Race of Scorpions - Dorothy Dunnett [210]
‘So might you,’ Nicholas said. ‘In the mountains. You didn’t invite me.’
‘You are not in season,’ said Zacco. The broken horse, sweating and shivering, stood at his side, its head drooping. Zacco stood, his eyes steady and cold, and his smell and that of the horse were the same.
Nicholas said, ‘There is a season for fighting, and I am in that.’
‘With me, they are the same,’ Zacco said. He moved, his muscles oiled over with sweat, and slipping the bridle over the exhausted horse, laid the reins over his shoulder and led it slowly out of the ring. He said, ‘Well, Niccolò. Playing at soldiers without sense, without leave, you know you missed a messenger from Nicosia? It seems your silly child in the dyeworks has gone. Now perhaps we can get on with this war.’
Nicholas stood still, hesitated, and walked on again. ‘My lord?’
‘Yes?’ said Zacco, waving to someone.
Nicholas said, ‘Diniz Vasquez? My lord, where has he gone, and when?’
‘How should I know?’ Zacco said. ‘Four or five days ago, I presume. They sent to tell the woman at Episkopi, and found she had heard of it, and hearing, had disappeared. But you will not be distressed about that. You wanted nothing to do, as I remember, with Katelina van Borselen. Go and get clean. When I want you, I shall send for you. Tomorrow, perhaps, or the next day.’
They parted. Nicholas stripped, deep in thought, as he walked to his tent, and let his servants sluice him outside, as he had just sluiced the King. Somewhere over the bustling heads he glimpsed the plumed helm of Tzani-bey, and beneath it his face, attentive and still as if watching him, or his scars. If so, he was welcome. In Astorre’s quarters, a violent celebration seemed to be taking place without requiring his presence. As the sun’s heat began to make itself felt on his bare head, and through his light robe, Nicholas retired to his tent and then, presently, crossed to his little field desk and took up his pen. A shadow fell, and John le Grant said, ‘If anyone lost, I suppose it was the horse. Not you, at any rate. That’s the King confused, the war advanced, and Katelina and her nephew shamed and neatly got rid of. Who or what next?’
Nicholas finished writing. He said, ‘You need to move that bombard, and place another one, much lighter, on the other hill nearer town. Now they’ve had a shock and lost all those arrows, the garrison won’t hold out very much longer. I’m suggesting to Zacco that he slackens the sea blockade in Kyrenia and makes it complete, from now on, at Famagusta. Once the mastic crops are in, the Bank of St George will put all their money and ships into saving the Genoese colony. Genoa won’t have any to spare for Queen Carlotta. Kyrenia should fall in two months: Famagusta by winter. I’m going south.’
John le Grant came and sat beside him, his red-fluffed arms folded and smelling of metal and gunpowder. He said, ‘The boy and the lady have gone, and not by your orders?’
Nicholas said, ‘I could have released the boy any time that I wanted. I gave Bartolomeo no new instructions. The lady was being held against my wishes by the King’s mother, and I haven’t spoken to her yet. Once I have, I shall go down to Episkopi. If Katelina and her nephew are both conveniently on their way west to Simon in Portugal, I shall come back.’
John le Grant said, ‘Where else could they be?’
Nicholas powdered his writing and sat back, thinking a little. He found his teeth had locked like those of a ferret and he