Venom Read online

  The Giudecca was coming into focus, its southern coast barely visible through the low-hanging haze. Cass steered the boat toward the dark finger of land.

  “Your friend is already dead. It doesn’t really matter where her body is now, does it?” Falco said curtly. Before Cass could protest that it did matter—of course it did—he pointed toward the eastern side of the island. “The water is calmer if you hug the shoreline.” There was silence for a moment before he added, more softly, “Anyway, what matters is finding out who sent you that threatening note, so we can stop him from whatever he’s planning next.”

  Cass let the argument go. He was right, of course—what mattered most was making sure the murderer was caught and put away, before he could do more harm. They needed evidence of some kind. They needed a suspect.

  As they neared the Grand Canal, Cass began to feel the weight of fear pressing down on her once again. The Chiesa delle Zitelle loomed like a stone guardian southwest of the entrance to the canal. Lanterns burned in the church’s twin bell towers, illuminating the structure’s gleaming cupola. It was like God was watching over the city. Cass steered the boat into the large backward-S-shaped canal that wound its way through the main areas of Venice proper.

  The air was warmer inside the city, tall palazzos sheltering the small boat from the night wind. Cass leaned forward to put space between herself and Falco. The darkness swallowed up all but a faint halo of light from their lantern.

  As Falco directed Cass down a side canal, the two maneuvered the gondola by the light of the moon reflecting off the water. Cass held her breath, hoping she wouldn’t awaken anyone by running the boat into the canal wall.

  Falco seemed to sense her discomfort. He took the oar from her and navigated toward the Castello district, toward a seedy block where the buildings looked as though they’d been under siege. Even in the darkness she could see that their roofs were full of broken red clay shingles; shutters hung open and tilted at funny angles.

  As Falco steered the gondola along the edge of the canal, Cass saw a man slink across a bridge and head down an alleyway.

  Cass pointed out the retreating figure. She and Falco watched the man vanish into a broken-down shack. “Probably just a thief, or a Jew hiding from the soldiers,” Falco said. “Ah, there it is.” Falco pointed to a square brick building with a pair of cracked marble lions flanking the front door. He steered the boat over to a dock. Sliding his body nimbly over the side of the gondola, Falco looped the rope over a mooring post. The gondola swayed back and forth. “Leave the lantern,” Falco said. “I’ll guide you.”

  Cass reached out for Falco’s hand as she exited the boat, thankful that she was moving without the constraints of her heavy skirts and chopines. She had never been out in the streets like this before—unfettered, nearly undressed—and it gave her a quick thrill.

  Falco led her quickly into a narrow alley and pressed their bodies up against the side of a private residence. The alley was completely dark. Cass again felt the weight of the knife in her pocket. She realized she was holding her breath. She exhaled slowly. The night was so quiet, she swore she could hear her eyelashes feather together each time she blinked.

  From where they stood, they could see the front of the abandoned building. The whole street was deserted.

  “Come on.” Falco took Cass’s arm and pulled her past the front of the building around to the back. Another alley. This one was home to a butcher shop and an apothecary.

  The two of them maneuvered around a large pile of trash. Cass’s insides churned from the smell of spoiled meat, and she brought the sleeve of her cloak to her face, inhaling through it. Falco pointed; Cass could just barely make out a small six-petaled flower inscribed in a circle beneath one of the windows. Though mist or rain had faded part of the symbol, she could tell each petal was exactly the same size and shape, meeting at a point in the center of the circle. There was something almost mathematical about the design.

  “What now?” she whispered.

  Falco didn’t answer. He stood on tiptoe, his face pressed against a pair of grimy shutters. Cass leaned in next to him, but the crack between the shutters was too small and the room beyond too dark to make out anything.

  “Do you hear something?” he asked her.

  She stretched up and tried to press her ear to the warped wood, but her face only reached the stucco. For once, she would have welcomed her chopines. “Nothing.”

  Cass’s stomach flipped over as Falco reached into the stinking heap of garbage. He closed his hands around a tangled chunk of blackened metal.

  “What is that?” she asked.

  “Blacksmith’s error, most likely,” he said, reaching up and slamming the metal into the shutters. The wood splintered.

  Cass jumped back and covered her face with her hands as a cloud of dirt sprayed outward. “Are you insane?”

  “Only occasionally.” Falco brushed the dust from Cass’s cloak. He reached his arm through the jagged hole and winced as he felt around for the latch. The shutters opened with a groan, unveiling an inky rectangle of open space that reminded Cass of a coffin.

  Falco hoisted his body up through the opening and into darkness.

  “We can’t just break into the place,” she whispered loudly.

  “And yet, it appears that we can,” Falco said, perching like a cat on the narrow windowsill. “Were you hoping a servant might admit us through the front door?”

  “No, but…” Cass glanced around the dark alley, half expecting a battalion of soldiers to come running with their swords drawn. All she saw were the lurking outlines of dilapidated buildings. All she heard was her own breath and the lapping of the canal water against wet rock.

  “Do you want to find out about the murder or do you want to go home to your satin sheets?” Falco asked, extending his hand in Cass’s direction.

  She felt heat rising to her cheeks. He had no right to speak to her like that, so scornfully. She glanced around the alley again. A pair of beady eyes stared back at her from the trash heap. The rat chittered and then let out a high-pitched squeal. Cass bit back a scream.

  “I’m coming,” she said hurriedly. She reached up to let Falco help her through the window.

  He pulled her up under her arms, grabbing her waist and easing her through the opening. Cass felt her body tighten momentarily. She wondered if Falco had felt the jolt of tension pass through her.

  She landed in a cold, shadowy space. The air smelled acrid. A glimmer of moonlight through the broken shutter illuminated the room’s basic features. Along one wall, a group of glass cabinets held rows of silver instruments. Most of them looked like scissors. Or knives. Some of the tips were crusted over with a reddish-brown substance Cass hoped was rust. She jiggled the handle of the nearest cabinet. Locked.

  “Look at this.” Falco stood at the edge of a square table in the center of the room. A thin white sheet covered a mounded form beneath it. He yanked the corner of the sheet, pulling it back to expose the corpse of a dog. Cass drew in a sharp breath and stepped back, bumping against a cabinet. The animal’s four legs were tied out at its sides. Someone had sliced a Y-shaped incision down its middle, pinning back flaps of skin so that even in the darkness, Cass could see the sinewy red muscle beneath.

  “What is this place?” Cass whispered, past the lump that had grown huge in her throat.

  Falco’s mouth was set in a grim line. “I don’t know,” he said. “It’s set up like some sort of workshop.” He drew the sheet back over the dog’s corpse and crept across the stone floor to the doorway.

  Cass followed him, pressing one hand to his back as she peered over his shoulder and into the hallway: darkness, in both directions.

  “Come on.” Falco grabbed Cass’s hand and pulled her out into the hall before she could even protest.

  The blackness thickened with each step they took away from the room with the broken shutter. Cass gripped Falco’s fingers with all her strength, positive that the hallway would swallow
her up if he released her, blinking rapidly in a futile attempt to adjust her eyes to this new level of darkness.

  Something sticky slapped across her cheek and she fought to keep from screaming. She flailed her free hand out in front of her face.

  “Spiderweb,” Falco said. “It got me too.” His voice was calm, reassuring.

  They crept farther down the corridor. The hair on the back of Cass’s neck pricked up. She could swear they weren’t alone, that someone else was walking alongside them, toying with them. “Do you hear that?” she whispered. “I hear someone breathing.”

  “All I hear is you huffing and puffing,” he answered.

  Cass paused and held her breath. Sure enough, the hallway was silent except for Falco’s smooth, even exhalations. How could he be so calm when she was panting like a dying animal? Dying animal. She touched her rib cage, imagining thick bands of red muscle like there had been on the dog. Who would do something like that? Why would anyone be so violent and cruel? What was this place?

  A faint glow lit up an arched doorway in front of them. Grateful for the reprieve from total blindness, Cass moved toward the light.

  This room was spacious, with a high, vaulted ceiling, but it had no window and no real furniture. Instead, the floor was lined with rows of oval-shaped tin basins. Six rows of eight. Cass did the math in her head. Forty-eight. The ones nearest to them were small, just big enough to bathe an infant. Along the far wall stood three larger basins. A thick white candle sat in a far corner of the room, its weak flame flickering. Someone had been here recently. Cass stared at the dim flame. Whoever it was, he or she was planning on coming back.

  Cass knelt down by the nearest basin. A shapeless blob was submerged in some kind of liquid. It looked soft and squishy and fleshy, like something that had come from a body…

  But no, she was likely letting her imagination run wild again. Still, she wanted to get up and run. The faint, flickering light no longer comforted her—it made everything more uncertain, more terrifying.

  But she couldn’t run. Instead, she found herself bending closer, her head just inches above the fluid. A familiar odor, crisp and cold, wafted up into the air. Where had she smelled it before? Falco drew his index finger across the surface of the liquid.

  “Are you crazy?” Cass hissed. “That could be poison.”

  He held his hand up to his nose and sniffed. “I didn’t plan on tasting it,” he responded.

  A series of soft thuds drew Cass’s attention away from the basin.

  Footsteps. Falco must have heard them at the same time. As Cass reached out for him, he was already moving to the far side of the room. The two of them bent down behind one of the larger basins, pressing their bodies against each other. Cass pulled the tail of her cloak in close and wrapped her arms around Falco to steady herself.

  The footsteps grew louder. Cass’s heart hammered painfully against her ribs. The light in the room brightened and the footsteps stopped. She held her breath and willed the banging of her heart not to give her away, praying her hair and cloak weren’t visible.

  Just when she had convinced herself that she was safely hidden, Falco raised his body slightly, as if to peek over the top of the basin. Cass was still entwined with him. She had no choice but to move as he did. A man with a tall, severe-looking forehead and white hair that flowed back from his long face stood in the arched doorway. He held a lantern high, as if he were searching for something. Or someone. Falco’s whole body went rigid. Cass ducked back down and pulled Falco with her.

  Her shoulder bumped into something hanging over the edge of the basin. Something with fingers. She clamped her hand over her mouth to keep from screaming. Falco’s eyes widened in the dark. Cass pointed at the hand as she cowered in her hiding place.

  She held her breath again, and Falco moved his face back just enough so that his eyes could find hers. Soft and blue, even in the dark. Then, after what felt like a lifetime, the footsteps started up again, but quieter. Receding.

  “It’s okay,” he whispered finally. “Come on.”

  “There’s a body in this basin,” she choked out, unable to pull her eyes away from the pale fingers dangling over the basin’s edge. The hand was muscular and hairy, obviously male. “A man.”

  “Better him than us,” Falco said. He was already halfway across the room, heading for the arched doorway. “Come on.”

  Cass didn’t need any more convincing. Fighting past the nausea that overwhelmed her, she crept quickly through the rows of basins—wondering if one of them contained Liviana’s body, or parts of it. Falco was standing in the doorway. The two of them peeked into the hall. To the left was the room with the broken shutter, and their only escape route. To the right, the faint light of the long-faced man’s lantern was barely visible in the distance.

  Cass started to ask if they should make a run for it, just as Falco yanked her out into the hallway and turned left. Cass raced behind him, painfully aware of a third set of footsteps pursuing them.

  “He’s coming,” she hissed, fumbling through the darkness as fast as she dared, panic rising like a wave.

  “Then hurry,” Falco said.

  The two of them raced past the table with the dog. Falco vaulted easily through the window and immediately turned back to assist Cass. She made it halfway through, but then got stuck. Her nightgown had snagged on something—the window ledge or the broken shutter. She gave it a furious tug, but it didn’t budge.

  “I’m caught.” Her heart started slam-banging again. Don’t look back. But of course she did. The long-faced man was striding through the doorway. It would take him only a few paces to get to her. She turned back to Falco, tiny whimpering sounds escaping from her throat.

  “Who’s there?” the man called out, and the sound of his voice almost stopped her heart completely.

  Falco hooked his hands around her elbows and pulled Cass so hard, she thought both of her arms would dislocate. Her body slid through the window with a harsh ripping sound. She was running as soon as her feet hit the cobblestones, tearing through the alley and over to the gondola, which was, thankfully, still bobbing in the dusky water where they’d left it. Falco practically threw Cass in the boat, and as he did, the kitchen knife slipped out of her cloak pocket and landed on the wooden baseboards.

  He raised an eyebrow, but went immediately to the platform and began to row, jolting Cass backward into her seat.

  She bent down to retrieve the knife, tucking it back in her pocket. “Hurry,” she begged, expecting to see the long-faced man appearing from the alley any second. Soon, bella, it will be your turn. She saw the bloated corpse from Livi’s tomb, the sharp X sliced deep into her once-beautiful skin. Was this man the murderer? Had he sent Cass the note? She got up unsteadily and looked behind them, petrified, as Falco rowed furiously away from the building.

  “Is he coming?” Falco asked. For the first time since they’d met in the graveyard, he sounded scared.

  “I don’t see him,” Cass said as Falco navigated the boat down a side canal, putting a row of small dwellings between them and the mysterious building. She held her breath until the gondola was out of the Grand Canal and back into the open lagoon.

  “I—I don’t understand,” Cass said. Suddenly, she was freezing. She could hardly keep her teeth from chattering. “That place—What are they doing there?”

  “I don’t know,” Falco said. His voice was grim.

  “Do you think we should go back?” Cass asked, her stomach twisting at the thought. Still, maybe Livi’s body was there. “We can bring members of the guard…”

  “Are you kidding?” Falco asked, his voice heavy with disbelief. “I don’t ever want to see that place again.”

  Cass looked out over the dark lagoon and willed herself to remain calm. “But we can’t just forget about it. All those basins full of…parts. They’re doing witchcraft there, or worse.”

  “No one is doing any witchcraft,” Falco said. “Those parts probably weren’t even huma
n. Probably harvested from dogs, like the one on the table.” He didn’t sound convinced.

  Cass turned back to face Falco, her eyes bright with anger. “What about the bodies in the big basins?” she asked. “They looked human enough to me. Even if our murderer didn’t kill them, they could be victims of vampires or demons.” A tremor made its way into her voice. “What if Liviana is there? I will not see my friend’s body torn apart by monsters.” Cass wanted to curl up in her bed, under all of her covers, and drift into dream. No. She wanted to wake up, and find out that that horrible place—the dog, the body, the man with the long face—was the dream. For once she was relieved to see the shore of San Domenico in the distance. Falco let go of the oar and put both hands on Cass’s shoulders. He didn’t say anything for a minute. Beneath her feet, she could feel the coasting gondola slow to a stop and bob gently in the still waters of the lagoon.

  “Cass,” Falco began slowly, “I don’t understand what that place was myself. But there’s one thing I do know: there are no vampires or demons. Whatever is happening there…it’s human. Human experimentation. Human madness, perhaps. But human nonetheless.”

  The word experimentation suddenly recalled to Cass the familiar smell from the small basin. Balsam. That’s what it was. Her father used to bring the sticky substance home on his clothes. She didn’t remember what it was for—an antiseptic or a preservative or something. “They were using balsam,” she said shakily. “I smelled it. It—it reminded me of my father.” Her voice was still a little shaky. “He dabbled in medicine.”

  “See,” Falco said. “The man we saw was probably a…a physician, or a surgeon. Maybe he’s doing research in that place.”

  “But it’s still not right,” Cass protested, shrugging away from Falco’s grasp. “All those organs just sitting out like that. The church would forbid it.”

  “This isn’t Rome, Cass. Venice does what’s best for Venice.” Falco took the oar and steered the bobbing gondola back on course. “And we can’t say anything to anyone without admitting we broke into the place. We’d be arrested. We have to let it go.”