The Master of Verona

Joy. Ecstasy, raw delight, the face an angel might bear doing the bidding of the Lord. Only this face was delighting in the death of a child. Blood of his blood.

A giggle made them all whirl about. Stepping into the road from by the treeline was Cesco. With nothing worse than muddy knees and hands he stood in the light of the fire, smiling happily.

Dante goggled, Katerina let out a sighing sob, Pietro stared between the flames and the child. Then he looked to Cangrande.

The Scaliger's face was back to its old self. With a twinkle in his eye he bowed to the boy, who made a fine bow in return. Then Cesco ran forward to embrace his foster mother, who was too tired to deny him the affection he so clearly deserved. She wrapped her right arm about him and wept.

Later they would reconstruct his miraculous escape as something quite simple. The compartment under the seat also had a door leading to the rear exterior of the carriage, allowing the disposal of waste or stowing of luggage without disturbing the passengers within. Cesco must have forced the catch just as they halted, then dashed for the trees. That rear door also explained why the carriage went up in flames so swiftly — the two grooms had taken straw from a nearby hut and stuffed it into the compartment. What Katerina thought was Cesco moving about under her was really the murderers, planning their demise.

"It's a shame they didn't live," observed Cangrande. "We might have discovered who hired them."

"But we know, my lord," said Dante, blinking. Then he realized what he was about to say would be quite a blow to his patron. "I have a heavy tale to tell, my lord," he began, quickly outlining their deductions regarding Cangrande's wife, Donna Giovanna da Svevia.

When he was finished, the Scaliger turned away. "I see. That reminds me — Morsicato. He's nearby, unconscious. Rogue Paduan soldiers attacked us on the way here. He was knocked out, and I had to tie him to his horse to bring him along. If he's up to it, perhaps he can examine your wounds, Kat." The Scaliger vanished up the road.

With the two carriage horses, removed before the fire, and the two horses that bore Cangrande and the senseless doctor, they were able to slowly make their way back to Vicenza. Pietro rode one horse, Katerina another, Morsicato lay over Dante's saddle, and Cesco sat in Cangrande's lap.

No one spoke overmuch on that ride. For Pietro it was a ride filled with one thought, one image that returned over and over to his mind — Cangrande's expression when he thought that Cesco was dead. That horrible delight tormented Pietro's imagination the whole weary ride back to Vicenza.

Forty

Vicenza

22 May 1317

Perched atop the roof of the Nogarola palace, his back to a turret, Pietro stared down at the sleeping city. The wet rooftops of Vicenza glistened under the light of the moon and the stars.

He heard bells. Barely midnight. So much had happened since the dawn. He'd lived a whole life in the span of the rising and falling of one sun. Yet while his inner eye ran over all the events, in his ears he heard only a child's voice singing through tears of fright.

They'd been dropped into complete oblivion, he and Cesco. Without each other, neither would have survived. Never out of reach, always conversing or singing, they had kept away the korai, the gods the Greeks believed called men to madness. It had seemed eternal, though he now knew it was less than an hour. He also knew how close they'd come to running out of air altogether. He wondered if he'd ever be comfortable in enclosed spaces again. Hence the rooftop.

Cangrande had insisted they creep into town unseen. Until it was clear that there were no more threats to them, the Scaliger deemed it best to keep their arrival a complete secret. Once Morsicato, singed scalp bandaged, had seen to Katerina's arm, he'd sewn up Pietro as well. The doctor hadn't bled him, deciding Pietro had already bled enough to release any foul elements in his system. Pietro had refused to add any contents to the doctor's jordan, rightly saying he was too parched to produce a drop. But Morsicato had insisted on bringing forth the maggots once more, this time wrapping them into the gash across Pietro's left hand. Recalling how close that cut had come to his face, he tried not to imagine the maggots embedded in his cheek.

Dante had been granted a set of rooms, and Morsicato had given the poet a sleeping draught. Jacopo was still at the revels by the hillside. Antonia was off with Gianozza somewhere. Bailardino, one of the few who knew of their return to the city, had stopped by briefly to pay his respects, but spent the rest of the time divided between his frightened son and his pregnant, injured wife. Left alone, Pietro had wandered up here, leaning heavily on his bloodied cane.