The Nascenza Conspiracy (12 page)

“Yes, he’s one of my tutors, but Queen Poppea?”

“In the fifth century after the founding of Cassaforte, the old king was on his deathbed. King Mollo was his name. Like many old men on their deathbeds, he was senile.” She stood before him in a rigid posture, her hands on her hips as she spoke. She had sheathed her weapons, but looked as if the slightest motion might signal the return of their lethal sharpness. “Instead of naming his son or some qualified courtier as his heir, he instead bestowed the title upon his seamstress, a seventeen-year-old girl named Poppea. Well, naturally all of so-called decent society was in an uproar. The Seven unanimously refused to hand her the Olive Crown and the Scepter of Thorn, saying that she had unduly influenced the old man. Instead, they bestowed them upon the King’s oldest son, who had been the heir presumptive. The original loyalists were those who supported Poppea after she was denied the crown. Apparently they persisted for some decades, petitioning the crown to recognize the girl’s offspring as royalty.”

“I’ve never heard of Queen Poppea,” Petro admitted.

Her mouth again twitched with some emotion he couldn’t identify. “It seems to me a pity that an insula education is often wasted on those fortunate enough to receive it.” Before he could respond with surprise to that statement, Emilia looked around as if expecting to see loyalists lurking behind every tree. “Now, what these current loyalists are loyal to, I have no idea.”

“Prince Berto. That’s what the Bearded Lady said.” The words were out of Petro’s mouth before he could help them. He blinked rapidly. “That’s what Petro and I called him,” he admitted, shame-faced.

“Poor Bonifacio,” was all Emilia said, though it was uncertain whether she was mourning his death or their cruel nickname.

“And the Padrona at the inn, she said it was for Prince Berto, too.
All for the prince
were her words.”

“Prince Berto is dead,” Emilia replied, her voice flat. “By his own hand. It makes no sense.”

“I know.” They seemed to have reached some sort of impasse. Petro could sense her already dismissing him, more than she had already. “I’m just telling you what the Padrona said.”

Her face was blank and impassive. “Show me where you left the others,” she commanded, flipping her fingers to move him on.

Petro didn’t dare disobey, though part of him wondered why he leapt to attention and scampered to do her bidding as if he were a junior guard under her command. He led her up the embankment toward the sheltered space beneath the trees where he’d left Elettra and Amadeo. “What will happen to the rest of us,” he asked, “while you try to find Petro and Brother Narciso?”

“Don’t worry,” she assured him. “You’ll be out of harm’s way.”

“I’m not worried about being harmed,” Petro attempted to tell her. “I’d like to help—”

“When Giles returns from Colona, some of the detachment of guards he brings will take you back to the city,” she told him. Her flat tone of voice told him that there would be no more conversation on the matter. All debate was closed. “It’s protocol.”

“Protocol” seemed to be Emilia’s favorite word, and Petro’s enemy. A hundred possible objections came to mind, but he knew that in her current mood, she would accept none of them. To Emilia Fossi, rigid guard of the King’s own, Petro was little more than a triviality to be cleaned up after a mission gone wrong. An annoyance. If he intended to stay and help search for Adrio—and he did—he’d have to prove his worth to her.

Elettra ran up to him before they’d even reached their concealed campground. “Who’s this?” she asked, looking over Emilia.

“She’s a palace guard, though she doesn’t look it,” Petro told her. He was rewarded with a scowl from Emilia.

Elettra didn’t seem to find the news either surprising or interesting, any more than she seemed to notice that Petro was soaking wet and nearly naked. “Adrio, don’t hate me,” she said, grabbing his hands. “I only fell asleep for a moment. Honestly. I was so tired after all that running, and he said it would be all right, and the bank was so mossy and soft. I didn’t mean
…
”

“What’s wrong?” Petro tried to cut off her stream of babble. Beside him, he heard Emilia reach for her blades.

At the unexpected sight of the poniard and the sword, Elettra backed off and blinked. She looked from Petro to the guard, and back again. “It’s Amadeo,” she said, swallowing. “He’s gone.”

A life in the guards of Cassaforte is not a dainty or delicate profession, especially for a girl. It is often brutish and uncouth. If your tastes run more to your dollies than to your brother’s mud pies, you may well want to heed your parents and grow up to marry a nice boy, than take up arms for your country.

—Camilla Sorranto, bodyguard to her brother, King Milo,
in response to a fan letter from Lucia Hieronimi, age eight

Almost immediately, Emilia began barking out orders. In a more disciplined setting—if she had been surrounded by other guards, say—her orders might have been obeyed, or even heard. But Emilia Fossi was not in the company of experienced soldiers. Nor was she even in the company of apprentice guards, most of whom had begun training before they were Petro’s age. Emilia Fossi was in charge of two inexperienced and panicked youths, one half-asleep and the other half-naked, who proceeded to hotfoot around like chickens pursued by a ravenous, axe-wielding farmer. Elettra began to run back the very direction they had come, while Petro attempted to clamber into the thick of the woods while simultaneously putting on his pants.

Both Petro and Elettra were trying to talk to the other. When they returned to hear what the other had said, Emilia grabbed them both by the collars, marched them to the edge of the trees, and growled, “Shut your mouths and heed me, or by the gods I’ll skin you both alive and set you out for the buzzards.”

After a masterful threat like that, Petro felt as if he really had no choice but to listen.

Emilia instructed them to search along the river while she, the more experienced tracker, would investigate the woods for any trace of Amadeo. “That moonfaced idiot’s likely wandered off on his own,” she added. “He’s probably not far. Don’t go thinking the worst until we have proof of it. And most of all, don’t panic.” To Petro, she added more sternly, “You kept your head tolerably well last night. Don’t become a ninny over something that may prove to be minor.”

The chastisement worked. Petro shuffled off, more calm and collected than he had been, as well as slightly prideful. Had the guard actually given him an off-handed compliment of sorts? He didn’t have time to consider the possibility, as Emilia’s words proved prophetic. Scarcely had he stepped out of the woods than he saw Amadeo. The boy’s dirty nightshirt spilled out of his pants as he stood down by the river talking to several men, in no apparent trouble at all. He was far enough south, beyond the river’s bend, that Petro and Emilia hadn’t seen him on their walk back.

Petro called out to the others, who immediately came running. Emilia had to restrain Elettra from running over to Amadeo that very moment. Judging from the expression of frustration on Elettra’s face, which resembled the one she had worn the night before when she’d hauled off and slapped her fellow aspirant, Petro judged it a wise move. Petro let Emilia take the lead as they all jogged down the embankment. “But it’s true!” Amadeo was saying, when they drew within hearing distance. “There was a murder! Two of them!”

“I’m not saying there wasn’t, and I’m not saying there was, lad.” The men around Amadeo were locals, by the rumpled look of them. A clay pipe bobbed up and down as the eldest spoke; somehow he managed to keep it expertly clenched in one corner of his mouth. “But a murder, now. That’s a serious charge.”

A shorter man, with several shoulder-bags of branches lying at his feet, pulled off his straw cap and scratched at the bare head underneath. “You know that Campobasso has always been a queer place,” he argued. “Always kept to itself, did Campobasso.”

“Just because they’re odd in Campobasso don’t make them murderers,” said a fellow carrying fishing paraphernalia.

“No, but just because you don’t want to get involved doesn’t mean the boy’s a-telling tales,” said another man, standing beyond the others next to his team by the river. Petro couldn’t see him through the group. “He’s obviously had some sort of fright.”

“He’s in his sleeping gown,” laughed the fisherman. “He’s had a nightmare.”

“That ain’t fair,” said the unseen man with the horses. “And you know it.”

They were close enough now that Amadeo saw them. “Ask my friends,” he said. “She goes to the insula with me. And he’s from the other insula, though Brother Narciso says he’s not to be trusted. I don’t know who that other one is. But ask them.”

Petro was surprised that when Emilia spoke, all traces of her brusque, commanding voice had vanished. “Well, good morning, gentlefolk,” she said, sounding almost unnaturally pleasant. “How fares everyone this morn?” She had buttoned her surcoat in the front so that her blades were concealed beneath the fabric, though Petro had no doubt she could seize them in mere seconds if need be. The men, all wary, nodded and grunted at her. “We thought we lost you, tyke,” she added, chucking Amadeo under the chin.

Amadeo was not the type who took a chin-chucking from a stranger without question. “I don’t know you. Who is this person?” he asked Elettra, sounding suspicious.

“The lad’s been making some serious accusations,” said the man with the clay pipe. He pulled it out in order to regard them all, stroking his wispy white beard as he looked them over. Considering the various states of disarray of their clothing, or lack thereof, it was obvious he was wondering if they were all lunatics. “He’s been saying something about murders in Campobasso.”

“Murders! Is that what game you’re up to, now? Scamp.” Emilia pulled Amadeo toward her. He resisted, and veered instead in Elettra’s direction. “He’s a bit of a fabulist, that one,” she told the men, shaking her head. “Once he had all his friends believing he was the natural son of one of the Thirty, or some such nonsense.”

“But I am—!” Elettra cut off Amadeo’s outraged squawk by yanking at one of his arms. “Ow!”

“He is, eh?” asked the man with the pipe, who seemed to have appointed himself the spokesman of the group. He turned to Petro for confirmation. “Is that true, boy? Is your friend a tale-spinner?”

“I’m not the one to ask,” Petro replied in as normal a voice as possible. He had been trying to struggle back into his clothes, wet though they were. “You heard his words. I’m not to be trusted.”

Unexpectedly, his response made the man pull the clay pipe from his mouth and begin to laugh. The three other men joined in. Finally both Emilia and Petro added their chuckles to the group, while Amadeo looked stunned to be so mocked. “I knew there had to be some explanation.”

“Murders in Campobasso,” said the fisherman, shaking his head. He picked up his nets and poles. “I knew it was silly.”

“Campobasso has always kept to itself, though,” repeated the fellow who had been collecting wood from the forest. “Queer place, Campobasso. Odd folk there.”

“We’re from Cassaforte city, on our way to Nascenza. We were talking last night of making our way to Campobasso this morning, for supplies.” Petro admired how casual Emilia managed to sound even as she spun a whopper larger than any the alleged fabulist had woven. “The boy got his fool notion from that, I wager.”

“I don’t even
know
her.” Amadeo’s protest was met with laughter, as if he were pulling a jape. It was easier for the men to think him a fibber than to comprehend the true state of affairs.

The fisherman had already had enough of the conversation. With a lift of his chin in farewell, he began walking up the river. “Well, a spritely imagination in someone young is no crime,” said the old man, “but he shouldn’t be let out to give people a fright, like he tried with us.” All of them, save Amadeo, nodded in solemn agreement. “Surely I’m glad there’s no harm come to anyone, though. Murder’s a dreadful crime.”

“You hear that, you rapscallion?” The swipe that Emilia took at the back of Amadeo’s head was perhaps a little harder than he deserved, but rubbing it kept him quiet. “You worried these good, honest folk.”

“I could tell he was fibbing,” said the man with the branches. Like the fisherman, he had picked up his bags and was preparing to move on.

The fourth man, who still stood by his team in the background, said softly, “I thought there was something to the boy’s tale.” He sounded disappointed to have found out otherwise, and bent over to attend to one of his horses’ hooves.

“We’ll be on our way, then.” Emilia kept her hand firmly around the back of Amadeo’s neck as she steered him away from the riverbank.

“You may want to backtrack a bit to Eulo for those supplies, miss.” The old man with the pipe waved off the woodsman and began to shuffle in the opposite direction, upstream. “He was right about Campobasso being an odd place.”

“Odd how?” Petro wanted to know. It was a valid question, he thought. Sometimes outsiders knew more about what was happening than they let on.

“Well.” The old man again stroked his long beard as he considered. “They keep to themselves, as we said. Unfriendly-like. And people have said that they’re friendly to ’Landers.”

“’Landers?” Petro could tell that Emilia had merely intended to walk away from the man as quickly as possible, but now even she was listening. “What’s a ’Lander?”

“You know. ’Landers,” said the man. Then, patiently, as if he were explaining to simpletons, “Folk from Vereinigtelände. That’s what they’re called.”

“Oh, ’Landers.” Petro tried to make it sound like he’d heard the term before. “You mean, the odd trade caravan on the way to Cassaforte, that sort of thing?”

“Aye, that,” agreed the old man. “And more. Campobasso was the place to stay if you were a ’Lander, is what they used to say. Liked them more than they liked their own countryman. Well, the world’s a strange place sometimes, what?” The man chuckled to himself and took another pull on his pipe, releasing a mouthful of spicy smoke into the morning air. “I’d best be on my way or I’ll not make it home before dinner. It’s a long tread for me.”

“Many thanks for your help,” Emilia said, ending the conversation once and for all. Was it Petro’s imagination, or did she seem to be stung a little at nearly missing what sounded like important information? She strolled a little bit away with Amadeo and Elettra, slowly, so it didn’t look as if she was trying to flee. The old man tipped his cap, called out a farewell, and went on his way, whistling a merry tune.

“Who—” Amadeo was asking before the man was scarcely out of earshot.

“She’s a palace guard, ’Deo,” Elettra snapped at him. “She’s here to help.”

“And you didn’t know who those men were!” Emilia scolded. “They could have been the very enemies you were trying to flee.”

Amadeo was obviously fed up with being mocked and maligned. He struggled free of Emilia’s grasp and ran several paces again. “I’m no fool.” He was the angriest that Petro had ever seen him. “I know you think I am,” he said to the women, and to Petro, he repeated, “and I know
you
think I am, but I’m not. I didn’t wander up to them and start babbling about murders. I saw the fisherman talking to that one over there.” He pointed in the direction of the fourth man, who was still by the riverside, tending to some kind of flat barge floating on the river’s surface, which attached with tethers to his team. “I was hoping they might have some food to spare. For all of us, not just for me. So I asked if they did, and they started asking questions about why was I wandering around in my nightshirt with my forehead banged up, and the other two came
…
” Overcome by exhaustion or frustration or perhaps both, he put his hands over his face. “I hate you all. I was only trying to help.”

“Don’t be so hard on him. He has a point.” Emilia’s eyebrows shot up at Petro’s unexpected defense. Even Amadeo seemed a little surprised, peering between his fingers to see what Petro would say next. “We didn’t know anything about a rear guard. We didn’t know you existed.”