Torrent (9 page)

“I am dead already.” He looked to me and then closed his eye in pain.

I glanced at Mom, silently asking her for her assessment, as she finished pressing into his belly.

“I think he’s bleeding inside,” she said bitterly, in English. “His belly is distended but hard as a rock. They have beaten him relentlessly,” she continued, switching to Italian. “You must not let them take Gabi.” Maybe seeing Fortino made it all the more real to her. It was one thing to hear of being thrown into a cage and being exposed to the elements. But to see the effects of a physical beating? Her face was stricken—half out of rage over Fortino, half out of panic for me. And Dad was right behind her.

“I will fight it with everything in me,” Marcello promised them.

“M’lord,” said Ascoli, coming closer. “Shall we begin?”

“In a moment.”

Clearly irritated, the small man reluctantly turned away, edging past Luca, Lia, and my father, who had joined our circle.

“Fortino,” Marcello said gently, squeezing his hand.

Fortino stirred, as if he might have fallen asleep for a moment. His good eye blinked open. “You have been a fine brother, Marcello. The best any man could ever ask for.”

Marcello stared at him for a moment and swallowed hard, acknowledging his farewell. “As have you,” he said at last.

“Honor our father’s name.”

“With everything in me,” Marcello pledged. He swallowed hard. “I shall miss you, brother.”

A tiny smile lifted Fortino’s lips, and he looked to me. “Find distraction in Gabriella. She was always meant for you.”

“Well I know it,” Marcello said, smiling too.

But then Fortino was asleep—unconscious?—closing his eye. Marcello hesitated and then leaned forward to put his ear to his brother’s mouth, listening. “He yet lives,” he whispered. In an instant his expression turned from agonizing grief to fierce determination. He rose and assisted me up too, then paused to whisper something in Luca’s ear.

With that we proceeded over to a long table.

“You shall be expected to stand behind my chair,” he said in my ear.

I nodded, shoving down a wave of aggravation.
So the boys will sit down and chat for hours, and the women are expected to stand?
But I’d promised to stay by his side…so I went and did as was expected. Everyone was seated, and yet there was one open chair. But did they offer it to me? No way.

Yeah, not everything in Medieval-ville was cool. Women’s rights were a ways off. A long ways off.

My eyes followed the direction of Lord Ascoli’s gesture.

The guards opened the tall doors, and through them strode Lord Cosmo Paratore.

I stared at him, openmouthed for a second, panic stalling my heart and then sending it into a rapid
thud-thud-thud.

Marcello saw him then and abruptly stood, taking a half step between me and the man who surely wanted to see me dead. “Lord Ascoli,” Marcello sputtered. “How could you invite such—such—
vermin
inside your city walls?” He said it to our host, but he looked to Lord Greco, who was sitting back and casually eating a date. Was Greco putting on an act? Or had he known?

“Cease your theatrics, Marcello,” Cosmo Paratore said, sitting down and gesturing toward Marcello’s empty chair. “Come, let us speak of what is to be done, once and for all.”

Marcello put his fists on the table and leaned menacingly toward the man, with an unwavering stare. “Order the release of my brother as well as my rightful property. Retreat to the border that was established by our grandfathers.
That
is what can be done.”

Cosmo arched a brow and reached for a date; then, for the first time, he allowed his eyes to go to me. He’d let his hair grow long, covering his damaged ears. The ears I’d ordered cut from his head. His green eyes were bright with interest. He pursed his lips. “I notice that in your demands you do not plead for your lady’s hand, her safety,” he said, biting into the date.

Marcello faltered, embarrassed. It wasn’t part of the plan. I knew that. I knew it. But it still stung. Just as Paratore hoped it would. He knew something was up. As did Ascoli. My heart settled into a triple-time beat. We were in trouble. Big trouble.

“We are here,” Marcello said belatedly, “solely to negotiate Fortino’s release, one way or another.” He paused, took a breath, then sat down and looked toward Lord Greco. Like a man now, not a boy begging for a chance. “I am prepared to offer Firenze a chest full of gold in exchange for my brother,” Marcello said. “And our mediator ten percent for his trouble.” He glanced at Lord Ascoli. The man gave him a regal nod, barely hiding his smile.

“Unacceptable,” said Paratore, beside Rodolfo.

“It was made clear that we would exchange Lord Fortino Forelli only for the Ladies Betarrini,” said another short lord. I tried to remember his name. He was one of the grandi I’d met in Firenze.

“Surely you don’t believe I will hand them over to you. My brother is barely alive, so poorly has he been treated!” Marcello growled.

Lord
Barbato
, I finally remembered. He was short and scruffy, with a beard that was closely trimmed over a rounded chin. I remembered that I thought of him as a terrier the first time we met in Firenze. All high energy and ego. It was easier to focus on him than my enemy, Cosmo Paratore.

“Fortino’s imprisonment has long spared your people further battle,” Barbato said simply. “The people’s fury was assuaged by punishment meted out to him.”

“The people?” Marcello challenged. “Or her governors?”

“Both,” Barbato returned easily.

Marcello took a deep breath and placed his hands on the table, palms down, as if steeling himself. “Such is the terrible price some of us must pay,” he said carefully. “Fortino knew it as well as I. But you’ve extracted his worth and more. To take home my gold, enough gold to feed a thousand families for a year, is more than fair in exchange for allowing us to take him home to die. The Ladies Betarrini are no longer a part of this bargain.”

Lord Barbato considered him, then looked down the table. All of them slowly shook their heads, including Lord Greco. Cosmo Paratore simply wore a small smile directed at me that said
You are sooo in trouble.
His confidence sent a shiver of fear down my back. Were our hosts truly neutral? Or were they on the side of the Firenze, ultimately?

Barbato looked back to Marcello. “We must adhere to the original terms that brought us to this table. We cannot return to Firenze with anything less.”

Lord Ascoli, at the head of the table, cleared his throat. “The original terms, Lord Forelli. Your brother in exchange for Lady Gabriella and Lady Evangelia Betarrini.”

Marcello let out a scoffing sound. “It would be one thing if you were offering my brother, well and whole. If he had been treated as a nobleman ought in this past year.” He lowered his voice. “But you have brought me little more than his corpse.”

I winced, hoping his lowered voice wouldn’t carry over to Fortino, still over at the edge of the hall with my family. But I suspected it was nothing Fortino himself wouldn’t have said in order to negotiate more powerfully. He’d know Marcello said such things not to be unkind, but to further their joint cause.

The men of Firenze shared a look. Lord Barbato glanced at Paratore and Greco and then gave Ascoli a nod.
Some sort of prearranged signal.
I tensed.

“They understand your frustration,” said Lord Ascoli soothingly. “And therefore shall only require Lady Gabriella in exchange for Lord Fortino.” By his tone you would have thought he was offering a case of Turkish apricots in exchange for a case of plain old apples. Like it was a huge favor, taking me off Marcello’s hands.

It took one look at Paratore to make my stomach turn. He was grinning.

“We could have demanded all three of the Ladies Betarrini,” said Lord Barbato, casting an eye toward my mom. That put Dad over the edge. He took a step forward, his face hardening. “But we knew that would have been too much,” Barbato went on. “We are reasonable people. Don’t forget, we were once your friends.”

Yeah, those days are seriously over.

“We recognize that it is a great sacrifice to give us Lady Gabriella,” he continued with a nod in my direction, “which is precisely what is required to consider this exchange at all. Firenze’s people will not abide by us merely
giving
you Lord Fortino. An eye for an eye, you know.”

“You’ve literally taken an eye and more,” Marcello ground out. “Even one of these fine women is far too great a price in exchange for what remains of my brother, and you know it.”

“Take your brother home, where he can breathe his last in Siena,” urged Lord Greco.

“His last,” Paratore echoed in a whisper, tracing the edge of his goblet.

“To take him
home,
” Marcello said to Greco, “I’d have to take him to Castello Forelli.”

Lord Barbato hesitated. “We are prepared to offer you Castello Forelli as well as Lord Fortino in exchange for Lady Gabriella.”

Marcello stilled.

Seriously? In exchange for me?
I groaned, inwardly.
These guys want me bad.
Far more than we expected.
Not that I was flattered. There was only one reason they wanted me—to humiliate Marcello and Siena. And any way you cut it, that couldn’t be good news.

Marcello flicked his fingers away. “Keep Castello Forelli. I now have a much finer home in the palazzo vacated by the traitor.”

Way to go! Throw
’
em off—make ’em think we don’t care about Castello Forelli.

Lord Barbato leaned forward on the table, hands clasped before him. “It is clear to us that you have great feelings for Lady Gabriella.”

Marcello studied him for a moment, then glanced back at me and offered his hand. I looked down at him and slipped my fingers into his. “’Tis no secret that the lady holds my heart,” he said to them.

“So is it that you fear that Lady Gabriella will be tortured as your brother has been?”

“That is but
part
of my trepidation about releasing her to you, but yes.” He was milking the conversation, drawing them out, getting us closer to nightfall, closer to the point when we’d have a chance to make a run for it.

“We are noblemen,” Paratore said, waving in either direction along the table. “She shall be treated with respect.”

I almost laughed out loud. It took everything in me to pretend I was every inch a medieval lady who knew her place.

“I released her from a
cage
the last time I was in Firenze,” Marcello bit out, returning his focus to them. “Your
noblemen
left her to die in it—you, Lord Barbato, and you, Lord Greco—without water and food. She suffered through nights in the cold. Untold humiliation. You believe I will take you at your word when you tell me she shall be treated with
respect?”

The Fiorentini were silent for a moment.

“There is a perfect solution,” Lord Barbato said carefully.

“And what is that?”

Barbato glanced down the table at Rodolfo. “Lord Greco has generously offered to take Lady Gabriella’s hand in marriage.”

We froze. All except Dad. “
Scusa un’attimo
—” he demanded, striding forward.
Now, see here…

“
Ben!”
Mom called.

But it was too late. I groaned inwardly; Dad had tolerated the fake potential prisoner exchange deal, but once we started talkin’ marriage…he was undone. Two burly guards grabbed hold of Dad’s arms and, with a nod from Lord Ascoli, escorted Dad out. “I’ve heard quite enough!” he shouted over his shoulder. “Only I may grant Gabriella’s hand in marriage to anyone! She is not some sort of chattel to be bartered off—”

The doors shut behind him, and his shouts were muffled. Mom was standing by the doors, a hand over her mouth.
Great, now we’re gonna have to free Dad from some sort of cell…

Lord Barbato cocked a brow and glanced at his cohorts. “The Normans. You would think they knew the ways of war by now.”

Paratore laughed and said, “Lady Gabriella is hardly the virgin daughter of nobility, awaiting her groom—”

Marcello shoved back his chair and stood so suddenly it fell over, almost knocking me over with it. Luca and his men were only a half second behind, the others gathering behind us.

The Fiorentini rose too, and the Sansicinian guards behind both sides, and then it was a total glare-fest for a long, tense moment. Like the second before two hockey teams gave in to their pent-up anger and just went at it.

“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” soothed Lord Ascoli. “I’m certain Lord Paratore did not mean to question Lady Gabriella’s, ahh,
purity
. He merely refers to the fact that she has been as fierce an opponent on the battlefield as any man. Hardly the sort of woman we are used to encountering.”