The Exiled Blade (The Assassini)

40





“How do you extract a s-snail from his s-shell?”

Lady Giulietta looked at her cousin, wondering if it was a riddle or a serious question. “Marco?”

“If you use a p-pin he hides. Of course, you can s-stamp on h-him, b-but then you have lots of p-pieces of shell.” Marco grinned. “You c-cook him. M-mother taught me that.”

“But then it won’t be alive.”

“Not b-by the end,” Marco agreed, freeing his sword. “Now, y-you must let the men see you.” He gripped Giulietta’s reins and walked his horse forward so they rode a dozen paces in front of the army as it began to move. Prince Frederick immediately kicked his spurs and positioned himself on her other side.

“Ahh,” Marco said. “Her faithful hound.”

Frederick scowled. The WolfeSelle had a new handle of white leather wound with gold wire and a scabbard decorated with nielloed flowers. But that, a battered hunting horn and simple trews, was all he wore.

“No armour, I s-see.”

“I fight better like this.”

“F-feeling wolfish today, are we?”

“Your highness, if I might have a word with Lady Giulietta . . .?”

“I don’t k-know.” Marco looked at Giulietta. “M-might he?”

She edged her horse to one side by pulling slightly on the reins and kicking on the side she wanted to turn, looking up to find Frederick smiling his approval at her skill.

“I wanted you to have this,” he said.

Dropping his hand to his hip, Frederick lifted the hunting horn to free its lanyard and offered it to her. The horn was dented around its rim and its mountings were so tarnished the silver was smoky black. Instinct made her glance back and she saw his men watching her.

“What is it?”

“It belonged to Roland.”

The name meant little to her.

“Roncesvalles?” Frederick said. “Roland turns back the Saracens at the pass and saves France from becoming Moorish?” He seemed surprised he needed to tell her the story. “It arrived from my father just before we left.”

“What happens if I blow?”

“The paladins wake from under the hill.”

“Really?” Giulietta had heard of the paladins.

“So it’s said.” Frederick shrugged. “No one has sounded it for five hundred years. No one has dared.”

“Why me?” Giulietta demanded.

“Because Leo is heir to the Wolf Brothers. If his life is in danger you must blow it and the paladins will come. You will need a circle of fire from which they can ride. Without the circle . . .”

“You’re giving me this because I’m Leo’s mother?”

“Because I love you.”

Serves me right for asking, Giulietta decided. Frederick was waiting for a reply, and when he realised she didn’t know what to say, he leant forward and carefully put the cord around her neck, making sure the battered hunting horn hung neatly at her side.

“That’s pretty,” Marco said.

“Roland’s horn.”

His eyes widened and he grinned into the wind. Marco looked good in armour, his thin shoulders widened by boastful shoulder plates, his chest broader than in real life. Had his mother been alive she’d have been surprised at how like his father he looked. “W-what are y-you thinking?”

“You could be your father.”

Marco’s mouth twisted. “I imagine that’s m-meant as a c-compliment.” He looked to see if Frederick was listening, but the princeling was staring at the onion domes of the cathedral. These were tarnished, one or two of them askew, but the afternoon sun still glinted on what was left of their gilt. “You k-know why you must let my soldiers s-see you?”

“Because they came to get Leo back?”

Her child was with a nurse back at camp. Four of Frederick’s krieghund guarded him and a dozen of Marco’s best infantry.

“B-because you will r-rule after me.”

“Marco . . .”

He smiled. “There, I’ve said the unsayable. Everyone says my m-mind is weak. Well, my b-body is w-worse. My joints ache, my chest is t-tight, my eyes not as g-good as they should be. Alonzo tried to p-poison me before I was b-born.”

“What?” Giulietta was shocked.

“That was when my m-mother started taking her daily d-doses of a d-dozen different p-poisons . . . I came into the w-world with the antidotes already in my b-blood. He tried n-next when I was s-small. And this summer.”

“The plum . . .?”

Marco nodded.

“Why did you eat it?”

“I like p-plums.”

Looking at her cousin, Giulietta knew his mind was keen – often fiendishly so – but his thoughts were unlike other peoples. That he liked plums and the colour purple was enough to make him risk poison. Aunt Alexa should be congratulated for keeping him alive this long.

“How about y-you?” Marco asked.

Lady Giulietta looked at him.

“Still yearning after p-poisoned fruit? Or . . .” Marco smiled at where Frederick was reciting a battle prayer, “p-perhaps you want something s-safer? Well, r-relatively speaking . . .”

Giulietta blushed.

“Doing right is h-hard. Sometimes it simply t-turns out to be what w-works. Others times, what c-causes least h-harm. Truth now. Do you r-really want a r-republic?”

“You think it’s a bad idea?”

“I think it’s a d-dreadful idea. Look at the M-Medicis. All that v-vote rigging and influence buying. All those m-murders and p-poisonings. At least V-Venetians know where they stand . . .”

“Which is fine,” Giulietta said tartly. “Unless it’s on the scaffold, without appeal and without knowing why they’re there.”

Marco laughed. Behind them, knights were smiling grimly and captains encouraging their men. The duke’s good humour carried the first wave out to the island. The first wave being Marco’s knights, fifty archers in wagons dragged by horses specially shod for the task, and spearmen who were expected to walk for themselves. A final cart was loaded with barrels and planking.

Ahead of them the Red Cathedral waited on its island.

Not a single sentry could be seen on the balustrade circling the bell tower that stood slightly apart from the bulk of the cathedral, no guards stood positioned on the sharply sloping roof beneath its cascade of onion domes, the great doors were shut and the rocks in front of the church looked deserted. The moat Tycho had warned Frederick about wore a thin crackle of ice.

“You don’t think it’s deserted?” Frederick asked.

“W-where w-would they g-go?” Marco demanded. “H-how would they g-get past us? No, they’re in there all r-right.” He glanced round and saw a troop of locals who’d been conscripted into their own company of archers. “P-put the bridge in p-place and s-send those m-men across first.”

The archers looked terrified at being singled out.

Lady Giulietta didn’t blame them. The cathedral looked ominous and darkly silent. She wished Tycho was here and immediately blushed guiltily because Frederick nudged his mount closer as if reading her fear. One of the archers was arguing with a Venetian sergeant. After a second, the sergeant went to talk to his captain. This was strange enough to make Marco jig his reins.

“C-come with m-me.”

Marco’s horse edged forward and Giulietta followed, Frederick kicking his mount to a slow amble behind her. Marco sighed.

“Yes. Your s-shadow can c-come too . . . Right, w-what’s going on?”

The captain was so horrified to be addressed directly by the duke that his mouth opened and shut wordlessly and it was his sergeant who answered. “The heathen wants to talk to you, sir.”

“They’re E-Eastern C-Christians.”

The sergeant shrugged. “Don’t sound very Christian to me, sir. Sounds distinctly heathen. If you’ll forgive me.”

“Talk,” Marco ordered.

The archer glanced at the cathedral, glanced at Marco and then looked desperately at his companions. It was an older man who stepped forward and bowed. It took Giulietta a moment to recognise him as the village priest. He addressed Marco in Latin and spoke slowly as if trying to remember the language.

“May we speak alone?” he said.

“This is my cousin. This is her friend. You may speak in front of them.”

Maybe the priest knew he would probably die that day, perhaps he was simply too desperate to worry about manners or maybe he simply didn’t care. “Fine,” he said, “keep your devil dog and your demon’s whore. It won’t help you if you try to burn the Red Cathedral. Kill the scum inside by all means, kill them and sodomise their dead bodies . . . But if you try to harm the cathedral its protectors will destroy you.” The man spat and those behind them who didn’t speak Latin and were too far away to hear anyway realised he’d insulted their duke.

Marco smiled. “T-tell me about these p-protectors.”

“Hell will open and demons come through.”

“Heaven using h-hell to p-protect a r-rotting cathedral stolen by t-traitors? Isn’t that a little s-strange?” Marco looked at the captain. “Get the bridge into p-place over the m-moat and send in the archers. This m-man will l-light the arrows.”

“I refuse,” the priest said.

“I’ll b-burn your c-church in the village if you d-do. And put all the r-remaining villagers inside it f-first.” Giulietta couldn’t tell if this was simply a threat or if her cousin meant it. “Besides,” Marco said, “if you h-hate us that much I’d think you’d be delighted to see us d-destroyed.”

“Why hasn’t Alonzo come out?” Giulietta whispered.

Frederick shrugged. “Maybe he thinks the walls will protect him.”

Leaning across, Marco said, “T-too exposed.” He nodded at the wide expanse of ice around the moat. “We h-have more archers. Your lover s-saw to that.” He smiled sweetly when Giulietta glanced at Frederick, who scowled.

Up ahead, sappers rolled barrels to the edge of the cracked ice, lashed them into a double row using rope hoops already in place, and pushed them in. Two roof beams from a broken house came next, long enough to stretch across the moat, and the sappers lashed them tight to support the whole. Planks ripped from the side of a house came last. “Will it hold?” Giulietta asked.

“Let’s find out,” Frederick said.

The villagers shuffled forward under the glare of the Venetian sergeant and strung their hunting bows. At a barked command, they slotted arrows wrapped with naphtha-soaked bandages on to their strings and the bearded priest, scowling furiously, took the flaming torch he was offered. Together, archers, priest and sergeant crossed the creaking bridge, stopped at the sergeant’s shouted order, and raised their bows towards the walls. The priest ambled down the line lighting arrows.

“Release them.”

A ragged cheer went up from Marco’s troops as the volley rose high and dropped towards the cathedral. A few stuck, the rest dropping away to fizzle out on the rocks below. “And again,” Marco ordered.

The villagers notched new fire arrows and the priest shuffled forward with his flaming brand, glancing nervously towards the cathedral. The air was unusually still for so far out on the ice, and the valley quiet. Not even the sound of a distant bird broke the silence. “Get on with it,” the sergeant shouted.

The priest lit the arrows and the men released their bowstrings.

This time the army watched in silence the arc the arrows made as they flamed into the clear blue sky and then fell towards the cathedral’s wooden walls. A few more stuck this time and the sergeant grinned. The villagers fitted new arrows without being ordered, moving like dead men or puppets, not looking at each other or at their priest, simply replenishing their bows and waiting.

“I don’t like it,” Frederick whispered.

Although the air hung heavy there were no thunderclouds in the sky and no sign of a storm on the horizon. Giulietta nodded her agreement. It was too quiet and she felt exposed out here, as if the mountains were watching. “What’s that?” she demanded. The crack sounded as loud as the absent thunder, and she looked at the ice below her horse’s hooves to check it was still firm. Others were looking around for the source of the noise.

“Light those arrows,” Marco ordered.

The bearded priest shambled forward, the flaming torch in his hand, and was readying to light the first arrow when the sergeant yelled a warning. The priest spun faster than seemed possible for such a big man, looking every which way but up, and that was how he found himself standing headless, before toppling sideways to stain the ice a vivid red. A ragged shadow dropped his head and it landed with a thud, rolling along the ice like a ball.

Turning, Giulietta spewed noisily.

“What the f-f*ck was t-that?”

“Not sure,” Frederick said. “But there’s another.” He pointed to an onion dome on the cathedral. “See it?”

“M-my eyes aren’t that g-good.”

“Can y-you s-see it?” Marco asked Giulietta.

“Looks like a bird with the head of a lizard,” she said.

“Like big b-bats?”

“Not really. More like gargoyles.”

“Does it matter?” Frederick asked, as Marco summoned an officer and told him to make the archers fire another volley.

“Of course it d-does. If I don’t know what they l-look like h-how can I work out w-what they are? If I don’t k-know what they are h-how can I d-defeat them? Pity Tycho’s n-not here. He’s g-good at things like t-this.”

“He’s good at most things,” Frederick said bitterly.

Giulietta leant across and touched his wrist. With a scowl, he shook her off and withdrew. Since this involved making his mount walk backwards she was almost as impressed as she was irritated.

“You n-need to choose,” Marco said.

“Marco . . .”

“I’m s-serious. Which do you l-love?”

She thought about it. “Both, if I’m honest.”

“I was a-afraid of that.” He nodded to an officer, who said something to the sergeant, who shouted an order. The villagers notched new arrows and the sergeant took a fresh torch.

“W-wait . . .” Marco ordered. It seemed he wanted a line of Venetian bowmen behind the villagers. They, too, should have naphtha-tipped arrows – but their job was to kill whatever it was before it could kill the sergeant.

Weirdly brilliant, thought Giulietta, seeing her cousin wide-eyed and excited by his own plan. But not really in the same world as the rest of us. She watched as Venetian archers hurried over the barrel bridge and drew up in a line. The officer went after them and took a lighted torch for himself.

“When y-you’re r-ready.”

As the first line raised their bows, a swirl of light-swallowing darkness detached itself from the cathedral roof and the sergeant and officer ran down the double line of bowmen lighting arrows.

“F-first line, f-fire.” Arrows rose and fell towards the cathedral, but everyone except the second line of archers was watching Marco, who was squirming with excitement. “S-second line, f-fire.” His bowmen had their arrows in the air before Marco finished the order.

The beast swirled away at the last second.

A fire arrow passed through its wing, tearing a ragged hole in black leather. Another struck its chest and the creature screamed.

“B-bring it d-down.”

Archers scrambled to obey Marco’s order almost before he spoke it.

Two more arrows found the creature as it turned away and flapped its wings frantically, trying to climb high enough to make it home. The beast had almost reached the island before it faltered, twisted in the air and fell.

“Mine,” Frederick shouted. Spurring his mount across the barrel bridge, he raced for where the creature struggled to get airborne and five krieghund followed, their swords already drawn.

“Such c-children.”

Giulietta didn’t doubt that half the krieghund were older than him.

“Oh h-hell,” Marco swore suddenly. Half a dozen black shapes appeared on the cathedral roof and swooped towards Frederick and his followers.

“Watch,” Giulietta said.

Suddenly crouching on his saddle, Frederick leapt for the flapping blackness overhead and began his change in mid-air. It was so brutal Giulietta looked away as his scream echoed from the mountains, and she found herself overcome with nausea all over again.

“Oh G-God,” Marco said.

Frederick hit the creature full-on, his twisted hands clawing its head as he found his grip and twisted hard enough to break its neck. He dropped back into his saddle, grabbed the reins of his terrified mount, holding it steady with brute force while he drew the WolfeSelle from a scabbard on the saddle. Then he vaulted from his horse, strode to where creature he’d originally been after flapped and struggled on the ice and beheaded it.

“He’s trying to impress you.”

Lady Giulietta didn’t bother to say he was succeeding.

Unslinging the ash and buffalo-horn bow bequeathed her by Alexa, Giulietta put her knees to her horse to spur it forward, dipped for an arrow from the quiver by her knee and turned for the bridge.

“G-Giulietta, you c-can’t . . .”

For a moment, she thought Marco had grabbed her bridle and opened her mouth to shout in protest, but he snatched the Lion of St Mark from its carrier and thrust the flagpole at her. She showed him her bow.

“Fire y-your d-damn arrow . . .”

Fingers releasing, she let her arrow fly, slammed her bow back into its open-topped case and grabbed the battle flag. The Lion. Her throat was tight and tears filled her eyes. She wanted to sneer at herself for the sudden sentimentality but felt only awe as she lifted the flag higher.

“That’s it,” Marco shouted.

Archers were cheering around her.

Marco’s knights had gone from standing to a trot and from a trot to a light canter as she and Marco led them across the barrel bridge. Officers were shouting orders but she had no idea what they were and cared even less. She, Lady Giulietta di Millioni, was carrying the great flag into battle beside the duke himself. It was an act from which legends were made. Up ahead, the krieghund sprang at the shadow things as archers began aiming for the walls, with archers behind them aiming for any creatures that appeared above. Young boys dashed between the archers, lighting fire arrows from their flaming brands.

A couple of Frederick’s followers lay dead, half-naked boys dressed in bloodied rags where they’d reverted to human form. Giulietta looked frantically for their master. He was a hundred paces away, gripping the WolfeSelle in hands that looked too twisted to hold it, his mouth open in a high and ferocious howl, his sex erect and his fur shimmering in a sudden cold wind as he cut the last of the flapping black creatures from the sky.

What was it with the erect sex? They all did it on changing. She wondered if it was the nature of the change or their lust for battle. Catching her glance, Marco grinned. “Not quite as s-safe as you t-thought?”

She scowled at him. “Find your own monster.”

“Every time I d-do you take him f-first.” She had a feeling he meant that. Dragging his reins, her cousin swerved to shout some order at an officer half a dozen paces away. The man peeled off and she saw him drop back.

“We n-need m-more archers.”

Enemy forces were appearing along the roofline of the cathedral, the first of Alonzo’s followers she’d seen. They began dousing the arrows stuck into the walls below them. At first she thought they used water then realised it was sand. Behind her came the rattle of carts and the clank of bridles. She heard a cart reach the barrel bridge and stop. The driver, with the thick accent of a Nicoletto, told the archers to walk the rest. Giulietta thought him wise.

Bowmen pushed through a gap in the cavalry and began to range in a line until someone shouted at them to make it two lines, one behind the other. Boys ran along their length lighting the naphtha rags on the arrows. From this close it was hard to miss and a wave of arrows rose to fall on wooden walls. Some stuck fast and were smothered by buckets of sand dropped from overhead.

Enemy crossbowmen on the bell tower raised their weapons and bolts hurtled towards the Venetian army, falling a dozen paces short. Swinging round, one of the Venetians dropped his trews and farted at the enemy while his friends cheered.

“Back into line,” their sergeant shouted.

A sudden crack of thunder killed the laughter and those who’d just arrived looked around, puzzled by the lack of storm clouds. Marco and Giulietta were staring at shadows popping into existence on the Red Cathedral’s roof, fifty where there had been five before. They crawled and tumbled and found their feet and tried their wings.

“Warn the c-captains,” Marco told a messenger.

The man galloped away, halting at each troop to tell them what was happening, until he was so far round the island that Giulietta lost sight of him as he disappeared behind the cathedral. Within a few minutes he was back, his circle completed. Still the shadows gathered.

“M-magic,” Marco said.

Giulietta thought he sounded worried. “Frederick’s magic.”

“He’s k-krieghund.” Marco made it sound something else. Maybe it was, but Lady Giulietta didn’t see why.

“Tycho then.”

“Who k-knows what he is, p-poor b-boy.” The duke chewed his lip as he watched the slopes of the roof become buried under restless shadows. The creatures looked strange and ancient. As if they came straight from hell or belonged to the world in a rawer age. “My m-mother would k-know.”

“How to defeat them?”

“W-what they are,” Marco sighed. “D-defeating them is s-simple.” Giulietta stared at him. “We s-shoot them full of f-flaming arrows and your wolfie f-friends rip off their h-heads. We just need them to d-die faster than we d-do – and h-hope we have some p-people left to k-kill Uncle Alonzo at the end.”

Giulietta laughed, she couldn’t help it.

Knights looked across and sat a little straighter, archers muttered something appreciative and probably obscene. Unquestionably obscene, since they glanced from her to Frederick, who stood near naked and still in his krieghund form, quite as tumescent as when he first changed. She’d expected battles to be fierce and disorientating. Full of ferocious fighting, screams, cowardice and feats of bravery. When she said this to Marco, he smiled at her sadly. “My l-love,” he said, “the b-battle h-hasn’t even begun.”