The Botticelli Secret - By Marina Fiorato Page 0,82

well . . . solid, not liquid as it usually is.”

I expected him to scoff at me as he had many times before, but he glanced about and nodded.

“I know what you mean. Like the saint’s blood.”

I remembered the legend of San Gennaro—remembered the bright moon last eve, and now the sea had drained away like water from a ewer. Portents, omens, signs. I shivered despite the heat of the day, and my steps quickened. We walked the short distance to the port and, by strange chance, entered the city once again by clambering upon the jetty where we had landed a day ago. This time, though, no waves lapped the wooden pier, and no citizens thronged the dock. We took the same route through the market, but today doors closed as we passed and the black-clad widows pulled their veils across their faces. Lethargy had replaced lechery, calm had replaced chaos. Curs skulked in the shadows, their barking silenced, their heads on their paws. Today the sign of the Devil’s horns was everywhere—every citizen from the oldest graybeard to the youngest child made the sign with their hands: little and first finger extended, and middle fingers held by the thumb.

We climbed the silent hill to Castel Nuovo and were let pass at the gates. Inside the castle courts I looked forward to a return to normality, but here, too, there had been a sea change. Outside the keep a dozen gold and black carriages lined in wait. The black horses stood still as statues, but rolled their eyes to the whites, their flanks dark with sweat. They did not shift in place or flick manes or tails at bothersome flies—for, incredibly, there were no flies to swat away. Brother Guido and I walked grimly forth to join a waiting Santiago. Now there was no argument about whether we would or would not return home to Florence with the king. Whether we went all the way there or not, one thing was for sure: we had to leave this eerie place in those fast carriages or face we knew not what. At Santiago’s gesture, we followed him to the royal carriage. We needed no second invitation, for I felt more and more uneasy. Brother Guido wrenched open the gilded door of the third carriage, with the elaborate cognizance of the House of Aragon upon it. We climbed inside and almost fell into the laps of the king and queen. They nodded, but their tongues were silent, their smiles muted. They felt it too.

As I caught my breath I looked to the bay below and marveled at how hidden were the cavern and the fleet—had it not been for the riddle of Fiammetta we would never have known it was there.

But as I looked to sea I saw something else.

The ocean was gathering in an enormous steely mass on the horizon, a wave of such biblical proportions that it seemed all seven seas were rising to crash upon the hapless city and sweep us from the coast like insects. Fishmouthed in horror, I pointed seaward and my noble companions followed my finger with their eyes. It was enough.

“Drive!” bellowed Don Ferrente. As the order left his lips three things happened.

Cosa Uno: the twelfth stroke of the Angelus struck.

Cosa Due: the angry sea rushed home upon the city.

Cosa Tre: the driver’s whip cracked and the earth did too.

An immense rumbling shook the ground beneath us and the castle walls round about. I looked to Brother Guido, horrified, my teeth rattling in my head and my ribs shaking in my chestspoon. Masonry began to fall from the fortress, and we lurched forward at a pace that would be frightening were it not that every hoofbeat took us farther away from this falling place. It felt as if the end of the world had come, but our horses sped down the drive and hurtled out of the castle gates, needing no further cuts of the whip. As we rattled around like polenta in a stockpot we wordlessly regarded the scene below. The vengeful tide seemed set to consume the bay as the waters curdled and seethed on the shores, greedily snatching boats from the harbor and shacks from the hillside. I clasped Brother Guido’s arm hard enough to hurt, in genuine fear for my life as the horses bolted through the ruined city. I felt his hand squeeze mine in return. I knew at that moment that he felt death approaching too, but I