It galled Gianni to think of people being used as merchandise, but he knew that was how the lords, and their hired Stilettos, saw the commoners.
A shadow fell across him. Looking up, Gianni saw Gar settling down cross-legged by him. With resentment, Gianni realized that the big man wasn’t even breathing hard, scarcely sweating at all—the pace that had so exhausted the other captives had been light work for him! “It’s easy enough for you,” Gianni grumbled. “After all, you’re the one who got us into this mess!”
“We won’t stay in it long,” Gar said softly, his eyes on the courtyard.
Gianni stared, unbelieving. The half-wit who had brought down the wrath of the Stilettos had disappeared again. “Have your wits come back so soon?” he asked. “Or were you shamming?”
“Shamming, this time,” Gar told him, his voice still low, “pretending, so that we could get into Castello Raginaldi to see for ourselves what’s going on.”
“See for yourself,” Gianni said bitterly. “Our companions have seen more than enough already! Oh, you’ve brought us in here easily enough—but how shall you bring us out?”
“Not quite so easily, but with a great deal more subtlety,” Gar told him. “First, though, I want a look at that tower.” He nodded at the spidery triple cross.
Gianni stared. “All this—putting us all in danger of the galleys just so you can look at a tower you might have gazed at from the top of a ridge?”
“I couldn’t have seen inside it,” Gar said patiently, “and you won’t go to the galleys—no, none of you.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Because,” said Gar, “the time for fair play has passed.” And he would give no more information than that, only turned aside Gianni’s questions with short lectures that veered quickly from the point until the young merchant gave up in exasperation.
When night fell, though, Gar became much more communicative. He gathered the prisoners around him and said, low-voiced, “We’re going to leave this castle, but before we do, I must see what secret the prince is hiding in his tower.”
“What does your curiosity matter to us?” Giuseppi said bitterly.
“A great deal, because I’ve begun to suspect why the noblemen have paid the Stilettos to steal as they have never stolen before, and why they seek to screw the merchants down as though they were boards to walk upon.”
Gianni stared. What did Gar mean? They knew why the lords had united against the merchants—because of the scheming of those fake Gypsies! Though, now that he thought about it, they did seem an awfully ineffective lot, to have so mobilized the lords—in fact, they seemed far more the kind of people who sat around and argued heatedly about what to do rather than the kind who actually did it.
Giuseppi frowned. “What reason do they need, other than greed?”
“They’ve had that all along,” Gar explained, “though I think it’s increased hugely this last year. But I have to know, you see, or I can’t fight them with any hope of winning.”
Ambiguous as it was, that seemed to make sense enough to the others; they subsided, grumbling. It didn’t make much sense to Gianni, though, and he found himself wondering why they could be so easily convinced.
Then he looked into Gar’s glowing eyes, and saw why.
“Come!” The giant rose, stooping slightly because of the roof. “Follow and do as I bid, and you shall be out of this castle before dawn!”
They murmured a little as they followed him, then went quiet as he stood by the gate, reaching out to lift the huge padlock in both hands, staring at it as though by simple force of will he could make it open. Slowly he wrapped his fingers around the curving top of the lock, wrapped the other hand around the keyhole, then began to twist …
The lock groaned, gave off a sharp cracking noise, then wrenched open, the curving top curving even more, its tip shredded.
The prisoners stared, speechless.
Carefully and silently, Gar removed the lock from the hasp, laid it on the ground, then opened the gate and crept out into the night. Wordlessly, they followed as Gar turned toward the keep—but Gianni reached up to pull on his shoulder. “You’re going the wrong way!” he hissed. “The gatehouse is over there!” He pointed, his arm a bar of urgency.
“But the gatehouse isn’t what I came to see,” Gar whispered back, his tone gentle. He started toward the keep again. Gianni glared after him a minute, then threw up his hands in exasperation and followed. Everything considered, it was probably safer with Gar than without him, if his wits lasted. Of course, Gianni thought inanely, if his wits were sound, would he have come in here in the first place?
But there was no good answer to that question, so he followed with the rest of them.
Gar drifted up to the door of the keep like a shadow made gigantic by candlelight—only this shadow clasped a huge left hand around a sentry’s mouth and pressed fingers to his neck. The man folded without a sound. Gar handed him to Gianni and stepped across the doorway just as the sentry’s partner turned to look. He stared, speechless with surprise—then speechless because Gar’s palm covered his mouth, pressing him back against the wall, as the other hand pressed his neck. In minutes, he, too, slumped unconscious. Gar handed him to Giuseppi and whispered, “Tell Claudio and Benvolio to put on their livery.”
Claudio chuckled as he dressed the unconscious soldier in his vermin-ridden garb.
“Be sure they stay unconscious,” Gar whispered to Vladimir, who nodded and pulled the bodies into the shadows, then sat down beside them with one of their own truncheons in his hand. “Keep the watch,” Gar hissed to Claudio and Benvolio, and they nodded, then lifted their halberds slanting outward and stood vigilantly at the door. As an afterthought, Claudio pushed it open for Gar. He beckoned his little company forward, and prowled into Castello Raginaldi.
Stairs wound upward alongside the entry hall, and Gar headed straight toward them. Just as he came to their foot, hard footsteps sounded, and a Stiletto captain came around the turn. He saw Gar, yanked at his sword, and managed a single shout of anger before one big hand clamped down on his mouth and the other swung a borrowed truncheon. The captain’s eyes rolled up as he slumped down. Gar handed him to Feste, hissing, “You’re promoted. Strip him and dress! Bernardino, Estragon! Bind him and gag him, then hide him.”
“With pleasure,” Bernardino said, grinning, as Feste stooped to start stripping the captain. He grumbled a little at shedding his motley, but it was very grimy, after all, and the clean livery felt much better.
Gianni was amazed that they were all so eagerly following Gar, so blindly obeying him. But he was no better off himself; his pulse had quickened with excitement at the audacity of it, and at the hope of striking a blow at the noblemen and their tame condotierri. Up the stairs they went with Feste strutting at their head, his hand on his new sword. No one else stopped them until they came to the top, where two more guards stood at either side of a brass-bound oaken door. They snapped to, halberds slanting out at the ready, as Feste came in sight, then relaxed at the sight of his clothing. “Oh, it’s you, Captain,” one said, then looked more closely. “Hold! You’re not the captain! And who’s that monster behind …”
Gar stepped past Feste and cracked their heads together. Their helmets took most of the force of the blow; one of the guards turned jelly—kneed but managed a shout of alarm anyway, before a right cross to the chin felled him. The other was shaking his head and blinking furiously, trying to bring his halberd to bear, when Feste clubbed him on the side of the head with his sword hilt. The man folded.