Victory. Castello Paratore defeated. For Siena, it would be huge.
It all seemed like a movie I’d seen. I reached out and grabbed Lia’s hand. She was so tenderhearted. She had cried when she shot her first bird with a bow and arrow. I knew killing those men must’ve been excruciating for her. “Lia, do you want to talk about it? I mean, the battle. All those guys—”
“No.” She pulled her hand from mine. “No, I don’t. I want to get out of here, Gabi, and forget this all happened. It’s like a nightmare.” She shook her head. “We have to get back to the tomb. Try it together. I mean, to make the jump back.”
I nodded, but my mind was already pulling me in two directions.
“You’ll do it, then?” she said, relief flooding her face. And in that moment, I remembered how badly I wanted to return to our own time, how I longed for Mom and Lia just a week ago. But now…
Maybe it was having Lia here, with me. Maybe I was being selfish. But having her here settled me, made me feel less homesick, less vulnerable.
It wasn’t just me.
It was us.
And that freed me to think more broadly about Marcello.
It was as if some bonds had been broken. Over and over, I had resisted Marcello because of Lia, because of my mom, because I needed to get back. And because he was promised to another. Another who could help him, help his family, help Siena. But now that Lia was here…
“Maybe I can get you to the tomb on my own somehow,” Lia said, looking at my side again. “It’d be better if we could get you home and to the doctor.”
“And how do we explain that?” I asked, pointing to my side.
“That’ll be tricky,” she said, pursing her lips. “Can you believe I did that? Sewed you up?”
I laughed under my breath. “No. But then you pulled through for me in so many ways, Lia.” I grabbed her hand and waited until she looked at me. “We’ll have to talk about it at some point, you know. I don’t want you to have post-traumatic stress disorder or something. You know, like the guys who fight in wars sometimes get, coming home? I know I’ve been having nightmares—”
“I really don’t want to talk about it,” she said. Was she a shade paler?
“You had no choice, Lia. If you hadn’t killed them they would have—”
“Stop!” She yanked her hand from mine again. She stepped away from me and brought a hand to her forehead. “I just wanna get back, Gabs. This is all so crazy.…”
A knock sounded at the door, and a moment later, Cook peeked in. She looked at me with her kind eyes. “I thought you’d enjoy a bath, m’lady.”
I winced as I tried to sit up, then lay back down. A bath sounded so good. “I would like nothing more. But my wound.” I glanced at it again and shook my head. “I think it best if I not get it wet.”
“Well, what if we assist you? To wash your hair, at least. Take care with the rest.”
Finally I nodded my agreement. Four maids with pails of hot water and a manservant, carrying the deep wooden tub, followed her, set up a screen, dumped the water into it, and then left again. Lia looked like she wanted to follow them.
“On the morrow, these halls will be filled with Siena’s finest,” Cook said. She beamed over at Lia and then back to me. “They’re coming to honor you two, you know. As much as the Forellis are the favored sons of Toscana, at the moment, all of Siena wishes to know about the she-warriors of Normandy.”
“I don’t know,” I mumbled. I hadn’t yet managed to rise from my bed. Part of me feared that if I moved, I’d tear out Lia’s stitches. I shuddered at the thought.
But then I caught Lia’s expression, which plainly said, Yeah, you should take a look at yourself, and thought of how nice it’d feel to be clean again. It had been over a week. And that last day had hardly been a prissy-girl experience. I leaned down and sniffed my armpit. “Uhh,” I said.
Lia arched a brow and moved over to my side. “Come on. We’ll help you.”
I almost screamed when I sat up, and after a moment, I gritted my teeth to stand. Any movement along my side was excruciating. Sweat rolled down my face. Briefly, I considered what it would be to have Lia remove the stitches soon, and quickly cast that thought out. I’d have to bite down on a stick, down a bunch of grappa, or something…because that was going to kill.
I wrapped my right arm around the shoulders of Cook, who was much shorter than me. Lia held my left hand, more for encouragement than support. Slowly, we moved to the tub, and I sat down in a chair and leaned my head back, letting my hair fall behind me.
They moved quickly, tag-teaming the process. Cook dumped a pail of water down my head, dousing it, and Lia moved in with a bar of lavender-laced soap, scrubbing my hair into a thick lather. Then they each began with the pails of water, dumping one after another. It felt delicious, and I sighed in relief at the sensation of getting clean.
Then they brought me a basin and cloth, and together, we washed the rest of me, the best we could, without submerging. Beads of sweat lined my upper lip even as I shivered. Lia frowned at me. “You don’t look so good,” she whispered, when Cook left the room. “I mean, you look far better than you did, but are you feeling sick?”
I shook my head. “Just the exertion, I think.” I sat up as straight as I could as Lia began the long process of combing out my tangled hair. That was another thing that definitely sucked about living in medieval times: no conditioner.
Cook returned with two servants. They each set a trunk down, on the edge of my room, and left, never looking in my direction. But Cook was grinning as she opened the trunks. “Gifts, for you and Lady Evangelia.”
Lia stopped combing and leaned over to see what it could possibly be. Cook flipped the brass latch on the first trunk and opened it. She pulled from it a magnificent robin’s-egg-blue gown, embroidered with what looked like silver thread. “For you, Lady Evangelia,” she said, dragging it across her arms and carrying it across the room.
“Oh, Lia,” I breathed, reaching out to run my hand across the finely woven silk. It was amazing. And the exact color of her eyes. “With your hair…my goodness, no one will be able to keep their eyes off of you.”
“I agree, but she’ll have a firm competitor in her sister,” Cook said, going to the second trunk. From it she pulled a copper-colored silk gown, this one embedded with tiny seed pearls all across the bodice.
I gaped at her. “I cannot wear such a thing. It is far too beautiful.”
“It is only fitting,” Cook said with a dismissive snort, “for them to honor you so. Were it not for you two, Castello Paratore would not be ours.”
“My side,” I said, hating the whine that crept into my voice, “with my wound, I’ll never be able to endure being in that gown.”
“Nonsense,” Cook said. “Lord Marcello has seen to every detail. He had the seamstresses cut it a couple inches wider than your other gowns, so that there will be plenty of room to bind your wound so it won’t chafe.”
I looked her in the eye. “This is a gift from Marcello?”
“But of course,” Cook said, smiling at me quizzically as if to say Who else?
I shared a look with Lia. She turned to Cook. “Is my gown from Marcello as well?”
“I believe that was more of Sir Luca’s doing,” she said, turning back to the trunks again. Did the woman think it was odd that two men more comfortable with swords had spent the afternoon at a Sienese seamstress’s shop?
She pulled several more gowns out of each trunk to show us, one for each of the days of the feast. “Your other two gowns should arrive with our guests,” she said.
“Two more?”
“Indeed,” she said, brows raised. “The ladies of the castle are all expected to be in their finest for the festivities. You’ll find in each trunk new sets of underclothes, underdresses, and the like.”
And with that, she went out the door, closing it softly behind her.
Lia was again at my hair, but she wasn’t paying attention. The comb caught in the tangles, and she pulled hard, ripping out some strands of hair. “Lia.”
“Sorry,” she muttered, dropping the comb to the bed. “Okay, I so wanna wear that gown. I’ve never seen anything so pretty. It’s like something out of a dream.” She went over to it, lifted it into her hands, and then draped it across her body.
I smiled and shook my head. “You’ll look amazing in that.”
“You’ll be gorgeous in yours, too.”
I looked at my own and then back to her, hope lifting my heart. We don’t have to go. Yet. “So…we’ll try to get to the tomb after the feast?”
She didn’t answer me for a moment. “What’s one or two more days? We don’t have to stay for the entire feast, right? And you need a few more days to mend. Mom would freak if she saw those sinew stitches.”
“Right, although it may be hard to slip away.”
“Okay, but we’ll go right after the feast, all right? Promise me.” She laid the gown down and came over to me, kneeling beside my chair. “Promise me, Gabi.”
“I promise. We’ll get to the tomb.” She seemed mollified by my words and went to retrieve fresh bandages to rebind my wound. What she missed was that I didn’t promise the rest—to put my hand on the print, to make the leap back. Might there be a way for me to send her home, give her what she wanted, but stay, myself? But if she were gone, could I stay? Would I not be crazy with longing for my family, homesick?
It was too much to consider. I had a few days. I’d figure it out.
CHAPTER 21
A servant knocked on my door, awakening me from my nap. The bath had pretty much wiped me out.
Lia went to the door and was speaking in hushed tones, but I said, “Wait. Who is it?”
She glanced back at me with a worried expression. “Lord Fortino,” she said in a low tone.
“Let him in,” I said, closing my eyes.
I could feel her hesitation. She was worried about me, getting so tired.
“I’m fine, Lia. Let him in,” I whispered. I willed myself to turn over and then push myself to a sitting position, turning away so Fortino couldn’t see my face, riddled with pain, as I did so.
When I turned back, I saw him, halfway across the room, leaning heavily on the arm of his servant. “Lord Fortino,” I said, “you shouldn’t have taxed yourself so.”
His eyes, beneath concerned brows, went from my torso to my face, which was covered in sweat. “Pay me no heed, dear lady. I fear it is you I tax. Shall I leave?”
“No. Come, come. Please.” I glanced at the volume beneath his armpit. “You visit to share a bit of the poet with me?”
“Indeed,” he said. The servant pulled a chair beside my bed, and Fortino sat down on it. I could hear the wheeze in his breathing.
“At least you fare better than when last I saw you,” I said.
He gave me a rueful smile. “I bear no wound of battle, just those that God has allowed me to bear within my lungs.”
I reached out and put my hand on his arm. “It is enough.”
He patted my hand and looked at me fondly. “Lady Gabriella, you did so much for me, my family, Siena. We are eternally grateful to you and your fair sister.” His eyes shifted to Lia, but she had turned to fiddle with the herbs and bandages on the table.
I smiled. “We only did what we could. Truth be told, we were fighting to free Evangelia more than anything. I fear Siena’s future is something I have not given much thought.”
He lifted his brows and nodded, understanding. “Most women do not think of such things. But fortunately for us, our intentions aligned.” He raised the golden volume. “Shall we?”
I nodded, leaning my head back against the goose-feather pillow and closed my eyes. Fortino began to read, his voice surprisingly strong, and yet pausing often for him to catch his breath. We were in the midst of the Inferno, the part in which Dante and Virgil climbed out of the hellish underworld to find themselves on an island called Purgatorio, somewhere between heaven and hell. “‘To get back up to the shining world from there,’” Fortino read, “‘My guide and I went into that hidden tunnel; Where we came forth, and once more saw the stars.’”
My eyes sprang open. “Please. Read that last line again.”
“‘My guide and I went into that hidden tunnel; Where we came forth, and once more saw the stars.’” He lowered the book and stared at me. “What is it that captures you so, m’lady?”
I couldn’t really tell Fortino what I was thinking. I’d had a crazy thought that maybe Dante, once here, in this very castle, had traveled through time and space himself in the tomb. The tunnel, the passage…could he not have seen much more than a distant time? Perhaps even a different space, world? Heaven? Hell?
I shivered, hoping that was not what was at the end of that tomb’s tunnel.
When I remained silent, Fortino said, “It is a remarkable turn for our hero. Here, he begins his true trek toward salvation.”
A cough at the door made us both turn. Marcello. He smiled at me, clearly glad to see that I was clean and changed, looking as if I felt better even if I was miserably tired. He stepped forward and took a seat at the foot of my bed. “The image is evocative because Dante has seen the depths of hell, and now he’s glimpsed heaven.”
I shifted uneasily, because Marcello’s eyes were intently on me. Fortino was staring at him, then me, then his brother again.
“He’s on his way toward Beatrice, our heroine, and God. In the midst of such darkness, he’s seen the light. The stars.”
I knew he was trying to speak to me, reach me, through the double meaning of his speech. Fortino clearly heard it too. He mumbled an excuse, bent to kiss my hand, and departed, with Lia on his heels, leaving us alone.
Marcello moved to kneel beside my bed and took my hand in both of his. “Forgive me for my absence, Gabriella.” He stood, hunched over, and kissed my brow—a slightly disappointing move since it’d been a week since we kiss-kissed, but sweet. He was still treating me as if I was made of glass. “In truth, I have thought of little other than you, but there is much to attend to, with the feast upon us on the morrow. And neither my father nor Fortino is prepared for such a task. My day has been spent with cooks and bakers and vintners and falconers and dignitaries, all swirling in plans for our grand meals and festivities over the next days.”
I nodded, but I lifted my eyes to meet his. “’Tis truly necessary? Could we not allow Siena their festivities…in Siena?”
He smiled and turned his head, repositioning his hands over mine. “We represent the front lines. ’Twould not do for us to do anything but celebrate this victory, and loudly.”
I nodded and then looked to my thick blanket and wondered if I had the guts to ask what must come next. I plunged onward. “Marcello, what became of Lord Paratore and Lord Vannucci?” I remembered nothing more of that night, and I hadn’t had the nerve to ask Lia. She clearly was in denial about that whole night.
“Both are imprisoned in Siena.” His eyes flicked away, to the window. “Most likely they shall be traded at some point for one or two men we wish to free. But with tensions so high, it may be some time.”
I nodded, as if happy to know of their fate, but in that instant, I knew I wished them dead and gone.
His hands gripped mine. “Gabriella, ’tis the way the Nine wished it to go.”
“I understand.” I raised my eyes to meet his. “But the thought of either of them, free…” I shook my head. “Given what they’ve seen, what they’ve experienced, Lia and I are as much enemy to them as you and Luca.”
He blinked his heavy lashes and then nodded once. “Indeed. It is a grave danger. But I do not foresee them ever threatening you
again. They shall be exiled or traded, deep into Florentine territory. Or put to death.”
Put to death. Hanged. Dismembered. Drawn and quartered. Death was a bloody business in medieval times.
I wanted to feel a measure of compassion for them. I wanted to hope that the exile card won out, but I knew that selfishly, I was hoping they would die, never to be a concern for me and Lia again.
“Gabriella, we must speak of something else.”
My eyes moved to his.
“Lady Rossi and her family are arriving on the morrow.”
I studied him, waiting. Knowing I should take him off the hook, release him of responsibility, tell him I was on my way out, that it couldn’t really work between the two of us.
“I shall break our pledge, make it clear to both Lady Rossi and her father that no union shall be formed between our families.”
I frowned, even though my heart pounded with hope. It was not good for Marcello to end his plans with Romana. She wouldn’t go down without a fight; she’d try to bring me down with her. If I can’t have him, neither can you. We’d all suffer her wrath, her father’s wrath.
Marcello was feeling strong, invincible even, after our capture of Castello Paratore, and perhaps it would afford him some protection amid Sienese politics. But didn’t he need every protection possible? If Firenze was to attack, they would surely target a point such as Castello Forelli first. And Castello Forelli needed to know they could rely on reinforcements from Siena. That Siena had their back. Without a marriage between the Forellis and the Rossis, was that truly possible?
Marcello was studying me. “M’lady, do you doubt me? Doubt my fervor for you?” He stroked my forehead, cheek, and stared into my eyes with such love, it set my heart pounding. “’Tis not simply what I owe you as a man loyal to Siena. ’Tis what I owe you as a man. Gabriella,” he said, looking intensely into my eyes, “you own my heart. My life, and all I have in it. You have captured me, m’lady, like no one else. My hours are spent absorbed in thoughts of you, dreams of you. I cannot imagine a life without you in it. Might I dare believe that you would leave Normandy for good? To remain here, with me?”
The River of Time Series Page 25
