City of Flowers Read online

  ‘I have a shadow because I am in my home world,’ said Brother Sulien. ‘When I stravagate to yours, as I did to bring the talisman, I am without one, just as you are here.’

  Sky was beginning to understand that he had travelled in space, and almost certainly in time, but he still couldn’t quite believe it. Brother Sulien explained that they were in a great city called Giglia, in the country of Talia, but it looked to Sky as he imagined Italy to be. He couldn’t speak Italian, yet he understood what Sulien was saying to him – at least he understood the words; the meaning was still impenetrable.

  ‘What do you mean by helping you?’ he asked, trying another tack. ‘What can I do?’

  They had walked, slowly, all the way round the square cloisters, back to where they had begun, and stopped by the door into the laboratory. Again Sky felt overwhelmed by the scent coming from the room.

  ‘What is this place?’ he asked. ‘Some sort of church, or what?’

  Brother Sulien gestured to him to resume their walk. ‘It is a friary – Saint-Mary-among-the-Vines. We have a church, certainly, a most beautiful one, which is reached through the Lesser Cloister, but also an infirmary and a pharmacy, of which I am the friar in charge.’

  ‘Is that the same as a monk?’ asked Sky. He felt very ignorant about all this. He had only ever been in churches with his mother, as a sightseer.

  Sulien shrugged. ‘More or less,’ he said. ‘It depends what order you belong to. We are Dominicans. “The Hounds of God”, they call us. “Domini canes” is Talic for God’s hounds.’

  ‘And that laboratory?’

  ‘Is where I prepare the medicines,’ said Sulien. ‘And the perfumes, of course.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Sky, ironically.

  Brother Sulien gave him a quizzical look, but just then a bell started clanging in the tower above them, and all the other friars, as Sky supposed they were, downed tools and set off towards an archway in the corner.

  ‘Time for prayers,’ said the friar. ‘The Office of Terce, but today I shall miss it and take you out into the city. I want to show you something.’

  *

  The Eel was feeling pleased with himself. He had comfortable lodgings, ample pay and the best of everything to eat and drink. Most satisfactory of all, he had power. As the Duke’s right-hand man, he felt himself to be only a heartbeat away from the very seat of government. And it could so easily have gone the other way; he had at one time feared that Duke Niccolò would dispose of him by having his throat cut, after that business in Remora. Instead he now wore velvet, in his favourite blue, and carried a hat with a curling plume in it, and kept a horse of his own in the Duke’s stables.

  In fact, the Eel did not cut as impressive a figure as he thought, being short and a bit skinny. But he was well pleased with his new life, especially his little crew of spies. He liked Giglia better even than Remora, and much better than Bellezza. In a very short time, he had memorised its streets and squares and alleys, particularly the alleys – the Eel was an alley kind of fellow, even if he aspired to boulevards and avenues. You couldn’t skulk in an avenue and skulking was his forte.

  *

  Brother Sulien led Sky through an archway in the corner of the Great Cloister into a smaller one and then in through a door into the church. Up at the far end Sky could see quite a number of black-robed friars on their knees and could hear the low murmur of voices. His eyes scarcely had time to adapt to the gloom inside the church before they were out in the sunshine again, under a clear blue sky.

  Sky inhaled deeply and looked around him. The church fronted on to a large square, at either end of which stood a strange wooden post in the shape of an elongated pyramid. There were no cars or buses or motorbikes, but across the square there was a jumble of poor-looking houses and shops and then, every block or two, a noble building standing impressive among its surroundings like a racehorse in a field of knackered nags. Definitely the past, thought Sky. Then there was the dazzling sunshine which brought a warmth unknown in an English March, sunny though they could be. Definitely Italy, he thought.

  They walked briskly along a street whose gutters were overflowing with debris, and Sky couldn’t help noticing an unhealthy smell of rotten vegetables and worse. Two young men rode past; they were evidently noblemen, since everyone got out of their way and they paid no attention to their route but chatted to one another oblivious of the people scattering before their horses’ hoofs. Sky saw they both wore long shining swords dangling from their belts and remembered what Sulien had said about danger.

  A short walk brought them to a halt in front of what was the biggest building Sky had ever seen. It was familiar to him though, from art lessons at school.

  ‘This is Florence, isn’t it?’ he said, pleased to have recognised where he was.

  ‘I believe you do call it something like that, but for us it is Giglia,’ corrected Sulien patiently. ‘The City of Flowers, we call her, because of the meadows around that bring her such wealth. Her and the di Chimici,’ he added, lowering his voice. Then, more naturally, he continued, ‘It could as easily be called the City of Wool, since almost as much of her wealth comes from sheep, but that’s much less pretty, don’t you think?’

  This is like Alice in Wonderland, thought Sky. There seems to be logic in it but it doesn’t quite hang together.

  ‘And this is the best flower of all,’ said Sulien, gazing up at the bulk of the cathedral. ‘Even if my heart lies among the vines, I must admire Santa Maria del Giglio – Saint-Mary-of-the-Lily.’

  The walls of the cathedral were clad in white marble, with strips of green and pink marble in geometric patterns; Sky thought it looked like Neapolitan ice cream but sensed it would be unwise to say so. Though he noticed that the front was unfinished, just rough stone. A slender bell-tower in the same colours rose beside it, and the whole was dominated by a vast terracotta dome, encircled by smaller ones.

  ‘In this cathedral in eight weeks’ time,’ Sulien continued, ‘three di Chimici princes and a duke will marry their cousins. Now let me show you something else.’

  He walked Sky round to a little piazza where people were playing bowls. ‘In that square,’ said Sulien, ‘twenty-five years ago, a member of the di Chimici clan stabbed to death a young noble of the Nucci family.’

  ‘Why?’ asked Sky.

  ‘Because of an insult to the di Chimici over a marriage arranged between the two families. Donato Nucci was to marry Princess Eleanora di Chimici – a fine match for him, but he was twenty and she was thirty-one. And perhaps not one of the most beautiful of her kin, though intelligent, pious and accomplished. On the day of the wedding young Donato sent a messenger to say he was indisposed. Indisposed to marry Eleanora, as it turned out, for he was also in negotiations with another family and another, younger, bride.’

  ‘Poor Eleanora,’ said Sky.

  ‘And poor Donato,’ said Sulien grimly. ‘He had the gall to show himself at a game of bowls the next evening and Eleanora’s younger brother, Jacopo, stabbed him in the heart.’

  ‘What happened to Jacopo?’

  ‘He left the city. He had only come to Giglia for the wedding; his family lived in Fortezza, another great city of Tuschia, where his father Falco was Prince. The next year old Prince Falco died and Jacopo inherited the title. Some say the old Prince was poisoned by the Nucci, but he was a good age.’

  ‘And what happened to Eleanora – and Donato’s other girl?’

  ‘No one knows what happened to the other girl. Eleanora di Chimici took the veil and so did her younger sister. Jacopo himself married – and had two daughters, one of whom is going to marry Prince Carlo di Chimici here in a few weeks. The other will marry her cousin Alfonso di Chimici, Duke of Volana.’

  Sky was beginning to see, among this muddle of names and titles, a pattern emerging.

  ‘Is this Jacopo still alive?’ he asked.

  Sulien nodded. ‘He will give his daughter away to the second son of this city’s Duke.’

/>   ‘And the Nucci lot?’

  ‘Will be invited, of course. They are still one of the great families of Giglia.’

  ‘Phew,’ said Sky. ‘Could be pretty explosive. But I really don’t see why you are telling me all this.’

  ‘Come,’ said Sulien, ‘a little further.’

  They skirted the back of the cathedral. Among the buildings behind it was a busy, noisy workshop, ringing with the sound of chisel on stone. Sulien stopped and looked both ways.

  ‘This is the bottega of Giuditta Miele, the sculptor,’ he said. ‘She is another one of us Stravaganti. And her next commission is to make a statue of the beautiful Duchessa of Bellezza, who is coming here for the di Chimici weddings.’

  ‘Sorry,’ said Sky. ‘I still don’t see . . .’

  ‘The Duchessa was supposed to marry Gaetano di Chimici, the third prince. Supposed by Duke Niccolò, that is. She refused him, some think because she was too attached to a young man who was her father’s apprentice. Her father is Rodolfo Rossi, the Regent of Bellezza, one of the most powerful Stravaganti in Talia. And the young man, his apprentice, did her mother, the late Duchessa, great service, and is now an honoured citizen of Bellezza, but it wasn’t always so.’

  ‘No?’ asked Sky, because it seemed expected.

  ‘No,’ said Sulien. ‘He was once from your world, and I think you probably know of him.’

  *

  Gaetano di Chimici stood in the loggia of the Piazza Ducale and everywhere he looked he saw evidence of his family’s influence on the city he loved. They had built the palace that housed the seat of government, with its tower that dominated the square, they had placed the statues commemorating victories of the weak over the strong, and they had built the Guild offices, with their workshops underneath, where silversmiths and workers in semi-precious stones plied their crafts along with the less important goldsmiths.

  All over the city, poor housing was being pulled down and replaced with grand buildings, columns, squares and statues. And all this was the work of his father, carrying on the tradition of his ancestors, and part of Gaetano could not help feeling proud. But he also knew how much blood stained the family’s omnipresent crest of the perfume bottle and the lily, in pursuit of acquiring land and showing themselves superior to the Nucci and other feuding families of the city. And what he didn’t know, he could guess.

  Why, even old Jacopo, the kindest and sweetest of Niccolò’s cousins, had committed a murder only a few streets away from here! Uncle Jacopo, as they called him, who had fed all the little princes sweetmeats with his own fingers and wept like a baby when his favourite hound died. Not for the first time, Gaetano wished he had been born into a family of shepherds or gardeners.

  Then he and Francesca could have got up early one morning and made their vows in a country church, decorated with rosebuds. He smiled at the thought of his beautiful cousin, the love of his life, clad in a homespun dress with flowers in her hair. How different from their forthcoming marriage in the vast cathedral, which would be followed by a grand procession and surrounded by dangers in spite of all the finery of silks and brocades and silver and diamonds.

  Gaetano decided to walk towards Saint-Mary-among-the-Vines and look up the friar who his friend Luciano had told him was a Stravagante, like Luciano himself and his master, Rodolfo. Unlike his own father, Gaetano was not an enemy of the Stravaganti; in fact he thought they were probably the only people who could stave off the disaster he could feel brewing.

  *

  ‘Lucien Mulholland?’ said Sky, disbelievingly. ‘But he died – about two and a half years ago. He can’t be here in your city.’

  ‘Not yet,’ said Sulien. ‘He lives in Bellezza. But he will accompany the Duchessa to the weddings. You will meet him. And find he is very much alive, in Talia.’

  Sky sat down on a low wall. He remembered Lucien – a slim boy with black curls, two years above him at school. He vaguely remembered that Lucien was good at swimming and was also musical, but that was about it. He hadn’t known him well, and when the head teacher had told the whole school in assembly one morning that Lucien had died, Sky had felt only that shock that everyone feels when death comes to someone young and familiar.

  But now he was being asked to believe that this person was not dead at all but living in another world, somewhere in the past, and that he, Sky, was going to meet him. It was too far-fetched for words.

  Looking around him, he noticed that he and Sulien were not the only black inhabitants of Giglia. There were not many others but there were some, which struck him as odd, if this was a sort of Italy, goodness knows how long ago. Although Sky was taking history AS, he realised that he had only the vaguest of ideas about life in Renaissance Italy. And then had to remind himself that this wasn’t Italy at all. But he was glad not to attract any strange looks, except from a rather scruffy boy lounging apparently aimlessly round the food stalls.

  The boy caught his eye and made his way towards Sky and Sulien.

  ‘Hello, Brothers,’ he said.

  Sky knew it was because of his robes that the boy called him that, but it made him jump all the same.

  ‘Sandro,’ said the boy, nodding at Sulien and sticking out his hand towards Sky.

  ‘Celestino,’ said Sky, remembering his new name.

  ‘Brother Celestino,’ said Sandro, with a sideways glance at Sulien. ’You’re new here, aren’t you?’

  Chapter 3

  Brothers

  Sulien knew the Eel’s boy and he hesitated about letting his new visitor spend time with him. But the friar couldn’t continue to neglect his work at the Farmacia and it was essential for Sky to learn his way about the city.

  ‘Brother Celestino is newly arrived from Anglia,’ he told the younger boy. ‘He is a stranger to Giglia – indeed he has never been to Talia before. Perhaps you would like to show him around?’ He pulled Sky to one side and whispered, ‘I have to get back. Let Sandro teach you about the city – no one knows it better than him, but tell him nothing of what I have said to you, particularly about the Stravaganti – he works for the di Chimici. And keep out of the full sun – you can always say it’s too hot for you after chilly Anglia. When you want to leave, get him to direct you back to Saint-Mary-among-the-Vines. You must go back home without fail before sunset. The talisman will take you if you hold it while falling asleep anywhere in the city, but it’s best to come and go from my cell.’

  ‘Come and go?’ whispered Sky. ‘So I am coming back again?’

  ‘Certainly,’ said Sulien quietly. ‘That’s what Stravaganti do – travel between worlds and do what is required of them in both.’

  Sky had the strangest feeling that this friar was not so mad after all and that he knew all about his life in the other world. Brother Sulien slipped off round the side of the cathedral, waving to the two boys, and Sandro, who had been cleaning his nails with an alarming-looking dagger, gave Sky a big grin.

  ‘Ready, Brother?’ he asked. ‘There’s plenty to see.’

  And so Sky found himself being shown round Giglia by Sandro. The boy had asked no questions, except for Sky’s name and if he was attached to Sulien’s friary. And those Sky could just about manage to answer, though it was odd to think of himself as Celestino – or Brother Tino, as Sandro began to call him, a novice from Saint-Mary-among-the-Vines. It was like taking a part in a play or a role-playing game.

  Sandro was much more interested in telling than asking. He loved explaining his city to someone so ignorant, especially someone older than him.

  ‘This is one of the grandest streets in Giglia,’ he said at the end of their wanderings, taking Sky up the Via Larga some hours later. ‘The Duke has his palace just up here and my master lodges not far away.’

  ‘What do you do?’ asked Sky, amazed that someone so young could have a job; perhaps he was an apprentice of some kind? Or perhaps boys in this time – he still had no idea when it was and only the haziest idea about where – went to work much younger? He had assumed
that Sandro was only about fourteen.

  But Sandro just tapped the side of his nose mysteriously and said, ‘What you don’t know can’t hurt you. Maybe I’ll tell you one day when we know each other better.’

  He insisted on treating Sky like a big simpleton, more naïve than himself. Sky felt his mouth curving in a smile; it was how he imagined having a little brother might be.

  ‘Here it is,’ said Sandro proudly. ‘The Palazzo di Chimici. Where Duke Niccolò lives when he is in Giglia.’

  Sky saw a magnificent building, much bigger than the others around it, taking up an entire block of the street. A grand pair of iron gates inside an arch allowed the two boys to look into the huge courtyard beyond. A fountain played in the middle of geometrically arranged flower beds, separated by what looked like patterned marble slabs.

  ‘Hey there, young Sparrow,’ said a voice from behind them, and an absurdly overdressed little man attempted to put his arms across both their shoulders. It was easy enough to manage with Sandro but Sky was a head taller than him and the man had to stretch to reach.

  He was wearing a blue velvet suit with a lace collar and a hat with a curling feather, and Sky couldn’t help noticing a powerful smell of stale sweat.

  *

  Prince Gaetano entered the gate to the Lesser Cloister of Saint-Mary-among-the-Vines; he had always liked this Dominican friary. It was here that his family’s great fortune had begun, when they backed the researches into distilling perfume from flowers and gained their surname of di Chimici, meaning Chemists. But he hadn’t been here recently, not since the arrival of Brother Sulien as Pharmacist and Senior Friar.

  Gaetano recognised Sulien from Luciano’s description. He was supervising the delivery of cartloads of hothouse irises at the back door of the Great Cloister. But he stopped and came over as soon as he saw the young prince.

  ‘Welcome, your Highness,’ he said. ‘I have been expecting you.’

  *

  The guard at the gates of the di Chimici palace knew the Eel well and let him in with his two companions, even though a scruffy boy and a young novice were hardly likely visitors for the Duke. But the Eel was not on his way to see the Duke – not yet. He wanted to show off in front of his young apprentice and his new friend.