The first thing that struck him was the silence. Then, as he drew nearer, he began to see dead bodies strewn around, some of the men wearing the blazon of Silvio Barbarigo, others a device he did not recognize. Finally he came upon a sergeant, badly wounded but still alive, who had managed to prop himself up against a low wall.
'Please, help me,' said the sergeant when Ezio approached.
Ezio searched around quickly and located the well, from which he drew water, praying that the attackers had not poisoned it, though it looked clean and clear enough. He poured some into a beaker he'd found and put it gently to the man's lips, then moistened a cloth and wiped the blood from his face.
'Thank you, friend,' said the sergeant. Ezio noticed that he wore the unfamiliar badge, and guessed that it must be Bartolomeo's. Evidently Bartolomeo's troops had been worsted by Silvio's.
'It was a surprise attack,' the sergeant confirmed. 'Some whore of Bartolomeo's betrayed us.'
'Where have they gone now?'
'The Inquisitor's men? Back to the Arsenal. They've established a base there, just before the new Doge could take control. Silvio hates his cousin Agostino because he isn't part of whatever plot the Inquisitor's involved in.' The man coughed blood, but endeavoured to continue. 'Took our Captain prisoner. Carried him off with them. Funny really, we were just planning to attack them. Bartolomeo was simply waiting for. a messenger from the city.'
'Where are the rest of your men now?'
The sergeant tried to look around. 'Those that weren't killed or taken prisoner scattered, tried to save themselves. They'll be lying low in Venice and on the islands in the lagoon. But they'll need someone to unite behind. They'll be waiting for word of the Captain.'
'And he's a prisoner of Silvio?'
'Yes. He.' But the unfortunate sergeant here started to fight for breath. His struggle ended as his mouth opened and a shower of blood streamed from it, drenching the grass for three yards in front of him. But the time the flow had stopped, the man's eyes were staring sightlessly in the direction of the lagoon.
Ezio closed them for him, and crossed his arms on his chest. 'Requiescat in pace,' he said, solemnly.
Then he hitched his sword-belt tighter - he had also strapped the guard-brace to his left forearm, but had left off the double-bladed dagger attachment. To his right forearm he had attached the poison-blade, always so useful when faced with huge odds. The pistol, most useful when a single, certain target was in view, as it had to be reloaded after each firing, he kept in his belt-pouch with powder and shot, and the original spring-blade as back-up. He pulled up his hood, and headed for the wooden bridge which connected San Pietro to Castello. From there he made his way unobtrusively but quickly down the main street in the direction of the Arsenal. He noticed that the people around him were subdued, though they went about their daily work as usual. It would take more than a local war to stop the business of Venice entirely, though of course few of the ordinary citizens of Castello could know just how important for their city the outcome of this conflict was.
Ezio didn't know then that it would be a conflict which would drag on for many, many months, indeed, into the following year. He thought of Cristina, of his mother Maria and his sister Claudia. And he felt himself to be homeless, and getting older. But there was the Creed to be served and upheld, and that was more important than anything else. No one, perhaps, would ever know that their world had been saved from the dominion of the Templars by the select Order of Assassins, which had pledged itself to opposing their evil hegemony.
His first task was clearly to locate and, if possible, free Bartolomeo d'Alviano, but getting into the Arsenal would be hard. Surrounded by high brick fortified walls, and containing a warren of buildings and shipyards, it stood at the eastern limit of the main city, and it was heavily guarded by Silvio's private army, whose numbers seemed to exceed the two hundred mercenaries Agostino Barbarigo had told him of. Ezio, passing the architect Gamballo's recently built main gate, wandered round the outside perimeters of the buildings as far as they were accessible by land, until he came to a heavy door with a wicket gate built into it, and, observing from a distance, saw that this unobtrusive entry was used by guards on the outside when they changed shift. He had to wait unobtrusively for four hours, but at the next shift change he was ready. It was baking hot in the late afternoon sun, the atmosphere was humid, and everyone except Ezio was torpid. He watched as the relief soldiers marched out through the gate, which had only one guard, and then followed the mercenaries coming off shift, bringing up the rear and blending in as best he could. Once the last soldier was through, he cut the throat of the guard posted at the gate and slipped through it himself before anyone had noticed what was happening. As had happened years ago at San Gimignano, Silvio's force here, big as it was, wasn't sufficient to cover the entire area it guarded. It was, after all, the city's military focal point. No wonder Agostino couldn't wield any real power without control of it.
Once inside, it was relatively easy to move about between the wide open spaces beween the huge buildings - the Cordelie, the Artiglierie, the shot-towers, and above all, the shipyards. As long as Ezio kept to the dark late-afternoon shadows and took care to avoid the patrols within the vast complex, he knew he would be all right, though naturally he remained extremely vigilant.
Guided at last by the sounds of merriment and mocking laughter, he found his way to the side of one of the main dry-docks, into which a massive galley was drawn. On the side of one of the dock's massive walls, an iron cage had been hung. In it was Bartolomeo, a vigorous bear of a man in his early thirties and so just four or five years' Ezio's senior. Around him was a crowd of Silvio's mercenaries, and Ezio thought how much better employed they'd have been patrolling than triumphing over an enemy they'd already rendered helpless, but he reflected that Silvio Barbarigo, Grand Inquisitor though he was, was not experienced in matters of handling troops.
Ezio didn't know how long Bartolomeo had been chained up in his cage; certainly for many hours. But his anger and energy seemed unaffected by his ordeal. Given that he'd almost certainly been given nothing to eat or drink, this was remarkable.
'Luridi codardi! Filthy cowards!' he was shouting at his tormentors, one of whom, Ezio noticed, had dipped a sponge in vinegar and was pushing it up to Bartolomeo's lips on the tip of a lance in the hope that he'd think it was water. Bartolomeo spat it away. 'I'll take you all on! At the same time! With one arm - no, both arms - tied behind my back! I'll fucking eat you alive!' He laughed. 'You must be wondering how such a thing could be even possible, but just let me out of here and I'll gladly demonstrate! Miserabili pezzi di merda!'
The Inquisitor's guards howled in derision, and poked at Bartolomeo with poles, making the cage swing. It had no solid bottom, and Bartolomeo had to grip hard with his feet on the bars beneath to keep his balance.
'You have no honour! No valour! No virtue!' He summoned enough saliva into his mouth to spit down at them. 'And people wonder why the star of Venice has begun to wane.' Then his voice took on almost a pleading tone. 'I'll show mercy to whomever here has the courage to release me. All the rest of you are going to die! By my hand! I swear it!'
'Save your fucking breath,' one of the guards called out. 'No one's going to die today but you, you fucking turdbag.'
All this time Ezio, sheltered by the shadow of a brick colonnade that skirted a basin where some of the smaller war-galleys were moored, was working out a way of saving the condottiero. There were ten guards around the cage, all with their backs to him, and there was none other in view. What was more, they were off-duty and had no armour on. Ezio checked his poison-dagger. Dispatching the guards should present no difficulty. He'd timed the passing of the on-duty patrols and they came by every time the shadow of the dock wall lengthened by three inches. But there was the additional problem of releasing Bartolomeo, keeping him quiet while doing so, and making quick work of it. He thought hard. He knew there wasn't much time.