Assassin's Tale

by Turney, S. J. A.

  Of the thirty or so arches on the downhill side, only the grand one facing the west was large enough and clear enough to admit a man on horseback, and only two of the smaller ones were unobstructed enough to grant pedestrian access without a struggle. Orsini had clearly taken careful note of the place’s defensive qualities during his wanderings up here yesterday as they waited for nightfall to move on Velletri and free their employer - typical of the man.

  Skiouros held his breath and cupped his hand to his ear. All he could hear through the din was the muted sound of their own horses which were tethered in one of the blocked tunnels on the far side of the arena, and the only hint of life were the three twinkling lights he could make out in the streets below.

  ‘Any sign yet?’ called Nicolo from below, his voice curiously hollow and echoey from inside the tunnel.

  ‘No. Not…’ Skiouros fell silent as his eyes caught just a flicker of movement near the church of San Paolo atop its grand staircase. For a moment he held his breath, uncertain as to whether the movement was a trick of the rain. At least the lightning and thunder had moved on and now rumbled over the hills to the south like a man losing an argument. But then, just as he was about to turn back to his friend and proclaim the area silent, the movement caught his eye again and within a heartbeat, two riders burst from the cover of the trees in the small square. Through the arch by the church they rode, and into the open ground beyond the walls. Skiouros squinted in an effort to identify the men, but the conditions revealed only two dark, cloaked shapes that could be anyone.

  Confirmation came only a moment later as a small party of half a dozen riders emerged into the square at pace behind the pair, racing on for the gate.

  ‘They’re coming, and the enemy are right behind them. Six, I reckon.’

  ‘Odds of two to three, then,’ Nicolo said quietly, drawing his sword and parrying dagger in the stygian darkness of the tunnel as Skiouros dropped from the upper curves, concentrating on keeping his footing as he clambered down to the lower levels of the structure.

  ‘You ready?’ Skiouros called as his friend emerged from one of the dark tunnels and into the deluge once more.

  ‘No. Are you?’

  ‘No,’ the Greek smiled. Neither of them were warriors - just a sailor and a thief cast into the wrong roles. ‘Come on, then,’ he sighed.

  The two men moved across to the wide archway that led in from the west, the sailor moving to the far side, clambering up the steps and crouching ready, blade in each hand. Skiouros moved into position opposite, drawing his own sword and reaching for his macana club but pausing. Instead, he crouched and grasped a heavy chunk of fallen masonry just smaller than his fist.

  By the time he was straightening and preparing himself, he could hear the hoof-beats of his friends’ horses pounding across the compacted turf just outside. As Orsini and Parmenio pushed their way into the arena, the former looked up to both sides, clearly expecting to find his friends exactly as they were.

  ‘Block the exit after them,’ he shouted. ‘Horses?’

  ‘In there!’ Skiouros called, pointing with his sword to the recess at the far end where they had stabled their own beasts. Orsini nodded and kicked his animal into fresh speed, cantering across the deep grass of the makeshift oval graveyard and slowing into the darkness with Parmenio at his shoulder.

  Even as Skiouros silently urged them to speed, he heard the next set of hoof-beats outside, betraying the arrival of the Frenchmen. The Greek tensed, his teeth chewing on his lip in apprehension. The way Orsini had laid it all out, it had sounded so sensible and easy. Now, as the thunder of six trained killers pounded through the arched tunnel into their oval killing zone, everything seemed so much more stupid and he wondered bleakly whether he might shortly occupy one of the unmarked graves in this ancient theatre of death.

  Then, as was always the case, the adrenaline and the necessity for urgent action took over and the world exploded in a flurry of activity. The six Frenchmen, uniformed in blue and gold and all looking more expert and at home in the saddle than Skiouros despite their earlier belief that few of the enemy would be trained horsemen, roared into the arena. They were armoured in breastplates only, with heavy leather riding boots, long gauntlets and metal caps to protect their heads. None bore a shield, but each man had his sword out and poised while they chased down their prey.

  As the last of the six thundered past, Skiouros brought the odds a little back into their favour with a cast of his jagged chunk of masonry. The throw was far from expert, and a good throw from a professional would probably have stoved in the man’s head. But it was enough. The glancing blow smacked into the rider’s head at the base of his skull where it met the neck and the shock and the force of the blow combined to throw him from the horse, where he hit the ground hard and lay, twitching but immobile. His horse went merrily on without him into the oval arena.

  Through the sheerest luck the French rider closest to him was looking a different way and the din of the storm concealed the noise of the attack, so the remaining five horsemen rode on into the arena with their extra empty horse, looking this way and that to try and locate their prey. Not one of them looked back at where they had entered.

  The French soldiers moved quickly and professionally, the man who seemed to be their leader despite a lack of insignia gesturing this way and that. Two of the men dismounted and ran off towards the various tunnels and chapels that led off the arena, swords held tight. Then, even before Parmenio and Orsini appeared from the small stable passage, the Frenchmen finally realised they were a man down and pointing fingers and raised voices singled out the prone form in the entry tunnel, the horse having wandered off to the side of the arena where it had decided that the soaking grass looked appetising.

  Skiouros and Nicolo took a look at one another. Nicolo glanced questioningly down at the passageway between them and Skiouros nodded. They could not afford to let a man go. With acrobatic ease, the two men dropped down to the ground, Skiouros coming up and drawing his macana in his off-hand, Nicolo pausing only to drive the point of his blade into the prone French body to be certain he was out of the fight.

  Parmenio and Orsini appeared at that moment from the darkness of the tunnel where they had tied their horses, roaring eagerly as they charged, weapons raised. The two French soldiers who were making for the other tunnels veered off to intercept and the officer clearly discounted any further danger from there since he turned his horse to watch instead his two men who were still mounted racing towards the arch and the new figures who blocked it on foot.

  Skiouros felt his heart rise into his throat as he watched the riders coming. He was no soldier or tactician, but he had seen enough action in the service of Orsini this past year to know that the only way for infantry to stand against cavalry was with a good long spear, not a sword and a club. Sure enough, the two riders aimed for the pair in the tunnel, one apiece, picking up pace for a full charge. The only positive thing Skiouros could think of in those panicked moments was that the Frenchmen both lifted their swords up and away from a sweep, realising that there would not be room in the passage and relying on the sheer force of a running horse to deal with the pair standing against them.

  Skiouros risked a momentary glance at Nicolo and saw his friend cast the parrying dagger aside and grasp his sword in both hands, bracing his feet to meet the charge point-first. What the hell was he doing? Skiouros realised the answer at the last moment, but could do nothing about it as time had run out. Turning back to the horse bearing down on him, he cast up a prayer half a heartbeat long that Nicolo would survive his brave and stupid attempt to stop the man.

  The young Greek was not such a straight-forward thinker - never had been. A boy does not survive for the best part of a decade in the streets of the world’s greatest city living off his wits alone without coming to realise that there are always a thousand other ways to do things than the obvious, and most of them are less troublesome.

  As the rider hunched down behind
his steed’s neck, bracing himself to flatten the insane man standing before him, Skiouros threw himself sideways, flat against the wall, but he did not stay there. Instead, as he hit the ancient stone he rolled along the wall with the momentum, past the charging horse but so close that he could feel the sweat spraying from the shining flanks even among the raindrops as hot water among cold.

  The rider had not even realised that Skiouros had moved. As he reined in and his head came up and round to look for the corpse of the man he assumed he had ridden flat, Skiouros swung from behind with his macana, smashing the heavy wooden staff across the man’s rein-holding arm hard enough that he felt the crack of the bone, even though he could not hear it over the deluge. Before the man could react, even as the hand fell away from the reins, the Greek thrust out with his sword. Not an elegant blow, but with the rider in shock and facing away, it was an easy enough attack. The point slid into the man’s side above the hip and just below the cuirass, grating up past a rib and into the organs.

  A hiss of effort escaping, Skiouros yanked the sword back out along with a spurt of blood and took half a dozen steps away from the panicked horse as the rider slid, agonised, from the saddle to land in the mud. Quickly, he was round the rear of the horse, giving its back end a wide berth. No one who’s seen a horse kick out wants to be too close as those chestnut eyes roll over white with terror.

  His heart fell as he rounded the beast with the intention of coming up behind the other rider. The Frenchman was already extricating himself from the saddle with difficulty as his horse, collapsed in agony from the sword wound to its chest, thrashed and screamed, every movement further pulverising the lifeless mess beneath it that had so recently been Nicolo di Siginella. Fury coursed through Skiouros as he set his hard eyes on the French soldier. Here and there between flailing hooves and sheeting rain he caught a glimpse of Nicolo out of the corner of his eye, and in every flash his friend looked less and less like a human being.

  The rider must have seen in the Greek’s eyes something of what was coursing through his veins for, as he stood, finally extricated from the horse and bringing his weapon to bear, he apparently changed his mind and turning on his heel fled for the open ground beyond the amphitheatre.

  Somehow, through the blur of anguish and hatred that was suffusing Skiouros, he managed to retain enough reason to pause and turn, checking the situation in the arena. Parmenio had not seen what was happening, busy as he was fighting the French officer in the middle of the grassy oval, his back to Skiouros. Orsini, fighting two men at once and apparently still managing to maintain the upper hand, looked past his opponents and laid eyes momentarily on the Greek.

  ‘Get him.’

  Needing no further encouragement, Skiouros turned and jogged through the tunnel, casting a momentary look at Nicolo as he went to further fuel his ire. As he stepped out into the open once more, the battering rain slammed into him like a slap from a weather God and he had to blink away the excess water to locate his prey. He had been late to respond, checking on Parmenio and Orsini first, and had moved slowly through the passage, but the rider had apparently twisted his leg when his horse had gone down to Nicolo’s blade, and he was moving slowly enough that the vengeful Greek would have no trouble keeping up. Indeed, as Skiouros watched the Frenchman move through the tufa arch and back into the city proper, the man slipped on the wet stonework and went down painfully into the torrent of water rushing down the street.

  Skiouros stomped at an inexorable pace after him, and as he passed through the arch, he saw the man only halfway across the square in front of the heavy, squat church. His ankle was truly slowing him. The French soldier looked over his shoulder, spotted Skiouros across the square through the vertical rods of water, and a flash of panic crossed his face. He had clearly come to the same conclusion about their relative paces, because he suddenly put on an extra turn of speed, but the extra effort caused him to slip once more on a wet cobble, bringing him down with a shriek. Skiouros continued to close the distance like some avenging demon, blade in one hand, macana in the other, his face a mask of violent intent.

  The Frenchman was whimpering, Skiouros could tell. He could hear snatches of it through the roar of the weather, for he was little more than twenty paces behind, now. He would catch up soon enough, and could be on the man in moments if he chose to run. But no. Nicolo’s killer had to feel this one coming with every step.

  In panicked desperation, the soldier turned away to his left, preferring the chance of losing this pursuing monster in side-alleys to the risk of the precipitous street with the slippery cobbles and the rush of ankle-deep water.

  Skiouros smiled to himself. No way out down there. This was one of the few places Skiouros had visited on their sojourn here yesterday, and he had done so with eagerness. His home city had been full of underground cisterns, their roofs propped up by ancient columns. After all, he’d almost died in one a few years back. Some people said there were so many in Istanbul that the city was built over a hollow world, like an eggshell after the contents have been sucked out.

  And Albano had such a place, too. Oh, it was nothing compared to the great edifices of that eastern capital, but still impressive in its own way, providing enough stored - and continually replenished - water to supply a legion. This narrow, stretched yard with its rough grass and half-grown trees granted access to that place, but to there alone, with the far end being fenced off. A man in the peak of fitness would have no trouble with that fence, of course. Skiouros would manage it well enough. But a man with a twisted ankle? In a downpour?

  Skiouros rounded the corner at that same, measured, inexorable pace, his face unchanged. The Frenchman was already close to the far end of the alley, and even as the Greek hunter picked him out in the gloom, he saw the man realise he was trapped, peering hopelessly at the enclosing fence. With another whimper, the man turned and made for the only other possibility the narrow yard offered.

  Skiouros closed on the side door, built into the wall next to all the bricked-up arches, as the Frenchman wrenched at the handle desperately. Even over the rush of the heavy rain, Skiouros could hear the roar of the water in the subterranean tank behind that door, falling from the aqueduct channel down through the cold, damp darkness and into the reservoir below.

  Skiouros slowed his pace slightly with an unpleasant smile.

  Nicolo was gone. He knew that on some small level the blame could be thrown at Cardinal Borgia for assigning them this dangerous task simply in order to buy him a little more time to run and hide. On the grandest level, the blame had to stick to Skiouros himself for dragging his friends into this pitiless crusade for vengeance, and he would crucify himself for that particular fact in due course. But the immediate blame could be plainly and simply pinned to this French soldier who had ridden down his friend and crushed him beneath a hundred stone of horse and rider.

  Vengeance was nothing new to Skiouros, of course, but until this moment it had always been a vague, distant, almost ethereal thing. Now it was immediate and right in front of him and while he had faltered at the Castel Sant’Angelo, he had never felt more focussed and determined than this. It was proof that he could do it. He had lied so many times to Orsini and had lived with this deep, shadowed fear that he would not be capable of taking revenge when the chance finally arose, but with the heaviness of his heart in this dreadful night came a strange freedom as he finally knew beyond all doubt that he could do it – he could take a life in cold blood. Would do it. He sheathed his sword.

  The Frenchman finally succeeded in ripping the door open and flung himself inside. Skiouros waited for the inevitable, and almost laughed as he heard the panicked scrabbling of the man. Having visited the place yesterday, Skiouros had almost come to grief when he had entered, expecting more of a platform or tunnel inside that he’d actually found. Instead, there was only a staircase with a narrow landing, surrounded by a low stone wall, and beyond that the plunge into deep cold darkness.

  Skiouros reached the d
oor and flung it open as the soldier tottered, trying not to plunge into the hellish, pitch-black cavern, punctuated with columned arches and echoing with the sound of thousands of gallons of water falling into water. Skiouros reached out and grabbed the wrist of the man’s sword arm, arresting his momentum and keeping him here on the landing. A puzzled look of gratitude flitted momentarily across the man’s face but vanished again as the man realised that his salvation was far from assured, after all. Before the man could do anything, Skiouros brought his knee up as he wrenched the arm down. The Frenchman’s wrist shattered with a noise that echoed around the subterranean chamber and his sword fell useless to the floor. As the man screamed, Skiouros lashed out with his macana, an expert blow that mirrored his last move, smashing the rider’s left wrist and leaving him helpless. As the man began to shout something in his nasal French, Skiouros calmly shifted his weight, grasping the man’s broken sword arm and bringing down his boot heavily on the man’s foot, breaking most of the bones in it. Another shift, to the soundtrack of the man’s agony, and he did the same to the other foot.

  ‘It is a proven fact,’ Skiouros said in a leaden voice, ‘that a man can float on the surface of the water and does not truly need to swim.’ He looked past the Frenchman into the darkness. ‘You might live a while yet if you just lie on your back and try not to struggle.’

  The Frenchman stared at him in incomprehension and replied in some French babble that was equally unintelligible to the Greek. With a shrug, Skiouros gave a sharp push and the Frenchman disappeared backwards over the low wall with a shriek that ended only with the splash below. Stepping forward, Skiouros peered over the side, but all below was shrouded in black.