A clap of thunder sounded. Cass glanced up at the sky. Billowing gray clouds were rolling in. She could just barely make out the hazy tips of the Apennines behind them. The third body landed with a soft thud.
A guttural wail broke the grim silence. Cass snapped her head around to where the pack of dogs had been. They were scattering into the trees, as though even they could not bear to stand witness to this. The two men with shovels began to replace the dirt over the white-wrapped corpses. There was no funeral, no priest. There were not even any words spoken.
“What of their families?” Cass asked, her voice trembling. “Is there no one here who will speak over their bodies?”
“They don’t have families anymore,” one of the men said. He pulled a dirty handkerchief from his pocket and mopped the sweat from his brow. “They are not human. No priest will speak for their souls.”
The sky rumbled again. The air was still dry, but the wind had picked up. “What proof was there that they were bitten by vampires?” Cass crossed her arms, warming herself.
“They have all the symptoms,” the man said grimly. “Weakness, pale skin, delirium.”
“But that is nothing,” Cass protested. “Maybe they just fell ill. Maybe they succumbed to a new strain of plague.”
The man shook his head. “They had the marks too. Puncture wounds on the neck, all identical.” He looked back at Cass. “Fangs,” he said, as if she hadn’t understood.
Marco had stayed near the wagons this whole time, overseeing the men struggling to fix the broken axle. Now he strode across the grass and joined the girls by the freshly dug grave.
“This is far too gruesome a scene to attract the attention of ladies so lovely.” His voice was light, but he drew Cass and Mada firmly away from the gravesite. “The axle is almost fixed and a storm is brewing. We should be under way shortly.”
“But Marco,” Mada protested. “These men say that Florence is overrun with vampires.”
Marco touched his hand to Madalena’s lower back and steered her across the grass. “Come, my goddess. You’ll have nightmares.” A gust of wind stole away part of his next words. “. . . die before I let anyone hurt you, right?”
Mada rotated her face in toward Marco’s chest. “But you’re going to be so busy.” She sounded childlike, honestly afraid.
Marco kissed the top of her head. “Not too busy to protect my beautiful wife.” He led her back toward the carriage, and the rest of the girls turned away from the grave as a group.
The driver took the repaired carriage for a short test loop around the uneven ground of the field and then declared it fit for travel. Cass hopped back into the travel compartment and pulled the curtains closed across the window. Within moments, the group was heading toward Florence again.
A clap of thunder made the seat beneath Cass tremble. Parting the curtains with her fingers, she peeked out, expecting to be pelted with cold rain. But the air was dark and dry. The storm was chasing them, but it hadn’t yet caught up.
They left the field and the graves behind, passing through a series of rolling green hills. A sharp breeze tickled her skin as Cass leaned slightly out the window. She could just barely make out a jagged skyline in the distance. Florence. After a grueling week of travel, they were finally there.
By the time the carriages reached the outskirts of the city, the storm had blown past and night was beginning to fall. Again, Cass peeked out through the curtains.
Her first thought of Florence was that it was heavy and deserted. Large, hulking palazzos made of red and tan brick lined both sides of the cobblestoned streets. Elaborately painted chimeras loomed from the rooftops like hideous protectors. Most of the houses looked abandoned, their shutters pulled tight against the gathering dusk. The streets were mostly empty; there were no merchants returning home from a long day at the market, no peasant boys prowling for women and wine.
Cass inhaled deeply. The air was different, sharp and crisp, with only the faintest tinge of stale water from the Arno River, which cut through the city. She had grown used to the sweet moldy smell of Venice, to the low- hanging fog that blanketed everything. The air of Florence was a welcome change, clear and fresh.
Cass heard the crescendo of angry voices as the carriages rolled past a large, open piazza with a statue at its center. Here was where all the people were gathered, apparently. Peasants in brightly colored breeches and doublets stood in a throng around a statue. One of them was waving a piece of parchment.
“What are they doing?” Cass asked.
Marco leaned over to look out the window. “This is the Piazza del Mercato Vecchio, where the townspeople shop and gossip. It looks like they’re posting pasquinades.”
“Pasquinades?” Mada repeated, wrinkling her nose.
Marco gave her a squeeze. “Complaints against the church, public statements, and pronouncements. Nonsense, mostly. The citizens are always complaining about
“Here?” Mada squealed, wrinkling her nose. “This isn’t how I remember Palazzo Alioni at all. This whole neighborhood looks so run-down. So old.”
Marco nodded grimly as the driver slowed the horses to a stop. “Your father sent word to warn me that your aunt’s living conditions had deteriorated, but I had hoped for better than this.”
They had pulled over in front of a three-story palazzo made of red stucco and trimmed with marble. The chipped roof tiles and peeling paint made Cass think of Agnese’s villa. “It’s not so bad,” she said, with forced cheerfulness. “It looks lived-in.”
The carriage driver opened the wooden double doors that led into the palazzo’s courtyard. Mada’s face fell even further. Up close, the house looked even older than Agnese’s villa, and the only thing growing in the garden was weeds. A rusty bucket sat on the edge of a well. Mada turned to Cass incredulously. “It looks like no one’s lived here for a hundred years,” she insisted. “There’s no one outside to greet us and not even a candle burning in the window. Did they forget we were arriving today?”
The driver had returned to the carriage and prepared to help the ladies out. He caught Mada’s last few words. “Many are afraid to be out on the streets after sunset,” he explained as he helped Cass step down from the high carriage. “Because of the vampires.”
Cass and Madalena exchanged a look. Mada reached down, her fingers finding the crucifix that dangled from her belt.
They made their way across the uneven stone courtyard. Each side of the palazzo’s wooden door was flanked with a faded banner emblazoned with a pair of white unicorns, their horns crossed as if in battle. Marco reached out and rapped sternly on the wood. A stooped and sagging butler opened the door after a few moments. He ushered them into the house and up into the portego.
The inside of the palazzo was a slight improvement over its exterior. The portego was wide and airy with high, vaulted ceilings and solid, if slightly worn, furniture. Giant murals decorated each wall, though the paint was faded in places, revealing the cracked plaster underneath. The candlelight illuminated only portions of the murals, so it took Cass a moment to realize she was standing next to a giant nude Eve holding an apple. She flinched slightly and turned away, but not before her eyes traced the Serpent’s coils all the way out to the forked tongue that was flicking in the direction of Eve’s exposed breasts.
The far wall was even worse: a white-wrapped Lazarus emerging from his tomb. It made Cass think of Liviana and the vampire girls and her dream of being buried alive. She shivered. The butler had disappeared into the bowels of the house. Cass hoped he was alerting the kitchen staff as well as the mistress about their arrival. She needed a cup of tea and something to eat.
Feliciana came up behind Cass. “
“Don’t worry,” Cass whispered back. “If they can’t use you, we’ll find someone else here who can. At least you’re safe now.”
Madalena’s father emerged from the back of the house, his brilliant green-and-gold breeches lighting up the dingy room. A plump older woman in a lilac gown trailed behind him. Cass assumed this was Madalena’s aunt.
The woman smoothed the front of her bodice. “I’m Signora Stella Alioni.”
