Marco’s Journal : Striking Back

Now I must scribble these thoughts in haste, for we are hiding in the enemy camp, with a desperate fight to come.

But I should start at the beginning.

Saint Christopher had seen us safely to the Deliziosa with the Jews we rescued from murder in the dark alleys of Rome, to find Bettina and her news that we were homeless. While we settled them in, Rocco went out onto the streets again and returned with Marisa and news that the Bardoni gang had restored the Sorceror and his minions to the House of Crows. Donna Giulia sent word to the Jewish Quarter, and the next day some Pierlione surcoats arrived with a horse-litter to collect the old man [one Simione Zacuto] and his wounded nephew and escort their precious cargo to safety. He gave us a small bag of florins, his thanks, and an address we would always be welcome to visit.

The six golden florins were very welcome, as we all had hardly any money in our pockets once more. The rest of our goods we had to think were already plundered. A year’s work - gone. Our most valuable asset was now Giovanni’s metal foot. Father Arturo prayed for the safe return of his newly-inked copy of Galen, which it seems was very precious to him. Indeed we might all lament the loss of our savings, and how we might have squandered it all on wine, women and song instead and be better off than we now were. Certainly Astore did. Brother Giovanni told us to take heart as poverty is good for the soul, but that did not lighten my spirits much; instead I kept myself warm with dreams of revenge.

More hope arrived later that day, when we heard that Cola was calling a council of war at the Black Cat in two days time, at noon. Welcome news indeed, so straightway we said our farewells at the Deliziosa and made our way down to the river to catch a boat back to that end of town. Bettina and Marisa would throw their lot in with us and come too. The boat and river toll was painful to our drained purses, but the streets did not seem safe to travel on after all the rioting. So we made our way swiftly to the Black Cat, and all made ourselves useful as it now housed many refugees from violence and looting. Like us they were homeless and looked to Cola for help.

By noon the next day Matteo and Noni had arrived, along with Renzo, Lino and Father Michele from the Baths of Diocletion, and our old friend Pino, who was growing up fast. Cola had the bar cleared with guards at the door as we held our council of war. Cola told all that the Bardoni gang had taken over the House of Crows by force-of-arms, and so slighted our familia.  That same night the Sorceror Aristofane Caltagirone was back, with the hunchback and deformed hulk he had as his servants. Like me, Cola felt the recent kidnapping of nuns was no coincidence. They had been taken into the depths of the Suburra, the haunt of the Bardoni gang. We know for certain the Sorceror murdered poor virgins to summon and bind the flying monkeys from hell [the good father says they are Scimioni Volanti] , and their return would darken the credit we received for their elimination from the streets of Rome.

Renzo said that both he and Lino hated the Bardoni for once they had been enslaved urchins of The Sweeper - those spigolatori who must glean the endless darkness beneath the streets and return with items of value if they wished to be fed. They had suffered captivity and starvation for many years until they found an escape to the surface. When we described the modern entrance we had found once in our questing below the streets, he agreed that was the point they came from. Above was an old Palazzo, which the Bardoni brothers shared with their aunt as a fortified base for their crimes. Geppetto was the brains, Carlo was the enforcer, and The Sweeper ran her own affairs as tyrant of the urchins and a fence for stolen goods. She wielded a broomstick, and kept a black cat, so all the urchins named her a Witch.

Matteo said he had not settled his account with the Sorceror, and would join in any action to scotch his plans.

After much discussion we made a plan to prove again the route from Renzo’s exit to the Bardoni basement, before launching an attack from below. The attack would involve a Magician’s ruse, a feigned assault on the House of Crows and an ambush of the Bardoni gang sent to clear that away. We would need hour-candles to time our attack from beneath with the action in the streets above. Everyone had a part, and we would make common cause for revenge. A fine plan, but in war few of these thrive in the real world. The Will of Providence is often otherwise - for good or ill - and so it was for us.

To prove the old route still sound, Renzo and Lino took Rocco, Astore, Father Arturo, Brother Giovanni and I across to the Calean Hill. Our new housemate Lorenzo would not be left behind, and was determined to use his magic arts to aid us in the darkness below. The old exit was hard to find in the overgrown ruins on the slopes of the hill, and there we came across two monks arguing with an angry mule. Their progress was not helped by the jeering of many novices from the walls of a small monastery close by. So I took a hand, and as they slipped and stumbled I calmed the poor beast and led it quietly inside the gate. We were thanked by a senior monk, who soon re-ordered the novices as well as any sergeant-at-arms. He offered us water and some shade to drink it in as we had saved the day. When Renzo enquired about the shrine of Santa Barbara he lent us a guide to show it to us.

Soon we found the shrine further down the hill, well worn but still bearing a faded painting of the saint. She is a patron saint for miners, I am told, so Father Arturo made a small mass for us to ask for her protection in the tunnels below, for surely they are as dark as any mine.

Nearby was Renzo’s exit, a tiny cave hidden in a mass of bushes. Crawling within, you can reach stone stairs leading down into an ancient tunnel, although it is a tight spot indeed. Once we had all squeezed through, even Rocco, we descended to an ancient water-way with a walkway on each side, like many we had seen before. The air was fresh and clean compared to many of the lower passages. Renzo led us down, past openings, across a small ford, and eventually to a passage covered in hanging gauze, light as air and strangely sticky. Spider-silk writ very large in the darkness, for this was no common web. All gripped their weapons and prayed to Saint Barbara as we pressed on. Rocco’s prayer must have been heard, for when a huge spider dropped upon him from ceiling, he skipped forward without harm as it landed just behind. Its legs were longer than a man’s, and it scuttled right quick about the walls and web above, despite its great size.

Both Rocco and Renzo had struck it hard, so it swarmed back into its lair above, leaving the tips of two legs behind to the delight of Lorenzo, who stuffed them into his bag for later examination. Above we could see a crack in the roof, or another small tunnel, where must be its lair. The way up was hard, and any fight would be one alone with a dagger in a small space against the fangs and venom of the great spider. We had other business more pressing, and so we passed on and left that danger behind us.

Renzo led us on until we reached the smell of the sewars, and still recognised the passages despite nearly ten years passing since he had trod these ways before. We were close to the stairs we sought, so Rocco and Renzo crept ahead to spy on them while the rest stayed quiet. When we heard a cry and the clash of arms, I ran forward towards the faint light ahead.

I found Renzo and Rocco struggling against four goat-headed men who bore crude shields and iron weapons – heavy falcione or maces. Astore and I rushed in to even the odds, and then Lino arrived with his great axe to tip the scales in our favour. Soon their harsh bleating was silenced when we cut the last down just as Lorenzo, Father Arturo and Brother Giovanni arrived. At that moment the door at the top of the stair was thrown open, and a woman with a broomstick stood forth brazenly.

So we had found our witch, and she was indeed amazed. For in a trice Rocco threw his sword at her, Renzo and Astore stormed up the stairs, Father Arturo appealed for God to Smite the Witch, and Lorenzo cast a bolt of fire at her. I hardly had time to reach the foot of the stairs before she had burst into flames, been hacked by Astore’s falcione, and stabbed in the vitals by Renzo’s baselard. Her time was up before she could utter a word, and she pitched off the top of the stairs down to the stone floor below. Just to make sure, as there are many stories of dead wizards walking before they are turned to ashes, I lopped off a leg and then her head for good measure. It fitted into a small bag nicely, so I took it with me to prevent any reunion whilst we were busy inside.

Within we found a small chamber with a ledger recording the return of each urchin and what they had gleaned. Beyond that was a room with two caged pens of urchins; some twenty-or-so unfortunate spigolatori pleaded for food and their release. While Lino reassured them we would get them food and take them to safety, Father Arturo and Brother Giovanni treated Rocco’s wounds.

Renzo, Astore and I went up the stairs and cleared each room seeking her retainers or other guards. In a closet we found Rosa, the Sweeper’s maid, who gave no trouble and talked with hardly any questions. She explained she was the last servant left – all the rest had been replaced by the goat-men. Apparently the Sorceror had moved in a year or more ago, and things had changed after that. The Sweeper now made many plans with Geppeto and Carlo when before they rarely spoke. Some deal had clearly been done, and we guessed it involved the flying monkeys - for control of a few of them would greatly aid the Bardoni gang. Rosa had seen the missing nuns herded into the palazzo a few days ago, although where they were being held she did not know.

So now we knew we were right. Although we had struck the Bardoni hard, and Renzo was revenged, we were not done if we were to scotch these plans and hopefully kill the Sorceror too.

Although we still had the element of surprise, we had only 5 soldiers, two priests and a magician against an unknown number of Bardoni thugs - still behind many secure doors as the palazzo was divided into three sets of quarters. We held a little council of war and agreed that Renzo and Lino would lead the urchins back to the old exit and the monastery above before bringing news to Cola and our friends. We would try and hold here until they could make a new plan of attack for tomorrow. If all failed, we could retreat into the tunnels beneath and flee, but if we could hold out we might make the defence of the palazzo much more difficult.

First we needed to find some money and food to persuade the monks to take in twenty new mouths to feed, or they might be back on the streets instead. So Renzo, Astore and I crept up the stairs once more and opened the door which lead out to the covered porch and cloister with led around the courtyard one floor below. We could see the courtyard was divided into two parts by hurdles with four large guard-dogs penned into one half. No guards. We crept along and entered a door leading to many rooms. In one we found a scribe hiding out; like Rosa he came quietly and gave no trouble. Umberto showed us to a strongroom with many bags of coins; we took a few to oil the wheels of the monastery and some more full of ducats. If we live, perhaps our fortunes might be repaired. All around, the shelves were full of artifacts from the ancient world – a huge collection. If Cola could see this, he would have a fit. But there was no way of carrying even a tiny part of all of this, so I would have content myself with a box of jewellery looted from the Sweeper’s rooms.

Now we crept back to the basement, where Lorenzo took on the likeness of Rosa and went out into the courtyard on his own. Back and forth he strolled with food from the kitchen – a large pot of pottage, bags of grain, and even two sides of bacon. Whilst some of us held our breath, he blithely collected what we needed with casual steps and cool glances.

Soon we had all we needed, and fed the urchins before readying them all to leave with their little cloaks and candles. Rosa pleaded to go with them, saying she had had enough of the Sorceror and guessed her mistress was no more. Renzo agreed to take her along – it was his call. He seems kind-hearted even after such a hard life, for his first thought was ever for the urchins. I hope they make it out unharmed.

Umberto confessed that he lived alone, and had no wife or children to miss him. We told him he need have no fear if he waited quietly in the basement and took no part in our fight with the Bardoni. He knew they were evil men, and that his employment was over, for they had no interest in the antiquities hoarded by their aunt.

So now we wait in hiding within the Bardoni palazzo, for a challenge from outside. We shall need some stratagem to throw them off, or take a chance with silence. If that fails, it will be cold steel once more, although maybe Lorenzo’s arts may aid us again.

Chaos and Kindness

Marco’s Journal

Now I must scribble these thoughts in haste, for we are in peril and homeless once more, with many new problems to solve.

But I should start at the beginning.

For weeks the mood in the city had turned ugly; armed men walked openly in the streets and sought to rob the meek or squabble with other bands of ruffians. It seems the great houses push against each other in earnest, and lesser rivals follow suit, all the way down to the rabble in the street. In such times being outside one’s door is fraught with peril, but you cannot earn your bread sitting within. Rocco felt our house was being watched, so we took care not to wander alone in the streets, but went to work in a group, and varied our route from the House of Crows to the Black Cat.

Rocco had made a promise to the Maidens of the Midden that dwell in the darkness far beneath the ruined Baths of Diocletian – apparently the shaft of sunlight that brightens their squalid abode is being blocked by green growth above, and shadows linger even in the underworld. So his task was to find the hole where today’s rubbish is thrown down from the ruins above, and do some weeding. It being dangerous to walk the streets alone in these times of chaos, we agreed to help Rocco fulfil his promise, however strange the task might seem and with no obvious reward. But we have been comrades since we met on the road to Rome, and my other companions all felt the same.

We needed to find a hole in a maze of ruins occupied by a host of the desperately poor, governed by a small band who had taken over after the pirates had been scoured out by the Venetians. But the mendicant Fra Michele lives in those ruins, and he had been our guide into Rome so many months ago. So we spoke to Trucco at the Black Cat, and he was happy to give us his task of meeting Michele in two days to check he was well and see if he had any news for Cola. If we took over that duty of regular contact, it would save him many tiresome journeys across Rome as the House of Crows was much closer than the Black Cat to the Baths of Diocletian.

The streets were quiet on our way home; apparently the Frangipani assault on the Colosseum had been repelled by the ruffian gangs within, and no-one molested us. But the air was full of tension, and every alley seemed to have eyes watching us. It was the same the next day, so we stayed behind our locked doors and left the troubles on the streets outside; it was our last morning of peaceful contemplation.

In the early afternoon our house-guard Bettina called us, saying a man in the street was asking for entry. It was one Geppetto Bardoni - the local crime-lord. Geppetto asked to come in with his men, which Rocco politely declined. So he spoke his business to us, which was blackmail. Pay 25 florins and 5 more each month, or else. It was put more politely, but it was plain enough. We declined to pay, as such people offer no real protection and their demands only grow larger with time. If you cannot pay, you are in their debt, and your troubles grow accordingly. Our defiance ended the meeting; Geppetto said we would meet again soon, but in less happy circumstances. Now we felt under siege, for soon they would come to our door or attack us in the street. That night I sharpened my blades and pondered what to do.

Before dawn the next morning we took a ladder and climbed from our garden into the side alley. With no gate or door on that side, we hoped to evade any spies and let them think we remained within. In the cool early light we made our way by the back streets to the Baths of Diocletian, avoiding a rioting mob which was assaulting a half-built palazzo defended by guardsmen in the colours of the Colonna. These fellows had hardly had their breakfast before starting a pitched battle on the streets of Rome! Chaos had descended, indeed.

Nearby the ruins we met our old friend Michele in a small bar, and told him what we were up to. He said he would introduce us to Renzo, the ‘protector’ of the ruins but advised us to speak truthfully to him and avoid deception. We stood back while Rocco bartered with Renzo and eventually was taken within the Baths to do his worst with the weeds around their rubbish hole. Renzo drove a hard bargain, for it cost Rocco ten Venetian ducats for a guide and an hour within the Baths, but he returned pleased with his gardening. We left Renzo wondering what mischief we were really up to, while checking our ducats were real coins. But he knew of the Bardoni gang, and gave us some useful information, although it hardly lifted our spirits. He thought them a very bad lot, and he should know as he had surely come up the hard way in the same district of Rome.

As the afternoon progressed we tried to make our way back home, but the riot was now a full pitched battle with cavalry against the mob, and whichever way we went seemed difficult. After walking in circles for hours we declined to enter the maze of alleys in the district controlled by the Bardoni mob, given our recent conversation with Geppetto, and instead began a long climb up the Quirinale hill as evening approached.

We were still miles from home and getting short-tempered with the endless obstacles Fate seemed to put in our path for no good reason. Now I think it might have been the work of Saint Christopher, for travellers were in peril, including – as it turned out - ourselves.

As we passed a dark alley, we saw an old man being attacked by armed men, while a youth lay stunned at his feet. In the background a donkey was protesting loudly, as other thieves tried to drag it away. The frustration of our day boiled over. In a trice, we piled in. Rocco led the way, followed by Astore and I. Rocco engaged an axeman with his staff, while Astore dashed up a side alley to out-flank the donkey-thieves. Soon Rocco had pushed past the first axeman and engaged another behind him, allowing me to enter the fray. A few blows and the hapless youth went down and surrendered. The next man did the same as I closed on him, leaving Rocco to pursue the donkey thieves round the corner. With a few shrewd thrusts of his blade Astore had already dealt with them, and they fled for their lives. Meanwhile Father Arturo and Fra Giovanni were treating the unconscious youth and the old man.

Apparently they were Jews from Siena who had just arrived in the chaos of Rome and had chosen their guides unwisely. Those rascals had lead them far away from their destination in the Jewish quarter and planned to kill them and steal all their possessions in the back alley we found them. The poor old man was wounded and alone in a city on fire, with his nephew prostrate at his feet. We all knew he would not make it to the next street if we left him. By the will of Providence, kindness filled all our hearts, and Brother Arturo reminded us of the parable of the good Samaritan, and the words of Jesus: ‘Go and Do Likewise’.

So I told the old man we would not desert him, but take him to our own home, although in all this chaos we might not be safe even there. Now it was getting dark, and none of us had taken a lantern as we expected to be home long before dusk. So Rocco carried the lad and I led the donkey, while Astore led us all round a few corners to our old friend Donna Giulia at the Deliziosa, so we could borrow a lantern and a few links to light our way. We found Donna and her girls in the Deliziosa, and with them a bigger surprise – Bettina. She told us the Bardoni gang had arrived that afternoon with a battering ram and gone through the front door - right quick - after a couple of hard blows. Our house-guards had escaped using the same ladder we had used at dawn, after wounding two of the dozen armed attackers with

crossbow shots. Behold ! In all the chaos of the streets, out of all the bars in Rome, Providence had brought us together so we could learn that the House of Crows was taken, and armed men lay in wait for us. It seems Saint Christopher was looking out for us as much as the old Jew.

So here we are, with few possessions and little money - our goods and home looted, and the Bardoni gang waiting for us. Not to mention two Jews and a donkey to deliver to safety, across a city engulfed in madness.

Let’s just hope Saint Christopher is not done for the night yet.

Rocco: In the footsteps of Pasquale Bembo

— As told through Pietro lo Scriba —

One morning in May at the dawn of the day...

Astore and I were teasing Father Arturo on the matter of mortification of his flesh, but happily were derailed by our gate-keeper, Bettina’s, announcement that there was a Venetian person at the gate, asking for me by name. As we like to think of ourselves as friends of the Venetians at least until it pays to be otherwise — and our experience so far is that they are very good payers and bad people to make enemies of — I called for him to be admitted.

He was one Signore Maffeo Barozzi, who was a ‘page’ in Signore Pasquale Bembo’s lance*. Now this Pasquale Bembo was the unfortunate whose bones our own Marco da Pitigliano found in the bottom of the toad’s pool in February (see A Tale of Two Treasures) though we’d only learned his name later when I returned some identifiably Venetian items to the Venetian Factor, Lorenzo Bembo (see Venetian Gratitude).

((* Aside: Astore informs from his experience as a soldier that a Lance is a fighting unit, comprising a principal fighter, well armed and armoured, and a small number of supporting soldiers of lesser rank and equipment, including a ‘page’ – a soldier, not a pretty young boy with a particular haircut.))

So this Snr Maffeo Barozzi had accompanied his principal, Snr Pasquale Bembo, on the Venetian raid on the Baths of Diocletian to extirpate a gang of smuggler / pirate / wreckers disposing of goods ill-gotten from Venetian ships through secret routes into Rome, which we had been peripherally involved with last October (see Venetian Justice).

He told us a tale of pursuit of a suspect though the ruins of the old Baths, who dived down a crack in the earth, closely followed by Pasquale Bembo, neither of whom were ever seen again. Nor was a slim young lad of the Venetian troop who was sent to look for them. Snr Barozzi, not a small fellow, shamefacedly admitted that he himself was too well built to fit down the crack, even once he had shed his armour...

So following our discovery of some traces of Pasquale’s end in the toad pool, Venice was interested in any further detail we might find; the delay since I has spoken with Snr Lorenzo Bembo when returning his kinsman Pasquale’s possessions, had been because Snr Barozzi had been out of town and was only now returned.

So with the three of us gathered our usual tools and accompanied Snr Barozzi to the ruins of the Baths to see the place where the story of Pasquale Bembo’s end had started.

At the Baths we met the ‘Protector’ of the ruins, one Renzo, who was handsomely paid by Snr Barozzi for permission access to the ruins; so handsomely that the gang boss was near speechless and assigned one of his men, Lino, as guide so that the common people there knew not to interfere with us (or ‘to prevent any misunderstandings’ as Renzo put it, once he’d regained the power of speech after weighing the Venetian purse in his hand).

The place we had entered the ruins, coming from the west, was not familiar to Snr Barozzi from the raid, so Lino led us around to the remains of great archways on the eastern side, which Snr Barozzi recognised. The space between the outer walls and the main ruins is much overgrown with straggling scrub and even some small trees, not yet reduced to fire wood for the many small cooking fires we could smell and see the smoke from curtained doorways and lean-to shacks in the ruins.

Once he had his bearings Snr Barozzi quickly led us to a relatively small room, partly open to the sky by both design and decay, an overgrown pit occupying much of its floorspace, where he pointed out a crack in the stonework as the place he last saw Pasquale Bembo in hot pursuit of his fleeing quarry. The local guide, Lino, a long-time resident of these ruins, sucked his tooth and opined this place has a reputation for fools and small boys taking dares to go down ... and never coming back.

Ignoring this, of course, we made our way down into the pit by some ancient steps and, with the aid of a Venetian alchemical torch, examined the depth of the crack by dint of tossing the torch down the hole. It looked to be a squeeze for a man around a protruding outcrop of stone, but the torch had passed it by, then come to rest somewhere close below so we could see a gleam from not too far past the obstruction. There seemed to be no movement or sound save the barely audible hiss and fizz of the torch, so I stripped off my jack, hung my dagger about my neck and started down after it.

After some minor scrapes past the protrusion which had blocked direct sight of what lay here below I found myself in a crack in the wall of a small chamber with several skeletons of the walking dead slowly and silently shuffling to and fro in a slightly hunched posture. Another walked down some steps from a higher level to join them. Unlike the shufflers, who seemed to be miming sweeping the floor, the skeletal walker had a belt of accoutrements: a whip and a sheathed sword on a belt, a decayed harness of rotted armour and a small truncheon in boney hand. I called back up the crack a warning “Deadmen walking...”

And in the skull’s sockets were eyes which saw me, and as they took regard I found myself in their world; a phantasm of the past where workmen, full-fleshed, with brooms in hands, swept a floor clear of filth dribbling from pipes high-set in the walls into this sump and a overseer telling me to pick up my broom and get on with it!

I feigned obedience, waiting for the overseer’s gaze to turn from me and the arrival of friends, but every time I took the slightest glance towards the overseer the eyes were on me and instructions given to sweep this way or that way or into a small, dead-end passage I took to be a drainage sluice. Time passed and the pressure of the overseer’s constant gaze drained my mind of all but the sweeping task.

Suddenly Astore was in my face shouting at me to wake up — the room was dark, lit only by the dropped torch near one corner and crowded with three armed and armoured skeletons, the sweeping skeletons, still ‘brushing’, and Fr Arturo calling on merciful heaven to save us from these undead shades. Astore and I engaged with the overseers. He took on two, being the better armed, and I the third. His was the tougher fight of course, but then Arturo’s prayer took effect. Two of the overseers collapsed into piles of aged bones, but the first retreated back up the steps into a dark opening.

We gathered ourselves and took stock. One of the worker dead was a small, shrivelled corpse dressed in modern clothes. We took this to be the young Venetian sent to discover Pasquale’s fate. His remains were bundled up and Snr Barozzi hauled them up into the living world.

Below, we inspected the sump room for clues. Astore and I looked into the sluice passage while Fr Arturo tried to work in the main room, though we had unthinkingly taken the only light source. Which promptly disappeared as we pressed in to look at what seemed to be a modern footprint in dust at the far end of the sluice, where we discovered the hard way that the floor was actually a hinged trapdoor, as we slid sideways then dropped deeper into the underworld.

It seemed an eternity, but must have been a short slide in the dark then a drop into gloomy light to land on a stinking midden; just the sort of place the sump might have drained to, I thought, before Astore landed on me and all was dark for a few moments. No Maffeo Barrozzi he, but Astore is not a light man. There was something familiar about the smell and the green-fringed circle of light from above, but little time to think about it, not to mention my spinning head from the fall and impacts of landings. As Astore heaved himself off me we were aware of scuttlings approaching us.

To our good fortune the noises turned out to be the Graces, naming themselves Aglaea, Euphrosyne and Thallia, who I’d met — from base rather than atop the midden — on the exploration which originally brought us to discover Pasquale Bembo’s remains (see A Cloacal Exploration).

The three crawled around the midden, which on reflection is unsurprising given the poor footing. I myself dared not risk standing to pay my respects after softening Astore’s landing... Anyway I made introduction and apology for my prone position on top of their midden and they recalled me as ‘the polite young man’ who’d brought them wine previously. I told them, truthfully, that given the circumstances of my arrival, the three carafes I had in my pack for them were still up above with the bulk of my exploring goods. I didn’t even have the light-storing pebble Signorina Aglaea had gifted me, which was awkward...

But as before they were desperate to make conversation, so I turned to the matter in hand and asked if anyone had ‘dropped in’, in the same manner the two of us had just arrived, a while before we first met? It is little surprise they do recall such an event. Two dropping in, one with a light (there was a trace of torchlight from the other side of the midden even now, which I took to be our alchemical torch we brought with us, leaving Fr Arturo in darkness...). The fellow with the light then was impolite, so they didn’t tell him where his sword fell (my ears pricked up at that) and he went on his way ill-speaking them, so on being told of his fate “A toad ate him” one responded “Well I can’t say I’m sorry...”. Of the other of the two arrivals they noted that, well, he was dead anyway so as the first (Pasquale, we assume) hadn’t given them a present “...but he did bring us dinner”, they took the inadvertent offering and ate his companion...

Conversation with the Ladies is difficult to recall precisely as they kept cutting cross each other, finishing each others’ sentences and have similar voices and manners of speaking as three long term close companions sometimes grow to do — they have had quite some time so — and in the resonance of the cavern of the midden pit it can be hard to tell who is speaking.

The Ladies were chattering with each other when it occurred to me and Astore that perhaps we should make our way down the midden, a bit, in case Fr Arturo joined us by the same route we had taken. We slithered awkwardly downslope. Seeing we are neither of us moving our best, though we have no present to give them, the Ladies offer to ‘do us a favour’ if I promised to do them one. I agreed, despite misgivings about the wisdom of promising favours to fallen pagan deities. I did mention having toasted them when I have opportunity — by ‘accidental’ spillage of wine with a muttered ‘to the Ladies’ — which cheers them up immensely, when they understand that was me — they are remembered Above. The ‘favour’ I am tasked with is ‘a little gardening job’ — to clear the spring overgrowth at the mouth of the pit they currently dwell in, allowing the sun to shine down. The favour granted was Aglaea persuading Thallia to kiss us both. We both found this remarkably invigorating and restorative and were, of course, effusive with our thanks. ((Euphrosyne was put out and said “They’d have enjoyed it more from me!” Thallia agreed we certainly would have, but pointed out we needed it from her more.))

Their conversation turned melancholy as they fell to reminiscing on the past. Gifts of wine they appreciated because it reminded them of their Papa and his parties, though now they have fallen on hard times. They exist in hope it can be their time again, though their world is still shrinking. At the Fall, Aglaea said, creatures of power and gods continued down here in the underground and dark, where there is more power to sustain them, but they’ve all been decaying slowly for more than 1,000 years. Clinging to the margins where there is power to be had. Magician and their magics are seen as leeches, sucking up the power the Ladies, and their contemporaries, need to continue to exist. They wondered how long they could continue. One says something about there being a way out, while another says they should never have left their images... “They were so constraining...” “Well it would be lovely if we were reunited with our images and fed regularly...” “Or taken somewhere where people still appreciated us...” “There have to be people who still appreciate the Graces”

I had no idea what to make of this and wanted to head off any more ‘favours’ or presents being required, so despite the Graces’ disappointment said I could only commit only to gardening rather than taking on the honour of serving their greater needs. Their names are known to the Great —I was thinking of Cola— “Then it is very disappointing that they know of us and choose to ignore us entirely!”

I had a strong feeling this was going in a bad direction, but from above there was a grating noise, and just the person to sooth the rising storm arrived: Fr Arturo, in a rain of bones, debris, and a wide splash of midden detritus, sporting a handful of righteous glow of our own Lord God Almighty in the presence of Aglaea, the Shining...

I started to introduce the Ladies to the discombobulated priest, clearly still mazed from the fall, but Aglaea pointed out they had met before; she and her sisters are the Graces and in her view he is lacking in manners. His tentative “Hello” cut none of the ice I heard in her tone. Before Aglaea could enumerate the priest’s failings, starting with his mere existence, one of the others broke in to say he’d brought them a present, looking to the pile of bones Arturo accompanied. It wasn’t the bones she was looking at but a sword she pulled from in their midst.

Arturo stated that the sword was his by right of conquest, which sounded interesting. I rather suspected it was theirs now by right of possession, and whichever one was holding it started to say it is a very nice gift, quite a good sword, but Fr Arturo just had to draw himself up, covered in midden mess though he was, mount his high horse and make it quite explicit “I am not giving you a present!”

Of course he has to do that sort of thing, I do understand.

The look on the faces of the Ladies’ was, at best, worrying, so I broke in to suggest the Father gives ownership of the sword over to me, hoping he would understand this is a stratagem to avoid him making sacrifice to unchristian spirits.

He paused for a moment and doubtless seeing my intent, spoke to award me the ownership of the sword, enjoined me not to lose it, which I promised not to do. Of course. And of course I chose to keep the sword there, in the hands of the Ladies, as I would know where it was, so it would not be ‘lost’!

The Ladies — their forms seem to shift and merge in the dim light so it is never quite clear who is speaking — acknowledge this true, with some surprise. But they didn’t really want a sword — once the priest of a different God did not have it, I suspect, and gave it to me.

((The Grace handing over the sword described it as well made and mused on the fact her husband was a smith... and perhaps still is...))

On the subject of swords, as a distraction, I ventured to enquire whether they still had the sword left by the earlier fellow? By which I meant the luckless Pasquale Bembo’s weapon they’d mentioned having. There is some to and fro about the swords with the Ladies and the standards of upbringing of the youth of even the better sort of family today. I do wonder what he had called them… Anyway, I offered again to take this other sword off their hands too if they feel swords are not a thing they need in their midden, and eventually a sword which bore the familiar marks of the Bembos was produced from some unobserved sub-heap. I thanked them, truly and with all the sincerity I could muster, and bowed as deeply as I dared on the slippery midden slope.

As we made our excuses, again, and were setting about leaving when Fr Arturo’s handful of holy light became an active point of friction with Aglaea, with much growling, bristling and sneering on display. Astore and I are told not to bring him back on pain of..., well something which would doubtless be an inconvenience. I did my best to apologise for Arturo on the basis he is bound by oaths, rites and rules to behave the way he does with them, but I doubt that weighed much as an argument.

We tried to make a rapid exit but Astore and I fumbled and stumbled around the walls of the pit a while trying to find our way out, until Fr Arturo gave us a heading. By a candle stub and Fr Arturo’s grace-of-God light, undiminished despite Aglaea’s threats, we found the (a?) tunnel out then a junction we recognised and returned up the brick-lined sewers to the seat-of-ease in the basement of the House of Crows.

There above we had our gatekeepers send word to Snr Barozzi at the Baths that he should return to the House of Crows, then set about cleaning ourselves of midden-slime, shifting our clothes and taking a refreshment.

We discussed and agreed what we needed to tell Maffeo Barozzi: the barest outline of: down the crack, through the trapdoor; finding traces of his principal; finding the sword en route to where we'd found the body; and return to the surface by our own ways.

A couple of hours passed before there was a knock at the gate and Snr Barozzi arrived, accompanied by a porter with handcart carrying a nondescript boy-sized bundle and our left-behind gear. He gave thanks to God on seeing us, that we had all survived, for he had feared he faced loss once more, encouraged so by remarks of the denizens of the surface layer of the Baths, familiar with the reputation of the crack of doom.

He asked what happened and I explain enough, I hoped, to discourage further investigation: the walking dead, the illusion of the past; the trapped victim; the fight with the walking dead, the prayer-work of Fr Arturo in freeing the lad's mortal remains from the curse… Discovery of the route Pasquale Bembo must have taken. We think that when he went down he was lucky or quick enough not to be trapped by the illusion of the past. He must have taken an opening that would have been obvious in front of him, until a waste disposal trapdoor opened beneath him. What about Pasquale's quarry? We saw no trace of him. Perhaps he was one of the walking dead, or lost elsewhere in the underworld, but we did not find any trace of a yellow shirt in our search. (Best not to mention the Ladies’ part…) We followed down the chute which came out in a midden of trash and detritus. That was where we were fortunate to recover… — and here we presented the sword, which Maffeo recognised as Pasquale Bembo’s — doubtless dropped in the fall from the trap floor and hidden in the midden trash at the time. It was a place we had found before, and there is a route out, but his luck failed him and he encountered his end — did you hear of...? The demonic toad, yes.

And that is all there was to tell. I offered to tell the tale again, should there be a desire for an official record to be made. I am at Snr Lorenzo's service in this matter.

We all drank a cup or two (or three…) to toast as successful a conclusion as might have been expected before Snr Barozzi departed to return to his people, accompanying his doleful burden away down the hill.

Coda:

Most generously Fr Arturo confirmed the overseer’s sword as mine, despite that I had only intended a stratagem to save him from a difficult position, by asking for it.

The next day we gave a more complete account than Snr Barozzi received, confidentially, to Cola.

A few days later Snr Barozzi returned to present us with a reward of 100 Venetian ducats for the further information and the sword, and five pearls in appreciation of the return of the boy's remains, from his family.