by David Blixt
Pietro gestured helplessly to his crutch. "Lord — how can I? I'm..."
Bailardino clucked his tongue. "Are you sure you want him, Francesco? He seems a little thick." He laid a hand on his shoulder. "A knight is a mounted soldier, son. He does very little fighting on foot. In fact, only an idiot jumps off his horse." He dug his elbow into his brother-in-law's ribs.
Cangrande momentarily clasped his hands to plead to the cross on the far wall. "Dear Lord, what good is it to give me power when I cannot use it to smite those who ridicule me? But Bail's not wrong, Pietro. There is nothing preventing you from being a great soldier. Unless," he added, "you think it's not in your stars?"
"Don't answer him, Pietro," came a familiar, cool voice. "He doesn't believe in the stars."
Pietro hadn't heard that voice in months, not since he'd left the palace at Vicenza. She had been too busy with her new charge, and far too unwelcome in Verona these last months. Turning, he saw Donna Katerina emerge from the curtains enclosing the baptismal font. It was like breathing again.
Clasped in her arms was the child — Cangrande's bastard heir. The infant had grown in the months since Pietro had seen him last, limbs long and thin. Now his eyes were wide, his mouth working silently, his body damp.
A low huff came from the door. Turning, Pietro saw Mercurio's ears curiously flattened, his tail wagging intensely.
A Franciscan priest was now crossing the threshold of the baptistery. Feeling monumentally stupid, Pietro finally made the connection between the alcove, the water, the priest, and the baby.
Pietro started to bow to the lady, but the baby reached out a hand and grabbed his nose. Pietro yelped. Though the adults chuckled, the baby himself seemed disinterested as he let loose a long yawn.
"From the mouths of babes." Cangrande beckoned his chaplain forward, indicating Pietro. "This lad needs to receive confession and be dressed in time for the first entertainment of the day." He slapped Pietro on the shoulder. "One of a knight's merits must be punctuality!"
Pietro made way for them as the family exited via the metal-studded double doors of the south exit. The young hound moved to follow, straining at his tether. "Mercurio. Stay."
The priest stepped towards the confessional. "Come, young man. It's a busy day."
"And an early one," observed Pietro.
A weary-looking fellow with a knowing eye, the priest nodded. "Well, as the lord of today's festival, the Capitano had to be shrived. Though why the christening had to be today, I have no idea." His tone was disapproving. "The child — well, you won't guess what name the Capitano gave him."
"Francesco."
"Oh, you knew? Can't say I approve. The Capitano has never formally acknowledged any of his natural children before."
That caught Pietro's attention. "Did he now?"
The priest considered. "No-o-o," he admitted, drawing out the sound. "But his sister is raising a child he has given his own name? It seems to me that he might be planning — if, God forbid, Donna Giovanna remains barren –" His voice trailed off. "Well, God works in mysterious ways. Come."
Stepping into the penitent's seat, Pietro's thoughts were on the boy. Francesco. Pietro alone knew that wasn't the name he'd received at his first baptism. His mother had given him a different name, a name the Capitano saw fit to erase from memory.
Another thought occurred to him. The custom was that the ceremony of baptism would drive the evil spirits from a child, making him cry as they departed. This child hadn't cried. Did that mean the demons had already departed at his first baptism? Or did they still lurk within?
FIFTEEN
The walk to the Arena was an ordeal. After confession, Pietro had struggled back to the room, trying twice to run, falling both times. Poco, under strict instructions from their father, was now extravagant in his compliments. "Really, no one deserves it more. It's the least he can do, and really about time! It's not like he's been busy. I wonder what took him so long –"
"Shut up, Poco." Pietro hurried over to his uniform for the ceremony and dressed rapidly.
Poco examined his brother's new farsetto with great interest. "The Capitano knows his fabrics." Lifting a fine pair of knee breeches, he added, "And he's considerate — he knows about your new aversion to hose. And that hat! Look at that feather! It's perfect. Daring, but not foppish."
Dante was beginning to laugh. Pietro said, "Seriously, Poco, I mean it, shut up."
But his little brother was on a roll. The purple of the doublet was a subject of particular eloquence. "This is a Tyrian dye — you know, the sign of senators and emperors. It's not the purple of violets, but more a plum colour. Do you know where they get it? From the ink sacks of a Mediterranean mussel. It takes hundreds of shells to obtain just a pound of it. First you have to crack the shell, then pull out the tiny sack, which contains only a few drops."
From across the room Dante arched an eyebrow. "And how, pray, does my son know so much about dyes?"
"When we were in Lucca, I — knew someone involved in the art."
The patriarch's left eyebrow arched even higher. "Oh? And you didn't introduce me, why?"
Jacopo shrugged, kicked the bed with his toe. "You wouldn't've liked — I mean, this person wasn't very –"
"She wasn't very what?" asked the father gravely.
"Did I say it was a girl?"
"No, but evasion is as good as an oath. I swear, Jacopo, if you've—"
"Father," said Pietro, "the Capitano is waiting."
Dante's jaw moved from side to side under his beard. But the poet decided to let it go for the moment. With a mutter about Poco being blown by eternal winds, he wrapped a scarf about his face. At fourteen, Jacopo was already close to notorious among the ladies, and Pietro was vaguely jealous of his little brother.
They departed the Domus Bladorum in the predawn light, Mercurio padding dutifully along by Pietro's legs. As they passed by the arch with the highly decorated monster's bone, a newly established phenomenon occurred. The occupants of the Piazza delle Erbe spied Pietro, and a murmur began to ripple through the crowd. Applause started, not for the poet, but for Pietro. Bailardino hadn't been lying — everyone loved a battle wound. Nothing gave more proof of devotion to a just cause and to God.
Strangely, this reverence of injury had grown into a passion for disfigurement. The worse the wound, the greater the knight's daring and endurance. Pietro himself thought this a little backward. A skilled knight avoided injuries, as Cangrande had. But while the common people revered their Capitano as something akin to a warrior angel, popular lore had embarrassingly turned Pietro into an earthy romantic hero. His wound was just right, not hard on the eye, only evidenced in his limp.
"Stay awake, boy," muttered Dante as Pietro bumped into someone. "You're not as spry as you used to be."
"Mi dispiache," muttered Pietro as he struggled with his crutch. It was all he could do to look self-sufficient enough to fend off the well-wishers pressing forward to carry him to the Arena. Even more disturbing, several young ladies were making eyes at him. Mercurio growled.
They continued through the throng all the way up to the Porta Borsari. Once past the old Roman arch, Pietro suggested that they turn up a small side street. "It'll be less crowded."
His brother looked put out, but Dante was grinning. "So. For once it is you being harassed in the streets, not I. A pleasant change." Incredibly, the wryness of the old master's grin indicated pride.
Old master. His father did seem older than his years. It might have been the exile that had so aged Dante, but Pietro fancied it was the epic poem itself. An auspicious fifty years old this June, at the end of each writing day the poet looked far older. Each stroke of the quill removed a day of his life. Today was an unaccustomed respite, a pleasure-filled day, yet Pietro could sense the resentment in his father. As his patron's client, he was obligated to show himself in public. But it meant a writing day lost, which he deemed a terrible price.
Focused on not falling, Pietro was sta
rtled to look up and see a wide area, like a Greek agora or a Roman forum, filled with thousands of massed bodies pressed against their neighbours for warmth, blocking out the chilling air. The Piazza Bra. The sun was just peeking between the city towers, the first race still some five hours away, but already the rowdies, having begun their celebrations hours, nay, days early, were being trounced by men in Scaliger livery.
Pietro stopped in his tracks. In front of him, rising like magnificent island in a sea of men, was the Roman Arena. He had only seen it in passing in autumn, and since his return he'd been pretty well confined to the streets around the palace.
Though dressed in brick, the body of the Arena was made of cement mixed with river pebbles and tile fragments. Supporting the body were arches, huge, square blocks of rose-marble, creating in each space an arch four times taller than a man, wide enough for five men to walk abreast with room to spare. Pietro counted twenty arches before it began to curve out of sight. It was magnificent, titanic, collossal, far greater than he could ever have imagined.
"The one in Rome dwarfs it," murmured Dante.
"I don't believe it." Pietro finally understood his father's obsession with the Arena, the model for Dante's version of Hell.
Pietro drew in an awed breath, and Dante nodded. "Literally inspiring, I see." His father pointed to the top of the Arena, indicating a set of exterior arches that rose higher than the rest. "See that? It is the remains of an outer wall that collapsed in an earthquake long ago. But come. The Scaliger waits."
Several civic caretakers bearing the badge of Verona were cleaning new graffitti off the lower walls. A trickle of water seeped between the stones of the Arena. It mixed with dirt, claylike and red, that must have been left over from some event. The red dirt turned to mud, making it appear that the stones themselves were bleeding, a river of blood flowing out of Hell, through the stony earth, and into the mortal world.
Emerging from the corridors beneath the Arena, the Alaghieri family arrived at the balcony reserved for the Capitano's personal guests. They were guided to the second row on the left-hand side. Not bad seats, though more for being seen than for seeing. Opposite them on a twin balcony sat many of the city elders and local nobles. Craning his neck this way and that, Pietro looked for Antony and Mari, hoping they were near.
Cangrande himself had not yet arrived. Pietro got Mercurio settled in at his feet. As they waited in the biting air, Dante fidgeted with his cap and scarf. Poco was twisting in his seat and winking at older girls in rows behind them. Seated between them, Pietro was still looking around for people he knew when the horns began to sound.
Down in the pit, fifty mounted knights appeared from the arches and rode headlong at each other as if to clash at the Arena's center. Suddenly all wheeled, merging into a tight formation for a series of mounted maneuvers that had the crowd on its feet. Drawing up into dual battle-lines, the knights stilled their mounts and drew longswords. The scraping of fifty blades departing their sheaths echoed around the great bowl. Slowly the lines advanced towards each other until the steel tips of the swords touched.
A hush fell over the crowd. Pacing slowly under the canopy of swords was Cangrande's nephew Mastino, playing in the role of the Herald of Verona. He carried before him the ceremonial bow to launch the Bolt of the People, an honour long held by the Scaligeri. In his youth, Cangrande had walked in this place. Mastino's older brother Alberto had been Herald for the past three years. Now it was Mastino's turn. The bow in his grip was symbolic of the weapon that had slain the legendary monster in La Costa.
Reaching the open air beyond the swords, the boy lifted the bow. He took no particular aim but loosed his bolt high into the air. People watched the shaft hurtle into space, wondering upon whose unfortunate head it would fall.
When they glanced back down, the men-at-arms had melted away to the far walls of the Arena and Mastino had vanished. In his place, mounted on his magnificent warhorse, was Cangrande. He wore his finest armour, his famous Houndshelm resting in his lap. In his left arm he held the two scrolls that symbolized his sovereignty over the merchants. In his right hand he held a ceremonial sword. On his head was the laurel wreath, denoting his recent victory over the Paduans.
The audience surged forward, calling and cheering, stamping their boots and shouting his name. Cangrande stepped lightly from his saddle to kneel on the ground. The crowd calmed somewhat as the same priest who had heard Pietro's confession now recited a loud, short invocation to the Virgin Mary and her son.
The moment the prayer ceased to echo around the Arena, Cangrande rose to his full height and threw a balled fist into the air. "Let the festivities commence!" The crowd went wild and Cangrande withdrew, making way for the actors.
At the center of the Arena floor, a stage was marked out, and the rising sun coincided neatly with the start of the first entertainment. Far from the usual miracle or mystery plays, what erupted onstage was a bawdy romp by Aristophanes in which the women of Athens stormed the Acropolis, demanding that the men of Greece stop warring or else live lives of involuntary chastity.
"Hardly appropriate to Lent," observed Dante.
"Unless one viewed the denial of sex as a religious concession," said Pietro. That drew a laugh from Poco. "I hear Cangrande asked for something light and silly."
Dante sniffed. "This qualifies. Tcha! They're ruining the text."
On the stage were about twenty men, most dressed as women (acting was a degenerate profession, and in those parts of the world where women were allowed onstage, the word 'actress' was synonymous with 'whore'). Some of these girls sported long beards, much to the elaborate dismay of the over-phallicized men on the makeshift stage. They spoke loudly, but the crowd paid little attention to the dialogue as they pointed at the actors' enormous false bosoms and prodding genitals.
There was a bustle of activity on the balcony as Cangrande arrived and took his place at the center beside his wife. He'd shed his parade armour for the fine clothing Pietro had seen that morning. At once the performers started to play up to the Scaliger, blowing him kisses and offering protestations of their affection. The master of Verona readily returned the proffered love, and the crowd whooped with glee — everyone knew how much Cangrande loved actors.
One member of the company ran forward, a huge bouquet of flowers in his hand, and began to climb the balcony with cries of love. The Capitano made a big show of coyly refusing, but swayed in tune with the love song of the afflicted actor. Finally he took the flowers from his would-be paramour.
"Give us a kiss, lovey?" asked the 'girl'.
Lifting a flagon from beneath his seat, the Capitano poured the contents over 'her' head. The actor sputtered, smacked his lips, and cried, "A good year!" The crowd cheered. Cangrande tossed the fellow a coin and demurely handed the flowers to his wife. The show went on.
Poco glanced sidelong at his father. "Fun stuff!"
Dante shook his head. "Poor Aristophanes. If anyone should take such liberties with my work, I should rise from the dead and castrate them."
"That's real contrapasso," murmured Pietro. His father chuckled.
Only the Capitano's wife appeared unappreciative of his antics. Or perhaps it was her neighbours that bothered her. To Giovanna's right was Cangrande's sister Katerina, with only Bailardino separating them. Gay and lively, thoroughly enjoying the antics of the jugglers, Katerina behaved as if there were nothing the matter whatsoever.
At least there was no sign of the boy. Already the people had glommed onto this child as Cangrande's successor. If the Scaliger had no legitimate son, this child, they said, would be the natural heir. The term natural was thought to be a nice double entendre.
Pietro watched as Giovanna carefully avoided Katerina's eyes while their husbands chatted across them. Instead the first lady of Verona conversed with the Bonaccolsi family — Passerino, his brother Guido, and Guido's wife Costanza della Scala, the forgotten older sister to Cangrande and Katerina.
The rest of the Capitan
o's family was in evidence. In the front row just past Donna Katerina sat Cecchino, the groom of Pietro's first day in Verona. He held his wife's hand and smiled blissfully. Rumour said she was already with child.
Past them sat the two little nephews of the Scaliger, Alberto and Mastino. Alberto was watching the goings on in the pit with avid interest. Mastino, on the other hand, listened intently to the adult conversations around him.
A fortnight in the Scaligeri household had not increased Pietro's liking for the child. His first impression had been correct. Mastino ran about causing all sorts of trouble, leaving the blame to rest squarely on the shoulders of his older brother, the kind and oblivious Alberto. No matter how often Alberto was chastised for his brother's deeds, he came lumbering back to fall into the trap anew. In amused sympathy, the servants had taken to calling the older boy Alblivious.
Pietro scanned the rest of the faces around him. By now he knew the Scaliger's intimates well enough. Directly in front of Pietro sat Nico da Lozzo and Guglielmo da Castelbarco, both of whom wore their wartime gorgets to the festivities, following the latest of French style. As Pietro returned their nods, his father coughed and muttered, "Dandies."
On the other side of the balcony, far from Pietro, Marsilio and Giacomo da Carrara sat in the front row. No doubt it was an invitation of politics, but the uncle appeared to be enjoying himself. Marsilio looked as handsome and mean-spirited as ever. Pietro recalled his lost ransom with a little bitterness.
Turning in his seat, Pietro finally spied Mariotto. The Montecchi clan were seated a row behind the Paduans, a position Mari must have hated. Pietro's friend was wearing the purple and silver, though the feather in his hat was from a swan, pure white. While Pietro knew he cut a fine figure in his new clothes, withered leg and all, he couldn't hold a candle to Mariotto. The fellow couldn't be unhandsome if he tried.