The Mosaic

Chapter 8

Guido swayed slightly, before he managed to push himself upright. "See?" He turned to the two men. Then he closed his eyes, face turning serious when he opened them again. His eyes burned into Alessandro's. "I'm dying and there is nothing," he straightened his back, "you can do to stop it."

Alessandro opened his mouth.

"No," Guido cut him off. "You can't save me. You can't save everyone. So don't waste time trying."

The blond shifted, the angry shout he had swallowed down bubbling in his chest, pushing against his heart. He clenched his fists. Then he lowered his head.

"Good," Guido smiled. "I have good news too, Urbino and Verona won't join their cause — they are Ghibelline, Genoa is Guelph."

Giacinto snorted. "Is that a bad excuse or are politics these days that petty? Who cares about whether they favor the pope or the emperor when it's a war against Venice?" The man throw his knife in the air, watching it spin, and caught it easily. "And, honestly, the emperor is a douche and the pope is too busy with picking sides in some French succession crisis to even look at Italy."

"Giacinto!" Alessandro hissed, shaking his head, "You can't call the emperor a douche."

"As you can see I can." He crossed his arms. "But, maybe, I shouldn't."

Alessandro sighed. "Finally—"

"For accuracy's sake, I should call him an incompetent douche."

"Really," Alessandro dragged a hand over his face. "Half of Italy is planning a war against the city you live in and this is what you come up with?"

Giacinto grinned like the cat that caught the canary – sharp teeth showing and eyes glinting mischievously. He seemed very pleased with himself.

"They're doing a little more than just – "

"The emperor? The Germans call him 'the lazy', and you can't argue with German logic. I don't make the rules," he smiled innocently, "And the pope? That's right, he's also trying not to get stabbed by his own cardinals." The Greek deadpanned. "Anyways, there's no reason for the cities to care who's Guelph and who's Ghibelline, because this war is only about Venice."

"You're forgetting it's not the cities negotiating, but families. It's nothing official, just a nobility trying to gain support. They wrote the Montefeltro family and got a reply stating they would not waste ink, paper – or soldiers for that matter – on 'those bastard Guelphs'. Antonio della Scala of Verona was a little more polite, but essentially said no as well." The boy spoke up, a soft chuckle in his voice, blue eyes watching their banter with an amused twinkle.

Giacinto scrunched up his nose – a habit when he was irritated, Alessandro had noticed. "Why do you sound like you have more bad news?"

"The Visconti are very interested in a very defeated Venice."

"Milano as well? Padua, Genoa, Milano and the Ottoman Empire against Venice – that's what I call a fair fight," the Greek examined his knife.

"Well, we can count on both Urbino and Verona not siding with Genoa, but – "

" – but that doesn't mean they will aid Venice." Giacinto huffed, blew a strand of unruly black hair out of his face. He started spinning his knife. The slowly turning blade caught the flickering candle light – the orange glow in the iron made it appear like a doorway to hell.

The metal winked teasingly at Alessandro with every spin. Spin – wink – spin – wink – spin ...

"What about Florence?" The commissar spoke up, eyes still following the twirling blade.