‘NO GOOD LOOKING FOR HIM, he’s far away now.’ Santo nodded in the direction that Baroque had gone over ten minutes ago. Katina’s heart sank. There she was, unarmed and vulnerable, her weapon and horse out of reach by the pledge stone.
Santo stood in front of Katina. In one hand was his sword, in the other a dirk. His face was twisted in a lopsided grin. He swayed from side to side, ready to attack. Katina registered a mad, unfamiliar glint in his eyes, the position of his weapons. They shone, sharp and deadly, by the fractured light of the moon. She didn’t recognise this being before her; the strange, dangerous energy he exuded.
‘I have been wanting this for so long, Katina Maggiore. Ever since I learnt about you and Stefano, ever since I discovered the nature of his shame.’
‘Stefano’s shame? What are you talking about?’ Katina’s mind reeled. ‘The only thing Stefano is ashamed of is you.’
Howling like an animal, Santo ran at her. Katina tried to wrest the sword from his grip, knock the dagger from his hands; but he was a good fighter, a dirty one – even full of vino: even unhinged. She’d seen him and Stefano battle many times. It was part of what drew them together, a love of violence. They broke apart. His knife had sliced her arm. She bled onto the ground.
Her heart was beating frantically. She had to keep her wits, not panic. She also had to keep Santo talking, try to distract him.
‘Why do you say my name like that, Santo? What do you know of the Maggiore?’
Santo laughed, his lips pulled back to show all his teeth. ‘Me? I know nothing. I care even less. This isn’t about me, this is about Stefano. This is about you and what you have done to him and his casa.’
‘What are you talking about?’ Katina was very confused. ‘Stefano and I have not been together for centuries. And as for his casa, I have done nothing to it … how could I? We are of the same family, it is my house too. I would not harm my own.’
‘You really don’t know?’ He crowed at the look of puzzlement on her face and swung at her with the sword. Katina jumped back, the blade narrowly missing her stomach.
Katina could see Tallow’s blood splattered all over his shirt, her own glued to his knife. It sickened her. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean that because of what you are, what you believed, Stefano was forced to pledge to Casa di Nicolotti. You, your blood, your line ruined his life.’
Katina stared at him in disbelief. ‘How is that even possible? There are hundreds of Maggiore in Serenissima.’ ‘Why my line? It is his too.’
Again Santo laughed. Katina backed away, increasing the distance between them. ‘You’re wrong as usual, Katina. There’s only one bloodline remaining that tarnishes the fine name of Casa di Maggiore. Only one that is directly linked to the Estrattore. Only one that prevents the Maggiore from ascending to the Dogeship – and they’re all gone. Stefano has long desired to destroy the taint – the pain, the shame. That’s you, Katina.’
He lunged again. Katina slipped and only just managed to move out of the way. The ground was muddy; the soles of her boots failed to grip. Sweat broke out on her brow. By the gods, he was crazy!
‘Pain and shame? Well, you should know all about that, shouldn’t you, Santo Pelleta!’
Santo gave a harsh laugh. ‘Try and provoke me all you like, Katina. I will kill you when I’m ready. This has nothing to do with my Bond. I’m not bound by your Obbligare Doppio.’
‘If that’s so, why have you waited?’ gasped Katina. ‘Why didn’t you or Stefano just kill me in the Limen?’
‘Oh, believe me, I tried. Many times I tried to dispatch you. But there was always Debora and Alessandro hovering around or the other Elders and, later, my pathetic excuse for a son. There was even the Estrattore. But now they’re all gone. She’s gone and you’re alone. No-one is here to stop me. Stefano will thank me. They’ll all thank me.’
‘But you’ll be killing a Rider, Santo. You’ll be renounced, exiled just as I was.’
‘Not if I end the stalemate you caused with your Obbligare Doppio. Not if I kill a Rider who consorts with Estrattore behind the backs of the Elders.’ He laughed at the look on Katina’s face. ‘Sì! I know about that too. No, with your death, I’ll not only be setting Stefano free, but all the Bond Riders.’
‘Free? Nothing will set us free, Santo, except the Estrattore. And you tried to kill the one who has the only chance of uniting us all, of having us cooperate the way we used to in the old days.’
‘The old days? Who cares about those? They don’t mean anything anymore.’
‘Is that what you think, or are you simply parroting Elder Nicolotti … like you always do? Poor, needy Santo. You know you’re an object of pity in Settlement?’
With a ferocious, guttural growl, he ran at her, thrusting with the knife as he brought the sword down. Katina ducked to one side and spun, coming out under his arm, unharmed. They both stood panting, staring at each other. Feet separated them. Katina’s eyes never left his weapons.
Santo’s grin widened. ‘Happy now? I lost control. Won’t happen again.’
‘Senta, Santo – listen.’ Katina’s voice was harsh in her ears. ‘I know you think you’re doing this for Stefano, but you don’t understand. Even if you want to kill me, there are greater forces at work here. The Obbligare Doppio – it will not allow you. It will stop you …’
‘What? Like it stopped me killing Tallow?’ He threw back his head. ‘You fool! Don’t you understand? The Estrattore is dead. Your double bind is meaningless now. All those years you and my son and that useless shrew of a wife of mine worked to protect her were for nothing! It’s over, Katina. Over.’ His sword cut the air. ‘You’re finished.’ With a shout, he raised the sword again and dived towards her.
‘Not while I’m alive,’ roared another voice.
Santo froze mid-swing, pulling up his knife, the sword poised.
Katina stared, her mouth dropping open. ‘Pillar!’
Santo began to laugh harder. He lowered his weapons, his face twisting in a range of expressions. ‘Well, well, well. So it is. Pillar. Pietro. Old man. My son,’ he said slowly. ‘You never could get your timing right, could you?’ Contempt hung in the night. ‘You would protect this woman? You would risk your life for her? You would challenge me, your father?’
‘My father,’ Pillar repeated. ‘The father who left Mamma and me in poverty, to fend for ourselves while he joined the Bond Riders. The father who never gave us another thought. The father who thinks only of himself and where his next drink is coming from. Sì, I remember you.’ Pillar lifted the axe he’d held by his side, the axe he’d stolen from a woodsman’s cottage after he’d blundered through the marshes, desperately following Dante’s trail.
Santo looked from the axe to Pillar. He stood up straight, fixed a smile on his face and lowered his sword. ‘What are we doing? You would do battle with me, Pietro? Your own flesh and blood? This is not the Serenissian way. This is not you.’
Behind Santo, Katina watched, unable to move. Father and son circled each other, their weapons aloft, their faces alike and yet so different. Santo, the father, unlined, his hair dark, his eyes undamaged by years of squinting over hot fat, of extreme temperatures. His body lithe from its time in the Limen. Even affected by alcohol, he moved with a grace and knowingness that his son lacked.
She looked to Pillar. He’d changed. Weight had fallen from him, leaving him lean and sinewy; he appeared pale and unwell. But within him something burned. Rage, revenge. She was not sure. A long beard hid the lower half of his jaw, disguising the weak chin. His lined cheeks, savaged by sores, had a sharpness and strength she’d not noticed before. If they lacked the skill they required, his long fingers held the axe with determination.
‘How would you know what’s me and what isn’t? You don’t know me,’ said Pillar, his voice deep, deadly.
Santo chuckled. ‘You’re meant to be my son. I know you – you’re like me.’
Now it was Pillar’s turn to laugh. ‘I am nothing like you.’
Faster than Katina expected, Pillar crossed the space between them. He swung the axe hard. Santo feinted to the left and brought the sword down on Pillar’s arm. It sliced through his cape, just missing his flesh.
Pillar spun round quickly, panting heavily. He now had his back to Katina. He flapped his hand behind him. ‘Go, Katina. Make yourself safe.’
‘Yes!’ cried Santo. ‘Go, Katina. Go Bond Rider. Run while you still can. I will find you and when I do, I will finish you just like I did the Estrattore!’
‘What?’ Pillar glanced at Katina briefly before turning to keep Santo at bay. ‘Is that true?’
‘Yes, my son. I killed your precious pet. The pet I made sure was handed to you all those years ago on the Old Jinoan Road.’
‘But why?’ asked Pillar. Katina could hear the confusion in his voice. ‘If you wanted her dead, why did you give her to me? “For Santo” that Rider said. He threw her to me. I knew you’d sent her. I thought, finally, you trusted me with something precious, important. I believed then that you’d come back, that you’d be proud of me. I defied Mamma. I kept that sweet little girl.’
‘Sì, you did. But do you know why I told the Rider to give the baby to you?’ He did not wait for an answer. ‘Because I knew even then that you were so desperate to win my approval, even though I’d been gone for many years, that you would obey anything asked of you in my name. That you would risk your life and Quinn’s. That you would take an Estrattore. And I was right. You did. You did very well, Pietro. You did what Papa told you. Only it was never for me. It was for the Bond Riders.’
Pillar did not speak. His shoulders seemed to slump with the burden of this new knowledge. He’d been used. Like his father had used him and Quinn when he lived with them. No wonder Quinn had been … the way she was. Santo kept circling. Now his back was to Katina. Both men were between her and the pledge stone. She couldn’t get to her weapon without Santo seeing. She bent down slowly and, without taking her eyes off them, felt for a rock, a branch, something to help Pillar.
‘Did you know that all this time, Pietro,’ continued Santo, his voice taunting, ‘all the years you raised Tallow, trained her, you’ve been doing the Bond Riders’ bidding? That Katina, this woman you want to protect –’ he jerked his head back ‘– was making sure that everything went according to plan? The Elders’ plan, Pietro. Not yours, not some divine prophecy, but the gospel according to the Bond Riders.’
‘Don’t listen to him, Pillar,’ said Katina. ‘He’s twisting the facts.’
‘Am I?’ asked Santo, closing the distance. ‘Isn’t it true that the Elders listened to me, Katina, to me? The new Bond Rider. When I said my son and wife would mind the child they fell over themselves to accommodate me. How that must have rankled with you – one of the ancients. But they knew it was a good idea. Hide the child where she was least likely to be found, in the backwaters of Serenissima, apprenticed, as I knew she would be, to a candlemaker.’ He looked Pillar up and down. ‘To you, Pietro.’
‘If Tallow is so important, why did you kill her?’ asked Pillar suddenly.
Santo paused. Bewilderment ran across his features and then disappeared. ‘Because as long as she lives, the Bond Riders can’t act – we can’t be freed. Katina made sure of that when she made the Obbligare Doppio. So you see, it wasn’t me who killed Tallow, it was Katina.’ His face brightened. ‘Sì. It was Katina. And now I am going to kill her.’
As he spoke, Santo twisted his sword and held his knife at an angle. With a mighty shout, he leapt in the air. Still kneeling, Katina looked up in horror to see Santo descending on her, the blades of his weapons inches from her face.
She screamed and threw herself backwards just as Santo swivelled again and turned on his own son.
Pillar had run at his father, his axe raised. Santo landed lightly, sword and dagger attacking. Pillar swung his axe, crudely, bravely, but Santo’s abilities were greater. With his sword arm, he parried the axe, pushed it away and used his knife. Again and again, he stabbed at his son.
Katina saw Pillar’s face change. The realisation that his own father was prepared to kill him triggered something inside. With an almighty howl, he jumped, just as Santo plunged his sword into what would have been Pillar’s heart. Santo lost his footing, stumbling forwards, his neck outstretched. Pillar lowered his axe with all the force he could muster.
Santo’s scream of rage was cut off the moment the axe lodged in his neck. His body collapsed at Pillar’s feet. Pillar raised the axe above his head and struck again and again. Blood rained on him from above, spurting in a vermilion fountain and flowing, thick and sluggish, from the growing wound. It looked unnatural in the light that penetrated the clouds and illuminated the glade, soaking into the earth, a metallic vein of silver.
It was only when Santo’s head detached from his bloodied shoulders and rolled into a pile of leaves that Pillar stopped. Santo’s eyes stared at the sky, a look of surprise and pain forever etched across his features.
Katina rose slowly, a rock clutched in her fist. She let go and it thumped to the ground. Pillar stared at his father’s body, his face frozen in disbelief. Katina hesitated.
Pillar flung the axe to one side and, running towards Katina, held out his arms. She surged towards him, but stopped short, her hands raised. ‘Pillar … you’re covered in …’ She indicated his clothes.
He dropped his arms and looked down in dismay.
‘My father’s blood.’
‘Sì.’
With great care, Pillar took off his cloak and pulled off his shirt, using it to wipe his face, his head and his hands. When he’d finished, he flung it to one side and slowly retied the cloak. Only then did Katina stepped closer. He cupped her face in the palm of his hand.
‘You saved my life,’ she whispered.
‘By God, I thought I was going to be too late,’ he said, swallowing the emotions that threatened to spill.
Katina drank in the sight he made, noting the bloodstains smeared across his cheeks, over his forehead, between his fingers and under his nails. She saw the thinness of his body, the muscles twitching in his face. They stood under the moon staring at each other for what seemed like ages.
‘You were just in time,’ said Katina, softly. All the confused affection she’d held for this gentle man rushed to the surface. She touched his beard, ran her fingers through his filthy grey hair. ‘Oh, Pillar. Grazie. Grazie.’
Pillar bent his head to kiss her. She stopped him. ‘Pillar, mi dispiace. But you … you smell terrible.’
For a moment, hurt flared in his eyes, but then he laughed.
‘You’re probably right. I have lived with this odour … this state for so long, I am no longer aware.’ He cupped her chin. ‘When I am clean again, perhaps?’
‘Perhaps,’ she said. ‘But there are more important matters.’
His eyes narrowed and his hand fell away. ‘Tallow,’ he said hoarsely. ‘I was too late to save Tallow.’
‘No. No. That’s not true,’ said Katina hurriedly. Disregarding the bloodstains, the stench, she grabbed Pillar’s face between her hands. ‘She lives, Pillar. She’s going to be all right. She’s in the Limen. Dante has taken her, and Constantina, another Estrattore.’
‘She lives?’ Pillar’s face broke into a smile. The sadness that cast his features sloughed away. He laughed. Softly at first, but then with greater abandon. ‘Thank God. Oh, thank God.’ He looked deep into Katina’s eyes again, his hands rising to cover hers and press them into his skin. ‘There’s another, you say? Another Estrattore? Is this possible?’
‘Sì, Pillar. It is. There are many more and I have to find them. It’s part of my Bond, part of my duty to Tallow. I must find the rest of her people. Terrible things are happening in the Limen. There are dreadful forces mustering and we have to stop them. The Bond Riders are not what they seem,’ she glanced at Santo. ‘They have been corrupted, lost their way. That’s why I cannot stay with you. I have to go, Pillar. That’s what I wanted to tell you. Mi dispiace, You understand? I must work with Tallow and give her a chance to do what she was born to.’ She dropped her hands and stepped out of reach. She held his regard a moment longer before turning towards Birrichino. She found her sword among her things and sheathed it.
‘But I can help as well. I must,’ said Pillar, following her.
‘No, you don’t understand.’ Katina paused and spun to face him. Already the light was changing and she could see Pillar’s face more clearly. A cold wind gusted through the clearing, rustling the trees, loosening the moisture collected on the leaves that surrounded them. ‘You cannot come with me, Pillar. I have to return to the Limen. What happened here tonight, in Serenissima, and this …’ She gestured to where Santo’s corpse lay, wincing at the sight. ‘This is only the beginning. I have to see it through to the end.’ She swung herself up into the saddle.
‘No,’ cried Pillar, and grabbed the reins. ‘It’s you who doesn’t understand.’ Birrichino pulled against him, neighing in protest. ‘I’m coming too. You can’t stop me.’
‘Pillar, you of all people know that’s not possible. Only Bond Riders or those without souls can breach the Limen.’
A strange look passed over Pillar’s face. ‘Esatto,’ he said, and shoved his palm towards her.
In the cold light of the new dawn, Katina saw the long, jagged cut filled with dried blood that crossed his flesh.
Katina gasped. ‘No!’
‘Sì. I am pledged, Katina. I have made a Bond as well. To Tallow. I have forsaken her once but I’ll not do so again. I promised.’ He let go of the reins and, instead, used the edge of the saddle to heave himself up behind Katina and wrapped his arms about her. ‘I apologise for the condition I’m in, but the sooner we breach, the faster I’ll be able to do something about it. And the faster we’ll be able to help Tallow.’
Katina froze for a moment, trying to comprehend what had just happened.
‘What are we waiting for?’ cried Pillar. ‘Take me with you, my Bond Rider.’
After the horror of the last hour, Katina felt the release of laughter bubbling up inside her. Pillar was right. What were they waiting for? The time had come to set things right.
‘For Tallow!’ she shouted and, swinging Birrichino around, galloped towards the beckoning veil of the Limen.