Marcello faltered, embarrassed. It wasn’t part of the plan. I knew that. I knew it. But it still stung. Just as Paratore hoped it would. He knew something was up. As did Ascoli. My heart settled into a triple-time beat. We were in trouble. Big trouble.
“We are here,” Marcello said belatedly, “solely to negotiate Fortino’s release, one way or another.” He paused, took a breath, then sat down and looked toward Lord Greco. Like a man now, not a boy begging for a chance. “I am prepared to offer Firenze a chest full of gold in exchange for my brother,” Marcello said. “And our mediator ten percent for his trouble.” He glanced at Lord Ascoli. The man gave him a regal nod, barely hiding his smile.
“Unacceptable,” said Paratore, beside Rodolfo.
“It was made clear that we would exchange Lord Fortino Forelli only for the Ladies Betarrini,” said another short lord. I tried to remember his name. He was one of the grandi I’d met in Firenze.
“Surely you don’t believe I will hand them over to you. My brother is barely alive, so poorly has he been treated!” Marcello growled.
Lord Barbato, I finally remembered. He was short and scruffy, with a beard that was closely trimmed over a rounded chin. I remembered that I thought of him as a terrier the first time we met in Firenze. All high energy and ego. It was easier to focus on him than my enemy, Cosmo Paratore.
“Fortino’s imprisonment has long spared your people further battle,” Barbato said simply. “The people’s fury was assuaged by punishment meted out to him.”
“The people?” Marcello challenged. “Or her governors?”
“Both,” Barbato returned easily.
Marcello took a deep breath and placed his hands on the table, palms down, as if steeling himself. “Such is the terrible price some of us must pay,” he said carefully. “Fortino knew it as well as I. But you’ve extracted his worth and more. To take home my gold, enough gold to feed a thousand families for a year, is more than fair in exchange for allowing us to take him home to die. The Ladies Betarrini are no longer a part of this bargain.”
Lord Barbato considered him, then looked down the table. All of them slowly shook their heads, including Lord Greco. Cosmo Paratore simply wore a small smile directed at me that said You are sooo in trouble. His confidence sent a shiver of fear down my back. Were our hosts truly neutral? Or were they on the side of the Firenze, ultimately?
Barbato looked back to Marcello. “We must adhere to the original terms that brought us to this table. We cannot return to Firenze with anything less.”
Lord Ascoli, at the head of the table, cleared his throat. “The original terms, Lord Forelli. Your brother in exchange for Lady Gabriella and Lady Evangelia Betarrini.”
Marcello let out a scoffing sound. “It would be one thing if you were offering my brother, well and whole. If he had been treated as a nobleman ought in this past year.” He lowered his voice. “But you have brought me little more than his corpse.”
I winced, hoping his lowered voice wouldn’t carry over to Fortino, still over at the edge of the hall with my family. But I suspected it was nothing Fortino himself wouldn’t have said in order to negotiate more powerfully. He’d know Marcello said such things not to be unkind, but to further their joint cause.
The men of Firenze shared a look. Lord Barbato glanced at Paratore and Greco and then gave Ascoli a nod. Some sort of prearranged signal. I tensed.
“They understand your frustration,” said Lord Ascoli soothingly. “And therefore shall only require Lady Gabriella in exchange for Lord Fortino.” By his tone you would have thought he was offering a case of Turkish apricots in exchange for a case of plain old apples. Like it was a huge favor, taking me off Marcello’s hands.
It took one look at Paratore to make my stomach turn. He was grinning.
“We could have demanded all three of the Ladies Betarrini,” said Lord Barbato, casting an eye toward my mom. That put Dad over the edge. He took a step forward, his face hardening. “But we knew that would have been too much,” Barbato went on. “We are reasonable people. Don’t forget, we were once your friends.”
Yeah, those days are seriously over.
“We recognize that it is a great sacrifice to give us Lady Gabriella,” he continued with a nod in my direction, “which is precisely what is required to consider this exchange at all. Firenze’s people will not abide by us merely giving you Lord Fortino. An eye for an eye, you know.”
“You’ve literally taken an eye and more,” Marcello ground out. “Even one of these fine women is far too great a price in exchange for what remains of my brother, and you know it.”
“Take your brother home, where he can breathe his last in Siena,” urged Lord Greco.
“His last,” Paratore echoed in a whisper, tracing the edge of his goblet.
“To take him home,” Marcello said to Greco, “I’d have to take him to Castello Forelli.”
Lord Barbato hesitated. “We are prepared to offer you Castello Forelli as well as Lord Fortino in exchange for Lady Gabriella.”
Marcello stilled.
Seriously? In exchange for me? I groaned, inwardly. These guys want me bad. Far more than we expected. Not that I was flattered. There was only one reason they wanted me—to humiliate Marcello and Siena. And any way you cut it, that couldn’t be good news.
Marcello flicked his fingers away. “Keep Castello Forelli. I now have a much finer home in the palazzo vacated by the traitor.”
Way to go! Throw ’em off—make ’em think we don’t care about Castello Forelli.
Lord Barbato leaned forward on the table, hands clasped before him. “It is clear to us that you have great feelings for Lady Gabriella.”
Marcello studied him for a moment, then glanced back at me and offered his hand. I looked down at him and slipped my fingers into his. “’Tis no secret that the lady holds my heart,” he said to them.
“So is it that you fear that Lady Gabriella will be tortured as your brother has been?”
“That is but part of my trepidation about releasing her to you, but yes.” He was milking the conversation, drawing them out, getting us closer to nightfall, closer to the point when we’d have a chance to make a run for it.
“We are noblemen,” Paratore said, waving in either direction along the table. “She shall be treated with respect.”
I almost laughed out loud. It took everything in me to pretend I was every inch a medieval lady who knew her place.
“I released her from a cage the last time I was in Firenze,” Marcello bit out, returning his focus to them. “Your noblemen left her to die in it—you, Lord Barbato, and you, Lord Greco—without water and food. She suffered through nights in the cold. Untold humiliation. You believe I will take you at your word when you tell me she shall be treated with respect?”
The Fiorentini were silent for a moment.
“There is a perfect solution,” Lord Barbato said carefully.
“And what is that?”
Barbato glanced down the table at Rodolfo. “Lord Greco has generously offered to take Lady Gabriella’s hand in marriage.”
We froze. All except Dad. “Scusa un’attimo—” he demanded, striding forward. Now, see here…
“Ben!” Mom called.
But it was too late. I groaned inwardly; Dad had tolerated the fake potential prisoner exchange deal, but once we started talkin’ marriage…he was undone. Two burly guards grabbed hold of Dad’s arms and, with a nod from Lord Ascoli, escorted Dad out. “I’ve heard quite enough!” he shouted over his shoulder. “Only I may grant Gabriella’s hand in marriage to anyone! She is not some sort of chattel to be bartered off—”
The doors shut behind him, and his shouts were muffled. Mom was standing by the doors, a hand over her mouth. Great, now we’re gonna have to free Dad from some sort of cell…
Lord Bar
bato cocked a brow and glanced at his cohorts. “The Normans. You would think they knew the ways of war by now.”
Paratore laughed and said, “Lady Gabriella is hardly the virgin daughter of nobility, awaiting her groom—”
Marcello shoved back his chair and stood so suddenly it fell over, almost knocking me over with it. Luca and his men were only a half second behind, the others gathering behind us.
The Fiorentini rose too, and the Sansicinian guards behind both sides, and then it was a total glare-fest for a long, tense moment. Like the second before two hockey teams gave in to their pent-up anger and just went at it.
“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” soothed Lord Ascoli. “I’m certain Lord Paratore did not mean to question Lady Gabriella’s, ahh, purity. He merely refers to the fact that she has been as fierce an opponent on the battlefield as any man. Hardly the sort of woman we are used to encountering.”
Marcello glanced at me, silently inquiring if I was all right, if he could let this assault to my honor go. I knew my face had to be about the color of a tomato by now. Out of all the things I’d dealt with in ancient Toscana, I never thought a hundred men would be in the room when the subject of my virginity came up.
I waved at him. Let it go. Please, please, let it go.
He shook his head and reluctantly resumed his seat.
“Lord Forelli,” Rodolfo said, after a moment, “I know it would take great sacrifice from both you and Lady Gabriella. But under my roof, upon my arm, no harm would come to her. She would be treated as a lady. Mayhap it would even be the first step toward lasting peace between our provinces again.”
Marcello stared at him for a long moment, tapping his thumb on the table. I was trying to figure it out too. Was it a way for Greco to make sure I stayed safe, in case I had to go to Firenze? Or was he merely helping us extend the conversation, the time, to get us closer to nightfall, so that we could attempt our escape?
I knew what they were after. Potential headlines from grocery-store news rags back home came flying through my brain—She-Wolf Dumps Siena for Firenze! Who Would You Choose? Lord Marcello or Lord Greco? Readers Respond Inside…
“Your price is still too dear,” Marcello said.
“Come now, m’lord,” said Ascoli. “If you truly love her, demonstrate it. Ensure her safety, her health, her future, by allowing Lord Greco to marry her. It is the ultimate form of self-sacrifice. And as he said, it may be the first step in bringing our provinces closer together again.”
Marcello shifted in his seat and glanced up at me. “I would give my very life for Lady Gabriella. The question is her happiness. If I hold her heart as clearly as she does mine, it would eviscerate us to remain apart. But I leave it to her to decide.”
I frowned down at him. What? Great, put it on me.
I lifted a hand to my chest. “’Tis a great deal to ask, m’lords. A lady cannot come to such a decision lightly.”
Lord Paratore snorted. “You’ve made hundreds of decisions in an instant upon the battlefield. Why is this any different?”
“’Tis one thing to decide to move and save one’s life. Another to commit one’s future.” I glanced at Rodolfo, but he avoided meeting my gaze.
“Give us an hour to discuss it,” Marcello said.
“Please, take more than that,” Lord Ascoli said. He flicked two fingers toward a group of knights at his right, and suddenly the room was full of movement. Every one of us was guarded by two of our hosts, as were the Fiorentini.
“What are you doing?” Marcello said, pulling against the iron grip of the knights on either side of him.
“Ensuring this deal is completed, as I pledged,” Lord Ascoli said. “Mayhap a night in the dungeon shall convince Lady Gabriella that marriage is a winsome prospect, regardless of her groom.”
“You dare not,” Marcello growled.
“Indeed I do,” said Lord Ascoli, lifting his brows. “We shall resume our discussion on the morrow. As we break our fast, Lady Gabriella shall tell us what she has decided.”
He knew. Somehow he’d figured out our plan. Had our men been discovered, seen stealing toward the hill town? Had Greco sold us out?
“And if my brother dies this very night?” Marcello said. “Then there is nothing to discuss.”
“You are correct. If Lord Fortino dies, our discussion is complete,” Ascoli said. “I shall send you home with his corpse to bury in honor beside Castello Forelli. And I shall send Lady Gabriella to Firenze. Her fate remains in her own hands, just as long as Lord Fortino tarries between this world and the next.”
CHAPTER 8
They pushed me forward, and I stumbled into the center of the small cell. I turned to rush the door as they locked me in. “Please,” I begged. “Do not do this. Lord Marcello, he shall see you well paid if you will only assist me—”
The guards eyed each other but ignored me, turning to stand on either side of the door as sentries. I clenched the rough, hand-forged metal rods in my palms and fingers and leaned my forehead against them. What had I been thinking? Talking Marcello into this? My parents? My sister? Now we were all in danger.
I’d pictured us battling our way out, hand-to-hand combat. In danger that way. Not in danger because we’d been outsmarted.
“Gabriella,” said a familiar voice.
I lifted my head and peered through the dark.
It was Dad, two cells away.
“I’m here,” he said simply.
I turned to go over to the side of my iron cage and clung to the bars there. “I’m so, so sorry, Dad. I didn’t know this was how it would come down,” I said.
“I know that.” He hesitated. “So I take it you’re here because you didn’t agree to marry Bachelor Number Two.”
I laughed under my breath and said in English, “They’re totally using me to pressure Marcello. Lord Ascoli wishes for me to ‘consider my options.’ Some options, huh? I can choose to rot in her prisons or give in and become Rodolfo’s wife.”
Dad’s eyes shifted to the guards. “Is it a way for him to protect you?” he asked in English, casting a sidelong glance at the guards, as if they might interpret what he was saying.
“I…I think so. It’s all so complicated,” I said, putting a hand on my forehead.
“Does our friend—” he said, avoiding using Rodolfo’s name, “—does he have feelings for you, Gabi?”
I looked at him in confusion, then shook my head. “I don’t think so. He has some sort of old pact with Marcello. He knows that Marcello is the one I love.”
“That does not mean that he doesn’t—”
Footsteps on the stone stairs brought both our heads around. Men came down, ducking their heads beneath the low clearance, and I saw in a moment that they carried Fortino between them.
“Oh!” I cried, then switched to Italian. “Nay! Leave him in the hall, where he will be warm!”
They ignored me, dumping Fortino at the front of the cell between me and Dad and locking it up tight as if he might jump up and make a break for it. Fortino groaned but then was still.
“You can reach through the bars to do your rites,” said the knight to a priest who stood to the side. I hadn’t noticed him arrive with the others. The same dude from upstairs, about Marcello’s age and round-faced. The weird little ring of hair and shaved crown wasn’t really working for him, either. Not that it did for most of the holy men I’d spotted.
He kneeled and reached through the bars to feel for Fortino’s pulse.
“Does he live?” I asked in a hoarse whisper.
“By a thread,” he returned. He looked up at me, sorrow in his eyes. “He is dear to you, too?”
I nodded, too choked up to dare answer, and sank to my knees in the corner, as close as I could get to Fortino. I shook my head slowly. “Why, Father? Why would God let such a goo
d man die in this terrible way?”
He waited until I met his gaze. “This is not of God. But God allows men to make their own choices. Women, too,” he added with a nod.
I stared down at Fortino. “He’d finally regained his health, after battling for a decade to do so. He hoped to be married…” My voice broke then, aching with the sorrows that Fortino had endured.
“To Lady Rossi,” the priest said softly.
That brought my tears to a stop and my head up. My eyes searched his. Had he known Fortino when he was well? Could he be an ally? But then, their coming nuptials had hardly been a secret…
Fortino moaned, whimpering in his unconsciousness. I closed my eyes and thought about all he had endured. The flogging, the beatings that had left him bleeding inside…the taking of his eye. Lord Barbato had wanted him here, to remind me of how bad it could get, of what might be ahead of me if I chose the noble route, refusing Greco’s offer.
I stared as the priest began a soft prayer in Latin and opened a small pouch and set a corked vial of oil, a wooden cross, a bit of dry bread, and a small bottle of wine on the stone floor. “Through this holy unction and His own most tender mercy, may the Lord pardon whatever sins or faults you have committed, brother…”
“Extreme Unction,” Dad said lowly, as the priest reached for the vial of oil and uncorked it.
I glanced up at Dad in surprise, so lost in thought I’d forgotten he was there. What must he be thinking? I knew that at this point, he likely was back in the This-is-a-Nightmare-Somebody-Wake-Me-Up stage. We weren’t Catholic, but we’d spent enough time in Italia to know about Extreme Unction. The last rites.
The priest thought Fortino was about to breathe his last. Which really shouldn’t have shocked me. I’d been thinking about it ever since we first saw him, since Marcello basically said good-bye. But being here, now, on the cold stone floor, hearing the ancient words, it was all of a sudden real.
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