The Serpent

by Claire North

  Thene stares astonished at this man, and for a moment does not know where she stands, or what she does, or even who she is to have come to this pass, to be standing now hearing this tale. Is she not Thene, the Jew’s daughter? Is this earth not the earth, is the sky not the sky, are those centres of her world no more than the afterburn of the setting sun, a reflected illusion on the horizon?

  Then the Fool breaks out into a great guffaw of laughter, slaps her on the back and says, - You are delightful, dear lady, simply delightful – thank heaven for Milanese girls!

  And like that, he is gone.

  Chapter 25

  We remember this man, do we not?

  Too easy, too easy for a player, lost in their own cleverness, to forget the moves of other clever men!

  A great face of hair, two tiny eyes and a little nose, the rest lost beneath black beard and swagger. He is a proud man, this Knave of Swords, for who would not swagger who had seen death as many times as he has and lived to tell the tale? There is no monarch in this world, no pope or prince that can command him, for he – why, he has seen the fall of men and heard the growling at hellish gates and defied them all.

  He was sent to the house of Contarini, that most elusive of all the pieces, a man whose fear is almost greater than his sense – or perhaps rather, as time may show, perfectly matched to that scale of disaster that yet hangs over him. We have watched him on and off these last few days as he spoke to captains and sergeants, made enquiries about doors, noted quietly to himself each motion of every messenger, each movement of every spy, each coin that falls upon the ground at Contarini’s boot. Contarini, Contarini, you are being most cleverly played by that unseen man who stands behind the shuttered window. Tiapolo is lost, Seluda has yet to make its move but you, Contarini, you have united Church and state in the name of making money. Few things are as likely to win an election as this!

  A message comes to our Knave of Swords, word of a relic hidden somewhere about Contarini’s belongings. Destroy the relic, you destroy the excuse the bishops have to make their towers of gold, you destroy the profits that strangers will have in building these palaces to theological expense.

  So the command comes down – find the relic. Destroy it. Let us stop Contarini’s greatest play before he makes it.

  So our knave searches, making most discreet enquiries and abasing himself before the might of others. It doesn’t bother him, a proud man, to grovel before men he knows are lesser than he. His cleverness exceeds theirs, is clearly shown to exceed theirs with every lie he tells and quiver he makes – how clever indeed that a man so proud should slobber so extemporarily!

  When the end comes, it is without warning. He did not see it coming, did not dream that it was coming, but a stranger whose face is hidden by a mask held a card in his hand, the Sun, whose light shines into every corner and beneath whose gaze all things are revealed – why yes, even our ally, our friend, our rogue sent into another’s den.

  He stands upon the bridge, feels a hand upon his arm, hears the words, - May we speak?

  He turns, and the club that strikes his skull breaks both his jaw and two of his teeth in a single bounce. It is a crude weapon, perhaps fashioned from a cabinet-making project that failed, or chipped from the branch of a rotting tree. Can its owner not afford anything better?

  (Yes, he can, but he waited too long to acquire his wealth and invested too much pride in poverty, so now that he flaunts his tatty clothes, his thin shoes and in his proud humility, it is perhaps fitting that he now serves as our sergeant’s nemesis.)

  They beat him, our Knave of Swords. They beat him so no one can tell between what is swollen and what is broken, whether his features were ever really human. All red, red, the water runs red beneath him, his clothes are saturated with it, so that red seeps from velvet, and now they take him without word, without ceremony, to the house of Angelo Seluda, and three men hold him up while a man in a mask looks towards the high windows of this place, and waits.

  He waits until she appears – Thene, her mask as empty as his – and sure now that he has her attention, turns to one of the men who has helped carry our wounded knight to this place. This man pulls a small axe from his belt, of the kind that might be used to cut away heavy ropes from a ship under sail. Down the axe falls once, and twice, and away they go, leaving the Knave of Swords on the cobbles before Seluda’s door.

  They carry him inside, and she herself descends with a hessian sack. She picks up his right hand by the tip of the little finger, not looking at her work, then picks up his left, pinching it tight, thumb on the soft palm, finger on the still hairy top. The blood drips through the sack as she walks, and she tells herself that it is but flesh, is but meat, that bounces at her side.

  Earth, sea or fire? For a moment she cannot decide, before at last throwing the bag into the ocean, weighted with a stone. It is blissful how fast the waters claw these fingers down, and how little blood is on her hands as she washes them in the fountain before the church.

  When she returns, the Knave of Swords is dead.

  The blood loss was too great, the shock, the pain – or perhaps with his last glimmer of awareness, as the mercenary saw his hands struck from his body, he resolved that life itself was not worth the living, and let go of it with the same force of will which, until that time, he had lived it.

  Seluda says, - Who was he?

  - A piece, she replies. - He was a piece.

  - Why did they do this?

  - I sent him to the house of Contarini to find an object. The player who runs that piece has sent him back.

  - I thought players didn’t hurt other players.

  - You are correct. Nowhere in the rules does it say what may happen to our pieces.

  Angelo Seluda is silent at this. We do not think he is a foolish man, and if he did not know before what it is to be played, perhaps he does now.

  She retires to her room; does not look back.

  Chapter 26

  The coin turns, the coin turns.

  She rolls it between her fingers.

  The coin turns, and she does not understand.

  Chapter 27

  She returns to the Gameshouse.

  Faliere’s player does not come there any more, nor does Contarini’s. The game is too advanced for them to dally with lesser matters.

  She does not spare much thought to Tiapolo.

  - You play? he asks.

  We know this man too, do we not? Silver in the sleeves, a face that is too tired to be young, too soft to be old. It is as if the age has been rubbed away from him, leaving a featureless surface behind which smiles from habit, not from humour. We called him Silver before, the man who challenged her to play, and now he sits opposite her once more but does not move towards the pieces or the dice, but rather asks again:

  - You play? Here, still? I thought you were engaged in higher matters.

  - I find that the games played here helps focus my mind.

  - You should be careful. Others will watch you, learn your style, your techniques. Even in a simple game of dice, your character can become visible, and certain deductions will be made.

  She smiles at this and says nothing, and he is surprised.

  - You…want to be seen?

  Admiration, incredulity, disbelief, wonder, delight – why, all these things we may hear in his voice, strange to the sound. - You want players to observe you playing?

  - Would you like a game? she asks.

  - What would you propose?

  - Cards. For every hand you win, you may ask a question. And for every hand that I win…

  - I understand.

  - Then let’s play.

  She divides the deck.

  Deals the cards.

  At first, she is rusty, slow to find the pattern of it, and he asks five, six, seven questions in a row.

  - Are you winning your game?

  - No.

  - Can you win?

  - Perhaps.

  - Do you like your piece
, the king you must get a crown for?

  - No.

  - What do you want, if you win?

  - Freedom. The freedom that only victory can afford.

  We would imagine, would we not, that after losing nine hands in a row, she would be disheartened, she would fold, but on the tenth hand the game turns, fast now, and with a brisk efficiency she starts reclaiming the cards, taking hand after hand as quickly as the questions come. So now she asks:

  - Are you a player in the higher league?

  - Yes.

  - How long have you played?

  - I think…centuries.

  - Are you lying to me?

  - No.

  - Have you been sent to influence, help or hinder me?

  - That sounds like three questions.

  - I think, if you listen, it is only one, but should it be a concern for you I can break it into three separate parts, win three separate hands and get the answer either way.

  - Did you let me win? he asks. - Did you play me?

  - You will have to win another hand before I answer that. Now – my questions, please.

  - No, no one sent me to interfere with you in any way. I saw you alone and wondered if you would like to play, and here we are, playing still.

  - Does the Gameshouse exist outside Venice?

  - Yes, but I think you need to find a better way of asking the question that you wish to ask.

  The next hand she plays too quickly and loses, and is barely able to hide the intake of breath, irritation at herself, that slips through her lips as he takes the hand.

  - Did you let me win our first few hands? he asks.

  - Yes.

  - Why?

  - The questions you ask are indicative of who you are, and the information you hold. It allows me to formulate my own questions more successfully.

  At this he laughs, throwing his cards onto the table and leaning back. For a moment he sits there, shaking his head, arms folded, legs crossed, until at last he says, - Lady, I do not know precisely what the situation is with the game you play outside these walls, but let me say that if you are playing it as well as you play me now, you cannot help but win.

  - I have more questions, she says, indicating the cards between them.

  - I do not think we should play this game any more.

  - Why?

  - A game should be balanced, and there should be joy in it. I see neither any more. But you are eager, I think, for more answers, and it would be churlish of me not to give them. So I propose an accord, a deal struck between us alone.

  - What deal?

  - Not here, he replies. - I will visit soon, somewhere else, and we will discuss fairer terms.

  - Do I have your word on that?

  - You have seen me play. Would you value my word if I gave it?

  She does not answer, and when we look again, both she and he are gone.

  Chapter 28

  A man in Milan.

  He is no longer young, but has applied every trick he can to appear so. He wears a wig to thicken out his thinning hair, his stockings are tight, his shoes are curled, the colour of the cloth that tugs against his hips is vibrant orange, a garish, tasteless thing that no Venetian would approve of. He has a cap upon his head from which silver feathers sprout, and he wears no fewer than eleven rings upon his fingers, though secretly he knows only three are gold all the way through.

  His name is not important, for he is less than a piece in this game, but we must take a moment now to sympathise with his coming predicament, for he is a man who had a sister, and that sister loved a boy of Venice, and he on learning of this slaughtered the boy and threw him into the river. For two years perhaps, he believed he was free from this crime – though he would not call it such, not crime, no, justice, justice for his sister, for his family, for his honour, justice – but now retribution comes.

  It comes, it comes, and it wears the face of Galliard Viole, our foolish Frenchman, who approaches this stranger in the street and says, - Friend! Friend, my old friend, my brother, it has been so long! Let me buy you a drink!

  He buys a drink, and another, and another, and soon both Fool and friend are mightily drunk, holding onto each other, kissing each other’s cheeks, roaring with merriment when their staggering tips one or both over to the ground, for how funny it is to be in good company! How noble it is to be loved, how great is the bounty of man, how little matters material things when there is the joy of humanity, of fellowship, of the communion of souls!

  Thus proclaim Fool and friend both, and keep on proclaiming it, right to the moment when our unfortunate fellow realises that he is far from home, in a street where no torches burn, and turning to the Fool mumbles:

  - I think we should have turned left…

  …before he is soundly beaten about the head, bound, gagged and thrown into the back of a midden cart.

  Chapter 29

  Alvisa Muna exclaims:

  - How did you do it? How did you persuade Belligno to switch his support? And to Seluda?!

  - I had a piece find the remains of his child, slaughtered by a vengeful brother in Milan. I offered a great deal of money. I promised peace. But I do not think it will be enough to win.

  - Contarini still holds the support of the bishops.

  - And Faliere?

  - A ship came into harbour last night carrying his colours, and a stranger from Constantinople.

  - Did the ship ride high or low in the water?

  - High. The stranger was its only cargo. Zanzano has declared for Faliere too, and he brings with him the cloth merchants and most of San Marco. But Belligno gives you the docks, the fishermen, the fish market. Seluda will be noticed now: it was an extraordinary move!

  - Perhaps an unwise one. If he is noticed, he is more liable to be attacked.

  - You are ready though?

  - I do not know what cards my enemies might play.

  - But you know your enemies, yes?

  She considers this question a moment, then nods. - Yes, she replies. - Now I do.

  That same day, a whisper goes through the town.

  Faliere has negotiated with the Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Sultan himself; Faliere has struck terms. Faliere has been granted such concessions to trade with the infidel that if he were to declare now that the Turk had turned Christian, it would be believable, so impressive is this coup!

  That night, Faliere and Contarini attend church together, and sit on opposite sides of the aisle. They do not shake hands when the ceremony is done, nor do their wives smile and embrace, but stiff and separate they go their own ways, and people bow uneasily as they pass, trying to direct their homage to neither man specifically but both in equal measure. Tiapolo sits far at the back, his three daughters around him. They say, the whisper goes, that the eldest is to be sent to a nunnery. None of the suitors that Tiapolo has found for her are interested any more.

  Thene watches these daughters, their eyes down, pieces that were played upon, and for a moment remembers what it felt like to weep.

  Chapter 30

  She finds him at the Gameshouse.

  - You are Tiapolo’s player, she says, sitting beside him.

  He looks up from the card table, two fingers of his right hand pressed against his closed lips as if to trap the breath within them. He doesn’t wear his mask now, and his eyes are red in the rims, black around the lids from too much work, not enough sleep.

  - And you’re Seluda’s Jew, he replies sharply. - What do you want?

  - You’ve lost the game, she answers. - You played too fast, too soon, too strong; you had nothing left for the end.

  - You’re here to laugh? he exclaims. - Is that what you want?

  - No. You still have cards to play, a piece at your command. Tiapolo cannot be Tribune, and you cannot enter the Higher League, but we may still do a good turn for each other.

  - You suggest…an alliance?

  - There is nothing in the rules to prevent it.

  - You’ve just said
I’ve lost.

  - And you have. The question is whether you lose everything.

  A shadow follows her through the city.

  This time she does not run, does not stop, does not wait, does not fear.

  She remembers now how good it is to refuse to be afraid.

  She stops on the Rialto. Even at this hour, merchants and hawkers are bartering their wares, and crowds jostle for space across the waterway. Architects and detractors predicted that the bridge would not stand for more than ten years, so absurd was its design of arches and white stone, but here it is two decades later, as implausible and defiant as Venice herself.

  She waits, and Silver comes, no smile on his face.

  - Shall we walk? she asks before he can speak.

  They walk.

  Chapter 31

  - First Belligno, now Tiapolo throws in their lot with you? he asks as they move through the night-time fires of the city. -You have an unorthodox approach to victory, turning your enemies to friends.

  - My approach to victory is that I intend to win. The rest is merely tactics. You mentioned some sort of arrangement? Answers to questions?

  - You have more questions than I do, I think.

  - And yet you are still interested in me, she replies. - Though I think you are fascinated by my mind rather than any other parts.

  - To speak truth, my lady, I think you are going to win.

  - Am I? Faliere still controls trade with the east; Contarini still commands the power of the bishops and the builders of the city. I have gained ground, but not enough to guarantee the win.