by Aidan Harte
‘That’s it?’
‘Well, the whisper went that their great victory at Megiddo came at a terrible cost, that King Tancred made a pact with Jerusalem’s dead, who gave them victory in return for Jerusalem and the freedom of Akka.’
Sofia whistled. ‘Nice. I’m surprised that Oltremare’s not on Concord’s side.’
‘For the time being they’re on their own side. Etruria’s war is an opportunity for them to consolidate control of the Middle Sea.’
‘The procurator looked pretty mad when you told him that you had invited them.’
‘I was worried he was going to order me strung up along with the Doge, but he knew it was too late already, so managed to limit himself to a lecture about “acting unilaterally”.’
‘Too late – he already knew?’
‘Well, it’s kind of hard to miss.’ Levi pointed to a great ship sitting majestically still on the placid waves, its blue flags roiling and whipping like chained dragons. Painted on each side of the hull was a great blue hand with a single eye staring out of the palm.
Sofia looked blankly from the ship to Levi.
‘Madonna, Rasenneisi are a slow breed. That’s the Tancred! The procurator said it arrived a week ago.’
‘Then the Oltremarines are in?’
‘Conditionally. Queen Catrina is insisting that the summit take place in Akka.’
‘Oh.’ The hope that had suddenly lit in Sofia’s breast was snuffed out just as suddenly. ‘Bet our hosts liked that.’
‘I think the queen sent her flagship just to infuriate them. Any merchant’s cog could have carried that invitation here and the envoys back. If that was her intention, it worked; the Tancred’s been impounded ever since.’
‘Isn’t that an act of war?’
‘Sinking it would be, but they’re probably just going to delay them until the Tancred’s supplies run out. The cruellest cut of all is that they’ve forbidden any Oltremarine to disembark. I believe the local courtesans have quite a reputation.’
‘How inhuman.’ Sofia examined the great ship. With nowhere to go and no one to do, its crew were occupied with maintenance; she could see them patching sails and painstakingly replacing the running rigging. Boys were diving and cleaning the hull.
One of the young barnacle-scrapers was noisily attempting to haggle with a ragged old sailor who sat thumbing through a book and paying not the least bit of attention.
Sofia looked twice, then cried, ‘Levi, that’s him – the old man!’
‘Signorina?’ The old man looked up at her voice. ‘Do I—? Ah, I remember you!’ he exclaimed, shutting the book carefully. ‘The nearly stowaway.’
‘Where’s your little ship?’
‘Sleeping soundly on a seabed somewhere off the Levant. You wouldn’t think that recommends me as a navigator, but that’s what I’m employed as on the good Queen Catrina’s flagship.’
‘The Tancred? Why did they let you disembark?’
‘I am on good terms with Tancred’s captain – we sailed together before he took the queen’s silver. Oh, you mean the Ariminumese, that prohibition applies only to Oltremarines,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Some races are beneath the State’s attention.’
‘You’re not an Oltremarine subject?’
‘In Oltremare, I’m subject to Queen Catrina; in Ariminum, I’m subject to the Doge and,’ he said looking directly at Sofia, ‘if I ever go to Rasenna, I’ll be subject to the Contessa Scaligeri.’
Levi’s eyes narrowed. ‘You’re Ebionite?’
‘Don’t fret, Signore. I do not bite. Etrurians aren’t kosher.’ Levi didn’t smile, so the old man turned back to Sofia. ‘So, Signorina, what brings you back to the City of Bridges?’
‘Same thing as last time.’
‘Ah, the summit! The talk’s of nothing else. It’s not drink or women that sailors look forward to in strange harbours, it’s gossip. Captain Khoril sent me ashore to retrieve some. I understand that the states south of Concord are making peace with each other.’
‘In order to make war on Concord,’ Sofia said sardonically.
‘The Prophetess said, “Blessed are the Peacemakers”. Motivations don’t matter, only actions.’
‘Motivation is clearly something you struggle with. You’re the only sailor I see sitting on his arse.’
He shrugged. ‘The Tancred’s impounded.’
‘So are your shipmates. They’re working.’
‘My shipmates are Marian, like yourself. Today is the Ebionite day of rest.’
‘You people have a fetish for prohibitions,’ said Levi scornfully. ‘What if your ship were sinking?’
Sofia glanced reproachfully at Levi, but the old man said with a smile, ‘Depends on the rate it’s sinking.’
‘Life’s to be lived. You really think God cares if you constrain yourself? ’
‘Self-imposed prohibitions can be liberating. My people know what real bondage is like. When we tired of being slaves, we wandered until we found a land where we could be masters.’
‘Too bad the Oltremarines had the same idea.’
Levi might have been aiming to wound, but he answered cheerfully, ‘Alas, that’s true, and so we are slaves once more. What’s worse? My people never had more freedom than in the desert, and all we did was complain. When you settle, the world insists you adopt a role, slave or master; they’re equally limiting after a time.’
‘You’d rather roam and be nothing?’
‘I prefer to keep my options open. Wisdom does not come at once, and to those who will not take it slowly, it does not come at all. A good book helps pass the time.’ He patted the thick volume on his lap reverently. Battered skin covered the yellowed pages.
‘That your logbook?’
‘In a manner of speaking. It is the adventures of God and His fleet. It’s all here – His famous captains, their famous voyages, the storms they survived, mutinies foiled, appalling shipwrecks, warnings of rocky shores, treacherous currents, sirens, sea beasts—’
‘Merda,’ Levi interrupted, ‘It’s a book of laws for a race of slaves.’
‘Sounds more like a storybook.’ Sofia was annoyed with Levi’s fractiousness, and glad that the old man was not taking offence.
‘It need not be one thing. This is not a book, it’s a bookshelf. A library containing History, Philosophy, Poetry, and a thousand and one trifling fantasies. If you see only one of those things, you don’t diminish it – there will be more perceptive readers, after all – you diminish yourself.’
‘What good is it?’ said Levi. ‘It keeps your people slaves.’
He held up his hands like a prisoner. ‘What good is it? Well, it’s riddled with contradiction. The protagonist scarcely seems to know His own mind. He is obtuse and stubborn. It jumps from precept to commandment that seldom agree. It distorts facts, garbles history. It’s inconsistent, wild, undisciplined. In short, it is, like life, a work of genius. So tell me’ – he looked up at them – ‘is life good?’
Sofia declined to answer. ‘Enjoy your reading, sir. We shall not take any more of your time.’
‘You cannot take my time; I have a surfeit of it, and it’s pleasant to talk to a pretty girl and a blunt soldier on a quiet morning. One sees so few these days. When I see you tomorrow, perhaps you’ll answer my question.’
‘If negotiations allow. ’
‘They will,’ he said with certainty, and returned to his reading.
CHAPTER 52
Fra Norcino rolled a battered old coin from finger to finger, then held up a second to a shaft of dusty moonlight. The coins were older than Concord, minted when Etruria was called Etrusca, and bore the profile of a forgotten emperor.
‘Herod’s soldiers were not devils. They were men like you, no worse. They followed orders. Is guilt a link in the chain of command? Do the soldier’s crimes tarnish his officer? Do only officers’ sins count? Is guilt compounded?’ The theme of the oration was an old favourite: the Massacre of the Innocents. He preached with his
usual intensity, although tonight nobody was listening; he was surrounded by the sleeping bodies of his closest followers.
Since Geta’s bravos and Corvis’ praetorians had joined in common cause, the fanciulli were on the defensive. No one knew what part the First Apprentice had in all this – there were rumours that he haunted Monte Nero’s summit like a grieving spirit while Corvis ran the Collegio – but no one was certain. What was certain was that the streets were unsafe, so each night the fanciulli found a new safe house to stay in. It was exhausting work, yet no one ever saw Fra Norcino sleep.
‘Certainly it was wrong to dash the little ones against the stones – but compared to the great sin the soldiers committed that day, O what a trifle. They couldn’t know, but ignorance is no excuse! God was watching, and he struck them down! Everyone! Their murdering right hands forgot their cunning, their lying tongues cleaved to the roof of their mouths.’ He stopped and looked around. Snores drifted around the low-ceiling room. ‘O faithless generation, is not one of you awake?’
Footsteps. The thud of soldiers’ hobnails. Suddenly the door burst open to admit a boy, one of his most devoted fanciulli. ‘Master,’ he hissed, ‘you must flee!’
The other sleepers didn’t stir. Norcino raised his finger to his lips and gestured the boy closer. When the boy came within reach, Norcino pulled him in and clapped a large hand around his mouth. He whispered in the boy’s ear, ‘It’s time to render onto Catiline that which is Catiline’s.’
Without much exertion he twisted the boy’s head—
Craa aa aa kkkuh.
He laid the body amongst the sleepers like a mother putting a child to sleep and placed a coin on each eye. The hobnails were thumping down the stairs now.
The Collegio’s board sat around the stone table in the otherwise empty chamber. It seemed much larger than it did during general assemblies. The speaker’s mace rested in front of the chairman’s seat, which was empty, like the First Apprentice’s throne. Like everyone else, the members of the board had heard the rumours of Norcino’s arrest.
‘Where is the First Apprentice? It’s not proper for the board to assemble without him,’ said Scaurus, the old consul who sat opposite to the chairman’s seat. Scaurus was a veteran of Forty-Seven, and an opponent of all innovation. He still bore the scars on his skin, which was now translucent, and wormed with tiny blue veins.
The other consuls paid no attention. They whispered amongst each other until the door opened and Corvis entered, followed by General Spinther and Lord Geta.
‘Consuls, please be seated,’ said Corvis. ‘Thank you for coming at such short notice. I trust you’ll understand in times as disturbed as these the proper channels were too slow – to safeguard our security it was necessary to—’
‘Necessity,’ a voice croaked. ‘The watchword of tyrants.’
‘Consul Scaurus, I must—’
‘—you must nothing!’ He stood with difficulty and said, ‘You arrest this preacher, and then peremptorily summon us, presumably to retroactively approve your actions. Where’s your respect for Guild protocol? Due process? For that matter, where is the First Apprentice? And now, the final insult, you enter this sacred arena flanked by soldiers. I remind those who remain loyal to Bernoulli’s legacy,’ he looked around the table, ‘that there is still one Apprentice, and our allegiance is to him.’
‘Scaurus, you are either joking or senile. No one could seriously suggest that the Guild still owes allegiance to that boy. He’s locked himself away in that tower while Concord burns. He’s is no fitter to wear the red than Bonnacio was. Sit down.’
‘Your hired thugs might intimidate these children, but they do not intimidate me. I stood side by side with Girolamo Bernoulli against better men than them, aye, and you.’
Corvis slammed his fist on the table. ‘I don’t need your approval, any more than the Apprentices or your beloved Saint Bernoulli needed it! I have the praetorians and that’s as good as wearing the red.’
‘You’re a fool, Corvis. By arresting Norcino you’ve exacerbated the situation. Consuls, are we really going to let this outrage continue?’
Corvis took up the mace and handed it to Leto. ‘Give Consul Scarus due process.’
Leto took it and walked around the table to Scaurus. Geta walked around the other side.
‘General Spinther, it comes to this?’ said Scaurus. ‘I fought along your grandfather in Forty-Seven. He’d be ashamed to see you a tool of this usurper.’
‘You don’t get it, old man,’ said Leto, lifting the mace. Geta seized the old man from behind and bent his head down to the table.
‘We’re—’ CracCK! ‘—all’ Ssspraklesumph ‘—usurpers!’
sqwelcsh
The consuls closest to Scaurus were showered in viscera. Leto held onto the mace. ‘Will that be all, Corvis?’
‘Will that be all, Consuls? No other objections? Good. We have a crowded agenda today, beginning with a Motion of No Confidence in the aforementioned Apprentice. Geta, Spinther, probably best you stay till we’re done.’
The knocking shook the door of the Selectors’ Tower and Leto walked in without waiting for an answer. A cold wind entered with him, scattering papers from Torbidda’s desk.
‘Close the door,’ said Torbidda mildly.
‘First Apprentice, I come with ill tidings.’
Torbidda did not look up from his drawing. ‘I don’t recall, Leto. Were you ever sent to Flaccus’ office? You always knew how to stay out of trouble.’
Leto continued in the same solemn tone, ‘The Guild has passed a Motion of No Confidence in your leadership.’ He opened the door again. Outside, Corvis, breathing heavily, was climbing the final steps to the tower.
‘The Collegio’s consent is not a condition of my leadership,’ Torbidda said evenly. ‘I wear the red.’
‘And you never tire of reminding us,’ Corvis wheezed. ‘We have also decided your dereliction of duty amounts to treason. General Spinther has a warrant for your arrest—’
‘Enough!’ Torbidda slammed his hands on the desk, upsetting a jar of ink. ‘This is more important than anything else in the Empire. I’ve tolerated your inveterate scheming for the sake of Guild unity, but if you think I’m going to let you take me away from my work—’
‘What makes you think I’ll give you a choice?’
‘We’re alone up here, Corvis. The stairway’s the only way up. Your pet general should have told you never to attack someone on such defensible high ground.’
‘Oh, Spinther’s been very helpful.’ Corvis grinned, and Torbidda saw the direction of his glance. He walked slowly to the window and whispered, ‘Leto, what have you done?’
Perched like carrion birds on the web of wires binding the Selectors’ Tower were dozens of hard-faced children, all armed with bows.
‘As you see, I came in strength,’ said Corvis exultantly. ‘The class of Sixty-Nine all volunteered to be part of the surprise. It’s a reunion! They say the friends you make in school are friends for life. I suppose you’re the exception that proves the rule.’
‘Torbidda, I’m sorry. I have to look out for myself,’ Leto said, then, with less repentance. ‘Frankly, in allowing things to get this far you’ve demonstrated—’
‘Don’t apologise. I understand perfectly. If you get a chance to cull the competition, you take it. So what’s to become of me? Shall I slip on the way down? A tragic accident?’
‘I wanted to have you killed on the quiet,’ said Corvis sadly, ‘but your old friend here insists on a very public trial. He believes that will set the correct tone for the new Concord: a city ruled by the Collegio, by reason, and by me!’
The dungeon below the praetorian barracks was dark, damp and chill. Norcino’s sightless eyes looked up as he heard the commotion of a new prisoner being led in. Vagrants usually escaped with a flogging and the loss of some or all of their limbs, but the praetorians stood respectfully back from the boy in red as he walked in.
Norcino sat up and
crawled as far towards him as his manacles allowed. ‘My king! Is it really you, Majesty?’
‘Tranquillo, my good Fra. I haven’t come to free you. I’m in the same bind you are.’ Torbidda rattled his chains so that the blind man could hear. The guards opened the cell next to Norcino’s and Torbidda calmly walked in. He waited for the guards to leave before turning to his neighbour. ‘When I heard of this blind preacher disrupting the city I knew it was you. Who are you?’
‘Never mind that,’ Norcino hissed. ‘Do you know the Handmaid’s identity?’
‘Her name’s Scaligeri. She’s the one who burned the Molè.’
‘Then why,’ he demanded, ‘did you not complete the rite? You know what’s at stake.’
‘I know.’
‘Then what have you been waiting for?’
‘Out in the Wastes you told me I didn’t have to be a sacrificial lamb. I didn’t climb the mountain to donate my flesh to some tattered ghost. The rite’s unnecessary. I can deal with the Handmaid myself. Bernoulli had his turn to run Concord. This is mine!’
Norcino rattled his chains in mockery. ‘And a fine mess you’ve made of it!’
CHAPTER 53
Ariminumese are not a God-fearing race, but the new Doge’s most solemn vows at his coronation are to protect the Basilica of Saint Barabbas. Foreigners surprised by the reverence accorded to the Basilica misinterpret its role. This centuries-old institution maintains a depository for private individuals and the commune and has considerable wealth in trusts and landholdings. Its most important function is to advance loans to the government – in the words of Doge Dandolo, ’A State without credit can accomplish many things, but no great things.’
from The Stones of Ariminum
by Count Titus Tremellius Pomptinus
They came to forge an alliance, but no venue could be more illsuited to that end than the green jewel-wearing whore of the Adriatic, the city of gold lacquer, of wine swoons and expensive sin. The unsophisticated principalities of the south – violent, in-bred hill-towns, sleepy under-populated settlements along old Etruscan dirt roads and brash cities of the coast – sent eager ambassadors whose full purses were soon emptied by Ariminum’s industrious harlots. And every dalliance, every cup, was spied upon and reported in meticulous detail to the undying Consilium.
