City of Secrets (10 page)

‘Well, that's good of him, but I think I know that. They've already tried to get me expelled from here.'

‘No, this is more. He says “Beware the heir”, but he didn't say what that means.'

Matt was relieved to wake up in his own bed on Sunday. Not only would he have both Sunday and Monday off in Talia from the Scriptorium – Monday was the Feast of the Archangel Raphael apparently – but in his own world he had a whole week of half-term to look forward to. He yawned and stretched luxuriously and thought about going back to bed after a late breakfast. He hadn't set either of his alarms and it was already ten o'clock.

He wandered down to the kitchen in his bare feet and saw that his parents and Harry had finished their breakfast long ago. Their places had been tidied away and the dishwasher was stacked. He had no idea where they all were. He poured himself orange juice and a large bowl of cornflakes and switched on the kitchen TV.

He didn't want to think about printing, books, magic, laws and most of all he didn't want to think about stravagating. But his peace was soon disrupted. The doorbell rang and feet thumped down the staircase. He heard Harry's voice and soon his brother's tousled head poked round the kitchen door.

‘Oh, you're up,' he said. ‘There's people to see you.'

Matt groaned softly. ‘Where are Mum and Dad?' he asked, wrapping his dressing gown tighter round him.

‘Sainsbury's,' said Harry and disappeared.

Matt found Georgia and Nick standing sheepishly in the hall and waved them into the kitchen.

‘I've only just woken up,' he complained. ‘And I can't think till I've had some coffee. Do you want some?'

Georgia was sympathetic. ‘You must be exhausted,' she said. ‘I remember what it was like. Shall I make it?'

She busied herself with filter papers and cups while Matt finished his cereal. He looked longingly at the toaster but didn't really want to make any breakfast for the others.

‘So,' said Georgia. ‘How's it been going?'

‘OK,' said Matt. ‘I've met this new character.'

He hadn't really liked Ludo but he felt a sudden urge to know more about something or someone in Talia than these two did.

‘He's a what-d'you-call-it . . . Manoush.'

‘Ah,' said Georgia, as if she already knew about him. ‘Was it Aurelio, the blind one?'

‘No,' said Matt. ‘It was a new one, one Luciano didn't know.'

At the mention of Luciano, he saw Nick's eyes swivel to Georgia with a look he couldn't interpret. But she had her back to them, filling the coffee machine with water and didn't notice.

‘He's called Ludo something but he mentioned Aurelio,' said Matt.

‘They're wonderful, the Manoush, aren't they, Nick?' said Georgia, looking nostalgic. ‘So dark and mysterious.'

‘This one wasn't dark,' said Matt. ‘He was practically ginger.'

‘Then he can't have been Manoush,' said Nick. It was the first remark he'd made since arriving and Matt suddenly felt really hacked off about the way these two treated him.

‘Look,' he said. ‘
I'm
the one who met him and your precious Luciano TOLD me he was. And HE told me all about them. They seem to be some sort of Travellers or Gypsies. Ludo had to rush off and warn his mates about the laws against magic. Luciano seemed to think they'd get into trouble for worshipping the goddess or something.'

Nick had stood up, his fists clenched, but when Matt said that the Manoush were in danger, he slumped back in his chair. When he had been Falco, he had loved the Zinti, as most Talians called them, and their music had been what led him to Luciano, Georgia and his new life in this world. Now he just felt helpless and frustrated that, if they were in danger, there was nothing he could do to save them.

‘Do you want me to kill him?' asked Filippo matter-of-factly.

It did Fabrizio good to hear him offer so willingly but he replied, ‘No. At least, not straight away. If my plan works, his blood won't be on di Chimici hands. What I want is for you to find out what you can about the Stravaganti and what it is that they can do. It might even mean befriending him.'

Filippo frowned. He would rather use force than subterfuge; it seemed more manly. But Fabrizio was his friend as well as his relation and, since Niccolò's death, the head of the family.

‘If that is what you wish, cousin,' he said.

‘I do. And if you can gain his confidence and trick him into performing any of their ungodly acts in front of you, then we can just hand him over to the Padavian authorities. Antonio might not have been willing to yield him to me but, if he's proved to have broken the new laws, he'll have to have him executed.'

Chapter 10

The People of the Goddess

The Manoush had gone underground. As soon as Ludo had brought them Luciano's news, the group had dispersed over the city, pulling long dark cloaks from their bags to cover their bright clothes and putting away their musical instruments. They pulled the ribbons out of their hair as they walked and wound it into tight buns or neat pony-tails. The transformation was almost magical in itself.

Most Manoush had friends in cities among the ‘permanenti', as they called people who were not wanderers like themselves. It was not long before Ludo was knocking at the door of Messer Antonio's house near the main square. Fortunately for him, Antonio was not at home. It was Giunta, the Governor's wife, who was friend to the Manoush, and she opened the door herself.

In the past she would have welcomed him openly, entertaining as many of his friends as she could fit round her table. But since her husband's new laws – much as she disapproved of them – Giunta could not afford to be seen socialising with worshippers of the goddess.

As soon as she saw Ludo's unaccustomed sober clothes and his red-brown hair tied neatly back with a black ribbon, she realised he must know of the new danger.

‘Come in, come in,' she welcomed him hastily. ‘Are you on your own?'

‘Just me this time,' he said with a rueful smile. ‘We thought it would be easier to ask shelter with friends singly.'

Of course, both he and Giunta knew that shelter was the last thing he wanted. The Manoush always spent their nights under the stars, spreading their bedrolls in courtyards or fields, in most weathers, taking cover under trees or overhanging walls only in the worst of storms.

But in this new situation they would welcome hospitality and a place to hide if the authorities came after them. To do it in the house of the man who had published the very laws he would be breaking was typical of Ludo.

‘Can you help me?' he asked Giunta. ‘It will be dangerous.'

Her only answer was a contemptuous snort, which he rightly took to mean that her husband's laws were no concern of hers. She led him to a part of the house which was as much her domain as the study was Antonio's.

Beyond the kitchen and scullery, Giunta had a laundry room, which was the latest in sixteenth-century technology. A wood fire was always laid in readiness under a copper boiler and cupboards held clean linen for the household. Bunches of dried lavender hung from the low rafters and Ludo had to duck to avoid them. Outside was a little yard with a private well in the middle. The yard was strung with washing lines and held a wood-store, a chopping block and axe and a pile of logs.

Ludo's eyes lit up when he saw the wood.

‘I could chop logs for you, Signora Giunta,' he said, taking off his dark cloak and hanging it over a line.

Giunta nodded. She pointed to a small wooden door that opened out of the yard into an alley.

‘Come and go by this way,' she said. ‘I will give you a key. You can sleep out here and take your meals in the laundry. You'll be quite safe. Only my laundry maid and myself come here and she won't give you away. She follows the Lady.' She paused and looked him shrewdly up and down. ‘Only no trifling with her affections – Maria is a useful girl and I don't want to lose her.'

Ludo opened his eyes wide and pointed at his heart as if to say ‘Would I?', but Giunta was not convinced. So good-looking a man, who never stayed long in one place, was bound to acquire a reputation and he was not as high-minded as his cousin Aurelio.

He took her hand and brushed it with his lips. ‘You know you are the only woman for me, Signora,' he said.

*

The youngest stable boy in the Ducal Palace of Bellezza had the job of exercising Arianna's African spotted cats. His name was Mariotto and he loved the cats as if they were his own. Each day they had leather leashes fixed to their silver collars and walked sedately with him across the Piazzetta, to the amazement of all the citizens and the few tourists who were up early enough to see them.

Once away from the populous centre of the city and out in some of the swampy land that had not been built on, he let them run loose and stretch their long muscular legs for as long as they liked. There was little to hunt in the marshes, except a few waterfowl, and after about an hour, they would come back to him sniffing the canvas sack he had brought with him.

Then they would lie at his feet, gnawing on the hares or small wild pigs he had bought from a hunter, while Mariotto sat on a tussock of grass eating bread and cheese and feeling utterly content with his life.

After they had all slept in the sun for a bit, he would put their leashes back on and begin the slow walk home. Apart from another short walk in the evenings, with just a bone or two to gnaw on, this was their main exercise of the day.

Imagine his surprise when early one morning the masked Duchessa herself turned up at the stables at dawn, just as he was getting the cats ready. They heard her first and turned their elegant heads towards the sound.

‘Florio, Lauro,' she cooed and they loped over to her, burying their muzzles in her hands. She had brought them tidbits of food from her own table.

‘You shouldn't feed them till they've had their run,' said Mariotto disapprovingly. He also disapproved of their names since ‘Florio' was clearly a female, but the Duchessa had named them after a couple of male saints; he had no idea why.

Arianna was amused. She had become accustomed to the deference of servants over the two years since she had become Duchessa and it was refreshing to find one – even a rather small and grubby one – who was not overawed by her.

‘You are quite right, Mariotto,' she said. ‘We don't want them to get fat and lazy, do we? I'll help you make them run, though'

‘You, milady?' he said dubiously.

‘I am coming with you this morning.'

‘But you can't,' he said bluntly.

‘Can't, Mariotto?' said Arianna. ‘Am I not your mistress and the ruler of your city? Are you sure “can't” is the word you are looking for?'

‘But I have no weapons, milady,' he said, truly aghast at the thought of having her with him. ‘How could I guard your safety?'

‘I think two African hunting cats are weapons enough, don't you? No one would dare attack me while with them, Florio and Lauro would tear them apart.'

She threw on the plain cloak she had brought with her and looked at him expectantly.

Mariotto put the leashes on the cats, muttering under his breath.

The first day of half-term began with an early driving lesson for Matt. He was hopeful of passing his test first time and wanted to get in as many lessons and as much practice as he could. As his father was an opera singer it meant Andy was around till mid-afternoon. He got back every night after singing at the ENO, ate a very late supper and never got up early. So the second half of the morning was always a good time to get him to be an accompanying driver.

On this Monday after the driving lesson, pleased to know that he wouldn't have to spend all night working in the Scriptorium, Matt drove cautiously round the streets of Islington in the family car, while Andy complained about the soprano who was singing in the current production of
The Magic Flute
.

‘Grade A bitch,' he said. ‘Only told the conductor the chorus was too loud – took that corner a bit wide, Matt – too loud, I ask you! She's the Queen of the flipping Night, with a voice that'd break glass at fifty paces and suddenly
we're
too loud! I'm sure she was looking at me, too.'

‘Well,' said Matt, ‘you
do
have a loud voice.'

‘Of course I do,' said Andy. ‘I'm a flaming opera singer, aren't I? Not a fliggering horse-whisperer – watch your speed.'

‘How do you think I'm doing?' asked Matt.

‘What? Oh, fine, lad. You're doing really well. Hello, isn't that Ayesha? I DIDN'T SAY EMERGENCY STOP, did I?'

But Matt had seen her too and she was with Jago. They weren't holding hands or anything but they were walking side by side in earnest conversation. A murderous rage welled up inside him and he wanted to mount the pavement and mow his rival down.

Andy, blissfully unaware, was winding down the passenger window and waving. ‘Hey, Yesh, how are you doing?'

Ayesha looked up and saw them. Why did she look so embarrassed? Jago just looked faintly bored and amused the way he always did; it made Matt want to smash his supercilious face in.

Matt started the engine and revved, making the car leap forward.

‘Mirror, signal, manoeuvre, Matt,' said Andy, clutching the strap of his seat belt.

Matt watched the figures of his girlfriend and his enemy recede into the distance.

Luciano wondered what on earth Ludo had meant by Aurelio's warning, ‘Beware the heir.' The obvious heir was Fabrizio, who had become Grand Duke after Niccolò. But then he wasn't the heir any more and, besides, Luciano was well aware he had to be careful of Fabrizio.

He thought of other di Chimici who might be described as heirs, but he didn't have much connection with any of them except Gaetano, who was now heir to the Principality of Remora. It should have been Carlo who would have inherited that most important city when their uncle the Pope died, but Carlo had been killed on his wedding day and Gaetano was next in line. Gaetano was Luciano's friend and he trusted him completely; he had no reason to doubt him.

The only other real ‘heir' Luciano could think of was Filippo, Francesca's older brother. But what could Filippo di Chimici have to do with him?

He gave it up as a bad job and went to look for Cesare. What he needed was a good ride.

He found his Remoran friend already in the stables of his lodging house and pleased to see him.

‘You heard about the Manoush?' Luciano asked, as soon as Cesare had saddled up and they had gone out through a gate in the city's northern wall.

‘I heard they were here one minute and gone the next,' said Cesare.

‘I think they're still here,' said Luciano. ‘They're just keeping out of the way because of the new laws.'

‘Right, yes, I see,' said Cesare. ‘Goddess-worship.'

Luciano thought of something. ‘You must have the new laws in Remora?'