The Master of Verona (34 page)

The crowd roared to life, a thousand voices chattering at once. Hadn't she said their city would be famous? And the Capitano would win everything he dreamed of! Terrific stuff!

But what about the darkness? People whispered, nudging their neighbours, looking at the children on the balcony near the Scaliger. Which of them would be that unsung hero of Verona? Certainly not that Alberto. He had none of his grandfather's daring or piety. And that Cecchino was a wastrel. But there, looking down on the oracle as she was led away, there was little Mastino. Gossip said he was a wild one — hadn't she said a twisted path? Oh,
he
was the one to watch.

Pietro saw the realization pass over the six-year-old. The boy straightened, basking in the attention. Pietro could see his pleasure and, beneath it, a hunger for more.

Nico had said that the oracle's words were written ahead of time — she was supposed to have been another part of the pageant, like the actors and the jugglers. But something in the air told Pietro she had departed from her script.

Poco nudged him. "What's wrong with your dog?"

Pietro glanced down to Mercurio. Until now he'd been in a fine mood, lapping Pietro's hand happily. Suddenly the greyhound was shaking, traces of froth and drool around his mouth. His eyes, angled up to the open sky, were strangely opaque.

"Mercurio? Hey, boy." Voice urgent, Pietro rubbed Mercurio's ear. "What's the matter?"

Eyes blinking, Mercurio turned its head and laid his chin on Pietro's right thigh. The hound always arranged himself on Pietro's wounded side, the better to protect it. Pietro used both hands to lift the dog's face and nuzzle it with his own. "You all right, boy?"

There was a plucking at his sleeve, and the Grand Butler was saying, "It is time, my lord."

Lord?
Dear God, he means me!
Pietro turned to his father. "Could you keep an eye on Mercurio?"

Dante nodded, reaching out a hand to brush the Mercurio's snout, a game the poet and the hound had developed. The dog ducked and swiveled his head over the extended hand, waiting for Dante's second try. Dante glanced at Pietro. "Go on. We're fine."

Rising, Pietro leaned on his crutch and hobbled after the rest of the prospective knights as they passed under the seats on their way down to the Arena floor. It was good to be out of the chilled air for the moment. The braziers on the balcony had helped, but the cold air threatened to freeze the blood in a man's veins.

Or perhaps it was the oracle's eyes.

As Pietro followed the steward's lead, Antony and Mari fell in beside him. "Let's get this over with," said Antony, rubbing his hands together and blowing on them. "I want to get to the race."

Mariotto hit his friend on the arm. "Just like you to think of the greatest day of your life as nothing but the race. We're to be knighted!"

Antony said, "You're running, aren't you, Pietro?"

Pietro almost answered in the negative. Then he remembered Bailardino's comment about riding. No, he couldn't compete in a midnight footrace. But that didn't stop him from riding his new palfrey in the noon stampede. He nodded. "I think I will!"

"Good!" Antony clapped a hand on Pietro's back, hard. "Mari and I have a bet on who will win."

"There's no chance you'll win, oaf, unless you fall off your horse onto me again," replied Mariotto.

"Would you listen to him? I save his life –"

"You fell! You said so yourself!"

"I saved your life!"

"I saved yours!"

"Pfah! You should have that Morsicato look at your head, pretty boy. Phantom knights with spears!"

"Phantom crossbows is more like it –"

"Girls, girls," laughed Pietro. "You're both pretty." Which turned them both to attacking him.

There was more good-natured scuffling as they walked down a ramp and under the outer ring of the Arena's lower level. All around them were remnants of past times: grooves in the marble floor worn by centuries of traffic; the rough sockets in the walls where, after Rome's fall, citizens suspended timbers to create homes out of the Arena walls; and here and there a touch of the original paint still lingered, reminding everyone that the Roman Empire had been a startlingly garish place.

"Say," said Mari suddenly, "look what Antony and I have!" He drew a long silver dagger from its sheath at his back. "Show him yours, you big lout! Or have you lost it already?"

"I have mine right here," retorted Antony, tossing his dagger up by Mariotto's head.

Mari's gloved hand plucked the blade from the air. "Nice."

"Daggers?" Pietro wondered why he didn't get a silver dagger in his box of weapons. Or had he overlooked it?

"Something Mari and I had made," said Capecelatro. "We got one for you, too. A gift." He handed over a third matching weapon, which Pietro accepted joyfully.

Mari pointed to his own. "Look, on one side it says 'The Triumvirate,' and on the other a name engraved on it." Sure enough, Pietro saw
Mariotto
etched with acid into the finely wrought silver of one,
Antonio
in the other. The one in his hand read
Pietro
.

He looked up into their expectant faces. "I don't know what to say."

"Say you can juggle!" Antony and Mari started tossing their knives back and forth with practiced ease, causing people around them to duck and curse. Pietro tossed his up into the mix and nearly sliced his free hand open as he caught the one that flicked back at him.

"We were thinking of working up an act for the next festival," said Mariotto. "You should join up — we'd be famous!"

"Yes, the three-fingered trio," laughed Pietro, ducking. "Watch out!"

"Did you listen to that oracle?" asked Antony, catching a knife and waving it back and forth mystically as he crossed his eyes and began to moan. "Loooovvve! All of you will die for loooooove!"

Mariotto snickered. "Wait a minute — she didn't say it was the love of a man for a woman. Perhaps it will be love of battle that will destroy the city!"

"Or of poetry," growled Antony.

"Or of wine," observed Pietro.

"Well then I'm safe," sighed Antony happily. "I prefer beer."

"You would!" snorted Mari. "You're probably really a German. The whole Capua story is a lie."

"That's right," nodded Antony. "Spying for the Empire, here to report on who's fit for battle. I've told them that of the whole Montecchi clan, only Monsignor Gargano Montecchio is fit for duty."

They were trailing the crowd of new knights around the outer ring of the Arena, below the vaulted arches that held the seats. Mari said, "I have a pretty fierce aunt in a convent in Treviso. Perhaps your father would fancy her," he added to Pietro. "Her name is Beatrice."

"Ouch! One is enough, thank you." He explained that his sister would soon be joining them in Verona. "The old man calls her Beatrice."

"Maybe your father and Mari's will arrange a match," muttered Antony.

Pietro was shocked. "What?"

"Don't mind him," chuckled Mariotto breezily. "He's only cross because he meets his bride today."

"Don't remind me!" shouted Antony.

"Bride?" said Pietro, eyes wide.

Mariotto glanced down at the dagger in his hand. "Hey, oaf — you've got mine."

"And I'm going to keep it," muttered Antony, slicing the air. "If you bring her up again, I'll give it back to you up to the hilt!"

Grin widening, Pietro repeated, "Bride?"

"Yes, yes!" proclaimed the Capuan hotly. "My father's arranged a marriage for me. I meet her today."

Mariotto was positively joyful. "There will even be a formal betrothal on Wednesday. And a solemn supper, and a clasping of hands, and a –"

"And a dead Montecchio for dessert," growled Antony.

Reaching the exterior of the Arena, they circled around to where their horses waited, the giant
destriers
. Their saddles were all equipped with swords and bucklers. Apparently they were to ride out in full glory.

As he was being helped into his saddle Pietro said, "So who is she? Some old widow?" The look that earned him was deadly.

"Better," Mariotto told him brightly. "She's Paduan."

"No!" said Pietro incredulously.

"Not only a Paduan," beamed Mari as he mounted. "She's a Carrara!"

That took a little of the joy out of Pietro's smile. "What?"

"That bastard's cousin," moaned Antony. "My father went to the Capitano and they decided it would be a fine way to signal the peace. Cangrande has no relatives of marriageable age, so he agreed to present me to the Carrarese."

"That's — quite a match." Pietro didn't know much about Antony's family, but such a union was certainly above their station. It was a signal honour the Capitano was bestowing on the Capecelatro family.
Just how much money does Antony's father have?

Hearing Pietro's thoughts, Antony bristled. "Oh, she's not too good for me. Don't worry your snobbish little head off."

Pietro frowned. "I didn't say—"

"No, you didn't! No one does. But I see it in your eyes. You too, Mari!" He swung a fist that barely missed Mariotto. "Everyone wonders why we left Capua, how we made our money. How does anyone make it? Just because we came to ours lately, we get snubbed! We run
commendi
now! We just provide capital! How did your ancestors get their wealth, Montecchio? Hmm? Are you so proud of the horse thieves in your family stable?"

A coarse and boorish thing to say, worse because it was true. For all their lands and respectability today, the Montecchi fortune had been founded by a branch of the family famous for stealing horses. Even the family motto,
Montibus in claris semper vivida fides,
had derived from that practice.
Faith is always vigorous in the clear mountains
— well, it would be if you were praying to avoid capture, riding stolen horses to some hiding place.

Around them the other soon-to-be-knights shifted, watching with eagerness. Mariotto's voice was level. "Take that back."

Antony was uncowed. "Make me."

Mariotto was about to launch a punch at Antonio's head when Pietro walked his horse between them, holding up his crutch. "Umm — I don't think this is how knights are supposed to behave."

Mari looked murderous. "We're supposed to uphold our honour."

"Then think of the dishonour your family will suffer if you don't get knighted today. Antony, if you're mad at anyone, be mad at me. But apologize to Mariotto so we can get on with this." Already the other prospective knights were being summoned to the tunnel that led to the Arena floor.

Antony looked sullen. "I'm sorry, Mari."

Mariotto waited a beat before answering. "I should have let you get skewered."

"I should have let you get shot."

"You fell."

"So I did."

"I'm going to kill you in the Palio, you know."

"You'll die trying."

Mariotto raised the small silver dagger in his hand. "Don't forget, I've got a dagger with your name on it."

"So do I," Capecelatro said, lifting his own knife. And just like that, it was over.

Pietro put up his hands. "Remember, both of you, that my name's on one of these knives. Don't get any ideas."

"Pietro, you really need to stop worrying," said Mari as they fell in behind the line of young cavalieres at the tunnel's mouth.

"Yeah." Antony grinned. "You could start going prematurely grey."

"At least it won't be from my wife nagging me."

"A hit!" cried Mari.

Even Antony laughed as they rested in the shadow of the tunnel. "Keeps me from a life in church, though. Did you see that poor sod waiting on Guelco and the abbot?"

Pietro recalled the young monk with the new tonsure. "I did, in fact. I'm surprised he isn't married."

"Probably likes the boys," said Antony, scandalizing his friends. "But thank God, I've avoided the cloisters. Now I only have to weather a wife!"

"It won't be too bad, Antony," observed Mariotto.

"How do you know?"

"I don't. I was just trying to make you feel better."

"Why don't you ask your daddy to make you a match," suggested Antony sweetly. "Then we can both put our heads into the noose together."

"Not me," said Mariotto, puffing out his chest. "Footloose and fancy-free. When I marry, I want to have lived a little."

"Oh, thank you!" snarled Antony, rolling his eyes back in his head.

"Shhhh!" Pietro pointed. The steward was signaling that it was time to ride out into the Arena. He began to give them their instructions. The three young men in back shifted on their horses and straightened their farsettos as they listened.

"Pietro," whispered Antony urgently. "Seriously, dine near our table tonight. I don't want to meet her alone. Mari will be there."

"I will," Pietro whispered back.

Then they were riding out to huge applause under the noonday sun.

All fifteen new knights looked exquisite in their identical uniforms. The only difference among them was that no two bore the same feather in their cap. Here there was a peacock plume, there the pinfeather from a duck.

Entering from the west, directly opposite the Scaliger's balcony, they rode around the pit twice, then made for the center where they dismounted and knelt. A struggle for Pietro.