We picked the most cooperative horses from the stables, retrieved Sebastie’s body from the dungeon, and rode toward town. The gates to Vostitza were closed and would be until dawn, so we stayed in one of the abandoned homes outside the wall. We placed Sebastie’s body in a storage room where the animals couldn’t get at it and settled in. The money we’d scrounged from the dead Catalans would be enough to pay a priest and a grave digger and get us across the gulf, but that would have to wait until morning. We needed to grieve, we needed to plan, and we needed to rest, but we also needed to know what had happened while the Catalans had held Eudocia.
“I didn’t want to go,” she told Gil. “But how could I not agree to everything they asked if it would save you?”
“But after that night, couldn’t you have escaped?” he asked. The two sat beside each other near the fire Aban had lit in the hearth.
“They left a pair of assassins in Thebes, men who would kill you if I didn’t obey all their commands. Rasheed too.” She glanced my way. “They showed me the pigeons they had ready to send with the message. There were times I might have gotten away, but I didn’t think there was any way I could outpace a bird. I’d never get to you in time to prevent your death.”
Gil put his arm around her and pulled her closer. “Do you think so little of my ability to defend myself? I’m not an easy man to kill.”
“There were two of them, and they were not the type to bumble. I couldn’t risk it. And they promised to let me go once I had Nerio for them. I thought if I could just nab their prisoner, no matter what I had to do to accomplish it, it would all be over and I could go back to you.”
“Two assassins?” I tried to catch Gil’s eyes, but it was too dark for him.
He understood anyway. “Two men tried to kill Bertaldo the day we left to find you. Rasheed took care of them.”
Eudocia sighed. “So I could have left.”
“You couldn’t have known,” I said.
She nodded.
“Sebastie talked to some of the company.” Gil gazed at the fire. “Rasheed and I did too. It sounded like you almost got Acioli, and I’m not surprised.”
“I was close,” Eudocia said. “But after that first time, they knew someone was trying. And then it was impossible.”
I threw a small stick into the fire. “I understand why the Catalans took you. Who else could steal a hostage from the Navarrese? And if you failed, they could at least have their revenge. But why did the Catalans take Querini?”
Eudocia frowned. “He’s a spy. His networks get information from all across the Mediterranean. Little bits of knowledge he can sell or use as blackmail. He’s loyal to Venice, but beyond that, he uses the information to line his pockets.”
“So he has money to pour into a shipping business.” But there was something else I didn’t completely understand. “Why did he choose to marry Signorina Bertaldo? It sounds like he has plenty of options, and the Bertaldos are no longer wealthy.”
Eudocia pulled off her cloak. “The dowry wasn’t affected by the leaner years. Querini said it was set up some time ago, before the war.”
“He told you all this?” Gil asked.
“The Catalans asked. They also made threats, so Querini answered. I listened.” She snuggled closer to her husband. “The real reason behind the match was the past work between Querini and the Bertaldo family. The Sea Maiden was part of Querini’s network. Signor Giacomo Bertaldo and his brother before him gathered information from spies in ports all along the sea. They were good at it.”
“Cecilia’s father was a spy?” I asked.
“Spy, spymaster, and courier, I think,” Eudocia said.
Gil took his eyes off his wife long enough to glance at me. “She didn’t say anything about it to you?”
I shook my head. We’d spent hours talking about the Sea Maiden and her father, and she hadn’t once mentioned anything about gathering information for Venice or for more mercenary purposes. I could understand why they’d done it—Venice had almost been destroyed in their last war with Genoa. That threat might have passed, but Venice still had plenty of enemies to protect against. Yet she’d given me not a hint of the true nature of the ship’s work. Snatches of memory from our time together came to me, moments when she’d taken the trail of conversation a different direction. She would have known—she and her uncle had spoken of her father drawing her into the family business, so she would have been involved, too, and proud to collect information that might protect her republic. She hadn’t kept the Sea Maiden’s secrets out of ignorance or shame or embarrassment. That left one painful possibility: despite everything, she hadn’t trusted me.
“Why would she have told Rasheed?” Eudocia looked at Gil, then at me.
I filled her in on the ambush by the Turks and how I’d ended up chained next to Cecilia. I gave Eudocia more details than I would have given someone else, because she had a sharp mind and sometimes seemingly insignificant pieces of information ended up being important later. Maybe Eudocia—or Gil or Aban—would see something I couldn’t. “She said her father didn’t keep much from her. She sailed all over the Mediterranean with him—she must have known what the Sea Maiden was being used for. Probably helped, but I don’t know to what extent.”
Eudocia nodded. “If you were chained to each other for parts of three days, she certainly had the time to confide in you.”
Gil grunted. “They spent enough time together for Rasheed to fall most of the way in love with her.”
“Is that true, Rasheed?” Eudocia’s voice carried a hint of surprise, but more than that, it carried compassion.
I didn’t answer.
“Where is she now?” she asked.
I shrugged. “Her uncle sent her to the Sea Maiden before he drugged Gil and me. Now that Signor Bertaldo has Signor Querini, they’re probably on the gulf, sailing the Sea Maiden who knows where.”
“Neopatras.” Eudocia’s voice was a whisper, but it carried certainty. “That’s where they’ll go. They’ll sail across the gulf and ride north.”
“Why would they go to Neopatras?” I asked.
“Because Querini made a deal with the Catalans this morning. I didn’t know it involved trading for the group of you, but it included a plan to break the siege.”
“They told you that?” Aban sat near me. He’d been so quiet that I’d thought he’d fallen asleep.
“They didn’t know I was listening.”
Aban nodded. “So what do we do now? Go back to Thebes?”
Gil frowned. “We killed eleven of them tonight. And all their friends know exactly where to find us if we go back to Thebes.”
“Nor have they forgotten what we did before.” I crossed my arms. “Now they have even more reason for vengeance, but they’ll be busy defending Neopatras.”
“We should sleep on it.” Gil covered a yawn. “We’ll make a better decision in the morning.”
I nodded. “I’ll take the first watch.”
* * *
I woke the next morning after the sun had already cleared the horizon. Aban had stood watch after me, but now he lay a pace away, still slumbering. I stretched my legs. The movements didn’t stop the pain, but it seemed to reduce it, a little. Neither Gil nor Eudocia was around. Maybe they were standing watch together.
I found them outside. Gil leaned against the wall, and Eudocia leaned up against him, wrapped in his arms. I cleared my throat so they’d know I was there, though I suspected they’d already heard me.
“How’s your leg today?” Gil asked.
“Not much worse than yesterday.”
“So, rotten?” Gil gave me a sympathetic smile. Then he planted a kiss on his wife’s cheek and released her. “Want me to work on it?”
“I didn’t want to interrupt, but yes, please.”
I lay on my back, and Gil tugged gently on my leg. I glanced at Eudocia. “How many other Catalans are in the area?”
“You saw about a third yesterday.”
Roughly a score of them might still be looking for us. Even if we killed every last one of them in the Peloponnese, we’d be in a scarcely better position. The Catalans to the north knew who we were. “You didn’t have anything worth going back for at the villa Bertaldo was using, did you?” I asked Gil.
His horse had been stolen by the Turks, but neither the Venetians nor the Catalans had taken our armor, so I wasn’t surprised when he shook his head. “Everything I want from the Peloponnese is leaning on that wall right over there.” He glanced at his wife.
Aban came outside and joined us. He hadn’t brought much of value on our trip either—he’d left Valencia with nothing but what he could carry. I preferred the sword I’d left at the villa to the one I’d taken from the Catalans last night but not enough to make the journey worth the risk. My favorite sword was on a Turkish pirate ship; I doubted I’d ever see it again. “We should go into the city soon, then. Take care of Sebastie’s body and find passage back across the gulf.”
“And from there?” Gil finished with my leg.
I stood, in less pain than I’d been in only a while before. We could go home and spend the rest of our lives in fear that one day the Catalans would come for us. We’d lost Sebastie this time. Who might they kill the next time they came for us?
Eudocia broke the silence. “Thebes won’t feel safe as long as the Catalans have an outpost in Greece.”
Their only remaining stronghold was Neopatras. We could chase the Catalans—and chase the Bertaldos, chase Cecilia. But they might not have gone to Neopatras. Even if they had, she might be married by the time we caught up to her. I wanted to chase her, even if my hope was slim, but I didn’t want to risk the lives of my friends for what was probably a fool’s errand. If she hadn’t seen fit to tell me of the Sea Maiden’s real purpose, maybe my feelings for her weren’t fully reciprocated.
“If we go to Neopatras, we need good reasons as to why,” I said.
Gil grinned. “To free the woman of Rasheed’s dreams from the evil clutches of her uncle. Sounds like a worthy cause to me.”
“That’s not enough,” I said. “Not when we’d be headed toward enemies and might end up dead.”
“If you asked, I’d go just for that reason.” Eudocia slipped her arm around Gil. “If you love her, it would be worth the risk, even if it means tangling with a set of Venetian spies. But finding Signorina Bertaldo isn’t the only draw. If Neopatras falls, the Catalans will have nowhere else to go. They’ll have to leave the Duchy. We’ll have to be cautious for a time, regardless of what happens, but if they’re gone, we’ll be far safer far sooner. And Micer Aner leads the besieging army. We could help him.”
“Micer’s there?” He’d helped us steal Thebes eleven years ago. Gil, Eudocia, and I had settled down into the bathhouse business after that, but Micer had gone on to help kick the Catalans out of Athens.
Eudocia nodded. “And he is my favorite uncle, other than Sebastie.”
“I thought you didn’t have any family other than your husband.” Aban’s forehead scrunched up in confusion.
“Some family you’re born with.” I put my hand on his shoulder. “Some family you collect along the way. But knowing the man in charge of besieging the city doesn’t mean we can do anything to help him win. There are only the four of us.” The persistent pain in my leg was unlikely to subside much if we crossed the gulf and rode all the way north to Neopatras, even with Gil’s help. Aban wasn’t a warrior—at least not yet. Gil’s sight was dim, and Eudocia was a woman. We were unlikely to make much of a difference in a conventional battle.
“At the very least, we can find that Venetian siren and convince her to run off with you.” Gil smirked.
Eudocia jabbed Gil playfully in the ribs. “I don’t know if we can do anything to affect the fate of Neopatras. I’ve never been there. That’s why we have to talk to Micer. Maybe he’s learned something. At the very least, we can warn him that Querini is plotting against him.”
“Did you hear Querini’s plans?” Gil asked.
“No. But he has the connections and the money to hire more defenders—there are always Albanians or Turks willing to fight for coin or the promise of pillage. Or he could cause other mischief. He’s not an enemy to ignore.”
“Why is he working with the Catalans?” Aban asked.
I had the same question. The Catalans and Venetians had formed trade relations on and off, but the Venetians currently wanted Argos from the Greeks for themselves. So why would they allow themselves to be sidetracked by a dispute between the Catalans and the Florentines?
Eudocia’s lips pulled down. “I’m not sure. An alliance against the Florentines? Having a common enemy might be enough. Maybe if they help the Catalans at Neopatras, the Catalans will help them at Argos? Querini will have found something that benefits him or benefits Venice.”
“Everyone else turns to the Turks,” Gil mused. “Regardless of the consequences. Maybe it’s not so strange to turn to the Catalans.”
“But the Venetians are using the Navarrese and the Catalans at the same time—that’s likely to backfire.” I looped my thumb through my belt, remembering more than a decade of bad blood between the Grand Catalan Company’s remnants and the Navarrese Company’s splinters.
“Maybe Querini isn’t acting for Venice. Maybe he’s acting for himself,” Eudocia said.
“Could be money,” Gil said. “Or knowledge of some kind. Maybe a promise from the Catalans to funnel information to Querini if he helps them stay in power. He’s unlikely to get much cooperation from the Florentines if they take the city. I suggest we go to Neopatras and find our answers there.”
I glanced at Aban. He gave a halfhearted shrug. “Thebes or Neopatras. I’ll follow you, brother.”
Aban’s cooperation surprised me in the most pleasant sort of way.
Eudocia met my eyes. “I agree with Gil. We should go to Neopatras.”
They would listen to me if I thought we should go to Thebes instead, but they were right. Going to Thebes would mean constant worry about Catalan revenge. Helping Micer take Neopatras seemed the best way for us to find lasting safety—and maybe the best way for me to find an end to the aching in my heart.