Saint Fire (Secret Books of Venus Series) Read Online Free Page A

looking up her legs, Volpa dreamed she was on the plain again, under the foothills. Now, however, there were no villages or towns, and the land was covered by warm powder, or dust, very deep, so that as she walked, Volpa’s feet sank far into it.
    Also there was before her only one mountain.
    Realizing this, Volpa halted.
    The mountain was astonishing. It was long, and had a curved, flattish top, and was colored a lucid flaming red—like a hearth or a sunset. A scarlet red, that had fluted shadows chiseled in it, and veins like living fire. In wonderment Volpa stood, watching the mountain, which seemed to reflect the passage of clouds and suns. Then, she saw between herself and its incredible rock, figures dancing on the powdery plain. They were black, as if being by the fiery mountain had burned them. But something touched Volpa’s foot, and looking down she saw a golden serpent rippling away through the sand.
    When she woke, it was night, yet through the high window of the kitchen a full white moon was blazing.
    Somehow the contrast of its color scorched the dream of a red mountain into Volpa’s brain.
    She got up silently. The male slave lay sleeping in his corner. The houses were soundless, but for the lisp of the spring canal.
    When she went out, the whole City of Ve Nera, Venus, seemed laid to sleep. Nothing stirred. No human voice nor cry of any creature, not one bell.
    Volpa went to the fig tree and danced slowly around it, as she had done with her mother.
    The boughs were silver with moonlight, but showed no hint of renewal.
    On the Isle of the Dead her mother would be ashes now, andtipped in some hole. But the people in the dream were so black, surely they had been in fire and come back out of it, whole, and far stronger, better.
    Once she had danced, Volpa leaned on the tree, holding it, and crying noiselessly. Her pain rose and fell like waves, and it occurred to her that perhaps God noted this, and the height of her suffering, and that by her grief she helped to buy the life beyond life in God’s perfect world.
    Then something rustled, up in the bare tree. And for half a second, Volpa thought it was her mother, become now an angel, perhaps black, and leaning through the branches to say something kind.
    But when she looked, Volpa saw it was a scrap of some refuse, blown up there in the winter, now coming apart and so making movement and sound to deceive her.

2

    As spring took hold, Ghaio felt new optimism. This was almost always to do with money. The untamed scents of sea and fish and sap that now filled Ve Nera, put a bounce in his step, but only so he went up the ladder more quickly to count the money.
    Having counted it, he selected a bag of silver duccas and one gold venus, and dressed himself in his tatty best.
    (There had been some talk of an edict against usury, when practiced by Christians. Ghaio did not think this could come to anything, but it was wise to stay friendly with the Church.)
    The hired boat ferried him out on to the wide Fulvia lagoon. Ghaio Wood-Seller looked about. How much of the City could he now buy? How soon could he buy more?
    The gift to the Church was a sensibleinsurance.
    It was almost midday, and Ghaio was going to attend Midday Mass, the Solus, in the Primo.
    The lagoon was a sheet of green silk. The very sort of silk for which Ve Nera had become a rival in the cities of Candisi and the East. After the winter, the buildings crowded round the lagoon looked dank and draggled, matted beasts that had slunk to drink. Then the shoreline opened into the great square, swept, and tinted like Juvanni’s prettiest sweets. From which rose the moon-dome of the Basilica.
    Ghaio would not mind the mass. Although impervious to the holy ritual and the ethereal singing, the gold ceiling was of some interest to him, and the jewels and magenta of the priests.
    When his boat reached the bank, the bell began to call.
    Ghaio got out, paid the boatman (meanly) and strutted across and in at an