The Immortal Greek (16 page)

Ravenna’s first reaction would have been to yell at Malina to make her finish her tale. Instead, she tried a breathing exercise to calm her nerves.

“As soon as the door was closed and barred behind me, the noises from inside the house changed. I heard screaming and begging. At first, I thought my cousin had orchestrated the whole thing, and I prepared myself to see the two of them barreling through the door to make fun of me. So I put a hand over my mouth and I tried my best not to scream when I heard steps coming from nearby. I backpedaled until I found a wall, then I followed its contour to a doorjamb. I felt the frame of the door with my fingers, getting several splinters under my fingernails in the process, but once I rounded it, I saw faint light coming from the other side and I kept walking in that direction. I hoped to find my way out through the servants’ opening that normally would have been at the back of the house. Instead, I found the stairwell that led both upstairs to the bedrooms and downstairs to the cellars. The noises came from the bedroom, from where a bright light spilled into the stairwell. At that point, I had the feeling something was completely wrong. The smell in the air, the quality of the illumination—everything was unnatural. I turned on my heels, finally ready to call it quits, when I was grabbed from behind. A hand was lowered over my mouth and I almost fainted. I struggled to free myself, but I wasn’t as strong as I am now, and my assailant wasn’t the boy I had thought him to be. I was dragged upstairs where I was dumped on a floor slick and wet with blood. My mouth free from the restraint, the smell of old blood, like at the butcher’s, hit my senses and I gagged. The bright light coming from a corner of the room temporarily blinded me and it took me a few seconds to make sense of what I was looking at.” She took another of her long pauses, but raised her chin to face Ravenna instead of staring at imaginary points. “Your fiancé, the illustrious Livio, the renowned merchant the whole of Florence knew for his virtues, was sacrificing women on an altar.”

Ravenna instinctively shook her head.

“I didn’t know then that he was sacrificing women, of course. That is knowledge I acquired later on. Back then, I was only seventeen. Brave and careless. And naïve. I was so shocked by the sight, a man I knew of, my best friend’s promised, with his hands elbow deep in the carcass of what once had been a woman. I didn’t scream. I didn’t move from the spot.”

“It can’t be.” Ravenna felt sick. The picture Malina was depicting had that eerie ring of truth that made it difficult to dismiss as a lie.

Malina’s lips turned up in the ghost of a smile. “It shouldn’t have been. In a fair world, I would’ve encountered a caring man, lived a human life to its completion, and left numerous progeny behind.”

“He was never… I didn’t—” Ravenna’s stomach hurt.

“No, you couldn’t know. Nobody besides his helpers knew. The man who had dragged me upstairs was one of them. He grabbed my hair and led me closer to the altar, where his master had successfully rescinded the woman’s heart from her open thorax. The man waited before interrupting Livio, who seemed deep in trance, his eyes rolled to the whites as he ate the organ still pumping blood.” Malina slouched against the radiator. She looked tired. “The man, no more than a servant, asked permission to talk only when, several minutes later, Livio’s eyes rolled back to normality. ‘Master, I got a fresh one for you. She might be a virgin also.’ I was paralyzed by fear, but when Livio lowered his gaze onto me, I convulsed and released all the contents of my stomach onto the floor. The servant slapped me, but Livio stopped his hand from hitting me a second time. ‘I know you,’ he said. ‘You’re my stupid fiancé’s equally stupid friend.’ He brought his bloodied fingers under his chin as if to ponder my fate, then laughed. ‘Ravenna seems to be very fond you. It is only fair you’ll both share the same destiny. Hazelthot needs fresh virginal blood and you’ll do just fine until my dear wife’s turn to contribute to the monthly quota.’” Malina leaned toward Ravenna, who was now ready to cast her last meal out.

“He would’ve killed me.” Ravenna could barely say the words without heaving.

“Yes, he would have. If anything good came from my exile from Florence, it was that I saved your life by chance.”

Ravenna pressed her hands over her stomach to relieve the pressure, but the cuffs and the chain painfully poked her. “If he was about to kill you there at the haunted house, how did I come to meet you at his stables instead?”

Another grimace thinned Malina’s lips. “That was Giulia’s courtesy as well. When she didn’t see me banging on the door, screaming to be let out, she sent the boyfriend to check what I was up to. You should’ve seen him. The poor boy pissed himself as soon as he entered the sacrificial room. He couldn’t stop screaming and Livio asked his minion to kill him. Before dying, in a vain attempt to save his life, he gave away Giulia’s presence outside.” She shook her head. “When Giulia entered the room, dragged in by the minion, she immediately assessed the situation, gave her dead boyfriend a glance, and told Livio she wanted to be like him. He laughed, then said, ‘Little girl, you don’t know what you’re asking.’ She answered by walking to him and rising on tiptoes to kiss him on his mouth.”

Ravenna couldn’t shake the image of what must have been a bloody kiss and felt even worse. Despite the pain, she pressed down on her stomach and hunched over, gasping for air.

“Giulia wasn’t happy with me just dying and convinced Livio a better solution would be to pull one last, cruel prank on me by making you think I had an affair with your fiancé,
then
sacrifice me to Hazelthot. Giulia was jealous of you as well, and Livio liked the idea of humiliating you.”

“He probably thought I wouldn’t have dared to publicly reveal the affair.” Ravenna tasted blood in her mouth.

“Yes, I believe they counted on you coming alone and not bringing the cavalry along. That upset their plans for the two of us. In the commotion that followed, half of the household converged to the stable. Rumors spread fast among the servants, and soon after you left, escorted by your mother and their maids, half of Florence had arrived. I managed to escape while Livio tried to send everyone away.” Malina caressed her arms, goose bumps on her skin. She looked at the window and shivered. “It’s getting darker.”

“Are you okay?” Ravenna had noticed Malina’s hair looked more ruffled than a moment earlier.

As if following Ravenna’s thoughts, Malina passed her right hand through her mane. “The pull to change is getting stronger.”

Ravenna nodded, not knowing what to say or how to help her in any case. She decided to go for idle conversation. “What happened next?”

“As you know, Livio went on to marry several young girls who died either during childbirth or soon after—”

“Those girls were all from outside of Florence, seemingly with no families.” She did remember all the gossip Livio’s marriages generated for more than a decade. Anybody who knew her thought she wanted to know what happened to her ex fiancé.

“They were rarely seen outside of his properties and didn’t socialize. The only people allowed to see them were the family’s medicus, and Giulia.” Her hand still resting on her head, Malina leaned sideways against the radiator, adjusting her body once or twice before she could find a position. “Of course, nobody knew of Giulia. Nobody even suspected she was the only bride Livio kept and respected the whole time, while the others were sacrificial lambs. Literally.”

Ravenna was stuck at something Malina had just said and had barely listened afterwards. “Alberto Giudici…”

Malina shrugged. “What about him?” She massaged her temples with unsteady fingers.

“He was Livio’s medicus.”

Malina dismissed her words by waving one of her hands outward. “I would’ve known.”

“No, it wasn’t common knowledge. Alberto, who was related to my mother, presented Livio to my family, vouching for his intentions when Livio asked my hand in marriage. I remember the night Alberto came to talk to my father. One of the servants knocked on my room to tell me my father was talking with my mother’s cousin about marrying me to a merchant. I went downstairs and eavesdropped from the wall of the adjacent room. When my father asked about my potential husband’s wealth and health, Alberto told him he was his personal physician and that there was nothing to worry about.”

Malina scratched her head, then frowned. “Do you think Alberto knew of Livio’s proclivities?”

Ravenna’s heart was heavy. “I hope he didn’t, but if he did—” A sudden smell coming from under the door hit her nostrils and she gasped in recognition of where they were.

****

Alexander’s previous anger toward Ravenna turned to fear for her. He barely glanced at the plate Marta had brought him. Before him, positioned over a lacy napkin on a small coffee table, lay one of his favorite breakfasts, croissants fresh from the oven and the homemade marmalade Marta personally prepared with the apricots from his Amalfi villa. He had presently forgotten all about his headache. Samuel had kept talking on the phone while his mind replayed his last words to Ravenna. Sensing the angel was telling him something important, he tried to focus on the here and now. “Can you repeat that?”

“I said I’m driving to Ravenna’s. Maybe we can find a clue about her kidnappers. Malina never made it home, and we thoroughly searched her car, but it turned out to be clean.”

“Sure. I’ll meet you there.” Alexander threw the handset on his loveseat and almost dropped the breakfast plate on the floor when he stood and moved the coffee table out of the way in his eagerness to get out of the house, only to stumble on it. His head wasn’t as clear as he had thought.

“Mister Drako.” Marta was looking at him from the hallway. She was on the last step of the stairs, balancing a tray with a fuming moka, cup and saucer, and a second plate full of mini-pastries.

He heard the censure in her voice, but ignored her, and while trying to look more sober than he felt, he walked toward her. “Thanks.” He grabbed the moka and filled the cup to the brim.

Marta raised one eyebrow. “Sugar?”

He shook his head and drank the entire cup. Then he continued until the moka was empty and he felt like a black hole had just formed in his stomach.

Marta handed him a napkin. “You should let Pietro drive.”

Alexander knew she was right, but he couldn’t stand his own presence at the moment and needed to be alone. “I’m fine. Stop worrying about me.” He left a kiss on her cheek as he navigated around her and gained the stairs. He ran down before she could say anything that made irrefutable sense and forced him to follow her suggestion.

Probably called by his wife with a heads-up, Pietro managed to catch up with him at the garage door. “Mister Drako?”

The couple had a way of pronouncing his last name with so much loaded content that they were able to express a whole concept within it. “I already told your wife I’m fine.”

Pietro’s face was a mask, but Alexander noticed the way his lower lip trembled a bit. His majordomo was prompt in hiding the tick denoting his uneasiness. “I wanted to let you know that Miss Del Sarto came back yesterday afternoon and left a message for you. In case you haven’t touched base with her yet, she wanted to invite you for dinner yesterday night.”

“At what time was she here?” A sour feeling crept inside of Alexander, until he could taste it in his mouth.

Pietro removed a speck of dust from his livery. “It was in the afternoon, soon after lunch time.”

Uncertain of what to do with that information, Alexander thanked him and found his way inside his car without realizing he had done so. He was already halfway to Ravenna’s when he finally engaged his mind in the act of driving. Once he reached her house, the mere sight of her door threw his stomach in knots. Ravenna’s fiancé wearing an apron was the only image he could see. He stepped out of his Mercedes, but his legs refused to climb the steps.

“Alexander. Up here.” Samuel waved at him from the open window to the right of the door. The angel disappeared for a moment, then reappeared beside the door he had opened for him.

Alexander took the stairs as steadily as his trembling legs allowed. “Any witnesses?” He didn’t know how to ask about the fiancé and hoped Karl wasn’t there.

“None. Ravenna was kidnapped between shifts. There are no signs of forced entry.” Samuel sidestepped to close the door behind him, then showed Alexander the wooden surface was intact. “We’re running prints, but I don’t think we’ll find anything useful.”

“She knew the person who abducted her.” Alexander looked around the hallway. The apartment didn’t show any sign of altercation. The pair of ballerina flats he had seen her wear were neatly arranged by the door. He saw her walking around, her black hair moving as she swayed to the kitchen. “Was she alone?” He didn’t want to know if she wasn’t, but what Pietro had told him and the sight of the kitchen table decked for two made him think.

Samuel followed Alexander’s eyes and he too focused on the table. “Yes, she was alone.” He walked to one of the chairs that lay at an angle to the table and automatically put it back under it.

“Was she expecting someone?” Alexander didn’t like asking roundabout questions, but when it came to Ravenna, he had to admit he wasn’t sure how to behave.

“I already called her fiancé, Karl, and asked him to come here.” Samuel gave his cell phone a peek. “Meanwhile, let’s search the rest of the house and see if we can find anything useful.”

Alexander dragged his feet after Samuel, trying his best to steady his nerves before Karl arrived. Not even ten minutes of fruitless search had passed when the doorbell rang.

Samuel opened the door for Karl and it was immediately evident the two men knew each other. Somehow, Alexander took offense to that. Then Samuel made the official introduction between the two, and when Karl approached him to shake his hand, Alexander counted to ten before he reciprocated the gesture.

Karl turned to Samuel. “We met yesterday.”

“You did?” The angel gave Alexander a puzzled look.

He looked down at the point of his shoes, suddenly remembering he hadn’t thought necessary to mention that detail to Samuel when they had talked earlier. “I came by to talk to Ravenna about the case, but she wasn’t home. Karl was here.”