The Red Priest’s Homecoming

 

DIRK FLINTHART

 

 

In the wake of a chequered career in the public service and elsewhere, Dirk Flinthart now lives relatively quietly in Tasmania with his three children, his long-suffering wife, and a variety of animals. These days, he works mostly in speculative fiction, with short stories in horror, sf and fantasy appearing in a range of Australian publications. Like any good writer, his interests are way too numerous to list, but he’s currently active in martial arts, photography, Irish music - and excessively extensive house renovations. He is not a fictional character, no matter what John Birmingham may say about it.”

 

About this story, Dirk writes: “I got started reading fantasy and SF when I was a kid, and my early favourites included many in the ‘heroic fantasy’ tradition, like Fritz Leiber, C.L Moore, Michael Moorcock, Roger Zelazny and yes, even Robert Howard. Faced by the current avalanche of Tolkien-derived five-volume trilogies of generic Save-The-World-From-The-Evil-Overlord stuff, I decided to have a go at creating my own larger-than-life hero. It seems to have worked. There will be more Red Priest stories.”

 

* * * *

 

I

n the dark of the alleyway, Antonio Dellaforte paused and glanced behind him yet again. Not once in all the long, circuitous walk back from his tryst with the lovely Alegreza Scarpano had he seen anything suspicious, or out of place - and yet, the hairs on the back of his neck prickled as he peered into the shadows.

 

Still nothing.

 

With a tense laugh at himself, Antonio vaulted to the top of a rain barrel, straightened, and swung his weight onto the terracotta tiles that roofed the stables. A quick scramble up the steeply pitched surface, then a simple lift of the body, and Antonio was up and over the tiny balcony under the window of his own room.

 

A last look over his shoulder revealed a man standing in the mouth of the alley that Antonio had just left - a strange, scarlet-clad figure with the biretta of a prince of the Church, and the hafts of twin swords protruding above his shoulders. Even as Antonio watched, the man in red lifted his head and seemed to gaze up at him. For an instant, they locked eyes across the distance, and Antonio felt an uncanny chill. Then the stranger turned away and vanished into the crowded square beyond.

 

Had he been following Antonio? Or was he merely another of the myriads of wildly costumed revellers of Carnevale?

 

Thoughts of Carnevale brought Antonio to his senses with a jolt. The masquerade! He was late already. Any more delay and his grandmother would flay him!

 

Cursing softly, Antonio tore off his outer clothing. The simple domino mask he had worn was good enough for the streets of Venezia, but hardly acceptable for the only son of the Dellaforte family at their own Grand Masque. He struggled into the costume that his grandmother had chosen for him, an infernally complex construction of shining satin and watered silk braced with leather, brass and whalebone. Not until the last of the pieces was buckled into place did he look into the mirror of silvered glass and groan.

 

He was a fish. The reason was obvious enough: the three salmon of the Dellaforte arms. Nevertheless, he was still just a fish. For just an instant, he considered wearing formal black, with a black leather domino. Understated amongst the gaudy costumes sure to fill the ballroom, perhaps he might generate an air of mystery and maturity. At least he wouldn’t look like a fish.

 

On the other hand, Luciana Dellaforte herself had ordered the costume. Antonio sighed, and lowered his head.

 

Resigned to his fate, he detoured past the kitchens on the way to the grand ballroom, acquiring a tray of fine pastries and a bottle of the sweet French wine his grandmother favoured. Thus prepared, he made his way to the high balcony where he knew she would be waiting.

 

Like a box at the theatre, the balcony had been purpose-designed for watching what went on below. Though the grand ballroom was all of a splendour with hundreds of lanterns of vivid Murano glass, the balcony itself lay in shadow. All but invisible to the revellers below, a watcher from the balcony could easily make out individuals, read lips, sometimes even hear entire conversations. For a moment, Antonio let himself enjoy the spectacle. Musicians filled the air with the sweet sound of flutes, viols and drums. In one corner, a performer in parti-coloured tights juggled flaming sticks, pausing now and again to puff firebursts into the air from his lips. In the centre of the floor, dozens of couples danced a stately pavane, brilliantly coloured costumes turning and swaying to the rhythm of the music. Scores of others clustered around tables that groaned with wines and cordials of France and Spain and spiced foods from the fabled Indies and the Orient, or simply toasted one another with the largesse of the Dellaforte. Altogether, more than a hundred of the richest and most powerful of the Republic of Venezia revelled at the Carnevale Masque of the Dellaforte.

 

“Tonio.” At the rail of the balcony stood Luciana Dellaforte. Though her voice was soft, it carried perfectly, even over the music and hubbub. “How pleasant to find you here.”

 

Antonio bowed carefully, keeping the tray level. Now was not the time to spill anything. “Grandmother,” he said. “Your favourites, I think.”

 

“Please, Tonio,” said Luciana with a smile. She poured a measure of wine, which gave Antonio some little hope that her temper might be softened. “You have seventeen years now. It makes me feel old to have a young man calling me ‘grandmother’. I believe you can pronounce ‘Luciana’, can you not?”

 

Certainly, she did not look the part of a grandmother. Her black velvet gown clung to an elegantly curved body the envy of women half her age, and her fine, dark hair was still soft and lustrous. If there were lines upon her face, they were well earned, as she often said, and her skin was supple and smooth as a milkmaid’s. Antonio knew his grandmother took pride in the fact that men’s heads still turned for her - and also that she used her looks the way an assassin used the stiletto. Therefore, he lifted the tray and inclined his head, saying: “I will try to remember, Luciana. It is hard to change the habits of a life overnight, I fear.”

 

She raised a goblet of fine glass to lips no less red than the wine she sipped, and allowed herself to peer over the railing once more. “An excellent vantage point,” said Luciana. Then she shook her head. “Such expense! Tell me, Tonio - what do you think of all this money we are spending tonight? Money spent today is money which tomorrow might have been yours, no?”

 

Her tone was light, but Antonio feared the depths that lay beneath. Clearly, she had not yet forgiven him his late arrival; even less would she forgive him ignorance. “Grandmother,” he said, then stopped as she raised a warning finger. “Luciana. It is not yet for me to say how the family will spend its money. Nonetheless, I understand what we are doing here tonight.”

 

Luciana looked back over her shoulder, pinning him with a cat-green stare. “Do you really, Tonio? Enlighten me.”

 

Greatly daring, he leaned on the ornamented railing next to her. “We are close to gaining a seat on the Council of Ten. For this, we need the support of others, both of the Ten and elsewhere. Yet the easiest way to lose such support is to show that it is needed. Therefore, we spend money to show our power and position, and to buy friends for our cause.”

 

Once again, his grandmother stared at him, unblinking behind her black velvet domino. “Your father is ill, Tonio,” she said at last. “I am no longer young. It is true we have powerful allies and clever advisors, yes. But we have enemies, too. Therefore, more is needed, Tonio. Behind the power and the money, directing the advisors, satisfying the allies and destroying the enemies, there must be a Dellaforte with a strong will and a sharp mind. There,” she stabbed out with a finger, indicating a man disguised as the bronze giant Tantalus. “There is Pascal Colonna. Is he our friend?”

 

“No, grandmother,” said Antonio. “He loathes our family for the fleet he lost to us.”

 

“Yet soon he will vote us a place on the Council of Ten, in exchange for certain concessions in turmeric and cardamom. Does that not make him our friend?”

 

He stiffened with contempt. “No.”

 

“Indeed,” said Luciana. “Him, there -” she pointed to a man dressed in blue and green, carrying the trident of Neptune, King of the Sea. “Admiral D’Agenzia of the fleet. Is he our friend?”

 

Antonio frowned. What was she asking? Surely the answers she sought were obvious. Nervously, he licked his lips and tried to compose a reply. “From my youngest days, I have heard the story of how Pietro D’Agenzia gave my grandfather his first command. You yourself have told me that the money for our first ship came from the D’Agenzia coffers. I have sat upon his knee, and played at soldiers with his grandsons. If Pietro D’Agenzia is not our friend, then we have no friends.”

 

“Closer still to wisdom.” She took another sip of wine and dabbed absently at the corner of her full mouth. “Only the poor can afford the luxury of friendship, Tonio. We are rich. We do not have friends. There are people whose interests align with ours, and people who oppose our interests, and some who have not yet declared themselves. That is all. Consider: the Bishop Calanza, there. Do you see him?”

 

“Dressed as a Saracen?” Assuming, of course, the gaily coloured robes and extravagantly pointed helmet were intended to convey a Saracen. Antonio had never heard of a Saracen as fat as Rambaldo Calanza, but perhaps it was possible.

 

“Calanza would be our enemy, if he could.” Luciana smiled then, a wide, slow smile that made her look almost predatory in the shifting light. “To do that, however, he would first need to discover the whereabouts of a certain young catamite, and his keeper. So long as I know where to find those two and Calanza does not, his interests align with ours. Do you see?”

 

“I think I do.” In fact, Antonio saw something rather different in the maelstrom of colour below - a flash of scarlet? It was hard to be certain, with so many coloured lanterns. He blinked, and focussed his eyes again.

 

“You say this,” said Luciana. “But I think you have much to learn, Tonio. Does it occur to you to wonder why I know of the catamite at all? Or where he might have come from? Or how much all this may have cost? What kind of favours we may owe? Yes, and what of the Doge himself, there,” she pointed, “in the cloth-of-gold costume that our house had the honour of purchasing for this occasion?”

 

“Please, Luciana,” Antonio interrupted, with courage he had not been certain that he owned. “I am sorry to cut short your words, but I have seen something…” Cautiously, he moved back from the railing and pointed with a finger into the crowd by the trestles. “Who is that person?” said Antonio. “What is his name, and how does he come to be here?”

 

“That is -” Luciana frowned, her fine brows drawing together. She leaned out slightly, and tilted her head so that her darkly gleaming tresses fell softly over one white shoulder. “I believe that is… no. Your eyes are younger than mine, Antonio. Tell me what you see.”

 

“I see a man clad head to toe in a scarlet robe like a cassock, with a scarlet biretta upon his head, and two swords slung crosswise upon his back.” He glanced at Luciana, and was startled to see her eyes narrowed to green slits.

 

“Who dares?” hissed his grandmother. “Who dares bring that costume into my house?”

 

“Grandmother?” Antonio took a half-step back, and craned his neck to peer over the railing.

 

“Go and find the Byzantine, Antonio,” said Luciana. Her gaze never left the man in scarlet, who stood quietly in the shadow of a doorway, munching a pastry. “Tell him we have an uninvited guest who is to be removed without disturbing the masque. And Tonio,” her voice was silky again, but Antonio shuddered inwardly. “Tell the Byzantine that I do not expect this person to return.”

 

Antonio hesitated. Phraxas - the Byzantine, to Luciana - was head of the Dellaforte house guard, and likewise in charge of providing security to Dellaforte interests wherever they might be. A smiling, friendly little Greek man, he took his job very seriously indeed. Luciana’s unequivocal message could only result in a scarlet-clad corpse surfacing in one of Venezia’s less frequented canals in a week or so. With a momentary pang, Antonio quieted his conscience. He offered a silent bow to his grandmother, and went in search of Phraxas the Byzantine.

 

Dressed incongruously as a brown velvet mouse and nibbling pistachios from Persia, Phraxas lounged with apparent ease, next to a niche with a marble of St Martin, the Dellaforte patron. He nodded curtly in reply to the message from Luciana.

 

“I wondered how long the Old One would tolerate such a thing,” he said. Phraxas always referred to Luciana as ‘the Old One’. He was the only person in the household who could get away with it. “He came by the side entrance not ten minutes gone. Go you and watch, boy, that he does not slip away. I will bring Grigori and the Florentine. When you see my sign, go and make conversation with this person. I will come upon him from behind, and he will suffer a spell of fainting, eh?” He grinned wickedly from behind his mouse mask, his gold tooth glinting.

 

“A moment, Phraxas,” said Antonio. “I do not know this man, I think, although perhaps I recall something about his costume. He poses as the infamous condottiere known as the Red Priest, does he not? What is it about him that angers grandmother so?”

 

The little Byzantine regarded him with glittering eyes. “Truly, you do not know?” At Antonio’s shrug, he continued. “It is a double jest, of the poorest taste. The costume itself, with the biretta - the man apes a prince of your Church, which is bad enough. But the scarlet robe and the two swords across the back: these are worse. You have guessed aright: he dresses as the heretic called the Red Priest, a mercenary soldier. But this Red Priest: he goes by the name of Deilaforte!” He grinned again, delighted by Antonio’s gasp of surprise. “Insult upon insult, eh? And in the very Deilaforte Palazzo, on the night that the Doge is to announce a vacancy on the Council of Ten. Such shame! Such embarrassment! It is a wonder the Old One does not wish to tear the skin from his bones with her teeth!”

 

With that, the Byzantine slid quietly away, leaving Antonio to study the scarlet renegade.

 

He seemed no more than a man of middling height, of somewhat light build. His black hair was bound in a short braid that curled at its ends, and what could be seen of his skin beneath the scarlet domino was a light golden colour, fine and smooth. The scarlet robe had seen hard wear, although it had once been brocaded, and quite fine. Unlike most of the gaudy costumes in the ballroom, this fellow had tried to dress himself as closely as possible after a true man of arms.

 

Out of the corner of his eye, Antonio saw the Byzantine mouse, accompanied by a large, shaggy lion and a knight-at-arms in armour of silvered silk. Quickly, he filled two goblets with wine, and lifted them high to catch the eye of the man in red. The stranger, now leaning comfortably with his back in the corner made by the descending grand stair, raised his own glass in reply.

 

Antonio paused. What now? In the place where the stranger now stood, the Byzantine could not approach unseen. Yet Luciana Deilaforte had been most specific in her instructions, and Antonio knew what would befall him if he allowed the masquerade to be disturbed against her wishes. Smiling widely behind his salmon-mask, he waved one arm in a friendly come-hither fashion. The stranger in red smiled just as widely, and signalled likewise.

 

Exasperated, Antonio lifted his mask and called. “Well met, stranger,” he said, pitching his voice to carry through the music and laughter. “Come and share a cup!”

 

Whatever the other might have said, Antonio could not make it out, for quite abruptly, his free arm was seized, and a girlish voice cried: “A fine! A fine for Antonio Dellaforte, unmasked before the hour is called!” The cry was quickly taken up by those nearby, and Antonio groaned. A dozen willing hands emptied a nearby table, and Antonio was unceremoniously urged to climb aboard. Feeling utterly foolish in his clumsy, garish costume, Antonio mounted the table and danced a country jig to a tune obligingly provided by the musicians. Amidst the laughter and applause, there was nothing to be gained by resisting churlishly. He could only hope that the Byzantine and his cohorts could resolve the matter without him.

 

At last, the good-natured crowd agreed that Antonio had redeemed himself, and he was allowed to rejoin the masqued revellers. Yet where was the man in scarlet? And likewise, the Byzantine and his mismatched companions? A flash of red amongst the dancers caught his eye. The music had changed to a sprightly roundel, and partnering his own sister Zaneta in her mermaid costume of green and silver was the stranger in red.

 

His mouth a grim line, Antonio scanned the ballroom. There was no trace of Phraxas. Try as he might, he couldn’t even make out his grandmother in the darkened eyrie of the balcony. After a momentary agony of uncertainty, he shook his head. Let the Byzantine fare as he may. Antonio would wait for the music to end, and assert the privilege of a host and brother in seeking a dance. At the very least, it would keep Zaneta clear of the stranger and give the Byzantine room to move.

 

He had not kept track of the time, however. As the music ended and he closed on the pair, the cry went up: “Midnight! Midnight and the unmasking! The masquerade is ended!”

 

Immediately, servants lit the great whale-oil lanterns and the myriad tall, white candelabra. The rainbow of coloured lamplight gave way to a glittering luminescence that penetrated to the darkest corners of the great room, revealing all. Peals of laughter rang out as masques were abandoned and identities disclosed at last.

 

Without the foolish biretta or his scarlet domino, the stranger was a striking young man with the golden brown skin of Cathay, and a strong, fine nose. He declined a kiss from Zaneta, preferring instead to bow over her slender white hand. As he righted himself, his startlingly dark eyes, only slightly tilted after the fashion of the Easterners, lighted upon Antonio pushing through the happy crowd, and he smiled brilliantly.

 

“Aha, cousin,” said the man in scarlet. “Well met at last!” He kept Zaneta’s hand in his own, and she nodded gravely to Antonio.

 

“Cousin?” said Antonio. He glanced quickly about, but there was no sign of the Byzantine, nor any other who might help.

 

A movement from the man in red brought Antonio’s attention back. For the moment, he must needs play the host. One day, he would have to manage the fortunes of the Dellaforte family for himself. No doubt he could deal with the matter before him. “Your pardon, Signore,” he continued. “I believe you are mistaken. I am Antonio Dellaforte, son of that Jacopo Dellaforte who hosts this gathering.”

 

“I know,” said the stranger, regarding Antonio closely. “I am pleased to make your acquaintance. You have the family look about you, I think.”

 

Antonio smiled carefully, for he saw that many of the guests had contrived to be near this scarlet-clad stranger for the unmasking. They waited for Antonio to reveal his identity to the public. “I know you not, Signore,” he said easily. “How is it you know this family look of the Dellaforte?”

 

The stranger nodded. “Forgive me,” he said. “I have yet to introduce myself. “ He turned slightly, and raised his voice so that it could be heard over the hubbub in the crowded ballroom. “I am the man they call the Red Priest,” he said. Instantly, the assembled guests grew silent. “I am Tomaso Dellaforte, son of Niccolo Dellaforte who went to Cathay nearly thirty years ago, and I have come home.” He swept a deep bow, releasing Zaneta who instinctively moved to her brother’s side.

 

Suddenly the babble started once again, redoubled in its intensity.

 

There was a ringing in Antonio’s ears, and he cursed the youthful flush he felt in his cheeks. Doubtless he gaped like the fish whose costume he wore. Worse, though he knew how callow he must look, he could find no way to recover. The audacity of the man! Despite the command of the Doge himself that there should be no duelling in Carnevale, Antonio found his hand upon the hilt of his sword, his pulse racing. For a moment, he hung upon the very edge of fury - and then by a miracle, his grandmother was there, cool and elegant with her sharp eyes and her quick wit. With her hand upon his shoulder, Antonio felt himself relax. Luciana Dellaforte would know how to deal with this supposed Red Priest.

 

“Tomaso Dellaforte,” she said, in her quiet but penetrating voice. She nodded slowly, her raven-dark hair moving about her face like silk. “It is a good name. It is a name my Nico might have chosen.”

 

“It is the name he chose, grandmother,” said the Red Priest, and his quaintly accented tones were stainlessly polite. “But he was not your Nico. You and everyone else called him ‘Colo’.” He smiled, then, a very natural-seeming expression, and took Luciana Dellaforte’s hand in his own. “He called me Tomaso, for your father,” he said. “Even as Jacopo was to name his first son Antonio, for my grandfather, your husband.”

 

Luciana withdrew her hand swiftly, yet with grace. Her voice was still calm and friendly, but there was a light in her eyes that Antonio knew only too well. “You know the family histories, I see. Doubtless you have seen the letters we sent to Niccolo,” she said.

 

“Both of them,” said the Red Priest, and there was a hardness in his eyes that matched hers. “He treasured them. One arrived before I was born. I remember the other. He made himself wait two full days before he opened it, so that I could be there when he read it. I was only nine. I did not truly understand what Venezia meant to my father; only that it made him happy to speak of it, and so I listened.”

 

Antonio glanced about. The cluster of onlookers surrounding them had become a true circle, with himself, Zaneta, Luciana and this so-called cousin near the centre. People stared openly, and whispered to one another behind their hands. Despite his grandmother’s presence, Antonio felt his ears begin to burn. “Enough of this,” he burst out. “Who put you up to this? Who paid you for these lies? Was it Colonna gold that brought you here? I will kill them, I swear it. I will call them into the street and slaughter them like pigs!” Spittle burst from his mouth with those last words, and Antonio realized to his utter mortification that the room had fallen silent.

 

The Red Priest shot him a look of innocence. “Calm yourself, cousin,” he urged. “I have spoken only the truth. Would you care to see the documents? My father - your uncle - married well in Cathay. My mother was daughter to the Great Khan. I have with me the scroll that attests to her lineage, another which confirms the marriage, and still another marking my own birth.” He paused, and shrugged. “The Yuan Court of the Great Khan is somewhat obsessive about such things. They have been known to issue official scrolls to mark the loss of a royal tooth.”

 

“Marriage?” Luciana pounced. “Without the sanction of the Church, what marriage can there be?”

 

“Exactly as my father felt,” agreed the Red Priest without hesitation. “Fortunately, in the year of Our Lord twelve-ninety-four, two years before my father arrived, Father Giovani da Montecorvino was dispatched by His Holiness Nicholas IV to convert the folk of Cathay. It was Gianno - I knew him thus in my childhood - who confirmed my mother in the True Faith. Likewise it was he who carried out the ceremony for my mother and my father, and it is his seal, with the very authority of the Pope himself, which attests to my birth. My father planned carefully against our return to Venezia,” he said. Then the skin around his eyes tightened very slightly, and his voice softened. “I am sorry he could not see this day. He spoke often of his home here, and his family.”

 

There was a pause. Luciana stared imperiously at the young man in scarlet, who lifted his chin almost imperceptibly. For a moment, Antonio felt a crackling, sparking sensation from the very air between the two, and his hackles lifted. At his side, Zaneta shrank back.

 

Then Luciana drew a deep breath. She looked about her, noting the fascinated onlookers, and she narrowed her eyes. “Where is my ‘Colo now?”

 

“Alas,” said the Red Priest, his voice cold as the wind from the steppes. “Niccolo Dellaforte, your eldest son and my father, is dead these fourteen years. By law of primogeniture, therefore, the estates of the Dellaforte fall to myself.” He spoke without inflection, but so clearly and boldly that his words carried to the farthest corners of the grand ballroom, and in their wake the noise of the crowd redoubled.

 

“Out!” cried Luciana in a terrible voice. “All of you, be gone. I declare the masquerade ended.” With a visible effort, she mastered herself. “Jacopo Dellaforte, master of the Dellaforte fortunes, thanks you all for your kind attendance, and hopes that we will see you again in the near future. Wine and food will be served in the courtyard. The musicians will follow, and play until dawn.” She whirled, and confronted the Red Priest once more. “Not you,” she snapped. “I have much to say to you.”

 

“Unfortunately,” said the Red Priest with a savage grin, “I have pressing engagements elsewhere. Your hospitality has been magnificent. I will certainly call upon you tomorrow, if it suits.” He bowed deeply, with a flourish of gloved hands.

 

“It does not,” said Luciana. Her brows lowered, and she fixed the Red Priest with a poisonous glare. “You will remain.”

 

The young man looked about, dismissing with a single, contemptuous glance the Dellaforte retainers who were herding the crowd of revellers through the great doors. “You mean to imprison me,” he said lightly. “Perhaps you should reconsider. I am, after all, a properly invited guest. It would reflect poorly upon the hospitality of the Dellaforte. Certainly, it would not impress those who are even now considering you for a position on the Council of Ten.” From a pocket somewhere under his scarlet robe, he produced an elaborate parchment, complete with the Dellaforte seal.

 

Antonio started. He had written those invitations himself, and he was absolutely certain that he had written none to a ‘Tomaso Dellaforte, called the Red Priest’ - and yet there it was, in his own handwriting. “How did you come by this?” he demanded.

 

The Red Priest affected a slight shrug. “As any guest. A messenger brought it, and when I saw what it was, I decided the time had come for a long-delayed family reunion. Now I choose to take my leave. Until the morrow!” He inclined his head ever so slightly, and spun to join the retreating crowd.

 

Antonio’s hand fell to the hilt of his sword, yet even as it did so he felt his grandmother’s smooth, soft hand fall upon his arm.

 

“No,” said Luciana softly. “He has the right of it. For good or ill, he is a guest here. We will see what the morrow brings, Tonio.” She shook her head slowly. “To think that my ‘Colo fathered such a one.”

 

“You don’t believe his story, grandmother!” Antonio stepped back, and shook off her hand. “He is an adventurer, a brigand seeking notoriety. My uncle’s disappearance is common knowledge. This is nothing more than lies and extortion.”

 

“No,” said Luciana Dellaforte, and there was a faraway look in her dark eyes. “You never knew my ‘Colo, but a mother never forgets. Even a generation gone, I know my son, Tonio.”

 

From one of the exits, a liveried Dellaforte guard approached, and bowed to Luciana. “Lady,” he said in a low voice, without raising his head. “The Byzantine has been found with his neck broken at the bottom of the stairs to the wine cellar, shattered glass and wine all about him. It is thought that he drank too deeply, and fell down the steps.”

 

“Phraxas!” cried Antonio. This time, his grandmother’s hand fell upon his shoulder, but be shook it off and stalked away, hot fury stinging his eyes. If only he had chosen to look for the Byzantine, instead of playing chaperone upon his sister. “He was not drunk, grandmother. I know this! The red-handed bastard has a confederate in the house.” Or worse, he realized. Perhaps the Red Priest fell upon Phraxas unawares while Antonio played the fool, dancing for the crowd upon a tabletop. He gave a great groan. “Ahh, Phraxas, my friend. I will finish this for you. Upon my name, I swear it.”

 

“Antonio,” said Luciana warningly. “This is not for you.”

 

He whirled. “Oh, I know my place, grandmother,” he stressed the title sardonically. “Little fish Antonio the obedient; that’s me. You needn’t fear for me, grandmother. I go to pay my respects to my dead friend Phraxas. I would never even dream of seeking retribution for him, no matter how cruelly murdered.” At least, he thought, as he turned and strode into the darkness of the inner house, not while I am dressed after the family coat of arms…

 

* * * *

 

Antonio Dellaforte clung to the shadows on the Via Canale. Ahead, his quarry moved in a swirl of scarlet among the throngs of late-night Carnevale revellers. Though it had taken time and coin to find him, it was no task at all to follow an enemy so bold as to dress head-to-toe in the red of fresh-spilled blood. Nonetheless young Antonio moved with care. The Red Priest was a notorious villain, come but lately from the scene of a murder. He would be wary.

 

Down the crooked street went the Red Priest, threading the crowds purposefully at such a pace that Antonio had to move swiftly to keep him in sight. In a flash of red, he turned down a darkened side street. By the time Antonio reached the corner, the Red Priest was gone, vanished into the gloom.

 

For a moment, Antonio vacillated. Perhaps he should turn back? After all, Venezia was not so large that a man such as the Red Priest could hide for long from a determined search. Indeed, the man had promised he would return to the Palazzo Dellaforte on the morrow. That promise, offered with careless insouciance in the very face of the armed Dellaforte retainers, burned in Antonio’s memory, urging him against his better judgment down the dark and narrow side street. Balling his fists, he hesitated. Then, with a deep breath he clapped his hand to the hilt of his sword and strode into the darkness.

 

Just five paces later, something struck him stingingly across the nose. Blinking, Antonio staggered. A grip of forged steel seized his hand and twisted. Unable to resist, Antonio lunged forward to prevent his wrist snapping, only to have his invisible assailant reverse the twist with brutal force. Desperate to save his arm, Antonio leapt up and backwards. His enemy yanked the trapped wrist, and Antonio smashed to the cobbles on his back. His teeth came together sharply, and hot blood filled his mouth. Then the grip on his wrist turned yet again, and Antonio flopped onto his belly like a stranded fish, the pinioned arm bending agonizingly up behind his back. A hard knee descended between his shoulder blades, holding the much-abused arm in place while a strong hand gripped his hair and yanked Antonio’s head backwards. Cold steel kissed his throat.

 

Then it stopped.

 

“Ho. It’s only you,” said an all-too-familiar voice. The grip on Antonio’s hair relaxed, and he banged his already stinging nose on the stones of the street. “Get up, boy,” said the Red Priest.

 

Fury clouding his vision, Antonio scrambled to his feet, and yanked at his sword. Instantly, something hard and blunt smashed into his forearm, paralysing his fingers with jagged shards of pain. “Dio mio!” swore the young man, clutching the injury with his other hand. “You are a devil!”

 

“You’re not the first to say so, cousin,” replied the Red Priest. “Have no fear. I use not magic, but knowledge and skill. Be grateful. You will have the use of your hand again in an hour or so. Had I chosen, I could have snapped your arm in a dozen places when I threw you to the ground.”

 

“Do not dare to call me cousin,” cried Antonio, blinking back tears of rage. “You lie! You are an infamous liar. You are a heretic and a renegade, a traitor and a black liar. You are no Dellaforte, nor ever could be.”

 

There was a sudden swirl in the darkness, nothing more. Then Antonio found himself pinioned against a wall of brick, two razor-keen blades crossed against his throat. He closed his eyes, and swallowed.

 

“Heretic, yes,” said the Red Priest, and at last, there was a hint of emotion in his voice - a quivering, as of barely suppressed rage. “Renegade; that too. Traitor to some, though none that have earned my respect. But liar?” With a ringing whisper, the swords vanished. “Never. All that I said to our grandmother in the ballroom was true. Every word, boy. Niccolo Dellaforte, your uncle, was my father.” He took a step back.

 

Cautiously, Antonio rubbed at his throat. Finding no blood, he breathed a little easier.

 

“Listen to me,” continued the Red Priest. “When our grandfather for whom you are named died, the family had many debts. It was… decided that Jacopo would stay and work as best he could to manage what was left. Meanwhile, my father was to follow in the steps of the Polo family, and make the journey to Cathay to seek a fortune such as Marco Polo brought home.”

 

Antonio’s eyes finally adjusted to the darkness. He made out the cloaked shape of the Red Priest, backed against the opposite wall of the alley. Though he had lowered his swords, they were still naked in his hands, pointing in opposite directions along the dark and noisome little byway. Did he expect some kind of trouble?

 

As if reading Antonio’s very mind, the Red Priest broke off his narrative. “This is no place to talk, boy,” he said. “I am expecting unwelcome company. Go home. We can talk on the morrow.”

 

Stubbornly, Antonio shook his aching head. “I will not. I care nothing for all your documents and seals. I will not accept that you are my uncle’s son, and I will not let you steal away what my father has built in the years since Niccolo Dellaforte ran off. You may have the best of me in the filthy dark, renegade, but I am no mere Greekling you can push down the stairs. I am the scion of the Dellaforte, and I swear to you matters will be different when we meet on the field of honour.”

 

From the darkness there came a low chuckle. “The field of honour,” said the Red Priest. “Why is it that men always speak of honour when they talk of killing? Forget everything you have heard, little cousin. An honourable killing takes a life as surely as any other murder. I will not meet you, and I will not play by the rules of your duello. Yes, I killed your Byzantine, and it was desperate work in the dark, for whatever you may think, he was quick with his knife. Yet it was he who sought my life, not I who looked to kill him, and I would have let him live, if I could.”

 

He paused a moment, then drew a deep breath, and continued. “If you come against me, for the memory of my father I will not kill you, but I promise you will wish that I had. Now go home, Antonio Dellaforte. And know this: I want nothing of your father’s fortune. Not a ducat, not a boat, not a brick. Nothing.”

 

“But you said - You invoked the laws of primogeniture!” Antonio could not believe what he heard. Perhaps thirty years ago the Dellaforte family had more debt than fortune. But under Jacopo’s careful management, the family holdings had grown steadily. Now the Dellaforte were amongst the wealthiest families of Venezia, on the very brink of a seat on the all-powerful Council of Ten. To an adventurer and a mercenary like the Red Priest, such a fortune must be an impossibly tempting target. At the very least, Antonio was certain that his tormentor expected a considerable bribe to drop his claims and disappear.

 

“Eh? Oh, for -” The Red Priest stopped. “Walk with me, then, cousin. We will talk as we go. I like not this dark corner, and I will be much easier when I am once more amongst friends.” Without sheathing his blades, he turned and strode into the darkness, forcing Antonio to hurry in his wake. “I spoke of primogeniture, yes. My father was the elder. By the laws of La Serenissima, I may lay claim to the Dellaforte fortunes, if I choose. Yet did you hear me say I so chose?”

 

Stumbling along in the piss-stinking blackness where the Red Priest glided noiselessly, Antonio was forced to admit he had heard no such thing. “Yet if you choose to make no claim, why have you come?” he said plaintively. “You appeared at the ball uninvited, in your famous garb of scarlet. You unmasked at midnight with the rest, and immediately announced yourself as Tomaso Dellaforte, son of the long-lost Niccolo. You must have known you would be seen by the cream of Venezia.”

 

“It is all one to me,” said the Red Priest, without looking back. “I was invited. I chose to come.” As they emerged from the darkness of the alleyway into a torch lit courtyard, he swung about and faced his young cousin. “Now, will you go?” He gestured at a heavy door set in the stone wall. “Beyond that door is another courtyard, which backs onto the inn where I am staying. If you come with me through that door, I cannot let you return until I have resolved… certain matters.” He cocked his head, and Antonio felt the pressure of his gaze, though he could not pierce the shadows that wrapped the other’s face.

 

“I don’t understand.” Antonio frowned. He shifted his weight, and flexed his arm carefully. There was some feeling in his fingers again, and he could almost curl his hand into a fist, though the effort sent heavy pulses shooting up to his shoulder. Whatever else this Red Priest had done, he had spoken truly about the damage to the arm. Likewise, there was no denying that he could have not only snapped the arm, but slit Antonio’s very throat in that dark place, and none would have been the wiser. Perhaps, Antonio thought grudgingly, there was more to this renegade than the stories gave out.

 

“Make your choice, boy,” said the Red Priest. “I cannot tarry here.”

 

Antonio gritted his teeth. “I will come with you. I have many questions, and I would have the answers before they are the gossip of all Venezia.”

 

The Red Priest watched him for a moment more, then shrugged. “As you will,” he said, and turned. “Follow.”

 

He knocked twice against the door, hesitated a slow heartbeat, then knocked three times more. At once, the door opened a crack.

 

“It is I,” said the Red Priest. “I bring my cousin Antonio. Open swiftly, and let us enter.”

 

The door swung wide, and the Red Priest slipped through, with Antonio on his heels.

 

The courtyard beyond was smaller than the previous one, and the walls were higher. It was well lit with bright lanterns, and a dozen fresh, unlit torches were spaced evenly around the walls. In the centre of the courtyard, a rough wooden table was flanked by two simple benches. A single door on the opposite side of the courtyard was closed. Antonio thought he caught a hint of movement atop one of the walls, but when he looked, there was no-one to be seen.

 

“What news, Pio?” The Red Priest spoke to the man who had opened the door, and who now closed it with a heavy bar of dark wood.

 

“Nothing of note, signore,” said Pio. He was a tall, broad man, with steel at his hip and the look of a soldier about him. “You may rest. I will send wine, and food. The others are in place, as you commanded. It would take twenty men to force this yard.”

 

The Red Priest shook his head. “I expect but one. Tell the others to be on their guard. Shoot first. We can pay a wergild later, if we must.”

 

The man called Pio saluted roughly, and vanished through the far door.

 

“Shoot first,” said Antonio, as they settled themselves opposite one another at the table. “Who is it you expect?”

 

Tomaso Dellaforte smiled, at which Antonio suppressed a shudder. Despite the Red Priest’s youth and undeniable good looks, in his black eyes there lurked a deep coldness untouched by the thin smile on his lips. “You really have no idea?”

 

“I am no more a liar than you claim to be,” said Antonio. “I am astounded and confused by this night’s events, and I hope for answers from you. Whatever mysteries you pursue, I know naught of them.”

 

The Red Priest regarded him with those piercing, dark eyes. “Let it be so, then,” he said at last. “What would you have of me, cousin?”

 

Antonio threw his hands in the air. “Where to begin?” he said. “What happened to my uncle? How is it you have only now come to Venezia, though your infamy is known from the Aegean to the far isles of Albion? When did you return from Cathay? Where is your mother? What do you want with us?”

 

Across the table eyebrows lifted, and this time there was a genuine warmth to the smile. “A host of questions! Here,” said the Red Priest, and took a jug proffered by the returned Pio, along with a large platter of spiced meats and pickles. “I will pour us both a drink, and we will talk. But you must promise me this, cousin.” He caught Pio by the sleeve, and held him witness. “If this visitor I am expecting comes while we are together, you must move to the farthest corner of the courtyard and stay there, on your life. If you move even a step from that corner, you will be killed, yes, by my orders. It is a dangerous thing I must do here, Antonio Dellaforte, and since I cannot be sure you are not ranged against me, I must be certain you are contained. Do you understand?”

 

Antonio nodded.

 

“Good,” said the Red Priest, releasing Pio’s sleeve. “Go now, Pio. Bar the door and guard it. Tell the others what I have said, and remind them that under no circumstances are they to enter this courtyard. They must shoot first, and shoot straight, but they must not stand and fight if our quarry comes against them.”

 

Wordlessly, Pio took his leave and the Red Priest returned his full attention to Antonio. “Which of your questions shall I answer first?”

 

“I think I had better know who it is you expect,” said Antonio quietly. “All these precautions against but one man?”

 

The Red Priest watched him silently, then poured two goblets of dark wine. Antonio noted that his cousin barely half-filled his own drink, though he raised the cup and tasted it with evidence of enjoyment.

 

“Have you heard tell of an assassin who stalks the nights of Venezia?” said the Red Priest at last.

 

Antonio shrugged. “Who hasn’t? Venezia is infamous for her killers. Our city is the very home of the stiletto. The stories I have heard of the Red Priest led me to believe you would not fear some bravo with a knife.”

 

The man in scarlet stroked his chin. “The stories of the Red Priest are told because I am still alive, despite the efforts of many who wish it otherwise. This is because I take precautions as I see fit. Your next question, please.”

 

The man’s secrecy was infuriating, though hardly surprising to one raised upon the convoluted intrigues of the merchant families of Venezia. Antonio sighed, and slouched back on his bench seat. “Tell me about my uncle,” he said at last. “Your father.”

 

A faraway look came into the Red Priest’s black eyes, and he took a long draught from his goblet before he answered. “I saw little of him, in truth. I know he won through to Cathay in the year twelve ninety-six, in good health and bearing certain letters in the hopes of breaking into the trade for silk, among other things. The Great Khan Yuan Chengzong, recalling the service of the Polos to his predecessor, the Khan Kublai, was well-disposed to the folk of our city, and my father was received graciously. A position was made for him, and he set out to serve the Khan to the best of his ability. He must have succeeded, for the Khan gave one of his own daughters in marriage to my father.

 

“For the first ten years of my life, I was raised in the great walled city of the Khans. At first, my mother and the women of the palace had care of me, and of this, I recall but little. When I was three years of age, however, a fever took my mother. My father was busy with the work of the Khan, which often took him to far corners of the empire, and so the responsibility for my upbringing was passed to an order of monks native to Cathay. The monks of Xao-lin taught me to read, to write, and to figure. I also learned of them matters of lore, of philosophy, and considerable of physical skill. When my father came for me again, I was eight years old, and he pronounced himself so pleased with the work of the monks that I remained in their tutelage for the next two years, although I lived in my father’s house for that time. I came to know him then - a proud man, with a quick mind and a swift wit, but with a deep sadness under the skin. He longed for his homeland, and for the family he left behind.”

 

Once again, the Red Priest paused, and for a moment, closed his eyes. “The second letter from Venezia came not long before my tenth birthday. It spoke of improvement in the family fortunes, but a need for further investment. There were papers for my father to sign. I know he was not altogether happy about this, for he spent many nights in discussion with various of the Khan’s court. In the end, it was decided that he and I would make a journey to Venezia, where he would apply himself to the Dellaforte affairs for a time, and leave me to complete my education when he returned to the empire of the Khan. Sadly, our caravan was waylaid by slavers in Turkestan. My father was slain, and I was taken captive, along with several others.” His voice was empty of expression.

 

“Some time later we were rescued, and most of my father’s documents were recovered, but by then my destiny had already taken me on a road that turned away from Venezia and the Dellaforte clan.” He looked at Antonio, and his expression was merely sad. “I suppose that tells you little of my father. It is strange. Though he is long dead, I still find it hard to speak of him.”

 

The Red Priest’s words touched a chord somewhere inside Antonio. Names like Turkestan and Cathay resonated with a kind of haunting romance for him - a sense of sadness, knowing that as the only son of the Dellaforte clan, his place would be here, in Venezia, at the heart of things. What would it be like to travel? To seek the ends of the earth after fortune and adventure, in the manner of his uncle Niccolo, whom he would never know? There would be nothing like that for Antonio Dellaforte: he would come into the estate of manhood in the centre of a great financial web, and become a spider like his father, and like Luciana before.

 

Antonio exhaled a soft sigh, and lifted his cup. “To the fallen,” he offered.

 

The Red Priest raised his cup in return. “To the fallen.”

 

There was a soft, heavy thump behind him, and Antonio turned. Something round, like a loaf of bread, rolled across the flagstones, a dark trail unfurling behind it. The thing came to a stop near Antonio’s feet, and with a shock, he realized he was looking at a man’s head. “Dio mio!” he crossed himself hurriedly, and leapt to his feet, clawing at his sword with his still-throbbing hand.

 

Instantly, the Red Priest was beside him, murmuring, “He is here.” He glanced briefly at the bloodied head, and looked back up to the top of the wall. “Ah, Gunnar,” he said. “I told you not to face him with steel. He was not for you.”

 

Another wet thump came, this time from behind the two Dellaforte, and a second head rolled into the centre of the courtyard.

 

“Pu khai!” snarled the Red Priest. “So fast! He has killed Skouros too!” He rounded on Antonio. “It seems I am forced to trust you, cousin,” he said, his gaze unwavering as still another head bounced across the slate stones of the yard. “Get a lantern. Take it to one of the torches. At my signal, use the lantern to light the torch. Do nothing else.”

 

A fourth head fell upon the stones, and the Red Priest closed his eyes briefly. “By the Buddha,” he said softly. “He has the speed of a snake. Hurry.” He shoved Antonio, who stumbled, and fell to his knees.

 

When he rose to his feet again, another man stood at the far end of the courtyard. How had he come in? The door was still closed and barred.

 

“Hurry, fool,” said the Red Priest. “He doesn’t want you. Get away, and remember what I told you!” He leapt atop the heavy table, his two swords appearing like a conjurer’s trick in his hands. As quickly as he could, Antonio scuttled to the farthest corner of the courtyard, and took a lantern from the wall.

 

“Tomaso Dellaforte,” said the new arrival, in a calmly conversational tone. He was of middle height, and dressed all in grey and black, so that the shadows clung to him oddly. In one hand he carried a long sword, and in the other, a wicked dagger that oozed darkly.

 

“I am he,” acknowledged Tomaso. “Did you kill those men who guarded the rooftop?”

 

“I am Grimaldi,” said the other man. “I killed those men. Now I will kill you.”

 

In his corner, Antonio’s blood thickened and slowed in his veins. Grimaldi! A legendary name, the stuff of impossible whispers. Grimaldi, who could turn to shadow and vanish in the blink of an eye. Grimaldi, who never missed his mark. Grimaldi, who could not be killed. What had this Red Priest done to bring the prince of assassins down upon him? Antonio’s hand trembled as he unshielded the flame of the lantern, and made to touch it to a nearby torch.

 

“Not yet,” said the Red Priest softly, and Antonio did not know whether he spoke to the assassin, or to his cousin. Then Grimaldi moved, and the lantern dropped from Antonio’s still-clumsy fingers to smash on the flags at his feet.

 

The assassin came on in a terrifying rush, faster than a man should run. There was something wrong, somehow, with the way he moved - swift and scuttling, like a gigantic wolf spider racing down upon its prey. He did not pause as he neared the table, but sprang headlong, blades upthrust. In the same heartbeat, the Red Priest leapt straight up, tucking his legs under him in a somersault that cleared Grimaldi’s weapons by a handsbreadth. Almost at the same time, the two landed on opposite sides of the table.

 

“Now!” cried the Red Priest. He spun and dived under the table even as Grimaldi jumped with impossible strength into a backwards tumble which carried him clean over the tabletop. Fumbling, cursing, Antonio yanked the torch free of its sconce and plunged it into the pool of flaming oil before him. The torch caught briefly, guttered, then flared up.

 

Antonio raised it high above his head. “Now what?” he called desperately.

 

Grimaldi and the Red Priest crouched on opposite sides of the table, regarding each other warily. Then the assassin’s teeth gleamed in a parody of a grin. With that same uncanny speed, he sheathed his dagger and seized the heavy table with one hand. In a single, careless gesture, he flung it aside like so much matchwood. With nothing now between them, the Red Priest fell back a pace, weapons at the ready.

 

The torch above Antonio’s head hissed like an enraged snake, and flared with blindingly white light. Involuntarily, Antonio turned away to shield his gaze. He heard a thump, and a cry of pain. As the torch sputtered back to near-normal, Antonio saw that the Red Priest now stood behind Grimaldi in a peculiar, fluid crouch.

 

On the ground in front of the assassin lay a grey-sleeved arm, hand twitching like a great spider.

 

“Ah,” said Grimaldi, almost pleasantly. Then in a blur, he whirled and drove at Tomaso Dellaforte with his remaining blade.

 

Though the assassin had but one arm to the Red Priest’s two, the unbelievable speed of his attack kept his opponent desperately on the defensive, falling back before a blinding, snarling storm of steel. So swift were the assassin’s movements that Antonio gaped, unable to accept the evidence of his eyes.

 

Though the Red Priest was every bit as quick and as deadly as the stories said, he could not match the inhuman speed and strength of the prince of assassins. Only the fact that Grimaldi had lost an arm kept Tomaso Dellaforte alive beneath that terrible rain. Twice, thrice, a handful of times he was touched, blood flowing freely from minor wounds at shoulder and thigh, and still the furious attack continued unabated. His breath whistling between his teeth, Tomaso Dellaforte struggled to keep his attacker at bay with liquid, elegant skill almost as startling as Grimaldi’s speed and strength.

 

With bated breath, Antonio waited to see which of the two would falter first. Then he caught himself. The Red Priest was a renegade and a heretic, and his very existence posed a terrible threat to the Dellaforte family and fortunes. Yet this Grimaldi, with his inhuman power, was something worse. He could no more leave Tomaso Dellaforte at the mercy of this terrible thing than he could abandon his own father. Gathering his strength, he took up the torch in his good left hand and flung it as best he could at the assassin’s head.

 

In a casual stroke, Grimaldi’s sword whipped out and deflected the torch to the ground. Yet in that instant, Tomaso Dellaforte struck. His timing and reflexes perfect, Grimaldi slid sideways and parried - with the arm that ended in a stump. The Red Priest’s blade licked out and opened a terrible wound to Grimaldi’s belly. It yawned and glistened as the assassin staggered back, and ropes of shining intestine bulged over his grey tunic.

 

Grimaldi fell to his knees. Dropping his sword, he clawed with his remaining hand at something beneath his short cloak. The Red Priest’s eyes widened, and he struck again, severing the assassin’s remaining arm at the elbow. Dark blood dripped, with an unclean slowness, to the flags.

 

Antonio made his way on unsteady feet towards his cousin. Tomaso raised a warning hand, not taking his eyes from the mortally wounded Grimaldi for an instant. “Stay,” he panted. “He is dangerous yet.” With surgical deftness, he slashed once more, cutting free a section of Grimaldi’s cloak. As the assassin watched, the Red Priest plucked forth a small phial of blackened silver. Observing Grimaldi closely, he uncorked the phial and sniffed once, then blinked. He put the cork back in place, and backed away from Grimaldi, sword still raised.

 

Both arms severed, his bowels spilled across his knees, the prince of assassins snarled like a beast, white teeth flashing in the lantern light.

 

Antonio started. “Do you see?” he cried. “His teeth - like the teeth of a wolf!”

 

“Aye,” said the Red Priest. “Or a bat.” He held out the phial for Antonio to take. “What do you smell?”

 

The cork came free easily, and Antonio’s stomach churned. “Blood,” he said. “Blood and corruption. This is a foul thing.”

 

“Oh, it is that,” said the Red Priest, and Grimaldi snarled once again, more weakly this time. “At last, I believe I understand. Do not touch the contents. Give it back to me, and fetch another lantern.”

 

By the time Antonio had done as requested, the assassin lay in a pool of dark, stagnant blood, his hate-filled eyes locked on those of the Red Priest.

 

Tomaso spilled lamp oil onto the stones, watching the flames rear and leap. Then, with a cruel smile, he tipped the silver phial so that a little of the fluid inside fell into the flames, where it hissed and sputtered vilely.

 

Grimaldi cried out in wordless anguish.

 

“Yes,” said the Red Priest, and the dance of the flames cast eerie shadows upon his strange, impassive face. “If I gave it to you, if you could drink it, then you could heal yourself, could you not? How did you come by this stuff, Grimaldi? Who gave it to you? Tell me, and I may yet leave you enough that you can live.”

 

On the flags, the mutilated assassin writhed and mewled horribly, his lips skinning back from those unsettling teeth. Shuddering, Antonio averted his gaze.

 

There was another hiss, and the stench of burning carrion redoubled. “Not much left, Grimaldi,” said the Red Priest softly. “You are badly wounded. I know you cannot die in the night’s embrace - but what will happen when the sun climbs over the walls? Tell me what I want to know. There is still enough that you can heal yourself to crawl away and recover.” Another hiss.

 

“Malik!” It was a tormented cry, as though torn from the assassin by steel pincers. “Malik of Acre makes it for me. Now give it to me. Give it to me, Tomaso Dellaforte, and let me go.”

 

Wordlessly, the Red Priest held the phial above Grimaldi’s head, tipping it so that the dark fluid rushed to the neck. Greedily, Grimaldi tilted back his head and opened his mouth. “Yes, yes,” he gurgled. “Pour it for me. Pour it into my mouth.”

 

The Red Priest’s sword flashed once, and Grimaldi’s head rolled away over the stones, mouth still working. “That was for Gunnar,” said the Red Priest. “And for Skouros, and Rosen, and Graves.” He turned to Antonio. “Buddha,” he exclaimed. “You look white as a ghost, boy. Sit! We’ll call for more wine, and send someone to find out who this Malik may be.”

 

“No,” said Antonio. “No! You don’t understand!” Staggering across the courtyard, he pummelled at the door through which Pio had gone. “Open,” he cried. “Open for the love of God!” He turned back to his cousin, still standing over the body of the dead assassin. “Malik the astrologer is our grandmother’s advisor! Luciana is in danger! We must go to her at once!”

 

Closing his eyes, the Red Priest spat a single crude word.

 

* * * *

 

They burst into the inn at a run, not stopping even to dress Tomaso’s wounds. The Red Priest paused long enough to seize a scarlet cloak that hung against the wall and cast it over his shoulders, concealing his torn clothes. Briefly, he barked some kind of message to a small circle of men in a language Antonio did not understand, and swept past them to the front door with his cousin at his heels.

 

“You must have questions,” said the Red Priest when they were in the street, moving quickly through the thinning crowds. It was well after midnight now, and even the Carnevale revellers of Venice were growing weary, sated with food and music, and pleasures less wholesome. “I will answer what I can. First, know this: I am no sorcerer. The torch was not magic,” he said, sidestepping a slow circle of dancers, their costumes askew, masques forgotten. “It was al-kimiya, a kind of learning from Araby. There is a metal, light and soft, which burns with the light that you saw. It is not easy to prepare, but I learned the way of it from a Persian sage, and I make it my business to have some with me at all times. Once alight, it will burn even underwater like the Greek Fire of old.”

 

“You knew of this Grimaldi, then?” puffed Antonio, struggling to keep up. What sort of man was this Red Priest, that he could fight a titanic struggle and then stride like an athlete through the streets without rest?

 

“Not precisely. I knew of an assassin, very dangerous. I chose to make myself known to him, and hoped to meet him on prepared ground, as you saw. I did not expect such a thing as Grimaldi. It is fortunate you were with me, cousin. I doubt I could have prevailed without aid.” The Red Priest swept over the cobbles, his gliding step methodically eating the distance, his cloak flaring behind him.

 

“What do… what did you mean about making yourself known to him?”

 

Tomaso cast a sharp glance over his shoulder at his cousin. “The Dellaforte fortunes have been good, no? A string of luck: enemies perishing, business rivals withdrawing, inconvenient ships disappearing at sea…”

 

Panting, and clutching surreptitiously at a sharp pain in his side, Antonio thought about this. “Fortune is just so. It comes like the tide, rising now, falling later.”

 

“The Dellaforte tide has risen very high indeed, of late,” said the Red Priest. “Others have noticed this. Some have wondered if more than simple fortune is at work.”

 

There was a roaring in Antonio’s ears, and his face was hot. “You came to Venezia to serve our enemies? You, who call yourself a Dellaforte?”

 

“I serve only myself and God,” said the Red Priest, without turning. His voice was hard. “I have had no blood family since the death of my father.”

 

Antonio found a burst of speed. He seized the Red Priest by the shoulder and forced him to turn, staring into those bleak, dark eyes looking for something - he didn’t know what, exactly. “It was your father who left us behind,” said Antonio. “You could have come back to us, even without him.”

 

For just an instant, there was a trace of something almost like anger, deep in those wells of darkness, a flash of something hot and sharp, and then it was gone, covered by the inscrutable masque of the Red Priest. “My father was sent,” said the Red Priest. “By his beloved family. Did you not hear our grandmother in the ballroom? How she questioned my patrimony? Had I not the legal proof of my claims, she would have ordered me killed on the spot. Welcome home, Tomaso Dellaforte.” He looked away into the darkness, and shook off Antonio’s grasp.

 

“Surely you did not think the Dellaforte commanded this assassin?” protested Antonio, but he spoke to the other man’s rapidly receding back. Grimly, he hurried after, still trying to reason with this man who claimed to be his cousin. “You could not - did not plan…” He faltered, hearing his own voice in his mind: Malik the astrologer is our grandmother’s advisor…

 

The thoughts that filled Antonio’s head to bursting were too painful and complex to articulate. Besides, what would this grim, vermilion spectre care for Antonio’s fears? This Red Priest, whose very name was a byword for bloodshed and battle, come uncountable leagues to the land that might have been his home: what did he want? He spoke of patrimony and primogeniture, but claimed no interest in the family fortunes. He slew the unspeakable Grimaldi without hesitation, but was it simply Grimaidi’s master that now he sought, or did he pursue a darker agenda?

 

Was he friend or foe to the Dellaforte of Venezia? There was no way to know, Antonio realized bleakly. All he could do was stay close to the man, and hope somehow to shape the outcome towards his family’s interests. And yet - was he even certain of those any more? How much influence did this Malik have?

 

Antonio tried to remember what he knew of the astrologer. A tall, cadaverously spare man, he spoke the Venetian tongue with a thick accent. He claimed to be Persian, and brought letters of recommendation from grandees of the Holy Lands. Over a year ago, Luciana had sought an astrologer, claiming a need for guidance. At the time, Antonio had thought it simply another affectation. Astrologers were much in fashion with the great houses of Venezia, as well as Firenze and even Rome. Malik had arrived with a huge baggage train, and promptly taken over a suite of rooms in the Palazzo Dellaforte, claiming that he needed space for his observations and experiments. Certainly, Luciana paid heed to him - but no more so than to Phraxas the Byzantine, or even to old Ezra who kept the books and figured the family wealth. Yet Antonio had to acknowledge it was true. Since the arrival of the astrologer, good luck followed the Dellaforte’s every move, and ill fortune plagued their enemies. Still, wasn’t that what you engaged an astrologer for? Confused and no little part angry, Antonio hurried in the wake of the Red Priest.

 

On the far side of the Plaza del Corragio, the grand edifice of the Palazzo Dellaforte rose boldly from the stones, its pink-and-white brickwork gleaming in the light of the torches that guttered around the square. Almost all the revellers and partygoers were gone now, leaving only a few drunkards sleeping here and there. No lights showed at the windows, and even the great door was closed, half-hidden in the shadowed portico. The Red Priest hung back out of sight as Antonio hammered on the oaken portals.

 

“Open,” he cried, and the doors swung inward, revealing two guardsmen with halberds in hand.

 

“Antonio Dellaforte,” he identified himself, and turned, indicating the man in scarlet. “My guest, Tomaso Dellaforte, the Red Priest.”

 

One of the guards, a giant of a man named Giapetto of Padua, shook his head. “He may not enter, signore,” he said apologetically. “Orders.”

 

“I am the Dellaforte heir,” Antonio flared. “Mine are the orders you follow, and I say that where I go, this man follows.”

 

Giapetto glanced at his partner, a new man whose name Antonio did not know. Then he shook his head again, very slowly, and lowered his weapon as a bar across the doorway.

 

“Antonio, we have not the time for this,” said the Red Priest calmly. “Malik will be expecting news from his creature. Who can say what he will do when no word comes?”

 

Anguished, Antonio turned back to Giapetto. “Please,” he raised an imploring hand. “Please -”

 

There was a flash of scarlet. Though he could not swear it, Antonio thought he saw the Red Priest touch the throat of the giant Paduan, whose eyes bulged horribly. Then his face turned purple, and he sank slowly to his knees as the young man watched. Somehow, the other man was already down, lying face down on the tiled floor, and Tomaso Dellaforte was striding through the open doorway into the hall beyond.

 

“Ward my back, cousin,” said the Red Priest. “We move swiftly.”

 

“Wait,” called Antonio, stooping to examine Giapetto and the other. “Wait!”

 

The man in scarlet did not wait. Torn between two duties, Antonio hesitated. Then, with a curse, he turned back to the fallen men. To his surprise, both still lived and breathed, though they were senseless as the marble tiles upon which they lay. Urgently, Antonio slammed shut the great doors, and slipped the bar into position. Then he flicked his cloak back over his shoulders, laid a hand on the hilt of his blade, and set off in pursuit of the Red Priest, and a reckoning.

 

With the advantage of moving on his home ground, Antonio caught the intruder near the door to the bedchamber of Jacopo Dellaforte. His teeth set, he seized the Red Priest by the arm and spun him around. “What are you doing?” he whispered in the stillness of the darkened corridor. “This is my father’s room!”

 

Silently, the Red Priest turned his arm in Antonio’s grasp. His other hand seized Antonio’s elbow and applied pressure. Yelping, Antonio writhed away, and discovered that yet again, his arm was locked painfully behind his back. Steely fingers tangled in his hair and yanked his head back. He breathed loudly through his nose, stilled by the fierce pain in his neck and his shoulder.

 

“Listen very carefully,” came the hatefully calm voice in his ear. “I tell you now, plainly, what you have refused so far to understand. Someone inside your family has been directing the actions of the creature Grimaldi for over a year. I followed you first, because you were the easiest to reach, but you are an innocent. I have reason to think your sister equally blameless, which leaves only your father, and your grandmother. Your father is ill, I know, but still he commands the family fortunes. Therefore I come to him.”

 

Deftly, the Red Priest unloosed Antonio’s hair, and used the trapped arm to spin him across the corridor, releasing him against the opposite wall. He lifted his chin, and stood in a fighting crouch before Antonio, his open hands belying their deadliness. “You saw Grimaldi. You know what manner of thing he was. You saw the phial that made him so. You heard him name the man who supplied that phial. Make your choice, Antonio Dellaforte. Make it now. Your family? Or the good God who forbids such vileness as Grimaldi and the stuff that gave him his Hell-spawned strength.”

 

Antonio struggled for words, for the reasoned denial that would set the lie to everything this Red Priest said, but his voice failed. All he could call to mind was the vision of the thing that had been Grimaldi. That such a thing might come of the Dellaforte - impossible! Yet Malik of Acre lived here, under the very roof of his family home.

 

Inside him, something gave way. Trembling, Antonio covered his face with his hands. “How?” he groaned. “How do you know so much? How can you do this? How can I make such a choice?”

 

“Find the strength, little cousin,” said the Red Priest, and for just a moment his voice was gentle. “I made my choice many years ago.” He turned away from Antonio and sprang high, planting one foot against the wall to push off and give him speed in his rush for Jacopo’s door. One step he took, then whirled and lashed out with his heel, striking the heavy oak door accurately at the lock, which tore free of the frame so that the door flew open and smashed against the wall within.

 

Where were the family retainers? Saving only the guards at the door, Antonio had seen none. Why hadn’t the sound of the door breaking brought them running?

 

“Look,” said the Red Priest in a voice like fire in the wind. A grip of Damascene steel sank into Antonio’s shoulder, and he was dragged forcibly around to face the open doorway. “Look within,” said the Red Priest. “See what has become of your precious family.”

 

Beyond lay a nightmare. Upon his bed of fine linens, Jacopo Dellaforte sprawled, naked and pale. One arm hung over the edge of the bed, and on the floor below Luciana Dellaforte crouched, like a vile beast. Her fine, raven hair fell about her shoulders in lank strings, and her full lips were stained a rich, dark red with blood that oozed from a raw wound on the inside of Jacopo’s arm. At the sight of the Red Priest, she gave an animal growl and scuttled beneath the high bed, into the shadows.

 

“Fetch her out,” said the Red Priest, shoving Antonio forward. “I will see to your father.” He vaulted lightly to the bed, careful to avoid the space below, and knelt over Jacopo Dellaforte’s limp body.

 

Horrified, Antonio stumbled into the room. “What is… what is wrong? Why is my father so pale?”

 

“Beware, you fool,” snapped Tomaso Dellaforte, not looking up from his work. “Old as she is, if she takes you unawares she may yet make an escape and warn our quarry.” He put his ear to Jacopo’s chest and listened.

 

“I don’t understand,” said Antonio plaintively. “Please, help me.” He peered beneath the bed, where his grandmother lurked like a monstrous, deformed cat in the darkest corner. She hissed at him, and he jerked back.

 

“Idiot,” said the Red Priest. He tore a strip from a linen sheet and carefully bound the wound on his uncle’s arm. “Our grandmother is more than threescore winters. Yet her hair is black as midnight, and her skin as soft and smooth as that of your sister. Does that mean nothing to you?”

 

“The di Carnuto - her family. She says they were long-lived.” Antonio floundered. He had never thought about his grandmother’s appearance. She had always looked that way, as long as he could remember. It wasn’t strange; it was just… it was simply the way things were. She was his grandmother, and she was still beautiful. He looked back under the bed. “Grandmother? Please - please don’t do this. He means no harm. I promise you. Grandmother?”

 

In the darkness under the bed, something moved.

 

“Grandmother? It is I. Antonio, son of Jacopo.” He put his hand out gently, palm upwards, reaching for the grandmother he had loved all his life.

 

Something seized his hand in a grip of iron and yanked him bodily forward. He cracked his head on the heavy wooden frame of the bed, tasting blood. The grip redoubled and a terrible strength dragged him under the bed, head swimming, lights popping behind his eyelids. “Jesu, Jesu,” he screamed thickly, spitting warm liquid.

 

A guttural growl answered him, and a white-hot pain lanced through his forearm. As if from a great distance, Antonio Dellaforte heard himself squealing like a pig at the slaughterhouse, felt himself struggling, flailing weakly against an inexorable power that pulled him in, gurgling and growling as it sated itself on his blood.

 

Then there was a shriek, cut off as suddenly as a door slamming. The grip on his arm vanished. Whimpering, he scrambled out from beneath the bed into the lantern-light, clutching his torn and bleeding arm to his chest. On the opposite side of the bed, a blood-red shape rose up, and Antonio scuttled backwards until he came up against the wall.

 

The Red Priest dropped Luciana Dellaforte unceremoniously onto the bed, and stared at her, his lip curling. “She is not dead,” he said. Tearing more strips of sheet, he bound the woman hand and foot, swaddling her in strong linen as a spider cocoons a fly. “Perhaps better if she was. She is like Grimaldi, save that for Luciana, the potion brings youth and beauty, the envy of all women. As it did to Grimaldi, it has also brought changes. Already, she has begun to feed, and upon her own son.” He looked up at Antonio, his black eyes twin windows onto damnation. “Are you ready to show me this Malik?”

 

Staring at the blood-drinking creature that had taken the place of his grandmother, Antonio nodded. There was nothing left in him with which to fight.

 

Malik of Acre, astrologer to the Dellaforte, lived in a suite of rooms on the eastern wing of the palazzo. At the top of the stairwell, at the entrance to the corridor which gave on Malik’s suite, the Red Priest stopped. “Three doors,” he said. “And another stair at the opposite end. Too many exits, Antonio. We will need help to trap this rat in his bolthole.”

 

“What of the household guard?” His wounded arm bound, Antonio was steady on his feet once more. Behind his eyes, though, there lurked the terrible vision of his grandmother feeding on the blood of his father, and somewhere deep within he felt the first, faint pricklings of a strange, fey mood that he thought was madness.

 

“Dismissed by our grandmother, I presume,” said the Red Priest. “Possibly out searching for me, or even you. The orders would have been a pretext to ensure Grimaldi could come and go unheralded. We can look for no help from that quarter.“ He seemed completely assured that Antonio was now entirely of one mind with him - or was it merely that he acted a part? Antonio had no way of telling any more, even if it mattered. Events were unfolding far too quickly.

 

From a pouch at his hip, the Red Priest extracted a peculiar wax taper, which he lit from a wall lantern, and held up before a window on the stair. “Watch,” he said, “but be ready to shield your eyes. This is an art of the country of my birth.”

 

The Red Priest elbowed the window wide, and held the burning taper outside in the chill night air. Within moments, the flame leapt to a fierce, hissing white light that suddenly turned scarlet and showered sparks. Tomaso Dellaforte waved the brilliant flare back and forth three times, slowly, then threw the still-burning taper into the alley below.

 

“Now what?” said Antonio. His arm throbbed horribly, but the bitter ache in his heart was by far the worse.

 

“Now we wait,” said the Red Priest.

 

Minutes later, five black-clad men entered the stairwell, and climbed to the landing where Antonio waited with the Red Priest. How had they come past the barred doors?

 

“Kill them all,” said one of the men, to Antonio’s alarm. The newcomers were heavily armed not only with swords and knives, but with the wicked crossbows outlawed by the Pope himself for their devilish power.

 

“God will know his own,” recited the Red Priest smoothly, in countersignature. “I am he.” He gestured down the corridor. “Three doors. I will enter the first. Nothing and no-one emerges except me. If I do not come out within the hour, burn the house and all within it. Use holy water over the ashes - and be sure it is blessed by a true priest, not that fat fool of a bishop.”

 

“No!” Antonio pulled himself to his full height. He pushed in front of the man who had spoken, and addressed him urgently. “I know not what you expect to find in there, but you will not burn this house in which I was born, with my family inside.”

 

The black-clad man glanced past Antonio to the Red Priest, who regarded Antonio with empty eyes. “They follow my orders, cousin. That is all you need know. They will do as I say, and if you seek to stay them, they will kill you in an instant.” He lifted his shoulders slightly. “Not my preferred choice, you understand - but I will not permit what lies beyond those doors to escape, no matter what the price.”

 

Antonio looked from the face of the Red Priest to the utterly impassive mien of the man in black. No mercy lay in either gaze, though perhaps there was compassion in the stance of the man in scarlet. By now, Antonio knew well that his cousin made no idle threats. Whatever lay within the chambers of Malik the Astrologer, it had already turned at least two people into creatures of night and horror. He thought momentarily of his sister Zaneta, and then of the red-eyed, predatory madness in Luciana Dellaforte’s face as she crouched under the bed in her son’s room, his blood upon her lips.

 

The Red Priest was right. Such things must be prevented, no matter the cost.

 

Antonio squared his shoulders. “I too will enter Malik’s chambers. If my house and my family are at stake, you cannot deny me that.” He paused, hearing his voice tremble. When he had control of himself, he continued. “In any case, you will have to kill me to keep me out.”

 

Those dark eyes watched him a moment longer. Then the Red Priest nodded, and strode up the corridor. As the men in black took their places with alarmingly professional speed, he grasped the handle of the first door to the chambers of the Astrologer, and shot a glance at his cousin.

 

Antonio nodded, and clasped his sword-hilt for strength. “Let us keep him waiting no longer,” he said.

 

The Red Priest grinned mirthlessly, and flung the door wide.

 

The rooms of Malik of Acre were dark, save for a handfulof candles scattered here and there. Behind Antonio, the Red Priest closed the door. “Split up,” he said softly. “Follow my lead.” Before Antonio could respond, he was gone, vanished into the shadows.

 

“Stay where you are,” said a deep, powerful voice.

 

Antonio stopped reflexively, but from near the shadows of a huge, floor-length drape that hung askew over a collection of peculiar statue, came the voice of the Red Priest. “I know what you have done, Malik of Acre,” said Tomaso Dellaforte. “Where is your creature?”

 

The astrologer laughed, and now Antonio could see his tall, lean shape at the far end of the suite. “You have seen my assassin, yes? And perhaps your grandmother too? You know only the slightest of my whims. I have powers that can blast your soul, little priest.”

 

“What have you done to my grandmother?” Something burned inside Antonio, and he strode forwards towards the astrologer, his wounds and fears forgotten.

 

“Stay!” snapped Malik, and now Antonio could see the bottle he held on high, tilted over a strange, dark casque of metal at his feet. “One step more and I feed the creature within. If it breaks loose, you will certainly die, and perhaps much of Venezia with you, for it will take all my strength to master it again.”

 

“You never mastered it at all, did you? It was bound, trapped, starving when you found it.” The Red Priest’s voice was soft, but penetrating. “You know almost nothing of what you have there. You feed it blood, and you take blood from it to make your little magicks, but you fear it terribly, and you never feed it more than a few drops.” Antonio could no longer locate the Red Priest in the darkness. By some trick, his voice seemed to come from all about.

 

“What does a priest know of these things?” Malik laughed again, but less convincingly. His gaze flickered back and forth, and the bottle shook in his grasp, Antonio saw. There was a strange, guttural noise from within the casque.

 

“I am no priest,” said Tomaso Dellaforte. “Not as you know it. But for a time, I was a Knight of the Temple. You of all people should be familiar with the knowledge the Order carried, Malik of Acre.”

 

“Impossible,” snapped Malik, though his voice trembled. “The Templars were broken and banished. Their leaders were killed. Their knowledge is destroyed.”

 

“Knowledge may be lost, but never destroyed,” said the voice of the Red Priest. Antonio was certain now that his cousin was closing in, using the shadows and the flickering candlelight to conceal his approach amongst the jumble of furnishings and oddments that filled the suite of rooms. To distract the astrologer, he spoke up.

 

“My grandmother,” he shouted. “You didn’t answer me, Malik.”

 

“I did nothing to her,” said the astrologer, glaring towards Antonio. “She asked me to give her what every woman wants. I gave her the means, and she took it gladly. She took what I made for her and used it as only she could, and the Dellaforte grew rich. You grew rich, young Antonio. And I can do more for you.” His harshly accented voice grew sly and soft. “I have the power. Women, Antonio - I can give you any woman you desire. I can give you strength such as no man possesses. Speed and power and vitality; all of these. With time, as I learn more, perhaps even immortality. Do you see?” His eyes were bright in the candlelight, and his chest heaved beneath his white robes. “The Dellaforte can rule all Venezia, and with my guidance, Venezia can become the new Rome. We can reunite the world beneath our banner. An army of soldiers like Grimaldi! An immortal emperor, guided by the wisdom of the ages. I can give you all of these things, Antonio. Help me deal with this man who tries to steal your birthright, and together we can bring about a new age!”

 

Dizzied by Malik’s visions, Antonio shook his head. “I see no new age,” he said. “Only madness.”

 

In the uncertain light, the astrologer’s cadaverous face seemed to writhe. “I see,” he said. “That is your final answer?”

 

Though the words were different, it was the same choice the Red Priest had posed outside Jacopo Dellaforte’s room. This time, Antonio knew his own heart. “Ask a thousand times, sorcerer,” he said heavily. “I will always say nay. There is a price for such power as you offer, and I will not pay it.”

 

“So be it,” said Malik, and turned the bottle in his hand.

 

“No!” Like a bolt of light, one of the Red Priest’s swords transfixed Malik’s arm even as he poured dark fluid over the casque. With a cry, the astrologer dropped the bottle which bounced away across the floor. Yet the damage was done; perhaps a cupful of the stuff trickled through the elaborate scrollwork of the metal sarcophagus to drip upon the thing that lay within.

 

“Take the sorcerer, Antonio,” shouted the Red Priest, springing from the shadow of a bookshelf. “The thing in the casque is mine alone!”

 

Antonio charged forward, only to be stopped in his tracks by a nightmare stolen from the works of Dante himself. There was a sound - a noise like a scream, like the tearing of silk, like the sizzle of lightning that cleaves the air before the thunder - and the great casque shattered into a hundred fragments. In its place stood a creature. Its form was human, but no-one could mistake it for a man. Unnaturally tall, skeletally lean, its clawed arms hung below its knees. Upon its long skull, great webbed and pointed ears streamed back from oversized jaws and a maw filled by thousands of needle-sharp fangs. Its huge, triangular eyes glittered, flat and black as a basilisk’s gaze in the candlelight.

 

“Take them,” howled Malik, pointing at the Red Priest. “Take them and destroy them!”

 

His dagger in his left hand, Antonio flung himself at the sorcerer, hoping desperately that Tomaso Dellaforte had some kind of answer for the abomination from the casque.

 

Before Antonio had taken two paces, the thing lowered its head and snarled, a noise eerily like the snarl of Grimaldi earlier, but a thousand times more dreadful. It lurched sideways, and one arm lashed out, seizing Malik by the throat. The astrologer’s eyes bulged, and he gurgled, hammering with clenched fists at the great hand upon his neck. Contemptuously, the thing placed its other hand atop Malik’s shaven head and twisted.

 

There was a crackling noise, and the astrologer’s body capered in a ghastly dance. The thing twisted once more, and Malik’s head came loose in its grasp. It flung the head away and raised the body by its shoulders, as a thirsty man might raise a bottle of rare vintage to his lips.

 

“Now!” cried the Red Priest, leaping upon the back of the thing. “Strike now, while it drinks!” In his hand was a long, dark dagger which he plunged into the flesh of the thing, striking over and over again, seeking a vital place.

 

The thing roared and squealed, dropping its prey and shaking the Red Priest from its back as a dog shakes water from its coat. The smell of it was unspeakable, like grave-dust and carrion and old blood. It was not so fast as Grimaldi, nor so graceful, but the power of the thing - the raw, awful power of it radiated like terror. Antonio’s breath caught in his throat. Closing his eyes, he thrust with his dagger, feeling the point turn against the beast’s leathery hide and the cabled muscle beneath. Something struck his head, and again he saw bright lights as he fell away, felt the warm blood pouring from his torn scalp.

 

The stench redoubled, driving the air from Antonio’s lungs with its pungency. Like the breath of the very grave, it was rank and foul and cold. Struggling to regain control over his body that had turned into some broken child’s toy, a puppet with severed strings, Antonio managed to open his eyes. Looming over him was a shape too ghastly to imagine - licking. With a cold, rasping, hideously prehensile tongue, it licked at the blood flowing from his wounded head, lapping like a thirsty dog, drinking from his very life. He thrust at the thing, hammered at it with his hands, pushed with all his strength, but he might as well have struggled against a colossus of living stone.

 

Cold. It was so terribly cold.

 

And behind it. A dagger raised high.

 

Desperately, Antonio clutched the thing that was killing him, holding it close, trying to keep it from seeing the Red Priest. If it wanted his blood, let it feed - so long as it didn’t look up.

 

The dagger fell. Upon Antonio’s body, the great, cold figure jerked. And the dagger rose. And fell.

 

A scream of inhuman rage buffeted Antonio, tearing at his very mind, but still he clung grimly, with all that remained, hoping somehow to hamper the thing. If he could just hold it long enough -

 

The dagger rose again, and fell. Again.

 

Again.

 

Until the world went away.

 

Antonio opened his eyes. In the dim candlelight, he made out the bruised and battered face of Tomaso Dellaforte, the Red Priest. Swollen, bleeding lips stretched in an ugly parody of a smile. “You live,” said the Red Priest. “I feared otherwise.”

 

Antonio could only cough weakly. A small bottle was pressed to his lips, and he tasted something sweet and fiery.

 

“A cordial,” said the Red Priest. “It will help. For a while.”

 

With the help of the nearby drapes, Antonio pulled himself to his knees, though the rooms swam in his vision. “You must go,” he said. “My house. My family. They must not be burned.”

 

Tomaso Dellaforte, also kneeling, looked at Antonio.

 

“Your father will live, I think,” he said. “I cannot say what will happen to Luciana. She is very old. Without Malik’s potions to sustain her, she will lose her stolen youth. I do not know if she can survive.” He dabbed at the side of Antonio’s head with a ragged piece of cloth, and Antonio winced at the lance of pain that went through him.

 

“Better a clean death,” said Antonio. He wiped his mouth with a torn sleeve, uncertain whether to be pleased that he still had something to bleed with. “The creature. What happened?”

 

The Red Priest showed him a dagger of strange design, like an iron nail perhaps nine inches in length, with a simple cross-piece to form a hilt. The point of the dagger oozed something blackish. “The creature is dead. There is a virtue in this dagger which gives it power over such things, when used properly.”

 

Antonio sagged back against the wall, and closed his eyes, feeling all the different places on his body that hurt. At last, he opened his eyes again and nodded, waving at the door. “Do what you must,” he said.

 

Somehow, the Red Priest rose and limped to the door, throwing it open so that light streamed in from the corridor beyond. Then he too leaned against the wall, breathing heavily. There was a long moment of silence. Then, past the silent men-at-arms in the corridor strode a single figure resplendent in cloth of gold, followed by an even dozen soldiers in golden livery. Under the eyes of their leader, the soldiers set about opening the heavy drapes to admit the first, faint rays of dawn. Too stunned to speak, Antonio slid sideways, then sat down. He struggled up again until he could rest on one knee and bow his head.

 

“My lord Doge,” he stammered. Of a sudden, many things became clear - the Red Priest’s invitation; his astonishing intelligence of the Dellaforte family and its doings; the source of the heavily armed men at his command.

 

The Red Priest did not kneel.

 

“Rise, Antonio Dellaforte,” said the Doge of Venezia softly, without looking. “Renegade,” he said to the Red Priest. “Have you done as I commanded?”

 

Tomaso Dellaforte pulled himself upright and stood clear of the wall, raising his chin and linking his hands behind his back like a general reviewing his troops. “Malik of Acre brought with him from some forgotten desert tomb a creature of Hell. Binding it with silver and iron, he fed it human blood, and bled it in turn to make his foul potions. To Luciana Dellaforte he gave back her youth and her beauty. To the gutter bravo Grimaldi, he gave invincible speed, strength, and endurance. Luciana used her woman’s ways to carry out the Dellaforte ends, and where other means were needed, the assassin Grimaldi was available. Malik thought he controlled both, knowing he could withhold the potions at any time, but he did not reckon with what they became as their humanity receded before the black blood of the thing from the tomb. Grimaldi began to kill for the love of killing, and Luciana began to feed upon the blood and strength of her own son.” Glancing fleetingly at Antonio, he went on. “Antonio and his sister Zaneta knew nothing of this. I believe Jacopo Dellaforte was equally ignorant.”

 

The Doge nodded, his iron-grey hair falling in immaculate ringlets upon his shoulders. “Malik and his creature?”

 

“Both dead,” asserted the Red Priest flatly. “Malik unleashed it, and it killed him in its hunger. Weakened by its long imprisonment, it sought to feed, but Antonio and I harried it, and at last it fell. Finally, and forever. And my men?”

 

“They are in good health,” said the Doge, after a pause. His fierce, dark eyes regarded the Red Priest with clear hostility. “Take this.” He handed a small stone seal to Tomaso Dellaforte, who looked at it curiously. “When I receive a letter from Firenze sealed with that mark, your men will be released. Until then, they remain my… guests.”

 

The Red Priest’s face seemed hard as jade in the grey light of dawn. “This is not as we agreed.”

 

“It is as I require,” said the Doge in a voice even harder than the Red Priest’s visage. He lifted his chin, and signalled two of his men to stand on either side of him, weapons at the ready. “You have proven yourself a most dangerous man, Tomaso Dellaforte. You have no reason now to be in my city, and I will not be easy until I am certain you are well gone.”

 

“Not so,” said Antonio Dellaforte, surprising himself with the strength of his own voice. With the revelation of the Doge’s part in the night’s work, there came a new clarity in his thoughts. There were debts that he would repay.

 

With as much dignity as he could muster, Antonio grasped one of Malik’s heavy drapes and pulled himself to his feet, tottering uncertainly. He could still feel blood flowing from the wound in his scalp, but appearances were the least of his concerns. He took a deep breath to combat the dizziness of rising, and tried to speak boldly, as befit the scion of a great house. “You have done your family a great service today, Tomaso Dellaforte.” Keeping his eyes on the Doge, who watched impassively, Antonio stretched out a hand to the Red Priest’s shoulder, consciously mimicking his grandmother’s gesture. “Until my father recovers his strength, I speak for the Dellaforte of Venezia, and I say you are welcome here at your whim.” Without turning, he sharpened his voice. “I will give my own guarantee to the Doge as surety for your behaviour, for I know you as the most courageous and honourable of men, despite the tales of fools. Naturally the Dellaforte guarantee will be enough to free your men. Will it not, my lord Doge?”

 

The older man frowned, and considered Antonio thoughtfully. “Five thousand ducats if this one or his men cause trouble.”

 

Antonio met the Doge’s stare contemptuously. “Ten times that sum,” he said.

 

The Doge’s eyes widened. He nodded, and with a sign to his men, he left.

 

At last, Antonio turned and held the Red Priest’s gaze with his own. Then, with a single, heartfelt movement, he stepped forward and put his arm around his cousin’s neck. “Many thanks, cousin,” he whispered, and hugged him close.

 

For a moment, the Red Priest stood stiff and unyielding. Then, tentatively, he put his hands on his cousin’s shoulders and returned the embrace. When the two men stepped back from one another, Antonio was startled to see the Red Priest’s black eyes were bright with tears. Wordlessly, the man in scarlet fumbled beneath his robe, and brought forth a golden ring hung like a locket upon a neck-chain.

 

“I have a gift for you,” he said, and broke the chain with a quick twist of his hand. He dropped the ring into Antonio’s outstretched palm, and folded the hand over it. “My father bore this with him to Cathay. I took it from the body of the Turkestani who killed him. It is the signet ring of our family.”

 

Wonderingly, Antonio opened his hand. The heavy ring was still beautiful, though much of the enamelling upon the three salmon of the Dellaforte arms was worn away. “This came to you from your father,” he said at last. “You are the eldest. It belongs with you.”

 

A gentle smile touched the Red Priest’s lips. “No,” he said. “I have no need of it - and now it is in much better hands than mine.” This time, it was Tomaso Dellaforte who embraced his cousin. “Fare thee well, cousin,” he whispered, and turned on his heel.

 

Slipping the golden ring over his finger, Antonio Dellaforte watched his cousin, the notorious Red Priest, vanish from the room.