Page 17 of A Dangerous Bargain

A woman in a torn skirt throws herself on her knees, a crying baby clasped in her arms. “Please, angel! My daughter won’t stop coughing. You must save her.”

Lupa recoils. Even in the shadow of her cloak’s hood, her golden irises shine that unnatural green. There’s no hiding what she is here or anywhere else in Florence. “What is this pink squalling thing? It is too loud!”

“Please!” The woman thrusts her baby closer. She uncovers one plump arm and sinks her fingernail into it until the skin breaks. The little girl starts screaming, a thin, high sound that puts a lump in my throat. “Let her bargain with you!”

The crowd spills closer, a sea of desperate faces and grabbing hands.

“We ran out of food already this winter—”

“His leg took a fever—”

“Bargain with me, please, angel—”

The demand grows like a rising tide. One man cuts his forearm, then another. The scent of iron fills my nostrils, a tang I taste as much as smell. The crowd presses closer, scarlet-slick wounds offered to the angel like shining, fat olives.

The tip of Lupa’s tongue runs over her pointed teeth, her awful stare on everyone and no one. “Can you taste it too, Virgil?” She whimpers, her nails digging into my arm so hard, I gasp. “They taste so good.”

The lump in my throat hardens. Giorgio’s terrified face flashes across my mind. I feel the awful spray of the old angel’s hot gold blood on my face again.

Even though my brain screams not to let the angel go, I drop Lupa’s arm and beat the crowd away with my basket. “She can’t help you! Leave us alone!”

I don’t know if Lupa would hurt anyone, and I won’t find out. I told Verrocchio I’d look after her. It’s the one promise I haven’t broken yet.

The crowd scatters, only to regroup just out of range, surly and muttering.

A girl with soot-stained cheeks slinks forward. She sneers at the paint stains on my hands, the bargain marks disappearing up my sleeves. “It’s not fair you artists can make bargains, but we can’t!” There’s a chorus of jeering agreement, the sound like a kettle approaching a boil.

My blood starts rushing. I get why they’re angry, but it’s not up to me who angels make bargains with. “If you’re ill and hungry, there’s a hospital nearby—”

She spits at my feet. A knife gleams in her hand. “We’ll take her for ourselves!”

I throw the basket at her face, grab Lupa’s hand, and run.

I hit the wall of people shoulder-first. Cries of pain and surprise surround us, then a clearing opens up. I take it, zigzagging past the final man who tries to block us with a jagged-toothed saw.

I don’t stop running until we’re outside the towering walls of the Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore. I let go of Lupa and double over on the steps, hands braced on my knees, eyes locked on the street.

The crowd doesn’t follow.

I didn’t think they would, but Cristo santo, the misery in their eyes. Someone that desperate could do anything.

Lupa draws her cloak more securely around her body, her strange eyes flicking from me to where we came from. “What was that?” she demands shrilly.

“Oh, that? We call that one ‘an angry mob.’ ”

She scowls. “It felt bad. Please don’t create one again.”

Right. As if I were the one they wanted. I will my galloping heart to slow. Each too-fast beat feels like a grain of sand tumbling from an hourglass, a pointless waste of life. “Were you going to eat those people?”

She bristles, offended. “Angels don’t eat people.”

“You know what I mean.”

She shudders again, tongue tracing her teeth. “I wanted to taste their blood.” A guilty look thrown my way. “But I wouldn’t have.”

Not quite the reassuring answer I wanted, but I let it go. “I suppose we learned the hard way why angels shouldn’t leave their workshops.”

“Why did you help?” Lupa demands.