This Cursed Light, page 14
He held out his hands, subtly tensing in case she struck without warning. “I won’t even fight back.”
Talia coughed a laugh. “Where’s the fun in that? I’ll wait until you aren’t expecting it.”
He lowered his arms. “Something to look forward to, then.”
“Stronzo.” Talia flicked a rude gesture in his direction as someone stepped outside behind her.
“Give the boy a break, Natalia.” Matteo patted his daughter’s stiff shoulders.
Sour anger crept up Dante’s throat as he met his uncle’s gaze.
“Hey, son.” Matteo stared, before catching himself with a shake. “Mi scuze. It’s like seeing a ghost.”
“Yeah, it is.” Dante’s anger flared at the quaver in Matteo’s voice. He wasn’t the one who’d been left behind.
“Papa, can we do this later?” Talia said. “If you don’t get back in there, Nova might change her mind.”
“Sure. Right.” Matteo looked grateful for the excuse to leave. “But you’ll stay at our place tonight, and I won’t hear a word otherwise.”
Dante didn’t have a chance to object as Matteo hurried back inside.
“Come on,” Talia said softly. “It’ll take him all night to talk Nova through her anger bender.”
Dante breathed a little easier with every step away from the cathedral.
Talia’s rage must have burned out, temporarily at least. He was grateful for her silence. For the dark. He focused on the chill of the rain misting his face, seeping through his clothing. Anything to hold on to control.
Talia fished a key from her pocket in front of a narrow, modest building overlooking a quiet canal. “I still can’t believe you brought fucking Fonti.”
Somehow, the interior of the house felt exactly like her old cottage on Saverio. It even smelled the same, of linen and sandalwood. The rush of memories made Dante’s head spin.
“That key is for emergencies,” Talia said. “Not so you can hide in the dark.”
A flash of red in Dante’s peripheral vision warned him before a heavy hand slapped his back.
“Best friend prerogative,” Blaise said. “Congrats, man. Probation’s better than dead.”
Dante grunted a thanks, easing his knives back into their sheaths. “Where are my people?”
Blaise laughed. “They’re being taken care of.”
Dante’s stomach clenched. “Meaning?”
Blaise shrugged. “They broke rule number one and stepped foot on our island without permission. They won’t have the most comfortable night.”
Dante pulled his knives out again. “If anyone hurts them—”
“Relax,” Talia said. “We have rules here. Nova said they can stay, and we don’t fight fragiles unless they attack first. They might have to sleep on a hard floor, but they’ll survive. I suggest you make a good impression tomorrow if you want to keep it that way.”
Dante relaxed. Slightly. “And who, exactly, do I need to impress?”
“Everyone.” Blaise smiled darkly. “You were already going to get so many challenges, but they’ll be lining up for a chance to put you in your place now.”
Dante arched a brow. “Am I supposed to impress people, befriend them, or kick their asses?”
“What’s the difference?” Laughing like he’d made the world’s funniest joke, Blaise jogged out the door.
“Well, tonight was fun,” Talia said, dropping her key in a bowl on the counter.
The years had been long, and Dante’s list of questions were longer, but he didn’t know where to start. As kids, they’d spent their days one-upping each other or plotting elaborate war games, not rehashing past trauma. They didn’t have a guidebook for this.
The ornate but worn carpet muffled Talia’s steps as she paced the little sitting room. “So what, exactly, do you think Crollo is going to send?”
“I don’t know.” Dante ran his hand over the familiar faded quilt covering the back of the couch. “It’s always changing, like he wants to keep me guessing. The only thing that comes back every time is blood. Lots of it. What I’m still trying to work out is the point.”
“Isn’t the point to kill us all?” Talia asked.
“I don’t think so. If Crollo wanted to, he could just do it. That’s the story, right? Dea and Crollo disagreed about whether humanity deserved to exist, so they made a bet, and we’ve all been pawns in every round since. But all games end eventually, and now things have changed.”
Talia stopped pacing. “Changed how?”
“The point of the Duo Divino is supposed to be reminding people to work together, right? Well, the current Finestra’s power was too strong for one partner. There were five on Finestra’s Peak this time. And now Dea says Crollo’s sending something even worse. To me, that sounds like—”
“Double or nothing,” Talia said.
“Exactly.” Dante nodded. “Crollo’s tired of the game, so he’s raising the stakes. I think Dea wants me to finish her original play. Her blessing says she gave us three gifts, right? Fonti with powers, a Finestra to magnify them, and fighters with a source of healing. That’s the ghiotte, but since people misunderstood and blamed us for stealing a fountain that never existed, everyone paid the price. The way I see it, Dea wants me to get the missing players on the board for the first time since this began. Then Crollo will send his worst, so we can win Dea’s bet once and for all.”
Talia eyed him. “And if we don’t?”
He met her gaze. “Game over.”
Nineteen
DAYS UNTIL THE ECLIPSE: 23
Dante felt guilty as sin when he woke with a start in Talia’s guest room the next morning. He should have tossed and turned with worry, but familiarity had wrapped around him like a blanket and he’d slept like a rock.
He dressed quickly and threw the door open, nearly jumping out of his skin when he came face-to-face with Talia right outside.
She shoved an espresso into his hand. “First day of the rest of your life, and you slept past dawn?”
“You could have woken me,” he said, knocking back the espresso as they thundered down the stairs.
“Hah. Last time I woke you up, you punched me in the stomach.”
Dante chuckled. “You kicked me in the nuts for it, too.”
“And I’d do it again. Hurry up.”
“Where’s my team?” he asked as they crossed a small bridge. “I need to know they’re safe.”
“They are. For Dea’s sake, keep your shirt on. I don’t remember you being so impatient.” She kicked his foot. “Want my advice?”
His mouth twitched with the old urge to annoy her. “Not really.”
She punched his shoulder. “Stubborn asshole.”
“Learned from the best.”
“Yeah, you did. Look, no one will give you a chance if they think you’re taking orders from outsiders. If you’re the one giving orders, that’s different. One of us finally having the upper hand, you know? They’re just your lackeys, or whatever.” Talia studied him. “That is the deal, right?”
“Sure.” He’d almost forgotten how bossy she was.
“Better be. You made everything harder by bringing outsiders, especially because they’re blessed. You expect people to sign up for this bonkers mission of yours just because you’re a ghiotte? Not likely. Loyalty has limits. No one knows anything else about you, and you’re starting at a disadvantage. You’ve got ground to make up.”
“Give it to me, then. What’s the plan?”
“Step one: get the council’s blessing. Done, but barely. The next part is harder.”
“What’s the next part?”
“Make a good first impression. Well, second impression. People need to see you with me before they see you with the riffraff you brought. Make it very clear that you’re one of us.”
Dante pretended to scratch his bicep, checking that the bandage beneath his sleeve was secure. The stitches were supposed to stay in for another few days, but he’d have to risk removing them sooner. It felt like a tattoo marking him as a fraud, an outsider. The kind of guy who’d lie to his oldest friend because he couldn’t bear the thought of her knowing the truth about who he was. Or wasn’t.
Talia trotted him through the places where ghiotte gathered, lived, played, and worked. People were wary, sizing him up, but Talia was clearly well-liked, and her endorsement appeared to carry weight.
“I’m never gonna keep all these names straight,” Dante said after muddling through yet another introduction.
“Don’t worry. I know everyone.”
Dante hadn’t even dreamed this many ghiotte still existed—definitely enough for an army—but whenever he tried to bring conversations around to his mission, Talia elbowed him hard enough to bruise.
“It’s like you’ve never heard of strategy,” she said. “Have you forgotten every war game we ever played?”
“This isn’t kids playing soldiers on the beach, Talia. This is the real thing.”
“Even more important then. If you start a recruitment drive right now, no one will show up and you’ll look pathetic. People need to know who you are and that you deserve their respect first.”
* * *
Alessa’s day started with a bang.
“Get up!” Their red-haired captor stood in the doorway amid a cloud of dust from the door he’d slammed against the wall. “I’m Blaise, and you’re on probation. Time to impress me.”
She sat bolt upright, heart pounding. “Where’s Dante?”
“Asking questions does not impress me. Pack your shit. It’s time for a tour.” Blaise tapped his foot as everyone scrambled out of their bedrolls, disheveled and half asleep. When they’d shoved themselves into clothes and grabbed portable food, they followed him outside, blinking in the sudden daylight.
“Everyone see that?” Blaise said, very loudly and extremely slowly. “That is a canal. It’s like a road, but it’s made of water. And if you fall in, we all point and laugh. That over there is called a bridge. If you’re too scared to jump the canal, you can toddle over the bridge like little babies.”
While Alessa peered down alleys, hoping for a sight of Dante, Adrick, Ciro, and Saida trailed behind Blaise, asking leading questions. It seemed most ghiotte lived on the island of Perduta itself, but some families had farms on the mainland, and there were a few small ghiotte villages there as well.
“Fascinating,” Adrick said as Blaise expounded on their system of bartering.
“What a brownnoser,” Kaleb said. “Sorry, Alessa, but I can’t stand your brother.”
Kamaria patted his shoulder. “Keep telling yourself that.”
Blaise clapped. “Keep it moving. I don’t have all day.”
After an hour of random alleys and picturesque but not terribly exciting bridges, they hadn’t encountered a single ghiotte other than Blaise, and Alessa was beginning to suspect the tour was to keep them away from anyone else. Her feet were throbbing by the time Blaise returned them to their dismal lodging.
Someone had dropped off supplies while they were out: buckets, rags, brooms, oilcloth tarps, hammers and nails, a few thin mattresses, a wobbly table, and rickety chairs, all heaped in one corner of the courtyard.
“Ah, the special touches that make a house a home,” Ciro said, looking pained.
“Your welcome basket,” Blaise said. “You want a nicer living situation, get to work.”
Wrinkling his nose, Kaleb grabbed a broom, Kamaria filled her arms with rags, and Ciro peered into a bucket like he had never seen one before, while Blaise planted himself in the open gate to oversee their efforts—and presumably so his charges couldn’t escape.
Only the cat seemed delighted with their new dwelling, chasing dust cyclones and mocking their captivity by slipping in and out through the bars of the gate.
“Do you think we could train her to pick the lock?” Kaleb asked. His answer was a disdainful tail flick.
To be fair, the house looked better in full sunlight. Crafted out of tawny stone, it must have been a beautiful home for a wealthy family once upon a time, and the building appeared sturdy despite its neglected state.
The main level had tall windows (boarded up with rotting wood), a large room (carpeted with dust), and a narrow kitchen (cluttered with refuse and broken tiles).
Kamaria crossed the courtyard, which opened to a bright blue sky. “I’m going to check out the upper level.”
“I’ll clear the dust.” Saida crouched, hands out, directing the air to blow the worst of the dust out the door. Alessa took her hand to speed up the process, and Kaleb aimed his sparks so they could see better. Adrick picked up a broom, and Ciro began dabbing at the door handles with a damp rag.
Coughing and blinking dust from her eyes, Alessa struggled to see where she was going as she and Saida cleared one section after another.
Kamaria poked her head around the corner and declared that the roof was in dire shape, with no doors cordoning off the balconies with crumbled railings. “Better sleep down here again or someone might roll off and fall to their doom.”
“Could you two go a little bit faster?” Kaleb said. “My scar’s itching.”
“You need light?” Kamaria asked. She took over at Kaleb’s pained nod, and he slid down against one wall, pulling up his eye patch to rub at the scar where a scarabeo claw cost him an eye during Divorando. It looked considerably less gruesome than it had in the weeks after, but he often grimaced when movement tugged at the tight tissue.
“I have a salve that might help.” Adrick walked over, rummaging through his pack of medicinal supplies, but Kaleb recoiled as he pulled out a jar.
Adrick planted his hands on his hips. “I’m a gods-damned medic. I can show you how to massage it to soften the scar tissue, or you can keep itching every time you irritate it with all your scowling. Your call.”
Kaleb grumbled assent, and Adrick knelt, shaking his head in annoyance.
An odd buzzing, like the drone of distant conversation or a swarm of tiny bees, vibrated within Alessa’s skull. She had the strangest feeling that if she chose, she could let the bees loose, but something warned her to be careful not to. They were her bees, and she wouldn’t be able to catch them again.
She shook herself. Sleep deprivation or the crash following an intense day was making her ridiculous. If only Dante were there, with his steady strength.
Her stomach churned with worry. She didn’t want to think of what could be keeping him away for so long.
* * *
“Pinned you again!” Talia crowed.
Dante sat up, brushing dust from his pants after another surprise tackle. “I let you win.”
She offered him a hand. “Since when do you let anyone beat you at anything?”
“You told me to make a good impression.”
“You think being a loser does that?”
“Have I mentioned I almost died a month ago?” He gestured for her to walk ahead.
“Pssht. We’re ghiotte. Almost dead is nothing.”
If she only knew.
Talia continued to insist his friends were safe, but “safe” could mean a lot of things, and Dante was itching to see for himself.
“Have I jumped through enough hoops to free the hostages yet?” he asked.
“I don’t remember you being so impatient,” Talia said with an eye roll.
“I need to know they’re okay.”
“Ugh. Since you clearly don’t trust me, we’ll bring them some food and you’ll see that they’re fine.”
They didn’t head back to Talia’s place, thankfully, but to a building with rows of tables and a bustling kitchen on the other side of a counter loaded with food.
“Where do we pay?” he asked as they perused the selection of fresh bread, cheeses, and cured meats.
“We don’t. This is the community kitchen.”
“Everyone eats here?”
“Of course not. Most cook at home, but anyone who wants to, can. Perduta is a family. We’re all expected to contribute our skills, and everyone gets what they need.”
Ironic. Named and shunned for allegedly stealing Dea’s mythical healing fountain, the ghiotte had built a more egalitarian society than Saverio could hope for.
“You’re so twitchy,” she said, clapping him on the back. “Relax.”
“I’ve been watching my back for years. It happens.”
Dante paid more attention to the buildings on either side of the canals as they left. Some shops and cafés looked like any on Saverio, but others had open doors and no visible employees. Talia caught him peering into one such shop, crammed with racks of clothing—in good shape but not brand new—and told him to help himself. “People donate things they don’t want and pick up stuff they do. Waste not, want not.”
They had packed light, and everyone in his group could use a supply of clean clothes. It was easy to grab items for the guys and Kamaria, since she preferred trousers and was almost his height and narrow-hipped enough that he could guess which would fit, but he’d never picked out women’s clothing before.
Watching him examine a dress, Talia took pity on him. “That doesn’t have split skirts, so it would be a pain to move in, and they aren’t here to lounge.” Rummaging through the racks, she pulled out skirts, blouses, and underthings. “These should fit the short one with the dimples—”
“Saida.”
“Whatever. This dress may be too revealing for Saverian prudes, but it would probably fit the other one.”
“Alessa.”
Talia’s eyes narrowed. “Why’d you say her name like that?”
“Like what?” He kept his fist behind his back so she wouldn’t see the lacy scrap he’d snatched. Arms full, he followed her out and beyond the bustling center of Perduta to a residential area.
“What’s your trade, by the way?” Talia asked as they passed a tiny park where a young man was shouting encouragement to a pack of shrieking children climbing trees. “I forgot to ask yesterday.”
“Huh?” Dante said.
“You know, what you’ll do to contribute to the community. You’ll need to share it at your swearing-in.”
