Read Online The Alchemist's Code by Dave Duncan - Free Book Online

up without falling over. I released his wretched prisoner, who rushed to wrap herself around him with many cries of, “My darling, my lover, are you all right, my heart, my…whatever…” And so on.
    Sickening.
    â€œHe broke my wrist!”
    â€œYou damned nearly killed me!” I retorted. I sheathed my sword and retrieved his. Seeing that the fight was safely over, men were running in from both ends of the riva and also emerging from the calle . “Danese, old friend!” I detached the girl so I could embrace him myself. That, being a proper greeting in Venice, would hopefully discourage the busybodies starting to wander in around us.
    I told his ear, “Let’s get out of here before someone calls the sbirri . We can talk it over somewhere quieter.” Releasing him, I said loudly, “I regret I frightened you, madonna. Your parents are very worried about you. I do have your father’s written permission to take you home.”
    â€œI don’t want to go home!” Her voice was larger than she was. “My father has no authority over me now. This man is my husband!”
    â€œYes,” I sighed. “I know. Do you want to argue that to a magistrate? Now let’s go before the sbirri get here.” Taking him along was not part of the plan and would complicate matters considerably, but I knew him and had hurt him. Call me a softie, but I could not just abandon him.
    Venetians are good Venetians first and good Catholics next, but most priests will marry a couple who threaten to embrace adultery—or embrace adulterously—no matter what the law says about parental permission. My tarot had told me what was brewing.
    Giorgio had already brought the Maestro’s gondola across and I urged everybody aboard. Danese was in too much pain to argue and the girl clung to him like tree bark. Their would-be gondolier had emerged from his bath. Had I thought that he was just a gondolier, I might have tipped him a lira for his trouble, but he had tried to brain me and I need all the brains the good Lord gave me. The fight had gone out of him; he did not try to block our departure.
    A grinning bystander handed me the portmanteau Danese had dropped. I thanked him politely.
    The girl went in the felze , of course, but when her evil kidnapper tried to follow her I told him to sit on the thwart and trail his hand in the water to keep it from swelling.
    â€œYou think you’re a doctor?” he snarled.
    â€œNot quite, but that’s the best way to ease the pain and stop it swelling.” I clambered in beside Grazia, being careful to leave visible space between us. A grinning Bruno settled in behind the felze , raising our prow significantly, and of course Giorgio stood at the stern, wielding his oar.
    I told him, “Ca’ Barbolano please.” The original plan had been straight to the Ca’ Sanudo. He turned our stern to the Rialto and headed home.
    Grazia was small, as I said, and seemed little older than she had in the family portrait. Her nose…Either Maestro Michelli had flattered his subject, or her nose had grown more than the rest of her since he painted her likeness. Truly she had her uncle Nicolò’s nose and on a woman it was a disfigurement. Her body might just qualify for “sylphlike” instead of “skinny” but her complexion was unremarkable and there was an unwelcome trace of hardness about her mouth. Her dress looked childish and somewhat crumpled. But oh, her eyes! They almost atoned for everything else. Without her excess of nose they would have made her a beauty.
    Danese I have already described. Normally he always seemed a little too conscious of his good looks, but just then he was more like a lemon, pale and bitter.
    â€œDamn you, Alfeo Zeno!” he whimpered. “Why are you meddling in my life? And how did you find us?”
    The first answer was, “One thousand ducats,” and better not