Arcadia Burns

LYCAON’S CURSE


“MATTIA IS DEAD,” SAID Alessandro that evening, before Rosa could say a word about her conversation with Trevini.

She was holding a steaming double espresso, not her first of the day, and her whole body felt as if creatures of some kind were scrabbling under her skin.

They were standing on the terrace of the Palazzo Alcantara, with its panoramic view over the olive groves and out to the west. The tall palm fronds rising to the sky in front of the stone balustrade rustled in the darkness, and the pump of the swimming pool gurgled quietly, the light of the underwater lamps bathing part of the west facade in wavering brightness. The mild evening air was filled with the song of the cicadas.

“They found his body yesterday,” said Alessandro. “Burnt, lying in a Dumpster.”

“In Crown Heights.”

“You know about it?”

“Trevini called. He told me.”

Slowly, he nodded. “And of course he tried to pin the blame on me.”

Rosa emptied her cup of coffee in a single gulp, and placed it on the top of the balustrade. “Is he right? Did you have anything to do with it?”

“You’ve already asked me that question. And I answered you.”

“Were you telling the truth?”

“Would you sooner believe Trevini than me?”

“Oh, come on. I can’t just leave it hovering in the air between us.”

He sighed gently and looked out at the plain again. The countryside was almost immersed in night. Miles away, the lights of a village glinted. Up in the starlit sky, the signal beams of a solitary airplane blinked on and off as it flew silently north.

“When I told you that I had nothing to do with the assassinations, you said—”

“I said it was too bad. I know.”

“Did you mean it?”

She nodded without hesitation. “Do you think I’ve never wished them dead? I’ve hoped, often enough, that they’d perish miserably.”

“It’s possible that Mattia was still alive when they set fire to him.”

She took his hand, and gently drew him close. “He wasn’t there. Mattia wasn’t one of them.”

“What makes you so sure?”

Could she be sure? What would she see on the second video? Who would she recognize? Only Michele and Tano? At the moment, she wasn’t certain if she would ever watch it.

Alessandro’s gaze was grave and dark. “Did you ask Mattia? Or did he deny it on his own?”

“Neither.”

“Then you don’t know that he was innocent.”

“He saved my life!”

“And I’m not responsible for his death. Whatever Trevini claims.”

Had she really thought that Alessandro was lying to her? She fought down her guilt. “Okay,” she said after a while. “Who was it, then?”

His expression told her that he was reluctant to give her the truth. Rosa saw the trouble in his eyes. She stroked his hair and kissed him, just because all of a sudden she felt like it.

“The Hungry Man,” he said.

“I thought he was still in prison.”

“As if that ever stopped any capo from handing out death sentences.”

“But why would he do that? What business of his are your American relations?”

“His business is mainly to do with me.”

She stared at him. The grief in his eyes, the sorrow in his voice touched her. And slowly, she began to see where all this was going.

“The Hungry Man will soon be out of prison,” he went on. “That’s not just rumor; it’s only a matter of time. Someone in high places—very high places—has seen to it that the inquiry into his appeal was reopened. And everyone can guess the outcome.”

The Hungry Man—everyone called him that; no one used his true name—had been the predecessor of Salvatore Pantaleone, the capo dei capi whom Rosa had known. For decades he had ruled the Sicilian Mafia with an iron fist, until he was brought to trial and imprisoned almost thirty years ago. He had been as good as forgotten for a long time, and then, a few years earlier, new rumors began circulating. Ever since, it had been said that the return of the Hungry Man was imminent, that he had influential allies in all the European centers of power, people who ensured that the verdicts condemning him for the worst of his crimes were overturned and sentences for the other charges shortened. Pantaleone was dead; the position of capo dei capi was vacant. Who would be the new boss of bosses? Power struggles were going on within Cosa Nostra, but no one had nominated himself for the post. They all seemed to fear the Hungry Man, and no one wanted to risk standing in his way if he really did come back to Sicily to reassert his old claim.

He had given himself the title of the Hungry Man, proclaiming that he was the reincarnation of the ancestor of all the Arcadian dynasties—King Lycaon, the tyrant who, according to legend, had been turned by Zeus, father of the gods, into the first to change between human and animal form. With him, all the other inhabitants of Arcadia had been condemned to the same fate. And so the Panthera were born, the Lamias, the Hundinga, and all the other shape-shifters who had been dispersed around the world after the downfall of Arcadia, but maintained the sunken empire’s heritage to the present day.

The Hungry Man, so it was said, wanted to restore the rule of terror of the old Arcadian dynasties. He promised his followers a return to the bloody excesses of antiquity, when the shape-shifters ruled the kingdoms all around the Mediterranean and feasted to their hearts’ content on human flesh.

Rosa took Alessandro’s hand. “What sort of business does he have with you?”

“He hates my family. For a long time, the Carnevares were closer to him than anyone else, until someone betrayed him, and he blamed us for it.”

“And did your family betray him?”

He shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know, and I don’t think it makes any difference. He swore to take revenge on us more than a quarter of a century ago. And now it’s time for him to demonstrate his new strength. He’s gradually decimating my family—or what’s left of it—beginning with the American Carnevares. With every murder he’s coming closer, and someday it will be my turn.”

How long had Alessandro known about this? What he and she had between them was still too fragile to withstand so many secrets. When would the moment come when the strain was too much for it?

“You’re right at the end of his hit list?” she asked, her voice husky.

He nodded. “At least that’s what I assume.”

“How many people has he had killed already? Only Michele’s brother and cousins, or others as well?”

Maybe he was sorry now that he had told her the truth. But she gave him credit that he hadn’t tried soothing her with evasions. Another reason why she was so attracted to him.

“One of my second cousins was shot in Catania the day before yesterday,” he said. “And two more in Palermo. Unless there’s someone else behind that, his killers have reached Sicily.” He rubbed his nose, but it wasn’t the knowing gesture with which he sometimes riled her; this time it seemed to be nervousness. “He wants me to panic. Maybe strike out blindly around me, as my father or Cesare would have done. He’d probably like it if I tried to blame other families for the murders and started a clan feud. That would suit him very well. He’d only have to watch us weakening each other, and then he could seize power over all the clans.”

“What are you going to do?”

“The obvious thing would be to summon all the Carnevares. But I’d sooner die than ally myself with someone like Michele. Not after everything he did to you.”

Maybe she should have asked him not to take her feelings into consideration. But instead she kissed him again, this time harder, and for a while neither of them said a word, not even when their lips parted and they looked at each other.

“It’s not my turn yet,” he said. “He’s probably enjoying the idea of the murders spreading fear and terror among the Carnevares too much for that. He’ll take his time before his killers turn their attention to me. But that’s not what worries me.”

She raised one hand and stroked his cheek and throat. She just wanted to be close to him, very close.

“I’m afraid for you,” he said.

“I’m not a Carnevare.”

“Word of our relationship has spread. There’s a hotbed of rumor seething, and we haven’t gone to any trouble to counter that. I still thought danger loomed from the other clans and our own people. But now…” He stopped, kissed the palm of her hand, bent her fingers into a fist, and closed his own hand around it. “Now it’s possible that the Hungry Man has you in his sights.”

“Me?”

He nodded. “If he wants to get at me, if he’s really hell-bent on injuring the capo of the Carnevares, then he’ll have to take you away from me. He’ll try to kill you, Rosa.”

“Nonsense,” she contradicted him, but even as she spoke, she realized that he was right. There was a long tradition in the Mafia of attacking an enemy by murdering all his loved ones. Obviously she would be on the Hungry Man’s hit list herself.

“So now?” she whispered.

“I don’t want you going anywhere without bodyguards,” he said. “And I don’t mean those rustics from Piazza Armerina. You need a security service. Specialists who know what they—”

“Hey, hey, hey,” she gently interrupted him, putting a finger to his lips. A smile stole over her face. “I don’t want gorillas around me day and night, never mind where they come from.”

“But—”

“Where are your bodyguards?” she asked. “I don’t see any of them around here. You don’t like going around with a bunch of apes in black suits any more than I do.” She stood on tiptoe and kissed the end of his nose. “We’re Arcadians. We’ll manage by ourselves.”

“Says who?”

“Says me.”

“Totally senseless.”

“All this is totally senseless. That was obvious from the very first day. Did it stop us?”

His hand was on the back of her neck. He drew her to him again. Her breasts gently brushed his chest, and she felt the nipples harden—as they always did before disappearing and turning to scaly snakeskin. Infuriating.

“I know what we’ll do now,” she said.

At last his radiant smile came back. “You do?”

“To take our minds off it.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“The basement,” she said. “Those furs.”