Today's Reading
PROLOGUE
ALONG THE WESTERN COAST OF ITALY—1750
She ran down the quiet streets, her fine leather slippers making no sound on the worn cobblestones. She skidded past another alley and risked a quick look over her shoulder. At this time of night, most everyone in the coastal village would be safely tucked into their beds. No footsteps fell behind her, but the unmistakable certainty she was being followed forced her to make haste. Her breath rasped in the frosty air as she hurried on, feeling time tick away with every heartbeat. The darkness of the new moon helped to hide her, but it also meant she was out of time.
The ship would sail with the tide.
A block away from the smithy, she stopped and pulled the heavy boots she'd been carrying over her slippers. She tugged her cap lower and secured the square of rough fabric hiding her face, then wiped a sweaty palm over the trousers and shirt she'd taken from one of the young stable hands.
When she reached the blacksmith's forge, she swung the heavy wooden door open, cringing at the squeak of rusty hinges. The smithy glanced up as she slipped into the courtyard, his work-weary eyes narrowed, swarthy skin glistening with sweat, then stuck the metal rod back into the glowing coals.
"Come back tomorrow." He pulled the metal out and set it on the anvil, where it pulsed with heat and light. His hammer rang against the glowing iron circle at the end, flattening it.
She kept her voice pitched low, raspy. "My master needs them now. I can't return without them."
He held the glowing round emblem up with tongs, the two-inch circle displaying an anchor with a feather superimposed across its center. Her breath caught. It was exactly right.
"I need time to finish the others."
"There is no more time," she hissed. As if to underscore her words, running footsteps and clanking weapons sounded outside. They made no attempt at stealth or silence.
The smithy's face paled in the light of the forge. "Go. Now."
He plunged the emblem into a bucket of water, where the iron hissed and sputtered. Quickly, he grabbed another metal rod and stuck it into the fire, eyes darting from it to the door and back again as he pretended he was hard at work.
Her heart pounded, eyes focused on the bucket. She couldn't leave without the emblem. Too many lives depended on it.
The footsteps stopped outside the gate. "Open up!"
She leaped toward the bucket and plunged her hand inside, closing her fist around the metal. The searing pain dropped her to her knees, but she bit back an agonized cry and struggled to her feet.
She had to get to the ship.
She spun and raced across the courtyard, then grabbed the handle of a small door set in the opposite wall with her uninjured hand.
Locked.
The gate burst open and armed men charged in.
Frantic, she looked up and spotted a window high on the wall. She clambered up several storage crates, flung the shutter open, and swung a leg over the sill.
"There!" someone shouted, pointing upward.
She was too high, but she had no choice, so she swung her other leg over and dropped to the ground. She lost her footing as she fell and slid on her palms. A groan escaped as her burned flesh was torn away and the emblem rolled into the filthy gutter.
One of the soldiers poked his gun through the opening above. She scrambled to her feet and scooped the metal circle into her mangled palm as the ground exploded with gunfire around her.
Blood pounded in her ears and kept pace in her palm as she raced toward the docks. She yanked the square of cloth off her face and wrapped her hand, trying to stanch the flow of blood. She wouldn't leave such an easy trail for them to follow.
She turned down a dark alley and skidded to a halt. Dead end. She'd turned too soon. The voices behind her got louder, so she flattened herself into a shadowed doorway until they ran past. Breath heaving, she peeked out the alley and circled around a different way, cursing her own foolishness. She didn't have time for mistakes.
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