The Mascherari: A Novel of Venice

by Laura Rahme

  “For this to be true, we would have to consume them first,” protested Esteban.

  “I am afraid not. The air on this island is damp. In this strange garden, nature’s vapors infuse the fetid air. They combine to produce a lingering blanket of poisonous fumes. When I was a child in Tuscany, I nearly died from inhaling such pollen. We must not remain here a moment longer.”

  “We are in agreement about that. But there is one problem, my friend. This place is a maze–a labyrinth, if you prefer.”

  I gazed around me. “No…” My breath became heavy. Esteban saw me clutching at my chest. He was not pleased.

  “A maze, Antonio. As surely as I stand before you. Years ago, I overheard pilgrims speak of how such mazes featured on the floors of several churches in Rome and France. There is from, what I remember, in Rome, a church called Santa Maria di Trastavera. One can find an old labyrinth of marble on the inside pavement. Pilgrimages to the Holy Lands and into Castile are expensive and taxing on those who are ill. Believers who wish to atone but cannot risk the long journey, must do penitence in other ways. They must pray on their knees as they traverse the labyrinth inside these churches. Antonio, the gardens in which we find ourselves and that you have called strange are nothing but a creation to symbolize a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Only, it is we, who are the pilgrims. It is said that as we near the center of the maze, we arrive to the gate of Heaven and have negotiated our sins…”

  “And if we do not?” I gasped.

  “In your situation, I would rather not we failed, Antonio. We must return to the ship or else find Elena. You must choose.”

  “I must go to her.”

  “The men who built these hedges knew what it represented. I see its other meaning now. Only the pure, those who have expiated their sins, may cross the maze and reach Elena. Antonio, don’t you see? She may corrupt you. That is the other significance of this maze. You will encounter evil once you have found her and your soul must be pure. Are you certain you are prepared for this?”

  He seemed not the least affected by the vapors.

  “Do not speak in such terms, Esteban. It is all senseless, hundred year old superstition. Malek is not pure. He is one who has been given the key to this maze. Another man may not traverse, but if he sins, it is only because he dares take a path forbidden to him. And soon…” I began to cough. “Soon, his death arises, not from sin, but from the poisoned fumes in these treacherous confines. The only evil I see, Esteban, is within this maze. We have to reach Elena,” I said.

  I had spoken in a fever. Hives had broken on my hands and I felt blisters on my neck. I wiped my sweaty brow and examined the incomprehensible names surrounding us. A sense of doom chilled me. We had not much time and we had already wasted it in mindless erring.

  “We are lost,” I said.

  “That is unfortunate. Of all the evilness, that is surely the most terrifying.”

  “Si, si, we are completely lost, Esteban,” I said, biting my lips and trudging upon my wobbling knees. I had to think and in haste.

  “This does not bode well, Antonio. How shall we near the tower?”

  “I ignore it. But wait, please let me think. Those signs…”

  “Useless.”

  “Wait, Esteban. There has got to be a way.”

  Leaning against one of the columns to regain my senses, I examined the sign to my left and the one to my right.

  “Women’s names… Countless women’s names that repeat. They are not unique. Except—”

  “They all begin with an S or a D. Is that what you are thinking, Antonio? You’d best think fast then. We are running out of time. You look as pale as death.”

  He reached to support me.

  “Yes, yes, S or D…S…”

  “Devil take me! At this rate, we shall never get out of here.”

  “Wait! What strikes me is these marble columns. Look, Esteban, look! They always come in pairs and always at a node. One in the gray marble and one in the black. One in the gray… and one in the black. Almost as though there are instructions for going in…and going out.”

  “Antonio da Parma, I would gladly pursue this proposition but given that these instructions spell out names, and only women’s names, we are far from grasping their meaning.”

  “Si, si, I come to that. Wait a moment, Esteban.”

  It occurred to me that I could no longer see the tower. We seemed completely buried in this infernal maze of privet, thorns and marble. Esteban stood still, his breathing slow and calculated. He did not relish our entrapment. I had a vexing thought that our ingenious friend, Alberti, ought to have joined us to the island. The one aid I needed most in our present predicament was a man with his vision; a man who could see the marble signs for what they were. Someone who could read beyond those names… D or S. Surely the youth would have seen through these signs and derived the path to the tower. If only I had one iota of his genius. If only…

  “Esteban, I had an idea come to me. What if the women’s names were to mean nothing?”

  “Antonio, we must not tarry.”

  “Yes, I know. But indulge me for I think I have found the key to this absurd maze. At the present, we can only work with what we know. And what we know is that there are signs in gray that lead to the tower, and signs in black that lead out of the maze. Although it may be the other way around…but we shall determine this in time.”

  “This is the problem, Antonio. We have no time. We must think fast.”

  “I am. I am, Esteban. I come to it. What if the meaning we seek did not reside in those names? What if Siena, Dolce, Serena, all lovely women, are mere words. Words intended to confuse and confound the intruder of this island. After all, the purpose of the original Cretan labyrinth was to discourage trespassers. For those who understand the code, the names mean nothing.” I repeated this to myself. “If the names mean nothing…if the names mean nothing…then at the very least…” I recalled all the engravings we had encountered. “I think I have it, Esteban! We must assume that the maze has been created in the same spirit as the code which was employed to conceal the Consiglio dei Dieci’s secret files. Think, then. What if, what if the first letter…” I recalled how Signor Alberti had discovered a changing code in the secret message of the chancellery. “Si! That must be it! The code lies in the first letters.”

  “The first letters? You mean, the S and the D?” Esteban’s eyes glowed behind his mask. He reached to support me once more as I trembled from the effects of the miasma.

  I grabbed his arm and stared at him. I was suddenly cognizant of an idea that was so simple, so verily childish that I wondered why I had not thought of it previously. I tapped Esteban on the shoulder.

  “No, Esteban. Not S, not D. But rather, S for sinistra and D for—“

  “Destra! Destra! Antonio da Parma, you are a man of great sight!” I thought he would leap from joy. But he resumed his gravity. “We must carry it out.”

  “Precisely! Let us proceed. We shall assume first that the gray marble dictates the way into the maze and toward the tower. An S will see us turn to the left and a D to our right.”

  We set out, carefully determining the correct path each time two options presented themselves. It occurred to me as we crossed the maze, and determined that black marble was the color of choice to the tower, that the presence of such labyrinth ought not to have been a surprise. If the Consiglio dei Dieci were convinced that Elena Visconti was an accursed being, they would have counted on the belief that the evil spirits animating her could only travel in a straight line.

  Elena Visconti was surrounded by a labyrinth, because those who kept her believed that such a maze would baffle and contain her evil energy to the island.

  They were truly frightened of her.

  The poisonous miasma seemed to dissipate as we progressed. The path had widened. As we neared the tower, I found myself breathing with less difficulty.

  “We are close, Esteban. I sense that she is near,” I gasped, still feeling a litt
le weakened.

  “I fear something else, Antonio.”

  “What is it?”

  Ahead, the tower stood, flanked by a small church. We had only to cross the final privet-lined path and we would find ourselves at the feet of Elena’s prison.

  “A maze, Antonio. A maze is a frightening portent,” continued Esteban. “Think like a treasurer, da Parma. If you find yourself relying on only one labyrinth to ward off intruders and there are no guards, nothing surrounding the tower…” He sighed. “I have a sentiment about this.”

  “In Greek mythology there is usually a Minotaur by now,” I said, half-musing. But Esteban shot me a dark glare.

  “I fear as much.”

  No sooner had he spoken, that we stumbled upon a masked corpse. There, at our feet, lay the body of a man, bludgeoned to death. Beside this body, footprints much larger than that of an ordinary man were imprinted into the mud.

  The Minotaur

  “A third body,” I counted, as we neared the tower. We had found a dead guard, five steps from the doors and another at the threshold. Esteban observed the muddy prints.

  “Can you hear this, Antonio?”

  “Hear what? What is it?”

  “Something is in the tower, Antonio. A giant with enormous limbs, nay, a beast.”

  “No such being exists as a Minotaur, Esteban,” I muttered, still panting.

  “With such footprints, it is a man at least eight feet tall.”

  I looked up, still gripping Esteban’s shoulder.

  “And yet he protects her. These guards came with Malek and all have perished.”

  I eyed the tower, knowing not what we would find. My spirits remained dim on account of the confined air we had breathed while inside the maze. Or was it that I was so near her that I now no longer thought for myself?

  Before us, she stood. A solid edifice of mud and stone that time had not yet conquered. Here and there, dark green vines clung to her narrow form. And as my eyes lifted toward a grilled window, high above, they crossed the unmistakable C.X. carved into her heart of stone.

  “We have found her,” I said, scarcely believing that such a prison existed.

  “We must hurry. Can you walk?” He let go of my arm.

  “I think so. I will follow closely.”

  And then I saw him. A small, thin man lay dead in an alcove near the tower’s entrance. He wore only a coarse tabard and a pair of miserly hose that were covered in mud. I could see from his clothing that he had once been a slave. His frozen fingers still clung to what appeared to be a vial of poison. There were icy tears upon his grimy face and a dribble of spit from the corner of his lips.

  “Poison,” said Esteban. “We must go.”

  I pressed a finger down the dead man’s mouth to inspect the color of his tongue. But the man had no tongue.

  “Why would he kill himself?” I asked. I sensed the horror of this place and the sad expression in the man’s eyes haunted me.

  “We will never know, Antonio. Let us not tarry.”

  He kicked the doors open and we entered.

  My heart thumped in my chest. There was something I sensed inside this fortress, even though I had jested of it earlier. I knew, no sooner had we entered the tower’s belly, that Esteban was right. A beast lived in it. A distinct human smell, the odor of unwashed flesh, it filled my nostrils. From above, we heard a cry of agony followed by a monstrous roar.

  Another guard lay by the stairwell, a hatchet in his belly. In the darkness, we scaled the spiral staircase until a further guard tumbled down, his skull landing with a crush against the stone.

  We moved fast, ascending each step of this infernal tower, guided only by the ferocious moans overhead.

  Halfway up, I found a lit torch and peered up into the dark circular passage. Again, the sound of the beast carried to my ear. Or was it a man? I did not know. I could hear Esteban’s furious breathing.

  “He is protecting her,” said Esteban.

  “Five have died. Only one guard remains,” I said. “Whatever is up there will either thwart us or aid us. If this beast has taken it upon himself to guard her, he will kill us once he has dealt with Malek.”

  “There is only one way to find out,” said Esteban. He unsheathed his sword and darted up, his heels fast up the cold steps.

  We scaled the last of the staircase, winding our way up toward a faint light overhead. I could barely feel my legs. The noise rose in pitch until we were very near it.

  And then at last we reached the top. I had not fully recovered from the maze’s fumes and felt short of breath. The hives on my neck and arms caused a burning pain, sending waves of nausea through me. Sweat glistened on Esteban’s temples as he led us past a lancet and through a short corridor.

  And that’s when I stumbled upon the sixth body. I fell upon my knees, barely hearing Esteban’s warning. For a moment, so close to her, I felt as though death had overcome me. No breath came. I gasped.

  As I looked up, I felt a jolt so that all my senses were suddenly awakened like never before. I think to that moment and I remember that a voluptuous sensation coursed through my body and that for a short time, in which I heard nothing and saw nothing, it seemed that a gilded mist blurred my vision and that I was floating.

  And then it was gone.

  Before I knew it, Esteban was screaming my name and a blinding light had pierced through the corridor. My breathing had returned. It seemed as though every beat of my heart found another throb to echo its own. That sound! I was deaf to all but that sound. Its rhythm found me. I dropped my flambeau, stunned by what I saw. From within a recessed chamber, the sunlight shone through a tall grilled window and into our eyes. And there, before us, a dark silhouette espoused the sun’s rays. She emitted not a sound. But I recognized her.

  “Elena…”

  Before her and just outside the chamber, two men wrestled. I say two men, but it seemed to me that one of them was a beast.

  Even before I could see it, the smell of it reached me. It gave off an offending odor and its belt reeked of sweaty leather. The head of a hollow-eyed goat rested upon his Herculean shoulders. And on this white hairy head, there were wooden horns that curled to each side. They could have pierced any man. He wore a coarse goat skin that only one with his build could carry. Already the blood soaked it, as Malek came slashing at him with two daggers.

  I heard Esteban gasp. But Malek paid no heed to the noble arts. In a clean under strike he had lodged his dagger into the beast’s upper thigh. And though the giant’s legs were as thick as columns, I saw that his fur-lined boots had begun to trudge the ground. Now Malek was certain of victory. Again, he struck.

  The creature gave out a harrowing cry. It came from deep within and spoke of despair and sadness. I remembered the tears which the man with no tongue had also cried and I understood.

  Both had wished to guard her life.

  Malek

  né lanza né azza né daga contra mi vale

  Chi contra me farà ben lo farò languire

  -Fiore dei Liberi

  This giant man with the head of a goat, he lay upon his back by the entrance to Elena’s chamber. He was barely breathing.

  At my side, Esteban had slipped a dagger from his boot. He placed himself in guard, preparing to counter Malek with both sword and dagger.

  “Take her and leave,” he ordered, in a voice that I barely recognized. And before I could respond, he and Malek were thrust into a merciless combat. Counters of blade, violent locks and deathly grips ensued, as the two masked men fought.

  I bolted toward the chamber. But my attempts to near Elena were thwarted. Sensing my advance, and having already felled Esteban, Malek now stood in my path. As I drew out my rondel, I saw that Elena stood safely in retreat. In this vast chamber, filled with artisan implements and masks, and which resembled an atelier rather than a prison, she seemed occupied with a curious object, around which she motioned three times as though summoning something.

  I had no time to
watch her. Malek came at me. From the corner of my eye, I sensed the waning sunlight and I saw that Elena waited. She waited for something.

  Malek gripped my wrist, causing my rondel to slip from my hand. Malek’s leg came beneath my knee, sending me to the ground. Malek’s fingers clung at my face. He would have gouged out my eyes, if Esteban had not countered for me. I rose, only to find that the two swordsmen were now engaged too close to the chamber door and that I could not enter.

  The Catalan fought valiantly, countering every lock and bind with a martial prowess I knew not that he possessed. The Dei Liberi scarmitor was an ever silent opponent. Artful and cunning, master of deceit, he seemed to sense each and every one of Esteban’s plays. He fought just as Esteban had foretold; for every counter, he had an answer and often, Esteban knew not the hand that would deceive him, from behind, from the side and from below.

  Esteban was toppled to the ground countless times but nothing could keep him from rising anew. Yet I saw the look in his eyes when he was struck underhand and his opponent gripped to his neck. At that moment, I would have run to Elena’s side were it not for my fear that Esteban would soon lose his life.

  There was in the Dei Liberi arts, a deathly nature and one that had soon disarmed Esteban.

  And then two things flashed before my eyes at a moment where I understood Esteban had lost.

  The first was her face. Her face, which I remember now, was beyond her years. She held in her hand, a large bull’s mask that had been fashioned with black leather and inlaid with gold. It was the face of the Minotaur.

  She had dropped to her knees before the dying giant and removed his goat’s head. The man’s true face was scarred beyond belief but Elena did not flinch. Years of captivity had hardened her.

  Before I could comprehend her designs, there was a fleeting movement by the window, and I noticed the second thing. It was the setting of the winter sun, heralding the time of the moon.

  In the corridor, Esteban lay flat upon his face, his right arm in a twist behind his shoulder, disempowered by Malek’s powerful grip. A moment of rage took over me. I seized upon the discarded goat’s head. I surged forth, ramming the wooden horns into Malek. But I was too slow for this skilled scarmitor. He met my pathetic attempts with a masterful block and before I realized it, I was savagely propelled against the stone wall. The goat’s head fell to the ground.