CHAPTER 46
Take care around men who are careful when drunk. Lord Geta spoke boldly in his cups, but some remembered that he had not spoken quite so freely before the Molè burned, no matter how many bottles had stood empty on his private table. Bold talk was commonplace now; few thought it likely that the engineers would remain Concord’s masters much longer.
‘You can’t tell me we were all bad or that you didn’t want us. We lived for you. The mob must work so that a few may dance, write verse, fight duels – we were your hawks; we made the hunt elegant and you gave it all to the dogs. Bad luck, Signori, bad luck.’
As Geta warmed to his theme, the older drinkers shook their heads and smiled. The speech was foolish and self-serving, but it was true. It was hardly an unusual subject for a drunken noble to declaim upon, but most suspected that even if it were in Geta’s power, he wouldn’t change a thing.
‘Oh, we had our fun, but you whores encouraged us: you can play coy, but you raised your skirts ready enough.’ His languorous merriment matched neither his polemic nor his military bearing.
‘Give it a bloody rest, Geta.’ The voice drifted through the mingled smoke and body heat that passed for atmosphere in The Rule and Compass.
Geta ignored him. ‘The noble Senator Tremellius was the Re-Formation’s first casualty. Its second? Glad you asked: nobility itself, no less. So, all equal, all impoverished.’ He looked around for his long-departed lady companion, snorted a laugh and lazily surveyed the company through the yellow gloom. ‘Not that ye lice would notice the difference.’
A different voice answered this time, a boy’s, and the tone was not bantering. ‘You’re the bloodsucker.’
The tavern fell silent. Geta appeared not to have heard, but as if remembering some pressing appointment, he suddenly stirred, pulling himself up to his full height with a languid grace that belied his drunkenness. He pulled his heavy cloak over his shoulder and snatched up his hat, setting it at a precise angle, more dandy than soldier, before striding out. The other patrons watched fondly; his proud bearing carried the past with him – a hundred battles, a thousand banquets. Even with his limp, the snapping heels of his long boots and bright ringing spurs conjured stately dances of days gone by – dances to which they would never have been invited. Now nobody danced, the musicians had departed and they called it progress.
It was almost a shock when Geta stumbled into a low table where a girl and boy sat whispering together in low voices under low hoods that covered their faces.
‘A thousand, one million apologies, my good—’
‘Mind your step, you drunken oaf,’ the boy snarled, pushing Geta’s elbow so that he lost his balance again and fell sprawled on his back.
Lord Geta lay there a moment and sighed loudly. Presently he sat up and said with regret, ‘Boy, I must kill you for that.’
‘Lord Geta,’ the tavern owner began as the swordsman stood and dusted himself off, ‘just leave him alone – don’t you know he’s—?’
In a whirl of colour, Geta had his sword unsheathed and pointed at the boy’s neck. ‘An engineer? Is that what you’re going to tell me?’ He pushed the blade forward before the boy could react, though he wasn’t aiming to cut. With his blade he pushed back the boy’s hood to reveal the numerals imprinted in sepia italics across the side of his shaven skull. ‘He might have been, if he hadn’t insulted the wrong fellow.’
The boy was speechless, but his partner spoke up. ‘My lord, please.’
Geta kept his blade pointed at the boy’s neck, but his eyes slid sideways. ‘Take off your hood.’ He looked at her appraisingly as she did. ‘You’re no beauty, Cadet,’ he said after a moment, ‘but you could do a lot better than this pug-nosed whelp.’
‘Please,’ she said. ‘He’ll—’
He brought the blade down and prodded the boy’s gullet. ‘Pay for my drink? Bloody generous of him. I’ve been running up my slate since yesterday morning and the lady I came in with appears to have absconded.’
As the stupefied boy fumbled for his purse, Geta leaned up against the bar and ordered another bottle. ‘Baldy’s paying. Salute,’ he shouted after the Cadets as they hurriedly stood up and left.
He pinched some snuff onto his hand as he kept an eye on the door. A month ago, Lord Geta’s only goal had been getting reinstated, but since the Battle of the Brothel a larger prize was in sight. He wasn’t about to leave the table, not with this hand, not while he was this hot.
The door opened again, and a fair-haired boy walked confidently to the bar, shooing away a barmaid by saying he was waiting for someone. Geta leaned over and offered some snuff, and when the boy studied him coolly, he affected to be insulted and turned away, pointedly leaving his silver snuffbox open on the bar. The boy sidled closer to whisper an apology and returned the box. As Geta took it, the boy took Geta’s hand, turned it over and sprinkled some snuff on his wrist, then slowly brought it to his own nose and inhaled. He held it there until Geta suddenly grabbed his neck, but he didn’t struggle as Geta pulled him in, but rather stood on tiptoe and leaned against the swordsman’s chest to whisper in his ear.
No one paid any attention: The Rule and Compass’s reputation for discretion was well deserved – and anyway, noble perversions had long ceased to be fodder for gossip; in their long twilight and exile from power, bluebloods had little to do but cultivate louche habits. Since the Curia’s overthrow, there were no more confession boxes for censorious informants to hide in. Fra Norcino’s followers were less liberal, but since the Battle of the Brothel they had troubles of their own.
After the boy left, Geta stayed to finish the bottle and to let the streets empty. The Old City byways used to be thronged at all hours, but not now; those who still walked the Depths at night were swordsmen whose long shadows made victims where they fell.
Geta was an old hand at intrigue; he had recognised the lad’s blend of secrecy and earnestness. He had been invited to talk of revolution, but until he discovered whether that invitation came from fools or men of consequence, he must tread carefully – but his interest was piqued by the New City address the boy had left in his snuff box.
His disempowered generation had grown up amidst fevered intoxicating talk of Restoration, and he knew where most plots ended: those that did not collapse though internecine assassination and betrayal led straight to the scaffold. But that was before. Now Concord was up for grabs, whether one dated it from the night the Molè burned or from the day that the Twelfth perished.
Geta was out of shape since his court-martial. He found himself sweating as he climbed the narrow old stairways that led to the Ponte Bernoulliana, where New and Old Concord were allowed to meet. He stopped to urinate and catch his breath at the Piazzetta Bocca della Verità.
A single cresset fixed to the wall above the leering Mouth kept the darkness at bay – only New City was worth illuminating by globe. With the help of the moon’s impartial light, Geta read the latest Truth:
I spit libation for brave Rasenna
Pondering Concord’s dire dilemma:
What cruel fate it was that sent us
A boy to be our last Apprentice.
Pinned below, in another hand:
I say, I say: The Twelfth is none, Three is One.
The Tenth, The Night, What’ the point?
Sore subtraction. War’s eruption
Bound to follow. Hard to swallow
One more lie. So hang them high Say I, Say I.
Still smiling at that, he scanned the other scrawled graffiti. There were the usual partisan slogans of the Naturalists and Empiricists, and more numerous complaints from those who made no such distinction and denounced all engineers together. But here – yes, he’d seen it in New City too – a new graffito: a Herod’s Sword in front of a rising sun, and the legend, Her Kingdom Come.
What did it mean? Nothing. Who was drawing it? No one. The children of the city were a new class as far as Geta was concerned: not noble, not engineer, not Small People, but some other thing. He turned away with a bemused smile and found two shadows waiting behind him. Assuming ambush, he raised a quick dagger, but then they stepped back into the light and he recognised the Cadets from The Rule and Compass. Perhaps they’d come here to slander one of their teachers; perhaps he’d interrupted an assignation.
The boy recovered his courage quickly. ‘Put your knife down, old man. It’s rusty and you’ve no audience here.’ He was obviously still smarting from the embarrassment the swordsman had dealt him in front of the girl, and the tavern.
‘Aye, we’re all alone,’ Geta said softly. The moon reflected in his still-raised blade, then it blinked and became a red liquid eye. A slash of black appeared on the boy’s neck, growing as if drawn by some unseen, slow-moving pen.
Geta appeared not to have moved, but for the widening smile underneath his moustaches. His eyes shifted to the boy’s companion as the boy attempted to gurgle his sweetheart’s name through a fine spray of blood from his neatly severed trachea. A fountain of blood followed, splashing into the dark puddle at the boy’s feet. Pink steam wafted from the mingling blood and piss.
‘My Lord.’ The girl took a step back from it and whispered, ‘I won’t say a word.’
‘Who could you tell? Nobody’s listening any more.’
As she turned to flee, Geta grabbed the back of her gown and tugged her towards him into his embrace. As she whimpered, the blade entered and Geta dragged his hand across his weary brow. He considered the merits of dumping the bodies in a canal. The ceaseless current would quickly bring them to Monte Nero – the Molè might be gone, but all Concord knew the beast’s appetite remained, undiminished. The young couple would not be lonely on their final journey; these days, the canals were choked with bodies, a pilgrimage of true equality drawn from every strata. But Geta’s romantic mood passed and he left the Cadets where they were lying, not even troubling to destroy their faces – engineers were no longer untouchable, and murder had never been remarkable.
Feeling thirsty again, Geta had automatically turned towards the nearest tavern when he remembered his destination, and swearing, he turned about and raced up the steps, anxious now that he might be late. The labyrinth of stairways and little alleys leading up to New City was crooked as an Ariminumese cleric, the quite intentional effect to separate old and new, ruled and rulers. The nobility’s complaint had never been the segregation, which they approved; they simply thought they were on the wrong end of it.
‘Concord needs you.’
Geta sniffed the wine with exaggerated care, then swigged it back and held the empty glass up to the fair-haired boy to refill. Dispatching the Cadets had left him in a sour mood. ‘You need me, but you don’t speak for Concord any more, Spinther.’
‘I will soon,’ Leto said with assurance.
The general looked like an insolent boy to Geta, though any youthful élan was fading somewhat. Disgrace plainly did not sit easily with the lad. He might wear his raven-black hair long, like a soldier, but a number was etched on the skull beneath, just like the rest of them.
‘You’re not confident of that. If you were confident you wouldn’t have allowed my glass to be refilled three times. If you were confident, you’d want me sober instead of agreeable. If you were confident, you’d be giving me dates and places and names.’
‘I’m confident, Geta, just not in you. Before we get to details we need to be sure we can trust you. There’s never yet been a successful rebellion, and every unsuccessful attempt has one thing in common.’
‘They were betrayed,’ Geta agreed.
‘I didn’t become general at the age of twelve by being foolhardy.’
‘But it can’t hurt having a name like Spinther, not to mention friends in such high places.’
Leto ignored this. ‘The majority of the consuls want to see an end to Apprentice rule: it’s inefficient and outdated, and after Rasenna, it needs only a push.’
‘Getting ahead of yourself, aren’t you? If the Collegio wants to overthrow the last Apprentice it’s only to take power for itself.’
‘That’s why I am keeping this to senior officers only: control the army and we control the State.’
‘I’m not an officer any more. You saw to that.’
‘That’s entirely to do with your lack of discipline, not lack of talent. Besides that, you’re a graduate of the Rasenneisi workshops.’
‘You mean there’ll be street fighting.’
‘Most likely, and if it comes to that—’
‘—you’ll need someone good at it.’ Geta was impressed, but he refused to show it. ‘Isn’t the last Apprentice a friend of yours?’
‘Torbidda was … an ally once. Things change.’
‘Tell me about it. Look, this is all very thrilling, but you’re assuming the legions will follow you, and that’s assuming too much. The only thing the generals hate more than the Collegio is each other. I didn’t hear any great outpourings of grief for Luparelli.’
‘Luparelli was a pompous ass. I’m not interested in your analysis; I’m asking you the same thing I’m asking the others: when it happens, that you mobilise for me.’
‘Mobilise what? I have no men.’
‘Don’t be disingenuous. I have my spies: I’ll never fathom why, but you’ve acquired quite a following in the Depths, and it’s in this city, not the swamps of Europa, where the empire will be won or lost.’
‘What about the praetorians? You have to get through them to get the Apprentice.’
‘Corvis has Castrucco in his pocket.’
‘And you have Corvis? Ah, I wondered why you two were snarling at each other so much at my court-martial. I felt quite left out. Very well. Very clever. Let me ask the same thing whoever else you’ve approached has asked: what’s in it for me?’
Leto sighed deeply. ‘That’s a hell of an attitude. Where’s your patriotism?’
Geta started laughing. ‘Madonna, is that all you have? I’m loyal to those who pay. I came here expecting an offer.’ He stood up and grabbed an unopened bottle. ‘I’ll take this for my troubles. Don’t bother me again till you have something real.’
Geta turned and wobbled a little on his feet, exaggerating his drunkenness. He stumbled to the door, and then turned around, almost disappointed.
‘You’re still so young, Spinther. When I said no, you ought to have killed me on the spot. That’s how I know you’re not serious. When I start hearing stories of generals meeting untimely deaths, I’ll start believing. Good luck, Signori.’
Leto listened till Geta’s footsteps had reached the bottom step, then he cleared his throat. From a dark corner of the room, a side-panel clicked opened. A man wearing a consul’s chain stepped out. His eyes twinkled in the gloom as he asked, ‘Did he say “Signori”?’
‘Yes – it’s that Rasenneisi training. Geta can smell a trap better than any officer I know.’
‘Why don’t we just hire a damn condottiere?’ said Corvis with sudden distaste. ‘Geta’s only talent is making trouble.’
‘We need troublemakers.’
‘Well, he said no.’
‘Just wait. The situation’s getting worse by the day. The worse it gets the better for us. Geta’s a wharf rat, he’ll jump aboard.’
Consul Corvis listened thoughtfully; the Spinther boy understood the legions like he understood the Guild, but Geta brought something to the table neither of them had: Old Town. Corvis was still a little incredulous that the general had even suggested enlisting the scoundrel who had nearly destroyed Spinther’s career along with his own. To rise above such a grudge, to ally with an enemy in order to go to war against an old friend? The coming struggle would require such discipline – that, and a great deal of luck. The last Apprentice might be isolated and friendless, but he still wore the red.
How many legions was that worth?