Page 53 of Bloodlines and Birthright

We’d been waiting nearly an hour when finally there was movement at the house. The door opened a crack, then widened, and a face peered out. Seeing no one about, two figures emerged, one dressed as a woman. The other was a youth, his age evident in the loping strides of his lanky legs. The woman, Signora Colombo, carried a small suitcase and the lad carried a sack.

We waited for them to cross the piazza and take the road out of Pecco, then followed. Despite staying well back, Signora Colombo heard us. She didn’t turn around, but it was evident in her stiffening spine and the way she clutched her son’s hand. They quickened their pace. I couldn’t keep up, but Oscar and Miss Wheeler had no such problem.

They stopped Signora Colombo and her son at the intersection with the road to Monteoro. They didn’t try to run off, as we’d feared. Miss Wheeler must have been convincing.

She was still speaking when I arrived, clutching my side and breathing heavily. Signora Colombo paid me no mind as she responded to Miss Wheeler’s question. Miss Wheeler, however, was looking at the boy. So was Oscar.

I studied him properly for the first time and saw what they saw. He was taller than his mother, almost reaching the same height as Miss Wheeler. Aged only thirteen, he had a lot more growth still to go. But it wasn’t his height that struck me. It was his eyes. They were prominent, bulging, just like the abbot’s. In fact, the boy looked eerily similar to the young abbot in the photograph at Villa Corzoni.

The boy turned those eyes onto me when I gasped.

“You’ve noticed?” Oscar asked me.

“How can I not? They’re related, surely. Father and son?”

“I think that’s what Miss Wheeler is trying to find out. She has assured Signora Colombo that we only want to find her husband’s murderer. If they still want to leave, we won’t stop them.”

Miss Wheeler put her finger up to shush us as she listened to Signora Colombo. Then she interpreted. “The boy isn’t the son of either the abbot or his brother, Pietro Scala. He’s their nephew.”

“Nephew?” Oscar and I both repeated.

“His father, the deceased boatbuilder, was a third brother. It seems the late Signore Scala, their father and the boy’s grandfather, was a philanderer. Giovanni Colombo was born out of wedlock to a local woman who caught the wandering eye of the late Signore Scala. Certain traits have been inherited by each of the brothers, their height, and the eyes were a feature of the late Signore Scala, the abbot and now Emiliano here, but not his father Giovanni or uncle Pietro. Other traits were inherited, too. Wood magic.”

“Giovanni Colombo was a wood magician,” I murmured, realization dawning. That explained the magic in the hull that Oscar and Miss Wheeler had felt, as well as the sturdy wooden crate and barrow Oscar had stepped on earlier to peer through the window.

Miss Wheeler nodded. “Giovanni wanted to expand his business but didn’t have the capital. So he approached his wealthy father a few months ago.”

“I’d wager that was a surprise for the old man,” Oscar muttered.

“Apparently so. He was unaware he had a third son, although Giovanni had known all his life. The interesting thing is, the late Signore Scala embraced him as a son. He was deeply dissatisfied with his two legitimate ones. Pietro is unlikely to ever marry and have children, and didn’t inherit his father’s magic. The abbot is also artless, and is unlikely to marry and have children. Yet here was another son, Giovanni, who was a wood magician and had a strapping son himself. The old man was overjoyed, according to Signora Colombo. He planned to adopt Giovanni and not just give him some money to help him build a new factory in Milan, but also ensure he received an inheritance upon the old man’s death.”

“Let me guess,” Oscar said. “Scala Senior died before he could do any of that.”

“Precisely. But he’d written Giovanni a letter mere days before his death. The letter acknowledged Giovanni as his son and detailed his intentions to adopt him and assist him financially.” She stopped to speak to Signora Colombo in Italian.

“Si.” Signora Colombo removed an envelope from her skirt pocket and spoke to Miss Wheeler as she handed it to her.

“She has kept this on her person ever since her husband’s death,” Miss Wheeler explained. “It’s the only way she can prove her son is entitled to something from the Scala estate.” She brandished it between two gloved fingers. “It’s an envelope, Gentlemen.”

“Is the wood spell in there?” Oscar asked.

“No,” I said. I didn’t need to see the contents of the envelope to know it didn’t contain a wood spell. Pietro Scala had lied to us about that. He wasn’t after a stolen spell. He was after that letter. “Giovanni Colombo already knew a wood spell. He’s been using it for a while, perhaps since magic was legitimized in this country not all that long ago. It’s probably then that he realized the Scala family have been using wood spells for centuries to make their staircases and, knowing he was the son of a wood magician and had an affinity for the material, he realized he was one, too. Since the late Signore Scala didn’t acknowledge Giovanni until quite recently, I suspect Giovanni got the wood strengthening spell from somewhere else beforehand. Wood magic is relatively common, and he may have met a tourist or traveler who knew it.”

Miss Wheeler opened the envelope and removed the letter. “There’s no spell here. I think you’re right, Professor. This is what Pietro Scala wanted you to retrieve—evidence that his half-brother had a claim on the family business and fortune.”

Oscar squeezed the bridge of his nose. “Blast. How do we get the location of the tattoo spell book now? Scala won’t give it to us without that letter, and I’m not stealing it from the Colombos.”

Miss Wheeler tucked the letter back into the envelope and returned it to Signora Colombo. “It is very good of you to put their needs above your own, Mr. Barratt. Not all men would. But you’re forgetting that you have leverage now. You’re in possession of something just as important as that letter. You know what it contains.”

“Blackmail?” I blurted out.

“I’m sure Signore Scala will hand over the name of the antique bookseller if you promise not to tell everyone about his illegitimate half-brother and nephew.”

“All right,” Oscar said slowly. “We’ll blackmail him. But there’s something I don’t understand. Quite a few things, as it happens. We’ve established that Giovanni Colombo was a wood magician, not a firework magician. So why did he associate with De Angelis? Did De Angelis kill him?”

At the mention of the name, Signora Colombo grabbed her son’s hand and pulled him close. She spoke rapidly to Miss Wheeler, who put her hand up to silence us while she listened.

“She’s afraid of De Angelis,” Miss Wheeler interpreted. “She believes he and his friends killed her husband when he refused to use magic to help them detonate their bombs.”