Chapter 1

CHAPTERONE

2210 AD, All Saints Day, Present Day

Some saythat every good story begins with a death, others claim that it begins with lovers meeting. As Providence would have it, this story begins with both, which is only fitting as death and love have always walked hand in hand in the Serene Republic of Venice.

As our tale begins, the life of Alfonso Pisani comes to an end. The salty wind blows off the lagoon, with the promise of winter in its bite, and the doomed Alfonso is led up the wooden steps of the gallows constructed in Saint Mark’s Square. It has been a place of public execution for as long as it has existed, even with its deceptive beauty and reverent holiness.

Despite the miserable weather, the square is packed with Venetian citizens. Everyone, from the Doge on his balcony above to the beggar boy straining for a glimpse below, is present to make sure that Alfonso dies.

His crime, you ask? One of the most despised in all of the New Republic. Alfonso has been caught making tarocchi, the tarot, and imbuing the cards with magic in order to screw with Fate.

In the Republic, tarot cards are carried and consulted by the very poorest to the very richest, and the making of them held as one of the highest callings. To use magic to manipulate cards is the gravest of crimes.

Fate, like the Republic, doesn’t like to be screwed with, and to attempt it is to surrender your life because no mercy will be granted by either. Alfonso was caught in the act. There was not even a trial, and he didn’t defend his innocence.

Fate fucked Alfonso Pisani before Alfonso Pisani could fuck Fate.

The Council of Ten had signed the execution paperwork before gathering on the Doge’s balcony to watch Alfonso die. They know he can use magic, so his guards are trained in battle spells and will be able to counteract any of his attempts to flee.

Alfonso does not attempt it.

His guards carry hexed stiletto’s and artificer’s stun bombs to keep any rogue stregoni in check.

Once the guards would have pointed guns to ensure compliance, but guns were the brutish weapons for the non-magical and banned in the city of Venice. They had a magical weapons trade to protect after all.

After technology failed two hundred years before, magic rose back up and had reigned supreme ever since.

Industrious Venetian artisans had been the first to discover how to fuse and capture magic in their finely blown glass, creating everything from batteries to bombs.

Some of the old technology like lights and phones had also been restored with magical adjustments, but the priority had been modified weaponry to deal with magical threats.

Business had always been revered as much as any saint in Venice, and magic is just something else to trade in.

The ancient blue and gold clock tower chimes to warn the crowds to hurry into the square, for Alfonso’s last dance is about to begin.

Standing behind the Doge and slightly to his right, Domenico Aladoro adjusts the black hood of his cloak of office to try and keep the misting rain from his face.

He wants to be back inside the warmth of his palazzo with spiced wine and a book, but as the youngest member of the Council of Ten, he must put in a reputable appearance. He is, at the very least, mature enough to keep the boredom from his handsome face.

Beneath him, in the crowd of the esteemed Tarot Artisans Guild, stands Maestro Pietro Vianello, the most famous and skilled tarot artist of them all, who also has the honor of having the patronage of the Aladoro family.

Dom catches Maestro Vianello’s eye and gives the old man a nod when his father can’t see. He can still hear Rodrigo chastising him for acknowledging ’the help,’ but Dom knows better. After all, every time he sits down to write, he’s doing it in books made for him by the Vianello family, sends letters using Vianello stationary, and turns tarot cards crafted by Vianello artisans. He doesn’t deem it beneath him to acknowledge the publishers at all.

Dom is still smiling grimly at the old man, so he sees the exact moment when a woman takes his arm. A lover? Not the strangest sight in Venice, especially for a man of fortune. No, the man smiles too fondly for it to be a lover. It is the smile of a father to a beloved daughter.

The Vianello heiress is someone Dom knows of but has never actually seen with his own eyes. In the dreary morning, the woman’s hair sparkles like sunlight under her hood as she follows her father’s gaze. Her eyes are clever and intense, even at a distance, so at odds with her soft red mouth.

Stella. The name finally surfaces from Dom’s memory. He gives her the slightest bow, and her golden brows tighten in a frown. Strange. Women don’t usually frown at the heir of the Aladoro family.

Underneath the balcony, Stella knows she should be interested in the hanging. Alfonso’s fate could so easily end up being her own, but as she catches Dom’s eye again, she’s not thinking of the danger. She doesn’t see the miserable sky and the sad spectacle.

She’s back at Carnevale, surrounded by masks and revelry, the feel of their bodies twining together, and the taste of his spritz-sweetened mouth on hers.

The Prince of Venice. Her forbidden fruit for one Carnevale night, and then gone forever.

Their attention is torn away from each other and back to the doomed Alfonso as he gives his final words:

"Hanging me won’t stop what’s coming, glorified monsters of the Council of Ten! Your wings and scales and fire magic won’t stop the Wheel of Fortune from turning. The Wolf Mage and her army aren’t what you should fear most, you warmongering fools! The blades in the darkness will be your own when you tear each other apart. Your kind couldn’t stop magic from destroying your safe worlds two hundred years ago, and it won’t be stopped now. You think you can control it? Ha!"

Beside Dom, the Doge’s sorcerer, Arkon Ziani, groans under his breath. "I do hate the ramblers."

Beneath them, Stella turns away from Alfonso’s rant and catches Dom’s golden-eyed gaze once more. They stare at each other as Alfonso’s words choke off. The trap door falls away, hemp silencing him forever.

In that second, Dom and Stella share a moment of understanding, a mutual hatred of the sport of a dying man, and both smile sadly at each other.

Neither knows that within a week, Alfonso’s words will be seen as an auguring, and all the secrets they are both protecting will become entangled in the other’s.

You see? Death and lovers, hand in hand, as promised.

* * *

The nightbefore Alfonso was caught, Stella had dreamed of being hung three times in three different circumstances.

It was an omen too dangerous to ignore, so she had been especially careful while trying to unravel its meaning. She hadn’t realized she would be watching Alfonso swing by the end of the week, strangely relieved the seawater-soaked hemp wasn’t around her own throat.

Despite that, the feeling of dread still hadn’t left her. What happened to Alfonso was also what would happen to her if anyone ever found out about her magic.

Maybe her dream had been trying to warn her that the noose was tightening around her. That her fate would be the same if she slipped up for a moment. Stella rubbed at her throat.

You are burned out, that’s all. She had been working on fulfilling a large order of books and cards for her father to take on his trip to Florence and was tired down to her bones.

Exhaustion and the fact she had caught the eye of Domenico Aladoro had put her in an especially bad mood.

Not that seeing his handsome face under his black hood hadn’t sent a secret thrill through her. It was that he had smiled at her like she was a stranger, which he thought they were, but there was still a part of her that hated it.

The smile was enough to make her mind go blank and then wander down paths that it shouldn’t.

Last March, they had an unexpected encounter at Carnevale that began with laughter and ended with sweaty, mind-blowing sex in a dark room of a stranger’s palazzo. It had been the best Carnevale she’d ever had, and even though she rarely admitted it to herself, she had really enjoyed Domenico Aladoro’s company.

Masked as she was, Dom had had no idea who he’d spent the night talking and drinking with. Stella had made sure of it.

She had given the Prince of Venice her number in a moment of weakness, and then two weeks later, she had dropped her phone in a canal in a moment of strength.

Magic-fused batteries had restored phone technology but reduced them to calls only, and even then, they were so expensive, not many people used them.

Magically sent messages and letters were easier and cheaper because there was always plenty of magic to go around.

Stella had been irritated enough to toss the expensive device despite the hole a new one would put in her bank account. At least she only regretted that decision once a month now, and not the previous four times a week.

That was progress.

"Stop thinking about it," Stella muttered under her breath and swirled her brush in red paint. Stella put the final touches on the card that she was painting and stretched her neck.

The King of Swords looked back at her, and with dismay, she realized he had Dom’s eyes, his sensual mouth lifted in the same smile he had given her that morning.

"Cazzo!" she cursed and was about to throw the card into her overflowing bin of other rejected designs when her father appeared.

"Ah, excellent, you’ve finished the last one. I’ll get this to the printer’s downstairs straightaway," Pietro said and carefully plucked up the drying card before Stella could object. He hesitated at her expression, brows furrowing. "Are you okay? You look upset."

"I’m fine, Papa. Just thinking of a new design." Stella smiled, not wanting to concern him.

He was already worried about leaving her alone for a few weeks while he toured Florence, Milan, and Rome in a series of business meetings and product showings.

Stella was looking forward to having the top levels of the palazzo to herself for once and maybe painting something other than cards. She needed the break. Maybe with some decent sleep she would stop being so worried about being hanged.

"Are you sure you don’t want to come with me?" Pietro asked for the hundredth time. He had been doing his best to convince her, so Stella stood, wrapped her arm around his shoulders, and kissed his cheek.

"Positive. You know I’d die of boredom halfway through the first meeting," she said.

"You’re going to have to do them one day, my dear. You’re my heir, and they all want to meet you," he replied.

Stella joined him on his way to the door, and together they walked downstairs from their private upper floors and to the busy workshop on the ground floor.

"And they will. I like being the talented recluse, just for a little while longer," Stella added, making him smile. "Besides, you leave in two hours, and I wouldn’t have time to pack."

"I suppose it’s a good thing. As soon as they see how beautiful you are, they will all try and set you up with their sons." Pietro raised his eyes to God. "Heaven forbid you end up with a Florentine."

"Better than a Roman. See? Staying back and keeping an eye on the workshop will be good practice for me. I might even meet with clients who want commissions."

Pietro laughed. "I wouldn’t want you to strain yourself."

Stella hoped that her father’s associates would see her as being too old for marriage material.

At thirty years old, she had only technically finished her apprenticeship under her father a year ago. She had no need for marriage or a man to take care of her. She would inherit Vianello Publishing, and that was better than any rich husband. She only had to keep her head down.

No more magic. No more lusting after Domenico Aladoro.

If only either of those things were that easy.

An hour later, Stella was helping box up some merchandise with Luisa, another card artist, for the postal barge when Luca burst through the doors. He was wet from the misting rain, his eyes frantic. He waved to Stella urgently from across the workroom.

"Someone is in trouble again by the looks of things," Luisa said disapprovingly as Stella passed her the half-completed order.

"He wouldn’t be Luca if he wasn’t pissing off someone," she replied and hurried to join him. "Come on, through to the kitchen, so you don’t drip on something by accident." She cut off his objections. "Not here, Luca."

He was twenty-two and the younger brother of her friend Claudia. They had been friends forever, so whenever he got in hot water, Luca always went to Stella first before risking the wrath of his older sister.

"What is this all about, and why do I feel like I’m about to lose a pocket full of soldi to get you out of a gambling debt?" she asked as they entered the privacy of the kitchen.

Luca took Stella’s arm. "It’s not me that’s the problem! I went to Claudia’s because I hadn’t heard from her in two days, and she’s gone. She was meant to meet me this morning, and she’s never late."

"What about her newest boyfriend? You know, the owl shifter?" Stella asked, Claudia’s recent conquest’s name escaping her. She could see the fear in Luca’s eyes and was trying desperately not to think the worst.

"Claudia would have told me if she was staying with Andreas. I’m telling you she’s gone. Maybe she was grabbed like the others. I told her we shouldn’t have been looking into the disappearances!" Luca paced, dragging agitated fingers through his hair.

The disappearances were all Claudia and Luca had been talking about for a month. There had been people going missing in the Coins districts, and the inquisitors didn’t seem inclined to worry about it, dismissing them as coincidental.

Luca and Claudia knew the families of a few of them, but what they hadn’t told theinquisitorswas that they had all been unregistered magic users.

It was illegal not to be registered by the Republic if you presented with magical abilities, but it cost money to be tested, and then you would always have your name on a record.

Two reasons that many wanted to keep their powers to themselves. Like Stella.

Stella never used her secret abilities on her work. Every pack of Vianello cards was tested for magical tampering before they left production anyway, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t be in deep shit if anyone ever found out she had magic and painted cards.

No questions asked. No trial. Just the Council of Ten and the executioner. Stella rubbed at her throat again.

"How about this: you let me finish up here, and once Pietro leaves for Firenze this afternoon, we can go to Claudia’s boyfriend’s place to check it out? I don’t want you to go there by yourself if she’s in trouble. She might be having a sex marathon with Andreas and just forgot to call," she said, trying and failing to lighten the mood.

"But Stella, I feel it in my guts. Something has happened to her. I know it," Luca replied.

"Okay, then tell your gut to wait a little longer. Don’t argue with me, Luca. You’ll need my help and my blades if there really is someone after her." Stella kissed his forehead, just like she had when he was a little boy.

"You’re shit with a stiletto, and you know it. Are you hungry?"

"I could eat," he replied, with the smallest smile. Food was always a good way to distract Luca from his problems.

Stella tried to keep calm for his sake, but inside, her feeling of dread deepened. She had thought that her bad omen had been seeing Domenico Aladoro again.

She couldn’t have been more mistaken.