City of Flowers (8 page)

‘You may leave,' he said. But after the Eel had gone, he said to himself in a ghastly voice, ‘He is quite right. I shall take a wife. And I know just the woman.'

Chapter 6

Wedding Dresses

‘Now we need to get out of the city,' said Sulien, when he and Sky had left the maze. He led the boy through the two cloisters to where a cart stood harnessed to two patient old horses in the cobbled yard.

‘Where are we going?' asked Sky, surprised when Sulien motioned him up on to the seat and prepared to drive himself.

‘To visit some more brothers up on the hill in Colle Vernale,' said Sulien, flicking the reins. ‘We have plants to collect.'

It was an hour's ride, on the flat at first, but harder as they climbed the winding road round a steep hill to the north-east of Giglia. The views were fantastic from the city side of the hill, the whole of Giglia dominated by the great Cathedral of the Lily and its huge dome. The air was a lot fresher than in the valley too and Sky breathed in the scent of flowers from the fields around.

He had never made a journey pulled by horses before; it made the whole pace of life seem slower and, as the cart moved steadily up the hill, Sky had the strangest feeling that his heart rate was slowing too, as it had in the maze. Sulien gave him a quizzical sideways look.

‘How are you finding life in the sixteenth century?' he asked. ‘We do things very differently from in your world, if the glimpses I've had of it recently are anything to go by.'

‘It's weird,' admitted Sky. ‘I'd have expected to find it a bit tame, but there seems to be so much going on. Tell me more about the dangers.'

‘We take a long time to learn,' said Sulien, shaking his head. ‘Family vendettas like that between the Nucci and the di Chimici go on for generations, sometimes bubbling underground, sometimes bursting out into violence and murder. At the moment the whole city feels like a cauldron, heating up to boiling point. These weddings provide the perfect opportunity for crime. The city will be full of strangers, the bridal procession will be through streets thronged with spectators, well-wishers and citizens, and no amount of city-guards could possibly keep an eye on all the crowds. It will mean that a single man armed with a dagger would be able to settle old scores.'

‘And where do the Stravaganti come in?' asked Sky.

‘There will be at least six in the city,' said Sulien. ‘You, me and Giuditta and the three from Bellezza – Rodolfo, Luciano and Doctor Dethridge himself. It is our job to do what the guards cannot – protect the Duchessa of Bellezza and try to keep the peace for everyone else. And keep out of the Duke's way as much as possible, since he is against the Stravaganti.'

‘And what am I supposed to do that you others can't?'

‘That I do not know. Keep your eyes open and wait for the right opportunity,' said the friar. ‘I'm sure it will come – otherwise you wouldn't be here – and I'm almost certain it will be at the weddings.'

*

Francesca di Chimici and the young Duchessa had rather surprisingly become good friends. The first time they had met had been when the young princess from Bellona had been forced to stand against Arianna in the election after the old Duchessa's ‘assassination'. Forced too into marrying old Councillor Albani, from whom she had later been freed by the Pope's annulment.

But when they had next met, during the visit of Prince Gaetano to court the Duchessa in Bellezza, Arianna had softened towards the young woman she had been taught to think of as an enemy. It was clear that Francesca was both very unhappy and in love with Prince Gaetano herself, and Arianna had done everything she could to put the two cousins in each other's way.

And when Gaetano, acting under his father's orders in Remora, had finally brought himself to ask Arianna to marry him, she had been happy to refuse and glad to see the light in his eyes as she sent him off to ask Francesca instead. Arianna liked Gaetano very much, something that made her more open to the idea that there were sympathetic di Chimici, but she didn't want to marry him.

Arianna and Francesca had travelled back to Bellezza at the same time and had become friends during the time that the di Chimici princess was packing up her belongings and extricating herself from Albani's house, before going back to Bellona.

And now she was in Bellezza again, as the Duchessa's guest. They never talked about politics and Francesca had no idea that Arianna's mother was still alive; even Gaetano didn't know that. Instead, they were in deep discussion about clothes.

‘I didn't get a proper wedding last time,' said Francesca. ‘And I hoped for something rather splendid in Giglia, but now we have to share the day with Gaetano's two brothers and cousin Alfonso, it's going to be a bit of a circus. Four couples – can you imagine? It would not have been my preference to share the day with three other brides!'

‘But you will be the prettiest, I'm sure,' said Arianna, adjusting her green silk mask.

‘Oh, as to that, I don't care,' said Francesca, tossing her black hair as well as she could for its pins and braids. ‘But Gaetano and I will be the least important couple in the cathedral. And I did so want it to be special.'

‘Nonsense!' said Arianna firmly. ‘You will be the most important to each other – and to me. I don't know the Duke of Volana or his duchess-to-be and I've met Prince Fabrizio and Carlo only briefly and never seen their brides. I'm sure they are all very good-looking and important, but you and Gaetano are the only di Chimici who are my friends.'

Francesca flashed her a grateful smile.

‘I've had an idea,' said Arianna. ‘What were you planning to wear?'

*

Sulien and Sky drew into a small village, the horses sweating and panting. ‘It will be a lot easier for them on the way back,' said the friar. ‘It will be downhill all the way and my plants make one of the lightest loads for a beast of burden.'

After a few minutes' rest, he urged the two nags up a steep side path out of Colle Vernale to a friary at the very top of the hill. From the quiet grassy terrace outside, the view over the countryside was spectacular. Sky could see not only the city and its cathedral dome, snug in the valley, but the great river Argento which fed it, snaking down from the distant mountains. If he screwed up his eyes, Sky could trace the blue thread of it right back up to its source.

‘The Argento is running high for this time of year,' said Sulien, following the line of his gaze.

‘It's fantastic up here!' said Sky. ‘Everything so far away but so clear. I feel as if I could touch the campanile of the cathedral if I just reached out a bit.'

Sulien smiled. ‘Not yet,' he said. ‘You are still a very new Stravagante.'

A brown-robed friar came bustling out to greet them.

‘Welcome, welcome,' he said. ‘Welcome to San Francesco.'

The friar must mean his Friary of Saint Francis, Sky thought. So Dominicans wore black and white and Franciscans wore brown. Just how many more religious orders were there to learn?

After introductions and instructions to a novice of his own to look after the horses, Brother Martino led them into his little church, which was cool after the sunshine and smelt of incense and candlewax. But they didn't linger there, crossing rapidly to a door into a cloister. When Brother Martino opened it, Sky was blinded by the light, overwhelmed by aromatic scents and almost deafened by the sound of birdsong.

The cloister was a herb garden. It was smaller than even the Lesser Cloister at Saint-Mary-among-the-Vines, and arranged around a fountain, whose spray sparkled in the sunlight. Low hedges clipped firmly into shape surrounded the herb beds. The wall nearest the church was one huge aviary, in which little birds like finches twittered and flew, singing at full throat.

Martino stopped to pull a pouch of seed from his belt of white rope and filled the feeders. The tuneful song immediately turned to squawking and squabbling.

The friars left the noisy cloister and entered the refectory, where Martino offered the Giglian visitors cold grape juice from a terracotta pitcher. Sky gulped it thirstily.

When they were refreshed, they went out to a yard behind the friary, where the horse cart was being loaded up by young friars. Hessian sacks gave off pungent and spicy scents.

‘Fennel,' said Sulien, consulting a list. ‘Lemon balm, valerian, pennywort, mallow, mint, burdock, borage, dandelion, bergamot.' He walked around the cart, crushing dried leaves between his brown fingers, and tying sacks tighter.

Sky was feeling dizzy. The smells reminded him of home and his mother's herb-based oils. What was he doing here, high up above a Renaissance city, wearing a friar's robe?

‘The flowers are brought to me from all the meadows around Giglia,' said Brother Sulien. ‘But the herbs I collect from Colle Vernale myself. I trust no one else to bring them to me with their properties undiminished.'

*

‘Will you let me help you?' Arianna asked Francesca. ‘My grandmother lives on one of the islands and makes exquisite lace. She makes it for all the most beautiful wedding dresses in the lagoon and can create any design. Shall we go there and ask her to make yours? I should love to give you your dress as my wedding present. And I haven't been to Burlesca for a long time.'

*

Camillo Nucci had an interest in herbs and plants himself, at least the poisonous variety. He had been brought up to hate the di Chimici family and he saw himself as the natural avenger of all his clan's insults and slights at their hands, not to mention the murders for which Duke Niccolò's family were responsible. It didn't bother Camillo that the di Chimici were growing in power and spreading over Talia; he wasn't interested in politics. All he wanted to do was even the score.

The upcoming weddings would provide perfect cover for an attempt on the di Chimici; the city was already filling up with merchants and pilgrims for Easter, and the public celebrations for the princes' marriage would only increase the numbers. Who could say whether a particular poison introduced into a di Chimici dish had come from within the city or from one of their many enemies from beyond Giglia?

Now he was closeted with an old monk from Volana, discussing with him the properties of the wild mushrooms that grew in the fields and forests around the city. But he had not noticed a scruffy street boy, who had trailed him to the family's old palazzo up near Saint-Mary-among-the-Vines and was now listening through a crack in the door.

‘Now why does Camillo Nucci want to know about poisonous mushrooms?' Sandro asked himself. He made a mental note to pass this on to the Eel, then set off in search of Brother Tino.

*

The boatman rowed the Duchessa and her friend out across the lagoon to Burlesca. He was doing double duty as a guard, and the Duchessa also had a young Cavaliere with her, armed with a wicked-looking merlino-dagger. Luciano carried his weapon openly, but only he knew that Arianna had one of her own tucked into a garter. Her foster-brothers, true to an old promise, had given it to her when she turned sixteen, and Luciano had no doubt that she would use it if attacked.

‘I came here with Gaetano last year,' said Francesca, happy at the memory.

Luciano looked at her curiously. Francesca never referred to the fact that her husband-to-be had been courting another woman the previous summer, a woman who was rapidly becoming her closest female friend. He himself had been all too aware of it, during the weeks when he had been in Remora, unsure whether Arianna would accept the di Chimici prince. His feelings about it hadn't been uncomplicated either, since he liked Gaetano, and had been having his own adventures with Georgia, the Stravagante. Not romantic ones, but their shared status as Stravaganti made their relationship special and had given him an insight into why the company of a Duke's son might be pleasant to a Duchess.

‘Look, there's their house,' said Arianna. ‘The white one among all the colours.'

The boat moored in the harbour and the young people moved through the village, receiving interested glances. Two good-looking women, richly dressed, both masked, were bound to attract attention.

‘That's the young Duchessa,' was the whisper. ‘Come to see her grandparents, no doubt.'

Paola Bellini sat outside her whitewashed cottage as usual, with her lace cushion. She had been mother and grandmother to a Duchessa, but had no desire to live anywhere grander than the little white house that had been her home for the last fifty years.