This Rough Magic (24 page)

It was a little—a very little—like being the Lion. The gulls didn't have much on their minds but food and flying. He made the jump into four more gulls, when Eneko's voice came back.

Now think about flying toward the piazza and landing on one of the piers. 
 

But the gull didn't want to do that; he felt the resistance.

You could make him, but that would make you noticed. At the moment, unless a magician was aware that you were riding this particular gull, there is no way that you would be detected. This is how you can scry and not be seen. So, find another bird and see if you can jump to one that will do what you ask. 
 

It took two more birds, not one, before he found one that felt that landing on the pier would be a good thing. This was a big, strong bird who often managed to snatch food from lesser gulls down there. With a tilt of its wings, it made a dizzying plunge down toward the water, skimmed along the surface, and made a graceful landing on the stone.

Good. Now reverse how you got to the first gull. Pull back. See the gull in the mirror— 
 

And before the voice was done, Marco was looking into the eye of a fine, bright-eyed gull, then watching it strut nonchalantly along the stone walkway of the piazza. . . .

He was startled to see that Eneko Lopez had his left hand firmly in the grasp of Eneko's own, with the needle poised over it, as the mirror went to ordinary silver again.

"Excuse me, Father, but what are you doing?"

"A precaution," Eneko replied, immediately letting go of his hand. "In case you got lost in the gull's thoughts. A sharp reminder to your spirit that it still has a proper human body would swiftly recall you back."

"It would?" Marco was impressed by that; he could think of any number of ways that he could practice this trick with Kat's help, if this was the safeguard he needed to take.

"Oh, yes, indeed." Eneko smiled. "How are you feeling?"

"Um . . . tired." He was, suddenly. But he knew why, now; this leaping about from gull to gull was something that had all come out of his own reserves. "Can I draw on some other power to do this, next time?"

"Only at the risk of being noticed," Eneko warned. "You will make the gull look different to another mage if you start drawing on more power. Just as, if another mage was to try to scry the bird you were riding, he would notice you unless you take care to be very still and not draw attention to yourself."

"But could I scry, say, a bird over Cremona, and ride it?" he hazarded.

"Yes," Lopez said. "But if there was anything watching for you, it would find you. Your risk would be less, once you began riding the bird, but it would still be there."

Marco nodded. "But what about defending myself?" he asked, quietly.

"That will be the next lesson; I want you first to learn how to make yourself so inconspicuous when riding a bird or a beast that a mage will have to be very skilled to find you." Eneko softened his stern look with a little smile. "After all, the very best defense is not to need to defend yourself at all."

The ships made their way, cautiously, under oars, the leadsman calling depths as ship by ship the first great spring fleet rowed around the sand-spit at the end of the Lido. In the deeper water of the Adriatic, something watched. 
 

If the shaman had been in his own white sea he could have named many of the denizens of the cold deep and sunk all of the vessels above. Here the massive eellike creature that was his sea-form was restricted to watching. He was eighteen cubits long, but that was still not large enough to take on ships. As always his body-shape dictated his appetites. Ships were full of food that would be nice to suck dry. 
 

He flicked his powerful tail, and began swimming southward. Best to see if the other fleet and army was well hidden. 
 

This water was too warm. And the monk seals weren't worth eating. 
 

The galley had a number of its berths taken by the Vinlanders that Kat had rushed over to see. Maria had watched them for a few days now, and she was fairly certain that the two men who looked like a pair of giant warriors were really nothing much more than boys, not much older than she was. They were very happy to be at sea, and she had the feeling that although they probably were quite fond of their sister, they were also just a little tired of having her fastened to them all the time. Back in Venice, no doubt, they'd been able to get out and about on their own, but here, they were forced into each others' company with no chance for privacy.

Maria came out to put the wicker crib on the deck. Other than the helmsman, the poop deck was empty except for the blond woman—who was dripping tears over the stern of the ship. It looked to Maria as if she might join them, to splash into the water amid the kitchen peelings the cook had just tossed there.

Maria bit her lip. She'd better go over and see what the matter was. After all, the Vinlanders were Kat's grandfather's business partners. And Alessia, looking like a particularly plump and pretty cherub, was fast asleep.

Maria walked over, quietly, moving easily with the rolling of the ship.

"What's wrong?" The Vinlander woman nearly fell overboard.

The woman sniffed, hastily scuffed a sleeve across her eyes, and turned to Maria with a fake smile plastered over a face that still had tear-streaks running down the cheeks. "Nothing. I thank you," she said. "I am well. Truly."

She looked as if she was going to dissolve into tears in the very next moment.

Fine. You and I are the only two women on this ship, young lady. And we're going to the same place. I think we had better be friends. 
 

One thing she had noticed about the Vinlanders was that they seemed to be very direct, in a way that suited Maria's canaler sensibilities. So she decided to be direct, herself.

"No, you aren't well," She put an arm over the blonde's big shoulders. "I'm not blind," she continued, feeling a hundred years older than this poor young thing. "You can tell me what's wrong. I'm a friend of Kat's."

That earned her a look of puzzlement from the woman. "Katerina Montescue. I mean Katerina Valdosta."

"Ah. Ja." The girl sniffed again, and bit her lip—but a tear escaped anyway. "You were with the bride. In the beautiful crimson dress—you are the bride's friend, ja? Such a pretty girl, and such a fine husband. I did not recognize you in those clothes."

It was plain this meant a huge leap in status to the Vinlander, and thus in acceptability as a confidante. "You know them well, then?"

"Kat's my best friend," Maria said, and was a little surprised to realize that it was true. "And her husband is very, very good to my people in Venice." Any more would be too complicated to explain at one sitting. Maybe later.

"I know that your—" she searched her memory for the word that Erik used "—your clan is going to be trading partners with Kat's family, and I know that Kat wouldn't want to see you so unhappy if there was anything she could do to help. So, can I help?"

"I cannot see how," the girl replied mournfully.

"Well, why don't you just
tell
me about it?" Maria said, reasonably. "That can't do any harm, and it's better than crying here all alone over the turnip peelings."

The girl's face worked for a moment, as if she was trying to hold herself back, but it all came out in a rush, anyway. "I am so unhappy!" she wailed softly, in tones of such anguish that they imparted a sense of heartbreak to the banal words. "I will never see him again!"

For one, sharp-edged moment, Maria was tempted to join her in her tears, for the words called Benito's stricken face up in her own memory.
I will never see him again—
 

But she was older than this poor child—in experience, if not years—and she held onto her composure.

The moment passed. Maria patted the blond woman's arm awkwardly. What the hell did you say to a cry of pain like that? She settled for: "There, there . . ."

Even this provoked another flood of sobbing. "He was such a nice man. The nicest we have met here in all Europe. And so tall, too." How could something that sounded so silly also sound as if the girl had lost her first and only true love?

Tall? Well, that counted out Benito. "Didn't he, I mean, couldn't you . . . ?" Maria floundered. She really didn't know how to deal with this. "What happened? Why won't you see him again?"

"I did not want to go. But Bjarni said Mama would never allow it. I know Mama would not be happy. But his eyes are such a beautiful blue-gray. And his chin is so . . . so square-cut and manly." She sniffed; and then, obviously overcome by the vision she'd conjured up, began to cry again.

"I cannot sleep for thinking about him!" she sobbed.

From the tone of her voice, that was nothing less than the truth, and a great deal less than she felt.

"Why won't your mama approve?" Maria ventured, cautiously. "Is he married or something?"

The woman mournfully shook her head. "Erik is not married. But he is just a lowly bodyguard.
We
are the Thordarsons. We are one of the wealthiest families in Vinland. I cannot just marry a
Nithing
. Mama wants me to marry a man of position. That would help the family. But . . . but he was so wonderful."

She began to hiccup, and Maria patted her back. Good Lord. How long has she been crying like this? Hours? Days? 

She knew all too well what the girl felt like. She'd been there—before she learned just what a scum-bred bastard Caesare Aldanto was.

Cogs began to turn in Maria's head, though. And if this Erik was the Erik
she
knew, he certainly wasn't a scum-bred bastard. "Who was he guarding?" she asked.

The Vinlander girl shrugged, as if anyone other than Erik was of no importance at all, and pulled a handkerchief out of her sleeve. By the sodden look of it, she had been crying for hours. "I do not know. A guard is a guard."

Maria bit her lip again. "You don't know the rest of his name do you? Erik what?"

"Hakkonsen. It is a good family . . ."

Maria almost choked.
Just a bodyguard!
"Ah. Well. Have you heard of Prince Manfred?"

Svanhild nodded. "Of course. The heir to the Emperor. The son of the Duke of Brittany. He was at the wedding." Her tone turned bitter. "It is very good for business, these connections that Katerina brings to the Thordarsons, ja."

"Well, he's actually not
the
heir. That's his cousin, Conrad. Manfred's next in line after him. That makes him the third most important person in the Holy Roman Empire, which is the most powerful state in Europe. Maybe in the whole world."

"Ja," the girl said, indifferently. "And also the Duke of Brittany has great standing in the League of Armagh. He is a very important man. If only my Erik could have such friends—" She began to sob again.

Maria shook the woman's shoulders, just a little, although it was like trying to shake one of those Teutonic warriors that had come into Venice among the Knots. Mostly, she was trying not to laugh.

"Listen to me! Erik Hakkonsen is Prince Manfred of Brittany's personal bodyguard and master-at-arms. Only bodyguard is the wrong word to use to describe him. It's more like—"

She scrambled for some phrase that might describe what Erik did besides "keeper." Or maybe, "nursemaid."
And if Benito only had someone like that to knock some sense into him—
 

"He's a sort of teacher, or companion, and—well, he keeps Manfred from getting into too much trouble. Being a bodyguard is just a small part of it. Kat's friend tells me they are really much more like friends. What he certainly
isn't
is a—" Again she searched her memory for what the girl had said. "—a
Nithing.
I suspect if you asked Manfred, he would say that Erik is very important to him."

The sobs stopped, abruptly, and the blond woman stood up from the stern rail, a look of fierce delight on her face. "Really?" she breathed, hope replacing the despair in her sea-blue eyes so quickly that Maria's breath caught.

Maria nodded firmly. "Really."

The blonde hugged Maria. "Svanhild Thordardottar is forever in your debt!" she said thickly. "I must now go and turn this ship."

Maria didn't try to tell her that you can't alter the course of a great galley in the Venetian Western convoy, not short of being the
Bora
-wind in person. But, by the looks of it, Svanhild would have a damned good try. Bless her heart, the girl had a good steel spine to her, when she wasn't sobbing in heartbreak!

Well, the captain had survived Alessia's bellows. He'd survive Svanhild.

The next day Svanhild and her two brothers sought Maria out, where she, Alessia and Umberto sat in the lee of the mound of deck-cargo. There was a bright, steely look in Svanhild's eye. "The captain says you and your husband are going to Corfu," she said.

Maria nodded.

"Do you know how often the ships sail back to Venice from this port?" demanded Svanhild. "And can you recommend to us a good vessel and captain? Not like this stupid captain! We even offered to buy his ship. He said it was the state's ship, not his to sell. What kind of captain doesn't own his own ship? At least, as a partner."

Umberto stared at them, openmouthed. Then he shook his head.

Maria was just as dumbfounded as he was.
Buy
a Venetian great galley? She couldn't even begin to guess how much that would take, even if one were for sale!

"We don't know Corfu," Umberto stammered.

"We've never been there," explained Maria, sitting Alessia up and rubbing her back. The baby rewarded her with a milky belch.

Svanhild deflated a little. "Oh. We thought . . ."

But some of Francesca's gossip had come back to Maria, and she'd been saving it for the next time she saw the girl. "But Svanhild, you don't
want
to go back to Venice! Erik and Prince Manfred are coming along somewhere behind us. They're going to the Holy Land."

One of Svanhild's brothers looked speculative and asked: "This ship will also stop in Corfu?"