Joseph!
Not so bad to die…it means we can be together again…
A man was murmuring prayers in the dark. “Pater noster, qui es in caelis, sanctificetur nomen tuum…”
When he had finished, a woman answered: “Amen.”
The man asked questions in Venetian about a patient’s name, when he had arrived in the hospitale, the cause of his malady. Something was said about the conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn as well as the harmful miasmas wafting from the marshes on the nones.
A fire crackled. People were coughing, and the sound echoed off moist stone walls.
“What is the patient’s temperament, sister?” the man said.
“Nobody knows, signore,” the woman answered. “We tried asking, but he couldn’t answer. He is to Venesia a stranger.”
“A grave case,” the man said. “Yet also a simple one. A fall from the doge’s palace, a punishment by God for many sinful transgressions. Yet he is lucky he struck the grass and mud. Otherwise he would have passed long ago.”
“We pray for the Lord’s forgiveness, signore.”
The man laughed. “Better to die, I should think. He must have a sanguine temperament, due to his adventurousness, no? We shall let blood to cool his inner fires, making an incision on the forearm below the elbow.”
Medieval European medicine. Rusted tools. No disinfection.
Gontran’s stomach twisted. “No,” he groaned, turning over in the darkness. “Get away from me.”
Gontran opened his eyes. He was lying on a bed in a dim hall of stone. Many other beds lay against the walls, and people were lying in all of them—sometimes multiple people to a single bed. A fire burned in a brick hearth at the room’s center, the smoke and sparks whirling into a square hole in the ceiling which glowed with cloudy sunlight.
A bald man in a brown cowl and a nun were leaning over him. Both faces were drawn with concern. They looked to be in their fifties, but Gontran would have been unsurprised to learn that they were half that age.
“I’m fine.” Gontran sat up against the wall to keep away from the monk and the nun. “Really. You both did a great job. It’s amazing. I’m cured.”
The monk and the nun looked at each other. Gontran suddenly felt his head pounding. He winced, but resisted the urge to groan and clutch it. At this time, he also noticed that a cold and heavy iron manacle was wrapped around his wrist and chained to his bed. Frantically he felt for his pistol-sword and his hundred and twenty golden nomismas. They were gone. The Venetians had even taken his shoes.
Fuck!
“Well, that’s good to hear,” the monk said to Gontran. “God is good.” He turned to the nun and stood from his seat. “Let me know if the patient’s condition deteriorates. In the mean time, fortify him with the usual mutton and gallon of ale per day.”
“Sì, signore.” She bowed, then picked up the stool for him as they moved on to the next patient.
“Wait,” Gontran said. “How long have I been here?”
The nun turned. “Only since prime or so. But a few hours.”
“My ship, did it escape?” Gontran said.
The nun glanced at the monk, then looked back to Gontran and whispered: “Sì, signore.”
He grinned and pumped his fist. “Yes!” As the nun was moving on, he asked her one more question—if he was still in Venice, using the Venetian word for this place: Venesia.
“Certo che sì,” she said.
Sounds like ‘claro que sí,’ Gontran thought. His high school Spanish teacher was always saying that—it meant ‘of course,’ didn’t it?
Gontran was unsure if he had phrased his questions correctly in the little Italian he knew, and wondered if the nun was just humoring him. He felt confused, like his thoughts were turning into nonsense when he spoke them aloud. The monk and the nun, in the mean time, tended to the next patient, a man who was coughing and hacking so ferociously—like most of the patients in the stone hall—that Gontran pulled his sweaty shirt over his nose. Then he examined his manacle and chain. Naturally it was impossible to break free, at least for now.
Won’t get far dragging a bed behind me through Venice, he thought, eyeing the doorway. He would have needed to prop the bed up on its side in order to have any chance of making it to the next room. Yet the bed was wooden. At night when everyone was asleep, maybe he could saw through the frame with the chain—assuming he was even allowed to stay here. There was no telling when the guards would drag him away. He shuddered to think of where they would take him. Loredan had said something about saline, hadn’t he? Was that something to do with salt?
Gontran lay back in his bed. How much time had passed since he’d really slept? A day or two at least. His stamina was still low, and his health was down to 25/100 after that fall. He could have died out there…
On the bright side, the sheets were clean. He’d never gotten used to sleeping in his hammock on the Paralos, but sometimes you were so exhausted you fell asleep wherever you were, regardless of your discomfort. It was nice to be in a bed again, and one softer than Anatolia’s rope beds.
The memory of Ra’isa blowing on his lips flashed in his mind. He felt her sweet breath on his mouth, and he groaned, clutching his head, which was pounding again. She had probably escaped—thank god—but he still wanted to be with her. Why had she even blown on him like that in the first place? Was she just drunk on exhaustion, like the rest of them? She was so beautiful. If only they could have been free from all this craziness, in a villa overlooking the sea, with orchards, fields of grain, fishing nets flung into the water, no fear of barbarian invasions. Stability, that’s what he needed. A break from adventure. The chance to lie on a beach all day—for just one day, without any guilt. Back on that island, what was it called? Sansego.
Sooner or later, though, he’d be back to dreaming of traveling again, to voyaging to faraway places no one had heard of.
Can’t help getting into trouble.
Gontran woke to metal boots stomping the tiled floor. A mountainous weight of drowsiness was crushing him, but it drained away the instant he opened his eyes to the unwelcome sight of Capitano Loredan and Annibale marching toward him with grim expressions on their faces, which they had washed clean. They were also wearing clean black clothing. The father and son were flanked by three armored guards; two were clutching the short swords that were sheathed at their sides; one held a torch. It was amazing how these guards resembled Roman soldiers from Konstantinopolis, complete with crested helmets, scale armor shirts that made them look almost like birds or fish, metal skirts, red undergarments, and even purple capes. They seemed out of place in Venice, too weighty for a city floating on the waves.
One soldier unlocked the manacle fastened to the bed, then both soldiers seized Gontran and stood him up. Feeling dizzy, he stumbled, but they caught him, swearing loudly enough to wake the other patients, who soon restarted their usual chorus of coughing and retching. The nun from earlier rushed through the doorway and said something about how the patient wasn’t yet ready to leave, but Loredan, Annibale, and the soldiers pushed past her and brought Gontran—barefoot—through dark corridors to the nave of a church, which was attached to the hospitale. Then they dragged him over the pavement and muddy grass outside, shoved him into a boat, and rowed him away. Except for the flaming torch one soldier clutched, the darkness surrounding them was absolute. Vague shapes of curved Venetian houses rose from the gloom, and the fetid lagoon water warped the torchlight as the soldiers rowed. Gontran stared into the canal and contemplated throwing himself inside.
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“You thought you’d won, Capitano Cane,” Annibale said, startling everyone in the boat. Until then he had been watching Gontran almost without blinking. “You were wrong.”
“Be silent,” Loredan said.
“Uncle, I—”
“I said be silent.”
Gontran might have laughed under better circumstances.
No escape, he thought. Once the Venetian state gets you, they never let you go.
Aside from their boat, the canal was empty at first, but soon the water grew more crowded with gondolas, rowboats, and even some pinnaces, their sails tucked to their masts. Gontran thought that only Konstantinopolis was so busy after dark; most town and city dwellers went to bed at sunset. Since this could be early in the winter, they would rise again at midnight to putter about their homes before passing out once more for their second sleep, which lasted until sunrise. But Venice was sleepless.
Crowds murmured and lutes twanged as Piazza San Marco drifted into view, the buildings and nettle trees glowing in the firelight. Gontran noticed how the city was more ornate—more of a work of art—in the old world. Here in the eleventh century, it was still a lump of matter being shaped into its final form. Aside from the occasional Byzantine church, the houses could have been transplanted from anywhere on the Italian mainland. They were mostly plain cubical structures—many built of wood—with rooftops that sloped so far from their walls that they almost met above the narrow streets and canals.
Their boat was moored to a vacant mooring post, and Gontran was dragged across the square toward the doge’s palace. Everyone stared as the soldiers hauled Gontran inside. Gates and doors were opened and closed by guards, the corridors more brightly lit this time, until Gontran found himself standing barefoot in a large but near-empty chamber before a judge who was sitting behind a raised table that was covered with carved wood on all sides. Dressed in red robes, this elderly man murmured in Latin for a few minutes and then banged his gavel. Capitano Loredan, Annibale, and the soldiers bowed and thanked the judge—“grazie, Vostro Onore!”—and the judge nodded and waved his hand like it was nothing. Gontran was then dragged along the corridors once again.
“Now that’s what I call a fair trial,” he said.
“You’ve been declared an enemy of La Repùblega, Capitano Cane,” Annibale answered. “Persona non grata.”
“The legal situation was a little complicated, as it were,” Loredan said. “Under normal circumstances, if we had captured you abroad, no formalities would have been necessary, you understand. But since you were apprehended in the doge’s palace, virtually in the act of murdering the doge himself—”
“And just as he was in the midst of planning our revenge for Galata,” Annibale interrupted.
Loredan shushed Annibale and glared at him. Then the capitano turned back to Gontran. “The situation was somewhat more complicated. Thankfully, however, the situation has been resolved in our favor. You’ve been remanded to us, to do with as we wish, just as if we had apprehended you ourselves on the high seas.”
“Venetian justice,” Gontran said.
Annibale punched Gontran’s face, lowering his health to 23/100.
“Do not speak ill of La Repùblega,” Annibale said.
“Why not?” Gontran spat blood from his mouth. “What do I have to lose?”
Annibale wound up to punch him again, but Loredan stopped him, then said to Gontran: “A great deal more than you can imagine. Your teeth, for starters.”
“They’ve always been a problem,” Gontran said. “I had to wear braces for years. I could never get them as white as I wanted.”
Loredan and Annibale looked at each other, confused.
Gontran was brought one story downstairs, which made it seem as though they had gone beneath the lagoon waters and underground. Through a locked door and then along a dark, dripping tunnel they passed prison cells walled with rusted iron bars. Lying on the dirt floors of these cells were living skeletons coated in filth. They were breathing. Some had rags wrapped around their pelvises; most were nude. The smell was thick, heavy, oppressive, an airless indoor latrine which made Loredan wrinkle his nose. None of the living skeletons stirred as Gontran and his captors entered.
“Humane,” Gontran said.
“Silence, fool,” Loredan said.
“You’re lost, Capitano Cane,” Annibale said. “Now among the abbandonato.”
“There’ll be no escape for you,” Loredan said.
At the tunnel’s end was a small chamber with a wooden beam stretched from wall to wall. This was only just above their heads, and nearly touching the low ceiling. A rope hung from the beam. The soldiers unchained Gontran, but then tied the rope around his wrists behind his back.
“You are familiar with this, Capitano Cane?” Annibale said. “We call it the strappado.”
“Another amazing innovation from the Republic of Venice,” Gontran said.
“If you’ll be so kind as to answer our questions,” Loredan said, “there’ll be no need to use it, and we can be on our merry way.”
“Where are we going?” Gontran said.
“You’re much too dangerous to be made into a galley slave,” Loredan said. “There we mostly employ workers, you know, and only the most trusted slaves, particularly those who have been promised their freedom in exchange for so many years of service. No, you’ll be sent to le saline.”
“Le saline,” Gontran said. “What’s that?”
“Salt pans,” Annibale said. “You’ll be making our table salt for the rest of your miserable life.”
Gontran’s head fell.
“Whenever we need some flavor on our food, we’ll think of you, to be sure, dear signore,” Loredan said. “But you never know. Depending on how cooperative you are, things can proceed more easily. We might even let you buy your freedom—should you perform your duties adequately.”
“Tell us where your ship is going,” Annibale said.
Gontran spat in his face. “That’s where it’s going.”
Annibale wiped the spit from his face, then grabbed the rope and hoisted Gontran up. The pain made him scream like he had never screamed before. It felt like his arms were being torn from his sockets, though his toes were still touching the floor.
“I ask again,” Annibale said. “Where is your ship—”
“Fuck you,” Gontran groaned.
Annibale hoisted Gontran higher, and he shrieked for all he was worth.
“We can only do it for a few minutes at most,” Loredan said. “Otherwise his arms will never work again.”
“What does it matter?” Annibale hoisted Gontran higher. “He’s just a slave.”
“It’ll be easier for him,” Loredan said, “if he dies here. If we let him live, he’ll work for years on the salt marshes.”
Annibale released the rope, dropping Gontran to the filth. The soldiers picked him up by his arms, which exploded again with pain. Gontran groaned. His health had ticked town to 17/100.
“Listen to me,” Loredan said. “When you are willing to cooperate, to answer our questions, we can make things easier for you. We might even release you, in exchange for a vow to never return to the Repùblega, and to never take up arms against us again.”
Bullshit, Gontran wanted to say, but he was unable to speak.
“Time’s short,” Annibale said. “Before you know it, we’ll have captured or destroyed that ship of yours, Capitano Cane. If we don’t kill the crew, we’ll enslave them. And who knows? You might even meet some friends out in the salt pans in the coming days. Perhaps you haven’t seen the last of those beautiful women of yours.”
Gontran was unable to even give the Loredani a dirty look.
They untied him, chained him again, and dragged him up the stairs, through the palace, out into the square, and then back into the rowboat. Gontran was delirious—shocked from the pain. By then a faint blue light glowed everywhere, and as the soldiers rowed through the morning gloom Gontran saw passing islands, many of which were covered in orchards or farmland rather than buildings. Loredan had left at some point, saying it was past his bedtime; now Gontran was alone with Annibale and the soldiers.
They rowed away from the islands and toward the marshes of the mainland. At the pier, Gontran was brought to a carriage waiting on a dirt road.
“Watch out for this one,” Annibale said to the driver. “Keep his ankles chained. Under no circumstances are you to remove them.”
The driver nodded and said: “sì, signore.”
Annibale turned to Gontran. “This is where we part ways, at least for the time being, Capitano Cane. Know only that I’ll be out there on the sea hunting for your ship—and that I’ll do my best to take your compagni alive, that they might enjoy all the pleasures of Venesia. Know also that every day you work on il saline, you’ll be working for me. Making me richer—and you poorer, your life wasting away as I live my own to the fullest. What’s that? I think I feel a poem coming on. Your blood will drain into my veins, until nothing of you remains.” He laughed.
Gontran was unable to lift his head. He barely heard Annibale.
Annibale stepped back and nodded to the driver, who whipped the draft horses’s reins. The carriage lurched forward, and Gontran slammed onto the floor. Annibale laughed with the guards.
“You’re off to a great start, Capitano Cane!” he shouted.