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Above the Flames
The sun had not yet risen, and already the fire was dying. A city can only burn so much, and this was far from the first fire of the year. It was for the best, I supposed; the Frescobaldi had been reminded that ours was not a family to be trifled with, and Florence still stood.
"We should have built higher," said Isabella. "This smoke is foul." Our father rose and struck her, not angrily and with an open hand; he is a gentle man.
"Have some respect for the dead," he muttered. Then he slouched back to his seat, and the room fell into a sullen silence. He was drunk, I suspected. There is something in him that balks at doing what must be done to defend his honor, and he sometimes requires aid to silence it; as I said, he is a gentle man.
It was a strange sort of respect that permitted us to order a dozen bravii to burn down a family's home in the dark of night, but barred us from remarking on the smell of their corpses after. "We should leave the city," I said, more to fill the silence than anything else, "for a few weeks. Amedeo will not settle with us, not now, but perhaps when tempers have had a chance to cool things will be different."
"Are you a coward or merely a fool?" asked Isabella, who used to climb on my shoulders to steal figs from trees. "If we flee now, we shall never be able to return. Do you think Amedeo would forget a grudge in this lifetime?"
She was right, of course, but I was in a quarrelsome mood. "Would that be so bad? This city is death to whoever holds it; why not let that be Amedeo?"
Our father rose again; he did not hold back his strength with me. I sprawled onto the floor, raised my arm to keep my head from striking stone. He stared at me in silence as I found my feet; I acknowledged his correction with a shaky bow. When he sat, I took the implicit permission to do the same, and returned to staring out the window slit.
They were not embers that I saw, but I could not shift my perception to align with what I consciously knew. It all seemed so small from up here. How strange, I thought, that men should go to so much effort to build cities, only to fill them with the ones we hate most in all the world. God must marvel that His creations could be foolish.
I wondered, briefly, if it could end, if someday a family could be strong enough that none would dare to strike at them, that none would offer insult, that they could, perhaps, show some measure of mercy to their enemies, kill them openly and without treachery, give them time to make themselves right with God. Foolishness, of course. Weakness binds a family together; strength fractures them. Adam's sons had no enemies, and look how that worked out for Abel. We who were tainted by sin could expect no better.
I set aside my musings; this was not the time for them. Amedeo would be out for blood, tomorrow if we were lucky, today if we weren't. Better to spend this time planning our reply.
"We should have built higher," said Isabella. "This smoke is foul." Our father rose and struck her, not angrily and with an open hand; he is a gentle man.
"Have some respect for the dead," he muttered. Then he slouched back to his seat, and the room fell into a sullen silence. He was drunk, I suspected. There is something in him that balks at doing what must be done to defend his honor, and he sometimes requires aid to silence it; as I said, he is a gentle man.
It was a strange sort of respect that permitted us to order a dozen bravii to burn down a family's home in the dark of night, but barred us from remarking on the smell of their corpses after. "We should leave the city," I said, more to fill the silence than anything else, "for a few weeks. Amedeo will not settle with us, not now, but perhaps when tempers have had a chance to cool things will be different."
"Are you a coward or merely a fool?" asked Isabella, who used to climb on my shoulders to steal figs from trees. "If we flee now, we shall never be able to return. Do you think Amedeo would forget a grudge in this lifetime?"
She was right, of course, but I was in a quarrelsome mood. "Would that be so bad? This city is death to whoever holds it; why not let that be Amedeo?"
Our father rose again; he did not hold back his strength with me. I sprawled onto the floor, raised my arm to keep my head from striking stone. He stared at me in silence as I found my feet; I acknowledged his correction with a shaky bow. When he sat, I took the implicit permission to do the same, and returned to staring out the window slit.
They were not embers that I saw, but I could not shift my perception to align with what I consciously knew. It all seemed so small from up here. How strange, I thought, that men should go to so much effort to build cities, only to fill them with the ones we hate most in all the world. God must marvel that His creations could be foolish.
I wondered, briefly, if it could end, if someday a family could be strong enough that none would dare to strike at them, that none would offer insult, that they could, perhaps, show some measure of mercy to their enemies, kill them openly and without treachery, give them time to make themselves right with God. Foolishness, of course. Weakness binds a family together; strength fractures them. Adam's sons had no enemies, and look how that worked out for Abel. We who were tainted by sin could expect no better.
I set aside my musings; this was not the time for them. Amedeo would be out for blood, tomorrow if we were lucky, today if we weren't. Better to spend this time planning our reply.
The writing's good, but I'm only vaguely aware of what's going on. A power struggle, something akin to mafia, if not that precisely. The characterization is fine, but I'm predisposed not to like mafioso stuff, so I don't know how helpful I can be. The father is characterized well, but the narrator isn't much, so it's tough to develop a rooting interest. The other issue I had is that barely into the story, I know what the conflict and the stakes are, and the rest of it doesn't develop that anymore. Hold something in reserve to dole out through the story so there's a continuous plot arc.
Probably something to do with the Medici, I suppose. Florence was known during the Middle Ages to witness bloody feuds between ruling families. Wasn't Machiavelli at the service of some Tuscany family?
That being said, much like Pasco, I’m failing to see what the plot is, and it reads as too-short an except from a larger story. Also the scene largely feels disconnected from the background in a way.
That being said, much like Pasco, I’m failing to see what the plot is, and it reads as too-short an except from a larger story. Also the scene largely feels disconnected from the background in a way.