You can raise all the merchant cities against the aristocracy. The cold eyes seemed to pierce Gianni’s brain, transfixing him, depriving him of all powers of resistance. You can bid them cut off the last vestiges of power that their contes and doges may have, even expel those noblemen completely—after all, their guilds and merchants’ councils really rule their cities already. Then they too can raise armies and build navies, and the lords will have to split their forces, and will be unable to combine against Pirogia completely.
But the other cities may be defeated! They may fall!
Then Pirogia must come to their rescue when you have driven off the Prince and his minions, the Wizard said sternly. Your city must make alliances, Gianni Braccalese. You must form a league of merchant cities, a true federation, a republic!
A republic of merchant cities? Gianni’s brain reeled under the vision of the seacoast of Talipon all united as one nation, leaving the interior split up into a score of ducal cities. They would fight with viciousness and not the slightest trace of mercy, those aristocrats. Many people of the merchant cities would die …
But many of them would die if they didn’t fight the lords, too—the false Gypsies and the Lurgan Company had seen to that. It may be as you say … there may be a chance of success …
It is your only chance of success! The Wizard’s voice was harsh with anxiety, with urgency. Tell your father, tell your Council! The die is cast, Gianni Braccalese, the wagers are placed! You must ally or die, and all the other merchant cities with you!
Gianni realized the truth of what the Wizard said. It was do or die, now—and if the lords eliminated Pirogia, they would go on to enslave or crush all other merchants, too. I shall do as you say, he promised. But the Council has already rejected such a notion.
Before the lords marched on them, yes! Now that they know they must fight, you will find them much more willing! Tell your father! The face began to recede, hair and beard swirling up to hide it. Remember—tell! Persuade! Or fall and die!
Then the face was gone, and Gianni woke, shivering with fear—but also with elation. The prospect of a league of merchant cities awed and enthralled him—a league with Pirogia as its leader! With all the navies of the island at its command, all the new armies of the coastland coordinated in their strategy! The day of the nobleman was done!
If the Council could be persuaded.
The Council was persuaded.
Gianni’s father returned home from the meeting, jubilant and brimming over with his triumph. “There wasn’t the slightest hint of disagreement! They heard me out, they voted unanimously, and the couriers are already taking fast boats out past the bar!”
Gianni and Mama stared in amazement. “However did you manage it?” she asked.
“I told it to them as though it were an idea new-made, as though I had never told it to them before—and they are all intent on war now, for even those who opposed it understand that once it has begun, their only hope of survival is to win! They didn’t need persuading—they were ready to embrace the idea, any idea, that would give them a greater chance of winning!”
While Gianni was drilling the army, Gar combed the waterfront for stalwart young men, catching them before they could line up to enlist—young merchant sailors and sons of fishermen. He took two hundred of them under his personal tutelage, promoting the quickest learners to corporal at the end of the first day and to sergeant at the end of the second. He marched them about on the quays from dawn till dusk. They were exhausted and cursing him by the end of the first day, but drilling like professionals by the end of the week, with no signs of weariness even as darkness fell. Then he taught them weapons drill, and at the end of the tenth day buttonholed the city’s two admirals. The result of their conference was that he marched his fishermen aboard a dozen ships in the morning and sailed out to the horizon, where ship met ship, for all the world looking as though they were fighting one another. They came sailing back at noon with the soldiers dragging their pikes, but the captains and admirals glowing—and the two hundred were dubbed “marines,” and marched on board to row out to the bar, waiting.
They didn’t have to wait long for a small, swift courier boat to come running back with the news that a pirate fleet was approaching.
The admirals sent the courier on with word for the Maestro and the Council before they set sail to meet the pirates. That word ran through the town, and when Gianni realized that his soldiers were virtually the only ones who weren’t down by the docks waiting with bated breath, he called for fifty volunteers to guard the bridge to the mainland and sent everyone else off to wait and hope and pray with the rest of Pirogia. The hours dragged by, and people began to curse beneath their breath—but there wasn’t a single echo of cannon fire, nor a trace of gunsmoke in the sky, for the navy had done its job well and attacked the pirate fleet far from the city.
Dusk fell, and people began to go home, dispirited and worried—but sausage sellers appeared, hawking their wares in the midst of the crowd, and a few enterprising wine merchants realized the chance to rid themselves of some of their worst vintages, so most of the crowd stayed, sipping near-vinegar and bolstered with meat that was best not studied too closely, waiting and hoping but growing more and more fearful by the hour, then by the minute.
Finally, hours after darkness had fallen, a shout went up from those who waited out by the headland, a shout that traveled inward to the watchers on the quays. “Ships! Sails!”
But whose? Impossible to tell, when all they could see was moonlight glinting on canvas in the distance—and the gunners stood by their cannon in the harbor forts while Gianni barked commands, and his brand-new soldiers marched forward to stand at the edge of the quay, hearts thumping so loudly that the crowd could almost hear them, halberds slanting out, waiting for sign of an enemy. The civilians gave way, letting themselves be elbowed back, more than glad to yield place to the soldiers in case the ships were pirates.
Then a shout of joy went up from the headland and traveled inward. As it reached the quays, three ships rounded the headland, their standards clear in the torchlight from the forts, the emblem on the one intact sail huge enough for all to see—the eagle of Pirogia! Then the citizens recognized the ships of their own building, and a shout of joy went up and turned into mad cheering that seemed as though it would never stop. The soldiers waved their pikes aloft, shouting in jubilation too.
More ships followed them, and more. The first of them glided up to the quays, and weary but triumphant sailors leaped over the side, elbowing their way through soldiers who laughed with joy and clapped them on their shoulders, cheering them on as they plowed into the crowd in search of sweethearts, wives, parents, and children.
Last from the last ship came the rear admiral, leaning heavily on Gar’s arm. A reddened bandage wound up across his chest to his shoulder, but he was smiling bravely, and the light of victory was in his eyes.
“A surgeon, a surgeon!” Gar cried. His uniform was blackened with gunpowder, rent with sword cuts in a dozen places; he had a bandage around his left arm and another about his head—but he seemed clear-minded and able.
The surgeons took the admiral away, and—Gianni ran up to clap Gar on the back and wring his hand, crying, “Congratulations! All hail the hero! A victory, Gar, a fabulous victory!”