Ilario, the Stone Golem (21 page)

light limned his hair and cheekbone.

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‘Alexandria is half a world from Taraco,’ Honorius said thoughtfully.

His eyes were lucid in the soft shadows. ‘Outside Frankish territories,

too. The Pharaoh-Queen won’t need Videric’s influence or friendship,

even if he had any to give. And you’re intelligent enough to answer her

questions about that stone blasphemy and still avoid going into the same

room with it. Of all the places for you to be, while I return home . . . ’ He

smiled at me. ‘You may even learn something!’

‘I’ve seen Alexandrine art. It’s all toes-pointing-down. And chests

face-on and faces in profile. The New Art’s here, in the Italian cities!’

‘So are Videric’s informants,’ Honorius said dryly. ‘You know, I

wonder if my estates at Taraco ought not to have some Alexandrine

work, as well as Italian? I hear they make faıënce tiles, and amazing

enamel-work.’

I gave him a look. ‘What would you know about enamel work unless it

was on the pommel of your sword?’

Honorius grinned. ‘I can learn.’

He brought bread and cheese, and another bottle of his better wine,

and set them on a bench by us, reaching out for a braided-stem glass and

tilting it against the light.

‘I don’t like dragging a youngling all around the middle sea,’ he

observed, and shot me a keen glance. ‘Better she’s with you, though.’

I am
by no means so sure
.

‘And you need have no concern for money, or worry that you’ll find

yourself dependent on the book-buyer’s charity.’

In another mood, that would have made me bristle. ‘I’d sooner not be

dependent on any other source – but I doubt I can keep myself and

Onorata on encaustic wax funeral portraits in Alexandria!’

Honorius snorted. ‘I intend to leave you half the household men-at-

arms,’ he added.

‘We had this quarrel in Rome!’ I chewed at the dark gritty bread.

‘You’ll make me noticeable—’

‘That hardly matters now!’

‘—and you’ll rob
yourself
of men you need to have with you.’ I met his

pale eyes, and held his gaze. ‘If you go to Taraco with only a small

number of soldiers, Aldra Videric or Rodrigo Sanguerra will think the

best solution to the problem you pose is a quick death, or quietly

vanishing into one of the King’s prisons. You must know this!’

‘I want you to be safe! I should have bought you when you were still a

slave. You’d have been so much less trouble!’

‘I wouldn’t count on it!’ Rekhmire’’s voice came from the doorway. At

Honorius’s beckoning gesture, he took the armed chair nearest the

hearth.

Putting his crutches down, and allowing his forearms to rest along the

arms of the wooden chair, he for a moment resembled one of the

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Pharaoh-Kings of Old Alexandria, heir to a thousand generations of

history. The lantern-light made sculpture of his face.

With an entirely irreverent-to-history gleam in his eyes, he murmured,

‘I’ve given Pamiu much to think on, while he arranges this household to

his satisfaction! Ilario, are you inclined to risk another sea-voyage?’

‘To Constantinople?’ I shrugged. ‘I can tell your Queen Ty-ameny

what I saw. I doubt it will help. It will tell her nothing except that the golem . . . obeys orders. And I suspect they know
that
.’

‘You don’t know what her philosopher-scientists will discover from

what you saw.’ Rekhmire’ spoke in an eminently reasonable tone.

‘I still say I should go back to Taraco and have it out with Videric!’

Honorius made a growling noise beside me, and I found myself in

receipt of his ‘you-lower-than-dirt-new-recruit’ glare.

‘Alexandria is your best choice.’ Rekhmire’ spoke unusually abruptly.

‘If only as a shelter. A place to rest. To give you time to think, to plan,

to—’

‘—be prodded by every one of the Pharaoh-Queen’s philosophers

because they’ve never seen a true hermaphrodite before!’

Rekhmire’’s brows went up. ‘Oh, I wouldn’t say
never
. You’re not

unique, you know.’

My temper was uncertain, but I managed to avoid that particular

inviting trap, and grin at the book-buyer. Which, although less satisfying

than throwing breakable objects, still pleased me greatly when I saw his

startled look.

More because I desired to bait him than by way of serious argument, I

said, ‘You should let me send word to Videric, and meet him, and settle

the matter.’

Rekhmire’ snapped like a bad-tempered mastiff. ‘Certainly, if you met,

it would settle the matter – with a freshly-dug grave! Ilario, come to

Alexandria.’

I grinned at him to let him know he’d been provoked. ‘Maybe I should

have left Venice with my husband.’

Honorius rested his chin on his sun-darkened fist. ‘If Madam Neferet

sees you in Master Leon’s company he’ll probably flay the skin off your

face before you reach the Arno!’

I found the reference to Neferet as
he
unexpectedly jolting.

Rekhmire’ drained his glass of the dark wine. ‘Neferet had sufficient

trouble before leaving Venice.’ He caught my puzzled look. ‘You heard

none of the gossip? I suppose not. It was widely said of your wedding

that Master Leon Battista had thrown Neferet over in favour of a “real

woman”.’

My father and I looked at each other for a long moment. He hit his

thigh with the flat of his hand several times, straining to breathe. I bit down hard on the root of my thumb, not knowing whether I desired to

laugh or cry.

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‘If they
knew
.’ I shook my head.

‘It would be additional danger,’ Honorius said mildly. ‘As if you

needed it! The longer you stay in Venice, the more likely it is some

rumour will be spread by the midwife or priest – although God He

knows we bribed them well enough! Or a story will come north that you

got married in Rome, and not to Messer Leon.’

Rekhmire’ repeated, ‘Come to Alexandria.’

Nothing but being contrary moved me to say, ‘Give me one good

reason why!’

He pushed himself to his feet. For all he stood like an Egyptian

monolith, I thought he seemed oddly uncertain.

‘I can protect you there.’

‘Oh, you can?’ I caught, out of the corner of my eye, a smile on

Honorius’s face. ‘Why can you protect me in Alexandria? Why would

you want to?’

Rekhmire’ looked surprisingly pained.

‘I think of you as a friend, not a master,’ I said hastily. ‘But shouldn’t

you be, I don’t know, off buying more scrolls?’ I gave him a slant look.

‘Or finding more mechanical copyists for the Pharaoh-Queen?’

Rekhmire’’s lips made a compressed line that spoke much of irritation,

to one who knows the man. His gaze, when it met mine, was in part

amused, and in part annoyed.

‘I do have to escort Master Mainz back to the city—’

For Egyptians, I think, there is only one city in all the world. Without

qualification, the words mean Alexandria-in-Exile.

‘—and it is the weather for sea travel.’

I wondered momentarily whether the voyage from Ostia Antica had

been dogged with sickness because I was with child.
If
not,
I
swear
never
to
set
foot
off
land
again!

‘Come to Alexandria,’ Rekhmire’ repeated, as if he would go on

tirelessly repeating it like water wearing down granite. ‘I can protect you.’

I looked him in the eyes. ‘Why?’

Sounding momentarily confused, Rekhmire’ said, ‘What?’

‘Why can a book-buyer for the Royal Library protect me?’ I jerked a

thumb at Honorius. ‘I can understand it with the Captain-General here,

and his thugs in livery—’

‘Thanks!’ Honorius grinned, as I intended him to.

‘—but why do you say you can protect me?’

The monumental face smoothed out into complete immobility. It was

possible to read nothing from him. I might have painted that face, or

rendered it in marble, and no man could have got any clue as to his

thoughts.

The Egyptian wiped his hands down his linen kilt and looked up from

his chair.

‘This may come as a shock,’ he said sardonically, ‘but I have certain

105

resources I can call on. Menmet-Ra will help with the voyage. You

would travel under a pass-port of the Pharaoh-Queen’s protection,

which I would provide.’

‘And you can do that because . . . ’

Rekhmire’ began to look cornered.

I folded my arms and gave him a recalcitrant stare.

‘Why should I trust you to get me – and my daughter – to Alexandria?

What makes a buyer of scrolls so capable of that?’

‘Ilario—’ He bit off whatever he had been going to say, glared back at

me, and snapped, ‘Because I’m a spy!’

The room poised, full of silence.

‘Ah.’ I didn’t look away from his gaze. ‘Good. I did wonder when you

might tell me . . . ’

Rekhmire’ positively snarled at me. ‘
What!
’

Honorius slid down a little on the bench beside me, hammering at his

thigh with his fist. Small tears easing out of the corners of his screwed-

shut eyes. I couldn’t make out what he wheezed.

‘Father?’

The Captain-General reached for the bottle and glasses, tipping a fair

amount of wine from one into the other. He pushed a glass at me, and

held one out to Rekhmire’, ridiculously delicate in his warrior’s fingers,

never mind the Egyptian’s large hand.

Honorius lifted his own glass, as in a toast. He remarked cheerfully, ‘I

bet you don’t get a lot of
that
.’

106

5

At Rekhmire’’s suggestion, Honorius broke off from packing long

enough to send ten men, inconspicuously, to pack up and bring back

Herr Mainz’s printing-
machina
from his workshop.

They found the anonymous shed stripped bare.

I supposed the Venetians might gain some knowledge from the

construction of the
machina
itself, but the German Guildsman’s satisfied

smile confirmed that the metal type was key.

Since mercenaries must be expert at moving their habitation, and

Rekhmire’ I knew to be more than used to packing up as a book-buyer, I

left the household to their skills.

Ramiro Carrasco entered the room I had come to think of as mine, just

as I completed packing what art supplies I judged worthy into a chest for

transport, and throwing out what paper I had wasted on unsuccessful

rendering.

‘You can take these down.’ I indicated the ash-wood chests. It

disquieted me how easy I found it to give plain orders.

Although
some
of
that
is
the
influence
of
men-at-arms,
and
not
merely
experience
of
slavery
.

A faint fuzz of black hair showed under Carrasco’s coif, growing back

in. A blue mark under his eye was a bruise, and new. No great wonder if

he didn’t mourn the departure of my father’s company for Taraconensis.

‘I feel strange at leaving this room.’ I looked about me, touching the

green velvet hangings of the bed, and continued without forethought:

‘After all, I gave birth to a child here.’

Ramiro Carrasco coloured from the skin at the neck of his shirt, clear

up to his ears and scalp; a glowing scarlet translucency of the flesh that

might as well have been a brand.

I
refuse
to
be
embarrassed
that
this
man
tried
to
kill
me!

‘I’ll take these,’ he muttered, squatting to lift one chest. He did not add

‘master’ or ‘mistress’. I was willing to bet he owed his black eye to

another such omission.

Shooting an apologetic glance, he added, ‘Will I come back and help

with the child?’

Onorata’s blankets, clothing, and feeding gear still occupied the bed in

sprawled heaps. She herself, in her lidless oaken chest, was beginning

107

that restless shifting of her face that meant she would wake soon and be

hungry.

‘
Lord
Christ
Emperor
on
the
Tree
.’ I sat bonelessly and suddenly on the edge of the bed, hard enough to jolt my teeth, and found myself staring