The Boy with the Porcelain Blade (35 page)

37

Beyond Shattered
THE GREAT HALL OF HOUSE ERUDITO
–
Febbraio
315

The grand hall of House Erudito had been one of the last additions to the complex that was Demesne. Erudito was the youngest of the four houses, formed at the express wish of the king, and less a branch of nobility, more a caste of the finest and most learned minds. Erudito was everything the king cared for and all he aspired to. The grand hall by extension was a perfect study of the king’s ego and narcissism, made all the more strange by his increasingly reclusive behaviour. His absence from Demesne was total by the time the craftsmen filed out, work complete.

Black diamonds and cream squares tiled the floor, meticulously waxed and polished by the household staff. A triptych of the king in a saintly robe stared down from the frescoed ceiling fifty feet above. In the first of the pictures he stood over the shipwrecks of legend, a yellow nimbus circling his head. The second picture showed him overseeing swarthy men at work on the foundations of King’s Keep. The third section showed the king’s coronation, the nimbus at his head now supplemented by a silver crown. The triptych was usually overlooked in favour of the splendour of the floor-to-ceiling stained-glass window. Another rendering of the king looked down in benevolence upon the room, cherubs fluttering at his shoulders, wolfhounds flanking his heels. In his left hand he held a sword, in his right a sheaf of wheat. Fertile fields and the outline of Demesne stood in the background. The craftsmanship was breathtaking, the composition of the image immaculate, the angle of the window perfect for catching the rays of the rising sun.

Except no one was paying attention to the window because they were arguing heatedly among themselves. Lucien wasn’t sure if Rafaela was supporting him, or vice versa; he only knew they’d dragged themselves through the winding corridors of Demesne trying to find everyone. They looked on with weary detachment as the throng occupying the hall squabbled and bickered.

Angelicola sprawled on the floor like a drunk, his face in his hands, while Duchess Prospero and Stephania seethed at each other nearby. The
capo de custodia
looked on impotently as mother and daughter aired their grievances.

Elsewhere Giancarlo argued with Lord and Lady Contadino. Massimo lurked at the viscount’s shoulder, his eyes fixed on Giancarlo’s student, Carmine. The youths’ hands rested on the hilts of their swords, quietly threatening, violence waiting to be let off the leash.

Nardo, struggling to get at Duke and Duchess Fontein, was being restrained by a clutch of farmers. The elderly pair looked on aghast as the messenger shouted accusations of their complicity in his sister’s abduction.

Mistress Corvo, for want of inclusion in the drama, was scolding Virmyre for being drunk. Russo, on the other hand, was keeping six guardsmen at bay with her acid tongue. The guards seemed intent on arresting Franco a second time, and mostly likely would have if not for Dino and Anea, who flanked Russo with crossed arms and sullen expressions.

Adding to the uproar were a smattering of aides and officials, notaries and even domestic staff from various households. Nobles from minor houses had also come, apparently just to watch and wary of being drawn in. D’arzenta and Ruggeri stood off to one side, keeping their own counsel, both dressed formally yet armed. Maestro Cherubini stood with them, a pained expression on his round face. He wrung his hands above his large stomach, rings glittering on chubby fingers.

The noise began to subside.

Voice by voice, each accuser or defender fell silent, each argument discarded, each slight forgotten. All eyes turned toward the two figures in the doorway. Lucien realised he’d not taken the scabbard from Golia’s corpse and so was not able to sheath the sword. He’d been holding one blade or another for so long now it felt like a natural extension of him. One he was keen to be free of.

Giancarlo stood on a chair at the opposite end of the room. ‘There he is. The exile. Guards, arrest him at once and we can lay this business to rest.’

The guards advanced, but very slowly. Whatever they’d heard about Lucien in the last two days filled them with trepidation.

‘ ”This business”?’ said Lucien, surprised at the strength in his own voice. Every eye rested on him, every ear bent toward him. ‘Let me tell you about the “business” of Demesne.’

The guards faltered, their curiosity piqued. Some looked back at Giancarlo but most focused their attention at the gore-slicked Orfano standing before them. The hall was quiet except for Dottore Angelicola, who sobbed into his hands quietly.

‘You stand accused of the murder of four Orfani and a litany of other crimes.’ Giancarlo remained on the chair, looking ridiculous and pugnacious in equal measure.

‘It would have been five Orfani, wouldn’t it, Giancarlo? Except Dino didn’t die that night. He had a decoy in his bed. Anea you simply threw in the oubliette. No stomach for killing women, eh? I’d been exiled by that point, to be hunted down in the countryside, out of sight.’

‘Lies,’ snapped Giancarlo. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

Lucien removed his arm from around Rafaela’s shoulder and tried to stand up a bit straighter. The pain of his wounds showed on his face. Rafaela nodded her encouragement.

‘There’s much that goes on in the countryside, out of sight,’ said Lucien, turning to the members of the crowd closest to him. ‘The Domo sent men to capture Salvaggia, Rafaela’s sister.’ He pointed at the shorn woman in the dirty shift. ‘But they took the wrong woman. That’s why I came back.’

All eyes turned to Rafaela, who stared at Giancarlo with unbridled disgust. People gasped as they recognised her. Lucien limped forward a few steps, the crowd parting in front of him, rapt.

‘And it’s not the first time a girl has gone missing around her eighteenth birthday, is it? Nardo’s sister Navilia was taken some years back.’

The messenger set his eyes on Giancarlo, his face ashen.

‘In fact,’ continued Lucien, ‘I’d say these abductions occur every three years or so.’

‘Silence!’ Roared the
superiore
from the chair. ‘I said arrest him.’

But the guards still didn’t move.

‘All so the king can carry out his monstrous experiments.’ Lucien limped forward, his gaze locked on Giancarlo’s panicked eyes.

‘This is treason!’ spluttered the
superiore
. ‘The king’s name will not be defamed in such a way.’

‘The king is dead,’ said Lucien. The hall filled with the sound of gasping. Mistress Corvo and Duchess Prospero fanned themselves and played at feeling faint. Someone fetched the dance teacher a chair and she all but collapsed into it.

‘I said arrest him,’ thundered Giancarlo, now red-faced with fury. The guards roused themselves and pushed through the crowd, but when they arrived in front of Lucien they found their path blocked. D’arzenta and Ruggeri had both drawn steel and were adopting stances of casual violence. Lord Contadino stood alongside them, sword in hand. Not a ceremonial blade, Lucien noted. Massimo was as ever at his master’s elbow, his own finely crafted blade drawn, looking as if he wanted to fight all six guards single-handed. Dino had drawn the sword from the cane and was sighting down the length of the weapon at the guard in front of him, a cool sneer on his lips. Anea had wrested the halberd from Franco and stood closest of all to Lucien, green eyes narrowed above her veil. She ignored the guards, eyes intent on Giancarlo, who withered under her accusing gaze. Nardo joined them, bearing only a knife but bristling with tear-stained ferocity.

‘This is a coup,’ shouted Giancarlo, his voice breaking.

‘No.’ Lucien’s smile was thin and bitter. ‘You were the one attempting a coup. You wanted to install Golia as your puppet king on orders from the Majordomo.’

‘What is this about, Lucien?’ said Virmyre. ‘What experiments has the king been doing?’

‘I’m not sure about the experiments themselves, only that the results of those experiments stand before you. The Orfano. The king has been trying to breed an heir according to some insane design of his own. The Majordomo decided it was going to be Golia.’

‘And he will make a fine king,’ said Giancarlo.

‘No—’ Lucien shook his head sadly ‘—he won’t.’

The blood drained from Giancarlo’s face. ‘You… you killed Golia?’

‘He took Rafaela hostage on the roof of the
sanatorio
. But you already know that because you gave him the order.’

Giancarlo shook his head, wanting to unhear the words.

‘You killed him?’

‘Actually it was me,’ said Rafaela defiantly, reddened hands testament to the fact.

Giancarlo’s shoulders slumped and he laid his trembling hand on the hilt of his sword. Lucien turned back to Virmyre.

‘Some of the Orfani were so twisted, so deformed, they stood no chance of a normal life. I found one living on the rooftops, no doubt stealing food to survive. Another lived behind the graveyard; yet more are imprisoned in the oubliette. The Orfani’s mothers were sent to the
sanatorio
to rot in obscurity. The Domo had the perfect cover if any escaped and tried to explain: he’d say they were afflicted by madness, had imagined all of it.’

Angelicola stopped his sobbing at this point. He looked up at Lucien with a pained look in his eyes.

‘There’s your proof.’ Lucien pointed his sword at the broken
dottore.
‘His mind’s gone with the strain of delivering the king’s bastards.’

‘If anyone’s mind has gone, it is yours, Master Lucien,’ spluttered Giancarlo.

Lucien and his ring of protectors had advanced up the room. The guards opposing them had melted back into the crowd, unsure of who was in control any more. Lucien was now only feet away from Giancarlo, who surrendered his vantage point on the chair.

‘My mind is just fine,’ replied Lucien. ‘You’ve spent most of your life trying to break my spirit, even kill me, but my mind is perfectly intact, I can assure you. I unravelled the king’s sick scheme and now the Majordomo is finished.’ Lucien limped closer. ‘You’re the last of them, Superiore. The last of the conspirators.’ He pointed with one finger. ‘You had me exiled and I will have satisfaction.’

Giancarlo took a half-step back. He smiled and drew his sword.

‘You can’t possibly think to defeat me. Look at you – you’re half-dead. You’ll never best me with a blade, you
strega
bastard.’

He was right of course. Lucien
was
half dead. The testing, the fight on the rooftop, the horsemen on the road, his beating at the hands of Raul da Costa’s idiot son-in-law. All of these exchanges had cost him dearly. His body was a litany of abrasions and cuts; he was attired in a motley of bruises and dried blood. Facing the Domo not once but twice had all but broken him, and then he’d fought the king and been poisoned by Golia.

He was beyond shattered.

And there was the small issue that he’d never once bested the
superiore
, not with a blade at least.

Lucien threw up a parry, turning aside a thrust from the
superiore
, saw the hatred in his eyes.

‘You’re a liar!’ bellowed Giancarlo. Lucien’s fingers weakened on the hilt of his sword as the blades met. The weapon had been Golia’s; the
superiore
knew it all too well.

‘You’re a murderer!’ Another blow. No finesse, just manic intensity.

The unfamiliar blade all but tumbled from Lucien’s grasp. Lucien thrust, not content just to react.

‘You’re a
strega
!’

A deafening clang. Golia’s blade spun across the tiles. Lucien looked down at his hand, the fingers numb. He was almost too tired to be afeared, too exhausted to be shocked. His legs betrayed him and he fell, waiting for the killing blow, one arm held up, a pitiful shield. Giancarlo grinned and lunged in.

The
superiore
’s body collapsed to the floor.

There was a wet thud as his head landed a few feet away, coming to rest at the feet of Mistress Corvo, who fainted clean away, dissolving from her chair, a collection of limbs in black.

All eyes turned.

Anea stood glowering at everyone, Franco’s halberd in her hands. She threw it down with naked disgust, before conjuring her book, then scribbled a message. Virmyre approached her and accepted the book, clearing his throat. A pause, then a raised eyebrow. He turned to her. She nodded in response to his enquiring stare.

‘Lady Anea Erudito wishes it to be known that the next person to use the word
strega
will, and I quote, “have their fucking head cut off”.’

There were no dissenting voices.

Lucien pushed himself to his feet despite gravity’s best efforts to retain him.

Virmyre extended a hand. ‘I see you’ve lost my sword.’

‘I dropped it off a roof.’

‘From anyone else, Lucien, from anyone else…’ A flicker of amusement.

‘What
did
happen to the horse?’

‘Best you don’t know.’ Lucien turned to Anea. ‘It seems I owe you my life.’

Anea, as ever, said nothing, just inclined her head.

‘Perhaps we can get on with the business of caring for the women of the
sanatorio
,’ said Virmyre, but the calm was short lived.

There was a second of quiet and then Carmine launched himself at Lucien, a snarl curling his lips. Carmine, the last of Giancarlo’s protégés, continuing his master’s vendetta. Unarmed as he was, Lucien could do nothing to protect himself. Anea made to snatch up the discarded halberd, but she was too late to defend the threatened Orfano a second time. Everyone stared in horror. A sword flashed in the sunlight and fell with lethal inevitability. Lucien regarded it with a detached disregard, too stunned to move.

Carmine shuddered as the tip of Dino’s blade punctured his throat. The momentum carried him further onto Dino’s blade. It slid from the back of his neck, a sleek red length of steel. The young boy clutched the sword cane Lucien had given him at
La Festa
with a dreadful intensity. Carmine tried to cough, but no sound escaped his lips, just a trickle of blood. Slowly he sank to his knees, his eyes set disbelievingly on the hilt, now just inches away from his chin. People nearby moaned in disgust, turning away appalled.