purpose, now that my face counts for nothing. Would you like to see?”
She reaches up, and, in a single, shocking movement, the red locks fall to the floor. The candlelight plays over a shining, scarred scalp. The skin seems stretched and rippled with channels like the sand of a beach when the tide has receded. A few wisps of her old hair grow in short, crinkled tufts.
“You like it?” she asks in a mocking voice. I force myself not to look away, even when she raises her hands to the mask that covers her face. My throat goes dry as she carefully pulls it away.
Now I cannot look, and lower my eyes.
“You don’t want to see your handiwork?”
I take a breath and raise my gaze. Carina’s brow appears half melted, the skin drooping at the corner of one eye. Her mouth twists in an unnatural grin, and the skin across one cheek blossoms with scars and broken veins. This face, once so beautiful, is now a distorted version of what Carina once was.
“More to your taste?” she asks.
Pity plunges through me. How could it not? Carina is still a young woman, trapped behind the face of a corpse. One of her eyes is weeping, and she lifts a square of linen to wipe away the tears that flow from the red swollen rim. But as I remember glimpses of the past, my feelings quickly disappear. This woman lunged at me with a dagger on the boat. If she’d had her way, I would have died that night. Roberto too.
“You tried to kill us,” I say. “Whatever happened to you, it’s your own doing.”
I expect her to lash out, but instead Carina titters. “My dear Roberto,” she says. “I hear he too will suffer for his deeds tomorrow.”
She reaches into the deep pocket of her skirts and pulls out a stiletto knife. Involuntarily, my hands strain again. The narrow blade makes it perfect for sliding between ribs, puncturing deep into the flesh. One movement, one twist, and a heart can be stopped in seconds. The handle is made of mother-of-pearl, and there’s a golden guard and pommel. They glint in the weak light as Carina brings the knife closer, closer to my throat. I catch my breath and wait for whatever comes next, not daring to move.
She draws the blade through the air, a hairsbreadth away from my neck, in a slow, luxurious movement.
“Tomorrow the executioner will take Roberto’s head and place it on a lance,” she says. Then the twisted smile drops from her face, and her voice turns low and angry. “You wouldn’t remember the execution of Grand Councilor Luciano Braccia, I suppose? You were in the convent still. Well, I remember. I held my mother’s hand as the old fool put his head to the block, his lips muttering a useless prayer. Some say he hadn’t bribed the executioner to make it quick. Others that the axman was drunk. Anyway, it took half a dozen blows before he was dead, and the ax handle broke after the third. It was almost funny as they hunted for a replacement, and all that time he lay there twitching.”
I feel the bile rise in my throat, and my chest heaves as I struggle to contain the gagging sensation. Carina claps her hands in delight, turning around on the spot like a child at a party.
“Oh, good! The great Laura is human after all. Have I turned your stomach, dear heart?”
“What kind of animal are you?” I spit. Any sense of treading carefully has evaporated. “What is it you want?”
Carina places the knife in my lap, tantalizingly out of reach of my bound hands, then bends down to retrieve her mask and wig. She places the red locks on top of her head, tugging at them until they sit in place. She looks laughable, like a gaudy puppet. Then she ties the mask in place and straightens her shoulders, as though retrieving what little dignity she has left.
Finally, she answers me. “I want nothing more than to see you and the Segreta suffer.”
She snatches up the knife again, and moves behind me. Every sense seems on fire as I wait for what must surely come. Will it be quick, or will she leave me to bleed to death in this lonely room? I close my eyes and try to think of Roberto’s face, but even that offers me no comfort now. I think instead of Lysander, the brother only recently returned to