Assassin of the Damned

— 11-

I had the sense of falling, and then grew aware of new surroundings. I was young again, a nine-year-old lad. I ran upslope among towering pines. I slipped and slid over a carpet of brown pine needles.

“Come and look, Gian. You have to see this. It’s lost treasure.”

I ran after Erasmo della Rovere. He was young again like me, nine. My father the prince of Perugia had taken us with him as he inspected country estates. Erasmo sprinted up a steep slope. He was a reed of a boy and wore a costly tunic with black leather boots.

“Wait for me!” I shouted.

Erasmo slithered through a giant bush and disappeared. I barreled through a moment later, and twigs and branches clawed me.

“Look out, Gian,” Erasmo said with a laugh. He darted aside.

I stumbled out of the bush, past him and smacked my forehead against a granite cliff.

Erasmo laughed shrilly and slapped my back.

“That was a dirty trick,” I muttered, tasting bits of granite between my teeth.

Erasmo only grinned wider. He had sandy colored hair and bright blue eyes. He had a narrow face and was clever like a fox. His parents were nobles. His father was my father’s closest friend. Between us, Erasmo was taller, but I was stronger.

I shoved him, and thought about clouting him a good one.

“Look at that, Gian.” Erasmo pointed at a small cave.

I shrugged moodily. I had scratches on my arms and face.

“There’s treasure in there,” Erasmo whispered.

I looked at him with wonder, all my bruises forgotten.

Erasmo darted into the cave, and a moment later, I followed. It was dark and narrow.

“Come on!” Erasmo shouted, and his voice echoed.

I felt my way forward and marveled at his courage.

I found him with a candle, with flint and tinder. Soon he had the candle lit, and in the flickers, our faces glowed with perspiration. “Look there,” he whispered.

There was a hole in a dirt wall. Erasmo’s thin arm shoved the candle nearer. I crouched, peered in. At the back was the corner of a small chest sticking out of the dirt.

“It’s buried treasure,” Erasmo whispered.

My young heart pounded with excitement.

“I’ll hold the candle.” Erasmo shoved a dagger at me. “You crawl in and pry it out.”

I took the dagger, hesitated only a moment and then squeezed into the narrow confines. I jabbed dirt. I sweated, and I heard earth shift around me. I would have backed out, but Erasmo might have called me a coward. So I dug, and all of a sudden, the hole collapsed. It surprised me, and I found myself unable to move or breathe. I screamed. I sucked down dirt. Then I felt hands on my feet and Erasmo tugged. I slithered hard and he must have dug like a dog. Soon I was out, my face wet with tears and stained by dirt.

“Were you crying?” Erasmo asked amazed, the candle by my face.

I glared. We both wanted to be knights. Knights were brave. They certainly didn’t cry.

“Are you hurt?” Erasmo asked.

I brushed past him and rushed out of the cave, desperately trying not to hiccup as children sometimes do after they’d been weeping. If he ever told anyone about this….

***

The situation changed. I was powerless to halt the leap in time. The dizziness returned, motion, and then there was a sudden halt and I found myself in a new place, several years older. Erasmo and I mock battled with axes. We were twelve. He was thin as a reed. I had thicker shoulders. I laughed as I saw him clearly.

Erasmo wore a quilted jacket made by his mother. She worried that he might bruise himself training with weapons. She doted on him, fed him pastries and pies and bought him canaries, cats and dogs. She couldn’t understand why the animals kept disappearing. Erasmo did secret experiments with them: cruel, boyish pranks that often went too far.

Today we mock fought, practiced in a sandy training area. A smith banged an anvil in a nearby shed, likely straightened a knight’s sword. Whitewashed walls surrounded the area. Older squires sat on benches, idly watching us.

We swung, but never to hit, just to pretend. We yelled mock insults. We clouted the axes together, liking the sound. They were old axes, but still too sharp for young lads to be using like this. We were too young to know better.

“Soon I’ll be a squire,” Erasmo panted.

“Me too,” I said.

We clashed the axes together. Erasmo grinned. So did I.

“I’ll certainly never cry in a cave,” Erasmo said.

I frowned. He darted around me, and he used the flat of his axe to thump me in the back. He laughed as I stumbled.

“Remember?” he shouted. “Don’t let insults get the better of you.”

I whirled. He faked a chop at my head. I flinched.

“Oh-ho!” Erasmo laughed. And several of the squires laughed from the benches.

I swung hard. He darted aside and swung his axe down against mine. The blow shocked and numbed my hands. The axe dropped free and thudded onto the sand.

“I win!” Erasmo shouted.

My face blazed with shame. I snatched up the dropped axe. “Let’s try that again,” I said between clenched teeth. I swung, but Erasmo was ready. He did exactly the same thing, clouted my axe hard with his and knocked it down. This time I hung on tightly with both hands. I stumbled forward, and my sharp blade chopped into Erasmo’s extended left foot. Bones crunched. He screamed, and toppled like a felled tree.

I let go of my axe-handle, horrified. Erasmo, my best friend-what had I done?

***

My father whipped me for that with a belt. Erasmo della Rovere was crippled for life. He would never run again and would certainly never become a knight. I begged Erasmo’s forgiveness. He gave it sullenly at his father’s prodding. His mother glared at me every time I entered her presence.

The years passed. I become a squire, a knight and finally the prince of Perugia after my father’s death.

Much to Erasmo’s chagrin, he entered the Church, the priesthood. For a noble there were two courses, knighthood or the Church. Before long, because of his father’s station and wealth, Erasmo left for Avignon, Provence. Provence was technically a part of old Gaul, but presently belonged to the King of Naples. The popes had fled Rome many years ago and had held court or the papacy in Avignon.

Something happened to Erasmo in Avignon. He left the priesthood, went to the University of Paris and soon become a noted lawyer. He’d learned clerking in the Church, but he’d read dubious texts and arcane lore stored in Avignon’s catacombs. Men said the pope himself had taken him to task, and the two had spoken privately for hours. After Paris, Erasmo returned to Avignon, where he remained until his mother died. He returned to Perugia for the funeral.

I’d become prince, and for old time’s sake, I begged him to stay here with his friends. The truth was I could use a keen lawyer. I’d become engaged in the violent struggles between the quarreling city-states of the Romagna, which was part of the Papal States. With the papacy in faraway Avignon, it gave all of us a freer hand, which we freely took.

To my surprise, he agreed. Then an incident occurred, a small thing. The vortex of these memories remorselessly took me to it.

***

I burst into the upper study, my spurs jangling. I wore a sword, mail and a scowl. Laura, my wife, had wept in my arms. She’d told me how Erasmo had secretly leered at her, how he’d obscenely wet his lips with the tip of his tongue. She’d begged me to dismiss him. When I’d told her to use her haughty airs on him-it was then she’d given me her secret fear. There was something evil in Erasmo, she said. I must rid myself of him today.

I strode across thick carpets, Persian rugs. Erasmo had followed the newest trend of unhooking the expensive rugs from the walls and using them on the floor. It was a quaint custom. Laura was a true noble, normally sure of herself. Something had keenly upset her regarding Erasmo and I intended finding out what.

Erasmo sat at an ornate table with an open book. There were hundreds of books around us, a treasure of inked words between thick leather covers or on ancient vellum scrolls. A robin tweeted at the ledge of an open window. Lanterns flickered from several corners.

I halted before the table.

Erasmo looked up. He wore thick furs and a velvet hat. A silver chain with a ruby pendant hung from his neck. He had aged poorly for so young a man, becoming heavier than his boyhood frame had suggested. There were circles under his eyes. He had keen eyes, very dark and piercing. That was strange. I thought his eyes used to be blue.

Erasmo wet his lips with the tip of his tongue. He had a rather disgusting way of doing it. “Milord,” he said.

“Erasmo,” I began.

He held up a thin hand, one heavily encrusted with expensive rings. It caused me to tighten my mouth.

“Do you recall the affair with Velluti?” Erasmo asked.

I nodded brusquely. Velluti was a village that I’d laid claim to. Clerks in Rome had disputed my claim and now marshaled troops and arguments against it.

Erasmo tapped the book. “Did you know that the Baglioni line goes back-” he gave me a thin-lipped smile, almost eerie “-it goes back beyond the time of Ancient Rome?”

I knew there were some preposterous tales. They were old stories told us as children when we’d been bad.

“Oh, this is very interesting, milord. This is an arcane book filled with ancient lore. Your line-” Erasmo shrugged. “My point, milord, is that Velluti is your old ancestral home. I’m in the process of writing a devastating argument. I can guarantee your victory against Rome and then Velluti will belong to you.”

“Oh?” I said.

“I’ll need to make a brief visit to Avignon, however. When I return…things will go much differently, I assure you.”

I frowned, noting something odd in the way he said that.

“What I’ve learned these past few days,” Erasmo said, “it’s a marvel.”

“Can you explain?”

“Will you let me wait until I’m utterly certain, milord?”

“…Yes, of course,” I said. I owed him.

“Excellent!” Erasmo said. He snapped the book shut and tucked it away in his fur robes.