Read Online Raine: The Lords of Satyr by Elizabeth Amber - Free Book Online
Authors: Elizabeth Amber
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friends tonight? Paulo and Gani could always be counted on to join in any escapade. But if she turned up at either of their homes wearing only a cloak, they would whisk it from her, teasing. And when they discovered her true sex—when they discovered the deceit she’d perpetrated for all the years that she’d known them as friends—she feared what their reactions might be.
She scurried onward, unable to think of anything except the need to reach the bridge, which served as the only link across the Grand Canal that divided Venice. In the distance ahead, she saw its stone arch. The smell of the sea stung her nose as she rushed toward it.
She saw no one behind her. Heard no one. But still her heart thumped in time with her steps. Her breath was tortured, her entire body tense with fear of discovery. Would Salerno jump out at her from a cross street or one of the alleys, preventing her from reaching the bridge and any chance of escape?
Only a single gondola bobbed along the quay ahead, clacking softly. She had no money for its hire. Where would she go even if she could pay?
Lanterns along the bridge flickered, casting diamonds across the murky waters of the canal. The rain had stopped, and the night was turning foggy. The Palazzos Manin and Bembo along the Riva del Ferro, where shipments of iron were unloaded by day, were barely visible across the canal. An inky blackness of sky and sea loomed like a gaping maw waiting to swallow her.
Above her, on the balconies of the houses along the Riva del Vin, courtesans with bosoms far more ample than hers discreetly offered the use of their bodies to passersby in spite of the weather. If she called to them would they take pity on her? Unlikely, unless she had coin to offer.
Most of the vendors in the shops that stood atop the Rialto had gone home for the day by now. Cries from those who dwelled in squalor under the bridge came on the wind, frightening her.
If she’d been pronounced a girl nineteen years ago, she and her mother might be there among them. They would only have received a small dowry that wouldn’t have lasted long in view of her mother’s capricious spending.
Whores and beggars were rife in Venice since the French had sacked the city under Napoleon. By now the two of them would be huddled under the bridges like the rest of Venice’s poor. Though she might have somehow managed to find a way to survive, her mother would have withered under the strain and degradation.
Ahead, the bridge-dwellers stirred, calling to a well-dressed gentleman. “Signore! Signore! Look my way.”
She heard a noise behind her. Salerno? Turning back to look, she lunged forward…
And crashed into a human wall.
6
T he golden hammer chimed eight times in the Campanile di San Marco as Raine strode down the steps of the lecture hall. He was surrounded by a half-dozen vintners who still discussed the lecture on phylloxera, which they’d all attended.
“What do you think of the French government’s increasing their 30,000 franc prize to 300,000 for anyone who can produce a cure for the phylloxera?” someone asked.
“Idiotic,” said Raine.
“I agree,” said one of the others. “The recitation of suggestions for a curative we were subjected to was a waste of four hours if you ask me. That blasted bug will go on its merry way sucking the sap and life from our vines with no hindrance from the French from the sounds of things.”
Someone else spoke up. “Still, I think the French should be the ones to pay for a cure, if anyone does. They’re the most desperate, since their grapes succumbed to the pest first.”
“It’s not the right way to go about things,” Raine insisted. “You all heard what stupid notions the offer of a reward has put rise to.”
One of his companions laughed. “And the ones the French official read aloud to us were supposedly thought to be the most viable of the lot. Considering that, I shudder to imagine what the rejects must have been!”
Just
She scurried onward, unable to think of anything except the need to reach the bridge, which served as the only link across the Grand Canal that divided Venice. In the distance ahead, she saw its stone arch. The smell of the sea stung her nose as she rushed toward it.
She saw no one behind her. Heard no one. But still her heart thumped in time with her steps. Her breath was tortured, her entire body tense with fear of discovery. Would Salerno jump out at her from a cross street or one of the alleys, preventing her from reaching the bridge and any chance of escape?
Only a single gondola bobbed along the quay ahead, clacking softly. She had no money for its hire. Where would she go even if she could pay?
Lanterns along the bridge flickered, casting diamonds across the murky waters of the canal. The rain had stopped, and the night was turning foggy. The Palazzos Manin and Bembo along the Riva del Ferro, where shipments of iron were unloaded by day, were barely visible across the canal. An inky blackness of sky and sea loomed like a gaping maw waiting to swallow her.
Above her, on the balconies of the houses along the Riva del Vin, courtesans with bosoms far more ample than hers discreetly offered the use of their bodies to passersby in spite of the weather. If she called to them would they take pity on her? Unlikely, unless she had coin to offer.
Most of the vendors in the shops that stood atop the Rialto had gone home for the day by now. Cries from those who dwelled in squalor under the bridge came on the wind, frightening her.
If she’d been pronounced a girl nineteen years ago, she and her mother might be there among them. They would only have received a small dowry that wouldn’t have lasted long in view of her mother’s capricious spending.
Whores and beggars were rife in Venice since the French had sacked the city under Napoleon. By now the two of them would be huddled under the bridges like the rest of Venice’s poor. Though she might have somehow managed to find a way to survive, her mother would have withered under the strain and degradation.
Ahead, the bridge-dwellers stirred, calling to a well-dressed gentleman. “Signore! Signore! Look my way.”
She heard a noise behind her. Salerno? Turning back to look, she lunged forward…
And crashed into a human wall.
6
T he golden hammer chimed eight times in the Campanile di San Marco as Raine strode down the steps of the lecture hall. He was surrounded by a half-dozen vintners who still discussed the lecture on phylloxera, which they’d all attended.
“What do you think of the French government’s increasing their 30,000 franc prize to 300,000 for anyone who can produce a cure for the phylloxera?” someone asked.
“Idiotic,” said Raine.
“I agree,” said one of the others. “The recitation of suggestions for a curative we were subjected to was a waste of four hours if you ask me. That blasted bug will go on its merry way sucking the sap and life from our vines with no hindrance from the French from the sounds of things.”
Someone else spoke up. “Still, I think the French should be the ones to pay for a cure, if anyone does. They’re the most desperate, since their grapes succumbed to the pest first.”
“It’s not the right way to go about things,” Raine insisted. “You all heard what stupid notions the offer of a reward has put rise to.”
One of his companions laughed. “And the ones the French official read aloud to us were supposedly thought to be the most viable of the lot. Considering that, I shudder to imagine what the rejects must have been!”
Just
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