‘The Blood of Christ…’

Then everything happened at once. Baroncelli sprang to his feet with a cry of ‘Creapa, traditore!’ and plunged a dagger into Giuliano’s neck from behind. A fountain of blood spewed from the wound, showering Fioretta, who fell screaming to her knees.

‘Let me finish the bastard!’ yelled Francesco, elbowing Baroncelli aside and throwing Giuliano, who was trying to staunch his wound with his hands, to the floor. Francesco knelt astride him and plunged his dagger over and over again into his victim’s body, in such a frenzy that once, without seeming to notice, he drove his weapon into his own thigh. Giuliano was long dead before Francesco had struck him the nineteenth, and last, blow.

Meanwhile Lorenzo, with a cry of alarm, had spun round to face his brother’s attackers, while Clarice and the nurses bundled the children and Fioretta to safety. There was confusion everywhere. Lorenzo had spurned the idea of having his bodyguards close – a murderous attack in a church was a thing all but unheard of – but now they struggled to reach him through the mass of confused and panic-stricken worshippers, jostling and trampling each other in order to get away from the scene of butchery, but the situation was made far worse by the heat, and the fact that there was scarcely any room to move at all…

Except for the area immediately in front of the altar. The Bishop and his attendant priests stood aghast, rooted to the spot, but Bagnone and Maffei, seeing Lorenzo’s back turned to them, seized their opportunity and, drawing daggers from their robes, fell on him from behind.

Priests are rarely experienced killers, and however noble they believed their cause to be, the two managed only to give Lorenzo flesh wounds before he shook them off. But in the struggle they got the better of him again, and now Francesco, limping from his self-inflicted wound but empowered by all the hatred that was boiling within him, was closing in too, roaring imprecations as he came, raising his dagger. Bagnone and Maffei, unmanned by what they had done, turned and fled in the direction of the apse; but Lorenzo was staggering, blood pouring from him, and a cut high on the right shoulder had made his sword-arm useless.

‘Your day is done, Lorenzo!’ Francesco screamed. ‘Your entire misbegotten family dies by my sword!’

‘Infame!’ returned Lorenzo. ‘I’ll kill you now!’

‘With that arm?’ sneered Francesco, and raised his dagger to strike.

As his fist plunged down, a strong hand caught his wrist and arrested its motion, before flinging him round. Francesco found himself looking into the face of another sworn enemy.

‘Ezio!’ he growled. ‘You! Here!’

‘It’s your day that is done, Francesco!’

The crowd was clearing, and Lorenzo’s guards were pushing closer. Baroncelli had arrived at Francesco’s side. ‘Come, we must fly. It’s over!’ he shouted.

‘I’ll deal with these curs first,’ said Francesco, but his face was drawn. His own wound was bleeding hard.

‘No! We must retreat!’

Francesco looked furious, but there was agreement in his face. ‘This isn’t over,’ he told Ezio.

‘No, it isn’t. Wherever you go, I will follow, Francesco, until I have cut you down.’

Glaring, Francesco turned and followed Baroncelli, who was already vanishing behind the high altar. There had to be a door out of the cathedral in the apse. Ezio prepared to follow.

‘Wait!’ a broken voice behind him said. ‘Let them go. They won’t get far. I need you here. I need your help.’

Ezio turned to see the Duke sprawled on the ground between two overturned chairs. Not far away, his family huddled and wept, Clarice, a look of horror on her face, embracing her two oldest children tightly. Fioretta was staring dully in the direction of Giuliano’s twisted and mangled corpse.

Lorenzo’s guards had arrived. ‘Look after my family,’ he told them. ‘The city will be in uproar over this. Get them to the palazzo and bar the doors.’

He turned to Ezio. ‘You saved my life.’

‘I did my duty! Now the Pazzi must pay the full price!’ Ezio helped Lorenzo up, and placed him gently on a chair. Looking up, he saw that the Bishop and the other priests were nowhere to be seen. Behind him, people were still pushing and shoving, clawing at each other, to get out of the cathedral by the main western doors. ‘I must go after Francesco!’ he said.

‘No!’ said Lorenzo. ‘I can’t make it to safety on my own. You must help me. Get me to San Lorenzo. I have friends there.’

Ezio was torn, but he knew how much Lorenzo had done for his own family. He could not blame him for failing to prevent the deaths of his kinsmen, for how could anyone have predicted the suddenness of that attack? And now Lorenzo himself was the victim. He was still alive, too; but he would not be for long unless Ezio could get him to the nearest place where he could be treated. The church of San Lorenzo was only a short distance north-west of the Baptistry.

He bound Lorenzo’s wounds as best he could, with strips torn from his own shirt. Then he lifted him gently to his feet. ‘Put your left arm round my shoulder. Good. Now, there must be a way out beyond the altar…’

They hobbled in the direction their assailants had taken, and soon came to a small open door with bloodstains on its threshold. This was no doubt the way Francesco had gone. Might he be lying in wait? It would be hard for Ezio to release his spring-blade dagger, still less fight, while supporting Lorenzo on his right side. But he had his metal bracer strapped to his left forearm.

They made their way into the square outside the north wall of the cathedral and were greeted with scenes of confusion and chaos. They made their way west along the side of the cathedral, after Ezio had paused to wrap his cape over Lorenzo’s shoulders in a makeshift attempt to disguise him. In the piazza between the cathedral and the Baptistry, groups of men wearing the liveries of the Pazzi and the Medici were engaged in hand-to-hand combat, so engrossed that Ezio was able to slink past them, but as they reached the street that led up to the Piazza San Lorenzo they were confronted by two men wearing the dolphin-and-crosses insignia. Both carried ugly-looking falchions.

‘Halt!’ one of the guards said. ‘Where d’you think you’re going?’

‘I must get this man to safety,’ said Ezio.

‘And who might you be?’ said the second guard, unpleasantly. He came forward and peered at Lorenzo’s face. Lorenzo, half-fainting, turned away, but as he did so the cape slipped, revealing the Medici crest on his doublet.