The Spirit Ring (2 page)

      
"No, she was a Christian woman," replied Fiametta's father. "From Brindisi." There was a certain dryness in his voice, whether with respect to Christian women or Brindisi Fiametta could not tell.

      
"She must have been very beautiful," said the Swiss politely.

      
"That she was. And I was not always so dried up and battered as you see me today, either, before my nose was broken and my hair grew gray."

      
Captain Ochs made an apologetic noise, implying no slur intended on his host's face. Messer Quistelli, also aging, laughed appreciatively.

      
"Has she inherited your talent in your art, Master Beneforte, while avoiding your nose?" asked Messer Quistelli.

      
"She's certainly better than that ham-handed apprentice of mine, who's fit only for hauling wood. Her drawings and models are very fine. I don't tell her so, of course; there's nothing more obnoxious than a proud woman. I have let her work in silver, and I've just started letting her work in gold."

      
Messer Quistelli vented a suitably impressed
Hmm.
"But I was thinking of your
other
art."

      
"Ah." Master Beneforte's voice slid away without actually answering the question. "It's a great waste to train a daughter, who will only take your efforts and secrets off to some other man when she marries. Although if certain noble parties remain in arrears on the payments an artist of my stature is properly owed, her knowledge may be the only dowry I can afford her." He heaved a large and pointed sigh in Messer Quistelli's direction. "Did I ever tell you about the time the Pope was so overwhelmed by the beautiful gold medallion I crafted for his cope, he doubled my pay?"

      
"Yes, several times," said Messer Quistelli quickly, to no avail.

      
"He was going to make me Master of the Mint, too, till my enemies' whispers got up that false charge of necromancy against me, and I rotted in the dungeons of Castel Sain' Angelo for a year —"

      
Fiametta had heard that one too. She backed up a few paces, shuffled her slippers noisily on the tiles, and entered the workroom. She set the walnut box carefully before her father and handed him back his keys. He smiled, rubbed his hands on his tunic, and with a word under his breath unlocked and opened the box. Folding back the silk wrappings, he lifted the object within and set it in the middle of the grid of sunlight falling on the table.

      
The golden saltcellar blazed and sparked in the light, and both visitors caught their breaths. The sculpture rested on an oval base of ebony, richly decorated. Upon it two palm-high golden figures, a beautiful nude woman and a strong bearded man holding a triton, sat with their legs interlaced. "As we see in firths and promontories." Master Beneforte enthusiastically explained the symbolism. A ship—Fiametta thought it more of a rowboat—of delicate workmanship near the hand of the sea-king was to hold the salt; a little Greek temple beneath the earth-queen's gracefully draped hand was meant for the pepper. Around the man sea horses, fish, and strange crustaceans sported; around the woman, a happy riot of beautiful creatures of the earth.

      
The Swiss captain's mouth hung open.
 
Messer Quistelli pulled the spectacles from his belt, balanced them on his nose, and peered hungrily at the fine work. Master Beneforte swelled visibly, pointing out meaningful details and enjoying the men's astonishment.

      
Messer Quistelli recovered first. "But does it
work
?" he demanded doggedly.

      
Master Beneforte snapped his finger. "Fiametta! Fetch me two wineglasses, a bottle of wine—the sour wine Ruberta uses for cooking, not the good Chianti—and that white powder she uses to destroy rats in the pantry. Quickly now!"

      
Fiametta scampered, glowing with her secret.
I designed the dolphins. And the little rabbits, too.
Behind her she could hear Master Beneforte bellowing again for Teseo the apprentice. She flung across the courtyard and into the kitchen, meeting Ruberta's protests at her flurry with a breathless, "Papa wants!"

      
"Yes, girl, but I wager he'll want his dinner as well, and the fire's gone out in the stove." Ruberta pointed with her wooden spoon at the blue-tiled firebox.

      
"Oh, is that all?' Fiametta bent over, unlatched the iron door, and turned her face to look inside the dark square. She ordered her thoughts to an instant of calm,
"Piro,"
she breathed. Brilliant blue and yellow flames flared up like dancers on the dead coals. "That should do it." She tasted the heat of the spell on her tongue with satisfaction. At least she could do one thing well. Even Papa said so. And if one, why not another?

      
"Thank you, dear," said Ruberta, turning to fetch her iron pot. By the aromatic evidence on the cutting board she was about to do splendid things with onions, garlic, rosemary, and spring lamb.

      
"You're welcome." Quickly, Fiametta assembled the items needed for the demonstration upon a tray, including the last two clear Venetian wineglasses from the set the carters had broken in their move here to Montefoglia, almost five years ago. Papa had forgotten to mention the salt or the pepper; she snatched their jars from the high shelf and added them to the array as well, and marched it all to the workroom, her back straight.

      
Smiling to himself, Master Beneforte tapped a little salt into the bowl-hull of the ship. For a moment, his face took on an inward look; he whispered under his breath and crossed himself. Fiametta touched Messer Quistelli's arm as he started to speak, to keep him from interrupting what she knew to be a critical step. The hum from the saltcellar that answered Master Beneforte's whisper was deep and rich, but very, very faint, musical and fine. A year or so ago she could not have sensed it at all; Messer Quistelli clearly did not.

      
"The pepper, Papa?" Fiametta offered it.

      
"We shall not use the pepper today." He shook his head. He then placed a generous spoonful of the rat powder into one of the wineglasses and tied a string around its stem to mark it. Then he poured the wine into both glasses. The powder dissolved slowly, with a faint fizz.

      
"Where is the boy?" Master Beneforte muttered after a few more minutes of waiting. Fortunately, before his master could work up to true irritation, Teseo slammed through the front door and appeared in the workroom, his cap askew on his head and one hose sagging with points half-tied, a towel bundled in his nervous hands.

      
"I could only catch one in the midden, Master," Teseo apologized. "The other bit me and ran off."

      
"Huh! Perhaps I'll use you for a substitute, then." Master Beneforte frowned. Teseo paled.

      
He took up the towel, which proved to imprison a large and wild-looking rat, its teeth yellow and broken and its fur mangy. Teseo sucked on his bleeding thumb. The rat snapped, hissed, writhed, and squeaked. Holding the beast firmly by the scruff of its neck, Master Beneforte took a fine glass tube, drew up some now-chalky-pink wine from the glass with the string, and forced the liquid down the rat's throat. After another moment he released the animal onto the tiles. It snapped again, started to run, and began whirling in circles, biting at its sides. Then it convulsed and died.

      
"Now observe, gentlemen," Master Beneforte said. His two guests leaned closer as he took a sprinkle of salt between his fingers and dropped it into the plain wineglass. Nothing happened. He took a second, more generous pinch, and dropped it into the poisoned wine. The salt flared, grains sparkling orange; a blue flame, like ignited brandy, breathed up from the surface of the liquid and burned for fully a minute. Master Beneforte stirred the mixture slowly with the pipette. The contents were now as clear and ruby-bright as the other. He lifted the stringed glass. "Now..." his eye fell on Teseo, who squeaked rather like the rat and apprehensively stepped back. "Ha. Unworthy boy," Master Beneforte said scornfully. He glanced at Fiametta, and a strange inspired smile curved his lips. "Fiametta. Drink this."

      
Messer Quistelli drew in his breath with a gasp, and the captain clenched his hand in shocked protest, but Fiametta straightened, gave them a proud and confident smile, and took the wineglass from her father's hand. She raised it to her lips and quaffed it all down in a single draught. Captain Ochs started up again as she grimaced, and just the faintest alarm flared for a moment in Master Beneforte's eyes, but she raised a hand in reassurance. "Salty sour wine." She scraped her tongue over her teeth, smothering a small belch. "For breakfast."

      
Master Beneforte smiled triumph at the Duke's steward. "Does it work? Apparently so. And so you may bear witness to your lord."

      
Messer Quistelli clapped his hands. "Wonderful!" Though his eyes shifted now and then to recheck Fiametta.

      
Regretfully, Fiametta stifled a malicious urge to clutch her belly, drop to the floor, and scream. The fleeting opportunity might be beautiful, but Master Beneforte's sense of humor did not extend to jokes played upon himself, nor did his respect for revenge include justice for insults he laid upon others.
It's a great waste, to train a daughter....
Fiametta sighed.

      
Messer Quistelli touched the beautiful gold work. "And how long will it last?"

      
"The saltcellar, forever, for that is the incorruptible nature of gold. The spell of purification—perhaps twenty years, if the piece is undamaged, and it is not used without need. The prayer of activation will be engraved upon the bottom, for I fully expect it to outlast me."

      
Messer Quistelli raised impressed brows. "That long!"

      
"I give full value in my work," said Master Beneforte.

      
Taking the hint, Messer Quistelli counted out the Duke's monthly allowance onto the workbench.
 
Fiametta was sent again to lock both the saltcellar and the purse away in the strong chest.

      
When she returned, Messer Quistelli had gone, but Captain Ochs lingered with her father, as he often did. "Come, Uri, into the courtyard," Master Beneforte was saying, "and see your martial twin before I clothe him in his clay tunic. I finished laying on the wax but two days ago. The clay has been seasoning for months."

      
"Finished! I'd no idea you were so far along," said Captain Ochs. "Will you invite the Duke to inspect this new soldier of his, then?"

      
Master Beneforte smiled sourly, and held one finger to his lips. "I wouldn't even be telling you, if I didn't want to check a few last details. I mean to mold and cast it in secret, and surprise my impatient Lord of Montefoglia with the finished bronze. Let my enemies dare try to insult my diligence then!"

      
"You
have
been at this for over three years," said Uri doubtfully. "Still, 'tis always better to promise less, and do more, than the other way around."

      
"Aye." Master Beneforte led the younger man into the open courtyard. The pavement was still in morning shadow, though a line of light was almost visibly creeping down the wall as the sun rode higher. Fiametta tagged along very quietly, lest by drawing her father's attention she win an unwelcome chore that would send her out of earshot.

      
Beneath a canvas canopy a lumpy linen-shrouded figure stood, a man-and-a-half high, ghostly in the grayness. Master Beneforte stood on a stool and carefully unwound the protective wrappings. A man's strong hand, raised high, emerged first, holding a fantastical snake-haired severed head grimacing in a death mask. Then the calm, heroic face beneath a winged helmet, then the rest of the figure's smooth nude shape. Its right hand held a fine curving sword. The supple muscles seemed to hold the whole body poised, live as a spring, beneath the grisly trophy brandished in triumph. Its translucent surface was all made of golden-brown wax, exhaling the faintest aroma of honey.

      
"Truly," breathed Uri, moving closer, "it's magical, Master Prospero! He almost seems ready to step off his plinth. Better even than the plaster model!"

      
Master Beneforte smiled, pleased. "No magic to it, boy. This is pure art. When this is cast, it will glorify my name forever. Prospero Beneforte, Master Sculptor. Those ignorant fools who call me a mere goldsmith and tinker will be utterly routed and confounded the day this is unveiled in the square. 'The Duke's Decorator,' hah!"

      
Uri stared, fascinated, into the hero's wax face. "Do I really look like that? I fear you flatter me exceedingly, Master Beneforte."

      
Master Beneforte shrugged. "The face is idealized. Perseus was a Greek, not a Swiss, nor pocked like a cheese. It was your body that was so invaluable to me as a model. Well-knit, strong without that lumpiness that some strong men have."

      
Uri mimed a shiver. "Glorious or no, you won't again talk me into modeling naked in the winter while you sit swaddled in fur."

      
"I kept the brazier full of coals. I thought you mountain goats were impervious to cold."

      
"When we can move around. Our winters keep us hard-working. It was the standing still, all twisted up like a rope, that did me in. I had a head cold for a month, after."

      
Master Beneforte waved a dismissive hand. "It was worth it. Now, while I have you here, take off your right boot. I have a little worry about this statue's foot. When the statue is cast, I must force the metal down nearly five cubits. The heads will do famously, for fire ascends. But he is to be Perseus, not Achilles, eh?"