“Lorenzo has seen me unclothed before.”
“That’s no reason he should do so again. He gets enough enjoyment from tormenting me without your giving him any additional rewards. Things are going to be different.”
“Different?”
But he was gone, striding swiftly across the barnyard toward the house.
Sanchia made a futile attempt to adjust the torn gown before finally giving up and drawing her cloak over it. She could do nothing to mend the rip since neither needle nor thread was at hand. Perhaps she could find both when she returned to the farmhouse. Her gaze fixed dreamily on the glowing windows of the house. Different. What had he meant by saying things would be different? Nothing could be more different from her previous life than the hours and days since Lion had purchased her. Yet he must mean there would be still other changes on the horizon.
She had never been afraid of changes before, but now she felt a queer stirring within her that could be fear … or the first fragile beginnings of hope.
“Is all well with you?”
Sanchia turned to see Marco standing a few feet away from the door of the barn. “Did Lord Andreas send you to fetch me? There was no need. I was just coming.”
Marco shook his head. “Lion is studying the map of the maze. I thought to seize this opportunity to—” He broke off and then added, “I knew he was angry with you.”
“No more.”
He looked relieved. “I wasn’t sure. I cannot always read Lion.”
So Marco had come out to the barn to make sure she had met with no harm, Sanchia thought with a rush of warm gratitude. “Yet it’s obvious there is a deep affection between you.”
“We are brothers.” He smiled and shook his head. “No, it’s more than that. We don’t think alike and seldom act for the same reasons, but the bond is still there.”
“It doesn’t surprise me that he mystifies you at times. I have no understanding of the way he thinks,” Sanchia said. “He has so much. Why should he risk his life for a statue? He says the Wind Dancer is of his family but I cannot see how anyone can think of a piece of metal as if it were flesh and blood.” Her gaze lifted to meet his. “As if it were alive.”
“But then you’ve never seen the Wind Dancer,” Marco said softly. “The first time I saw it when I was a child I thought it was alive. It took away my breath and filled me with wonder.” He bent and picked up the lantern from the earthen floor. “Come, we will go back to the house. Lion may need me.”
“What does it look like?”
“The Wind Dancer?” Marco took Sanchia’s elbow and steered her through the doorway of the barn. “It’s not easy to describe it. Let’s see, it’s a bejeweled golden statue of Pegasus, the winged horse of the gods. It stands only eighteen inches high and is no more than fourteen inches in width. And the wings …” His slender left hand made a graceful motion as if caressing the statue. “The clouds on which the Pegasus is running are—”
“Running, not flying?”
Marco nodded. “The horse is running, his wings folded back against his body, the wind braiding his mane. His lips are slightly parted and his eyes are huge almond shaped emeralds. Only his left hind hoof is touching the cloud on the base of the statue so that, unless you look closely, it appears the Wind Dancer is truly sailing through the air.”
“It sounds very beautiful.”
“Too beautiful. It hurts to look at it.”
That was a strange thing to say, and the sadness in his expression was even more strange. “Lion said the statue was very ancient and that there were many legends told of it. How old is it?”
Marco shrugged. “Who knows?”
“Well, how long has your family possessed it?”
The sadness was suddenly gone from Marco’s expression and his hazel eyes twinkled with amusement. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. We’re a very old family.”
Sanchia chuckled. “You go back to Adam and Eve in the garden?”
“Don’t we all?”
“No, tell me. You must have some idea when—”
“Back to the ancients of Greece, near the beginning of time. Have you heard of Troy?”
She frowned. “Oh, yes. From a storyteller in the piazza … and once in a manuscript brought to Giov—” She stopped. He could have no interest in her former life. “Troy?”
Marco smiled down at her. “According to the stories passed down from generation to generation in my family, it was in Troy where Andros was first given the Wind Dancer.”
“Andros.” Sanchia repeated thoughtfully. “Andreas.”
“Names change through the centuries. We’re not sure whether Andros was our ancestor’s true name. It is said he was of the Shardana and consequently very tight-lipped about himself.”
“I’ve never heard of a people called the Shardana.” She gazed at him uncertainly. “You’re jesting with me, are you not? Is this a story you’ve concocted to punish me for being too curious?”
He shook his head. “I only tell you what I’ve been told.”
“Troy never existed. I have heard of the Iliad, but thought it was a myth, a fiction.”
“Alexander the Great thought Troy existed, and so did Julius Caesar. Many scholars believe Homer merely repeated what centuries of storytellers before him had handed down through the ages.”
“You think the Iliad is true?”
“I have no idea. Stories, like names, become twisted through the centuries. The tale I was told certainly didn’t agree with Homer’s.”
“What story were you told?”
“You won’t believe that either.” He turned to gaze out over the mirrored stillness of the lake. “But I’ll tell you anyway, if you like. Andros was a Shardana, one of the sea people. They were great raiders and warriors and very secretive about where they came from. They had reason to be discreet. For centuries they had raided the cities of Greece, Persia, and Egypt, and there had sprung up tales of the splendid city which had been founded from the wealth of their raids. All the cities of that time raided and pillaged but the Shardana were the most successful.”
“Corsairs.”
Marco nodded. “Andros’s ship was storm-wrecked on an island off the coast of Troy, and Andros and his crew were captured. His crew was sacrificed to the god Poseidon, but the Trojans saved Andros to be tortured to try to get him to reveal the location of his homeland.” Marco grimaced. “Evidently Troy was quite a raiding power itself and wished to bring home even more treasure and slaves. Andros refused to reveal the location of his city and would have died under the lash if Agamemnon hadn’t chosen that time to launch his attack on Troy. The Trojans became distracted.”
She frowned. “But the Trojan war went on for years and years, didn’t it?”
“That is Homer’s story. Our version has it that less than a year passed until Troy fell. Andros was given to Paradignes, the king’s brother, to recover his strength until they could once more direct their full attention toward getting the information they wanted from him. The two men became friends over the months of the siege and after Traynor opened the gates they—”
“Wait.” Sanchia held up her hand. “Who’s Traynor and why would he open the gates?”
“Traynor was a Trojan warrior, and he opened the gates for the oldest reason in the world. He was bribed. He was captured outside the gates in a foray and kept in the Greek encampment for over a week before he supposedly escaped and returned to Troy.
“One night, a few days after he returned, he opened the west gate and the Greeks rushed into the city. They were finally beaten back, but the Trojans lost many warriors and the Greeks managed to set fire to the gate as they left Troy. Traynor had been seen opening the gates and the king ordered that he be hacked to pieces, his remains burned in the square of the city.” He paused. “In Traynor’s lodgings the king’s guards found the Wind Dancer.”
“The bribe.”
Marco nodded. “The king gave the statue to Paradignes and ordered him to burn
it until there was nothing left of the Wind Dancer but molten rubble.”
“But he didn’t do it.”
“He was a lover of beauty and couldn’t bring himself to destroy the statue. He didn’t want the Greeks to have it either and knew it was only a matter of time until they conquered the city.” He smiled at Sanchia. “Can you guess what he did?”
“He gave the statue to Andros?”
“And showed him a way to get out of the city. It seems Troy had been destroyed and rebuilt many times and there was an underground passage that led to a hill far beyond the city. Paradignes showed Andros the entrance to the tunnel and wished both him and Jacinthe well before—”
“Jacinthe?”
“One of the conditions of Andros’s release was that he take not only the Wind Dancer but a woman from Troy. Paradignes didn’t want the Greeks to have her either.”
“Was the woman Paradignes’ wife?”
“He had no wife.”
Sanchia’s eyes widened. “Helen …” she whispered.
“There was no mention of a woman called Helen, only Jacinthe.” Marco smiled faintly. “But I find it significant that the word Jacinthe means ‘the beautiful one.’ ”
“And they both left Troy that night with the Wind Dancer. Where did they go?”
“South. Toward Egypt. The legend says the two of them stood on a hill some distance away from the city and watched it burn.”
“So that was the night the Trojans brought in the Greeks’ wooden horse?”
Marco chuckled and shook his head. “That’s Homer’s tale again. There was no great wooden horse. There was only the Wind Dancer.”
Only the Wind Dancer. A statue so beautiful that a man would betray his home and his people to possess it. A work of art so exquisite it would inspire tales that would endure for over a thousand years. “Do you believe what you’ve been told is true?”
“Sometimes. Is it not more reasonable that the gates of Troy would fall because of bribery and betrayal than such a stupid ploy as a wooden horse?”
“I suppose it is,” Sanchia said slowly. “Where do you suppose the Greeks got the Wind Dancer?”
“Before he died Traynor said the Greeks told him two shepherds found it in the hills above Mycenae during a great storm and brought it to Agamemnon. They claimed it appeared in a flash of lightning.”
“Nonsense.”
“Legend. And not nearly as unreasonable as some of the other legends connected with the Wind Dancer through the centuries.”
Sanchia was tempted to ask him to tell her those other legends, but suddenly she knew she didn’t want to know more about the statue. The Wind Dancer was now looming in her imagination with an odd sentience, taking on a dimension and life of its own. She could almost see the golden statue shimmering in the darkness of the storehouse, waiting patiently for Lion to come for it, uncaring what danger he ran to free it from its prison.
Foolishness. She had never even seen the statue. Her nerves were merely on edge and crying out from the terror and strain she had undergone this evening.
She forced a smile as she turned away from him. “A fantastic tale, but certainly an entertaining one. You’re a far better storyteller than Pico Fallone, who entertains in the piazza in Florence.” She glanced back over her shoulder. “But, of course, I don’t believe any part of it.”
A gentle smile lent fresh beauty to Marco’s fine features. “Of course not. You’re clearly a very sensible woman. Why would you believe such a preposterous legend? I only told you the story because you asked.”
“I was merely curious.” Sanchia quickly opened the door and stepped inside. “But naturally I realize none of it actually happened.”
“It’s going to take longer than thirty minutes to make our way through the maze to the storehouse, find the Wind Dancer, and then travel back to the maze entrance again.” Lion scowled down at the map. “There’s no question that the watch will discover we’ve entered the maze and have guards waiting for us at both ends.”
Marco bent closer. “Jesú, you’re right. We’ll have to stop every few turns and study the map.” He made a face. “What a puzzle. That labyrinth looks like a passage through hell.”
“Then Damari must feel completely at ease there,” Lion said.
“I could go with you and wait in the shrubbery across from the maze to dispose of the watch,” Lorenzo offered.
Lion weighed the suggestion. “I don’t like having no one to watch the horses, and it would probably give us only another five or ten minutes before someone else was sent to see why the watch hadn’t returned. I doubt if that would be long enough.”
Lorenzo shrugged. “What other choice do we have?”
She wouldn’t answer, Sanchia thought, looking down at her hands clenched tightly together in her lap. They weren’t talking to her. She could sit on the stool by the fire and not say a word. Lion had told her she need do no more to reclaim the Wind Dancer. She would be foolish to go back to the palazzo when Lion said she did not have to help them.
“No choice,” Lion said.
She would remain silent. Lion had said she need not endanger herself again.
But she had promised him loyalty as well as obedience. Was it loyal not to speak now?
“Then you and Marco go inside the maze and I stay outside and take care of the watch,” Lorenzo said. “Marco can carry the lantern and you can try to read the map.”
“And hope we don’t lose our way among all those damned dashes,” Marco said ruefully, “or we’ll find ourselves hacking our way through those hedges with a broadsword.”
“Those hedges are almost four feet thick. At any place but the last outer hedge that borders the perimeter it would take the better part of a day to cut our way through.” Lion grimaced. “Providing we knew in which direction to cut. We’ll just have to—”
“I can lead you through the maze.”
The three men turned to look at Sanchia.
Sweet Jesus, why had she spoken? she wondered, slowly unclenching her clammy palms and rubbing them on the skirt of her gown. She stood up. “I can lead you to the storehouse and back to the entrance in less than thirty minutes.”
Marco shook his head. “I know you want to help, Sanchia, but this maze is hellish. No one can—”
“I can.” She came forward and looked down at the map. “I won’t have to stop and check the map every few minutes and I won’t lose my way. I’ll know exactly where I’m going every minute.”
“Astonishing,” Lorenzo said. “And unbelievable.”
“No, it’s true.” She closed her eyes and envisioned the map before her. “When you enter the maze you turn right, go past two passages and then turn left, go past another three passages and turn left again, then—”
“Enough,” Lion said.
She opened her eyes to see him looking at her with a faint smile on his lips. “It seems Giovanni wasn’t trying to raise your price as I suspected.”
She shook her head. “I remember everything. From the time I was a small child I had only to see something once to keep it forever in mind.”
“Surely a mixed blessing, but in this case a fortunate one for us.” He paused. “If you choose to come with us.”
“Choose? You do not command me?”
“I told you that you need not go back to the palazzo. I won’t break my word.”
Lorenzo cupped his hand to his left ear. “Hark, do I hear the glorious peal of trumpets? I don’t think I can bear many more of these appallingly honorable moods to which you persist in subjecting me, Lion.”
“Be quiet, Lorenzo.” Lion’s gaze did not leave Sanchia’s face. “I won’t force you to go back with us.”
“But you have need of me.”
“Oh yes, we have need of you, Sanchia.” He smiled that rare, brilliant smile that always succeeded in touching some mysterious emotion within her that had never been tapped before. A smile was a mere expression, she thought, puzzled. It should not have the power to cau
se this warm flowering of hope. A smile should not be able to make her do something so foolish as to go back to the palazzo. She should ignore his smile and tell him she would never return to the palazzo again.
“I’ll go,” she whispered. “I’ll lead you through the maze.”
Eight
Sanchia shivered as she gazed through the iron bars of the gates at the maze. When she had first seen the tall hedges of the labyrinth last night she had thought they resembled the walls of a fortress, but she had never dreamed she’d actually have to breach them.
“I still don’t think we should enter the maze through the south entrance,” Marco whispered. “Why don’t we try the north entrance, where there’s no officer in charge?”
“No.” Lion didn’t look at him as he opened the gate. “We go through the south entrance.”
“But we should—”
“I want Rodrigo,” Lion said savagely. “Give me five minutes and then bring Sanchia.” He faded into the dense shrubbery bordering the gate.
Her body icy now with foreboding in addition to fear, Sanchia wrapped her cloak closer about her and continued to stare at the maze. Death. Rodrigo Estaban was going to die within minutes at Lion’s hand.
“It’s time to go.” Marco took her elbow and propelled her gently forward. “Quickly, Sanchia.”
There was no sign of Rodrigo or the other guard at the south entrance of the maze. Lion came out of the maze and knelt to wipe his sword on the grass before sheathing it. Blood edged his scabbard. Sanchia couldn’t seem to tear her gaze from the wet, dark stain on the grass.
“I dragged them both just inside,” Lion said tersely. “Be careful not to stumble over them.” He turned back into the maze.
Marco lit the lantern as soon as they had joined Lion within the screening confines of the hedges.
Rodrigo Estaban and his fellow guard lay on their backs, their dead eyes staring sightlessly up at the black heavens.