The Descent (23 page)

“You will let me pass. The doge has sent me,” he roared at the guards. He knew what he was doing was ill advised; he’d already gotten in enough trouble, and by declaring himself so boldly to the guards, the doge would certainly hear of it. But Adair could see no other way to gain entry to Cosimo’s house, and every moment was precious. “That’s right.” Adair turned and shouted at the mage’s servants, pretending to gloat. “It was all a trap set by the doge, and I was part of it.
It was I who led them to your master. It is incumbent upon the doge, the leader of this city, to root out evil and eliminate it from our midst. Your master is evil—truly an evil man, a priest of Satan, and so I will testify at his trial.” He turned back to the guards and pushed the lances aside. “Now, out of my way. I tell you, I have been sent here by the doge himself and he will not tolerate your interference.”

His theatrics worked and they let him pass. Inside, every torch and sconce in Cosimo’s palazzo was lit and burning brightly. He heard the echoes of men’s voices coming down the hall from the study, and his heart sank. The inquisitors were here. As he approached the doorway, he saw two men standing before the shelves, thumbing through books. The floor was covered with discarded tomes and scattered sheets of paper. The men were dressed in the black robes of the court.
Of course
. Adair realized then that soldiers had not been sent to secure the documents because soldiers wouldn’t be able to read. These were two officials and they had already made two high piles of books on the floor, ostensibly to be taken away for further review.

He looked at the books thrown to the floor, and the few still clinging to the shelves like birds too frightened to come down from the trees. It seemed an unconscionable waste for all these books to be destroyed, a calamity on par—in Adair’s mind—with the destruction of the library of ancient Alexandria. He felt that he had to do something, salvage whatever he could. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of the peacock-blue spine of the book he’d surrendered to Cosimo. A wave of sorrow passed through him for having to lose it a second time. Surely there had to be a way to save it.

He pulled back into the shadows before the two officials could see him, and tiptoed to the kitchen. The kitchen fire blazed untended, no doubt deserted by the servants when the soldiers burst into the palazzo. There was a stack of firewood next to the hearth and a box of kindling. Platters of roasted meat stood on the table, left pooling in fat. The entire room seemed smoky and greasy and combustible, an accident waiting to happen.

It would be an extreme measure, to burn the house down. But when the officials ran outside to escape the flames and smoke, Adair thought he might have time to rescue a few of the volumes. Was it better to set fire to the house than to let the books fall into the church’s possession? He wasn’t sure. The church might burn them, too—but there was a chance they might be spared for further study. As long as the books were intact, there was a chance they might eventually find their way back to a practitioner, someone who would benefit from their knowledge. If they burned, they were just ash.

The thought that the church would decide the books’ fate was too much for Adair to stand. To have these precious books rounded up like children and held hostage in trunks in a moldy basement at the duomo, rotting away day by day until they were nothing but mildewed pages stuck together, illegible . . . then thrown into the fires of the auto-da-fé, fuel to burn some poor luckless devil to death. No, he wouldn’t let that happen. He took some kindling and dipped it in goose fat, then held it to the flame. The tender wood caught quickly. From there it was a simple thing to creep down the hall and hold the flame to the hem of a dusty drapery. . . .

The house filled with smoke in minutes as flames leapt
from wall to wall. Cries of alarm sounded from Cosimo’s study and then the two officials ran out, calling for the guards to fetch water from the well. As he ducked into the study, Adair knew he had mere minutes to act—and what’s more, the fire had leapt to the shelves quickly, seeming to know there were thousands of dry pages to feast on. Smoke had already engulfed the room and Adair could barely see his hand in front of his face.

Which books should he save? For a moment, he was paralyzed with indecision. It wasn’t as though he had Cosimo’s encyclopedic knowledge of the collection; he’d be hard-pressed to say which was the most valuable. He wanted to save them all but knowing that he couldn’t, his hand went to the one book that his eye always sought first: the one with the peacock-blue cover. Holding his hand over his mouth against the smoke, his eyes tearing, he grabbed the books on either side, too, and tucked all of them under his arm. He kicked open the shutters on the nearest window and—since he didn’t dare use the front entrance for fear of running into the soldiers’ bucket brigade—he hurled through the open window into the alley, landing in a puddle of filth. He leapt to his feet and ran without looking back, knowing that his mentor’s priceless collection was going up in flames, and by his hand.

Adair ended up hiding two books in a nearby square: all three made for too conspicuous a bundle to carry into the doge’s palazzo. And as little as he wanted to, he realized that he had to return to Zeno’s house. He would’ve tried his luck living on the street, selling his finer pieces of clothing to raise money to
live on—at least he would be free—but he couldn’t bear the thought of giving up all those recipes he’d copied out by hand and hidden in his bedchamber. He decided to take his chances weathering the doge’s wrath. If Cosimo had been arrested for being a magician, it seemed to Adair that he had no chance of escaping the same fate. If Cosimo was going to burn, Adair stood a good chance of burning, too.

With the blue book tucked securely in a panel of his cloak, Adair cautiously approached the formidable palazzo. It was uncharacteristically brightly lit for the hour, a sure sign that something was taking place inside. Once he entered, he saw that the halls were alive with chatter and he felt as though everyone stopped to stare at him as he rushed by. He’d hoped to get to his room undetected and gather his belongings, make up a packet, and be ready for escape as early as that evening. But he had gotten ten paces into the house when one of the court officials saw him and called for the nearest guard to detain him—on the doge’s orders.

He was brought to the anteroom outside the grand chamber. A flock of officials were clustered around the huge table, all in their long black robes. Old Zeno stood on the far side, his face as violent as Adair had ever seen it, frightening to behold. He could see why this man had come out on top of all the scheming and scrapping and battling among Venetian nobles and been made the doge, the ruler of the city. Bishop Rossi crouched at Zeno’s side.

Adair dropped his cloak—which he had taken off and wrapped around the book to soften its edges into anonymity—and set his package onto a chair as he approached his guardian. He could see fury building in the old man’s eyes as
he directed his words at the gathered crowd. “Leave us. I wish to speak to my ward alone. No, you stay, Rossi.” Zeno placed a hand on the bishop’s arm as he moved to join the others. The clerks gave Adair baleful looks as they shuffled out, as though they knew what fate was in store for him. He threw back his shoulders and held his head high: he would show them how a Magyar met his end.

Zeno waited until the heavy door had been closed before he began thundering at him. “You! You are the very devil! Look at the mess you have brought to my doorstep!”

Adair opened his mouth to defend himself, and then realized Zeno wasn’t looking for an explanation.

“Your father warned me that you had an unhealthy interest in the occult. But he said those days were behind you and that you had given it all up to study medicine. If he had been up front with me about your . . . your
obsession,
I never would have agreed to take you in.” The Venetian almost spat the words at Adair. “You bring this occultist practically to my door. What am I to do? I am the doge, I cannot ignore your indiscretions. I cannot allow heretics to flourish inside our city walls! My enemies would jump upon such weakness and use it to topple me. Do you understand now, boy, what a foolish, dangerous thing you have done?”

“Where is Cosimo?” Adair demanded, finally finding his tongue.

Zeno looked affronted. “In the dungeon, of course, where he should be.”

“He is a knight of Naples, you know. You will risk war with Naples if you do anything to him,” Adair cautioned.

Zeno dismissed the idea with a wave of his hand. “He
hasn’t been a knight of Naples for a very long time. I know the prince of Naples and the prince won’t care what happens to a wizard.”

“What will you do to him?”

“He’ll be tried and burned at the stake, of course.”

Adair took a step toward the table. It was scattered with papers, and he thought he recognized a few from Cosimo’s study. “Let Cosimo go and I’ll do as you ask. I’ll go to Scolari’s lectures, I’ll be his best student.”

Zeno stepped around the table until he stood in front of Adair, fixing him with a steely stare, no longer the comical little man in his nightcap. “Oh, you will do that anyway, if you wish to live. That was the bargain you struck with your father. You had your chance. I am not the only one whose patience you have exhausted. Believe me, if I sent word back to your father that you had met with an untimely—but not unexpected—end, he would understand. And perhaps be a little relieved, too. He always knew you were headed for trouble.

“This mess you have made is salvageable, however. That lie you told my guards at the heretic’s house—they reported it back to me, of course. And that’s the story we will tell, that you agreed to be my spy and ferret out the Satanist living in our midst; that will be our explanation as to why you have been in the company of the heretic. Luckily, Moretti’s servants are already spreading that story all over the city. Venetians do love a good piece of gossip,” he said in an aside to the bishop.

“You can’t do this to me,” Adair said, in despair.

Zeno observed him coldly. “I can and I shall. It’s about time you grew up, my boy. Give up and give in. We all do. You’re not a child anymore; it’s time to put away your childish
dreams. Take your place in society, as your family wishes. Or I will crush you, and end your family’s embarrassment.”

“And what can I offer you in exchange for Cosimo’s life?”

“There is nothing you can do for Cosimo. He must be sacrificed.”

The bishop leaned over the table toward Zeno, raising a finger for the doge’s attention. “Wait, your grace. There is one thing he might do. . . . I could speak to the inquisitors on Moretti’s behalf if you”—he narrowed his eyes on Adair—“agree to marry Elena.”

Adair’s heart squeezed as though a hand closed over it. “I beg you not to ask this of me. She’ll not find happiness with me. You are sentencing us both to a lifetime of misery.”

Rossi was unmoved. “You heard the doge—it’s time you grew up and took your medicine like everyone else. Do you think that every married couple lives in bliss? That only the well suited are allowed to wed? You make the best of it, that’s what you do,” Rossi said sagely as though he, an unmarried member of the clergy, had any experience in the matter.

Zeno turned away from Adair, heading back to the table. “The matter is settled. You will be engaged to the bishop’s goddaughter. You will be revealed as one of my agents and responsible for the arrest of the heretic Moretti.”

“You will spare Moretti?” Adair asked hopefully.

“I will consider it,” Zeno answered through gritted teeth.

It was the best he could hope for under the circumstances, with the arrest still fresh. Adair backed out of the room, retrieving his cloak at the door before shoving his way through the clerks waiting on the outside, to retreat to his chamber.

He hid the book and his packet of spells with the utmost
care, moving them to another room that he could access easily should he need to make a quick getaway. He didn’t think any corner of his room would be safe from search now. The next few days were spent attending Scolari’s lectures, where Adair’s mind wandered incessantly. How could he pay attention as the old physician droned on when Cosimo was languishing in prison? It was Adair’s fault, and what’s more, there seemed to be nothing he could do about it. He wondered, however, why the old Neapolitan couldn’t use magic to free himself. There must’ve been something in one of those dusty old books that would be helpful in this situation. Surely the old man knew a vanishing spell, or a way to charm the guard into unlocking the manacles. Or perhaps he could telepathically influence the inquisitors to find him innocent. There was so much he didn’t understand about magic and its reach.

He had wanted to go see Cosimo right away but knew he had to bide his time or risk pushing Zeno over the edge. He also feared he might arrive too late, turning up at the dungeon one day to find that the inquisitors’ tortures had killed him. Too, Cosimo might’ve heard of the false rumor they’d spread about Adair being a spy and would want nothing to do with him. It pained Adair to think that Cosimo might die thinking Adair had betrayed him.