by David Blixt
“Thank you, my lord,” said Girolamo, bowing his head.
“There is a price. You must not speak of this to anyone outside this room. Not until we have spoken to the lady.” Girolamo grunted his assent. “And you must take us to that house. The house in Padua, where you were meant to go.”
That caused the cripple to frown and Dandolo to arch an eyebrow. But Girolamo nodded.
“One more thing,” said Tharwat al-Dhaamin. “I must go with you.”
Now it was Pietro's turn to frown. But he accepted Tharwat's statement, saving questions for a more private occasion.
Retrieving his cooled drink, Dandolo sipped. “The lady is capable of answering questions?”
Pietro said, “Her ailment has not deprived her of speech, or thought.”
“So it is genuine. Forgive my suspicious mind. I understand she has played the invalid before.”
Pietro glowered as Tharwat replied, “When it was to her advantage. I see no advantage here.”
“With these Scaligeri, it is hard to know.” Dandolo raised the goblet in his hand. “Twice shy, you see.”
They discussed arrangements for Girolamo's exit from the city, and Tharwat's part in it. At the last moment, Poco offered to join the party leaving the next morning. Pietro was pleased, if a little concerned. Poco had trouble concealing anything important, like his feelings, or a secret.
Rising, Dandolo escorted them to the door, saying privately to Pietro, “I prefer to not appear in this.”
“Yes, I did hear poor Soranzo is ailing. We must not risk the reputation of one who means to be the next Doge.” Dandolo smiled at Pietro's perspicacity. Hand upon the door's handle, Pietro paused. “I have to compliment you one thing, at least. As friend or foe, you are unfailingly polite.”
Dandolo remained entirely unruffled. “All of my actions are political, none personal. Here, it is in my political interests to help you, which pleases me. Personally I abhor bringing unhappiness to men I admire. But for the good of Venice, I cannot allow myself to feel anything. Reason must dictate my actions.”
Pietro opened the door. “Whereas the Scaligeri feel everything.”
♦ ◊ ♦
SLIPPING OUT A private exit of La Rosa Colta, Cesco emerged into the chilly night quite alone. It had begun to snow, light flakes drifting down to melt as they touched his exposed flesh. He was acutely aware of the unexposed parts, and of the flush on his cheek. Damn. He hadn't yet achieved his goal. He longed to feel a postcoital nothing, a complete indifference to the act. If familiarity breeds contempt, he was not yet familiar enough.
Drink, he reminded himself. Until then, drink, the Leathe of Life. He lifted the skin of wine to his lips and slurped it down, splashing his fine doublet with crimson.
His step faltering, he tried to turn it into a little jig, giggling at himself. Realizing what an unmanly sound it was, he tried out different laughs until he found one that suited him. His first thought was Cangrande's laugh, deep and resonant. Then he found himself wondering if that was artifice, too. When does artifice become reality? If you pretend a thing long enough, do you become it? What am I pretending to be now?
It was a quiet night. For the first time in what seemed ages, Cesco was all alone. Tutto solo. He rested his spinning head by leaning it against the bricks of a house, watching the breath puff from between his lips. He tried to shape the tiny clouds, but it wasn't cold enough. I cannot even control the air in my lungs.
Feeling steadier, he walked carefully along the street, his shoulder close to the wall lest his feet choose to lose their grip. Idly, he reflected on having brothers. Barto was like a loyal hound, only with dimples, and Berto was like the little puppy chasing after the full-grown hound. They reminded him of Detto's brother Val, or perhaps of cousin Alberto. Good-natured, warm, cheerful. Nothing particularly special. They lacked what he'd come to see as a quality unique to the Scaligeri, an indefinable something that was more curse than blessing. Cangrande and Katerina had it. Mastino had it. The late Federigo had had a sliver of it. Detto had it, in more beneficent shades. Cesco himself had it.
Lia has it.
“Fut!” Shaking his head violently, Cesco slammed his closed fist against the nearest wall. That damned awful, unrepentant corner of his brain had done it again! It had made him think of her! And once thinking of her, the sequence progressed as it always did. First he thought of their initial meeting, on a snowy night like this one. Then of their last, with such horror in her eyes that Cesco was surprised he had not dropped dead from her gaze. He wished he had, because now he was thinking of her body, the thin, lithe form that he had known so well – too well…
He listened, hoping to hear the step he expected, a new fight to throw himself into. But there was nothing, no chance to blot out these images, purge the feelings that clawed his brain whenever he was still. A fight, a drink, a race, a jest, a gamble, a paid lover – any sensation to drown his overactive imagination.
Whores were especially important. Never the same one twice in a row, never one who talked too much or wanted to linger after. He needed to drown his memory of Lia's body in a sea of flesh, where limbs and breasts and that soft little nexus of birth and death all ran together into a nameless, faceless woman.
It seemed to have the opposite effect. Instead of forgetting Lia in the arms of other women, he was remembering her more each time.
If there's no fight… He slipped a wafer from his belt and pushed it between his lips, tasting the bitter sweet as he chewed it. This was useful, too. Anything to erase thoughts of Lia. For Lia was always in his mind, always talking to him, always eating at him, always searing his thoughts with guilt and longing. If I could take a knife and prise out the hunks of my brain on which she is written, all my pain would end—
For an instant the world went bright, and he wondered if he had actually stabbed himself in the brain. Sliding down the wall into the snow, the pain focused on the front of his head. Groaning, he cursed.
He was answered with more pain, this time in his stomach as a boot-heel descended again and again. Curling, Cesco covered up instinctively. Already his training was in action. He tried to catch the boot, missed, and so surged into a roll that tangled him up in his attacker's legs.
The figure came tumbling to the ground, and Cesco pounded at him with elbows and knees, his jaw jutting out as he sucked air in his nose and mouth together.
His assailant broke free, staggering away. Cesco came wincing to his feet, focused and happy. The heat of action had burned off the wine fogging his brain. He dabbed at the lump on his forehead. “O, thank you, a thousand times, stranger. You have no idea how much I needed that.”
“Bastard.” His attacker was taller than Cesco, clearly older. He swung, and Cesco blocked and shoved him back. “Bastard.”
“Whom have I offended today?” asked Cesco lightly as he bent his knees, readying himself for the next assault. “Be ye Paduan? Veronese? Florentine? Venetian? English? French? Spanish? German? Oh, please be German. It's been nearly three months since I killed a German. Would you be the relative of the importunate Fuchs, who died a-bleeding like an animal at slaughter? Or are you someone looking to make a name for yourself? Whatever,” said Cesco, rising to his full height, “you are most welcome.”
His attacker stepped back. “You don't even recognize me.”
He had, of course. “Why should I? Did I usurp your bedmate in there? She's still there, although perhaps not able to walk for the next few hours. Though I be but little, yet I am fierce.”
“You bloody whoremonger! You wouldn't fight me today.”
“Ah, is that you, thistle-down? I'm so sorry, I only fight those I know I can beat. It's the way to win. But perhaps that is not why you wanted to fight me? Is it to be close? Do you want to steal a kiss?”
The thistle-wearer looked first shocked, then disgusted. “You pervert! I'm here to win back my family's honour!”
“O excellent! A blood feud! Are we to be the new Montecchi and Capu
lletti? Alas, honour, thy name is as dust in my mouth. Dueling is verboten, my friend.”
“When did you ever shy away from the forbidden?”
“You're so very right. I love eating the forbidden apple, filching the unbought sweetmeat in the market, plucking another man's rose—”
That brought a cry of fury, accompanied by a knife, offering Cesco several moments' distraction and a wonderful clarity of focus. This would be a stupid death, and most deserved.
But she wouldn't like it, so Cesco didn't die. After ducking and evading, he stopped one blow at the elbow, twisted the wrist, and stripped the dagger away. He let it go skipping across the cobblestones. He didn't want to be armed. He didn't want this fight to be over. Not yet. However terrible, it was a connection to her.
His attacker was breathing hard. Too hard. Emotion had clenched his throat. Backing away, he spat, never taking his eyes from Cesco.
Since he seemed unlikely to speak for the nonce, Cesco filled the space. “You wish me to fly this life. But I am too, too wise. Have you never heard the tale of the girl who wanted to fly? A student at University offers to build her a tail, but it takes much repeated force, with the girl on all fours and the student hammering away. She tells him never to stop, day after day, until he gives her that tail.” And he quoted the close of the dirty French poem:
Since what she told him gave him joy,
he stayed on in the girl’s employ
and diligently worked her tail
continuing to bang and flail
away a little bit each day
till she was in a family way.
“Student,” she says, “I’ve been deceived!
Thanks to you, I think I’ve conceived:
That tail of yours has germinated!
I’ve been cruelly manipulated!
When I can scarcely walk upright,
what chance have I of taking flight?
I’ve seen my lot steadily worsen.
You certainly can fool a person!”
The student said, “By Saint Amant,
Why turn on me? What do you want?
You’re not diminished in your stature
when big with child – that’s only nature.
You take my word for this, however,
that it was prideful beyond measure
to think you could flight through the air,
more shame to you! How did you dare?
Now you will be a bit less flighty.”
“There's a tale of tails, and the hubris of wanting to soar, when it only makes you sore—”
He got no further. With an inchoate bellow of rage, the thistle-knight lunged. Cesco realized he might have miscalculated, then had no time to realize anything at all as he grappled and rolled and struggled with the thistle-knight, whose name Cesco knew all too well but was unwilling to utter. Until today, he hadn't been certain, that the family had known. Then he'd seen this man in the lists, staring and angling to fight him. He would have tried to kill, though it would have meant death for him too. Much better this way. If Cesco died, his killer would escape free. And he deserved this beating. This, and a thousand more.
She wouldn't want me to die. Or him.
The thistle-knight was beginning to suspect. Through the haze of rage and goading, he saw that Cesco was not taking the opportunities, not hitting the openings, fighting far less cleverly than he had in the lists today. “Fight me, you bastard! Fight me!”
“What do you think I'm doing?” demanded Cesco, half-choking, half-laughing. It felt so good, this release, this blessed pain and exertion. But it couldn't go on much longer. Even now there were footsteps. Someone would come, and the fellow was attacking Verona's princeling. He'd be hanged. She wouldn't like that.
Cesco was just about to fend the fellow off when his head exploded into a second sea of light. Tripping him, the thistle-knight slammed Cesco's head against the cobblestones.
Cesco plucked once at the man's sleeve, thinking to warn him. Then the thistle-knight was dragged off him and pummeled. Please, don't let it be the guards…
It was Prince Rupert, in the company of two of his Germanic fellows. And with them, Benedick and Detto. Always, Detto.
The thistle-knight was being roughly handled, and Cesco sought the breath to halt them before they went too far. “Stop – let him go…” Feeble. No one seemed to hear. Cesco repeated it to the men kneeling at his arm.
Holding a torch that stole the colour from his red hair, Benedick looked confused, but beside him Detto heard. He repeated the words, or at least one of them. “Stop! Stop! Cesco says to stop!”
“Of course,” answered Rupert, politely grim. “I imagine he would like the pleasure himself.”
There would be no pleasure in it now. The thistle-knight's face was already swelling, his lower lip cracked, his left eye was shut and enormous. Cesco had done none of that. Part of him wished he had. With a Herculean effort, he rose to his feet. “Let him go.”
“He was going to beat you to death!” protested Rupert.
“Are you blind? He was showing me a trick, and I slipped. He was helping me up, and he slipped.” Cesco hoped he wouldn't have to talk much longer. He was going to be sick.
“Slipped,” repeated Rupert, uncertain of the Italian word.
Cesco repeated his statement in Bavarian German. It was utterly absurd, and yet absolutely clear that Cesco would not countenance this man being called to account.
Shrugging, Rupert nodded to his men to let their prisoner go. Loosed, the thistle-knight staggered, stepping into the light from Benedick's brand. Detto let out a gasp of understanding. But then, he'd met the fellow before. And the rest of his family.
“Should we not at least ask his name?” said Rupert.
“I know his name.” Cesco's voice was severe, yet contrite. “The first among men. But I think my thanks for saving me from falling will have to wait until I am sober. Let him depart.”
The thistle-knight looked first surprised, then disgusted. Cesco had known his name all along, and not fought back. Pulling his shoulders straight, Adamo Rienzi leveled an accusing finger at Cesco. “You're a coward.”
It was on the tip of Cesco's tongue to make a coy remark, test the waters, find out how much Adamo knew. But to open those doors was to invite the storm. “I suppose I am.”
Torchlit-face contorted in rage, the thistle-knight fell silent. Cesco could almost hear the fists clench and unclench. The five others waited. When the battered attacker made no move to continue, Cesco turned. “Detto, help me into some house. Any will do.”
That stirred a comment from his foe. “You really don't care, do you? You used her and threw her away, and never cared for her at all.”
I care enough not to kill her brother. Her other brother. But this answered one question. Adamo knew nothing of incest.
Their father would, though. Down and down.
Rupert's face was suddenly amused. “Is that all? Some tryst gone awry?”
“Naturally,” replied Cesco with exasperation. “He's a shepherd, and I despoiled his prize ewe. Used her, you might say. In the face. It was while La Rosa Colta was closed for repairs. Any port in a storm.”
As Germans chuckled, Adamo shook a fist. “Stay away from her, you hear me? Stay away from all of us!”
“I have taken the golden fleece, Jason,” said Cesco. “I need not sail again.” Stop talking, you idiot!
“I mean it. Stay away from her husband's lands and ours, or you're a dead man, prince or no!”
Shock rippled through Cesco's body. He quickened his pace, hoping to turn the corner before his mouth betrayed him. Husband?
“You threaten a prince?” asked Rupert darkly. A prince himself, he was on the verge of continuing the beating.
“It's not a threat,” said Cesco. “He knows I am allergic to sheep. I break out in a rash. I will not act rashly, I promise.” Husband?
Of course. They would have married her off as quickly as they could, before the scandal g
ot out. He recalled her saying her father planned for her to marry their neighbour. What was his name?
Abramo Tiberio. “Old Bramo the wild-man,” she had laughed. “He once tore a wolf's leg off with his bare hands, they say.”
Husband. Lia, married. Rosalia Tiberio.
All's well then, thought Cesco savagely. She's married, and so am I. Everything's worked out so well!
As he staggered off between Benedick and Detto, he heard the bells from the nearby Duomo calling the monks to prayer. Reminded of wedding bells, he could not help himself crying into the night, “Congratulations to all newly-weds! Long may they suffer!”
♦ ◊ ♦
NOT FAR AWAY, in the home Cesco shared with his little bride, bells were also ringing, and feminine laughter fluted the air, but of a different sort than Cesco had heard at La Rosa Colta.
Little Maddelena was blindfolded, as were the household servants. Only the nurse Dahna's eyes were free. In exchange for her sight, the nurse was forced to wear small bells on her ankles and wrists, causing her to sound like a sleigh horse each time she moved.
The game was called Tintinnio, and the goal was for the blindfolded players to capture the jingling target as she hopped and jumped about, dodging as best she could. The best strategy was for the belled woman to find a place in the room to be absolutely still. But with a five-year-old playing, winning was not the goal. Especially not if the five-year-old in question was in dire need of distraction.
This was the most joy Maddelena had experienced since the wedding. Married nearly a week, she'd barely laid eyes on her husband. Occasionally she'd hear him on the other side of the house, or on some other floor. Once, coming back from church, she had witnessed a fight in the street that had frightened her so much that she'd hidden in her room all the next day, refusing to come down even for meals. Visiting, her mother and sisters were unable to shift her without employing force. Not even her new kitten could make her smile, though she clutched it close when it let her.
It had been Dahna who had devised an answer. In her mid-twenties, she had lost her own child at birth and her husband the following year in a battle with Paduan exiles. She'd nursed this child from infancy, and knew her well. So Dahna set about luring Maddelena with games. She'd begun with the board game Fox and Geese, then moved into more physical play.