The Devil’s Queen. Jeanne Kalogridis

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ rescuer with her gaze.

      “You swore on your life that you would tell the rebels nothing,” she said. It was an accusation.

      “Yes, yes,” he responded anxiously. “I will say nothing, Madonna.”

      “Only those who know a secret promise to keep it,” she said. “And there is only one secret the rebels would want to hear today. What might it be? They would not care about an absent stable master and his murdered grooms.”

      His mouth fell open; he looked as though he wanted to cry.

      “Look at you, covered in straw,” Clarice told him. “You hid because, like the others, you had heard too much, and they were going to kill you, too. You know where the heirs have gone, don’t you?”

      Owl-eyed, he dropped his head and stared hard at the grass. “No, Madonna, no …”

      “You lie,” Clarice said. “And I don’t blame you. I would be frightened, too.”

      His face contorted as he began to weep. “Please, Donna Clarice, don’t be angry, please…. Before God, I swear I will not tell anyone…. I could have gone to the rebels, run to the gate and told them everything, but I stayed. I have always been loyal, I will be loyal still. Only do not be angry.”

      “I’m not angry,” she soothed. “We’ll take you with us. Lord knows, if we don’t, the rebels will torture you until you speak. I’ll give you another florin if you tell me where Ser Ippolito and the others have gone. But first, hand me the girl.” She leaned down and held her arms out to me.

      He was bony but strong; he seized me below the ribs and swung me like a bale of hay up into Clarice’s fierce clutches.

      A wave of fear slammed against me. I endured it until it crested and faded, leaving everything still and silent its wake. I had a choice: to quail, or to harden.

      I hardened.

      At the instant the boy handed me to my aunt, I slipped the stiletto from its sheath, hidden in my skirt pocket. It sliced easily through the skin beneath the boy’s jaw, in the same grinning arc Clarice had drawn for me on her own throat, with her finger.

      But I was a child and not very strong. The wound was shallow; he flinched and drew back before I could finish. With all my might, I plunged the weapon deeper into the side of his neck. He clawed at the protruding dagger and let go a gurgling shriek, his eyes bulging with furious reproach.

      Clutching me, Clarice kicked the boy’s shoulder. He fell backward, still screaming while Clarice set me on the saddle in front of her.

      I stared down at him, horrified and intrigued by what I had just done.

       He’s going to die in any case, my aunt had said. But the rebels would torture him horribly, until he confessed, and then they would hand him over to the crowd. You can spare him that.

       Even we must not know where Ippolito and the others have gone. Can you understand that, Caterina?

      It did not seem like a kindness now, watching him flail in the new grass, the blood from his throat collecting in a pool on the grass near his shoulder, crimson against spring green.

      Suddenly, ominously, he stilled and fell silent.

       He will break, Clarice had said, and tell them where the heirs have gone, and the House of Medici will be no more. But he will not be suspicious of a child. You will be able to get very close to him.

      Clarice shouted in my ear. “Stand up in the saddle, Caterina! Stand up, I won’t let you fall.”

      Miraculously, I struggled to my feet, swaying. I was now almost the height of the wall next to me.

      “Crawl up, child!”

      I pulled myself up while Clarice pushed. In an instant, I was kneeling on the wide ledge.

      “What do you see?” my aunt demanded. “Is there a carriage?”

      I looked out onto the narrow Via de’ Ginori—deserted save for a peasant woman dragging two small children with her, and a motionless one-horse carriage sitting next to the curb.

      “Yes,” I called to her, then shouted and waved a hand at the carriage. Slowly, the horse lifted its hooves, and the wheels began to turn. When it finally arrived, the driver pulled so close to the wall that the wheels screeched against the stone.

      I looked over the roof of the stables as the gate squealed; it swung wide open as a small crowd swarmed onto the estate. A man pointed up at me and let go a shout; the crowd headed directly toward us.

      The driver, dressed in rumpled, oil-stained linen, stood up in his seat and stretched out his dirty hands to me. “Jump! I’ll catch you.”

      Behind me, Clarice lurched as she grabbed the wall’s edge; her panicked mount had taken a step away from the wall. I tried to pull her up but lacked the strength.

      I sucked in a great deep breath and leaped. The driver caught me easily and set me down beside him, then called to Clarice. I could see only her fingers and the backs of her hands—the right one purpled and swollen—where the fine bones stood out like ivory cords.

      “Hold on, Madonna, I’ll pull you over!”

      Our rescuer walked to the far edge of the driver’s box until his chest was pressed against the wall. He strained but could only brush Clarice’s fingertips.

      “God help me,” Clarice screamed, at the same time that her horse shrieked. Men shouted on the other side of the wall.

      “Get her! Hold her horse!”

      “Don’t let her escape!”

      In desperation, the driver climbed onto the roof of the carriage and, flexing his knees, bent from his waist to reach over the ledge and catch her arms. Clarice’s good hand caught hold of him; when he straightened, her face appeared over the top of the wall.

      She screamed again, in fury rather than fright; her shoulders dipped beneath the wall as the men on the other side pulled at her. “Bastards! Bastards! Let me go!”

      The driver staggered and almost fell, but pulled on her with such brute force that he fell back onto the carriage roof. Aunt Clarice came tumbling with him. The driver leaned down to examine her, but she sat up and struck him with her left hand.

      “Go!” she snarled. She clambered down the side of the carriage and pulled me inside to sit beside her. She was gasping and trembling with exhaustion; her hair was wild on her shoulders, and the back of her gown had been torn off, exposing her petticoat.

      She leaned out the door and shouted, “Out of the city, quickly! I’ll tell you then where we’re going!”

      She fell back against the seat and stared down at her injured wrist as if astonished that it had not betrayed her. Then she stared up at the dirty wooden interior; unlike me, she made no attempt to look back at the home she was leaving.

      “We’ll go to Naples,” she said, “to my mother’s family. But not today. They’ll expect us to go there.” Shivering but СКАЧАТЬ