Eric Flint - The Shadow of the Lion

If he hadn't been so nervous, he might never have noticed the stranger at all. But Marco was desperately afraid that his last escapade had drawn unwelcome attention to the entire Aldanto m?nage, attention that would have to include the Montagnards. And if anyone who had ever known Lorendana Valdosta got a good look at him?well, there'd be no doubt whose kid he was.

So he'd been watching every shadow, and thinking out every footstep ever since he'd emerged shakily from his sickbed?and he'd seen the man ghosting along, fifty feet behind as he went to work one morning. And no matter how he'd changed his course, there the man was. Then he'd watch from the dirty window of the Ventuccio offices as the man shadowed Benito on his first run of the morning. He was ready to rush out to attack the man himself out of sheer terror when he moved across a patch of sunlight?

It was at that point, when he got a brief but very good look at the man's scarred face, that he'd recognized him as the mysterious stranger who'd saved them.

That night he'd spotted the man slipping into the foundation hole across the canal.

And now, when he watched carefully, he could catch the stranger at his comings and goings?and very rarely, at trailing them. He thought that after a few days the man would get tired of it and go away?loco folk from the Jesolo weren't known for long attention spans. But he hadn't, and Marco realized that he was going to have to do something about the fact that he was there, and was apparently not going to give up on his self-appointed task.

First?tell Caesare, so that Aldanto didn't kill the stranger, thinking he was a threat. That was easiest done in the morning, before Aldanto was completely awake and thinking.

Marco had planned his approach carefully the previous morning, waiting until Aldanto had gotten his first glass of watered wine and was starting his second before accosting him.

"Caesare," he started hesitantly, "there's something you should know."

Before Caesare could do more than look apprehensive, Marco had plowed onward. "That man I told you about? The one in the marshes? The one that helped Benito and me?"

Aldanto nodded slowly, putting the goblet down on the table and absently running a hand through his tangled golden mane.

"He's here in the city," Marco said shortly. "Hiding out in that rundown building of Gasparsi's. I've seen him."

Aldanto didn't move, much, but he went from sleepy and a little bored to startled awake, wary, and alert. Marco continued before he had a chance to interrupt.

"He's right across the canal, holed up in the foundation under Gasparsi's place," Marco said, words tumbling over each other as he tried to get them all out. "Please, Caesare, I don't think he means any harm. I think he's guarding us, me and Benito. He's been following me to work, and I saw him following Benito on his runs. I think maybe he's trying to keep us safe. He's saved us once. I don't know why he did, I don't know why he's watching us, only?please, Caesare, please don't kill him."

Aldanto regarded Marco dubiously for a moment before replying. "You have strange choices in friends, boy." He picked up his goblet, and studied Marco over the rim of it.

Marco hadn't the faintest notion how to reply to that, so, in keeping with his recent decision to keep his mouth shut when he didn't know what to say, he'd remained silent.

"How sure are you of this?friend?" Aldanto asked, when even he seemed to find the silence had gone on too long.

Marco had to shake his head. "I'm not. I told you, I don't know why he helped us in the first place. I don't know why he's here now. I thought maybe?he's crazy, sort of. I thought he'd get tired and go away, but he hasn't. I don't know what to tell you, Caesare?but I just don't think he means us anything but good."

Caesare relaxed back into his chair, a thought-crease between his brows. Marco remained patiently standing by the table, wishing with all his heart that he hadn't been such a great fool this winter as to destroy any trust Aldanto had in him.

"I didn't even know that this watchdog of yours was there," Caesare said at last, cradling his wine goblet in both hands, as if taking warmth from it. "That argues for a?certain level of expertise. That is a very bad sign."

"If he wanted us he could have killed us a dozen times by now," Marco whispered humbly. "He could have just stood back in the marshes, and we'd have been dead and nobody the wiser."

"True." Caesare continued to brood over the wine goblet. "There would be no point in his watching you that I can see. If he wanted to take you to use against me he should have made his move by now. Which makes me think you might be right about him."

Marco heaved a completely internal sigh of relief.

"Now I can't for a moment imagine why this man should have decided to attach himself to you and your brother, but since he has, and since he seems to have some useful skills?" He paused, and raised one golden eyebrow significantly. "?and since he seems to have appointed himself as your bodyguard gratis?"

Marco flushed, and hung his head. He knew Aldanto was still desperately short of money, and he knew that the reason was because he had spent vast sums of money trying to find Marco when Aldanto and Maria had thought he was in trouble. Money that hadn't been his to spend. Brunelli money, Marco assumed. Or money from Bishop Capuletti, which amounted to the same thing.

"?well, I'm not inclined to look this particular gift horse in the mouth," Aldanto concluded. "But I hope he has the sense to realize that I am inclined to strike first and ask questions like 'friend or foe' afterwards. And I want you to stay out of his reach after this."

"Yes, Caesare," Marco backed out of the kitchen hastily. "Thank you, Caesare."

But here he was. Because he felt a responsibility to warn the man. And because he felt he owed him something besides a warning, he carried a bundle.

Word had gotten out from Tonio that, well, actually, it was that bridge-boy of Maria Garavelli's who had doctored their children. And if the parents had any doubts, the children didn't. That appeared to have overcome many an adult's doubt. Ever since his return from the swamp, Marco had found himself overwhelmed with new patients. Quite a few of them didn't even come through Tonio any more. The boat-folk, ignoring Marco's vehement protests that he did not want to be paid for doctoring their kids, had taken to leaving things in Maria's gondola or with Giaccomo. Things that Marco had no earthly use for?a woolen cloak, five sizes too big, laboriously knitted out of the remnants of five different lots and colors of yarn, half a blanket, candle-ends, a homemade oil stove of the kind used on boats, a bunch of fresh chestnuts off an incoming barge, a bundle of boccalao… and more.

A lot of it they couldn't use, and Maria couldn't sell or trade the stuff without going to a world of time and effort that she couldn't spare. But if the stranger had come out of the Jesolo, he was even poorer than the poorest canaler. These odds and ends could mean a great deal to him. So that was the thing Marco meant to do?see that the man was in some sort of comfort. It was a small payback for their lives. He'd gotten a few coppers doing some odd jobs on his day off, and those had gone for a bit of food for the man, flour and salt and oil, and some dried salt fish, all bundled in with the rest.

"Milord?" Marco called into the darkness of the partially flooded foundations of the building, wondering if the man could hear him?or if he was even there. He turned away for a moment to look out uneasily over the canal behind him?

"I'm no milord, boy," came a harsh whisper from right beside him.

Marco jumped and nearly fell backwards in the canal. A long arm snaked out of the darkness and steadied him.