A Bolt from the Blue, page 23
A roar of assent rose from the men within the hall, drowning out my cry of fear. Barely had the soldiers laid rough hands upon both their captives, when a familiar voice cried out over the chaos.
“Wait, Uncle! I can tell you which one of these men is Leonardo the Florentine.”
The claim came from the dark-haired youth with a pockmarked face who was pushing his way through the milling men to where the Duke of Pontalba stood. Earlier, he’d been dressed in a plain brown tunic, but he no longer wore an apprentice’s simple garb. Instead, he was clad in red and gold parti-colored trunk hose, over which he wore a blue silk tunic trimmed in gold, his white shirt puffed through the many slits in his sleeves. With a rolled brim hat of gold similar to his uncle’s sitting rakishly atop his head, he was all but unrecognizable as my friend Tito.
“What have you done?” I softly cried, knowing full well that he could not hear me but unwilling to believe that the youth whom I had considered to be both a friend and ally was apparently neither.
And yet, as my thoughts tumbled back over the events of the past weeks, the revelation made an odd sort of sense.
Tito had claimed his uncle was a soldier, which was surely the truth, for the Duke of Pontalba was a military man. Too, he drove a team of horses with far greater skill than a humble apprentice would possess. And, more than once, had I not heard him dismiss those of lesser ranks with a callousness that did not befit an apprentice’s station? As for the knife I’d seen him brandish, I had known at a glance that it was far too fine a weapon for a youth such as he to possess.
But why would a young man of his background buy an apprenticeship to a master painter?
The soldiers, meanwhile, had halted at Tito’s words and gazed uncertainly at the duke for direction. Shaking his head in disgust, Nicodemo gestured them to bring their prisoners forward once again.
“Very well,” he agreed, his sour tone matching his expression as he spared a glance for the youth beside him. “Stay a moment, and let us pause to hear what my worthless nephew has to say about this.”
A blush darkened Tito’s face, but his expression was defiant as he pointed at the Master.
“This man is Leonardo the Florentine, inventor of the flying machine. The other man is who he claims to be, nothing but a cabinetmaker who was staying with Leonardo. I gave your spies a fine description of the person they wanted. It is not my fault that they took the wrong man.”
Nicodemus raised a sparse brow. “Are you saying, boy, that you’ve known from the start that the man we were holding was not Ludovico’s master engineer?”
The duke’s tone was mild enough, but something in his expression made Tito sputter as he answered, “I knew . . . That is, I came back to the castle to tell you . . . but I—”
Swift as a knife strike, Nicodemo slapped his nephew. The sound of flesh against flesh was loud enough for me to hear where I stood. Tito staggered from the impact, clutching at his jaw. To his credit, however, he promptly straightened and, heedless of his now-bleeding lip, met his uncle’s cold gaze.
“That is for allowing me to look like a fool before my men,” the duke remarked, though with far less vitriol than I might have expected.
His fury apparently spent for the moment, he strode back around the table and again seated himself in his carved chair. Turning an ironic look on Tito, he waved a careless hand.
“My apologies, Nephew,” he said with mock graciousness. “In all the excitement, I forgot to welcome you home to Pontalba again. And now, since you were supposed to be my eyes and ears in Milan, perhaps you will enlighten me with any other information that you have neglected to provide.”
Dabbing the back of his hand to his lip, Tito nodded.
“Very well, Uncle. The Duke of Milan’s army is not waiting in the forest preparing to lay siege. In fact, Il Moro is meeting secretly with the French king’s representatives and is unaware of what is happening here in Pontalba. He knows nothing of the missing flying machine or the supposed kidnapping of his master engineer.”
“But the men in the forest—”
“—are but an illusion concocted by Leonardo,” Tito cut his uncle short with a small smirk of satisfaction. “The so-called army is but twenty of his apprentices, and many painted canvases cleverly arranged to look like rows of fighting men.”
“You are certain of this?” the duke demanded, his expression one of genuine surprise.
Tito shrugged. “I was there, and I helped arrange the props myself.”
Nicodemo sat silent for a moment, tapping his fingertips together as he considered the situation. Finally, he replied, “This is, indeed, a bird of a different feather. Twenty boys, you say?”
At Tito’s nod, the duke shot Leonardo another feral smile.
“You are quite clever, Florentine, and another time your plan might have borne fruit. This time, however, I fear your cleverness will be your undoing . . . but, for the moment, I have decided to keep you and the cabinetmaker alive.”
Turning to his captain of the guard, he commanded, “Remove these two to the dungeons, and have your men mount up. I want you to scour the forest and bring me those boys. Those who resist, run them through with your swords where they stand. The others, bring to the castle and toss them into the dungeon with their master and the cabinetmaker.”
To Leonardo, he said in satisfaction, “We shall see if Ludovico chooses to bring his true army to Pontalba once he learns of your fate. If he does, those boys of yours will make a fine greeting for him, hanging from my parapets. And, if he does not, I’m sure they will prove able workers in my quarry cutting stone to rebuild my castle.”
Whether or not Leonardo made a reply to that last, I did not wait to hear. I was already hurrying through the narrow passage, a plan half-formed in my mind as I retraced my steps through the castle. For the moment, I could do nothing for my father and the Master, but perhaps I could save my fellow apprentices from a cruel fate!
My breath was coming in panicked gasps by the time I reached the flimsy iron staircase that spiraled up to the roof. Knees shaking, I managed the steps as swiftly as I could, all the while knowing that time had me trapped on either side. It would not take the duke’s men long to assemble and ride out, meaning that I had to finish my preparations before they spilled past the castle gate. Neither could I forget that Tito knew I was here in the castle with him. Sooner or later, he would come looking for me . . . and if he discovered me too soon, all would truly be lost.
I eased open the door to the roof, mindful of the soldiers that I had earlier seen lining the parapets. I had to assume they were still there, keeping watch over Leonardo’s illusion of an army. Given that I wore my borrowed page’s tunic, I could claim to be delivering a message from one of Nicodemo’s other men should I be seen and questioned. But, for the moment, this portion of the walk appeared deserted.
As before, that first step out onto the roof sent me swaying. Taking a steadying breath, I started along the walkway in the direction where I had last seen the flying machine. Only then did it occur to me that perhaps the craft still lay in pieces. It had been but a handful of days since my father had vowed to finish building it so that he could make his escape by air and fly it away to Milan. If he had not yet completed his work, my plan was for naught, and I might as well surrender myself to the duke, then and there.
A heavy hand abruptly closed over my arm and cut short my musings, while the suddenness of the assault caused me to stumble alarmingly close to the parapets. The same hand jerked me upright again, and an angry red face pressed close to mine.
“What are you doing up here, boy?” the guard demanded, his breath faintly redolent of the cesspit. “Quick, speak, or I’ll toss you off the roof.”
“Please, I was sent with a message,” I cried in unfeigned fear as I struggled to regain my wits. When his grip on me loosened, I managed, “His Excellency has discovered that there is no army in the forest, only boys playing at being soldiers. The other men-at-arms are being sent on horseback to round them up. You—you are to go with them.”
I tossed out that last with the fervent prayer that such an order was breaking no soldier’s protocol. By this time, a second guard had been attracted by the commotion and joined his fellow in time to hear my last words.
My stomach lurched as the pair exchanged cruel grins, but to my relief their amusement was not directed at me.
“Pah, I thought there was something odd about it all,” the second man declared as his companion released my arm. “As for the other, it sounds like fine sport.”
“Why should the others have all the fun?” the first guard agreed with a laugh.
Leaving me to my own devices, the pair moved with eager purpose in the same direction from which I’d come. I waited a few moments longer lest any other guards appear; then, emboldened by this small success, I continued on my way.
A few moments later, I found the flying machine in the same place that I’d left it . . . and I gave a soft cry of relief to realize that my father had not been idle in his captivity. For no longer was Leonardo’s grand design but hewn lengths of wood and frames of stretched cloth. Instead, the craft now appeared as some fantastic, gossamer-like creature—not quite bird and not quite insect—which had landed by some providential accident upon this slate roof.
Knowing that my life depended upon it, I swiftly went over every one of its lines to assure myself that the flying machine was a finished work. Both cloth-covered wings had been affixed to the sleek body, their total span almost four times my height. Lengths of braided cord and leather served as its sinews, connected at various points on both wings and body, and attached to a series of foot pedals and hand levers, which the pilot would control.
I gave each an experimental push and was gratified to see the wings sweep up and down in measured response. The rudderlike tail had been completed, and a simple knob pulled up and pushed down made that nether limb of the craft rise and fall accordingly.
And no longer did the flying machine hunker on its bladderlike underbelly much as a sickly goose. Instead, four large wheels had been added to either corner of the supporting frame, raising the body sufficiently so that the entire craft could roll about with ease on a flat surface.
I spotted a rope looped through a stirrup mounted beneath the craft’s nose, and I let my gaze follow that cord’s length to its starting point. Someone, no doubt my father, had tied the other end to a short chimney at the top of a slanted section of roof behind the flying machine. Tracing a path back down from the chimney and past the craft again, I saw that it led to a spot where a section of the parapets had long since been broken away from the roof’s edge, leaving a sheer drop to the ground.
Recalling my father’s plan, I guessed that it would be but a simple matter for a single person to use that rope and stirrup like a pulley to drag the craft back toward the chimney and tie it off. Once the pilot was settled in the craft, he—or she—could release the rope and allow the flying machine to roll down that incline again. The path was both long enough and steep enough so that, by the time the craft reached the roof’s edge, it should have gained sufficient momentum to fly like a captive hawk abruptly freed of its jesses.
But what would happen if my father had misjudged the angle and speed?
The fleeting image of a hawk tangled in her hunting laces and plummeting to the earth flashed through my mind. At that thought, fear gripped me with so cold an embrace that I dropped to my knees and squeezed my eyes shut.
Folly, my inner voice cried. To attempt such a flight was to court certain death! The Master had said that the craft should be tested over water at first, lest a failure cause it to drop from the sky. What madness had led me to think that I, Delfina della Fazia, could accomplish a feat that had been the sole purview of birds and angels, up until now?
The sound of shouting men and stamping horses from the main courtyard below pierced the veil of fear that wrapped me. I eased over to the parapets, peered down, and caught back a gasp. Two score or more mounted men, and at least twice that number on foot, were gathering below me.
I saw no archers, and I reasoned that the duke would not want to waste good arrows on such a sparsely numbered opponent. But the other weapons I saw were equally deadly. Some of the soldiers brandished swords; others wielded crossbows or pikes. And all were readying themselves and their steeds to hunt down fewer than twenty young men, unarmed save for what sticks or stones they might snatch up in defense!
Tears welled in my eyes as I heard the soldiers’ cruel laughter and jokes ring loud above the sound of hooves and steel. The Duke of Pontalba had given his men leave to slaughter those apprentices who resisted them. Taken unawares as they surely would be, the youths would have no time to flee but would be forced into either submission or battle.
Davide would fight back, I told myself . . . and Paolo, and Tommaso, and Vittorio. Would the others stand their ground as their friends fell around them? Or would they realize the futility of resistance and give their surrender, to find death later once the duke deemed them of no further use as hostages?
But if the soldiers could be distracted long enough as they poured out from the castle, the apprentices might yet make their escape. With eight horses among them, they need not flee on foot but could abandon wagons and gear, and gallop off toward safety. Even riding two up, they would have a small advantage of speed over their pursuers’ more heavily laden steeds. How long and how far Nicodemo’s men would follow after them, I could not guess. But at least they would have a chance at escape, a chance they would not have if I chose the coward’s path now and stood aside to watch the coming debacle.
Thus resolved, I scrambled to my feet. The sound of the soldiers below echoing in my ears, I rushed back to the flying machine to make final preparations for victory . . . or, failing that, provision for a quick and glorious death.
22
... the famous bird will take its flight, which will fill the world with its great renown.
—Leonardo da Vinci, Manuscript Sul Volo
I had several minutes to prepare for my bold flight, I was certain, for it took time to ready so many soldiers all at once. And Nicodemo’s men would surely feel no great haste, knowing now the nature of their opponents.
Rope in hand, I began dragging the flying machine upward toward the chimney. The task proved harder than it looked, for the incline was steep, but soon enough I had tied the craft off so that its nose pointed down the slope.
Next came the task of strapping myself onto its frame . . . and, once again, I felt my courage quail as I contemplated that step. Large as the craft was, there still was little there to support me, so that it would be like climbing onto the back of an immense bird and clinging to its feathers for dear life. How could I consider trusting so fragile-looking a frame?
“Father would do it,” I sternly told myself. “And the Master would not be afraid.”
Besides, my inner voice reminded me, what was there to lose? If I did not make this attempt but simply waited for my own capture, I likely would end up dead alongside my fellows.
“Far better to die like a hawk than as a mouse,” I softly proclaimed and settled myself facedown upon the framework.
My last task would be to strap myself in. First, however, I spared a moment to test each pedal and lever, amazed that my lightest touch moved the great wings with ease. I had feared that I might not be able to reach those controls, designed as they’d been for a man of the Master’s height. Fortunately, they were positioned in such a way that they could be reached from various angles. All I would have to remember was the proper sequence of pedaling and flapping to keep the craft aloft once it was airborne.
All I would have to remember, indeed!
The commotion from the courtyard was growing louder. I knew, however, that I must take my cue from the now-familiar squeal and rattle of heavy chain that would signal the portcullis being raised. For the soldiers would not pour from the gate like ants stirred from a hill; rather, they would ride out and arrange themselves into formation first, before charging toward the tree line beyond. It would be at the moment when they began the assault that I would let loose the rope and sail the flying machine from the castle roof.
I managed a weak smile at the thought of the chaos I would cause. The sight of me gliding hawklike above the field would cause no end of consternation among the soldiers, while striking terror among the horses. Surely many a frightened steed would unseat his rider . . . and surely many a superstitious man would drop to his knees in the belief that he was about to be visited with divine retribution.
Once aloft, I would remain airborne for as long as I could, giving my fellows the time to make their escape while the duke’s men were thus distracted. And afterward, if my strength and the winds allowed it, like Daedelus, I would pilot the craft on to safety, perhaps as far as Milan.
But, if my fate instead mirrored that of the luckless Icarus, at least my spectacular demise when I hurtled to the ground should prove an equal distraction.
Knowing I could not put it off any longer, I reached for the first strap, which would go around my torso and fasten beneath me. My nerves were stretched as taut as the canvas on my craft’s wings, while sweat had begun to trickle from my brow. And still, the gate had not risen. Saints’ blood, how long did it take to gather arms and saddle horses and be off?
I paused in fastening the belt and sat back upon my heels, craning my neck in hopes of a better look. From the angle where the craft was poised, however, it was impossible to see the activity below. Still, the hum of preparation continued, and I lent my ear to that activity as I once more settled upon the frame and reached for the harness. Indeed, so carefully did I focus my attention on those sounds that the soft scrape of footsteps was almost upon me before I realized I was no longer alone on my rooftop perch.
