“Marina!” he choked. “What—what are you doing here? You’ve been gone for—I thought they said there was a doctor with him!”
The lean, weather-beaten man stood up, dislike written loud on his features. “And I thought they’d gone to fetch a priest, Bishop Capuletti, not a scavenger. I learned a thing or two about healing on my pilgrimage, and I was on hand. But I’ve done what I can. Get one of the Accademia’s cadaver-masters if you prefer. I’m out of here. I don’t like the smell—and I don’t mean that of burnt flesh and parchment.”
The bishop merely snorted dismissively as the weather-beaten man left. When he’d gone, he turned to the knights. “Pilgrimage, my foot! More likely, that Luciano Marina went to learn the dark arts from the devil himself. Now. One of you had better go and fetch a doctor, and the other find someone to send for the other Signori di Notte. And get me someone to tidy this room.” He looked at the confetti confusion of parchment. “Might as well throw this lot away.”
Erik shook his head. “I’m sorry, Monsignor. I think we should stay with him. Whatever attacked him may come back.”
The bishop patted his crucifix-hung chain. “I will deal with it. I am, in case you cannot see, your superior in the Church.”
Erik shook his head again. “Dealing with this magic requires steel, Monsignor. Not just holiness.”
“So—as he is going to live and we don’t need your priestly services, why don’t you trot off to do the errands,” said Manfred, with all the arrogance of an nineteen-year-old prince crammed into his voice. Because of Manfred’s size and the fact that he’d seen a lot, Erik tended to forget his age. Sometimes however, like now, it showed.
The bishop goggled, his ever-so-white face suffusing with choler.
Erik thought he’d better intervene. “That’s enough, Manfred! Go and bellow for someone at the door. I’ll collect these papers. Lord Calenti seemed to ascribe some importance to them. Perhaps they’ll mean something to one of the other Signori di Notte.”
Bishop Capuletti sniffed. “They’re just bills of lading and accounts from the bankers at the Rialto bridge,” he said, in voice like iced vinegar. He deliberately ground one underfoot.
Erik calmly picked it up and smoothed it. It was indeed nothing more than a partly burned bill of lading. A spice-cargo from Acre. It seemed to be innocuous enough. Loading. Unloading. Damages. Signed by the captain and bearing official looking seals. The bishop snatched at it. Erik held it away.
* * *
Manfred watched as Erik lifted the piece of paper out of the portly bishop’s reach. He’d known Erik for the better part of eight months now, and he knew the danger signals. He’d better be ready to intervene. Erik was easygoing and rational a lot of time. Hard to anger. But the Icelander had a rigid code of right and wrong—and the bishop had overstepped it. Erik would not let little things like the future stand in his way.
“A man has nearly died for what is contained in these pieces of paper.” Erik’s voice was absolutely level, utterly expressionless. “You will treat them with respect.” Erik’s gray-blue eyes bored into the red-clad prelate with an implacable stare. That look would have sent a ravening lion creeping off quietly to its lair.
The bishop, about to make some stinging comment, looked into those eyes. He shut his mouth. Raised his hands pacifically without even thinking about it.
Seeing Bishop Capuletti wilt, Manfred relaxed. Manfred knew himself to be much quicker to anger. But Erik, when he finally got angry, didn’t cool easily. The famous Norse fury of ancient times didn’t lurk all that far beneath the civilized and pious surface.
Relief in the shape of a doctor and a worried-looking Schiopettieri arrived.
“Ah! Father Belgio!” squeaked the prelate. “As you are both an ordained priest and a doctor, er . . . I think I’d better go and confer with the Accademia authorities.” He left hastily, without his dignity—but with his head.
Manfred turned his attention to the doctor-priest. The Schiopettieri had taken one horrified look, a second to confirm just who the burned man was, and had followed the bishop’s example of a hasty exit. Hopefully he was going to call someone more senior. The doctor, on the other hand, had knelt by the fetal-ball of burned man. He looked at the poultices.