Fires of the Faithful (34 page)

“Unlike your Redentore God,” a soft voice said with malicious satisfaction, “the Lady has told us that She does not want human sacrifices. But in your case, we think She’ll make an exception.”

T
he hands tightened, and the knife was pulled back for an instant. I knew that it was being drawn back for the final blow, and made a desperate attempt to wrench free. Then something whistled past my ear, and I heard the knife clatter to the ground as someone yelped. “Scatter!” a voice hissed, and I was turned loose as my attackers fled into the night. I stared around me, too stunned to move. As the surge of fear faded, my back began to burn from the fabric rubbing against the welts.

Giovanni stepped out of the shadows. “Some Generale you are,” he said, and pulled his knife. He wiped it clean on a rag and then slipped it back into a sheath in his boot, tucking his trousers around it to conceal it.

“Did you follow me?” I said.

“It occurred to me that something like this might happen,” he said. “I thought it would be good to find out who wanted you dead at this point.”

“So you used me as bait.”

“Better to be bait than prey, isn’t it?” Giovanni said.
“Which was what you were turning
yourself
into.” He picked up the knife my attackers had dropped. “Let’s go before Teleso sends someone to arrest
us
for attempted murder or disturbing the peace.”

“So who were they?” I asked.

“I didn’t get a good look at most of them, but the one I wounded was a soldier named Rico.”

“I didn’t think they were in uniform.”

“They weren’t. Presumably, Teleso wants you assassinated rather than executed. Or maybe Rico and some friends decided to show some initiative.” We were about to cross the piazza, and Giovanni ducked into a shadow. “Here, you can keep this. Tuck it inside your boot.” He handed me the dropped knife.

“You’re cracked. I’ll cut myself.”

“You really don’t know the first thing about taking care of yourself, do you?” he said.

“Want me to break your arm to prove I do?”

“That won’t be necessary.” Giovanni tucked the knife into his own sleeve and wrapped a piece of cloth around his arm to bind it flat and secure. “Let’s go.”

I studied Giovanni as we crossed the piazza; he had a little bounce to his step. The smugness would have been obvious at twenty paces, and the self-satisfaction at forty. “So this proved …?” I asked.

“You need a bodyguard.”

“A
bodyguard
?” That really seemed ridiculous. “What, to follow me everywhere?”

“Yes,” Giovanni said. “I’ll talk to the men who’ve been training. Michel would make a good one, and the others can trade off with him. Also,” he added, and turned to give me a patronizing smile. “I’ll teach you some knife-fighting.”

“Knife-fighting.”

“You can have the knife the assassins dropped. We’ll
make a sheath for it that will fit into your boot and keep it from cutting you. I’ll start training you tomorrow.”

Just what I need
, I thought. We’d reached Rafi’s tent, and went inside.

Lucia and Rafi were horrified by the assassination attempt; Giovanni told them he’d headed home right after I had, and “fortunately” came upon the assassins just before they were going to kill me.

“Knife lessons are a good idea,” Lucia said. “This could happen again. And if Rico
was
motivated by faith, things could get even worse as we get closer to Dono alla Magia, at midsummer.”

I’d almost forgotten how soon the festival would be. “Did anyone ever try to assassinate Beneto and Jesca?”

“Yes,” Giovanni said. “Once.
But
—” he thumped his hand on the ground for emphasis, “Beneto and Jesca were never
alone
. Everywhere they went, they went together. That’s why you need a bodyguard.”

“Hmm,” Lucia said. “That’s a good idea.”

“Lucia.” I turned to her. “There was something my attackers said that I was wondering about. They said that the Lady didn’t want human sacrifices,
unlike
the Redentore God. What were they talking about?”

Lucia flushed angrily. “That’s just libel,” she said. “We say that through blood the land will be redeemed, but we mean
sacramental
blood, the wine that becomes the blood of Gèsu in the Mass.”

“Ah,” I said, and waited.

After a moment she continued. “There are those,” she admitted, “that would like to take that passage of scripture more literally.”

“Whose blood would they like to shed?”

“Well, Teleso’s, for starters. And the Circle’s. And their enemies, and the enemies of Gèsu …”

“That seems like it could become a rather large group.”

“Well—yes. It could. But they’re
wrong
, anyway, and distorting scripture.” Lucia shook her head. “The only sacrifice that was needed is complete.”

This reminded me of something. “Hey, Lucia,” I said. “I’ve been meaning to tell you about this. The night I was in the dungeon—well, watch.” I closed my eyes for a minute to concentrate, cupped my hand, and summoned a tiny witchlight.

The whole tent fell silent. Giovanni reached out to hold his hand over it to test for heat, as if he thought I’d somehow secreted a candle in my hand. “That’s impossible,” he said, after confirming that it was witchlight.

I closed my hand over it and let it go out. “Guess not,” I said. “Not anymore.”

“How?” Lucia breathed.

“When I defused the riot,” I said, “I poured the energy down into the ground. Maybe you’re right, Lucia—Old Way rituals really
can
redeem the earth.”

“Or blood,” Giovanni said. Lucia turned to stare at him sharply, and he tilted his head to look at her. “Beneto and Jesca’s blood.”

“That’s not right,” Lucia said. “It couldn’t have been their deaths.”

“Well, in a way, it might have been,” Rafi said. “The anger from their deaths fueled the dance as lamp oil fuels fire.”

“Either way, it doesn’t matter,” I said. “Not right now. Right now, what we need is to get out of Ravenna. But later—maybe the land can be restored.”

Giovanni was cupping his hand and staring at it, frustrated. “I can’t get a light.”

“It takes a lot of effort,” I said. “It’s probably just as well if you don’t. We don’t want to drain the earth again.”

“Besides,” Lucia said, batting his hand aside. “It’s a sin to use magery.”

“What?” I said. I hadn’t heard this before.

“It’s a sin,” she said.

“Because of the drain on the land?” I asked.

“No,” she said. “Because the Book of the Lady says that magery was a gift from the Lady. And since there is only one true God, we know it can’t be right.”

“That makes no sense, Lucia,” I said. “The Book of the Lady also says that slavery is wrong. Does that mean slavery is right?”

“No, of course not.” Lucia gave me a look of earnest frustration. “There are plenty of reasons that slavery is wrong. But magery came only from Gaius, the Lady’s First Prophet—how can it be right?”

“What does it matter where it came from? I can make witchlight whether I believe in the Lady or not.”

“It
matters
, Eliana,” Lucia said.

I noticed from the corner of my eye that Giovanni was watching our conversation with avid interest; his eyes flicked back and forth between me and Lucia, a slight smirk playing on his lips. I wondered suddenly if he’d been through this same argument.

“I never heard this from my grandmother,” I said, “and she used to bless herself like a Redentore. I never heard this from Bella or Giorgi, at the conservatory.”

Rafi cleared his throat. “Maybe it would be easiest just to think about the harm magery brings to the land. It’s wrong for that reason—can you accept that?”

I nodded, a little reluctantly.

“It is wrong to go against God’s will,” Rafi said, “for no other reason than it is wrong to stand against God. But—” he caught my wrist and gave me a look even more
earnest than Lucia’s. “But often to go against God’s word will
also
cause harm to others—and so it is wrong
twice
.”

“Exactly,” Lucia said.

“So magery is wrong because it goes against God, and also because it hurts the land.” Rafi took a breath to continue the explanation, then decided against it. “Don’t worry about why it goes against God, Eliana. It’s enough for now to know that it hurts the land.”

I nodded again, still uncertain. I wasn’t sure I liked where this line of reasoning was taking us. “So what else is against God’s will?”

Rafi and Lucia both laughed. “Get some sleep, Eliana,” Rafi said. “I’m too tired for deep theology tonight. We can continue this in the morning, can’t we?”

“I guess,” I said. I glanced at Giovanni; he looked a little disappointed that the argument was ending.

As we made our beds and lay down, Giovanni brushed my sleeve briefly and caught my eye; in the last of the lamplight before Rafi put out the light, Giovanni gave me a sardonic smile. “It really isn’t any stupider than some of the rules the Lady made,” he said. “Those just seem less stupid because you grew up with them.”

“Giovanni!” Lucia said. Her voice was shocked.

“Sorry,” he said. “Good night.”

•  •  •

“This is the hilt,” Giovanni said. “This is the blade.” He had carved two rough knives out of a piece of wood. We stood in the little training ground he’d been using to train Michel and the others—two mostly undamaged walls and a canvas sheet pulled across the gap. Teleso probably had his soldiers keeping a watch on it, but it was the closest thing to privacy we were going to get in Ravenna. “For
obvious reasons, I don’t want you waving a real knife at me while we’re practicing.” He handed me the knife.

He was going to enjoy this, I could already tell. “Do we assume that I get attacked with my knife already in my hand?”

“No,” he said, and took the wooden knife back. “We’re going to start with footwork.”

“With what?”

Giovanni had me clasp my hands behind my back, then reconsidered when I winced and had me put my hands on my hips instead. “The most important thing in knife fighting isn’t the knife, it’s how you move your body.”

“How about getting away from someone who grabs you?” I asked.

“We’ll get to that.” He had me follow him as he bounced oddly around on his feet, lunging forward, then back.

“What’s the point of this?” I asked after about a half an hour. “This is useless.”

“It’s only useless because
you
don’t know what you’re doing,” Giovanni said.

“Isn’t that what you’re supposed to be teaching me?” I asked. The morning was already growing hot; my face was damp, and my hair was sticking to my neck.

Giovanni turned around to face me. Far from snarling at me, he was half smiling; he really was enjoying seeing me run around in circles after him. “If you needed to teach me to play a violin, would you hand me your violin and a sheaf of sheet music?”

“No, of course not,” I said. “You can’t even read music.”

“Actually, I can,” he said. “I was taught at the university. But that’s beside the point. You’d teach me how to stand correctly, wouldn’t you? How to hold the violin and bow? You’d teach me to move the bow on the strings to make a noise that didn’t sound like a dying cat, right?”

I nodded.

“Well, I’m teaching you how to move with a knife. Trust me.”

He had me prancing in circles for another hour, then called a rest. “You’re not bad,” he said magnanimously.

“Thank you,” I said, clenching my teeth.

“We’d better rest for a while; Rafi will have my head if I work you too hard. He’s afraid you’ll get sick from your injuries.”

“I won’t,” I said.

Giovanni sat down on part of the fallen wall, tipping his head up to look at me. “You sound pretty sure of that,” he said with a derisive half-smirk. “I’d still better not take any chances. Besides, you’re out of breath. Have a seat.” He gestured toward another fallen stone. I sat down. I
was
out of breath, and hot and thirsty besides. Giovanni had brought along a wineskin to his training ground, and he tossed it to me. “Cooled tea,” he said. “It’s what you drink when you’re sparring at the university. Wine when you’re sparring will just give you a headache.”

I took a swig.

“I suppose if I’m training you I ought to tell you some principles, as well,” he said. “The code of honor, and all that. You’re a peasant, after all; I couldn’t really expect you to know.”

I looked at him over the wineskin and waited.

“Never strike from behind,” he said. “Or rather, never strike without warning. It’s dishonorable.”

“So, waiting behind a wall for someone, and then jumping out and killing them, that’s bad?”

“Exactly,” he said.

“Why should I follow this rule if my enemies aren’t going to?”

“You’re better than they are,” he said.

“What?” I said. “I’ve barely started to learn how to use a knife, and I’m up against trained soldiers. What do you mean I’m
better
than they are?”

“I mean morally better.”

“A lot of good it’s going to do me to be moral, honorable, and dead,” I said. “Striking from behind without warning sounds like a good way to keep myself alive.”

Giovanni was glaring at me. This really was my week; gain alliances with every leader in Ravenna, and then get every one of them angry at me over some article of faith. “Look,” I said. “What if I’m leading the uprising to break out of Ravenna, and I’ve got a crossbow, and I come upon somebody who’s got his back to me? What am I supposed to do then?”

“Warn him,” Giovanni said. “Then fire.”

“
Warn
him?” I said. “I should say, ‘Hey you, I’m going to shoot you now’?”

Giovanni rolled his eyes. “It’s more traditional to yell an insult, or order him to surrender.”

“What if it’s Teleso?”

“Wouldn’t you want Teleso to
know
that it was
you
killing him?” Giovanni asked.