Dave Duncan - The Alchemist's Apprentice

“Diverting the mighty stream,” I said, feeding more paper into the hearth. “I made a terrible mistake.”

My master uttered a strangled cry and groped for his staff. “What are you burning?”

“The last surviving copy of Meleager by Euripides.”

He whimpered. “No, no! It’s priceless.”

“It isn’t, you know. There’s one price I won’t pay for it.” I threw the rest of it in as a single wad and sat back to watch the leaves blacken and curl. I crossed my legs and balanced my forearms on my knees. I felt better already.

“How did you get it?” he muttered, watching the fire, not me.

“It was a present from a demon. You obviously didn’t ask me for Karagounis’s last words. He said he could help me! But he left the manuscript on his desk and a halfwit young idiot decided that he could make better use of…” I explained.

“No!” Firelight made the Maestro’s tears shine like diamonds as he watched the paper burn. “You’re no thief! That was a cleverly set trap, Alfeo. Karagounis was dispensable. Even if the Ten did not already know about him, you had exposed him. So his demon used his death as a powerful charge of evil to break down your normal defenses, like setting off a mine under a castle wall. Your fiend had betrayed you to the chaush ’s demon, and it managed to open a portal to you, so you were vulnerable. You were bewitched!”

That thought helped. “But if I’d listened to what he said-”

“What he said was meaningless, just to distract you from the trap. Unwittingly, you swallowed the bait the demon had set out for you. Whatever you saw in the crystal was not clairvoyance, it was a sending, a hallucination from hell. What did you see?”

“The hook. Have I broken the line, though?” I told him briefly about my vision of the torture chamber and the temptation of the Tirali offer. I did not include the demon’s suggestion that I murder the Maestro for his hoard of ducats. They say you can only be tempted by your own thoughts and I had been aware of that possibility for years. We all know of dark places in our souls that we stay away from, and the Maestro must be aware of that one in mine.

He thought for a moment and then nodded, gazing wistfully at the charred mess on the burning logs. “You have repented and done penance. You spat out the bait. You should be safe now.”

Tomorrow I would know for certain. “Tell me what you want me to do in the morning.”

T he fog seemed thicker than I remembered, but its salty smell and the slap of ripples were frighteningly familiar. Everything was happening as before-Giorgio rowed me to the Molo and the Marangona bell boomed out, just as it had in the vision. I climbed out onto the Piazzetta, aided by the same unexpected heave from Bruno, which I had forgotten. He scrambled up beside me.

“I’ll be as quick as I can,” I said.

“I can wait,” Giorgio said. “It’s what I do best.”

I resisted an urge to make a joke about babies. “Keep an ear open for gossip about the murder, will you?”

With Bruno at my side, I walked along the loggia. The outer world was unfolding as before, only my thoughts were different. Now I knew I would never stand here waiting to be beckoned into the broglia and introduced by an influential patron. I had already written to Tirali, turning down his offer of Rome on the grounds that I owed loyalty to the Maestro; Corrado had promised faithfully to deliver the note and Christoforo to see that he did.

If I had described my vision in greater detail, the Maestro would certainly have given me very different instructions. So why hadn’t I? Why was I here? I had broken my curse by burning the book, but why not play safe and change the future completely by having someone else deliver a letter to Circospetto? Why risk the outcome being almost what I had foreseen? I did not know the answer to that. A stubborn determination to prove my courage, perhaps, or a refusal to be intimidated by evil. Let fear deter you and the evil has won, the Maestro says.

I hesitated for a moment at the Porta della Carta, so that Bruno went another step and turned to look for me, but then I forced my feet to move again and we entered the tunnel. The same guard shot the same startled look at Bruno, slammed the butt of his pike down on the same flagstone, and asked the same question.

I gave him the same answer. Again we were ordered to wait. Time passed even more slowly than before, because I had to fight a desperate yearning to turn around and flee away into the fog. The messenger returned eventually and again we crossed the courtyard. But now the pattern was broken, for only one man went with us, and not in quite the same direction. The moment I realized he was leading us to the censors’ staircase, I took large gulps of air and told my heart to calm down, for this was the way that honored guests were taken to the halls of justice.

We had to climb just as far, but the stairs were wide and high, and thus much easier, especially for Bruno. At the top we were shown into an antechamber that leads to both the hall of the Ten and the smaller room for the chiefs of the Ten. It was presently occupied by two fanti guards, and the cadaverous Raffaino Sciara, Circospetto, in his blue robe. Our guide departed the way we had come. The future was unfolding as it should.

“Well, sier Alfeo?” The secretary’s eyes were as sepulchral as always. “You have had a busy couple of days.” Sciara smiled contemptuously, but probably a face so skull-like can smile no other way.

I bowed and admitted that I had. Bruno was staring at the murals.

“And why are you demanding to see me, sier Alfeo? At this ungodly hour in the morning?”

“The…A mutual friend suggested I should report my master’s conclusions to you, lustrissimo.”

Circospetto frowned. There were witnesses present. “The man you saw that morning?”

I nodded.

“I’m sure you misheard him.”

“I must have done, lustrissimo. I am sorry.”

“Sensitive reports are made to the chiefs of the Ten. As it happens, your timing is excellent. They were just discussing the attack made on you yesterday. They may have some questions to put to you.” He pointed at Bruno, who was gaping at the Tintoretto paintings on the ceiling. “Will he remain here?”

“I could insist, lustrissimo, but he will do no harm if he comes. He cannot hear.”

Sciara nodded and ushered me through the corner door to the room of the chiefs of the Ten, Bruno hurrying at our heels. Three men sat behind the big table on the podium; all were elderly and wore the black robes of nobility with the extra-large sleeves denoting membership in the Council of Ten. Red tippets over their left shoulders showed that they were indeed the three chiefs. They had their heads together, conferring. The papers waiting their attention were still neatly stacked and the candles in the golden candlesticks were long and unlit, suggesting that they had barely started their morning’s work.

At a side table sat an equally venerable spectator in the robes and biretta of a state prosecutor, and beside him sat Missier Grande Gasparo Quazza in his blue and red, solid as a marble staircase. He looked at me with no sign of recognition whatsoever, which is his way.

If the doge had wanted to keep the Ten out of the Orseolo affair, then he had failed, but at least this time I was not facing Inquisitor Marco Dona. I gestured Bruno to a corner and bowed low while Sciara gave my name. He went back to his seat beside the prosecutor and dipped a quill in his inkwell.

The right-hand chief had a long white beard; the one on the left was portly. The middle one must be this week’s chairman and him I knew to be one of the Maestro’s patients, Bartolemeo Morosini. The Maestro had not told him that his heart was going to give out very shortly, but a glimpse of his inflamed, choleric face in any mirror would offer a strong hint.