The Wolves of Paris (12 page)

It was then that he noticed he was not running alone. Several others were in the woods around him. He didn’t see them so much as hear their pants, their snarls. And smell. Each one had a distinct odor. One of them cut in toward him. It was a huge wolf with ruddy fur and an insatiable hunger that permeated his scent.

Courtaud.

That was the other wolf’s name. Somehow he knew this without being told. Courtaud was the lord of the pack. Obey him or be killed.

Courtaud ran beside him, growling his orders.
Follow us. There’s a child on the road. We shall tear out its throat and feast on its flesh.c

A child? No, he thought. No, we can’t kill a child.

Lorenzo woke in a soft bed. He was burning up, sweat on his forehead. He felt weak, almost helpless, but his stomach no longer churned with nausea. Heavy wool blankets weighed down on his chest and the goose down pillows around his head threatened to suffocate him if he couldn’t get up. He struggled to sit.

A figure moved from a chair near the fireplace.

“No, go back to sleep,” a woman’s voice said.

“My lady,” he whispered. His throat was dry. He could barely form the words.

Lucrezia sat next to him on the bed. “Shh, I’m here.”

“Something . . . drink.”

“I have wine.”

“Water?”

“The water here isn’t clean. Should I send for a hot herbal drink?”

“Don’t leave me alone,” he said.

The dream lingered in his mind, falling away like dust shaking from the rafters in a heavy thunderstorm. He’d been a wolf, running with a pack, following—what was his name? Courtaud. The red wolf with the bobbed tail.

There’s a child on the road. We shall tear out its throat and feast on its flesh.

Dear God, what kind of horror was that?

She poured wine into a crystal goblet. It was a light wine, thankfully, and helped quench his thirst, but he would have preferred the hot drink. Not so much that he wanted to send her away, though.

Lucrezia stroked his cheek. Her hand was soft and cool and he closed his eyes and sighed. Her touch pushed the dream into hidden cupboards of his mind, nearly forgotten already, but he kept repeating the name of the lead wolf— Courtaud, Courtaud, Courtaud—so it wouldn’t slip away.

“You were so cold before,” she said. “But now you’re feverish.”

“Pull back the blankets, please.”

“The sweat will draw out the poison.”

“No,” he insisted. “I think it’s passing already. Please, the blankets.”

Lucrezia pulled them back. A sudden, terrible itch passed down his forearm, where the wolf had scratched him. Lucrezia caught his wrist.

“No, don’t pick at it.”

“It’s unbearable. Just a little scratch, please.” He tried to pull away, but lacked the strength.

“No,” she said, more firmly this time.

She tucked his injured arm beneath the blankets and kept hold of his other wrist. Lorenzo looked up at her face, caught in shadow and reflected firelight. He couldn’t see her very well—it was only a curve of her cheek and a hint of eyes, nose, and lips. But her voice was soft and kind, and he had a dim memory of being held in her arms in the sleigh as he’d slipped in and out of a delirious sleep.

She leaned her head on one of the pillows and lay down next to him. Her breath was against his neck. The grip relaxed on his wrist.

“My lady?” he said.

“Yes?” she said, voice heavy.

“Never mind. Go ahead, sleep.”

She lifted up. “What is it, Lorenzo?”

He felt stronger now and his mind was like a hive of bees, buzzing with questions. What did this gentle touch mean? Did she feel something for him, or was it simple kindness? And if she did feel something, what about Marco? Did she have feelings for him, too?

But there was something more pressing on his mind.

“You know something about these wolves, don’t you?”

Her breath caught. “Only by rumor, Lorenzo,” she said after a moment of hesitation.

“I don’t believe that.”

“Why not?”

“My father and mother taught me to be alert. Know when a man is trying to swindle you, when he has shorted a bolt of cloth or adulterated a measure of peppercorns with bits of blackened clay.

“And I’ve been growing increasingly alert since we met you on the road,” he continued. “You have a mastiff, not much different from the dead one they gibbeted over the river. You were riding, somewhat desperately, to Lord Nemours’s chatelet when we caught you. Except the king’s provost is not here, he’s back in Paris. Only servants remain. And our captured agent, who Montguillon suspects is one of these wolf men. Incidentally, we were attacked by the brutes on the road. One coincidence piled on top of another. Doubts are circling in my head.”

“What are you saying?”

“Maybe nothing. I’m not as clever or as suspicious as the prior.”

“You’re a learned man, Lorenzo. Your pen is beautiful, your Latin is superb. I read your Virgil translation—did you know that?”

“You did? I mean, I was barely involved,” he said modestly, but feeling a glow of pride.

He was feeling stronger by the minute, almost well, except for that damnable itch on his forearm. It took all his willpower not to tear it open with his fingernails, and he couldn’t resist a quick, blessed dig before she caught him and took his wrist again.

“You hired the man who found the lost manuscript,” she said, “and you read it and noted its significance. The actual translation was
pro forma
at that point.”

“About the wolves,” he said, more firmly. “Is Montguillon going to die?”

“How would I know that?”

“Lucrezia, please.”

She fell silent. Her hand slipped from his wrist and she shifted on the bed. There was no more contact between them.

“Perhaps if you forgot what you know, or think you know,” she said at last.

“Then what?”

“Then you’d be happier with me. Your respect for me wouldn’t wither and die.”

“Did you do something?” he asked.

“A bit of foolishness. Like when you charged my carriage in Lucca and they had to drag you away.” There was a smile in her voice.

“Yes, that was stupid. I’m sure you’ve done nothing like that.”

“Unfortunately, my folly had more serious consequences. People have died.”

“Tell me about the wolves,” Lorenzo said. “I can help.”

“There’s no help for the trouble I’m in.”

“Montguillon is suspicious. And he’s tenacious. Even if he’s unconscious, on the verge of death, he’ll whisper his charges to Simon, who will carry them to the Blackfriars. If you’re charged under the Inquisition as a witch . . . ”

“I will not burn. I’ll take my own life first.”

“And suffer in the Seventh Circle of Hell as a suicide? It’s better to burn for a few minutes.”

“The priests burned the other two women for six hours, kept them alive, their skin crackling and fat dripping into the fire, as they screamed and begged for release.”

“My God.”

“They were innocent. I am not.”

“My lady, whatever you did—”

“I’m not strong enough to face the fire. And besides, they’ll excommunicate me first. My soul is bound for hell one way or another.”

“Stop talking like that,” he said. “You’re not going to burn, and you’re not going to die. And you’re not going to hell, either.”

“You don’t know that.”

Lorenzo reached for her hand. She tried to pull away, but this time he was the one who tightened his grip.

“Please, trust me,” he said. “Whatever you’ve done, I’ll help you. I’ll protect you.”

“It’s too much, I can’t ask that.”

“You didn’t ask. I’m offering.”

She was quiet again, and after a moment she rose from the bed. He thought she’d leave him and return to her own quarters, but she moved to the fire instead, where she threw on a birch log. It crackled and flared as the bark caught fire.

“Lorenzo,” she said, turning. “I’ll tell you what I know. Not to save my own life, but to stop this thing. If you choose to denounce me to Father Montguillon when I’m done—”

“I’d never do that.”

“Let me finish, please. If you do choose to denounce me, I shall not blame you as they tie me to the stake.”

Denounce her? What kind of monster did she take him for? Besides, it was for
not
denouncing heretics, for defending them with the words of ancient pagan philosophers, that he’d found trouble with the Inquisition in the first place.

If he’d do that for a Franciscan monk espousing heretical views on the motion of celestial bodies, what would he do for Lucrezia di Lucca?

Lucrezia studied him with a worried expression. “Are you sure you’re ready to hear this?”

“Nothing you say could shock me.”

“You might regret saying that. Very well, here goes.” She sat next to him on the bed. “It began when I poisoned my husband.”

Chapter Twelve

“The first thing you should know,” Lucrezia began tentatively, “is that I didn’t marry my husband through any great love. If I had, I might have chosen a painter or a poet, or maybe even a young Florentine trader.”

Lorenzo’s eyes had widened when she’d mentioned poison, but he didn’t recoil, which was good. She was beginning to trust him—was desperate to trust someone—but needed to tell it in a certain way or he certainly would denounce her.

“I was still a girl when I met Rigord Ducy, the Lord Duke d’Lisle. Like your father, mine believed in taking his children on trading missions. Even his daughters. By the time I traveled to Paris I’d already visited Constantinople, Venice, Geneva, Bruges, three cities in the Hanseatic League, Toledo, and even passed through al-Andalus. The sultan offered my father forty thousand silver dirhams to add me to his harem.”

“You must have made an impression,” Lorenzo said.

“I was thirteen!” Lucrezia said. “Father didn’t tell me this until later, thank God, or I would have been terrified. Of course he never would have sold me to the Moors. By the time I was seventeen and I met the duke, I had become unfortunately aware of how men stared at me. It was enough to drive a girl to the convent. My mother thought I should become a nun and cloister myself with the Carmelites. She said the attention was of the devil. At times I thought she was right.”

“I don’t understand,” Lorenzo said. His tone was careful. “Thirteen, yes, and from a Mohammedan who wants to add you to his harem—that sounds frightening. But when you were seventeen, didn’t you enjoy the appreciation of wealthy and powerful men?”

“I could tell you a few things that might change your mind. Or maybe not. A man could never understand.”

“Go on, then.”

She was grateful he didn’t argue. It sounded petty to complain of being pretty, like whining about how being wealthy attracted sycophants, even as beggars starved in the streets. And perhaps for a man, there was no drawback to great beauty. A handsome man could only use those qualities to his advantage.

“Father wasn’t so interested in turning me into a nun. Six months after we returned to Lucca, our financial situation turned dire. We’d invested in a Genoan spice venture and the ships were lost to pirates off the coast of Arabia. Father began hunting for a wealthy husband. Lucca, Pisa, Florence—there were several interested parties.”

A frown crossed Lorenzo’s face and she wondered if he knew that Father had even spoken to Bernardino Boccaccio about the suitability of one of his sons.

“Then Father received a letter from Lord d’Lisle,” she said. “The duke was in Rome on pilgrimage and wanted to know if he could pay a visit to Lucca on his way through Tuscany. My father made discrete inquiries. It seems that Rigord Ducy was one of the five wealthiest men in France, and possessed estates in France and Burgundy. He stayed three weeks at our villa, and when he left, my father had an agreement.”

Lorenzo said, “But when I saw you the following year at the Festa della Rificolona, you were not betrothed yet. I tried to kiss you, remember? You said nothing.”
“I don’t remember that,” she said with a laugh. “Are you sure?”

“We climbed that old stone staircase to the olive grove overlooking the city where we watched the lantern parades. I fed you pan forte. I tried to take advantage of the darkness to steal a kiss.”

“I remember the pan forte—so sweet and rich. But you didn’t try to kiss me.”

“I most certainly did.”

“Then not very effectively, it would appear,” she said. “Or I’d remember. That sort of thing didn’t happen very often.”

He smiled. “I have a hard time believing that.”

“Well, maybe it happened once or twice.”

Lucrezia felt a blush rising, because suddenly she remembered Lorenzo’s
brother
trying to kiss her. And with rather more success. It happened at the Medici palace during a midwinter masquerade the year prior to the Festa della Rificolona. She’d been wearing a feathered, jewel-encrusted mask in the Venetian style, shamelessly flirting with a young man in bright leggings and a bulging cod piece, who wore a hawk’s mask and whispered funny, outrageous things in her ear. Then somehow she found herself alone with the young man in a dimly lit hallway lined with Greek sculpture. He took off his mask and hers, and kissed her. She barely resisted—the best that could be said was that it was a closed-mouth kiss and she pulled away after several seconds, and even then reluctantly. Who was he? She couldn’t even see his face before they slid their masks into place and moved back into the light.

Upon her return to the party, Lucrezia made discreet inquiries about the man with the hawk’s mask and heard it from Piero de’Medici himself that her would-be lover was the oldest of the Boccaccio brothers, Marco. And further, that he’d been asking about her earlier, before the flirtation began. He had sought her out specially, the scoundrel.

She decided not to share that particular story with Lorenzo. He might not find it as amusing as the story with the pan forte.

“Anyway,” she continued, “there wasn’t any betrothal to the duke, that’s why I didn’t tell you. Only an agreement. Rigord was still trying to obtain an annulment from his wife. He didn’t have any grounds, of course. Only boredom with a woman who was too old and fat for his taste. That’s how I understood it, anyway.”