Chapter Twenty-Six
My heart slams against my breastbone, writing a frantic message: Niccolo is here. Niccolo is here. NICCOLO IS HERE!
My feet are flying. Leonardo falls behind, shouting. I don’t pause to hear what he’s saying.
The rain has stopped, and the narrow streets swell with people trapped inside until now.
They just barely move aside for the racing horse.
They definitely don’t move aside for me.
A frantic scream tears from my throat, and the crowd becomes a blur of shocked faces.
No one wants to stand betwixt a madman and what he’s chasing.
It’s just enough to let me keep the rider in sight, to not lose him down a sharp corner.
The horse pauses at the end of a distant block. I get close enough to see it’s stopped in front of a grand house with an unfamiliar coat of arms hanging from its window.
Niccolo dismounts. He tosses the reins aside carelessly. A footman lunges to grab the horse’s reins before they hit the filthy street. Niccolo climbs the wide stone steps.
I throw myself after him in one last, desperate rush. My fingers catch his finely embroidered sleeve. “Volpone!”
Niccolo turns, eyes wide. The air catches in my lungs at the tiny heart-shaped divot on his cheekbone—a scar from a rock when we were little. I thud to the stairs on my knees, all my strength gone. “It’s you. It’s really you.”
He grips my wrist, the only thing keeping me from falling off the stairs entirely. His other hand is held palm-out to the footmen, motioning them back.
On his finger is a familiar ring.
A cluster of black garnets on a heavy silver band.
I spent all of my first payment from Verrocchio on it.
I couldn’t fathom the extravagance now, but at the time, it felt right to spend everything I had on the person I loved most. He helped me convince our hidebound father that going into a trade would be good for me.
He knew I needed to leave Casa delle Volpi before our father broke me.
I wanted Niccolo to know how much his support meant.
Niccolo blinks, his mouth slack with shock. “Who are you?”
The words don’t make any sense. “It’s… me. Your brother.”
A maelstrom of emotions swirls across his face—confusion, disbelief, and, finally, anger.
“I have no brother.”
He lets go. I sprawl into the street, staring with horror as he disappears inside and the doors slam in my face.