States of Grace (19 page)

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Authors: Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

Tags: #Fantasy, #Fantasy Fiction, #Fiction, #General, #Historical, #Horror, #Occult & Supernatural, #Historical Fiction, #Vampires, #Saint-Germain, #Inquisition, #Women Musicians - Crimes Against

BOOK: States of Grace
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May the Carnival bring you joy and the deliverance of Easter fill you with the love of Christ, for the glory of our faith.
With my pledge to continue to inform you,
In singular dedication to you, the Savii agli Ordini, the Minor
Consiglio, the Maggior Consiglio, and the Repubblica
Veneziana,
Basilio Cuor
 
By his own hand in Amsterdam, the 26
th
day of March, 1531
 
With a laugh that sounded like an unrosined bow dragged over old strings, Leoncio Sen reached out audaciously to take hold of Pier-Ariana. “Your fidelity is misplaced, ninotta, believe me. Your Conte has left you, and no one will think the less of you for taking anoth—”
“How dare you!” She rounded on him, her eyes shining with fury.
Leoncio offered his best placating smile. “I mean you no disrespect, ninotta, only the assurance that you need not suffer if you would prefer not—”
Pier-Ariana shrieked to shut out the words she dreaded might be true, and reached for a small vase of red-and-gold glass, preparing to throw it at her most unwelcome visitor. “You have said as much as I have any desire to hear: now I want you out! Leave!”
“I am not ready to go,” he said smoothly, confidently. “We have much to discuss, you and I.”
“
Go!
Or I will summon help.”
“Which of your two remaining servants do you expect will escort me?” Leoncio taunted, reveling in his power over her. “The old woman or the—”
The vase shattered on the wall a handsbreadth from his head, and Pier-Ariana, her face distorted in fury, rushed toward the door, shouting, “Lilio! Lilio!
Lilio!
And bring a cleaver when you come!” She could not keep from weeping; she felt her face blotch with red and she wanted more than ever to get this velvet-clad interloper out of her house. “Out of my house!” she shrieked, trembling with the force of her rage.
“Out!”
Leoncio took a step away from her. “You’re overwrought. Small wonder, to be treated so shabbily. If di Santo-Germano were a Veneziano, you might have some recourse against him. As it is, you are entirely dependent upon his provisions for you, and that has not been … all you expected, has it? Only your ’tirewoman and your cook are left, and I understand they are owed money. They won’t be able to stay with you forever, no matter how much they may wish to. With the Conte away, how can you keep this house? You must soon be out on—”
“I have a deed of occupancy; the only thing I cannot do is sell this house—otherwise it is mine; I will manage my affairs as seems wisest,” she was goaded into saying as she tried to wipe the tears off her face with her inner sleeves. “The deed is fixed; it was ratified for fifty years before di Santo-Germano left.” She could see the craftiness in Leoncio’s eyes and regretted having said so much.
“How very generous of him, to give you the gift but then not provide the means to keep it.” His sneer made his features ugly; he forced himself to offer a more concerned look. “Still, it may not be his fault: he may have come to some misfortune. We don’t know what the disaster in Lisbon may have done to his holdings there. He may have lost ships and warehouses, as has happened to many another. He may have forfeited contracts along with his losses.”
“He may,” she said, somewhat uncertainly, tears still shining on her face.
“And you are showing him respect by not abandoning him, which is to your credit.” Leoncio nodded. “I have spoken with his business agent—Gennaro Emerenzio; you must know him?—and he has said that the Conte’s accounts are all seriously depleted.”
“I don’t believe him!” Pier-Ariana burst out.
Leoncio regarded her slyly. “Because you have better information? Have you a secret that will provide for you?”
“Even if I had such a secret, I wouldn’t need it.” She tossed her head. “Because I know that di Santo-Germano has many business interests, and bad as the Lisbon tragedy was, his losses there did not represent the whole of his wealth.”
“He boasted and you believed him,” said Leoncio, shaking his head.
Pier-Ariana closed her eyes, nauseated by the spurious kindness Leoncio conveyed with his mendacious interest. “Signor’ Sen, I have nothing more to tell you; please leave my house,” she said in as calm a voice as she could summon.
“If you insist, I will,” he said. “But I ask you to keep my offer in mind: I would gladly take on your maintenance rather than see you on the street or in debtors’ prison, which must happen if the Conte does not provide relief for you soon.”
“It will not come to that,” she said, marshaling her dignity.
“Madama?” Lilio said from the door. He held his cleaver in his hand, but not raised to strike. “You called me?”
“Yes, Lilio, I did. Signor’ Sen is just leaving. If you would be good enough to escort him out?”
“Certainly, if that is your wish,” said the cook, his manner less confident than his words.
“It is,” she said, moving aside so Leoncio could depart without getting any nearer to her. Her shoes crunched on the broken vase; she did her best to ignore it.
As he reached the door, Leoncio lowered his head politely. “I go for now, but will return, ninotta; never fear.” Satisfied with his mission, he left her alone in her house, strolling away into the peachtinged afternoon light made sparkling by a faint gauze of fog in the city. He was very well-pleased with what he had accomplished during his visit to Pier-Ariana. He had suspected that di Santo-Germano might have left a secret cache of funds with her, but that seemed not to be the case, unless Pier-Ariana were cleverer than she seemed, and therefore Emerenzio would soon be reduced to ruin and would become his creature or end up working a galley oar. Given Emerenzio’s age and position, Leoncio was reasonably certain that the business agent would prefer to have to serve him privately than face public humiliation, to say nothing of the consequences of his sleight-of-hand with other men’s money. This would mean that he—Leoncio Sen, the wastrel, the gambler, the feckless, the man everyone said was incapable of doing serious work—could finally demonstrate his usefulness to the Savii, and earn the good opinion of his uncle. At last he would be a man of position, respected and powerful, not a lackey to Christofo, not an unprofitable expense, not an embarrassment, not a family obligation, but a family vindication. The family would be proud of him, and no one would speak ill of him again. He began to whistle as he walked, paying little attention to the crowd around him, and in a short while he reached the handsome Casetta Santa Perpetua, where he was admitted and shown to the larger of the gamblers’ parlors, escorted by a page displaying so much deference that those watching might suppose Leoncio to be the scion of a wealthy merchant.
From his place at the dice-table, Padre Egidio Duradante looked up, and motioned to Leoncio to join him, his smile a smug one. “I warn you, Signor’ Sen, the Saints have been touching my dice today. I have already won over a hundred ducats, and hope to gain more.” He was wearing standard priestly garb, but his lucchino was made of rich, dark-gray silk over a camisa of fine, bleached linen, all of which made him look more like an advocate than a priest.
“That’s because you have the Pope’s confidence residing in you—not even the dice dare to oppose you,” said Leoncio as he perched on a stool across the table from Padre Duradante, and next to a brocadeclad trader from France; from his glum demeanor, he had been losing to Padre Duradante for a while.
“How can you bother with talking?” the Frenchman demanded in dreadful Italian.
“It is pleasant to talk,” said Padre Duradante in excellent French, making no effort to diminish his gloating or to offer simulated sympathy for his success. “It makes losing money much more enjoyable.”
“You’re not losing,” said the Frenchman, and shoved another three ducats onto the painted table.
Padre Duradante smiled and shook the dice in their leather cup, tossing them almost negligently onto the table, watching them roll with an avidity that showed his nonchalance to be sham.
“Tell me,” said the Frenchman as the dice settled with a two, a three, and a six showing, “do you know the dice are proper?”
“Are you saying they have loaded dice at this casetta?” Padre Duradante was affronted now, and he stood up very straight. “Sanson! Sanson!” he called out, indignation raising his voice by four notes.
Sanson Micheletta sauntered over to the table, his dissolute features now a mask of good-will. “Padre—you have a problem?”
“No. Had I a problem, I would not continue to come through your door. This man has one, however,” he said, pointing to the Frenchman. “Because he is losing, he thinks the dice are inaccurate.”
“Does he?” The owner of the casetta reached down and picked up the dice one by one. “They are carved from ivory, as you see, and the faces are painted. All the edges are beveled to the same degree. How could these be weighted?” He held them out to the Frenchman. “You may want to examine them for yourself.”
The man took them and rolled them experimentally between his flattened palms, testing their weight and shape. Reluctantly he handed them back to Sanson Micheletta. “They seem true enough,” he conceded.
“But perhaps you would prefer a new trio to play with? One that has never been used before?” Sanson asked, and snapped his fingers; instantly a page appeared at his side. “A new trio of dice for this table. See these are put aside. Signor’ Hautecrete is not pleased with them.”
The page took the dice and vanished, and in a very short while, new dice were brought to the table by a lovely young woman with fine Greek features and an enchanting accent, rigged out in clinging silks from Antioch, the lengthened bodice of the new fashions showing off her slender waist. “For Signor’ Hautecrete,” she said, offering him a unimpaired view of her elevated breasts framed by a corsage of golden lace studded with pearls.
Guillaume Hautecrete took the dice and did his best to ignore Apollonia, who was leaning into his arm. “Padre, you had best hope that France does not go the way of England, and others, as well. You cannot forget that Ferdinand is Charles’ brother, and a Hapsburg before he is anything else.”
Padre Durandante recognized this ploy for what it was, and offered a sour smile. “If Frenchmen will give up their salvation as readily as the English have, and all for a King’s harlot, then perhaps God is preparing for Judgment Day, after all, and no one will emerge unscathed, let the Holy Roman Emperor do as he will. Not that a roll of the dice will change either England or France or any German state.” He took the dice from Hautecrete, and remarked quietly, “I would like to resume play—would you?”
“I suppose I will,” said Hautecrete, and moved another two ducats from his depleted pile onto a painted oblong on the table. “There.”
Matching the amount, Padre Duradante shook his dice and threw them. This time only two of the dice were winning, and so Hautecrete received one of his ducats back, seizing it and hanging on to it as if he feared it would escape through his fingers. He laughed harshly and looked from Padre Duradante to Leoncio Sen. “If you play with him, know you are dealing with the Devil.”
“I have suspected as much,” Leoncio rejoined with a smirk. He set down his bet and waited for Padre Duradante to roll the dice again.
“This is too rich for me,” said Hautecrete, who gathered up his few remaining coins and stalked out of the parlor, bound for the tavern at the rear of the casetta. After a moment, Apollonia followed after him.
“Safer to gamble,” said Padre Duradante as he watched her go.
“At least dice will not give you the pox,” agreed Leoncio.
“But if one must have pox, she would make the infection memorable,” said Padre Duradante; he tossed the dice and smiled as he won again. “I apologize for any hardship I may impose upon you.”
“Your forgiveness, Padre, but I doubt it,” said Leoncio, handing over his money. “You like to win too much.”
“You are quite ingenious, Signor’ Sen; you say just enough,” Padre Duradante told him, accepting his slight for a compliment, as he gathered up the dice for another throw.
Over the next hour, the trio of dice went back and forth between Padre Duradante and Leoncio Sen, and their stacks of ducats rose and fell on a swift tide of fortune, with neither pulling so far ahead of the other that they were forced to stop their game, or their play turned rancorous. Finally Padre Duradante dropped the dice back in their cup and announced, “I’m hungry, and I can smell aromas from the kitchen. Let us go to the dining room.”
“Of course,” said Leoncio, scooping up his bounty and shoving it into his wallet; all in all he was down about twelve ducats on the night—not a vast sum as gaming went, but enough that his uncle would complain of it when he heard.
“This is a very elegant casetta, this Santa Perpetua,” Padre Duradante remarked as he led the way toward the dining room. “I hope it continues successful, though in times like these, relying on chance is precarious.”
“No doubt Sanson shares your feelings,” said Leoncio, smiling at his own wit. “He is a very canny man, is Sanson.”
“So I have heard, and from many sources,” Padre Duradante said as they passed through the doors opened for them by Moorish slaves.
A waiter came up to them, bowing and asking, “What would you like to eat, Signori?”
“I am told you have a fish cooked in a bread that is said to be excellent tonight,” said Padre Duradante. “Some of that, I think, and then, perhaps, a duck in red wine would be good. Not too tough, or fishy—if the duck is from the land, so much the better.”

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