Priest's Tale

by Turney, S. J. A.

  Skiouros sighed as he brushed the worst of the dust from his formerly expensive clothes. For more than a year now he had been taking lessons with the sword, and yet every day brought some fresh humiliation. The early lessons had been brutal and hard, but were at least basic and had been formed of the bulk of standard moves a man with a blade needed to know, beyond which end to stick in the enemy. Iannis had been a tough but likeable teacher, having been pensioned out of his military service for the Duke of Candia following a harrowing illness that had almost claimed his life. A resurgence in that sickness had laid him low again almost two months ago and he had been forced to relinquish his position as Skiouros' teacher. Briefly, the young Greek had paid a local hoodlum instead, but Draco had proved to be more handy with the seedier side of fighting than the use of a blade, and so finally Skiouros had come to retain Don Diego and accept his teachings. Despite that, he still saw Draco once a week for a little less noble instruction - it was always worth knowing a few extra unexpected tricks.

  "My right high guard" Skiouros replied, wrapping his tongue with some effort around the strange language, "is somewhat hampered by the fact that you have me wielding a sword that appears to weigh the same as a pregnant cow. My arm shakes when I try to hold it aloft."

  Don Diego gave his customary sneering smile as he carved 'figure eights' in the air, twisting the ends of his moustaches with his free hand.

  "Your Greek swords are lighter, but they are also shorter and less protective." Don Diego paused in his endless whirling of steel to indicate the gleaming blade that his pupil would be willing to wager cost more money than Skiouros had ever held. "The Spanish rapier," the Don went on "is a more elegant sword with a longer reach, a more flexible blade and side rings for extra finger protection and grip. It is becoming the norm for the gentry of Spain and presents a good, effective and graceful weapon when compared with the glorified meat cleaver developed here in the east."

  "I don't need to look elegant. I just need to be able to fight."

  "There is no point, young Greek, in learning to do something poorly. Learn correctly or decide not to learn at all."

  Skiouros swished saliva around his mouth for a moment and spat the dusty dryness out onto the floor, causing the Spaniard to roll his eyes in disapproval.

  "Come on, then. Let's try again."

  Skiouros stepped forward and raised the heavy, gleaming Spanish blade so that he gripped the hilt close to his chin, left foot extended forward for stability and the sword point slightly inclined down towards Don Diego's groin.

  "Up! Up!"

  Mumbling curses in his native Greek, Skiouros raised the tip.

  "The whole blade, boy. Not just the tip. Hold it by your ear!"

  With more grumbles and muttering, Skiouros lifted the blade, feeling his muscles complaining at the weight. A distant carillon from the bells of Saints Petros and Paulos told him that the day's lesson was almost over and he felt an overwhelming sensation of relief.

  A shimmering line of gleaming sunlight sliced a neat line through his shirt close to the waist. Skiouros' mind drew back from the impending end of the lesson to realise that he'd been struck as his mind drifted. Damn the Spaniard!

  "What was that?" he snapped.

  "That was a reminder that I am here, costing you money," Don Diego laughed "and that daydreaming is a good way to get yourself killed in a fight. Concentrate!"

  Skiouros glared at the man, noting with irritation how the tip of his own sword wavered and dropped slightly in front of him as he seethed.

  "I am going to come in from the left" the Spaniard announced, "and fast. Show me how quickly you can bring the blade down to block."

  Skiouros narrowed his eyes. There was something about the Spaniard's stance and his manner that suggested a lie. Skiouros had always been good at recognising lies - it was a prime requisite of the professional liar.

  A strange silence descended, broken only by the song of a contented bird in one of the trees just beyond the wall, the dying echo of the church bells and the constant chirring of the cicadas that hummed and buzzed across the whole island. The sun continued to sizzle in the cloudless sapphire sky, causing the ground to shimmer in the heat.

  And Don Diego de Teba lunged, uncoiling so fast that he blurred, moving with the grace and speed of a hunting bird. His blade flashed out, coming round not from the left as he'd said, but from the right. Though he'd not the time to smile, somewhere inside Skiouros congratulated himself on his powers of observation as his rapier dropped in the path of the Spaniard's strike. The swords met in a loud ring of steel and then a rasp as the blades grated along one another before they came away once more.

  Why he did what he did next, Skiouros wasn't entirely sure, other than the fact that the ever-superior Spaniard had just pissed him off a little too much today, or possibly that he felt the need to show his ability in some way other than badly.

  As Don Diego swept his blade away, spinning in order to present himself for the next move, Skiouros ignored the standard instruction to come straight back up into a guard position as the Spaniard would always have it and, instead, took a heavy step forward, following closely the retreating master and bringing his heavy boot heel down upon the man's foot, causing him to stumble and lose his cool. With a smooth motion, Skiouros lunged out with his loosely-held rapier and flicked Don Diego's own blade from his grasp as the man staggered.

  The Spaniard lurched to a halt and brought himself up straight, one eyebrow arched in a supercilious manner. Skiouros dipped to the floor and retrieved the teacher's blade from the dust, swishing it a few times before reversing the sword and offering the hilt back to the man.

  "What, may I ask, was that?" Don Diego enquired in a low voice, and considerably faster than his usual slow, deliberate instructive tone.

  "That," Skiouros spat with a malicious grin "was a move that my other instructor gifted me."

  The Spaniard took his blade and examined it for damage from the gravel, noting with relief that the beautiful silvered hilt was still gleaming and unmarked.

  "That was the act of a street brute. No gentleman of Spain would stoop to such base thuggery."

  Skiouros rolled his shoulders.

  "If I were feeling malevolent I might be tempted to ask what such a fine Spanish gentleman as yourself was doing so far from home trading his skills as a sellsword?"

  "Some stones are best left unturned, young Greek. Leave it at that."

  "Don Diego, since I require only the ability to defend myself and fight off would-be attackers, I fail to see the need to learn the etiquette of gentlemanly swordsmanship. I will never move in such circles and I have no need to ever visit your homeland, my sights being set on closer goals than Spain. Perhaps you could concentrate more on the practical than the elegant?"

  "Perhaps the time has come to sever our arrangement, if you feel you are not learning what you need, young man?"

  Don Diego stepped back into the shade of the colonnade, wiping his blade on a linen square and then sheathing it at his waist. Skiouros stood for a long moment, sword in his hand, until the strange spell was broken by the bells of the great 'Saint Titus' cathedral picking up the ringing of the hour from the dying echoes of the church of Saints Petros and Paulos, which was always two minutes early. As the fresh clanging filled the air, Skiouros nodded.

  "I fear my time for lessons may be coming to an end anyway, Don Diego, through no fault or failing of yours. Time presses and a long-set-aside task looms in the coming days. If I find that I have the time and funding to continue I will seek you out, if that is acceptable."

  The Spaniard pursed his lips and gave a curt nod. "Unless my services have been fully retained elsewhere I am still amenable to our arrangement."

  As Don Diego sketched an elegant bow and stepped away into the darkness of the colonnade and the doors it concealed, Skiouros sheathed his own blade and wiped the patina of sweat from his brow - a futile move that simply made room for the next wave of perspiration that bro
ke across his hairline. It really was remarkable what a difference in weather he had experienced since leaving Istanbul almost a year and a half ago and travelling down here to this ancient island that formed the southern arc of the Greek world, albeit under Italian mastery these days.

  The winters were temperate, lacking the snow that occasionally cursed the new Ottoman capital, providing only regular - even warm - rain. The summers seemed to present an endless sky of bright, deep blue and a searing heat that blanched the world and sapped the energy of its inhabitants. Crete seemed to suffer a sun-inspired languor that would be abhorrent to the busy world of Istanbul.

  He would be sad to leave - but leave he must, and soon too.

  Walking across to the horse trough at the side of the courtyard, Skiouros bent double and dipped his head in, straightening and throwing it back so that the tangled, unkempt hair - too long to be fashionable and too short to be seen as exotic - sprayed a diamond stream of droplets through the air - droplets that hissed into steam almost as soon as they hit the ground. Blinking away the water, Skiouros rubbed his face with sun-tanned hands and straightened before collecting his doublet from the stone bench and making for the gate, noting with some satisfaction that the ragged Romani had disappeared.

  Should he visit Lykaion?

  Time was not an issue - he could easily spare five minutes to dip into the great church of Saint Titus and spend a moment in deep conversation with the ornate yet featureless casket that held his brother's mortal remains. The priests and monks at the church had become more than used to his daily visits over the past year and a half, expressing their admiration at the diligence with which the young man paid reverence to the hallowed relic. They would piss their cassocks if they knew the truth: that the head of Saint Theodoros - which sat in blessed state close by the sacred and powerful head of Saint Titus - was in fact the head of Lykaion, son of Nikos the farmer, a former Janissary in the Ottoman army. What they did not know could not hurt them.

  Perhaps he would visit later.

  His ever growing understanding of the world of the Catholic church and its denizens, gleaned over a year and a half of daily visits, reminded him that the great feast of Annunciation fell on the morrow, and the church would be in a state of organised chaos in preparation. With his almost special relationship to the church of Saint Titus - he was on name terms with many of the priests - there was a good chance he would be roped into some role for the festival if he poked his face into the cathedral.

  No. He'd seen Lykaion after breaking his fast, while the sun had still been mercifully cool, and his brother was going nowhere. He could wait 'til the morning now. Once the festival had begun, most of the activity would take place in the streets and the church itself would be a haven of peace among the madness until the time came for the services to draw the population back in.

  For now there were other matters upon which to ponder - matters on which he was unsure of Lykaion's ability to help.

  Matters of the future.

  Running his hands through his tangled hair to wring the bulk of the moisture from it, Skiouros opened the iron catch and swung the gate wide, stepping out into the narrow street, bounded on both sides by pale stone buildings, many whitewashed against the heat. The road was of old, flattened and smooth cobbles, interspersed with fragments of horse dung that had remained trapped in the grooves so long that it had lost all moisture and smell and become little more than straw and dust.

  The narrow road led down a gentle slope towards the centre of town, with its churches and monuments, the great marble palaces of Venetian power, the bustling markets and the numerous inns, including the modest yet respectable one that had become his home more than a year gone.

  He was not bound for the centre now. In fact, as he walked, greeting the passers-by in a friendly manner and pausing to scratch between the ears of the vast population of stray dogs, he moved in a circuitous route, edging round the centre of the town, keeping to the smaller, quieter streets until he emerged finally, blinking and sweaty, into the Via Porta, which ran from the larger markets and the mercantile quarter down to the great harbour. Here were taverns that provided anonymity and peace. Though filled with off-duty sailors carousing and with endless revelry, a man could sit in these houses of Bacchus and sup, keeping his own company without being scrutinised by the other occupants.

  Such care was, of course, unnecessary.

  He was a legitimate inhabitant of the city. He had arrived moderately well-off and had stayed within the aegis of the law his entire time on the island. He had been a model citizen and a regular church-goer (even if only to visit Lykaion). But old habits, as they said, died hard. A decade of hiding from the authorities and watching his tracks back home was not a practice that could be broken in a year and, despite his newfound legitimacy, he was still more comfortable keeping to himself wherever possible.

  Skipping lightly around a small group of sailors rolling barrels down the street towards the docks, Skiouros made for the Taverna di San Marco, one of the better establishments on the street, and one that had the thoughtfulness to provide a set of benches on the street front, shaded by a canvas canopy. Passing the wooden railing and dropping with relief onto a bench out of the sun, Skiouros watched with no small amusement as a barrel suddenly escaped one of the passing sailors' inexpert grasp and careened away down the street causing shrieks of alarm and a scattering of the populace. Half a dozen of the men from the same ship - including two seated in this very tavern - suddenly burst into life, chasing down the rolling barrel. A futile gesture. They could hardly hope to catch it. Shame… it was probably the sweet hot Candian wine or Tsikoudia brandy bound for the markets of Venice, worth more than any dozen sailors. Those men would be living frugally for years to pay off the loss of that barrel.

  For just a moment Skiouros flinched, his memory furnishing him with an image of the massed ranks of barrels filled with black powder in the explosive store of the abandoned church back in Istanbul. If these barrels were of gunpowder then Skiouros could only pity the people gathered wherever the container came to an abrupt halt. With the heat of some of the stones and glass in this sunlight, gunpowder was a menace just in the open sunlight, without the need of a naked flame to ignite it.

  Still, nothing came of the barrel's descent, barring a great deal of arguing some half a thousand yards down the hill, and Skiouros felt himself relax once more. A serving girl appeared through the doorway and spotted the new arrival. Rhea was a pleasant enough young woman, though her complexion spoke of a childhood run-in with the pox. Glancing in his direction, she gestured simply - a drinking motion. Skiouros nodded. An economy of communication. Rhea knew what he would want and would make sure he got the better wine and not the cat's piss the owner tended to dole out to the sailors when they started to become too inebriated to notice.

  As he waited for the drink to arrive, Skiouros glanced around the street at the general hubbub of the city and, satisfied that no one seemed to care who he was, opened up his doublet and slid out a leather folder, dropping it onto the table with a slap.

  The folder was of fine calf-skin, elegantly stitched and branded with the mark of the Medici whose tentacles reached into every corner of the mercantile world, extracting their fees for managing the finances of the great and the good - and sometimes even the poor and forgotten.

  Slipping the thong aside, Skiouros opened the container and perused the records within.

  It was a less than thrilling sight.

  Sliding the upper vellum sheet down, he examined the records on the next - earlier - one. Why, he had no real idea… it was hardly a surprise. If he looked back over all fourteen of them that went back to his arrival on the island, all they would show would be a steady dwindling of his funds to the latest depressing evaluation.

  He scratched his head and concentrated, hoping that perhaps he was misinterpreting the figures. His understanding of Italian as a spoken language was still a little slow, but his grasp of their written word was v
ery tenuous. Indeed, if he went back to the early sheets, he could find the serious dent in the finances where he had withdrawn enough money to pay the tutor the exorbitant fees he had demanded to teach the written word in both Greek and Italian and the spoken in the latter. As a bonus, the man had thrown in some rudimentary Latin lessons, claiming that their understanding would aid in the learning of Italian. It hadn't - not to Skiouros' mind, anyway.

  But no matter how unfamiliar the alphabet and how much he hoped that what he saw was the result of his struggling, the plain facts were there before his eyes, penned in black and red ink on the sheets of the local Medici banker.

  He would last another month or two at most. Less if he lived well or continued his sword lessons.

  His time was almost up.

  He paused and hurriedly folded the leather case as Rhea arrived with a tankard of good imported Piedmont wine, plonking it down before him with a friendly smile before turning and hopping away into the gloomy interior. As soon as he was alone once more, he reopened the folder and sighed once again at the figures that stared back at him,

  He had known this moment would come, even all those months ago when he'd first arrived on Crete. And yet, now that it was upon him, he found himself strangely reluctant to commit. There remained an unfinished task on the ledger of his life, many leagues away to the northwest, and everything he had done here in this past year had, theoretically, been merely steps in readiness for that task's undertaking.

  So many things achieved, really, in such a short time.

  He had learned his letters and a passing grasp of Italian from an expensive tutor. The latter had been made a great deal easier, admittedly, by regular contact in port with captain Parmenio of the Isabella and his purser, Nicolo, who had become the closest friends he had ever achieved. Possibly the only friends he had ever achieved? Parmenio had been experiencing a run of ill luck with trade and commissions and had found that for the past year all he could manage were small, moderately profitable runs to Santorini, Athens or Rhodos, or occasionally distant Cyprus. Despite bidding for big contracts to Venezia or Napoli or further afield, he had found himself in somewhat limited circumstances - a fact that had brought he and Skiouros into an ever closer understanding.