Belladonna

twenty-nine

Shouts ricocheted off the surface of the lagoon, but Cass saw only darkness. All around her. Inside her. Siena. She choked back a sob. Tiny waves lapped against her chin.

“Shh.” A voice, so soft, Cass thought it was speaking straight into her mind.

Luca.

“I’m so sorry, Cass.”

Straight into her heart.

She realized his arms were around her, that their bodies were intertwined beneath the frigid water. He was keeping her afloat. Without him she would sink like a stone, falling until she could go no farther.

Siena.

Cass sobbed again, nearly swallowing a mouthful of icy water. Her vision sharpened. They were in the quay somewhere, west of the Palazzo Ducale, tucked beneath a private dock. Soft clouds of light floated along the darkened canal. Soldiers. Soldiers were searching for them.

Luca pressed his lips to her forehead. “We couldn’t have saved her. This is what she wanted, for you to escape. For you to live.”

“I know.” But the words were hollow; they didn’t mean anything. Luca didn’t know of Siena’s love for him. Cass wasn’t going to tell him. She didn’t want him to share her pain.

Her guilt.

Another sob rippled through her body, which Luca misinterpreted as shivering.

“We’ll get out of the water soon,” he said. “As soon as the search parties spread out.”

Search parties. As if they were going to be rescued instead of executed. “San Giorgio,” Cass whispered. “Sie—” She couldn’t even say Siena’s name. “I left some supplies there. In the woods behind the church.”

“So brave,” Luca murmured. “So smart. I can’t believe you came for me.”

“I couldn’t let you die,” Cass said.

But she had let Siena die. No. Siena had distracted the guard so Cass and Luca could escape. Siena was a hero. Cass hadn’t let Siena do anything. Siena had made her own choice, and it was brave.

Luca touched his lips to the hollow beneath each of Cass’s eyes. Cass realized she was crying again. “Her body,” she whispered. “We need to get her body, somehow.”

“After she’s identified, the palace will return it to Signora Querini,” Luca said.

Cass knew he was right, but that didn’t close the hole in her chest. Through a blur of tears, she watched the glow of lanterns spread out. The sharp sounds of whistles and shouts began to dwindle.

“Can you swim?” Luca asked.

Cass nodded. The Giudecca lay directly across the water, with San Giorgio slightly to the southeast. Both islands were shrouded in darkness, but Cass could easily envision the façade of San Giorgio’s church. She’d passed it hundreds of times on trips back and forth to the Rialto. It took only a few minutes to cross the Giudecca Canal by gondola, but Cass wasn’t sure how long it would take to swim. And there was no place to stop or hide in the middle of the water. If the soldiers headed back toward the Palazzo Ducale before Cass and Luca made it to the shore, they would be discovered.

The idea should have terrified Cass, but she couldn’t stop thinking of Siena. She couldn’t stop seeing her pitch forward onto the floor of the corridor, blonde hair spreading out like a halo, blood flowing freely. It should have been Cass who died. How was she going to explain what had happened to Agnese and Narissa, to Feliciana?

Cass realized, suddenly, that she wouldn’t be able to explain it. She couldn’t exactly send a letter detailing what had happened that night. Siena was a hero, and they might never know it. And she, Cass, might never speak to Agnese or Narissa or Feliciana again.

“Are you ready?” Luca’s arms were still around her, one on the small of her back, one on her waist. Would she sink when the water got deep? She hadn’t gone swimming in years, but Luca couldn’t hold her up and swim the two of them across the water. Cass would have to make it on her own.

She nodded dumbly, and then realized it was probably too dark for Luca to see her. She swallowed hard. “Ready,” she whispered.

Luca grabbed her hand. Strange swirling things beneath the water grabbed at Cass’s ankles as she inched forward with Luca until the edge of the dock was right above their heads. She tightened her grip on his hand and clutched at the wooden mooring post with her other.

She struggled to peel her fingers from the rough, rotted wood. She wasn’t afraid. It was just that relinquishing her hold on the post felt like letting go of everything.

Siena.

Cass craned her neck to the east, back toward the Palazzo Ducale. What was happening? Was Siena still lying in a heap on the ornate marble floor? What if she hadn’t died? What if Cass and Luca had abandoned her to the Doge’s dungeons, to the foul, vermin-infested wells? No. It wasn’t possible. The sword had passed straight through her. Cass had seen the blade emerge from Siena’s chest. She had seen her eyes roll up to heaven, as if she were looking for God to take her.

“Come on, Cass.” Luca guided her toward the open water.

“I can’t,” she whispered.

Luca wrapped his fingers around hers and tugged. The hold broke, and her hand slipped free of the wood.

The current pulled her and Luca quickly apart. Cass reached out for him, but he wasn’t there. Her skirt had wrapped itself around her legs. She couldn’t kick. She couldn’t do anything. Her body started to sink. She tried to remember how to swim. She flailed out with her arms, and succeeded in moving forward, barely, as her dress spiraled her down.

Fighting to keep her head above the surface, she looked for Luca. All she saw was the reflection of moonlight on water and the hazy shorelines that mocked her—so close, so impossibly far.

Cass submerged briefly, then fought to the surface, blinking away murky fluid. And Luca was there, suddenly, a dark form in the water. Beyond him, to the southeast, was San Giorgio Maggiore.

She reached down and freed her legs from her skirt with a vicious rip. Immediately, she felt lighter. She kicked her feet, trying to propel herself through the water.

Luca fought the current to stay by her side. So strong despite his ordeal. He treaded water next to her, his long hair and beard making him look like a stranger in the night. “Are you all right?”

Cass didn’t speak. She couldn’t. The simple fabric of the servant’s outfit was growing heavier with each stroke. She needed to focus, to make it to land.

“I’m all right,” she gasped. “Keep going.”

Luca struggled to stay with her, but the water pulled him away again. Cass tried to follow him, concentrating on the blurry form she thought was San Giorgio Maggiore’s dome, but the stars were swirling in the sky, making her dizzy and disoriented. She felt as if she were going backward toward the Palazzo Ducale instead of forward to freedom.

The current tugged her back and forth. A rogue wave blew up from nowhere, slapping her in the face, pushing her under and causing her to swallow a mouthful of water.

Gagging, she expelled the foul liquid. Her lungs burned. Her throat swelled. She coughed violently for several seconds. Her vision went momentarily dark. Was she even heading in the right direction anymore? She didn’t know.

It took her a minute and several more strokes of treading water to find the dome of San Giorgio Maggiore again. She reached out and propelled her body forward again, kicking with all her might. The water was cool compared with the warm night air, and her teeth chattered loudly. Her legs sank lower. Each kick was harder than the one before. She was getting tired. So tired. So heavy. Her eyelids fluttered shut. She wasn’t going to make it.

“Luca,” she croaked, as if her mouth were full of sand.

No answer.

Her chin dipped below the water.

And then her foot hit solid ground.

She gasped with relief, collapsing to her knees as the shore materialized beneath her. Her torn skirt and bodice clung to her clammy skin as she crawled onto the land. Stumbling to her feet, she turned to find Luca beside her.

“I knew you’d make it.” He wrapped his arms around her, pushing her wet hair back from her face to kiss her on the cheek. “Grazie a Dio, you’re all right.”

In front of them stood a long stone building, the monastery connected to San Giorgio Maggiore. Tiny square windows ran the length of the wall. All of them were dark.

“Come on,” she said. Luca’s touch seemed to strengthen her. She caught her breath and turned toward the center of the island, toward the trees. She felt as if she were caught in a dream, as if her body were functioning independent of her brain.

With her legs trembling beneath her, Cass crossed the sandy ground in front of the monastery, holding tight to Luca’s hand, until they reached the little patch of woods. Even in the dark, she found her way back to the tree where she had hung the supplies. It was exactly twenty paces from the shoreline, with thick waxy leaves that obscured the leather sack dangling from a low branch.

Wordlessly, she untied the bag and handed Luca the clothing Siena had taken from Bortolo’s quarters. The elderly butler was the only member of the household even close to Luca’s height. Cass pulled her own clothes from the pack. She was moving numbly, mechanically. She was too tired to speak. Too tired to think. Tears hovered on her eyelashes. There was a third set of clothing in the bag. Siena’s clothing.

Luca stepped away and turned around to give Cass privacy. She wrestled out of her waterlogged dress and slipped the fresh chemise over her head. She tugged the skirt over her hips. The dry fabric felt good against her skin. She slipped her arms through the sleeves of her bodice and stopped. The ties were in the back. She had no way to lace it without Siena’s help.

A sob escaped from her lips. Luca was at her side in an instant. “Cass. What is it?” he asked. “Are you hurt?”

“I need Siena,” Cass whispered, feeling incredibly stupid. “I—I can’t lace this bodice. I—”

“I’ll help you,” Luca said. With slow, fumbling fingers, Luca threaded the first lace through the highest hole. He dropped it and grabbed the lace on the other side.

Cass started to tell him it was faster if he threaded one lace through all of the holes first, and then did the same on the other side. But she stopped. There was something comforting about Luca’s painstakingly slow progress, about the methodical but innocent way his hands grazed her back repeatedly.

“Thank you,” Cass said, when he had made it all the way to the bottom and knotted the silk pieces in a clumsy bow. She blotted each cheek on the back of her hand.

She tried to swallow back all of the questions that rose inside of her. What would happen to her now? What would happen to them? How would they live? Where would they go?

“Come on.” Luca led her back to the tree. The ground beneath her bare feet—even Siena hadn’t thought to bring an extra pair of shoes—was littered with leaves and brambles. Luca lowered himself to the ground. He brushed away the vegetation, clearing a spot big enough for the both of them. He leaned back against the tree trunk. Cass realized he was wearing only breeches and a chemise, that the plain black doublet Siena had packed was hanging over his forearm. He handed the doublet to her. “You can use it as a blanket,” he said. “Or a pillow.”

Cass sat next to him, leaning her head on his shoulder. Even in fresh clothing, he smelled of sweat and canal water, but she didn’t pull away. “I’m comfortable,” she said.

Luca draped the doublet over her arms and torso anyway. “Do you think you can sleep?”

She shook her head. She didn’t think she’d ever be able to sleep again.

But she did. In the morning she woke up with her head resting on Luca’s lap, the spare doublet clutched in her arms. She sat up, blinking in the sunlight that filtered through the trees.

The events of the night flooded back. Siena, sacrificing her life so that Cass and Luca could go free. I’m sorry. Cass thought the words as hard as she could. She felt certain that Siena could hear them all the way in heaven. Surely, she had gone to heaven. No one was more pure of soul than sweet Siena had been.

Cass’s chest ached. What if Agnese thought Siena and Cass had fled San Domenico together? What if Siena’s body wasn’t returned? She would be treated as a dead criminal, dumped in a ditch like the three girls tossed into an unmarked grave outside Florence. Another innocent victim of the Order.

The Order was responsible for everything—her parents’ deaths, Luca’s imprisonment, Cass’s attack.

Siena.

Luca groaned softly. Cass looked over at him; he was still asleep. He had dirt and leaves in his hair, and his chemise had managed to lose a button in the night. Cass couldn’t help but notice that his right shoulder was bleeding through the garment. She reached out to touch the bloom of red and he flinched.

“I don’t know,” he muttered, twitching in his sleep. His shirt fell open, exposing a series of jagged red scars down the front of his chest. Cass gasped. Luca opened his eyes.

He blinked hard. “What is it?”

“You’re bleeding.”

Luca looked down at his shoulder. “It’s fine. The water carried me into a mooring post last night. I think I got caught on a nail.”

“And this?” Cass reached out one shaking finger and traced down one of the scars.

Luca stiffened. He sat up abruptly, adjusting the fabric so that he was covered. “It isn’t as bad as it looks,” he said quickly.

“What . . . what did they do to you?” Cass’s voice trembled.

“I don’t want to talk about it.” His voice softened. “What’s done is done, Cass. We need to look forward, not back.”

“The Order,” Cass said, her resolve returning.

Luca looked at his hands. “Our parents spent most of their lives trying to destroy the Order of the Eternal Rose.”

“No, Luca.” Cass’s throat was thick. “You’ve got it wrong. Our parents were members.”

“I know,” Luca said calmly. He lifted himself to his feet and then bent down to help her from the ground. Keeping one of her hands twined in his, he started walking toward the shore. “My father told me. But the Order wasn’t always bad, Cass. It was founded almost a hundred years ago by people who believed in the advancement of science through the examination of cadavers. Those with access to the dead formed a network. They shared their research. They took the name the Order of the Eternal Rose.”

Angelo de Gradi’s words from the church in Florence echoed in Cass’s head. He’d said something about the Order almost being taken down from within. Could he have been talking about her parents and the da Peragas? Hope flickered inside of her, but only for a moment. Cass shook her head. “Even today, de Gradi is still defiling bodies in the name of science.”

“The goals have changed. The Order has abandoned its pursuit of scientific knowledge to chase after some mythical formula.” Luca’s expression darkened as he looked out over the water. “They seek everlasting life. They want to turn man into gods.”

“The fifth humor,” Cass said slowly. “I went to Florence, Luca. They’re using blood.” Breathlessly, she relayed the story of how she’d met Piero Basso at Palazzo della Notte and then later ended up watching Hortensa Zanotta’s execution. She told Luca about the dog attack, about Piero drugging her and stealing her blood, about following him to the church and watching Belladonna’s sacrificial bath.

By the time she was finished, the bell tower of San Giorgio had come to life. Cass counted six chimes.

“We can’t risk staying here much longer, but I know a place where we can go,” Luca said. “I have a friend from school whose father lives on the Giudecca. No one will come looking for us there.”

“Can we trust him?” Cass asked.

“We might not have to,” Luca said. “We might be able to hide away in his barn for a few days without him even knowing we’re there.”

“What then?” Cass asked. “Where will we go?”

Luca touched one hand to her lower back. “Wherever we need to,” he said, “to finish what our parents started.”

Cass glanced over. The sunlight glinted off Luca’s light brown eyes. “You still want to destroy the Order?” she asked. “After everything you’ve been through?”

He plucked a rock from the sandy soil and turned it over in his hands. “Especially after everything I’ve been through.” His eyes lifted to meet hers. “Everything we’ve been through.”

Cass thought back to a younger Luca who had once given her a similar stone, its edges worn by water, shaped into a heart. She had never imagined that boy might desire anything besides a life of traditional nobility. Servants. Children. A position within the Senate. A doting wife. Perhaps she had been wrong all along.

Luca flicked his wrist and sent the stone flying out into the waves. Cass watched it bounce across the surface of the water. He turned toward her, tucking a tendril of hair back behind her left ear. “Don’t you want the same? Will you help me destroy the Order of the Eternal Rose?”

“I do.” Cass suddenly felt warm. Her heart fluttered in her chest as she looked up at him. “I will.”

Luca pulled her in close. He pressed his lips against her cheek. Cass turned her head. She reached up and stroked the back of his neck as she turned her mouth toward his. He tightened up for a second and then relaxed. His lips pressed against hers, gently at first. Then harder. Cass’s whole body trembled. She folded herself against him. Her hands found his hair, the muscles of his back. Everything was warmth. Light. New life.

New beginnings.

She wanted to kiss him until she ran out of breath, and then kiss him some more.

When they finally broke apart, Luca trailed his lips from her cheek to her jawbone to her earlobe. So softly, like rose petals being dragged across her skin. “Cass,” he whispered, “you make me want to be better.”

She buried her head beneath his chin. “You are already the best man I know.” It was true. How had she not seen it? Luca had lied to her once, but it had been to protect her. He wouldn’t lie to her again. And he wouldn’t betray her. Not like Falco had with Belladonna. Cass trusted Luca with her life. With her heart.

He squeezed her against him and lifted her up into the air, spinning her around once before setting her gently back on the sand. “With you, I feel like anything is possible,” he said. “I love you.”

Cass smiled against his chest. “I love you too,” she murmured, but the wind and the waves and the beating of his heart stole away her words.

No matter. Their time together was just beginning.