The Master of Verona

Gasping, eyes filling with tears, Pietro struggled out of a helmet that fit him more snugly than before. On the ground beside him lay the dark youth, holding a broken crossbow. Since he was wearing armour, the fall had been much more damaging for him. Good, thought Pietro. He reached for the fellow's belt and removed a dagger. There were men all around him, and he expected a sword to split his head in two at any moment. Twisting about, he slashed with the knife at — empty air?

The gap in the Paduan line had broken the last of the men. The Paduan men-at-arms turned tail and ran. Seconds later, Vicentine horses thundered past Pietro to round up and kill the last of them.

The only Paduan who didn't run appeared to be someone of authority. He remained on horseback, his hands raised in the universal gesture of submission. "I surrender!" he shouted, his eyes on the young archer lying unmoving at Pietro's side.

Pietro stared around blankly, then thought of his helmet. Picking it up, he discovered a crossbow bolt running all the way through the steel, end to end, just below the crest. He remembered his head rocking back and realized the bolt must have penetrated above his scalp, in the gap just above his head. A shiver of insane laughter ran through him. Thank God for my wide head!

There was a groan beside him. The young Paduan sat up only to feel the pressure of Pietro's blade against his Adam's apple.

Marsilio da Carrara blinked, taking in the youth kneeling next to him with a look of contempt.

Pietro was just grateful to be alive. With his strange half-smile he said, "I guess you're my prisoner."

Halting the pursuit at Quartesolo, Cangrande set his men to rounding up the Paduans, a chore that would take days. The broken army had scrambled in every direction, throwing themselves down into ditches on either side of the road. Some had jumped into the flowing waters of the rivers that intersected at Quartesolo, whether they could swim or not. Many of them floundered in the muddy waters, weighted down by armour and weapons they struggled furiously to shed. Cangrande's men, who just moments before had been their destroyers, now became their saviors, stripping themselves of their own armour and diving in to rescue their Paduan brothers.

There was no more fighting. It had never been a battle, it had been a rout. Now the rout was over.

Under a tree on a hill to the south of Quartesolo, Cangrande dismounted his blood-spattered stolen horse. Walking around to the front of the animal, he unbuckled the testiera that covered its head, let the piece fall to the earth, and began to stroke the long nose absently. Jupiter dropped and lay at his feet, exhausted.

Kneeling down to pet his hound, the Scaliger did not glance back at the city that was now indisputably his. His gaze was directed south, beyond the men who ran to safety. The south and east, where lands were lush and green, with rivers and vineyards, mills, ranches, farms. Harvest was three weeks away. This was some of the richest land in the world, fought over and died for throughout history. This was the Trevisian Mark. This was the Feltro.

Cangrande della Scala, titular Vicar of the Trevisian Mark, looked down on the half of the Mark that he did not rule. If anyone could have seen his face in that moment, they would not have been able to decide if his eyes bore responsibility — or delight.

He was twenty-three years old.

Eight

Though the battle had seemed to last hours, it was over in less than twenty minutes. Of actual bloodshed there had been little, as armed engagements went. The dead numbered only seven Paduan nobles and fifty-seven foot soldiers. With the exception of the Carrarese, all the mounted knights had fled the field. Of the remaining foot soldiers, many were wounded. But the real surprise came from the number captured. Over a thousand men-at-arms had surrendered themselves to a band of just eighty men.

A modern Caesar, Cangrande was famous for his clemency towards captured foes, and today he was true to form. Returning to the northern edge of Quartesolo, he welcomed captured Paduan nobles as old friends. The poet Albertino Mussato had been discovered in the moat bearing no fewer than eleven wounds, the worst being a cracked skull and a broken leg. His wrist, too, hung at an ugly angle. It was a miracle he'd survived. Trampled by his own side, he'd flung himself headlong into the foul water of the moat. Addressing him, Cangrande commended his valour. In great pain, lying on a makeshift stretcher, the poet-historian was as gracious as the situation allowed.