Eric Flint - The Shadow of the Lion

Benito could still be useful to Caesare, and if he ever needed anything Marco could supply, Marco could send it surreptitiously through Benito. Honor could still be satisfied that way.

But he needed some way?if he was ever able to poke his nose back into the city?to keep himself housed and fed. And, maybe, maybe, save enough to sneak into the Accademia… perhaps with yet another changed name. If he could find some way to make enough money?

Medicinal herbs weren't all that could be found in the marshes, after all. The other things that were abundant enough were bones. And the way Marco figured it, if someone was superstitious enough to want relics or charms, well, he might as well get the benefit of the money being thrown away. He only knew of one person, though, who might know where he could safely dispose of "smuggled" "relics."

Giaccomo. Who scared the hell out of him.

Giaccomo's was just open; Marco went up to the front porch and through the door, open and aboveboard. He walked, barefoot because he'd stowed his socks and boots in his pack, silently and oh-so-carefully across the wooden expanse of floor. He gave over Maria's sealed letter, then asked of the man behind the bar in a soft and very respectful voice, if Milord Giaccomo might be willing to talk with him on business. Jeppo left the bar in the care of one of the other helpers and vanished briefly. As it happened, Milord Giaccomo evidently hadn't gone to bed yet?and was apparently willing to see the frequent bearer of so much of Aldanto's coin. Jeppo returned and directed Marco with a silent jerk of his thumb. The office.

The door to the office was next to the bar. Facing Giaccomo scared the liver out of him; to sit quietly at Giaccomo's invitation all alone in the cluttered cubbyhole while the dim gray light smudged the dirty windowpanes, and stammer out his offer, took all of the courage he had left. Giaccomo sat behind his desk, tall, balding?and big, most of it not fat?and looked at him hard and appraisingly, melting away the last of Marco's bravery.

"You want to sell relics, huh?" he asked Marco bluntly. "Why?"

Marco could hardly think under that cold, cold stare?he stammered something about needing a lot of money, and didn't elaborate.

"What?"

"Saints b-bones. Saint Theodoro," Marco stuttered. "Saint's bones" were fairly common?a cure and a protection for everything from pox to plague. Caesare had once said that it was a good thing that the saints had such numerous and big bones, the rate the city used them. "And… and some fragments of Saint Gerado's skull…" Skull fragments were more precious. But still quite commonplace.

"That won't get you much money in a hurry." Giaccomo continued to stare at him, jaw clamping shut on each word, eyes murky.

"Don't need it in a hurry. Just need to put it t-together. I can get you Strega herbs and charms, also."

"Huh." The way the big man kept staring at him, Marco imagined he could see all the way through him. He wondered what Giaccomo was thinking; the man's opaque eyes didn't reveal even a hint of his thoughts.

"Well, I don't deal magic, Christian or otherwise."

"Oh." Marco's plan for independence?and the Accademia?collapsed. "I'm sorry to have bothered you, milord. I guess it wasn't too good a notion."

He rose, awkwardly, and started for the door.

"Boy?"

Marco turned, a thread of fear down his spine. Giaccomo wasn't anybody to trifle with. He wondered if he'd passed the invisible bounds beyond which Giaccomo allowed no one he dealt with to trespass. Giaccomo had a way of dealing with trouble, or potential trouble. It ended in the canal, with a rock tied to one ankle. Splash, gone. He wondered if he looked as deathly white as he felt.

"Don't you go making that offer anywhere else?"

Marco gulped. He wasn't quite sure what the look on Giaccomo's face meant, but he thought he'd better answer with the truth. Or part of it.

"I w-wasn't going to, milord." he replied. "You were the only one. I got more sense than to deal with anybody but you. Milord, I got to be going, please, milord. You likely won't be seeing me again. Ever. That's a promise."

He meant that. It would be better for everybody at this point if he went back to the swamp and stayed there. Ties cut clean.

Giaccomo looked?funny. His eyebrows were up near where his hairline used to be. The big man looked a little confused. And oddly troubled. But he let him go, with only: "The town is full of spies, boy. Agents for the Council of Ten, the Servants of the Trinity, and even the Grand Metropolitan in Rome. This sort of business will get you burned at the stake for witchcraft, or beheaded for grave robbing… If you're lucky. The brethren who run the real thing…"

He shook his head. "Go. You stay out of it, boy. Especially with these magical murders happening. Everyone from the Church to the Doge wants to catch someone. Any scapegoat will do. That's how it works."

"That's the fifth murder," said the grim-faced Brother Uriel. "That we know of. This cannot be allowed to go on. We must find the guilty party."

Erik dragged his attention from the burned, shriveled remains of the body on the floor and stared at the monk. Of all the company of Servants of the Holy Trinity in Venice, Uriel was the one Erik found the most acceptable. Nobody could claim to actually like Brother Uriel. But you had to respect him. He was rigid and intolerant, yes. But also scrupulous, and one of the few Servants of the Holy Trinity who seemed to care little for hierarchy. He was certainly not one of Abbot Sachs's favorites. It seemed to make no difference to Uriel.

Manfred yawned and stretched. It was predawn. They?as a group?were only here together because they, and the guard, were the only ones who had not been asleep when the Schiopettieri runner came in. Erik had been drilling with Manfred. Brother Uriel had been having a fasting vigil in the chapel for some obscure saint. The Schiopettieri had sent a boat for them. But they were far, far too late.

Uriel began prayers for the soul of the departed. Erik stepped back and examined the room. There was a small, still hot, furnace. Many tools. Small delicate tools. "What is this place?" he asked of the woman who had called out the Schiopettieri. She was still standing, wringing her hands.

"It's… it's Signor Mantelli's workshop." She pointed weakly at the burned crisp on the stone-flagged floor. "He… he was a goldsmith."

"He lived here?" asked a tall, slim elegant man who, though he wore the signs of hasty dressing, also wore the air of command. The man had just arrived. From his appearance, Erik suspected he was one of the Lords of the Nightwatch?and was not pleased to find Knights and a Servant of the Holy Trinity there ahead of him.

The woman bowed respectfully. Whoever the man was, he commanded both respect and fear from her. "Upstairs, Lord Calenti. I… I was housekeeper to him." A tear began to trickle down her cheek. "I can't believe it. I just can't believe it. And I never had a chance to tell him that I was sorry…"

The respectfully addressed lord pounced on this. "For what, signora?"

She wrung her hands. "It was a silly thing, Your Honor. He shouted at me because he said I'd stolen a cap of his. A knitted one. It was his favorite. I would never steal, Your Honor. On my father's grave, I swear it! But he was angry. And I was angry. I said… many harsh things. He was good man even if he did drink too much."

The Venetian lord patted her shoulder. "There, there, signora. We all say things we afterward regret. I think you should go upstairs and have a glass of your late master's wine. He has family here?"

She shook her head. "No, Your Honor. He is?was?from Padua."