three
“The Order’s existence must remain a secret, and new members selected prudently and sparingly.”
—THE BOOK OF THE ETERNAL ROSE
Siena took Cass’s gloved hand to help steady her in her chopines as they threaded their way through the narrow streets of the Rialto, the main island of Venice. They emerged from an alleyway onto the wide path that ran alongside the Grand Canal. The area was crowded with peasants carrying paper-wrapped packages and sacks of vegetables. Siena headed for the arches of the Mercato di Rialto, where almost everyone went to buy food and herbs.
Peasant women and older children jockeyed for position in front of the stalls. Cass was reminded of the busy alleyway in Fondamenta delle Tette where she and Falco had gone to search for the identity of the dead body Cass had found in the contessa Liviana’s tomb a few weeks earlier.
That area had been full of brothels. To Cass, the marketplace seemed almost as bad, with Gypsies pushing trinkets outside the arches and fishermen hawking their catches inside. Anyone could be roaming within that crowd—con artists, pickpockets. Cristian.
“She’s waiting here?” Cass asked.
“Yes.” Siena yanked her forward impatiently.
Cass eyed the crush of people again. The back of a blond man, the ends of his hair reaching almost to his shoulders, melted into a cluster of brightly clothed peasant boys pushing and shoving each other as they headed toward the arches. Cristian. She stopped quickly, nearly pitching forward onto the damp, garbage-slicked cobblestones. “I’ll wait here while you go get her.”
Siena gave Cass a strange look. “She won’t come out, of course. She’s afraid someone will see her and report to Signor Dubois.”
Cass cursed herself for being such a coward. According to Luca, Cristian had left Venice for good. There was no reason for her to be seeing him in every crowd. “Lead the way, then,” she said.
Cass followed Siena into the market, her head pounding from the cacophony of vendors and customers trying to outshout each other. Her stomach churned from the stink of fish and sweat. She wished she could fetch her fan out from her pocket, but the peasants were packed arm to arm, as tightly as the seafood they were bidding on. Cass paused for a moment, covering her mouth with a gloved hand, trying not to retch.
Siena flicked a quick glance over her shoulder. “I almost forgot.” She pulled a tiny cloth bag from her pocket and handed it to Cass. “Breathe through this.”
Cass took the sachet of herbs gratefully. Pressing the small bag up to her mouth and nose, she inhaled mint and rosemary. She skimmed the sea of faces for the blond man. Suddenly he was right in front of them, bidding on a fish. Up close he looked nothing like Cristian. Idiota, she thought. Still, she couldn’t make her heart stop racing.
Siena led her down the main row of stalls, slipping effortlessly through the minuscule spaces between other people. Cass felt huge and clunky trying to do the same, excusing herself repeatedly as she wobbled in her chopines and stepped on the occasional toe. She pressed one hand tightly to the fabric of her dress, imagining that each accidental touch belonged to quick fingers trying to extract the leather pouch of coins from deep inside her pocket.
A peasant woman dressed in plain muslin squeezed past her, adeptly leading her three daughters through the fray. The smallest girl reached out to stroke the soft fabric of Cass’s skirts as she wandered by. Again, Cass felt silly. Why was she afraid of a place where Siena came almost every day?
As Cass and Siena weaved their way deeper into the market, some of the vendors called out excitedly, holding up gutted fish or giant squid for Cass’s approval. It was rare, she supposed, to see a well-dressed noblewoman wriggling her way through the masses. She quickly averted her eyes from what Siena told her was a sea bass, filleted down the middle and folded open to display its slick white interior. Cass had never seen the inside of a raw fish up close. She hoped the cook was fixing chicken for dinner.
Siena pulled her past a stall where shrimp and clams were piled high in woven baskets. Cass swore she felt a hand close around one of her ankles. She lurched forward, knocking a few of the shellfish onto the ground. A plaintive yowl came from the direction of her chopines. Looking down, she saw an emaciated black cat flick its tail against her leg again before pouncing on one of the fallen shrimp. Cass muttered an apology and tossed a copper coin at the scowling vendor.
Finally, they were past all the seafood and into the far side of the market where the produce was sold. The smell here was almost as bad, but at least Cass was no longer in danger of being assaulted by the sight of a gutted fish. She had seen plenty of rotting fruit before. The servants would sometimes buy it just before it turned. Agnese did love a good deal.
Siena pulled Cass behind a stall selling grapes and pears. A beggar in a brown wool dress and a black cloak knelt next to a stack of empty wooden crates, her hood pulled low to hide her face. She had her hands clasped around a half-rotten pear that she had no doubt fished out of the bottom of one of the crates.
“I’ve brought Cass,” Siena whispered.
The beggar looked up at her, and Cass immediately recognized Feliciana’s bright blue eyes. She swallowed back an exclamation of joy and relief so as not to call attention to Feliciana’s presence. She could hardly believe it. There were so many things she wanted to tell her. So many things she wanted to ask her.
But then Cass took a closer look. The left side of Feliciana’s face was colored yellow with the remnants of a welt, and her lips were swollen and marred by black blood, having split open and scabbed over. How could Siena’s vibrant older sister have become this skeletal, bruised woman?
Feliciana ducked her head again as the pear vendor, an older woman with deep lines etched into her tan face, stacked another empty crate behind the stall. “You should find refuge at a convent,” the woman said. “It’s hard for the good Lord to take care of you out here in the streets.” Feliciana nodded without lifting her chin. Someone hollered from the front of the stall, and the vendor disappeared.
Cass fumbled in her pockets as if she were searching for a few coins, talking low under her breath as she did. “You’ll come back to the villa with us, of course. We can get everything sorted out once you’re safe.”
Feliciana nodded again. “But what will you tell your gondolier?” she whispered. “If anyone were to recognize me—”
“I’ll get rid of Giuseppe,” Siena said. “I’ll say we’re going to walk across the way to the weaver’s to order some cloth and then take a stroll down to Piazza San Marco. I’ll tell him he should return to the villa, that we’ll find our own way home.”
“Good idea, Siena.” Cass turned back to Feliciana. “No one will recognize you.” Even if she hadn’t been emaciated and bruised, in the hooded cloak and rough woolen dress, Feliciana could have just as easily been her aunt Agnese as a runaway servant.
“Stay with her, Signorina Cass,” Siena said, as if she were afraid her sister was a ghost who might vanish if they both turned their backs. “I’ll find us passage home.” Siena disappeared in the direction of the Grand Canal.
Cass knew it must look strange to the people passing by, a noblewoman bent down over a beggar, but she didn’t care. “Are you sick?” she asked, kneeling to get a better look at Feliciana. The skin under her eyes was purple, and the fingers that protruded from the oversized sleeves of her cloak looked like twigs.
“Just sick of hiding,” Feliciana said with a wan smile. “And hungry.” She bit into the good side of the pear. She chewed slowly, as if it had been a while since she had eaten solid food.