The Master of Verona

Mariotto was doing his best to hide his fatigue as he pushed his men further. He shared the fear that their quest was hopeless, but refused to be the first to turn back. His thoughts were so focused on home and hearth that when he heard the noise he didn't register it as important. Then slowly he became conscious of a sound different from rain and river and horses and trees in the wind. They were voices. A man's and a woman's, to be precise, issuing orders loudly. Gesturing to his men, Mariotto set out to find the sound's source.

As they rode, the voices grew in number and in volume. Mariotto's troop arrived at a clearing high on a hill. There were several Scaligeri soldiers about, their armour discarded, their arms tossed aside as they knelt around the base of a toppled tree. The tree didn't so much look fallen as sunken, held aloft by branches stuck on other trees.

In the midst of the diggers knelt the Capitano, using his breastplate to scoop up and toss aside clods of damp soil. Others were doing the same. Standing at one side was the Scaliger's sister, still clad in male attire. By the way her weight shifted back and forth it was clear she wanted to dig, but was withholding herself in favor of her physical superiors.

Dismounting, Mari made his way carefully along the slippery slope to the lady's side. "Donna, what news?"

Cheeks flushed and lips tight, Katerina said, "Mariotto! Thank God! This is the cave, isn't it? Your brother-in-law gave directions. Bonifacio hinted that Cesco and Detto were under the earth." She gestured to the base of the hill. "We arrived to find the cave collapsed. They're buried in there. We're trying to dig them out!"

It took Mariotto only a moment of thinking before he cried, "What a fool I am! It's perfect! But do we know that this is what Bonifacio's hint…?"

"There are traces in the part of the tunnel uncollapsed. Hoofprints. Pietro's shirt, boots, and cane. They were here — and they were buried. The position of the tree, look at it. It fell in the last couple of hours, the side leaning away from the rain is still soaked."

Unable to argue with her reasoning, Mari volunteered to help. As he stripped off his armour he asked, "Where can we best be of service?"

Katerina looked at her brother, already knee-deep in a hole he and twenty knights had made. "Start in the tunnel. We began here to provide us with more room — there's nowhere to throw the excess dirt down there. But if your men set up a relay, tossing the rubble outside, you might have better luck."

Mariotto touched his hand to his forehead and ran skidding down the mud-strewn hill, one hand on the felled tree for balance. Behind him the tree's roots angled towards the black and grey sky, twisting like fingers reaching for God.

He and two of his men plunged into the dark tunnel. A torch was lit, and by its light they used breastplates to stab, then cup the fallen earth, passing them back through a line of men to be tossed aside at the tunnel's mouth. Soon they had a rhythm going, and they could sing, grunt, and chant in time to their labours.

After considerable time Mariotto emerged to let someone take his place at the head of the chain. Rubbing his aching arms, he let the rain fall over his hands to cleanse them. He wished the storm would abate. By now the cellars of Castello Montecchio would be flooded, and the chicken coops, and the kennels. He would listen again to his father's declaration that this was the year they'd dig the drainage ditch, as he had each time the summer rains came. Mari hadn't realized how much he'd missed home and family.

He kept stretching out his arms, working the life back into them, and as he did he walked, looking over his father's land. His land. He was almost out of earshot of the digging when he decided to turn back.

The wind changed direction just then, and the rain's force eased just a fraction. In that moment a noise came to Mariotto's ears, a gentle mewing like a that of a cat crying. Picking up a tree limb, Mariotto followed the sound, straining his ears over the cries of men and the fall of rain. Was that something shifting behind that tree? Was it-?

A horse. Pietro's palfrey, well hidden and tied to a tree. Huddled under a cloak beneath the horse was a tiny figure.

Mariotto ran over and lifted the cloak's edge. A terrified toddler, too small to be Cangrande's bastard, looked out at him with red-rimmed eyes. Mariotto laid his sword aside and crouched down. "Hello there. You must be Detto. We haven't met yet. My name's Mari."

Luigi Capulletto stood looking at the chance fate had granted him. Dared he take it?