The Warring States (The Wave Trilogy) (18 page)

‘Well, thank you,’ said Becket looking around. He leapt to his feet, hand on his sword. ‘What do you want?’

Uggeri didn’t frequent the Lion’s Fountain, or any other tavern, but more than one condottiere had learned not to cross this born fighter. He coolly indicated the bandieratoro beside him.

‘Your new brother-in-law, Tommaso Sorrento, wants to congratulate you.’ The boy was slightly older, but unlike Uggeri, he was quivering with fury, skin pale, lips tight as the grip on his flag.

‘What’s this about?’ Becket said indignantly, his blue eyes darting around the piazzetta to confirm the proportion of condottieri to bandieratori was in his favour.

It wasn’t hard to follow Becket’s calculations. Uggeri thumped his stick smartly on the cobblestones. ‘Keep swords and flags out of this. It’s very simple: Rosa Sorrento is waiting. Do the right thing. Give your son a name.’

‘Get lost before I spank you with the flat of my sword. I came here to drink, not listen to baseless accusations from impertinent boys.’

‘If you’re worried about money, Tower Sorrento’s doing well.’

‘Look, Rosa’s a friendly girl – if she said I showed her favour, then I can assure you I wasn’t the first. I’m a condottiere. I already have a worn-out saddle. Tommaso here will have to find another rube to marry his slut of a sister.’ He gestured wide. ‘Try any of these gentlemen. Their claim’s at least as good as mine.’

The condottiere’s speech had started with catcalls and hooting. It ended in a long silence. Uggeri alone did not look surprised. He stood to one side and gently led Tommaso forward, like a set-dancer swapping position. At Uggeri’s touch, Tommaso jerked to life and threw himself roaring at Becket, who, despite Uggeri’s advice, was unsheathing his sword even as he fell back in his chair. When he landed, his sword came free, but he had lost his grip. He reached for it, but Tommaso’s stick came down hard on his hand with a sound like thickly piled stones crunching. Becket screamed, but Tommaso was on him, using his legs to hold down Becket’s arms as he punched his face repeatedly.

Uggeri stood guard in case any condottiere attempted to aid their colleague. One of the three Becket was drinking with made a half-hearted lunge, but a swift parietal-tap dropped him. The other two leaped back, fumbling for their blades, as Uggeri vaulted over the table. He landed with a flourish, using his flag both to conceal his body and confuse their sense of space. Other condottieri tables were getting to their feet; he had to be quick. His foot sank into the first’s stomach, doubling him over into the end of a waiting flag. The stick rebounded and Uggeri turned it, catching the base against the second’s chin just as he was about to swing his sword.

Three down. Uggeri had always been dangerous, but under Sofia’s tutelage he’d become lethal. He glared at the other tables of condottieri. Those already standing exchanged glances and sat down to their drinks; clearly this was a family matter. For a minute there was no other sound in the piazzetta than the sweet, shrill cries of swallows and the wet, heavy rhythm of Tommaso beating Becket’s face to pulp.

‘Uggeri! Tommaso!’ Sofia shouted from a rooftop overlooking the piazzetta. ‘Flags
down.’
Uggeri swore under his breath and watched his teacher nimbly drop from construction hand-holds and windowsills to the ground. As she landed, Levi appeared from a northern alleyway, out of breath.

Uggeri blocked Levi’s way.

‘Stand aside,’ Levi said.

‘Your man took advantage of a Rasenneisi woman. This is justice.’

‘Justice is what your Podesta says it is. Stand aside!’

Uggeri’s flag went up, but Levi had been around Sofia too long to try a sword against a bandieratoro, or let him get any distance. He pushed the arm holding the stick aside and punched Uggeri hard in the face. The other condottieri had taken courage on seeing their leader arrive and now they
grabbed Uggeri’s arms as he stumbled back and pinned him to a table.

‘Tommaso,
basta!’
Sofia said. The bandieratoro looked up at her, his eyes dull, his face speckled with Becket’s blood, and drew back his fist again. Sofia kicked his exposed ribs and he fell off. She took a mug from a table and knocked back its contents as she walked to the fountain. She filled it with water, turned and poured it on Becket’s head. Enough blood washed off to reveal the landscape of swollen, broken skin.

She walked over to where the condottieri held Uggeri. ‘Let him go.’

They looked to Levi, who nodded.

Uggeri pulled his arms free and faced Sofia.

‘When are you going to get
smart?’
she hissed, ‘You’re not just embarrassing yourself, you’re embarrassing Tower Scaligeri – Doc’s tower!’

He was shorter than her, but he raised his chin defiantly. Sofia slapped him with an open palm. It was more noisy than painful, but there was enough boy in Uggeri yet to be shamed by the public admonition. With a glance at Levi, she grabbed Uggeri and led him away.

As Levi took Tommaso Sorrento by the arm, he realised the boy was numbed by what he’d done. He followed Sofia, pausing only to tell his men, ‘Wait for me back at the fortezza.
Dio Impestato!
You’ve better things to do in the middle of the day than drink!’ But he knew that wasn’t true. Just as he knew that an army without a war will soon invent one.

‘Sure you won’t take some wine? A little glass?’

Donna Soderini was younger than Donna Bombelli, but she didn’t look it. She dressed with the traditional simplicity of a carder’s wife, and had the usual pinched, hungry look. She had been a dyer before she married, and the alum and salt steam had wrought the usual damage on her lungs. She spoke in a breathless whisper. ‘All I ask is that you convince your husband.’

‘About what?’ said Fabbro, coming back into the courtyard of his palazzo.

The two women, who had been sitting at the banco, leapt up. The carder’s wife had the look of a discovered thief. ‘Gonfaloniere!’

‘Please, Donna Soderini – how many years have I known your husband? Call me Fabbro and tell me what problem’s so grave that you must enlist my wife’s help? I must have sinned grievously that you would set her tongue on me.’

His attempt to put the woman at ease failed. Donna Bombelli squeezed her hand and answered for her, ‘It’s simple,
amore
. Tower Soderini is having difficulty making ends meet on the money you pay.’

‘I pay fairly,’ Fabbro exclaimed. ‘When Pedro Vanzetti sold his wool contracts to me, he made me promise I would continue paying Guild rates. I’m a fair man so I agreed. What’s your complaint?’

The woman took a deep breath before letting the rehearsed
words tumble out. ‘You pay what was fair two years ago – even if bread still cost what it used to, now there are twice as many carders and spinners.’

‘And four times as much work! The rain falls on everyone.’

‘But it’s not distributed evenly.’

‘That’s my fault? I give work to those who deliver orders, on time and with good quality. Donna Soderini, your husband’s a good man – a reliable man. But his operation is, frankly, old-fashioned, and other towers win contracts that he might have. There are rewards for ambition.’

The woman’s face darkened at the implication that her husband’s problems were his own creation. ‘My husband does things the old way, to the Vanzetti standard. The new towers produce more wool, but the quality’s not there. Why should we be punished for doing good work?’

Fabbro almost laughed. ‘You’re looking at it the wrong way!’

Donna Bombelli looked at her husband with recrimination. ‘Fabbro, you’ve often said Rasenna’s reputation for quality is the only thing that lets us compete with Ariminum.’

‘It
was
the only thing. Now we have scale.’ Fabbro’s kindly manner was turning hostile. ‘So what do you want from me, Donna Soderini? More money? Then it comes from my pocket. I suppose that’s fairer?’

‘Oh, Fabbro! You know quite well there’s no comparison. You can trade in different cities according to demand. You can store merchandise until there’s a fair price. The Soderini don’t have that luxury. They have to sell their work at today’s price.’

Fabbro was piqued at his wife’s indiscretion. ‘I remind you, my little winter flower, who pays for your wardrobes of elegant furs, the feasts you throw, this palazzo. Would you rather Giuseppe Soderini got it instead? I have sacrificed the crutch of my old age, sending my boys to the four corners of the map to expand the Bombelli banco
and
Rasenna’s fortunes. I lose
shipments every month, to Tyrrhenian pirates, Anglish routiers, Frankish écorcheurs and Bavarian bandits.’

‘Fabbro, they’re all insured with Ariminumese brokers.’

‘Madonna!
Is this my wife or a communard before me? If I paid
your
husband more, Donna Soderini, how long before other towers came knocking? A week, perhaps? A day? No, the wool Guild sets prices, and sets them fairly.’

‘Fair to you,’ she said bitterly. ‘If we carders had a Guild we’d set a different price.’

Donna Bombelli turned around to stare at her friend. The silence was broken when Fabbro took a little bell and rang it.

Donna Bombelli took a step closer to her husband and said, ‘Only the Signoria can create a Guild.’

‘But only Guild members sit in the Palazzo del Popolo,’ the woman protested.

‘The Signoria can only function if it represents those with a stake in society,’ said Fabbro paternally. ‘Come, if every crumbling tower with nothing to lose had a say, how long before Rasenna came to ruin? They’d make decisions on a whim.’

‘That’s what Lord Morello used to say.’

Fabbro’s fat cheeks glowed like an anvil. ‘Things are different now! We’re not nobles trading on dead names. We’re men who prosper by wit and graft.’

‘—who’ve cleverly arranged it so that others cannot!’

‘Donna Soderini, does your husband know you’re here?’ said Donna Bombelli coldly.

Fabbro stood and walked around his banco. ‘I thought not.’ He took the woman’s hands gently. ‘I suggest you attend to your children. If your husband wishes to, he can petition the Signoria.’

‘One carder’s petition will not be heard.’

‘Your cynicism pains me, but that’s his only option.’

A servant appeared. ‘You rang, sir?’

‘Show this
lady
out.’

Donna Soderini recognised her escort as a former Morello bandieratoro. Serving the new elite was more lucrative than the workshops.

After she’d gone, Donna Bombelli shot an angry look at her husband. ‘She went too far with that Guild business, but how shameful to turn her away without a single soldi! That’s all she wanted, a little.’

‘To hell with them! The Small People are suspicious of all wealth except the inherited type. They bent the knee to the Families without a word of protest, but me, because I’m not a Fraticelli throwing away my worldly goods, I’m a bloodsucker! Is it a crime to be a businessman?’

‘No, but you’re also Gonfaloniere. Tower Soderini isn’t unique – how will it look to your fancy Ariminumese friends when they see beggars walking our streets? You used to rail against the Families arranging things in the old Signoria, yet you’re deaf to the same complaint.’

‘Oh, don’t be melodramatic. I see where Maddalena gets it.’

‘Ha!
Your
daughter has been giving herself airs since you were elected. Since the boys left you’ve spoiled her – it’s bad enough how she treats the servants; you should have heard the way she spoke to Sofia Scaligeri today.’

‘I’m sure the Contessa gave as good as she got.’

‘I don’t know what you have against that girl.’

‘You don’t find it telling who she picked for capomaestro? Uggeri Galati has an interesting résumé: that cherub was one of Gaetano Morello’s crew – he tried to shake me down once, have you forgotten that?’

‘Everyone
did things they’re not proud of under the Families. Doc Bardini trusted him.’

‘And that’s a recommendation these days? Not all of us go along with Doc Bardini’s post-mortem beatification.’

‘He gave his life, Fabbro! Sofia sacrificed, too. If she hadn’t renounced her title you wouldn’t have yours now.’ She saw Fabbro frown. ‘That’s it, isn’t it? You can’t stand owing anyone. Funny that someone who collects debtors like you can never forgive a favour.’

‘I see Donna Soderini hasn’t been the only one whispering in your ear.’

‘If Maddalena had half Sofia’s character we’d be lucky. You spoiled her.’

‘What are children for?’ Fabbro said laughing. He put his hand on her round belly. ‘I solemnly swear to spoil this fellow too.’

‘I don’t know why you think it’s a boy. I tell you, Fabbro, I’m too old for this.’

‘Nonsense. You’re too old to bear them only when you’re too old to beget them.’

As his wife laughed, Fabbro looked in the direction Donna Soderini had left.
‘Amore
, w
hy
must you patronise these people? You shouldn’t give them false hope just because it pleases your vanity to play intercessionry saint.’

Her smile vanished. ‘Better than playing God and creating enemies for our tower.
These people
are Rasenneisi, and when they quarrel, towers burn. The Gonfaloniere ought to be a shepherd to
all
towers, not just his cronies’.’

Fabbro was about to reply when the servant returned. ‘Gonfaloniere, there’s been an incident at the Lion’s Fountain. The Contessa’s man, young Galati, he beat a soldier rather badly.’

‘Did he now?’ Fabbro put on his chains of office while treating his wife to a telling look.