“Joseph, if indeed Jesus Nazarenus is dead, as the Centurion must confirm, I will not deny you custody.” Turning to Micheletto, Pilate spoke again. “Centurion! Is Jesus dead?”
“Ay,Ser Governor,” said Micheletto flatly, and Ezio noticed him draw a stiletto from under his cloak. Ezio had replaced his poison-blade, now exhausted of venom, with his trusty hidden-blade, and with it he now pierced Micheletto’s side, holding him upright and maneuvering him offstage, in the direction he had come. Once backstage, he laid the man down.
Micheletto fixed him with a glittering look. “Hah!” he said. “You cannot save Pietro. The vinegar on the sponge was poisoned. As I promised Cesare, I made doubly sure.” He fought for breath. “You had better finish me.”
“I did not come here to kill you—you helped your master rise and you will fall with him—you don’t need me—you are the agent of your own destruction! If you live, well, a dog always returns to its master, and you will lead me to my real quarry.”
Ezio had no time for more. He had to save Pietro!
As he rushed back onstage, he saw a scene of chaos. Pietro was writhing on the cross and vomiting. He’d turned the color of a peeled almond. The audience was in uproar.
“What’s going on? What’s happening?” cried Longinus, as the other actors scattered.
“Cut him down!” Ezio yelled to his recruits. Some threw keenly aimed daggers to slice through the ropes that bound Pietro to the cross, while others stood ready to catch him. Yet others were fighting back the Borgia guards who had appeared from nowhere and were now storming the stage.
“This wasn’t in the script!” gurgled Pietro as he fell into the arms of the recruits.
“Will he die?” asked Longinus hopefully. One rival less is always good news in a tough profession.
“Hold off the guards!” shouted Ezio, leading the recruits off the stage and carrying Pietro in his arms across a shallow pool of water in the middle of the Colosseum, disturbing dozens of drinking pigeons, which flew up and away in alarm. The very last glimmer from the setting sun bathed Ezio and Pietro in a dull red light.
Ezio had trained his recruits well, and those bringing up the rear guard successfully fought off the pursuing Borgia guards as the rest made their way out of the Colosseum and into the network of streets to the north of it. Ezio led the way to the house of a doctor of his acquaintance. He hammered on the door and, having been granted reluctant admission, had Pietro laid on a table covered with a palliasse in the doctor’s consulting room, from whose beams a baffling number of different dried herbs hung in organized bunches, giving the room a pungent smell. On shelves, unidentifiable or unmentionable objects and creatures and parts of creatures floated in glass bottles filled with cloudy liquid.
Ezio ordered his men outside, to keep watch. He wondered what any passersby might think if they saw a bunch of Roman soldiers. They’d probably think they were seeing ghosts, and run a mile. He himself had shed his Pharisee outfit at the first opportunity.
“Who are you?” murmured Pietro. Ezio was concerned to see that the actor’s lips had turned blue.
“Your savior,” said Ezio. To the doctor he said, “He’s been poisoned,Dottor Brunelleschi.”
The doctor examined the actor quickly, shining a light into his eyes. “From the pallor, it looks like they used canterella. Poison of choice for our dear masters, the Borgia.” To Pietro, he said, “Lie still.”
“Feel sleepy,” said Pietro.
“Lie still! Has he been sick?” Brunelleschi asked Ezio.
“Yes.”
“Good.” The doctor bustled about, mixing a number of fluids from bottles of variously colored glass with practiced ease and pouring the mixture into a vial. This he handed to Pietro, propping his head up.
“Drink this.”
“Hurry up,” said Ezio urgently.
“Just give him a moment.”
Ezio watched anxiously. After what seemed an age, the actor sat up.
“I think I feel slightly better,” he said.
“Miracolo!” said Ezio in relief.
“Not really,” said the doctor. “He can’t have had much, and for my sins I’ve had quite a bit of experience with canterella victims—it’s enabled me to develop this pretty effective antidote. Now,” he continued judiciously, “I’ll apply some leeches. They will lead to a full recovery. You can rest here, my boy, and very soon you’ll be as right as rain.” He bustled some more and produced a glass jar full of black, wriggling creatures. He scooped out a handful.
“I cannot thank you enough,” said Pietro to Ezio. “I—”
“Youcan thank me enough,” replied Ezio briskly. “The key to the little gate you use for your trysts at the Castel Sant’Angelo with Lucrezia. Give it to me. Now!”
Misgiving appeared on Pietro’s face. “What are you talking about? I’m simply a poor actor, a victim of circumstance—I—”
“Listen, Pietro: Cesare knows about you and Lucrezia.”
Now misgiving was replaced by fear. “Oh, God!”
“But I can help you. If you give me the key.”
Mutely, Pietro delved into his loincloth and handed it over. “I always keep it with me,” he said.
“Wise of you,” said Ezio, pocketing the key. It was reassuring to have it, for it would guarantee him access to the Castel whenever he had need of it. “My men will fetch your clothes and get you to a place of safety. I’ll detail a couple to keep watch over you. Just keep out of sight for a while.”
“But…my public!” wailed the actor.
“They’ll have to make do with Longinus until it’s safe for you to put your head above the parapet again.” Ezio grinned. “I shouldn’t worry. He isn’t a patch on you.”
“Oh, do you really think so?”
“No question.”
“Ouch!” said Pietro, as the first leech went on.
In the wink of an eye, Ezio had disappeared outside, and there gave the necessary orders to his men. “Get out of those costumes as soon as you can,” he added. “The Baths of Trajan aren’t far. With any luck, your street clothes will still be where you left them.”
He departed on his own, but he hadn’t gone far when he noticed a figure skulking in the shadows. As soon as the man felt Ezio’s eyes on him, he cut and ran. But not before Ezio had recognized Paganino, the thief who’d been determined to stay behind at the sack of Monteriggioni.
“Hey!” Ezio shouted, giving chase.“Un momento!”
The thief certainly knew his way around these streets. Ducking and diving, he was so adroit that Ezio all but lost him in the pursuit and more than once had to leap to the rooftops to scan the streets below in order to locate the man again. Leonardo’s magical glove came in surprisingly handy at such times, he found.
At last he managed to get ahead of his prey and cut off his line of escape. The thief went for his dagger, an ugly-lookingcinquedea, but Ezio quickly wrested it out of his hand and it clattered harmlessly to the pavement.
“Why did you run?” asked Ezio, pinioning the man. Then he noticed a letter protruding from the man’s leather belt pouch. The seal was unmistakable: It was that of Pope Alexander VI—Rodrigo—the Spaniard!
Ezio let out a long breath as a series of suspicions fell into place. Paganino had long ago been with Antonio de Magianis’s Thieves’ Guild in Venice. He must have been offered enough money by the Borgia to persuade him to switch sides and had infiltrated La Volpe’s group here—the Borgia had had a mole at the heart of the Assassins’ organization all along.
Here was the traitor—not Machiavelli at all!