The Venice Conspiracy (23 page)

Another explosion makes the ground tremble again.

All eyes flick to Pesna. He gives them another reassuring grin. ‘It is the sound of the gods applauding our latest find. Now come, enough of Aranthur’s tedious lesson, let’s share out the
wonderful presents you have been admiring. I have had gifts handcrafted for each and every one of you. My noble friend Kavie has a list detailing which piece belongs to whom.’

Another rumble.

This time no one flinches. They’re too absorbed in the sound of wealth being distributed.

Kavie starts with the smallest presents and least important guests. ‘It is my honour to pass these gifts on to you. First, to my old friend Arte of Tarchna, I am pleased to present this signet ring, beautifully engraved with his initials …’

The nobles applaud as Arte works his way through the throng to receive his present.

But he never gets it.

The whole wooden structure of the outbuilding creaks and shakes.

Parts of the roof break away. Daylight bursts through. Clapping turns to silent, open-mouthed fear.

They are all looking up as the entire roof collapses. Hands cover heads as timber and metal rain down.

Now the ground disappears.

Opens up beneath their feet.

Like a trapdoor to hell.

Hands cling to the edge of a crumbling crevice. Fingers claw frantically, but the soft earth yields and they slip away.

Screams echo from the gaping hole. The nobles tumble into a murderous torrent of cleaved rock.

Roaring through the complex of six mines is a fireball of methane, set off by fires in the cliffside.

Those who survive the drop are burned to death in the inferno.

From his vantage point on the hillside, Larth watches the mushroom cloud of dust and black smoke rise high in the afternoon sky. His men did well with the fires, brilliantly arranging them to set off the chain reaction that tore through stagnant chambers filled with the earth’s noxious gases.

As he leans against the busted chariot wheel and looks down at the three precious silver tiles in his hands, he allows himself a smile that even Pesna would have been proud of. The tablets are the key to great things. He must keep them safe. Guard them with his life. Guard them until his new master is ready for them.

Larthuza’s Hut, Atmanta

Tetia is unconscious by the time
Venthi gets her to the healer’s hut.

The old man fears the worst.

After such a huge loss of blood she is on the brink of death.

Helpers and well-wishers crush inside the healer’s hut as Venthi rushes back for his son. Larthuza lays Tetia out on a rough treatment bed, and quickly gathers cloths and a pot of water that perpetually simmers on the fire.

‘Thank you! Thank you! Time for you all to go now. Give me space. Give me room to work.’ He flaps the watchers away, as though he’s shooing a flock of unwanted geese.

Cafatia, a village seamstress of Tetia’s age, stays and helps mop her skin.

The old man examines the swollen stomach pumping blood. Though the wound has missed the womb, he knows the chance of him saving either mother or child is remote. ‘Wipe! Wipe here!’ he instructs Cafatia as he quickly examines another wound, a flap of gaping flesh on Tetia’s right arm. ‘May all the gods assist us, this is beyond the stitching or healing of mere mortals.’

He wraps a length of hemp rope tightly around Tetia’s bicep to stem the flow of blood as Cafatia finishes removing the patient’s clothing and wiping her stomach wound.

He sees it clearly now.

It is deep.

Too deep for her to live. He puts his wrinkled old hand near Tetia’s mouth to check her breathing.

Barely anything.

A noise and change of light makes him turn.

Venthi fills the doorway.

His dead son lies across his arms. ‘He is alive, Larthuza. Teucer is still alive! Treat him quickly!’ He lays him down next to Tetia.

Larthuza need look no closer. ‘Venthi, he is dead. Let me try to save Tetia.’

‘No! Save
him
, Larthuza, save
my sweet boy.’

The old man’s voice grows soft and kind. ‘He is gone. He is with the gods he served so devotedly.’

Tears stream down Venthi’s face. ‘At least examine him! I
beseech
you.’

Larthuza grabs him by the arms. ‘Venthi, I do not need to – he is gone! I am sorry, but there is nothing I can do for him. Now, let me attend his wife and child.’

Tetia’s eyes flick open.

A shot of pain jolts through her and her good hand clutches at the healer.

Larthuza rips off the last of her blood-soaked tunic. He bends and parts her shaking pale knees. In his mind he is praying –
begging –
Thalna, the goddess of childbirth, for help. He glances at Venthi with a thin trace of a smile. ‘I can see the child’s head. I can see the baby.’

Tetia’s eyes bulge. She howls like a wounded animal.

Larthuza tries gently to work his fingers around the soft bone of the child’s skull.

Tetia can barely pant. Her breath is shallow and limited but she’s prepared to use the last of it to deliver her child to safety.

The healer looks up at her. Her face is as white as a corpse. Her eyes as milky as those of her blinded husband.

Larthuza feels tiny shoulders in his fingers. Now the delicate bones of the baby’s back and ribs.

Tetia lets loose an inhuman roar.

Her head drops.

Her legs collapse.

She is dead.

For a second everything stops as the shock of her passing fills the room. Larthuza breaks the trance. ‘Venthi, lift her legs! Do it quickly! Take her beneath the knees and keep her legs open.’

The big man does as instructed.

The healer’s hands work quickly. Fingers hook around the armpits of the child, and slowly he pulls.

The baby slithers out of his dead mother’s body, a bloody snake of umbilical cord trailing behind.

All eyes are on the child.

The silent, non-breathing, baby boy.

Venthi can see the healer needs room. He takes his knife, slices the cord and pulls Tetia out of Larthuza’s way. He lays her cold body gently against that of his dead son.

Larthuza ties the
cord. Tips the baby face down in the palm of his hand and works one of his bony fingers into its mouth.

Its bloated little belly stretches to bursting point.

Then –

A splatter of dark fluid and mucus sprays from its mouth and nostrils.

But no cry erupts. Just short breaths, like an animal snuffing.

Larthuza smiles. ‘You are a grandfather, Venthi. This little man is breathing.’

‘Let me hold him,’ Venthi stretches out his hands. ‘He is the only blood that will now survive me.’

Larthuza gently passes him over. ‘Careful, he is very weak. I will get something to wrap him in.’

Venthi kisses his grandson. He is perfect, bar a small tear-shaped birthmark beneath his left eye. He kisses the child, then folds Teucer’s arm around his dead wife and places the baby between them. ‘These are your parents, newborn. Though you never saw them, I will make sure you never forget them and you in turn will ensure the generations that follow you will always remember them.’

18
TH
C
ENTURY
V
ENICE

26 dicembre 1777

Piazza San Marco, Venezia

Sunset
turns
the
Canale Di San Marco into an endless stream of spilled Chianti.

Masked courtesans totter carefully from their boats to ply their trade inland. Hungry eyes peer out from behind the soft velvet of full-face Moretta masks, most held in place by a button on a thread, clenched between the teeth.

Some of the wearers are young and beautiful. Some old and diseased. Rich women dress as paupers. The poor borrow disguises to spend the night as nobles.

In Venice, anyone can be anyone.

Everything is possible.

Nothing is certain.

It is the day after Christmas. The Feast of St Stephen. The start of Carnevale.

The most decadent festival in the history of the world is only hours old and it is screaming its arrival like a newborn child.

Six months of wild indulgence is born.

Music. Art. Sex.

And more decadent things.

Darker –
deadlier
– things.

Piazza San Marco is already a dance floor. Embroidered coats, Carnevale capes and shimmering new costumes swirl in the crisp winter air as mingling and flirtation commence against a backdrop of string musicians. Vivaldi is dead but the Red Priest’s music is more in fashion than when he was alive. Inside a café, female violinists play ‘La Tempesta de Mare’, and for a fleeting moment a group of men pause and listen before heading on towards Il Ridotto, the state-run gambling house at San Moise where most of their wages will disappear.

From behind
his long-nosed, deathly white mask, a man known as The Boatman watches them all.

He is in the centre of it but not part of it.

Piazza San Marco is the magnet for decadence, the epicentre of European sexual tourism. This is the place the poet Baffo dubbed the barking ground for bitches of all breeds to come and lift their tails.

At the far end of the square a street theatre performs on a raised platform. Centre stage is a broad-chested actor playing the role of the adventurer, Capitano Scaramuccia. He is dressed in a feathered hat, flowing black cape and thick belt with steel sword. From behind a small silver mask finished with a long ivory nose he is regaling an already drunken audience with tales of beating the Turkish army and running off with the beard of the Sultan.

The Boatman drifts away from the crowd’s laughter and wanders the streets, drinking in the sexual aroma of the early evening.

He decides to dine well.

A hearty
zuppa pomodoro
, followed by a rich, roasted haunch of lamb. But no wine. Not yet. He needs a clear head.

Afterwards he will walk off his feast and be ready for business.

He meanders north-east through backstreets and over stone bridges towards the brothel at Santa Maria Formosa. From there he’ll head into the finer quarters of Sestiere di Dorsoduro.

He fastens his coat as a biting wind blows in from the canal, and hears someone say there’s a stormy high tide on its way. He doesn’t think so. Most forecasters are fools. They don’t have the sense to predict that night follows day. The Boatman knows more about the elements than they ever will.

Still, he’ll be careful. Watchful. As always.

Two courtesans – both wearing silver cat masks – make pawing motions as they approach him. The smaller one lets out a loud and playful ‘Meeeooow!’ then purrs and wriggles against his hip.

The Boatman feigns disgust. All but jumps out of her way.

The courtesans laugh at him and teeter off on their platform shoes. They’re oblivious to whom they’ve just brushed shoulders with. Unaware of how lucky they are.

One of their nine lives – gone for ever.

Tonight in Venice, the two cats and ten thousand women like them will have sex with tens of thousands of strange men who’ve travelled from all over Europe to lie between their legs. The Boatman won’t be one of them.

The pleasure he is seeking is much less fleeting – far more permanent.

Present Day

Venice

It’s two days since Tina
left, and Tom is missing her far more than he thought he would.

When he’s not at the Carabinieri headquarters, which is where he’s currently heading, he walks the streets. Anything rather than sit and think about her. Maybe he was crazy to imagine he was something more than merely an exotic amusement for her.

As soon as she’d gone he moved back to his old hotel – there was no way he could afford the Luna Baglioni on his dwindling funds. He was pleasantly surprised when the cops offered to pick up the bill and also to pay him some daily expenses until they were done with him.

He pauses mid-bridge and looks out over passing gon dolas and water taxis heading into the Canal Grande. He’s taking in the view and half thinking about moving on, deciding what to do when the cops solve the case or shut it down, when the view jolts his memory. He puts his hand in the jacket Tina bought him and pulls out the postcard old Rosanna Romano gave him the night she died. Two gifts from two women he’d barely known and who’d never met each other, yet they’ve both left indelible marks on his life. Tom doesn’t know whether to call it fate, coincidence or just God’s will. He stares out at the Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute and understands why Canaletto felt compelled to paint it, and why Rosanna’s postcard drew him to Venice. In real life it’s so much bigger and more beautiful than even Canaletto could capture on canvas. It’s tantalisingly close to his hotel and he makes himself a promise that he’ll go inside – but not today. He’s already in danger of being late for a meeting with the Carabinieri.

Tom’s still reflective and melancholic when he arrives just five minutes late, which he’s already learned is like being twenty minutes early in Venice. A young officer from the front desk takes him upstairs to Vito Carvalho’s room, where he finds the major also looking downcast.

‘
Ciao
, Tom. Please sit down.’

‘
Grazie
.’ Tom takes
the chance to exercise his extensive Italian vocabulary of about ten words, ‘
Buongiorno
, Major.’

Valentina Morassi walks in and they briefly kiss, that wonderful double kiss that Italians do better than any other nation. As she sits at the side of her boss’s desk, Tom can instantly tell that something’s wrong.

Carvalho takes a set of stapled fax pages and pushes it Tom’s way. ‘From the
National Enquirer
. Faxed to us by the FBI this morning.’

Tom drags the document across. His own face stares up at him. Not a shot he’s seen before. Not one used in the cover age that came after the gang rape in LA. He’s wearing only a towel around his waist and he’s sitting in the window of Tina’s hotel room. It’s been taken on a camera phone. Tina’s phone. He almost daren’t look at the innumerable columns of text beneath the picture and the headline:
Hero Priest Finds Love and Death in Venice
.