Demon Knight

CHAPTER ONE

The condotta was signed where important civic ceremonies were always held — under the high, three-arched loggia adjoining the Piazza della Signoria. The crowds cheered lustily to hail their dashing new Castilian captain-general and his big deputy, who could undoubtedly defeat all the Fiend's horses and all the Fiend's men single-handed with a club. Their betters were of another mind, though.

The new slate of civic officials, especially the dieci della guerra, were steamingly furious, because the agreement had been finalized before they took office, cheating them of their just share of the graft. For this they blamed the barbarian giant, who had actually begun striking camp at Fiesole, preparing to move to Milan, and had thus forced messer Benozzo to ride out in haste and agree to initial the terms. Toby had been bluffing, of course, but the big mutt was a mile more devious than he looked and could outwit anyone anytime when he wanted to.

All the two-lire politicos and their wives were now snubbing him as obviously as possibly. If that made the ceremony unpleasant for Toby, it was pure torture for Hamish Campbell. A chancellor was supposed to steer his condottiere safely through the quicksands of Italian politics. That was his job, and to plead that the sands of Florence were quicker than others or that a non-Italian could not understand their constant shifting would be a confession of incompetence. If only someone knowledgeable had written a book on the subject! — someone like that slinky messer Machiavelli who advised the Magnificent, for instance.

However joyously the people of Florence hailed their new defender, the petty leaders were treating Toby more like a foreign conqueror than a guardian who had just sworn to defend them with his life. Most of the sumptuously garbed notables and their almost-as-sumptuously-garbed wives had just stalked by him with noses raised on their way to pay their respects to the captain-general himself before moving across to the Palace of the Signory for the banquet. The don was posturing in his silver helmet, flaunting his baton of office within a circle of fawning admirers. Apparently he had managed to overcome his dislike of taking orders from a rabble of moneylenders and haberdashers. The worst must be over, though. The slow grind of protocol was now about to bring forth the larger parasites.

"The people like you," Hamish muttered.

"What people?" Toby looked down with a grin. Nobody human should be able to smile while being humiliated on this scale, but he was showing that he bore no grudge against Hamish for it, which was typical of him. "If you mean the stolid citizenry of the republic, my lad, then they're still hard at work — weaving, dyeing, or fulling, whatever that is. No, don't bother to explain, I have an appointment later this afternoon. Those out there are the froth."

True. The overdressed spectators in the square were all handpicked Marradi supporters, probably mostly officials of the minor guilds who had no effective influence over the heavyweights of the major guilds, which in turn could do nothing without the Magnificent's approval, but a chancellor was supposed to explain such things to his condottiere, not vice versa.

"Fulling or not, the populace approves of you."

No condottiere in all Italy except Toby cared a fig for any populace. He sighed. "I hope I prove worthy of their trust. Any word on the darughachi?"

"Nothing new. His Highness remains in Rome, officially conferring with the cardinals. Unofficially, he is reported to be bedding the entire female population between the ages of thirteen and eighty. He is expected to come north later in the spring, when he has finished."

"It's still spring? Feels like high summer." Toby's face was dewed with sweat under his bronze helmet, for he was in military garb. His doublet and breeches were so heavily padded with linen that they would stop a saber or even a pike. They were as elaborately trimmed as anything the landsknechte wore, extravagantly piped and slashed in cerise and vermilion and peacock blue. With a broadsword at his thigh, he looked even more huge and dangerous than usual, dominating the piazza. The notables of Florence might be snubbing him, but the eyes of their wives and daughters were nowhere else. When he was leaving camp this morning, even Lisa had admitted that he was Mars incarnate.

Which reminded Chancellor Campbell that he had squandered every lire due him for the next six months in providing Lisa with an appropriate wardrobe, and the countess, although her health had improved until now she was well enough to be a real thorn in his flesh, was showing no signs of offering to recompense him for any of it out of the funds the Company had provided. When the first of the condotta gold arrived and Hamish received his arrears, he would have to turn it all over to Toby to start repaying his debts. Oh, women! Oh, ruin! Oh, Lisa…

Oh, spirits! Here came Lucas Abonio with his half-witted wife on his arm and his two quarter-witted daughters at his heels. Unlike the snotty Florentine politicians whose petty noses were out of joint just because Toby had called their bluff and forced them to cut short their games at his expense, the Milanese ambassador had a real grievance against the new deputy captain-general and against his chancellor, too. Hamish had gone within an eyelash — a rat's eyelash — of committing Toby to serving the Duke of Milan in return for various castles, fiefdoms, chests of treasure, hands of daughters in marriage, and so on. Abonio had almost certainly informed his ducal master than the deal was made, only to learn later that he had been, um, misinformed.

Now he stumped past the waiting Scots without a glance. His face was even redder and shinier than Toby's. At his heels stalked Jacopo Benozzo, haughtier yet. He had none of Abonio's excuse. Reports of Nevil's preparations were flooding in every day. Hiring a captain-general had been Benozzo's duty, so why had he procrastinated so long? Behind him tottered messer Cecco de' Carisendi, his replacement as chairman of the dieci. He was probably too senile to remember who Toby was.

The big hats were coming thick and fast now… Guilo and a collection of minor Marradis… and still not a glance, not a smile! This could not be their own idea; they would certainly have been primed by the Magnificent. Hamish looked up in alarm to Toby and was silenced by a warning frown: the podestà!

Antonio Origo oozed toward them with an elderly, almost emaciated woman on his arm — an aunt, perhaps. Was his wife unwell again? Origo was always greasy, but today he seemed more reminiscent of boiling oil, which might be a mark of displeasure or due simply to the fact that he was grossly overdressed in a jerkin of cloth of gold and a fur-trimmed cloak. Hamish prepared his most obsequious bow. The podestà ignored him and almost went right past Toby also. Then he paused, glaring.

"This is highly improper! You can expect to be stripped of your post very shortly. His Highness sent strict instructions that no major decisions were to be taken until he arrived. He will be extremely displeased when he hears the news of your appointment."

Alarmed to note that Toby was wearing his stupid-yokel expression, Hamish braced himself for some outrageous taunt, such as an inquiry as to why the Khan's representative did not boycott the free lunch if he disapproved of the occasion. Origo was having severe troubles of his own. Having ignored their titular overlord the Khan for a couple of centuries, the Florentines heartily disapproved of his reappearance in their lives. Prince Sartaq should not expect a cordial welcome when he arrived, and his flunky the podestà must be finding life even more difficult than usual.

But all Toby said was, "I am sure His Highness is well informed about what is happening."

Origo swelled like a bullfrog. "I send dispatches daily!"

"I hardly think he needs your letters, Excellency. Have you not noticed the owl?"

"Owl? What owl? Owls at noon?"

"On that cornice up there. Above the blue washing."

Eyes turned where Toby indicated.

"It can't be real!" Origo bleated shrilly.

Hamish was inclined to agree with him, for once. Owls were almost never seen in daylight. When they did appear, they were invariably mobbed by smaller birds, but that whatever-it-was up there on the roof just sat in full view, ignored by all the pigeons, sparrows, and starlings.

"It flew in an hour ago," Toby said. "I've seen it around quite a lot lately. Can you hear the drum?"

Hamish took a hard look at his big friend. He was flushed and sweating, although not as much as Origo was. Was the glint in his eye mockery or delirium? Smaller men than he could suffer heatstroke in a padded doublet, and it was suffocatingly hot in the loggia.

"Drum?" Origo squeaked. "What drum?"

"A shaman's drum, I suppose. I've heard it several times in the last ten days or so. The owl is usually around when I do."

"You are out of your mind!"

"Whatever Your Excellency commands."

Origo opened and closed his mouth a few times, took another quick glance at that inexplicable owl, and then jerked his skeletal companion forward as he headed for the palazzo and the free lunch.

"You never told me about this!" If Hamish spent less time fluttering around Lisa, he would have more time for his duties.

"There's nothing to tell," Toby said easily. "Tartar gramarye is different from ours, yes? Don't shamans immure spirits in birds or animals?"

"I don't know if immure is the right word. They…" Hamish reined in a lecture as he would a flighty horse. "That owl may be a familiar, I suppose."

"I'm sure it is. It makes the hob fidget."

Hamish yelped. "You're not going to lose control of the hob, are you? Not here?" Even a few thunderbolts in this crowded square would lead to a fearful massacre.

"No. It can smell gramarye around, that's all. It isn't worried at the moment. Ears up, lad — here comes Himself."

Having seemingly appeared from nowhere, Pietro Marradi and his train were already only a few paces away. He had Lucrezia on his arm, radiant in lilac silk, osprey plumes, and constellations of rubies. Hamish drew a deep breath at the sight of her. She was easily old enough to be his mother, but he knew he would be carrying a candle for Lucrezia if he were not totally consumed by Lisa at the moment. She had not noticed his existence yet, nor Toby's. She was not going to.

And neither was her brother! Hamish gaped in dismay as The Magnificent and his sister walked right past, heading for the don's admiring circle. So now all Florence knew that the deputy captain-general was out of favor already. Cooperation would drop from minuscule to negative. The money never would appear. Oh, demons! He looked up at Toby, but Toby's face was as inscrutable as the Alps.

"The darughachi?" his chancellor suggested, grasping for some rational explanation for this aboutface. "If the prince has indicated displeasure, then that might explain why everyone is trying to keep their distance from you."

But if Toby and the don did not carry some sacks of florins back to camp with them, the Company would riot. Milan was no longer an option — Abonio would never again let Longdirk or his chancellor cross his doorstep. Venice, perhaps? There had to be some rational explanation for this setback.

Obviously someone thought they could deflect Longdirk from his purpose, but that was never possible. Hamish had known him since he was a child, the unholy terror of the glen, goading and tormenting the schoolmaster with a cold-blooded calculation few adults would ever match. Even then he had never spoken a careless word or made a hasty move, as if he was frightened of breaking something with his enormous strength, but that had probably never been the case. The truth was just that Longdirk had an incredible ability to absorb punishment. As a bare-knuckle fighter he had been slow but indestructible, grinding his opponents down to exhaustion, and now he treated the world the same way — Hamish had realized that first in Aquitaine, the second time Toby had provoked Sergeant Mulliez into ordering him flogged. In his own eyes he had scored a victory, although at a cost that would have killed a lesser man. Now he needed Florence to aid him in his battle against the Fiend, so he would use Florence whether it liked him or not. Florence would have no choice in the matter.

"Messer Campbell!"

Marradi himself had shouted and was beckoning. Hamish scurried over to the group, registering trouble writ large on every face in it, including the don's. Marradi seemed close to an explosion.

"Your Magnificence?"

"What is this we hear about you organizing a party at Cafaggiolo?"

For a moment every word of Italian Hamish knew deserted him. He stood there with his mouth open while Latin, French, and Castilian buzzed around his head like wasps. Gaelic, Breton, English, Catalan, French again… Italian.

"But, messer… Magnificence… I was given to understand that Your Magnificence had most graciously placed his, er, your villa of Cafaggiolo at the disposal of the captain-general for three days so that—"

Obviously not.

"No?" Hamish whispered faintly, thinking of all the letters he had sent, all the hours of planning with Arnaud and Bartolo.

"I cannot imagine where you received such a notion. My honored sister has already invited some friends there for that week."

Lucrezia, Hamish observed, was staring over his shoulder — obviously at Toby, who must have followed him, for no one else was so tall — and her face bore an expression of satisfaction such as he had never seen on a woman except in the rapture of lovemaking. The sight was so startling that he again found himself at a loss for words.

It was understood that Il Volpe never raised his voice. Except now.

"Well?" he barked.

"Well?" scowled the don, wiggling his baton as if about to lash out with it. He knew invitations had been sent out in his name.

Hamish's instructions had come from Toby, and Toby had made the arrangements with Marradi himself. Or so he had said. Someone had gone crazy. Or was about to—

"There has been a misunderstanding?" he croaked.

"More a lack of communication," rumbled a deep voice behind his left ear. "It would seem that either my secretary failed to notify yours, Your Magnificence, or yours omitted to inform you of what must have seemed both utterly trivial and self-evidently already known to Your Magnificence, and that is that while we used the name of your villa when inviting certain grandees to the conclave, this was merely a blind to deceive the enemy. It was, indeed, suggested to us by your own illustrious chancellor, messer Niccolò."

After the momentary silence produced by this breathtaking falsehood, Toby continued in the same bland vein. "We are all aware that the Fiend has spies everywhere. He has been known to use demon assassins before now. We plan to meet the guests on the road and conduct them to the true rendezvous — which of course I shall not reveal here. I am confident that this will in no way interfere with the duchessa's festivities, and I deeply regret any distress this misapprehension may have caused, either to Her Grace or Your Magnificent self."

Lucrezia bared her teeth at him in an expression of lethal hatred.

Marradi was less revealing. "What guests?" He looked to the don. "The republic has hired you to defend it against its enemies, signore, not to entertain your friends at its expense. And if you are meddling in political matters, you may find yourself facing serious charges."

Hired? The don would never admit that he was a common employee, subject to restraints. While Hamish was still hoping the loggia would just collapse and kill him quickly, the don laughed.

"Magnificence, the last member of my family to meddle in politics was beheaded by the Visigoths. I instructed messer Longdirk to summon the leading military men from other cities — Venice, Naples, and so on — so that I might hear reports on their respective readiness to take part in the coming campaign. When I have had a chance to appraise the forces and ordnance they have available, I shall instruct them on what more we will require of them. Naturally I shall then inform the dieci of the situation and present my recommendations." He twirled up the points on his mustache.

By luck or his eccentric brilliance, he had struck exactly the right gong. The notion of Florence summoning the other great powers of Italy to a council rippled through the bystanders like a wave of rapture. He had bewitched them with his own vainglorious delusions.

It must have been many years since anyone so upstaged the Magnificent. Scowling, he offered his arm again to his sister and headed for the palazzo and the banquet. Hamish stared after them, stunned by the detestation he had seen on Lucrezia's face when her plot against Longdirk failed — for no one could seriously believe that she had conflicting plans for the villa. What on earth could the big man have done to provoke such hatred?

CHAPTER TWO

Lisa had decided to tackle her mother on the subject of Future Plans. She was hard put to believe that she had known Hamish for close to a month now, except when she looked at Mother. Fiesole had done wonders for the old dear. She was gaining health and spirits at an astonishing rate, visibly plumper and glowing with a good cheer Lisa could barely remember seeing in her from the days of her own childhood. She had completely recovered from the weeklong sleeping fit that beset her after she arrived. Unfortunately, in some ways. Then she had been unable to do much about chaperoning her daughter. Now she could, and no young lady wishes to be treated like an imbecilic infant. It was almost three days since Lisa had been properly kissed.

Longdirk and Hamish having ridden into Florence for a meeting, the courtyard was available. It was unquestionably the choicest place to sit and enjoy the glorious spring weather. The countess had ordered her favorite chair carried out to a shady place under the trellis where she could relax in peace while digesting a meal of unladylike heartiness. Her gown was a voluminous cloud of pale green silk, unadorned but very finely made, swathing her completely from the neck down. Her faded golden tresses — even her hair seemed to have recovered some of its former sparkle — had been coiled and pinned up, covered with a simple white bonnet. It was tragic to see a lady of her rank not adorned with pearls and gems, but she had not mourned her lost jewels in Lisa's hearing for at least two weeks.

She welcomed her daughter with a smile verging on the blissful. "Come and sit by me, dear. Would you like to read something? How are your Italian lessons proceeding?" Embroidery lay forgotten on the table nearby.

"Slowly, I fear." Most of the trouble, although Lisa was not about to say so, was that her Italian coach had an abrasive Scottish accent and restricted her studies to poetry with a vocabulary consisting largely of amore, bella, carina, appassionato, and similar terms. She brought a stool and set it near. "Mother, it is time you and I had a serious discussion."

"Oh, no!"

"Oh, yes. What do you mean?"

"Nothing, dearest. I was afraid you meant… never mind. What do you wish to discuss?"

Giving her mother a puzzled glance, Lisa folded her hands and began. "Every day we hear new rumors about the huge army the Fiend is gathering."

"Yes, dear."

"Everyone agrees that, having been balked once, Nevil will make absolutely certain of success this time. Panic will ensue, as it always does. And there is a limit to how far a coach can travel southward in Italy, you must agree. Consequently, I believe it would be prudent for us to take ship while the going is good." She had not yet discussed this with Hamish, but if he meant a tenth of all the lovely things he whispered in her ear, then he would jump at the chance of escorting the two ladies. He would make a wonderful bodyguard and likely much more than that in the near future.

The countess pursed her lips. "And where exactly are we to sail to?"

"Malta," Lisa said. "Or Crete. Malta belongs to the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies and Crete belongs to Venice. I don't like the sound of Egypt or Algeria or any of those Moorish lands."

"Nor I. We should both of us end up on an auction block."

"Mother!" That outrageous remark caused Lisa to lose control of her prepared speech, which threw her off and galloped out of sight. She dithered, at a loss for words.

Worse, her mother seemed not at all repentant. There was a rare gleam in her sapphire eyes. "Nor do I fancy an island. I should feel trapped, confined."

"You mean you are just going to wait until the Fiend arrives?"

"No, I am waiting for the Fiend to be defeated. I believe he is heading for his downfall. I think the scourge will soon be lifted from the back of Europe, and the clouds will lift before a new dawn."

Mothers could make speeches also, however muddled, and reverse previously unquestioned behavior patterns. Lisa stared at her in bewilderment. "What reason can you possibly have for thinking that?" It was an idea at variance with her entire life experience.

Maud smiled serenely at the blue sky twinkling through the olive branches above her. "Nothing goes on forever, dear, although we mortals often forget that and behave as if it will. The demon that possessed your father managed to turn the world upside down, but the world has a habit of rolling back again in its own good time. I am convinced that Rhym has met its match at last."

"Are you referring to that horrible Longdirk?"

Maud flashed a glance of maternal amusement at her daughter. "You don't usually take such dislikes to people, dearest. Yes, I am referring to that truly remarkable young man. I have met kings and dukes and lords aplenty, and at best they were merely stars. Sir Tobias is a rising sun."

"He is a boor! A great ox with no culture or breeding or manners whatsoever."

Her mother took no offense at being so blatantly contradicted. Indeed, she positively smirked. "Not an ox," she murmured. "A doughty warrior, yes. A splendid figure of a man, certainly. His background is undistinguished, I admit, so we must make allowances for his lack of polish, but his accomplishments to date are worthy of note. Think of the truly great shapers of history — Julius Caesar, Genghis, Charlemagne, Alexander the Great. Had you met any one of those men at Longdirk's age, could you possibly have predicted his future greatness?"

"At twenty-three Alexander had conquered the Persian Empire."

Maud dismissed Alexander with a wave of the hand. "He was born to the purple. All those men I mentioned were of much higher rank than Sir Tobias's."

"There is certainly none lower."

"He has promised that you will take your rightful place on the throne of your ancestors. No, we shall not go to Malta, Lisa. We shall follow the triumphant armies of a Europe reborn as they roll the Fiend back into the darkness, as they reestablish the ancient freedoms under a suzerain rightfully appointed by the glorious Khan. There has never been a female suzerain, of course, but who knows? Since you will be one of the very few monarchs with an undisputed right to—"

"Mother! You are dreaming moonbeams! You are hallucinating!"

"Not very much, dearest. Once the Fiend is exorcised, everything will return to normal very quickly. Wait and see! We must find you a husband."

"Husband?" Lisa's squeal came out at least an octave higher than she had intended. Hamish! Hamish! Hamish!

"It is tricky, because there are so few princes left. Ah, Lisa! When you were born I made a list of all the eligible royal bachelors of Europe younger than ten. Of course, I assumed that your father would summon me to court eventually, or at least visit me from time to time, so we should have other children; I never guessed you would be the heir. Alas, all those boys — there were seventeen of them, I recall, although only five or six were credible contenders — I fear they are all dead now. You will need a strong man at your side, dear. England is in a state of ruin and anarchy. All Europe is in a state of ruin and anarchy!"

Lisa could hardly believe her ears. Maud had never raved like this before.

"So I may have to wed a mere noble, you mean? Even, perhaps, a commoner?"

Her mother favored her with a very knowing smile. "I did say the Fiend had turned the world upside down, dear, didn't I? Yes, I do believe that I could even see my way to arranging your marriage with a commoner. He would, of course, have to be a very outstanding and accomplished foreigner."

Not Hamish. She didn't mean Hamish. Oh, demons! She couldn't possibly mean… could she?…

"Longdirk? That oaf? You are seriously thinking—"

Lisa sprang to her feet and spoke three words that she had never spoken before and had heard only rarely. She was not at all clear what two of them meant; they just sounded appropriate. Apparently her mother did not know them at all, for she merely frowned at the tone.

"Do sit down, dear. You said you wanted a serious discussion, so a serious discussion you shall have. Listen carefully. I have given the matter much thought. If Sir Tobias drives the Fiend's armies back over the Alps, as I am confident he will, then there is no doubt at all that Europe will rise against the monster and rally to the Khan's banner he bears. He may be a commoner now, my darling, but he will not be one for long under those circumstances. The Khan will—"

"I wouldn't touch Toby Long—"

"…at least a duke and probably a sovereign prince. He is, of course, greatly smitten with you!"

Lisa almost fell off her stool, having to grab at the edge of the stone table for balance. "He is what? Mother, he is the most insulting man I have ever met. He snaps at me, treats me like a child, orders me around. I assure you he likes me no better than I like him, which means utter revulsion. Repugnance!"

Her mother chuckled. "You think so? You should see the way he looks at you. Oh, Lisa, I know longing when I see it, and he craves you mightily. If he seems a little brusque at times, then that is merely because he is struggling to contain his feelings. Realizing how far above his own station you are, he is being careful not to embarrass you by revealing his great affection and desire. His worship must be unspoken and distant. Understand the strain this places on his self-control."

Awrrk!

Lisa drew a very deep breath. "He told me himself that he is celibate because he has no choice in the matter. When I said ox, I meant ox!"

The countess knew what that word meant, and her fair cheeks colored. "I doubt it very much! If he suffered an injury of that, um, description, then the story would be general knowledge. Your Master Campbell has a reputation as a libertine and lecher, but Sir Tobias's is above reproach."

Oh, worse yet! Humiliation! "You have been making inquiries?"

"Certainly. Women of the lower sort have thrown themselves in his path and he, er…"

"Steps over them?"

"Exactly. Are you quite sure of your own feelings in the matter, dearest? I have seen how you, in turn, regard Constable Longdirk when you believe you are unobserved. He is, of course, a magnificent figure of manhood, Hercules himself. Any young girl can be forgiven a certain fascination with such an Atlas."

"Atlas?" Lisa said hoarsely. "Don't you mean Grendel? That side of beef? Let me tell you, Mother, that all his stupid posturing as comandante is going to end very shortly. Even Hamish admits that he was lucky at Trent — that he was only elected commander because they couldn't agree on anyone else. And now the Khan has sent one of his sons to rally the opposition, so that problem will not arise again. Prince Sartaq will appoint a suzerain, and the suzerain will send Toby Longdirk packing, right back to the Highland bog he crawled out of in the first place!"

Even those harsh words failed to ruffle her mother's maniacal serenity. "Will he really? Princes don't discard warriors who win wars, Lisa, they promote them. I think," she added, fixing her daughter with a reproving eye, "that you had better face up to cold reality, dearest. Everyone is now talking as if your father is dead, which legally may be true. Under English law an underage heiress becomes a ward in chancery, and Tartar law or Florentine law won't be much different."

Lisa opened and closed her mouth a few times… "Or even the laws of chivalry," Blanche continued. "As heir to the throne of England you are a ward of your father's overlord, the Khan, or his suzerain, or perhaps this darughachi prince. One of them, certainly. Not the Florentine courts, I hope. Whichever it turns out to be, he will choose a husband for you."

This was ghastly! Even Hamish had never mentioned anything so grim. Talking Mother into something was a matter of persistence and hard work. Tartar princes might be much less malleable. "Mother…?"

"You bring a kingdom as dowry, dear. If the Khan wishes to confer royalty on a commoner, the easiest way is to marry him to a queen, you understand? Now the outstanding military figure in Europe at the moment is Sir Toby. I foresee a great future for Longdirk."

"Foresee anything you like for him as long as you don't include me in it!"

"Lisa, Lisa! Don't deceive yourself. Oftentimes we foolish women fail to understand our own desires. Many a highborn maiden has fallen in love with a man of inferior social station and exaggerated his rough qualities in her own mind to deny the stirrings in her breast. A certain amount of animal sensuality is a virtue in a man, alarming though it may seem to a virgin. I remember how terrified I was when my own parents informed me that they had chosen a man barely older than myself to be my husband. I quite—"

"No! No! No!" Lisa clapped her hands over her ears and fled howling from the courtyard.

CHAPTER THREE

Although the banquet had lasted late into the night, Toby had been out riding Smeòrach since before dawn. Between times he had slept, but poorly — too many things to do, too much to think about. Drumming had wakened him. He heard drumming often now, and the fact that others did not made it no less real to him. He was convinced that the darughachi had set shamans to spy on him, but if the Tartars could do that, then so could the Fiend's hexers. It was past time he found a replacement for Maestro Fischart.

Dusty and bleary-eyed, he strode into the courtyard. Hamish was there already with a pile of reports and correspondence. He looked up and frowned. "Did you come to bed at all?" At times he mothered Toby infuriatingly.

"You were asleep. And still snoring when I left." Toby sat on a stool and enjoyed a long yawn. The one bright note in the morning was that the Company had money again and could hold a pay parade at long last. He leaned his arms on the stone table and scowled at the heap of paper. "What bullguts have you got for me today?" He took a harder look at that face he knew so well and spoke more gently. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing. There's a letter in from—"

"Tell me."

Hamish sighed crossly and laid a pottery paperweight on the heap, although there was no wind. "You tell me what you think of Lisa."

A tiny demon of temptation told Toby to scream at the top of his voice, grab Master Campbell up by the throat, and wave him like a flag. Here they were preparing for a war that would decide the fate of Europe for centuries to come and his chief helper and closest friend — his only friend — was obsessed by an animal fire in his crotch. A fire that could never cook anything. Why couldn't he lust after some two-lire bawd who would drag him into the bushes and quench the blaze for him? Twenty minutes' rollick and he would be the old Hamish again, at least for a day or two.

Lisa? Toby scratched his unshaven jaw. "If you like statuesque blondes, she's one of the greatest beauties you'll ever meet. She has a wit like a whip, a mind like a rapier, and nerves of steel. She is also totally spoiled, completely self-centered, and as devious as an Italian. Not," he added, seeing the storm clouds roiling in Hamish's eyes, "that she can be blamed for all that. It goes with the royal blood. She had a bizarre upbringing, and her mother is nine-sixteenths madder than a March hare. As a king's wife she'd be magnificent, but never as a ruler in her own right. Not for another ten years anyway. I can't imagine her grinding meal or milking the goat. Why do you ask?"

The storm clouds had not dispersed. "Her mother thinks you are in love with her."

Toby said, "Oh, demons!" under his breath.

"You do not deny it?"

"I have told you what I think of her. If I could have dreams, old friend, they might well include a Lisa in them."

"She says you make eyes at her." Hamish bared his teeth. "Her mother is plotting to marry Lisa to you! You are going to destroy Nevil's army, reconquer Europe, marry Lisa, and become King of England."

If a ditch-born bastard was a suitable match for the future queen, then why wasn't a schoolmaster's son? Toby was aware that Queen Blanche had taken to smiling at him excessively. He snapped at both her and her daughter as much as he could to keep them away. Apparently that strategy was not working.

"She's even madder than I thought. Marry? I don't dare even smile at a girl, you know that!"

His suffering friend was not convinced. "Are you sure? How long since you lost control of the hob? It didn't escape you even at the Battle of Trent. If you can stay master in a turmoil like that, with gramarye and demons loose, then you can stay master anywhere!"

Toby sighed, shaking his head. "Believe me, it's different. I know." He shuddered, remembered the dozens of innocent people who had died in Mezquiriz. "Remember Jacques, at Montserrat, who tried to be a saint and failed that test? He started with an elementary, not a hob, and yet it became a demon." It had taken most of him with it when it was exorcised, and left a human cabbage. "Have you bedded her yet?"

"No!" Hamish glowered at the papers on the table.

"Do you plan to?"

Without looking up, Hamish mumbled, "You think I couldn't? If I wanted?"

"Sorry. Yes, she's lovely. If I give her sheepdog looks behind her back, then I'm sorry about that, too. I didn't know I was doing it. I probably ogle lots of women — didn't you tell me once that that was why men's heads could turn?" Briefly Toby considered ordering his chancellor to report to the camp brothel, but discretion prevailed. His troubles were too serious to cure that way. "Old friends should not squabble over a prize that neither of them can ever hope to win."

He ought to be more sympathetic. Things were easier for him, who was forever denied love. Time had dulled the pain of Jeanne and that terrible night in Mezquiriz, and yet he still dreamed of her sometimes. He wakened weeping.

"It does seem irrational." Hamish was too upset to smile. "It's the thought that she's going to have to marry someone, and probably very soon. Demons, Toby, I'm crazy about her! I've never felt like this about a woman, never. At times I want to burst out laughing, yelling, 'Lisa loves me!' so the whole world can know. And then I remember that some man is going to drag her off to bed to breed a pack of royal brats, and I want to kill myself. It's driving me insane! I can't eat or sleep or think straight." He pounded his fists on the table.

Man chooses woman, woman accepts man, society forbids the match — it happened all the time, but that made it no less tragic.

"Flea farts! You slept like a millstone last night. You're also doing the work of three men and managing to squire Lisa at the same time. Let's get started here. What have…" A flash of movement on the roof of the villa…

"What?" Hamish looked where Toby was looking.

"My keeper is back."

Hamish's eyes grew almost as wide as the owl's. It was a white owl, a large one, staring fixedly at them. "It's the same one. Can you hear drumming now?"

"No. Can you?"

"No."

This was new. Drumming with no owl, yes, but never owl without drumming.

Before Hamish could comment further, Don Ramon de Nuñez y Pardo came striding out of the villa with a couple of squires at his heels. He paused long enough to wave them away before advancing on the table like a stalking leopard. What would he say to tales of invisible drummers? He probably heard them all the time, and bugles, too. Toby and Hamish rose and bowed.

He sat down without inviting them to. He was even more resplendent than usual in a dazzling new military doublet that Toby had not seen before; he had his silver helmet on his head and carried his captain-general's baton. Although his blue eyes shone inhumanly bright, he did not seem especially mad this morning, neither angry nor crazy. Time would tell.

"I want an explanation for that scene yesterday! You told me that Marradi had put his villa at your disposal."

Toby met his glare squarely. "He did, senor. I suspect his sister bears me a grudge, and the problem is of her devising."

"The word in Florence is that the duchessa has sworn to have your hide for a rug and certain other parts of you as paperweights."

"I have done nothing to provoke her enmity."

"Obviously doing nothing was the trouble. Demons have no fury like a woman scorned, Constable." The don's smirk implied that he had not made the same mistake and his information had been collected firsthand, which was certainly possible.

Hamish was scrabbling in his papers. "A note arrived from Il Volpe this morning, Captain-General. He apologizes for the misunderstanding. The meeting may proceed at Cafaggiolo as planned."

All very fine, but a private apology would not begin to undo the damage of that very public snub.

"Typical republican stupidity!" said the don. "Never apologize, under any circumstances."

Hamish had not finished. "There is also a note from podestà Origo. He says that the prince has absolutely forbidden any meetings until he arrives in Florence. He does not say when that will be."

"Sometimes republicans don't seem so bad," Toby remarked glumly. "Does the idiot think the war will wait on his pleasure?"

After a tense silence, the don said, "Who was coming?"

Toby had been trying to keep the don and the proposed meeting well apart, but he could not refuse his nominal superior information when he asked for it, especially after the brilliant save the man had improvised in the loggia yesterday. He passed the question to Hamish.

"There was a letter in last night from Rome. The College will send Captain-General Villari. That's everyone we invited! Ercole Abonio from Milan — and he's bringing di Gramasci of the Black Lances. The Stiletto from Venice. Mezzo will come if his health improves; otherwise he'll send Gioberti or Desjardins."

The don raised aristocratic eyebrows. "Mezzo?"

"Paride Mezzo, collaterale of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies." No one but Hamish ever bothered to use that formal name for Naples. He just liked the sound of it. "We were about to invite the small guns: Verona, Bologna, Genoa—"

"Bah! They don't matter. They do what Milan and Venice and Florence tell them, and those three have no choice but to cooperate."

"They have some very competent soldiers," Toby protested.

"We do not need advice." From the don, that we was a remarkable concession, unless he had just taken to classifying himself as royalty. "The keys are Naples and Rome — Naples because it has the men, and Rome because it has the hierocracy for hexers. It also has to let the Neapolitans march through. Get those two into the coalition, and we may have a chance. At least we'll bloody the foe. The Swiss?"

"We can try. They're as biddable as cats."

"I assume that the real purpose of the orgy was to get you elected comandante?"

"Would be nice," Toby admitted. "But I do want to discuss strategy. We need to plan how to resist the invasion. We can't know where until we know which way Nevil's coming."

"Make up your mind, Constable. If you want to be elected jefe, then you bring in every little town that can field a pikeman. They'll all vote for you because Florence is less of a threat than any of the other four, but they'll never agree on anything else. If you need to decide whose crops are going to get burned, then you leave them out, all of them." Whatever illusions Don Ramon pursued, he was never stupid. He had a much better grasp of politics than he normally cared to admit.

"Another thing we must talk about is gramarye," Toby said. "We don't have a single hexer, and I've heard that the College is being absurdly uncooperative. If all the senior condottieri unite to appeal to Rome, then perhaps the hierocracy will bend a little."

"What need have you of hexers if you have one good shaman?"

Toby had registered Hamish's slack-jawed astonishment a split second before that new voice at his back spun him around.

A bizarre figure came limping across the courtyard toward them. It was short and completely enveloped in a floating costume of many colors and many parts — panels and swatches in green and brown and gray, bedecked with ribbons and lace, beads and embroidery, bunches of feathers and wisps of grass, a design that was either completely random or fraught with great meaning. Some parts of it looked new, others were grubby and worn by many years of use. The dainty, pointed chin suggested a woman, but she might be a young girl, or even a boy. Her hair and the upper part of her face were hidden by a blindfold and an elaborate headdress. Around her neck hung a drum as large as a meal sieve, which she steadied against her hip with one small brown hand.

Obviously she had just come out of the villa, but how had she passed the guards in there? How had she even entered the camp unchallenged? The hob was not reacting as it did to gramarye. Was this one of the camp brats playing a joke?

To his credit, the don remained on his stool. A slight narrowing of his eyes was the only sign of tension as he crossed his legs and leaned back to rest his elbows on the table. "And who might you be?"

She smiled, revealing a perfect set of sparkling white teeth. "Are you not in need of a hexer?" Her voice had a singsong accent and a curious huskiness. "And are you not all faithful children of His Splendor the Khan, who has sent his son to direct you? Who doubts that the illustrious prince has sent his personal shaman to be your guide and protector against the demons of the foe?"

Toby did, but he bowed. Hamish just glowered.

The don frowned. "A battlefield is not a fit place for a woman!"

"Who is it a fit place for?"

For a moment he bristled at such heresy, then twirled up his mustache, which was usually a sign of amusement. He rose gracefully and bowed. "Don Ramon de Nuñez y Pardo at your service, madonna."

"And I am Toby Longdirk."

"Who does not know you? Am I not Sorghaghtani? And is not Chabi my eyes, who found you?" The shaman raised an arm, and the great white owl floated down to settle on it, then shuffled sideways until it stood on her shoulder. The shaman was not just a boy playing pranks.

The don had not been aware of the owl.

Hamish said, "How do we know that you are sent by the prince and not the Fiend?"

"Are you not still breathing?" Chuckling, Sorghaghtani perched on a stool and arranged her drum on her lap. She ran fingertips over the skin, raising barely audible tremors like distant gunfire. Her hands and the visible part of her face had a brownish olive cast that was not European. Inside those extraordinary hodgepodge draperies she might be young or old, but there could not be very much of her. She was brazenly sure of herself and her owl — nothing else was provable at the moment. "Is your imp distressed by my presence, Little One?"

Toby assumed she was speaking to him, as the owl was staring in his direction. "No. Do you keep a spirit immured in your pet?"

"Who is the pet and who the keeper? Is it wise of you to arrange your council and not include the illustrious Neguder?"

"I have never heard of anyone called Neguder." Toby was starting to believe he was holding this conversation with the bird and not the woman. She was inhumanly motionless, except for the resonant tremor of her fingers on the drum and the movement of her lips as she spoke.

"Who else would be military advisor to the splendid prince?"

"Is he competent?" barked the don.

The owl turned its head in his direction. "Competent?" the shaman shrilled. "Who asks if a Tartar general is competent?"

"I do. Is he?"

"How could he be, when all preferment in the army is based on birth, when the Horde has not fought a war in two centuries, when all the skills of the steppes are forgotten and the swords rusted? Who would trust a man who drinks himself to stupidity every night?"

The don looked ready to eat his mustache. "Then why should I invite him to anything?"

"Will you defy the express command of illustrious Prince Sartaq, noble son of Ozberg Khan, your exalted liege lord?"

"Show me this command!"

"Can you not wait and ask him yourself?"

"Why," snapped the don, "do you always answer questions with questions?"

"Does it annoy you?"

"Yes it does."

The woman smiled.

Hamish leaned across the table, peering at her blindfold to see if it was genuine. "Why should we trust you? How do we know you are not sent by the enemy? Or are just a fake? How old are you?" He was seriously annoyed.

"Will you believe in me when I give you such boils on your backside that you cannot sit down?"

"Do that, and I'll wring your bird's neck and make it into soup. Why are you blindfolded?"

"If Chabi must be my eyes, will not the noon sun be too bright for her?"

"Well, yes, but…" Hamish straightened up. Frowning, he fell silent as he tried to puzzle out what that answer-question implied. At least the shaman had taken his mind off Lisa.

CHAPTER FOUR

They might be violent by nature, but soldiers of fortune were rarely monsters. The men of the Don Ramon Company were as concerned for the welfare of their souls as most other men, as heedful of the guidance of good spirits, and as abhorrent of demons' mindless evil. They were reasonably devout — but only reasonably. They would have as soon trusted their opponents not to use gramarye against them as they would have gone into battle wearing paper helmets. Only gramarye could fight gramarye, so the death of the company hexer had been the cause of much foreboding. If Longdirk tried to lead them to war before he found a credible replacement for the late Karl Fischart, he would march alone. Could they accept a woman? Even more unlikely, could they accept a shaman, whose style of conjuration would be so unfamiliar to them?

Could he? It was to be expected that the Tartar prince would show interest in the victor of Trent, but for Sartaq to assign his personal shaman to one of the smaller mercenary companies out of all the dozens in Italy was a gift horse with a very large mouth indeed. Was Sorghaghtani what she said she was? Whom did she serve? Hamish did not want to trust her, although he could not explain how he would test any adept for hidden loyalties. Toby was prepared to accept her because the hob seemed to. Either she was a hexer of such enormous power that she could blind the hob, or else she meant no harm. If he vouched for her, Hamish would go along, and the don probably would. How about the rest of the Company?

Sorghaghtani herself asked that question before he did. She also inquired why he did not invite all the officers to meet her at sunset in the courtyard and why he did not show her to her quarters in the meantime.

Since Fischart's death, the adytum held no spiritual threat to disturb the hob. Toby could go there now and had even inspected it a few days previously with the idea of turning it into a gunpowder store, eventually deciding it was too close to the villa. He conducted the little shaman there. She seemed pleased with the building and asked why he did not leave her to get on with her work.

He walked by it a few times during the day and each time heard her drum throbbing away inside as if she were performing some sort of shamanistic spring cleaning, but the hob paid no attention. Twice he tapped on the door to ask if she needed food and neither time was there any answer, but when he went to fetch her at sunset, she came out to meet him with her drum slung around her neck, all ready to go. An instant later the owl swooped down to settle on her shoulder.

"Do you need food, madonna?"

"Who? Why give me titles? If my mother called me Sorghaghtani, is that not good enough for you? Who can quest in the spirit world with a full stomach?" She hobbled off along the path. She was blindfolded, although the light would not bother her owl now. He could not tell whether her awkward gait meant that she was old or just badly shod. For all he knew, there was an adolescent inside that grotesque costume.

He caught up with her, staying on the non-owl side. "Have you cleansed the adytum of evil influences, Sorghaghtani, the shadow Oreste mentioned?"

"Have you sharpened the pikes, Little One?"

"You would rather I did not ask you questions?"

"Is not one of us enough?"

He could not tell if she was being humorous, since her face was hidden — he was so much taller than she that he could not even see the owl's goggle-eyed stare. He tried again. "I have assembled the officers. Will you tell me what you propose to do?"

"Why cannot you wait and see?"

"Do you ever say anything that is not a question?"

"Why do you ask?"

Toby sighed. "I'm beginning to wonder."

She chuckled, and that was an improvement.

"I have seen your owl many times in the last few weeks, and heard a drum. Was that you?"

"Who else?"

"Why were you spying on me?"

"Was I spying or just trying to find you?"

"I assume when you answer like that… I mean, I take that answer to mean that you were trying to find me."

"Do you?"

This was becoming more than a little irritating. "Warn me what you plan tonight, Sorghaghtani, because the hob — my imp as you call it — will not tolerate gramarye."

"Have I vexed it yet, Little One? Would it behave so well if I were a danger to you? How much will it do your bidding?"

"I try not to let it do anything. If I do, it will soon learn to bypass my controls and then overpower me. The tutelary at Montserrat warned me of that many times. Let sleeping demons lie."

The shaman chortled. "Tutelaries? You always believe tutelaries? Why do you carry it so strangely in your heart?"

"I do not carry it willingly at all. It cannot be exorcised, for we have grown too much together."

"Think you I cannot see that? Will not both become one soon?"

"Not soon. In many years perhaps, and I can only hope that then I will be the one who survives."

She did not offer her opinion of his chances.

Even before the horrors of Trent, Toby Longdirk had seen more manifestations of gramarye than most men, but not all of it had been violent and destructive. In the days before he learned to suppress its antics, the hob had often played tricks around him — often embarrassing, as when he found pretty things collecting in his pockets, sometimes deadly, but once in a while very convenient, almost as if it could think and were trying to please. So he knew gramarye, and yet Sorghaghtani's seance that evening was unlike anything he had ever witnessed before. It was subtle and stunningly effective, and the hob never stirred.

The courtyard was deeply shadowed, lit by a willowy moon in the pink dusk and the gleam of a few candles inside the villa itself. After the long-awaited payday, not all the officers of the Company were available to attend a council or competent to understand what was happening if they did, but the don had collected at least a score of them, perhaps thirty. They stood in small groups around the edges, under the trellises, staying well back, as if frightened the new hexer would turn them into goats to demonstrate her skills.

Toby presented Sorghaghtani, personal shaman to His Highness Prince Sartaq. He mentioned how honored and fortunate the Don Ramon Company was to have acquired such a hexer. The resulting silence might have come straight out of one of the age-old Etruscan tombs that were being excavated around Tuscany. Unless these men could be convinced, they would not persuade the rank and file.

"Are you always so mud-headed?" Sorghaghtani demanded shrilly. "What must I show you? Will you give me your hand, Little One, and stand at my back lest I fall off?"

Clutching his fingers in a powerful grip, she scrambled up on a stool and then the stone table itself. Evidently she could move as nimbly as a child when she wanted to, and his estimate of her age plummeted. She sat down cross-legged, gave the owl a wrist to step onto, and raised it overhead. Chabi spread her wings and floated away into the night. Sorghaghtani squirmed a few times as if to make herself comfortable on the hard tabletop, then settled the drum on her lap. "Do they understand that they must not speak, lest they anger the spirits?"

Of course they did not, so Toby passed the word. He stood ready behind the shaman and waited to see what she could do to convince this case-hardened crew of mercenaries.

For a long time she just drummed, but no one protested or made jokes or tried to leave. The rhythms were hypnotic and also restless, seeming to sing back and forth to their own echoes, although normally there were no echoes in the courtyard. To and fro, in and out, the sound went, surging and falling, then stopped abruptly, leaving a silence taut enough to raise the hair on a man's neck. The shaman sat hunched over her drum, motionless. When she spoke, the voice that rang out was female, but not hers.

"Mario! I, Angelica, speak. I need you. The mare foals tonight."

In the far corner, Mario Chairmontesi cried out.

Then another voice came from Sorghaghtani's throat, and this time Toby knew it, although he had not heard it for almost three years. "Ramon! Francisca am I. The new casa is ready, but servants… oh, to find servants!"

Wherever the don was standing in the courtyard, he did not comment, or if he did, the sound was lost in another voice: "Martin, my child! Hilda. So tall you are, so strong! Hilda with Ehingen am."

At that, Toby really did feel the hairs on his neck prickle, for Ehingen could only be a spirit or tutelary, so the woman who had spoken was dead. But he had no time to wonder what Martin Grossman was thinking before another spoke, and another, faster and jostling, as if the voices were struggling to take their turn in the shaman's mouth — not wives or lovers, only mothers, and more than half of them naming the spirit that now cherished them. Most spoke in Italian, but others used German or French or Spanish. Some, like Hilda, spoke as if to children. One just wailed incoherently, perhaps a wraith with no tutelary to care for it. One said plaintively, "You never knew me." The audience was reacting. Men tried to answer, or ask questions, or call back those who had spoken and fallen silent. Others tried to hush them as they waited for their own message. Some merely howled. Many wept as the significance sank in, and the weeping was infectious.

Barely audible through the rising hubbub, the last voice of all spoke very softly in the lilt of Gaelic. "Meg, Tobias. You do not remember, but I am with you. Proud I am." He had expected Granny Nan…

With him? None of the others had said that. Oh, spirits! No, no! Never in the years he had been possessed by the hob had he considered that it had been, in its witless, blundering, indifferent fashion, the nearest thing Tyndrum had to a tutelary. Only to the hob could the souls of the dead in Strath Fillan appeal for succor. So had it cherished them? All of them or some of them? When the hob left its haunt and went on its travels in Toby Longdirk, did it in some sense take them with it? He had no time to think of the implications, for the seance was over, and Sorghaghtani toppled backward into his arms.

She weighed nothing. He stood and cradled her as he would a child while his mind scrambled to recall every nuance of those faint words. You do not remember… Of course not, for Meg Campbell had died giving birth to a bastard rape-child, and she had been only a child herself. All around the courtyard, the officers of the Don Ramon Company were shuffling toward the exit — going alone, not in groups, not speaking. But a lot of them seemed to be weeping, and Toby realized that his own cheeks were wet, and his throat ached. Meg Campbell, the mother he had never known…

The shaman mumbled and began to stir. She had proved her skills. She had turned a score of intractable mercenary veterans into sniveling children.

CHAPTER FIVE

Lucrezia Marradi had two brothers. The elder, Pietro — poet, patron of the arts, head of the family bank, and, hence, head of the family — in his spare time ran city and state as a family fief. The younger was illegitimate, but bastardy mattered little in Italy, and he had followed a notable career in spiritualism, rising rapidly in the College until he was one of the senior cardinals, perhaps a future Holy Father. Early in March, Ricciardo Cardinal Marradi paid a visit to his native city, of which he was officially arch-acolyte.

Relieved that he would not have to send Hamish to Rome, Toby wrote asking for a meeting at His Eminence's convenience. He took the precaution of routing the request through the Magnificent. He waited, with growing concern. He asked again. He took the matter to Benozzo's successor, Cecco de' Carisendi, but the old man seemed unable to comprehend the seriousness of the problem — there was very little he did comprehend. It was on the tenth and final day of the cardinal's visitation that the captain-general and his deputy were summoned to the Marradi Palace to meet him. Toby took Hamish along.

He had been hoping and expecting that the meeting would be private, but they were shown into a busy antechamber, teeming with the usual crowd of sycophants and supplicants, and there they were left a long time. The snub itself was disturbing, both because it would soon become common knowledge in Florence and because anyone could guess why the captain-general needed to call upon the cardinal. Even when they were led through into the next high-ceilinged, overdecorated hall, they had not done with waiting. In the center the great man was holding court within about a score of people — mostly acolytes, male and female, but also four or five members of his family, including his brother and sister — and they were all just standing there having a loudly jolly chat, punctuated by much laughter. Clerks and stewards wandered around to no clear purpose.

The don was not noted for his patience. Cooling his heels always made his head hotter, and already he was muttering Castilian things under his breath. Eventually a chancellor arrived to confirm the visitors' identities, as if silver helmets were two-a-penny in Florence. Another wait. Then three of the courtiers kissed the cardinal's ring and departed. Everyone else remained, but now it seemed that the visitors were to have their audience.

Not so. The chancellor led forward a couple of very elderly female acolytes, tottering on canes.

"I see," the don announced loudly, "that I am too young to be trusted with important concerns. I prefer to do my aging elsewhere." He spun on his heel and strode out.

Hamish and Toby exchanged glances that included equal parts of relief and despair. No one else was reacting at all, but that did not mean that the insult had not been noted. It probably cost them another twenty minutes, but eventually they were judged to have suffered enough. Then they were led forward and graciously permitted to kiss the ring. Among the spectators, Lucrezia and the Magnificent watched in silence. Lucrezia was smiling.

Ricciardo Marradi was a plump, satisfied, and yet enigmatic man in his mid-thirties, five years younger than his brother. The Lombardy redness of his hair clashed horribly with his scarlet robes and biretta. His features were paradoxical — a sharp nose and small mouth flanked by brown eyes wide with babyish innocence, set in a soft pink complexion. He wore his power like steel armor, yet his voice was high-pitched and petulant.

"How may we aid your cause, Tobias? You understand that we are about to take our leave and cannot spare you long."

"The matter concerns the safety of the city, Your Eminence, indeed its very survival."

"Surely, then, it should be brought to us by Captain-General Signor Ramon de Nuñez?"

Years of practice let Toby restrain his temper. "Yes, it should, Your Eminence. I hoped it would be. But it seems that I shall have to suffice." For a moment he thought he was going to be dismissed unheard, but then the arch-acolyte gestured with a pudgy hand.

"Be brief." Accepting a sheaf of papers from a secretary beside him, His Eminence began to flip through them.

"Reports from the north tell of the Fiend preparing to bring his hordes across the Alps, Your Eminence. We expect him within a month or two at most. The brave men of Italy will resist his evil, but flesh and blood and courage are no match for gramarye. Nevil is a demon incarnate and fights with demons. It has long been suspected that he has refrained from trying to add Italy to his dominions only because he fears the righteous powers of the Cardinal College. I come to ask for the spiritual aid that the defenders—"

"Rest assured, my son," the cardinal twittered, barely glancing up from the documents, "that the Holy Father and members of the College will continue to pray without surcease for the defeat of the Fiend whether or not he invades Italy. We regularly remind all acolytes of the Galilean Order in all shrines and sanctuaries everywhere to petition the spirits they serve for assistance against the evil. Our esteemed Captain-General Villari has been told to save no expense to defend the holy city itself."

"Are not these the same precautions you took before France was conquered, when Austria was overrun, while the rest of Europe was ravaged by the monster? I am sure I speak not only for the armies of Florence but for all—"

"You may be sure of that." Marradi thrust the documents back at the secretary, approving them with a nod. "But we are not. If, as I fear, Tobias, you are about to ask the College itself to engage in gramarye, you should remember that the Holy Father and his predecessors for more than a thousand years have refused to countenance the use of demons under any circumstances whatsoever. The Galilean enjoined us to serve, worship, and educate the holy spirits within their natural domains. To abduct and torture them into demons is contrary to all that is virtuous. Fighting evil with more evil must always be self-defeating. Our shield must be love and goodness our sword."

Were this meeting the confidential and intimate parley Toby had requested, he would now agree wholeheartedly and mention that the Don Ramon Company was in dire need of a good healer, as battles were not necessarily fought within easy reach of a sanctuary. In other words, he would ask for a hexer. The cardinal, if he were reasonable, would refuse sadly and later arrange for one to appear. But this cardinal was not being reasonable and did not deserve to be treated reasonably.

"That was not how Rome escaped conquest by the Tartars in 1248, Your Eminence."

The onlookers flinched. No one contradicted an arch-acolyte in public, let alone a cardinal. Marradi's smooth pinkness turned a fraction pinker. He pursed his little mouth:

"You were there, I suppose?" he squeaked.

Toby could boom. "No, but I am here, in Florence, in your city, which I have sworn to defend with my life. Why are you not willing to assist its people in their hour of need? For all of that thousand years you mentioned, the College has waged war on hexers, and rightly so. It has invariably confiscated any immured demon it could lay its hands on, and it is public knowledge that all of those hundreds, nay thousands, of—"

"Public knowledge is worthless knowledge, my son. Those jewels and the demons they contain are taken to Rome to be destroyed, not hoarded in some secret cellar as you imply." His Eminence gibbered the words, sprayed them. "Even if we did control a legion of demons, to use it for the furtherance of evil would—"

"Is self-defense evil? If we use them only for that?"

"I have told you. Those demons do not exist."

"Then if you will not take pity on the men who will die because of your stubbornness, will you not save the tutelaries and spirits? Do you deny that whenever Nevil takes a city he turns its spirits into demons to serve his cause and thus continues to increase his power while you and others like you close your eyes to the suffering and—"

"Insolence! Blasphemy! Chancellor, remove this man and his companion from our presence!"

Toby turned on his heel and walked out.

Hamish stalked at his side, growling low in his throat. As they clattered down the broad staircase, he said, "Did ye see yon Lucrezia? Smirking and panting like a bitch in heat."

"I'm sure she enjoyed the performance," Toby said tightly, "but I don't think she wrote the music. There's another hand behind all this."

"Whose?"

"The shadow who arranged Fischart's death. There's a traitor in the Company."

CHAPTER SIX

Never since the Tartar conquest of Europe almost three hundred years earlier had a member of the Khan's immediate family visited Florence, and no expense was spared to honor the darughachi. The ceremonies would begin at the city gate on the Roman road, the Porta Gattolini, where bands played and banners flew above elaborate staging, where all the rich and powerful came to see and be seen, even those not required to participate. An honor guard lined both sides of the road out for more than a mile. Marshal Diaz had threatened to flog any man who did not meet his standards of perfection, be he cavalry squadriere, infantry commander, or Constable Longdirk himself. Growly old Antonio was probably capable of trying it, too, but the threat was not necessary. The entire Don Ramon Company was determined to upstage the Florentine provisionati, so sunlight blazed off helmets and breastplates, off shields and pikes and swords, off buttons and harness buckles buffed like silver. Even the horses looked polished. Toby had taken care that he would not be found wanting. At his post close to the gate, he flashed and sweltered in full armor like the rest.

The Company had begun deploying before dawn. Great carriages of the rich started rumbling out not long after, then the commonality emerged from the city like a noisy tide to roil over the fields, churning up the young wheat. They danced, picnicked, and generally enjoyed a sunny holiday. Hucksters and pickpockets plied their trades.

By noon the bands had given up, the honor guard was losing its glitter, and everyone was becoming grumpy. It was midafternoon before the long procession was seen winding in over the hills. It took almost another hour for the van of the Sienese escort to reach the first of the honor guard, and even then the end of the baggage train was still not in sight. The music began again, and maidens strewed flowers on the road before the prince's steed. Cannons boomed, startling the horses. Some ambitious souls began to cheer, although that did not last long in the heat.

All this was only preparatory, for the main events would take place in the city, in the Palace of the Signory. But before the speeches and masques, before ceremonies in the piazza and services in the sanctuary — before anything else at all — the city leaders must make the Tartar ritual of obeisance, which was so ancient that it had been conveniently forgotten in Tuscany centuries ago. Nevertheless, it was required now, however much republican blood might boil.

A herald proclaimed the name and rank of the Khan's official deputy, the despised Antonio Origo. The podestà advanced on foot, bowing seven times. Then he had to kneel and touch his face to the ground, rise to his knees, and kiss the prince's boot. Later, when Sartaq sat enthroned in the palace, there would be formal oaths of allegiance, with each participant lifting the royal foot and placing it on his own head, but that could not conveniently be done when he was on horseback. Even this ritual was more difficult now than it had been in ancient times, for where the prince's world-conquering ancestors had ridden shaggy little Mongolian ponies, he sat astride a long-legged Arabian stallion, and the dumpy messer Origo had considerable trouble reaching his lips to the boot without lifting his knees off the ground. Muffled sounds of amusement could be heard from the distant ranks of citizenry. Even the notables around Toby shimmered a little. As Origo rose and backed away, bowing seven more times as required, his face was observed to be redder than the rich wines of the Chianti Hills. Truly, the lot of a podestà in Florence was never easy.

Sartaq seemed younger than Toby had expected, although those unfamiliar Asiatic features were hard to judge. Under a towering, many-colored and many-layered hat, his complexion was the same olive-brown shade as Sorghaghtani's, plump and unlined, with a thin black mustache curving down almost to his jawline. He was short, probably stocky, although little of his shape showed through the grandiose robes of bejeweled and emblazoned silk — not for him the simple furs and leathers of his horseborne steppe ancestors. He looked very bored, but possibly he was merely wearied by a long ride on a hot day.

None of the twenty or so glorious-garbed courtiers behind him seemed likely to be the military attaché Neguder. They were all elderly and could be assumed to have been sent along to keep the young prince in line.

All the innumerable priors and other dignitaries of Florence had now to be proclaimed by the heralds and then follow Origo's footsteps over the crushed flowers. Pietro Marradi was not there, because formally he was only a private citizen. He was also too much of a realist to feel slighted by the omission, although all the lesser politicians, while denouncing the ceremony as barbaric and antiquated and humiliating, had been ready to riot if they were excluded.

The military were to come next, starting with the captain-general. Don Ramon might well be the haughtiest man in Italy, but an abasement that shocked republicans was no problem for him. He understood the rights of rank. He probably believed that he was entitled to much the same sort of veneration himself — after all, he could trace his lineage back six or seven centuries farther than the prince could, for the Khan's line had been undistinguished before it produced the great Genghis. He strode forward cheerfully, a limber, athletic contrast to the stodgy, overfed burghers who had preceded him. He was the first to perform the obeisance with grace.

Then the captain of the city's own troops, the provisionati, but no one put any stock in him. Toby was next. He braced himself…

"His Royal Highness," bellowed the herald, "the Duke of Anjou, knight of the Order of the Golden Sword, companion of the Crystal Star, Sieur de la Loire, seigneur of Anjou, of Beaupréau, of Les Herbiers, of—"

Toby had swayed slightly on the balls of his feet, but he regained his balance without giving onlookers the satisfaction of seeing him flail his arms. His immediate companions were hissing in astonishment as the catalogue of seigniories rolled on and on.

And on…

"…of Sablé-sur-Sarthe, of Aiffres, Viscount Chateauroux, Baron Bonneval, castellan of La Rochesur-Yon."

The old scoundrel had never admitted to any of those honors before. Even now, he was obviously laying claim only to the titles he had possessed before the war, before Nevil turned his family into dog food. Since then he had inherited a third of Europe.

The catalogue ended, the rangy old mercenary limped forward to greet the prince. Granted that D'Anjou himself had probably instigated this royal recognition, who had worked him into Toby's spot in the ceremony? It was universally assumed that the main purpose of the darughachi's journey west was to choose the next suzerain. If blood was what mattered, then D'Anjou must be the logical choice, but there was certainly no chance of D'Anjou then appointing Toby Longdirk comandante.

That crashing noise was the sound of plans collapsing.

D'Anjou rose and retreated, bowing. The herald proclaimed Baldassare Barrafranca, certainly one of the most incompetent fighters ever to sign a condotta and pretender to one of the least justifiable hereditary titles. Obviously Toby Longdirk was not going to be called forward at all. He supposed he should be feeling anger, but his inner calm remained unruffled, almost as if he had expected this; the hob slept on.

"They did it again!" said an irate whisper at his elbow. Even Hamish was polished up like a silver wine jug today, but now his face was scarlet with wrath. He was speaking out of the corner of his mouth, of course, as all attention was supposed to be on the ceremony taking place in the road.

"Did what?"

"Insulted you! Deliberate public humiliation!" He managed to spit the words without moving his lips, quite a feat.

"You mean I'm supposed to feel slighted because I'm not allowed to kiss a man's boot?"

Hamish glanced sideways at him. "Don't snarl at me, messer Longdirk! What Lucrezia does isn't my fault. I got your name as far up the list as was humanly possible."

"I'm not snarling."

"Well, you should be! Tell me why Il Volpe lets his sister interfere like this! She's doing everything she can to make your job harder. Nevil will hear of this. His spies will tell him."

"Lucrezia is a formidable signora." Toby had not identified her among the massed beauties in the ladies' stands. But she would be there, watching him to enjoy his reaction. "If she's the puppet master, she's doing a remarkable job, but she isn't really hurting me. I don't care about the prizes she keeps snatching from me. Bowing and scraping folderol! No, I'm sure the Magnificent knows his sister well enough not to let her meddle in policy. Someone else has turned him against me, and it must be a traitor, someone working for the Fiend. That worries me a lot more than a woman's spite."

The pattern was repeated when the procession reached the palace. Toby was not at all surprised to discover that he had been struck off the list of dignitaries to make obeisance before the throne. This omission was clearly intended to be another snub, but he could not feel hurt by it. The opportunity to place another man's foot on his head seemed a very questionable honor.

After that he rode back to Fiesole with the rest of the Company, skipping the inevitable banquet without finding out what little treats had been planned for him there.

CHAPTER SEVEN

"The duchessa was very disappointed that you missed the banquet last night," Don Ramon remarked airily. On that splendid spring morning, he and Toby were leading a group of senior officers into Florence to wait upon General Neguder. He looked astonishingly pert for a man who had partied all night — which he must have done, because he had not returned to Fiesole until well after dawn.

There was no justice. Toby, who had gone to bed at a respectable hour like a dutiful little boy, felt bleary-eyed and bedraggled. The life of a penniless outlaw had been much simpler than that of a condottiere.

"I bet she was."

"Mustn't disappoint influential ladies."

"I am sure you did not, signore."

The don smirked and twirled up his mustache. "I believe we gave satisfaction." He was riding the devil-horse Brutus, which kept trying to bite Smeòrach. Both Toby and Smeòrach were growing very short of patience. Toby had surreptitiously slid his boot out of his stirrup and was waiting for the next provocation.

"What did darling Lucrezia have planned for me — gunpowder in the soup?"

"I believe vipers in the pasta. What's wrong with your mount?"

"I'm not sure." Smeòrach was trudging down the hill like a cart horse, not at all his usual high-spirited self. Possibly he had been infected by his rider's glum mood. Toby gave him an affectionate pat. "I think I'm neglecting him. The big dolt isn't getting enough exercise."

"Not enough? If you want my—"

At that moment Brutus aimed another nip at Smeòrach. Toby's spur slammed into Brutus's flank, and at once the don had an unexpected fight on his hands. It was several minutes before order was restored and the procession could continue down the trail. The don had probably not witnessed that low blow, but he was already glowering suspiciously at his companion and would find the wound when he dismounted. Some of the sycophants following would have noticed and would tattle to him later. Which reminded Toby of the worst of the nightmares that had troubled his sleep.

"Are you prepared to accept the Chevalier as suzerain, Captain-General?"

The don shot him an astonished glance, then exploded into laughter.

"You don't think D'Anjou will be appointed suzerain?"

"No, I don't, because I know who will be."

And now he wasn't going to tell — so there!

The hall to which the noble condottiere and his men were conducted was neither the largest nor the grandest in the Palace of the Signory, but it was large enough and grand enough to dazzle any native of a poor, drab land like Scotland. Its walls and ceiling blazed with gilt moldings and vivid frescoes of glorious battles from the war-smeared history of Florence. Only a greasy layer of smoke stain from innumerable years of candles marred the brilliance.

Here the visitors were required to stand for a considerable time, long enough to make them feel less important than the roaming bluebottles. Eventually a herald hurried in and ordered them to kneel for the entrance of His Splendor General Neguder, military aide to the Illustrious Prince Sartaq, Swift Sword of the Khan, High Warrior of the Golden Horde, and so on. Later a trumpet brayed outside. Still later, it brayed again. And in due course the great man did waddle in with a train of attendants almost as splendidly arrayed as himself. The visitors, having been properly instructed, pressed their faces to the floor and squinted out of the corners of their eyes.

He was elderly, tall for a Tartar, and wide for a man of any race. Even flowing silks could not disguise the bulge of that belly. He took the throne with obvious relief, leaned back, and probably closed his eyes — it was impossible to be certain, because his eyes were tiny slits in the blubber of his face. His followers took the chairs arrayed to right and left of him. The visitors were left where they were, noses on an evil-smelling carpet reeking of generations of boots.

The herald said something inaudible, probably in Tartar.

The general then delivered a speech. Officially he delivered a speech. In practice one of his aged flunkies read it for him, remaining seated while doing so. Its meaning, if it ever had any, was gutted by the man's gruesome accent and skinned by Toby's inadequate command of Italian, but the shreds of meat remaining seemed to consist mainly of a review of great victories won by the Golden Horde in ancient times and the lessons to be learned from them. The tactics mentioned were rarely suitable for Italian terrain. There was no mention of firearms. There was no hint that the Khanate was prepared to support resistance in Italy with a strike at Nevil from the east, across Hungary.

The speech lasted about two hours. Toby wondered if a first snore would be a capital offense, or if he might be allowed a second. Not that the meeting was not educational. Nay, it was most exceeding instructive! Ever since Nevil's rampage began, the Khan's loyal subjects in Europe had been appealing to him for assistance. The lack of response had been a mystery much discussed, but it was a mystery no longer, not to Toby. These men were imposters. The once-invincible Golden Horde, whose ancestors had conquered all the world from Spain to Cathay, was a legend now. It had no more substance than a bubble on a stream.

In their time the Khans had ruled well, imposing peace on a very quarrelsome continent — more or less peace, and at a price, for the suzerains had been tax collectors before they were anything else. They had always managed to pocket a lionish share of whatever they gathered, but much of the gold had flowed east to Sarois.

With that insight came another. If the Khanate was only a mirage, then why was Toby Longdirk crouched on a rug being bored to distraction? Answer: Because power worked on men's minds, and the Khan's almost illusory power was still enough to make the Florentines serve his son's will. If Toby stood up now and tried to walk out, Florence would bring him to heel. He would be beheaded at best. So even the last reflections of glory could dazzle. These mummified incompetents were still in charge, and their orders would be obeyed until it was too late. All Toby's carefully nurtured plans would crumble to dust, and Nevil would take Italy without working up a sweat.

Hearing a faint moan to his left, he unobtrusively turned his head. The old Chevalier was beside him, his face twisted in agony.

"Trouble, signore?" Toby murmured.

"Cramps!" came the whispered response.

"Be grateful that they keep you awake."

The old scoundrel just scowled, a man without humor.

At last, thank good spirits, the speech ended. Now, perhaps, the mercenaries would be presented to the acclaimed General Neguder and could ask a few penetrating questions about his strategy and intentions. Alas, not so. A herald shook the noble warrior awake. He rose and shuffled out, followed by all his entourage. The audience was over.

The visitors scrambled to their feet and jigged up and down to restore circulation. Don Ramon — to Toby's delight — was deep purple with fury.

"What of Prince Sartaq, senor? Is he any more, um, impressive?"

The don gnashed some teeth. "His Highness is a worthy scion of his exalted forebears."

Splendid! They were going to need all of those they could get.

CHAPTER EIGHT

The Khan's son was an entertaining novelty at first, but his stallion interests quickly alarmed all mothers and husbands of young Florentine women. A week of Sartaq was enough to start them whispering that it must be time for the illustrious prince to go on and visit Milan. He must see Venice. Why not Padua? Verona was especially lovely in the spring. Anywhere. The city of flowers fidgeted, but the Magnificent tightened his grip and the complaints remained no more than complaints.

Rumors — never in short supply in Italy — were excessively, superfluently abundant and contradictory. Everyone anyone had ever heard of was going to be appointed suzerain, but the prince had decided to lead the armies of Italy in person, that he was going to flee the peninsula long before there was any chance of the Fiend arriving and catching him there. Also, Nevil's armies were massing to cross Mount Cenis Pass, Brenner Pass, and Simplon Pass, and to enter Italy by the coast road through Savoy. Choose the truth you preferred.

Toby Longdirk, the supposed defender of the city, was no wiser than anyone else. His petitions were ignored, his plans frustrated. He was shut out of the inner councils, if there were any, and the don now seemed less certain of what was being planned, if anything was. If Lucrezia was his source, she might not be as well informed as he had thought. Although he normally bragged openly of his conquests, he was almost discreet in his talk of the duchessa. She must be dangerous indeed if she frightened him.

Toby had a formidable lady of his own to handle. One rather typical afternoon was made worse by a stormy interview with Countess Maud, alias Blanche, Queen Mother of England.

By noon the air was stifling. He could find little compensation in the knowledge that the trellis vines would provide better shade later in the spring. Later in the spring he might be far away or even dead. He would be ready to break off and take a siesta if he could only convince himself that he had done any good at all so far.

He had wasted more than an hour repeating a familiar argument with Alberto Calvalcante, master of gunnery in the Company. Calvalcante had conceded that transporting guns in carts was an untidy and inefficient business. Yes, the noble constable's idea of building a permanent but transportable mount so that a cannon or bombard could be hauled to the battlefield and be ready to fire in minutes instead of hours or days, was an appealing notion. But, he insisted mulishly, such a carriage would fly apart at the first shot unless it was built of enormous balks of timber, so it would require as many oxen to haul it as all the carts it replaced. The recoil would drive it back into its own lines. The wheels would fall off. On muddy roads — and most roads were muddy most of the time — it would sink right out of sight. Toby had managed to answer all the objections except one, which was that a gun had to be aimed. That was achieved now by building a trough for it to lie in pointing at the target, which was almost invariably a city under siege. This fancy carriage of his, the gunner said, would require a mechanism to change the elevation of the barrel, and Maestro Calvalcante would never believe that such a contraption could be built strong enough not to fly apart after a couple of shots.

Toby was baffled but not convinced. In the last twenty years or so, armorers had perfected ways of casting bronze cannons far stronger than the old ones built from iron strips, and yet the military had found no better way of moving them around. Doubtless Nevil would bring many guns with him and use them to batter down city walls. Florence was a big target and stayed where it was. The attackers would not be so obliging.

After Calvalcante came Marshal Diaz, to present half a dozen minor condottieri who had signed up to enjoy the Florentine gold and serve under the celebrated comandante Longdirk. All of them were foreign refugees except one, a crusty peasant farmer from Romagna who led two lances composed entirely of his own sons, aged sixteen to twenty-three. Diaz swore they were as tough a gang of warriors as he had ever met, and Toby promised to come and meet them all in the next day or two. He refrained from asking how many mothers they shared.

Even Diaz, that stolid, imperturbable Catalan, was becoming frayed and harassed these days. The Company had expanded past the seven thousand mark, with no end in sight. There were too few large bands left to enlist as associates, and the small ones had to be included under the don's banner; it was the lesser of the two administrative evils. In theory, Toby could now field more than seventeen hundred helmets for Florence, half of them in the Don Ramon Company itself, but theories never won wars. Men did, good men. D'Amboise, Simonetta, and della Sizeranne had all accepted his invitation and were marching north with their troops. When they arrived, he would have to warn them that he was out of favor in Florence. He was certain that none of them would choose to serve under the don.

As Antonio and his recruits departed, Chancellor Campbell arrived with Brother Bartolo and Sorghaghtani — plus, of course, Chabi, who swirled down from the sky and flattered Toby by choosing his shoulder to perch on. She gave the back of his doublet a token of her affection, too. These were the Company's Intelligence Arm, but their subdued manner as they settled round the table told him that they had no significant news to report.

"Well?" Toby demanded. "It is almost April. The roads are dry in the north. The passes are open. Which way is he coming?"

Hamish grimaced, making his narrow features seem almost wolfish. "I don't know! As of five days ago, there was still utter, absolute, outright nothing. I'm sorry, Toby. Demons, I'm sorry! I'm doing everything I can!"

"You expect me to shoot you? If you don't know, you don't know."

Hamish had posted agents at the mouth of every Alpine pass to talk with travelers. Doubtless they reported what they had learned as promptly as they could, but all of them were stationed at least five days away from Florence and some even farther. The first word to arrive might be a report that Nevil's army was already entering Italy.

Hamish sighed. "You want a guess, I'll give you a guess. It's going to be the Brenner again."

"Well, we know that country. Why the Brenner?"

"Because traders are going north and almost none are coming south. Either there's a dragon eating them in there, or Nevil's shut off the north end of the pass. And the only reason to do that is to hide an army."

"Or weather," Bartolo remarked gently. The friar's face was still as round as a full moon, but it had lost much of its old jollity. "Bad roads in Austria, floods on the Danube. And the Tyroleans may not be cooperating." Tyrol had been horribly mauled by Schweitzer. The survivors could not stop another army, but they could tear up the road and throw down bridges.

"So what have you learned?" Hamish demanded grumpily. "Tell me where Nevil's mustering, and I'll tell you what passes he'll come by. What about the Swiss?"

The fat man spread his fat hands in a sort of shrug. "My correspondents north of the Alps report no massing of troops. Either Nevil has decided to wait until later in the year, or he is masking his movements with gramarye."

Toby looked to the inscrutable shaman. He wondered how the girl — he had concluded that she was little more than a child — how she managed not to cook inside that monstrous heap of cloth. Every day she rearranged the beads and lace and replaced some of the dangling vegetation. She moved panels of cloth around, too. It was a strange way to change one's clothes, but she was the strangest person he had ever met.

"Well, Sorghaghtani? Can the Fiend hide a whole army?"

"How many demons does he have? Is there anything you cannot do if you have enough demons?"

"Are you telling me I have to plan on fighting an invisible army?"

"Even if he can hide from the friar's clerks, how can he hide from spirits, Little One? Can he hide from Chabi, who sees all?"

"Do you keep watch on the passes?"

"You think an owl can fly so far?"

He was adjusting to her maddening speech, in that it now annoyed him only about half the time. This was one of the times, but she obviously meant that the Alps were beyond her range.

"Maestro Fischart once spoke of putting a demon watch on the passes."

"Who will give me the demons?" she snapped. "Even if he did leave a casket full of them in the adytum, what are their names, mm? Who will tell me that?"

Toby shook his head. However skilled Sorghaghtani was, she could not compare with the baron for raw power. She was now very popular with the men, because she would accept no fees for healing and could cure the Spanish Pox just by playing her drum. Tutelaries assigned severe penances for the pox. Her evening consultations always drew long lineups outside the adytum.

"And the Swiss?" Hamish asked again.

This time the friar's shrug was even larger, a huge heaving of meat. "Like the Tyroleans, they will harass the Fiend as much as they can but cannot hope to deny him passage."

Toby growled in frustration. "Will they join in the battles, though? Will they even come to the conclave?"

This time Brother Bartolo just shrugged.

The prince had belatedly given permission for the conclave to proceed, beginning on the first of April. Arrangements were Arnaud Villars's responsibility, and before Toby had read a third of the papers Hamish and Bartolo had left for him, in stormed Arnaud in a typical frenzy, tearing his beard. It was amazing how that furry jungle survived his continual tantrums.

"Money!" he roared. The dieci were already behind in payments. That was to be expected. Veteran mercenaries were surprised when their pay wasn't in arrears.

"Prices!" he howled. Horses were going for more than five hundred florins. The cost of wheat, of barley, of wine…

"The conclave!" he screamed. The darughachi had invited every knight and archer and man-at-arms in all Italy. The villa would not hold them, there was no place to feed them, and the Company was expected to pay for everything…

Toby listened sympathetically because being a scratching post was part of his job. The big Gascon was merely venting his frustration on a target he could not damage instead of taking out his feelings on his subordinates. The last time this happened had been two days ago, and then Toby had assured his treasurer of his continuing support and confidence and reliance. This time, for a change, he waited until the fires had died down a little and then laughed. Arnaud fell silent and began turning purple.

"Pardon me, old friend! I've seen you worked up too often. Oftentimes I've talked you out of strangling people — haven't I?"

"Certainly not! Well, maybe. Once or twice."

"More than that. You always tell me that the world is about to end, and you always solve the problems on your own. Always! Now, what are you going to do this time?"

Glowering, Arnaud began to list the measures he was planning to take, such as moving tents to Cafaggiolo for sleeping quarters. He had hardly begun when—

"Ah, there you are, Constable Longdirk!" The countess swished into the courtyard in a haze of russet-and-purple silk.

The men exchanged fraught glances, then rose and bowed low.

"I need a word with you, Sir Tobias — alone?" That aloneness would not exclude Lisa, of course, who had come scowling along at her mother's heel in a yellowy green robe and was illuminating the courtyard like a goddess.

Realizing that he was gawking at her, Toby swung his attention back to her awesome mother. "Pray speak freely, my lady. Treasurer Villars understands no English."

He registered his folly as soon as the words were out, for the countess had had dealings with Arnaud, and he, being a Gascon, spoke better English than Toby did. Fortunately, he never did so from choice, and the countess's failure to react showed that he must have forced her to converse in French. She dismissed him from consideration.

"Constable…" She did not presume to sit, so everyone remained standing, but she was displaying an uncharacteristic lack of confidence. "Constable, tell me how you expect… how you see events unfolding in the next few months."

"Months? I cannot see months, my lady. I expect the Fiend's armies to invade Italy within two or three weeks. Armies loyal to the Khan will oppose him and, hopefully, will deal with Nevil as we dealt with his flunky Schweitzer."

The lady was not pleased. She squeezed her lips together. "Under whose leadership?"

Her daughter was not pleased either. So they had learned just how bad relations now were between Toby and his employer, the republic of Florence, but why was Lisa not smirking her royal smirk at his downfall?

"That is for Prince Sartaq to determine, ma'am."

Blanche hesitated, as if about to ask him what his chances were, but then she changed her mind. "Victory is by no means certain, is it?"

"No, my lady. Nor is it impossible." What was she up to and why didn't she get on with it?

"I fear for my daughter's safety in the event of a defeat, Constable."

Ah! "And your own, ma'am, of course."

She sighed the sort of sigh that would have felled a royal court in her youth. "I am little concerned with my own fate, Sir Tobias. After so many years of flight, one wearies of the chase. But Lisa still has many years of life to look forward to, and I do not wish to leave her at risk. In the light of what you have said, I believe that we should withdraw to the island of Malta until the danger is past and you have won your great victory."

"Probably a wise decision under the circumstances," Toby murmured politely. What the lady was not saying — or had not said yet, at least — was that she was now penniless and had run out of friends to prevail upon. That would come.

She acknowledged his concession with a nod. "Then would you be so kind, Constable, as to have your staff make the necessary arrangements?" She indicated Arnaud with a fluttery gesture. "I plan on leaving as soon as possible."

Doubtless. So did all the thousands of panic-stricken refugees already packed into every port in the peninsula. Ships were rarer than sea monsters.

"I shall instruct messer Villars accordingly, ma'am. It may take him some time to find a suitable vessel, you understand."

The countess smiled as if about to terminate the interview, then remembered another detail. A moment before she spoke, Toby guessed what was coming. That was not just dislike in Lisa's eyes, although there was certainly enough of that. It was tension. And Blanche had it, too, although she was hiding it better. There was something between them that they were not revealing.

"My own staff was left behind in Siena, Sir Tobias, as you know. In particular, I feel the need for a steward, a majordomo. I have my eye on one of your chancellors, Master Campbell. He was of some assistance to both my daughter and myself in Siena, and I am favorably impressed with his qualities. We understand he has an indenture of some sort with the Don Ramon Company. May I prevail upon you to consider transferring this contract to my name, Constable? As a favor to the future Queen of England?"

She wanted to buy Hamish? Toby drew in a long, slow breath. Lisa was as taut as a bowstring, and he would wager that there had been a very stormy scene — several scenes, possibly a whole stage play — between mother and daughter before a compromise had been hammered out. Hamish was the price of Lisa's cooperation. Not buying him, though. Blanche expected him to give her Hamish. He did not know whether to bellow with laughter or keep the game going until Arnaud exploded, which might not be very long at all.

"It is true, my lady, that everyone in the company has put his name or made his mark on a scroll, but in the case of senior personnel like Chancellor Campbell, that is only because our clients insist on formal records. I would not dream of holding him against his will. If he wishes to enter your service, either permanently or temporarily, I will never stand in his way." So much for Master Hamish, who must have been the one to tell Lisa about the contract and who had, therefore, almost certainly been using it as an excuse to avoid making a commitment.

Meanwhile Lisa was having great difficulty in suppressing a leer of joy and triumph, and her mother was less pleased. So Lady Lisa thought she could talk Hamish into anything, and the countess was not as stupid as she pretended.

"Messer Arnaud?" Toby turned to Villars but was careful to avoid meeting his eye. "Kindly book passage to Malta for Their Ladyships and a small party of attendants. Charge it to the casa."

"Sì, messer."

"You are most kind, Constable!" The lady offered her hand to be kissed and paraded solemnly out of the yard, with Lisa floating blissfully at her back.

"How much priority do I assign to that last instruction, Your Magnificence?" Arnaud inquired acidly.

"Don't move a finger on it," Toby growled, staring after the disappearing visitors. "Spin her all the tales you like, but do nothing."

Lisa was far too valuable a card to be allowed to float around loose. At least, he hoped that was his motive. He hated the idea that he might no longer trust Hamish.