Tallow Read Online Free Page A

her heart.
    Pillar's eyes flew to the window. It wouldn't do for the neighbours to hear. If one word slipped out, one whisper of what they suspected Tallow might be ... Once freed, rumours, like a pestilent disease, had a nasty way of spreading. He jumped to his feet and shut the window. 'If someone should hear you –'
    Quinn's head wobbled an affirmative. 'You're right. We'll all be locked away in the Doge's dungeon. Tortured. Murdered. Killed. But would it matter? We're already trapped, imprisoned.' Her words came in long, drawn-out gasps. 'We're ensnared in a prison of our own making ... and for what?'
    Pillar went and stood behind his mother's chair. Hesitating briefly, he rested his hands on her shoulders. Quinn gave a small moan. With growing confidence he began to knead them, working on the knots of flesh, the tightness of her neck. All the while, he whispered words of comfort, trying to calm her.
    'And for what?' she repeated. She leant back into his hands and her eyes slowly closed. He continued his ministrations, feeling the tension drain from her body and a relaxed heaviness take its place. He worked in blessed silence.
    'You're right, Santo,' mumbled Quinn.
    Pillar's hands dropped and he backed away. It had been a long time since she'd called him by his father's name. The vino had contracted time and opened a splintered passage that melded past and present. 'He can't help it,' she murmured, 'and neither could you. That's why you did it, wasn't it? You were tricked. Thought you were taking a risk to help us, but it was a stupid risk, it was all a trick. He lured you away. Seduced you.'
    Her eyes flew back open she sat upright, blinking to refocus the here and now, folding her arms around her body. She sensed Pillar behind her. 'If he can't control himself anymore, then what hope do we have?' She tipped her head back until Pillar's face swam into view. He was astonished to see tears trickling down her withered cheeks. 'Answer that, you fool. What hope do we have?'

C HAPTER T HREE
Revelations
    I FELT HIM COMING .
    I waited. In my small attic-room at the top of the house – the one place I could almost call my own. Here I had a mattress to sleep on, a light when I needed it, the opportunity for fresh air and even some company.
    My few possessions were stored in an old wooden chest with the smell of the sea and a broken-lock lid. In there I kept a tiny sliver of myrtle wax. Green in colour and oozing a curious but pleasing smell, it was given to me by Pillar, years ago, as a reward for completing my first broach. I remember how proud I'd been when Quinn carefully placed my candles on the shop shelves and how thrilled I'd felt when, within hours, they'd all sold. Even Quinn had been happy with me that day.
    Beside the wax, I had a small tinder box and a few rush lights that Pillar gave me so I wouldn't spend my nights in the dark. Not that I minded, not when I could so easily climb up to the roof garden and gaze at the stars. I also had a piece of parchment that I found in the canal the day I went with Pillar to the Chandlers Quartiere to pick up an order of beef tallow.
    In an act of sheer rashness, Pillar had ordered the gondolier to row into the Dorsoduro Sestiere, to the outskirts of the Tanners Quartiere. It was the first time I'd ever been on the Circolo Canal. I couldn't believe all the traffic on the water. All the noise. Keeping my hat pulled down even lower than usual, I remember my eyes darting here and there as I'd tried to soak up all the colour and sounds. People were strolling along, talking, singing and shouting. Others peered out of windows, chatting with neighbours, hailing someone in a nearby calle. Some stood on the fondamenta, so close to the water they appeared about to step on to it, waving to vendors to row their gondolas laden with flowers and fruit and other produce closer. Children skipped across bridges, dogs barked at fluttering ribbons and flags; gondolas floated out of water gates into