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Nascimbene’s smile faded.
A grin crept over Fiore’s own features. Then he burst into an attack.
First a thrust at the impresario’s heart—the mirror image of the point he’d scored on Fiore. Nascimbene parried, stumbling backward. His eyes had flown wide. As if he’d never anticipated a counter-attack.
Fiore supposed he was, after all, the first conservatorio boy to ever strike back.
Another thrust from Fiore, this time at the arm that held the impresario’s blade. Parried again, but with a third thrust—this at the eyes—close on its heels. Nascimbene parried it as well and the overhead cut that came after and another thrust at his heart after that. Fiore plunged on. Every possible attack above the waist. Falling into a predictable pattern.
Just in time for Fiore to strike below the belt.
Fiore lunged. For the first time in the fight he felt a pang. A slight tearing sensation behind his navel.
Well worth it to see his blade plunge between Nascimbene’s legs amidst a crimson tide.
Enzo might wield a rapier as deftly as a scalpel. Fiore had not his skill. But what he lacked in skill he more than made up for in fervor.
And, to his ears at least, Nascimbene had a most musical scream.
As much as Fiore wished to drive his sword deeper, what little better sense remained to him demanded he retrieve his blade for another strike and withdraw out of his opponent’s reach.
Nascimbene dropt to his knees. His howl weakened to mere whimpering. It aroused no pity in Fiore’s heart—just as the cries of a thousand innocent boys before him had aroused no pity in Nascimbene.
The impresario’s off hand flew to the wound. Blood soaked through his breeches and oozed between his fingers. His sword-arm shook, the weapon trembling in a convulsive grasp at his side, lacking even the pretense of a guard.
A flick of Fiore’s wrist crossed their blades. A twirl entangled them. A single sharp heave sufficed to tear Nascimbene’s sword from his hand.
Nascimbene glanced up at that. Fear and rage mingled in his gaze. He scrambled backward, flailing for his sword. He turned his head from Fiore to find it.
Fiore leapt between him and his blade. His heel struck Nascimbene’s shoulder and sent him sprawling supine. Another wrist-flick saw his sword’s tip at the hollow of the impresario’s throat.
Now fear alone shone in Nascimbene’s eyes.
Fiore hesitated. He’d served Nascimbene the same wound he himself had suffered on the impresario’s orders. Elio had died of it. But Fiore had lived with it. As had thousands of boys before him.
And how could Nascimbene understand—truly understand—the horrors he had inflicted upon them all, unless Fiore allowed him to live with it, too?
But as this thought flashed through Fiore’s mind, a counter-argument arose. Even if Fiore let him live now, Nascimbene would never know the true miseries of the castrato. He’d carried his stones into adulthood already. His body had grown and changed as nature bid it. He’d had every opportunity to sire children if he so wished. He would never know the shame of an unbroken voice in a broken body.
Worse yet, he might well continue his monstrous work.
And while Fiore couldn’t stop them all—while Nascimbene was by no means the only monster involved in such crimes—he could stop Nascimbene, here and now.
Forever.
With a final thrust, Fiore slid his blade into its mortal sheath.
Nascimbene spluttered—gurgled—gasped—but could not scream. The blade stole his breath. Robbed him of the voice he’d unjustly kept whilst denying the same to every boy who passed through his conservatorio. He drowned on a mere fraction of the blood he himself had spilled.
And Fiore could not summon even a fraction of remorse.
Blood ceased to pour from the wound. The chest beneath it no longer rose and fell. The impresario’s eyes stared beyond Fiore into eternity’s abyss.
Fiore found a regret at last. Nascimbene had died far too quick.
“Fiore!”
The voice ringing out across the amphitheater sounded sweeter than any aria. Fiore whirled towards it, his bloodied blade still in his grip, freshly torn from the impresario’s throat.
