23

Had there not been snow, and had the fontego been built around a proper courtyard it might have held out for longer. But the Canalasso side made it vulnerable to attack from water as well as land. And three luggers filled with Castellani bobbed offshore to make certain no Mamluk barges tried to escape. The barges were burning, and the screams from inside said their crews burnt too. The snows simply meant no one watching this happen worried about accidental fires starting elsewhere, since the embers from the barges landed in the water or sizzled out on slush.

The building itself was intact. Sacked and savaged, shit-smeared and pissed in, but still standing and unburnt. It would be sold by the city to the highest bidder and the buyer could hire men to clean up what this night had done.

In the central courtyard, overlooked by the colonnades of its three sides, a young woman was backlit by burning barges. She looked to Tycho the same age as the girl in the basilica, but there the likeness ended. This girl had dark skin, and hair cut from the night, perfectly black and waterfall straight. Where the earlier girl had been thin this one was not. Her hips were full, her breasts fuller. The anger in her eyes was as fierce as any Tycho had seen.

“Little bitch,” a man said. Wiping spittle from his cheek, he flicked it to the ground. “Have your men hold her, Roderigo. And make sure they bend her right over. We’ll see how she likes this.”

Two guards grabbed the girl, who visibly flinched when the man with the steel breastplate began untying the laces to his codpiece.

“Strip her, then.”

A squat man stepped forward.

The same man who’d helped free Tycho from the ship, only to make him a prisoner again. Pulling down his cap, Tycho wrapped a filthy scarf around his neck and backed into the crowd.

“Hurry it up…”

Grabbing her collar, the squat man yanked so hard he pulled the young woman free from the two holding her. As the guards reached for her, she spun round and spat full into the face of the man in the breastplate. This time her spittle hit his lips and he didn’t flick it nonchalantly away; he scrubbed his lips with the back of his hand instead. And Tycho watched the smoky evil he felt around him enter the man’s eyes. Pointing at Roderigo, the man snarled, “Nail her to that tree. Flay her.”

“My lord?”

“You heard me, Roderigo.”

“She’s barely a child, my lord. And the building is yours. Cut her throat and be done with it. Take her first if you must.”

“Kindness is a weakness. Tell your man to flay her and do it fast. I’m due at prayers in an hour. You’ll be coming with me.”

As one guard went to fetch nails and a hammer, another disappeared looking for a kitchen knife and steel. His face relaxed when Roderigo ordered him to give both to Sergeant Temujin. The sergeant swore.

“What did he say?”

Roderigo looked uneasy.

“What did your man just mutter?”

“If it takes a Mongol to do the job, my lord. He’s happy to serve.”

Tycho doubted these were the exact words. So did Roderigo’s master, from his scowl. Although the words obviously hit home, because he shot the sergeant a glare and stared round the mob-filled courtyard, his gaze alighting on Tycho. “You,” he said. “Come here.”

The man behind pushed Tycho forward.

“I’m Prince Alonzo, Regent of this city. You hear me?”

Tycho nodded slowly.

“Typical,” the Regent muttered. “The village idiot. Give him the knife, explain what he’s to do. And hurry it up.”

It had been dark in the boat and Tycho’s face was now filthy, framed by a stolen cap and what showed of his hair was matted and greasy. All the same, the sergeant stood on the edge of recognition.

“Buonasera,” said Tycho, sounding like the Nicoletti’s son the dead printer had been. Temujin shrugged.

“Cut her a bit. Kill her soon after. Only not too soon…” Jerking his head towards Prince Alonzo, he added. “He needs to hear her scream. His type always does. Right, you two, wrap her arms around that tree.”

Temujin’s knuckles were white as he put a nail to her wrist, drew back his hammer and slammed it down so hard its crash almost drowned her cry. She howled again when the second nail went in. Thrashing as Tycho stepped up behind her with his knife.

“Please,” she begged. Her voice guttural, her Italian so thick he barely recognised the words. “Don’t.”

She knew he was there to hurt her.

Into Tycho’s mind came memories of a flaying. Bloody Boot stripped the ankles, Red Gauntlets the hands and wrists. Raw Saddle flayed the…

“Get on with it,” Temujin hissed.

Slicing fast, he outlined her spine, adding a second cut beside the first, slashing a third at the top and scooping under to give him something to grip. It was over in a second, maybe less. When he ripped, the young woman screamed so hard her voice broke. Behind Tycho someone vomited.

“Please…” The word was in his head.

A child’s whisper behind her animal howl. Pain spread like angel’s wings from her body, feathered and bright. Brighter than his eyes could stand.

“Please,” she begged. “Make it stop…”

He did as she asked, taking the brightness into himself. Feeling her shock as her mind abandoned the bleeding meat nailed to the tree. She was two people now. One silent, inside him. The other loud and bestial.

Such as it was her life lay open. The taste of food he’d never eaten, and memories of a rambling family home in Egypt, seen through her eyes as a child. Snatches of her language. Memories of a happy childhood turning sour as a father’s love hardened to anxiety. And the fontego that had been her world became her prison.

Tycho felt his dog teeth extend.

The night was his. The night, the city, the world… Everything was his and he moved freely through it. The water under the bridges barely troubled him as he flowed through the city at impossible speeds, streets unravelling as he printed them on his memory. Giving names to places he knew, learning locations for which he’d only known names. Behind him he left a crowd shocked into silence. Stunned guards and a prince open-mouthed with horror.

Tycho’s body hummed with power, his hearing was so sharp he surprised a hunting tom before the cat was aware of him. Time stretched and twisted and became malleable. Eventually moving so slowly he owned the spaces between seconds as well as the seconds themselves. He knew the stars for tiny suns lighting a night sky to the brightness of day. Except this sky was red.

As was the rest of his world.

Red walls and water held within red canal banks. The underworld and the overworld and the world of the dead were finally one. To look at somewhere was to be there. He could kill, he could observe, he could touch. Drunken couples fucked in doorways, feet slipping on slush and snow. Masked thieves waited to rob elegant cittadini. Old men staggered halfway across the city with goods from the sacked building that they didn’t really want anyway. And light to their darkness, children played marbles by candlelight on dusty floors. A boy stroked the face of a girl and ventured a kiss, feeling daring. Little knowing how long she’d been waiting for him to make this move. The air stank of sweetness. It smelt sweetly of dung. He was God and the Devil in one.

It was close to dawn before his euphoria faded. Dangerously close.

Too late to return to his lair, he found an empty attic above a goldsmith, with tiles new enough to keep out sunlight and settled himself into one corner, folding one arm under his head to make a pillow and folding his knees to steady himself.

He felt stronger than before, no longer hungry. But he also remembered how he’d earned this God-like happiness. Opening his mouth, Tycho ran a finger across his teeth, finding them normal. The creature that moved so confidently through the night was gone. But memories of the creature’s power, speed and glory remained. He’d thought his greatest challenge was to remember who he was. And had been wrong, almost childishly so. Who he was paled before tonight’s slaughter. What he was… That was the real question.