CHAPTER 22
Levi tipped his hat courteously to the newly married couple standing in the doorway of the church. Popular piety still ascribed the defeat of Concord’s siege-engines to the Madonna; the Santa Maria della Vittoria’s roofless state didn’t reflect any decline in gratitude – it was just one of the buildings begun but never finished in the last two years as an excess of ambition and enthusiasm outstripped the available manpower and money. The usual bloody routine of raid, burnout, grief and vengeance was a song grown old in Rasenna; these days fresh foundations and the dust of construction were everywhere.
Levi crossed Piazza Stella quickly, eager to leave behind his inconclusive meeting with the Gonfaloniere. Newly rich northsiders, tired of being shown up by the neighbours, had cleared a grand semi-circular space on their side of the Irenicon a year ago. Forty years ago, Count Scaligeri designed the original Grand Piazza in a day: he drew a circle on a map one morning and the towers within that circle were knocked by evening. Such autocratic town planning was, alas, impossible in newly democratic Rasenna. So many families refused to move their towers that the new piazza assumed a jagged star shape, rather than the pleasing half-moon intended.
Fabbro’s evasions frustrated Levi, though he was used to them by now. He’d seen similar sophistry in the Palazzo del Popolo. Rasenna had slipped off its Concordian shackles by a series of lucky accidents, and the magnates foolishly believed that their new-found wealth could keep them off. Condottieri traditionally preyed upon such delusions, but the Hawk’s Company had linked its fortune with Rasenna, and if it perished, they perished.
As he walked between the plinths at the mouth of the bridge, Levi glanced at the empty one. Soon there would be a full guard of lions. That was another change; Rasenneisi had grown used to these small revolutions since the Twelfth Legion’s destruction. After that prodigious feat, nothing could surprise them. Levi looked at the crowds crammed between the stalls; each month the bridge grew ever-narrower as the market grew busier. Even though he’d failed to bring the leaders of the southern cities together, their merchants were in a frenzy of communication, and Rasenna’s smart new bridge was the hub. Since it had leapt the Irenicon, the divisions that mattered were between the major Guilds, and their quarrels of precedence were thrashed out in the Palazzo del Popolo and solved the civilised way, by the other river flowing through Rasenna: money. The division between these privileged few and those whose trades were deemed ‘unskilled’ remained unbridged, a gulf wider than the Irenicon.
Levi froze as he felt an arm slide under his; he grabbed it while his other hand went instinctively to his purse.
‘You must think I’m terrible,’ said Maddalena with a smile. Her cheeks were flushed; she must have run to catch up.
‘I know you’re terrible.’ He released her wrist, but did not pull his arm free.
She laughed. ‘Just because I won’t let you browbeat poor Papa.’
‘“Papa” is far from poor, and he can stand up for himself – to everyone but you.’
‘That’s true,’ she said, unsheathing her weapon of choice. ‘With me on your side’ – she smacked her fan on Levi’s chest for emphasis – ‘you could get your way all the time. You could even be elected gonfaloniere.’ She paused by a fruit stall and picked up a yellow-green apple. She held it out to him. ‘Isn’t that what you want?’
‘I’m sure it’ll be delicious, when it’s ripe.’
‘You find the goods wanting before you’ve tried them?’ She began fanning herself. ‘The sample’s free, you know.’ Maddalena was confident that the stall owner would not object – after all, her father supplied credit to every entrepreneur in town.
‘Nothing’s free, amore; you learn that when you’re older. Be content. You’ll get a fine trousseau when you marry.’
‘My husband will, and meanwhile my brothers will inherit the lion’s share of the Bombelli fortunes.’
‘Fabbro’s still breathing, you know.’
‘And someday he’ll stop. Oh, don’t look so shocked, Levi! I can’t stand you thinking ill of me.’
‘I don’t. I pity you. If you’d had the luck to be born a man, your father would have given you everything. With a mind like yours, you’d have been magnificent. Instead, you waste your talent on silly dalliances.’
‘Bad luck indeed, to fall for the only chaste condottieri in Etruria. The rest of your company have been at it like cottontails since they arrived. Weren’t you ever that carefree?’
‘Once,’ he admitted, ‘when I didn’t understand the responsibility John Acuto carried. Rasenna’s in danger and we can’t afford to play games.’
‘Tell that to your warren.’
Levi pulled his arm free, but he couldn’t deny the charge. He had only to look at the swollen figures of every second Rasenneisi girl. They’d been locked away in their towers during the long years of hate and now they longed for love. Naturally enough his men were happy to scratch their voluptuous itches – but carousing with the townsmen’s daughters was making his soldiers hated, and Levi could almost hear old John Acuto growling, ‘That’s why God invented whores.’ The old bull would have forbidden any such congress on practical grounds – the price for enjoying respectable women was always too steep. But Levi was no Acuto – who was he to tell men to behave like saints, in Rasenna of all places?
Smiling again, Maddalena said, ‘With a good man at my side things would be different. We could rule together.’
When Levi said nothing, Maddalena leaned close to whisper, ‘Perhaps if I were a year or two older, like the Contessa, you’d be willing to sample the goods?’
Levi snapped her fan away and cast it into the river. ‘Hound me all you like, but don’t insult my friends.’
‘Friend.’ She laughed. ‘Is that what they’re calling it these days?’
Responding to Maddalena’s innuendos only encouraged her, so Levi apologised for his temper instead.
‘No harm done,’ she said stopping at a jewellery stall, drawing her fingers sensuously along a row of ivory fans. ‘I won’t tell Papa if you buy me a new one.’
‘What a scare you gave the farmer. He thought you were going to drop him!’
‘I ought to have. Cold-hearted stronzo.’
Sofia and Donna Bombelli were walking to the bridge from Tower Sorrento. Piazza Luna no longer looked like an accidental creation; with the new bridge and the rebuilding of the Signoria’s meeting hall, the piazza had unexpectedly attained civic dignity, though increasingly new towers were encroaching on its half-moon shape. Rasenna was remaking itself. In every ward, the presiding Guild advertised their respectability and wealth by clearing space for an oversized piazza and decorating it with vulgar fountains and statues.
Only the thoroughfare to the southern gate was kept wide and unimpeded. A steady flow of well-packed carts took Rasenneisi linens and wool south and brought back the Oltremarine spices that Rasenneisi had developed such a taste for of late. Goods from Europa couldn’t come via Concordian lands, so the Irenicon was choked with broad-beamed barques waiting to dock. Their clinker-built hulls, bulging with the heavy materials Rasenneisi engineers needed, sat low in the water.
‘The farmer’s no monster, he’s just cheap – who will marry Rosa now? He’s got two mouths to feed that will never bring his tower anything but shame.’
‘Shame! As if the Sorrentos are unique. We’ve been busy every day this month, and Melissa Tesoro and Lucrezia Abbrescia will pop any day now. There are a hundred girls in Rasenna praying for blood at the end of the month.’
Donna Bombelli was surprised at Sofia’s vehemence. ‘I’m just glad I have your help. I’m too old and Rasenna’s too big to have just one midwife.’
‘I’m trying to fill Doc’s shoes best I can.’
‘Well, thank Madonna this one went smoothly.’
‘She’s young. It’s only the old ones who have difficulties—’ Sofia stopped. ‘That is, there’s more of a chance of—’
Donna Bombelli just laughed. ‘Stop back-tracking. I’ve done it enough times to know it doesn’t get easier. It wears you, sure as washing wears dye out of wool.’ She rubbed her hand fondly on the bump. ‘After this one – basta! If Fabbro gets so much as a twinkle in his eye I’m going to chase him from the bed-chamber with the broomstick.’
The noonday chime made Donna Bombelli’s head turn, and Sofia noticed her proud smile. Her husband was determined to leave his mark with his ambitious Renovatio Urbis. The new Palazzo del Popolo might still sound strange to her, but the magnificent tower it housed was capped by a clock that counted not only the hours but the phases of the moon, the rotation of the zodiac and the seasonal ebb of the Irenicon.
Sofia laughed. ‘I’ll let you borrow a banner from the workshop. I never imagined Fabbro such a goat. You should be happy, most men his age—’
‘Most men his age work for him,’ said the old matron with pride, then rolled her eyes. ‘You know how men are. The more Bombelli business expands, the more Fabbro’s—’ she giggled like a girl.
‘Give yourself a holiday. Hire a pretty maid to scrub the floor in front of his banco in the mornings.’
‘Contessa!’ said Donna Morello with mock indignation. ‘Such an imagination for such a delicate young lady. Besides, it wouldn’t work – even with his trousers round his ankles, my husband’s a businessman. Bastards are a luxury only nobles can afford. The cost-benefit ratio would make Fabbro wilt before any transaction could be effected.’
Sofia avoided looking at the Irenicon as they reached the bridge. The wound still wept, and enough time had passed for her to realise it would never heal. At arm’s length, beyond an impassable frontier, Giovanni survived, but she could not reach him. He was in another country. When they pressed onto the bridge between the baying salesmen, the Rasenneisi made way for Sofia. The balustrade had been left unmended in tribute to the dead of the Morello revolt, until commerce trumped sentiment; when the foreign merchants complained, the Wool Guild offered to pay for a yearly mass instead, and the damage was now completely repaired. Memory was subject to conversion like every other coin.
Donna Bombelli noticed Sofia’s downcast eyes. ‘Sleeping these days?’
‘I’m not dreaming about that boy, the Apprentice, any more. Sometimes I dream – it’s strange – I have my back turned to a ruined city. Don’t ask me how I know what it is, I just know. I know like I know that it’s forbidden to look at it.’
‘Let me guess – you look?’
‘And the second I do, it crumbles – the whole city, into dust.’
‘Wonder what that means …’
‘It means I should find a better place to drink than the Lion’s Fountain. You’ve been a rock, Donna Bombelli, but I sometimes wish the Reverend Mother was around.’
They walked on in silence for a space.
‘Have you told the little Sister about it?’
‘Isabella has her hands full with novices and orphans. I’m not going to trouble her with my fantasies.’
But Donna Bombelli wasn’t listening any more. ‘What is that girl up to now?’ she said with an intake of breath.
Sofia followed her gaze to the jewellery stall. ‘Outman-oeuvring that poor condottiere, by the looks of it.’
‘Signorina Scaligeri. Donna Bombelli,’ said Levi with a courteous bow, ‘your daughter’s kindly permitted me to buy her a small gift.’
Donna Bombelli eyed Maddalena knowingly. ‘I hope you haven’t been pestering the gallant gentleman. Did you thank him?’
‘No, Mama. Yes, Mama.’ Maddalena performed a slow curtsey to Levi. Then, with the same satirical coyness, she grimaced. ‘Mama! You stink like a whorehouse. How many times must I tell you: midwifery isn’t a fitting occupation for a magnate’s wife. We’ve a name now – let someone more suitable take over. Now that Rasenna’s got real soldiers’ – she tapped Levi’s chest affectionately – ‘the former Contessa must needs work. What say you, Signoria Scaligeri? Mama thinks you’re a natural. Now that there’s no one to raid, your workshop’s pointless. I bet you miss that daily fix of horror. So long as your hands are bloody by the end of day you’re not particular how it gets there, are you?’
Sofia smiled. ‘No, I’m not particular. Insult me again and I’ll prove it. Your father’s this year’s Gonfaloniere, but that doesn’t make you royalty.’
‘Ah. Rasenna can only have one princess.’
‘That’s enough,’ said Donna Bombelli, grabbing her daughter by the arm and marching her back to Palazzo Bombelli. ‘Wait till I tell your father …’
‘Madonna, that girl.’ Levi whistled in relief. ‘I’d rather face the remaining Concordian legions than her tongue. Did she upset you?’
Sofia was breathing through her nose with a strange look on her face. Her normal olive skin paled and she suddenly rushed to the balustrade and retched into the river. She coughed and spat and rubbed her mouth before looking up. ‘Merda.’
Levi patted her back. ‘Something you ate?’
‘Didn’t have breakfast.’
‘Don’t let Maddalena get to you.’
‘Would it be impolitic to break her nose?’
‘Sofia.’
‘I’ve just got to take it. Great.’ Sofia looked around defiantly until the curious turned back to their business. ‘I’m just not used to it, to these—’
‘—bitches?’ Levi offered.
‘They silently hated me because I was free to do things they couldn’t. Now that the Families are gone, they feel free to insult me. Come up the tower. We’ll get some breakfast.’
She rarely called it Tower Scaligeri, though it was hers now. She still half-expected to see Doc Bardini’s watchful silhouette on the rooftop, looking over Rasenna and spinning his plans. Everything else was the same – the workshop full of fighters, boys and young men, bandieratori learning the Art Bandiera, training with sticks until they were ready for flags …
As they climbed the hill, Levi complained in his droll way about Fabbro’s apathy. ‘He doesn’t see the urgency. I’ve never seen him move fast unless there’s some gold in it.’
Sofia shared Levi’s anxieties, but she let him talk. She was still feeling a little queasy, but there was more: she remembered the Doc’s informal meetings, where he had corralled consensus. Growing up, she’d never questioned his reasoning – Bardini interests were Scaligeri interests, and so Rasenna’s – but now she knew better. The Signoria must speak for all Rasenna not just one tower. Finally she interrupted. ‘Say this in the Palazzo del Popolo. I’ll back you.’ But even that was too much, and she immediately regretted it. Prior agreements rendered the Signoria meaningless. It ended with two parties blocking their ears to each other’s arguments, every issue decided by who could buy the most votes. It was still the violence of the strong against the weak, only a tad more civilised than bandieratori fighting it out on the rooftops.
When they reached the tower, Sofia popped into the workshop to check on her boys.
‘Porca miseria! What’s this?’ she cried when she found them trading fight stories instead of paired off in tight rows and sparring. She broke the little groups up with a clap of her hands. ‘You’d think you don’t need practise!’
It was still marvellous to Levi. His condottieri were some of Etruria’s best-drilled soldiers and he knew the difficulties of coordinating any group of men in the twilight confusion of battle. The first time he’d first seen a troop of bandieratori was at the siege of Rasenna: a moving mass of colour, swooping in syncopated moves like a great serpent writhing on the dusty battlefield. The discipline of the individual within the chaotic mêlée had seemed nothing short of miraculous. In the year the Hawk’s Company had been stationed in Rasenna, he’d come to understand the thoroughness of bandieratori training, seeing how devoutly the basic sets were drilled, how obsessively minor infelicities were corrected, how reflexes and improvisation were honed as Sofia’s boys rose to the challenge. Doc Bardini was gone, but they had her and Uggeri to show them what was possible.
Levi knew it had been a necessary discipline, that without Art Bandiera, Rasenna would have destroyed itself centuries ago. Rasenna’s beauty was not docile or retreating, and her emblem was no accident: these people were lions. They must scream and howl, break glass and beat drums. Since the day he had agreed to become Podesta, one question had plagued him: his job was to make war on Rasenna’s enemies and to keep the peace within her walls – but how long can there be peace between lions and hawks?
Sofia was looking about for Tommaso Sorrento, Rosa’s brother, to tell him he’d just become an uncle.
‘He’s gone to the Lion’s Fountain.’
‘Bit early …’ Sofia wasn’t annoyed; the boy was entitled to celebrate, and he’d probably cleared it with Uggeri – but where was Uggeri?
‘With Tommaso,’ said one of the boys carelessly, and Sofia froze. Uggeri drinking in the middle of the day? That didn’t sound right. Then she noticed that three of the older students were gone too.
She looked at Levi and swore, ‘Madonna!’ She grabbed a flag from the rack and raced for the door. ‘Levi, I can’t wait for you!’
‘Don’t! Go!’