daughter, a girl scarcely five, waving her handkerchief calling out for him to bring her back a bit of green cheese. He never returned, and the little girl never saw him again, but she always imagined that he was on the Moon, there, looking down at her. That is, until one day, she found the airship, high in a tower, empty, and learned that men who fly too high suffocate from lack of air. She understood then that the ship must have gone no great distance at all, had been quietly found, returned to the castle, locked away.
I have finished this story, and I trust it explains many of the inconveniences you have suffered on account of me. I am sorry for these. Do not let my present circumstance also be an inconvenience, I beg you. Thank you for showing me the mountains of the Moon and for the opportunity to sail the air. Do not worry for me, for I am now content.
Yours very truly,
Lenka
Ben carefully folded the note and put it in his pocket, and the last of his doubts dissolved. In his mind’s eye, he saw again the moon he and Lenka had shared, and felt a dark grin creep across his face. He looked toward the north. “I have nothing in particular against you, Tsar Peter,” he said, “but God help you, now.” And God help the Masques.
Ignoring the puzzled looks of his companions, he continued toward the palace, his stride firm and resolute. “Bring the boy,” he commanded over his shoulder. “He may know something useful.”
Benjamin Franklin cleared his throat and looked frankly at the council. “I apologize for the delay, gentlemen, and thank you all for waiting. I wanted to consult with Sir Isaac Newton before proposing my countermeasures, which I am confident will prove adequate to end the Muscovite threat.”
“I thought you were certain before,” the now-present Blackbeard grunted, a dark fire burning in his eyes.
“I was,” Ben replied. “But Sir Isaac, after all, is the master and I the apprentice. ’Twas best I first consult.”
“Why isn’t Sir Isaac here?” Cotton Mather asked. “Why can’t he consult with us directly?”
“He is too busy with matters of his own.”
“Preparing his own measures?” Riva asked.
Ben hesitated for an instant, but by the look that flashed across Charles’
otherwise impassive face he knew that for one person, at least, it was an instant too long. “Yes,” he said anyway.
Everyone at the table seemed to relax a degree.
“Now then,” Charles said quietly, “what are your plans?”
“Should I wait for the Indian fellow?”
Thomas Nairne shook his head. “He’s a strange one, given to wander. I will inform him later.”
Ben nodded, wondering how convincing he could make his half-formed ideas sound, but determined that he would, indeed, convince. “This will require much work in a short time,” he said. “But I think Venice is equal to the task. There are things I must know first, however, of the city’s present defense.”
“That being?” The speaker was Hassim’s father.
For an instant, Ben felt dissected by the man’s gaze, revealed to the Turk as a charlatan. But that had never stopped him before, and it did not now. “Do you have a fervefactum?”
“We have fervefactum,” the Janissary confirmed.
“Of what use will that be?” Charles asked impatiently. “We have two, as a matter of fact, positioned to guard the entrances to the city. They were effective enough when enemies had to approach by sea, but they can scarcely boil a bowl of water if the distance is greater than twenty yards. The tsar need only stay above that range and land his troops in the interior of the city—once he has bombarded away resistance.”
“I know the limitations of the fervefactum, gentlemen,” Ben replied. “We will not be using them in the usual way. Can they be removed from their placement?”
“They are quite massive,” the Janissary chief replied.
“But can they be removed to a ship?” Ben persisted. “To one of the American ships?”
Now everyone in the room looked puzzled.
“Come, gentlemen. The fervefactum is used in siege to boil the blood of those approaching key points in a defense. The effect is most intense—indeed, almost unbelievably intense—near the device.”
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