He glanced at Luciano for reassurance.
But--Luciano didn't look right. He was pale and sweating, the hand that held the little drum shaking, and his breathing coming hard.
'Chiano?' he asked--but Luciano didn't respond. The steady drumbeat faltered.
The beater fell from Luciano's hand; a hand that clutched at the front of his own white robe, looking remarkably like a claw.
'Chiano!' Marco shouted, panic in his voice.
Slowly, Luciano's knees gave out and he sank to the ground. Slowly, the drum, too, fell from his hand, rolled across the floor, and overset a bowl of some dark liquid that had been laid aside when Luciano had completed the circles. And Luciano Marina toppled over onto his side and did not stir.
And then Luciano was silent. The mists and brightness around him cleared and Marco understood why.
Luciano Marina would not be summoning anything again. Whatever this was . . . it had been too much for him. His eyes were glazed, staring--and empty.
The yellowed old book was still on the pedestal where Luciano had been standing. A long-bladed bronze knife was lying atop the open pages.
Marco took up the book. It was only a book--but what was in it had killed Luciano.
The circles of power still held, but the magic within them faded with every passing moment.
I have to do something--
But what? He was no magician. Besides, looking at what was said at the top of the page, this called for a willingness to make the greatest of sacrifices. What had Luciano said? 'Only been done twice before. And two of the families listed are no more.'
Perhaps . . . perhaps it had been no token sacrifice. Valdosta . . . and Montescue were left. I am Valdosta. . . .
A faint sound penetrated the thinning circles of power, and Marco looked up. As if through a mist, or through frost-covered glass, he saw Lucrezia. Saw Rafael fall. He tried to push through the barrier that Luciano had raised. It was like steel. He beat at it. He might as well have pounded on a rock with his fists.
They were watching him now--Kat, with one hand at her throat and the other clutching her medallion; and Lucrezia. Lucrezia had a cruel smile on her face and a long steel and silver dagger in her hand. The handle like a dragon, or a winged serpent, with eyechips of ruby. Marco's arms fell to his sides; he felt frozen with fear and indecision. They all seemed frozen in time, insects caught in amber.
Something cold touched his foot, and he jerked out of his paralysis. He looked down. The puddle of spilled liquid oozed across the patterned marble and touched his foot, mingled with a thin trickle of blood coming from Luciano's outstretched wrist. And a mist passed over it for a moment, and Marco saw, as if from above, Venice burning. Children screaming, dying. And the body of Kat sprawled, abused. And then a sequence of people he knew, and loved. Gutted. Raped. Burned. And the face of Lucrezia . . .
Laughing, with a great darkness behind her. He knew it for a true scrying vision of the future. A future which Luciano--his friend and in many ways, more truly a father to him than his own blood had been--had been prepared to sacrifice himself to prevent. Perhaps, when he failed, Luciano had dared use his last life-blood, the last of his own magical power, not to save himself, but for this vision. So that Marco would know the consequences of failure, and act.
Marco took up the bronze knife, put it against his chest and began to read the words from the ancient book. From outside the enchanted circle Lucrezia gaped. If he read her lips aright before the brightness and mist engulfed him, she was saying 'No!'
* * *
'No! Caesare!' Benito looked down from the barricade he'd just climbed.
Caesare Aldanto looked up from Maria. He had an arm around her neck, and a knife against her breast. 'I nearly killed her when she came through the gap,' he said, conversationally. 'Quite a reunion, this. Where's that brother of yours? Also around?'
'Why?' demanded Benito. 'Do you want to make a clean sweep of the Valdostas?'
Benito tried to figure out what do next. He had an arquebus in his hands. But the weapon was far too inaccurate--even in the hands of someone expert in its use--to risk a shot at Caesare. As inexperienced as Benito
