by Cate Glass
I agreed. “That could buy us more time to understand Livia and pry Donato’s secrets out of him. He near collapsed when Placidio suggested we might tell his family that he was pissing himself.”
“There’s more going on with him than cowardice,” said Placidio. “Why did he ask us if ‘this is a test’—this being the snatch? And what did he mean by ‘whatever you think you know’ when you challenged him about making sorcerers into sniffers, or ‘you picked the wrong family to test’? That was more than preening his feathers to scare us. His words are very well-considered. He knew exactly who the Cavalieri Teschio are. Why would he think they were testing him?”
Lost in hatred of Donato’s people—and fear for Neri—I had seen the whole fabric of the conversation but missed the most interesting threads.
“You also warned we might tell his father he was revealing Confraternity secrets,” I said. “Just before he removed himself.”
“Aye. That I did. Maybe it’s not just his da he’s afraid of. Maybe he knows something he shouldn’t. He’s got to be wondering how the Cavalieri got into the villa to snatch him.”
“Which leaves us interesting speculations,” said Dumond, “but no more information to persuade him to forgo his coming marriage. The young man isn’t a fool, but perhaps is not quite sure what’s happening to him. So you two should keep watching, while I deliver our ransom demands.”
I disagreed. “I was thinking that someone else should go.”
“It’s clear Neri can’t do it,” said Dumond, cutting off a hunk of sausage. “Nor provide a sword here in case someone finds us while Placidio’s off to the city. And a woman traveling alone at night will invite too many questions.”
Neri, of course, could have used his magic to dart in and out of the Academie to deliver ransom demands. But Dumond …
“You can’t,” I said. “A stranger showing up to deliver a message is going to be detained, if not immediately arrested. Making a portal to get inside leaves you exposed for too long, especially if you leave it open for a quick escape; the Academie and Villa Giusti and likely the steward’s house, as well, will be on high alert for any magic. But I know some ways to deliver messages without getting personally or magically involved, and I can talk my way through the gates if I need to.”
“And having you here fixing us an escape route will be a boon, my friend,” said Placidio.
Dumond conceded our points. A rocky grotto, down the stair where I’d found Neri, housed the ruin’s spring. Dumond planned to paint a door down in the grotto and a matching one somewhere near the base of the bluff, allowing us to bypass the narrow path if we needed to escape an assault. But the spanning distance through solid rock would be greater than any he had ever attempted. He wasn’t sure he could make it work.
I downed a last fig. “Before I set out, I think it’s time for my first venture as Nis, the unhappy cavaliera. See if I can worm anything useful out of Livia.”
“You’ll think out your questioning this time, yes?” said Placidio.
I swallowed all retorts that came to mind. No question I’d been stupid with Dono. “His Confraternity prattling just got under my skin. Maybe Neri can do better, if he ever wakes—”
“He’s awake, and for any who’s worried, he’s quite recovered.” My shirtless brother sat himself between Dumond and me, engulfing us in the scent of overripe youth. “And I’m hoping most of this feast is left for me. I think my last week’s meals leaked out with all that blood.”
Despite the brave words, Neri’s lips were colorless, and his grin forced. He reached for the cheese, but instantly aborted the move and grabbed his bandaged shoulder. “Demonscat!”
He eased himself backward until he could lean on a broken column. His limp black curls dangled over his eyes. “Maybe not entirely recovered.”
I set the bag of figs where he could reach it and took the opportunity to feel his hand and his cheek. “You’re not fevered. You’re walking. Certain, you were not useless last night.” Easy to see the guilt reddening his face. “And maybe not even so useless today, if you’re willing to be a bit more uncomfortable. Before you dozed off this morning, you said we ought to throw you in a pit…”
I told him how he’d given me the idea to impersonate an unwilling member of the Cavalieri in hopes of getting some answers out of Livia. “And Placidio and I thought that maybe, while your wound still so clearly pains you, and before you wash…”
“You could throw me in with Dono the Groom.” Though his eyes were yet squeezed as he breathed through the pain, he managed the shadow of a grin. “I could do that. Certain, no playacting’s required to act uncomfortable.”
“Things are getting complicated in the city,” I said, “and the sooner we can make a plan for these two, the better. While I beard the she-wolf in her den, Placidio can stash you in the cellar with Donato. We’ll say we’ve acquired a new captive and had to rough him up. Then you can observe what he does when his captors aren’t looking, see if you can poke him into giving us a clue as to what he’s about … what scares him besides his father.”
“Are you sure the woman’s stewed long enough for you to question her again?” said Placidio. “She’s tough as a buck’s hindquarters and will take some softening.”
“Three days from now she comes of age. The philosophists want her wed before that, so every hour that passes makes this riskier. With the Gardia joining in the search, I’m not sure we’re safe to hide them very long. I need for her to trust me.”
We made sure Neri consumed enough ale and figs to keep him going. In truth he couldn’t stomach much. Once we’d told him of our conversation with Donato, I dosed his horrid, seeping wound with Vashti’s salve, somewhat comforted that the redness and swelling had not worsened. After wrapping it with fresh bandage, I dampened the filthy, blood-stiffened rags we’d used to bind the wound at the villa.
“I hate doing this,” I said, rewrapping the nasty strips over the fresh. “But it’s only for a few hours. Then we’ll clean everything again and use the salve—”
“Stop fretting,” said Neri. He lurched to his feet. “It’s a good plan. Smart. And I won’t have to loll around here with naught to do but feel sorry for myself.”
“I’m off to Livia,” I said. “I’ve decided to do a real impersonation for her. This girl is smart and observant. If she suspects I’m pretending, she’ll not tell me anything.”
“Makes sense. Are we ready?” Placidio had donned his black hood and cape.
When Neri nodded, Placidio heaved him as gently as possible over his shoulder. “You’ll follow my lead, eh?”
“Will,” said Neri, gulping repeatedly, as if ready to spew down Placidio’s back. “Make him believe this, swordmaster. Don’t know as I could fight a suckling just now.”
I smeared a little extra dirt on his face with my bloody fingers. “Put all you know about Donato right out of your head. He’s got to be a stranger to you. Forget all you know of Placidio, too. He’s your cruel captor, who’s cut you and doesn’t care if you die.”
Dangling upside down, Neri could produce only a finger wag.
“And you, lady scribe,” said Placidio, “be wary of this Livia. She’s stronger than you’ll believe.”
“I will.”
Placidio drew up his hood and marched down the path. Soon we heard him bellowing curses, and complaints that this new fellow would be the death of us all. “No ransom for you, little pustule! It’s off to the skin traders.”
Spirits, Neri …
“The swordsman will keep watch on him,” said Dumond, at my side, “and I’ll do the same for you, soon as I’ve taken care of the beasts.”
“I’ll be fine,” I said.
“Certain, you will.”
Dumond headed for the downward path. The borrowed mare and cart horses had been left on a ground tether between two outcropping bastions of the bluff. The grazing was so poor, he’d brought hay and oats in his last cartload.
Time to go. I bit my lip h
ard to make it bleed and swell. Then I pricked my finger with my knife and smeared a bit of blood on my forehead and a fringe of hair. It would be dry by the time I got to Livia. After the rough night, I’d no fear that my appearance might belie my impersonation of an abused partisan of the Cavalieri Teschio.
Breathing away my immediate concerns, I considered who I needed to become. Nis would be daughter of the nameless man who founded the Cavalieri. She had been horrified to learn what her father and his capos really did. When an attempt to run away—her first and only—failed, her father threatened to sell her to the Cavalieri’s sordid partners. Since then she had served as a minder for the snatch-crew’s young victims, ensuring that were the Cavalieri ever caught, she would hang alongside them.
I pocketed a small flask of ale, hung a cup and a sturdy stick at my belt, and wiped more dirt on my face and neck—likely unnecessary by this point. Surely I was as filthy and ripe as Neri. As I walked down the path, I considered all I knew of Livia, including the slip she had made; certain, it was the mention of her father had boosted her confidence.
When I reached for magic, it flooded into me with such raw, convulsive power, it almost knocked me to the ground. As soon as I could breathe again, I abandoned myself …
This new girl captive is so bold. Capo wants to repay her attempt to stab him, so he thinks to tame her with thirst. Certain, she’s no beauty. Her arms are sinewy, more like a man’s. Her chest is flat and her complexion sun-blotched. But her red hair has a pretty wave, were it tamed and brushed, and her overlarge lips and light, fierce eyes could be an advantage if she gave half a try. But if she’s starved and withered, the traders will declare her a drab—and a troublesome one at that. She’d bring a wretched price. Then Capo would blame me for not tending her, and Da, who ever believes Capo’s word over mine, will have me beaten again.
Peering over the rim of the cellar, I saw the girl’s still form under the slab half-roof. I threw the rope ladder down and descended quickly. Stick at the ready, I stepped under the slab, keeping as far from her as I could. Capo had made her new shackle shorter than the one she broke and tighter around her ankle, but she was tall and had long arms.
I knew she was someone important. The house where we snatched her was huge and fine, but a guard had been posted at her bedchamber door. So was she a captive there as well as here? That seemed unlikely; she’d had two weapons at hand, ready to use. We’d never taken a captive girl near my own age. They’d always been whiny youngers.
“Sssst. Girl!”
She didn’t move.
Like always I could hear Mam’s warning in my head: Don’t trust the wolf that lies still when you go near. Its muscles are ready to spring.
“I’ve brought ale for you, girl. Move to hurt me and I’ll take it away and not come back. And if you think Capo will relent and feed you, I’ll tell stories about how much he hates females who defy him.”
“Your very presence here makes all you say a lie. The big bully’s probably just out of sight up there, ready to laugh as you torment me. But I won’t play. I don’t care what you’ve brought.”
She already sounded dry, ready to snap like a dead twig.
“The rasp in your throat makes that a lie,” I said, spitting on the ground. “The day’s hot. I’m not stupid. And Capo is off on another snatch. Once he gets back here, we’ll deliver news of your price to that house where we found you.”
You’d think she was bit by a wasp, she sat up so sharp. “To the Confraternity? He said he was delivering it to my father.”
“It’s going to the people in the house where you were. You claimed you were to be betrothed today. Capo may be a brute, but he’s smart, too. He looked around and he got thinking the people in that big house valued you more than your family does. They’d likely paid good money for you already. Had a guard on you. He said perhaps they don’t know you as well as your own folks.”
“They don’t.” She said this to herself, not to me. “Not yet.”
My eyes were getting accustomed to the shade, so I could see her face. She believed I was nothing. Stupid as one of the rocks.
Easing close as I dared, I set down the cup, opened the flask, and poured a swallow of ale into the cup so she could smell it. I kept the flask and sat down, farther away.
She eyed me and the ale cup, one and then the other, but made no move to get it. Likely she didn’t know she was rubbing her dry lips together or how frequently she blinked, trying to dampen her gritty eyes. I knew what thirst looked like.
“So why are you here?” she said. “Won’t your capo beat you for bringing me that?”
“If your people won’t pay, then Capo don’t care how much you bring from the skin traders. He’d rather watch you shrivel to nothing—maybe die—cause you knifed him. Though the fault would lie with your people and with him, I’m the one’ll get blamed.” I touched the bloody spot on my head where Capo had cuffed me. “So I’ll bring you a drink when I can. But a favor’s not cheap. You have to pay before I give it to you. I want to know why.”
Her eyebrows raised up so her light-colored eyes looked like a beacon in the shade. “Why what? You people are the felons. Not me. I hope you hang.”
I squirmed a little. Capo said he’d left her without any rocks to throw, but she was clever, and I’d never done this kind of thing.
“Never had a chance to talk to a rich girl before. Why did you carry two knives in a house where you were going to marry? Do all girls like you do that? And why did they have a guard at your door—to keep you in or to keep somebody out? And was it the lord or one of those boys to be your husband?”
“Pssh. I owe you no answers.” She propped her wrists on her knees, letting her hands dangle, as if naught in the world bothered. How was she not scared?
Well, we’d see. I emptied the cup into the dirt. Then poured another swallow into the cup and moved backward again.
“You’re a brassy one,” I said. “I’m scared all the time. Asleep. Awake. In my dreams. I want to know how you got brave. Or maybe it’s just you’re too stupid to be scared.”
She snorted and didn’t move. So I did it again—another drink poured into the dirt. A third bit in the cup. She’d understand sooner or later. When the flask was empty, I’d leave.
I waited. The broken pavement throbbed with heat, even in the shade. The breezes of the heights didn’t reach down here. My own tongue was already parched.
“Oh, all right.” She had to stretch out full length to reach, but she emptied that cup in one swallow and held it out for more.
“Answer first.”
She rolled her eyes. “I carry knives because I’ve learned that there are very few people in this world one can trust. I’ve no idea if other rich girls carry knives. I never thought of myself as a rich girl, but I suppose you’d see it that way. They had a guard on me because I ran away. You’d think they’d reason that since I came back of my own will, I wasn’t planning to leave again, but then Confraternity people are either blind fools or conniving liars. All they care about is ordering the world in their own way. And I’m contracted to Director Bastianni’s eldest son. I had no say in the business. Evidently it was done before I was even born.”
“You said you were one as liked women. Was that why you run off?”
“Partly. And also why I went back. Sometimes you have to choose unpleasant paths to get what you want. That’s why I decided to accept the contract. It would have worked if you cretins hadn’t dragged me off. Now they’ll think I arranged this to get out of it.”
If she weren’t such a shrew, I might’ve felt a bit sorry for her, strange as that seemed. “Maybe we’ve done you a favor. The fellow likely won’t want you back once you’ve been in the hands of scum like Capo. You’re likely well shed of him. He was havin’ a romp with some other fellow when we was looking to find you.”
“That would be Silvio, Dono’s brother, who’s entirely a creature of flesh and impulse. Dono would never in the world commit a human act.
He has an attendant who probably pisses for him and chews his food. Had I been asked my preference, I would have chosen Silvio a hundred times over Dono. But like me, Silvio wasn’t even born when they made this damnable contract.”
Something about that nicked at me—about the brothers.
“So was it the milksop you was to wed? Two were just childer, but the other woke up, saw our skull marks, and fainted dead away.”
“Dono doesn’t faint, he … leaves. Don’t know how he does it. Some whisper that he’s sickly or a half-wit, but I think he’s just—”
Curiosity got the better of me. “Just what?”
She smirked and held out the cup.
“Set it down and move back where you were.”
She tried to stay close enough to grab me, but I wasn’t having any. When she was back to the wall, I poured another swallow and scooted back to my place.
The girl sipped, savoring it. “Aren’t you satisfied yet?” she said.
I wasn’t. Her story didn’t make sense once I gave it a thought. “So if he’s not sickly, then what was he doing? And why did you run away, if you had already decided to wed him?”
“You wouldn’t understand.”
“Why? Because I’m stupid and you’re a high-and-mighty?” I scrambled to my feet and shoved the flask into my pocket. I’d had enough of her sharp tongue. “Who’s gonna end up a drab for skin traders, yeah? Because I’m the one gonna deliver the ransom message tonight, and maybe it’ll just get lost along the way. All I want is to hear a story what’s different from mine. Not a favor. Not even a copper solet or a pretty ribbon. Not nothin’ that it would cost you to give.”
I was halfway to the ladder when she called me back.
“Nis—is that your proper name? Come back. Please. I … beg you.”
Never thought I’d hear a rich girl say please. Or beg …
Be careful, daughter. She thinks to play you. Mam was wise. Always warning me.
“Aye, I’m Nis.” I sauntered back her way. “Thirst don’t quit, does it?”
Even though she was in the shade and I stood in the sun, that girl was staring at me as if trying to peel my skin away and see my insides. “You’re carrying the ransom message?”