This Rough Magic

Benito felt like pulling his hair out. 'And I suppose his wife has gone too?

The jailor nodded.

'Well, can you get me one of the Justices? Please. I know. They've gone home. But this is urgent.'

The night-warder nodded. 'I will go and ask the chief night-warder.'

He returned a little while later. 'I am very sorry, signor. The chief says no. It is not in the rules.'

'Testa di cazzo! Rules! I'll have his guts for a skipping-rope, when I get out of here,' said Benito savagely. He shook the bars in frustration. And had an inspiration. 'Listen. Can I at least see a priest?'

The warder nodded. 'Brother Umbriel comes to see the prisoners every evening anyway.'

'I need to see someone specific. Either Brother Mascoli of St. Raphaella or Sister Evangelina of St. Hypatia di Hagia Sophia.'

The night-warder looked thoughtful. 'You could ask Brother Umbriel. He is Hypatian.'

And Benito had to content himself with that.

* * *

Brother Umbriel, when he came, proved to be willing to help. 'Benito Valdosta needing to see Evangelina or Mascoli . . . on a matter of some urgency concerning Eneko Lopez.' He smiled. 'You certainly know how to inflame a poor Sibling's curiosity, don't you? Very well, my son. I will interrupt my work and go to old Mascoli now.'

Brother Mascoli came a few minutes later. 'Ah. Benito Valdosta. You are very unlike your brother! You wish to see me in connection with Eneko Lopez. I'm afraid Eneko has gone to Holy Jerusalem . . .'

'He's on Corfu. I'm afraid Brother Umbriel got the wrong end of the stick. I have messages from Eneko Lopez, too. For the Grand Metropolitan—and you.'

Mascoli raised his eyebrows. 'Which are?'

'What Eneko wanted me to tell you is that they have hit magical problems on Corfu, where they are besieged. He says that the archangel Uriel, the guardian of the creatures of the earth, cannot be raised. They are unable to raise wards. There appears to be some malign force preventing them from contact by scrying with other sacred magicians. He wants help from the Church. He wants help from Rome.'

Mascoli gnawed his knuckle thoughtfully. 'Well, these things can be confirmed. I will go now to Sister Evangelina. The Siblings will attempt to contact Eneko magically. And should we fail, we will try Rome. There are magical ways of establishing authenticity.'

'Great. At least I will have succeeded in part of my mission,' said Benito.

Mascoli looked at the bars. 'I'm afraid I don't know if I can get you out of here, my son. I'll talk to Evangelina, and perhaps we can approach the Patriarch Michael . . .'

Benito yawned. 'Don't worry about it. The Justices can spring me in the morning. I suppose there is not much that could be done tonight anyway.'

 

Chapter 59

Odd. Unsettled. That was how Katerina would have described this meeting in Verona. Petro had insisted that Marco come with him, along with part of the Venetian Council of Ten. Marco had not wanted to go, but had been persuaded against his better judgment because of all of the strange and contradictory rumors that were now spreading about the likely intentions of the Holy Roman Emperor should Charles Fredrik die. More of these were coming out now that the meeting was in full session—and it occurred to her that if their Great Enemy wanted to eliminate most of the thorns in his side in one swoop, he would have had only to arrange for a human agent to pack the cellar of the palace in which they were meeting with gunpowder . . .

Which might explain who was spreading all these rumors, and why.

Fortunately, that seemed to have occurred to more than one of their allies as well; you couldn't move without bumping into a very alert-looking guard.

She couldn't make heads or tails of it. Some rumors had it that Prince Manfred had open designs on Corfu, and after that outpost, presumably Venice as well. Others claimed that he had quarreled with his uncle the Emperor over the Emperor's designs on Venice. Some said Manfred had quarreled with his cousin Conrad, the heir presumptive, over the same thing—with half the rumors ascribing evil designs on Venice to Manfred; the other half, to Conrad. Still others swore that nothing of the sort had happened, that, in fact, Manfred had never left Corfu and that so far as intelligence out of Corfu was concerned, there wasn't any.

Certainly ships were not coming from that direction, which was . . . odd.

'Tension' was not even close to describing what the atmosphere in this room was like.

And Marco was in knots. He'd told Kat yesterday that he knew there was something terribly, horribly wrong, but he was too far from the Lion to tell what it was, and too far from the Lion's protection to dare try to scry for it, either. Finally he'd gone out last night in search of the largest Hypatian establishment in Verona to ask them to find out what they could for him.

But if anything, this morning he was in worse case. Even the Old Fox had been forced to take notice.

'What's wrong? You look like you've been drinking the water out of your own canals.' The tension underlying his words made the attempted jest fall flat.

Marco shook his head. 'There's something wrong about all this—these rumors aren't spreading accidentally —and there's still more wrong back home—'

At just that moment, there was a commotion at the door. A burly man who looked more warrior than Hypatian Sibling shoved his way inside.