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A Sting in the Tail

The following short story written by Mary Hoffman is from the official Stravaganza-website, which doesn't exist anymore. It is accessible through the Wayback Machine, but I am uploading the short stories here to a) act as a secondary archive and b) to make them accessible to fans. If this story is ever re-published somewhere or I am asked to delete it, I will do so. This post will be unrebloggable, but feel free to link to it if you wish to add comments/discuss the story. I do not own the story, and it is directly copy-pasted from the old website.

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In 1450, the famous horse race of Remora was still run on the straight. Every other year on 15th August, companies from each of the city’s Twelfths massed at the Gate of the Moon in the south of the city and raced their horses north along the Strada delle Stelle to the middle of the Campo. On the alternate years they began the race at the Gate of the Sun and ran south to the same place.

That’s how, about a hundred years before, the race had got its name — the Stellata (short for Corsa Stellata, the Race of the Stars) — from its being run along the Strada delle Stelle. Of course, the whole city revolved around the concept of the stars, ever since Pope Benedict, following a decree of his predecessor, had built the broad Road of Stars that ran from the north to the south of the city, and the circular piazza at its heart, known as the Campo delle Stelle, the field of stars.

But in the middle of the fifteenth century, the Remorans were still happy to run their race in a straight line, although it meant that the onlookers saw only a short section of it and the Campo was the most popular place for spectators, because there you could see the finish line.

Fabrizio di Chimici was not yet the first Duke of Giglia and Remora was the unchallenged leading city of Talia. Ferrando, the first di Chimici Prince of Remora, who would one day dance with the Duchessa of Bellezza on the night she wore the glass mask, was not yet born.

So, although the Stellata was run according to pacts and plots hatched between different Twelfths, as it still was 128 years later for the race in which a twenty-first century girl from our world got involved, there was then no particular prejudice in favour of the Lady or the Twins.

In 1450 there was to be a Stellata Straordinaria, an extra race, run in September to commemorate an outstanding event. Maestro Giovanni Ortolano, the great sculptor and architect, had completed his starry pavement in the black and white striped cathedral and it was to be unveiled on the evening of the race. He had also designed a special Stellata banner to show his circular black and white masterpiece as well as the obligatory signs of all the Twelfths.

What fortune that would be — to win the star-sprinkled banner in the race of the stars! Every Twelfth was even more determined than usual to be the one that grasped the banner from the finish line and carry it in triumph to the Duomo.

And in no Twelfth did that desire burn more strongly than the Scorpion. It was the Nonna, the grandmother — the name given to the Twelfth which hadn’t won for the longest time. Poor Scorpion hadn’t won a Stellata that century.

“But this year will break our run of bad luck, I’m sure of it,” said Antonio, Horsemaster of the Scorpion. “And what a way to break it, to win Maestro Ortolano’s banner! Why, no one would be able to hold a candle to us after that.”

He was at a meeting with the Twelfths of the other Water signs — the Crab and the Fishes (for the Scorpion is the third Water sign of the Zodiac, not the water-bearer Aquarius, as you might think). Much liquid was consumed at these meetings, and that not of a watery nature. This one was taking place in a tavern in the Twelfth of the Crab, up in the north of the city.

The Horsemasters of Crab and Fishes, Giusto and Orlando, exchanged indulgent glances. They could afford not to contradict Antonio; the Crab had won six Stellate in fifty years and Fishes had won only last year. They knew in their hearts how Antonio suffered and how it was only his hope that kept him going. A dozen Horsemasters had come and gone in the Scorpion since it last had a win and every one of them had spent their few years as Capitano striving their utmost for victory and retired frustrated. Why should Antonio be any different? But no one was going to say that to him.

“What are you thinking of running?” asked Orlando.

“We have a new mare,” said Antonio. “A grey — pure white and delicate boned. Benedetta, we call her — the blessed one. And she will be our blessing if she wins. But we mustn’t have a long start; she is highly strung and wouldn’t cope well with a lot of hanging around at the start-line.”

His fellow Water Capitani nodded. This was a perennial problem. The horses with the heart and spirit to win the Stellata were the intelligent ones, who were often too nervous to handle the delays that could happen before a valid start to the race was declared. The more placid animals who could brook the false starts were usually lacking that extra spark that made a winner. The Scorpion had chosen the other option in the August race and their solid brown gelding Matteo had come second, which, in Remora, was almost worse than coming last.

They guessed that Antonio had paid a good deal of money for Benedetta; the Twelvers of the Scorpion were so desperate for victory that they had dug deep in their pockets for a new mount. But what would that leave to spend out on pacts and bribes? It was no good having even the best horse in the city if you hadn’t laid out enough cash on your agreements with other Twelfths.

As Antonio crossed the circular Campo on his way back home from the meeting, he took a detour off into the black and white cathedral. It was in the Twins’ territory, but that was all right. Twins and Scorpion were not allies but neither were they adversaries. It was much harder for Twelvers of the Bull, who had to cross into enemy territory every time they wanted to worship at the Duomo.

Workmen were busy in a side chapel, following orders of Maestro Giovanni. They were setting in one of the panels of his new pavement, sweating and straining with ropes while they lowered a segment of the astrological circle into place, shaped like one of the Twelfths of the city. (Like a slice of pizza, in fact, but no fifteenth-century Remoran would have thought of that comparison, since pizza had not been invented then.)

As he drew nearer, Antonio’s pulse quickened. He could see from the segments which had already been set into the floor, that the one being positioned now was his own, the house of the Scorpion. Surely this was an omen? He made the Hand of Fortune — thumb and little finger of the right hand touching — and swiftly pressed the middle fingers against his brow and breast, before crossing himself in the more orthodox manner of someone in a Christian church.

“Hey you!” shouted one of the workman rudely. “Clear off! No previews before the race.”

Antonio backed hastily away, though the preoccupied sculptor looked round mildly and smiled at Antonio, as if he didn’t mind his work being seen before its official unveiling. He wasn’t a temperamental artist, but his workers were very protective of him and proud of their association with such a great man.

The Horsemaster, after saying a fervent prayer for victory, came out of the cool shadowy interior and down the steep back steps outside the cathedral, past the baptistery, and skirted the rest of the Campo till he reached the entrance to his own Twelfth. Entering its familiar streets calmed him down.

The blue and purple banners still fluttered from flagpoles and hung from balconies, where Twelvers had left them out after the race last month; no point in taking them down with the Straordinaria coming so soon after. At every crossroads stood a statue of their totem animal, not the most beautiful, as Antonio readily conceded, but their own symbol after all. “In my tail do you see my true nature” was the motto of Scorpione, which each Twelver interpreted in his or her own way.

“Don’t underestimate us,” was Antonio’s reading of it; “Don’t write us off, because we’ll surprise you in the end.” His heart swelled as he walked up the broad Via Scorpione to the Piazza della Fonte Nuova. All the Water Twelfths made much of their fountains and the one in the Scorpion, the “new fountain”, had been created at least two hundred years before by a sculptor whose name was now forgotten and who was known just as the “Master of the New Fountain”.

Antonio sat on the broad marble ledge around the fountain and took off his blue and purple scarf to dip in the clear water. He dabbed his hot face with the cool wet cloth and looked at the intricate carvings of insects and small animals that surrounded the rim of the white marble basin with its inner ring of scorpions. “What a sculptor!” he thought. Then he stopped, with the cloth clamped to his head so that the water trickled down it in ever-warmer drops. If there had been anyone to see him, they would have thought their Horsemaster had lost his wits, but it was siesta-time and the square was empty.

“Sculptor!” he said out loud. The very Guild with which his Twelfth was associated was that of the sculptors — one reason it was so lavishly decorated with good models of its difficult-to-portray insect. And had a sculptor not just smiled on him — the very one whose work this extra Stellata was to celebrate?

“A second omen!” thought Antonio, amazed that he hadn’t made the connection before.

* * * * *

In the stables of the Scorpion a young boy, no more than fifteen, was brushing Matteo the brown gelding. The horse would almost certainly not run in the Stellata again, having proved not quite fiery enough to win, but he was a good riding mount and would never be sold. The boy, Ciro, was very fond of him. And of all the horses in the stables. He was a Scorpion himself, born in the Twelfth and baptised twice, like all Remorans — once by the priest in the church of St John the Baptist and once by the Horsemaster in the Fonte Nuova with his fellow Twelvers looking on.

Not this Horsemaster, of course, but the one of the time. Ciro was no kin to Antonio — in fact he was no kin to anyone, but an orphan the Horsemaster had taken on to help at the stables. He was a devoted lover of horses and hoped to ride for the Scorpion in the Stellata himself one day. Meanwhile, he tended the beasts and knew them all by name and by nature. Benedetta now was a lovely creature and Ciro had great hopes for her in this special race. He burned with his Twelfth’s shame at being such an old Nonna and longed for victory.

Ciro was too young and restless to spend his afternoons sleeping; he found it more relaxing to brush swishing manes and tails in the warm silence of the stables which smelt of horses and the sweet almond oil he had rubbed into their coarse hair before brushing it.

* * * * *

Antonio stepped into the church of San Gianbattista to offer up thanks for his two good omens and utter an even more fervent prayer for victory. The church was empty and peaceful. The two statues, one of the Baptist, with his coarse hairy tunic, and the other of the Lady, holding her miraculous Child, were both draped and adorned with offerings — trumpery gold necklaces, flowers, lace and other trinkets.

On a moment’s impulse, Antonio tied his wet neck cloth around the saint’s foot and prayed as he had never prayed before. In the silence of the church, he seemed to hear the high whinny of a horse. He looked round nervously but there was no one else there, neither four-legged nor human. The only time a horse came into this church was for the blessing before each Stellata; Benedetta would stand there herself in a week’s time, living up to her name.

Then Antonio shook himself and hurried out of the church and along the narrow cobbled streets back to the stables. He hadn’t gone far before he heard the sound of approaching music and the feet of many people and some horses on the cobbles.

It was a haunting music, of flutes, drums and fiddles and, as the music-makers rounded a corner, Antonio realised who they were.

“Oh no!” he moaned to himself. “Zinti!”

The travelling people who came from the east of Europa (and some say from even further east originally) were no more than tolerated in Remora. They were always around at the time of the Stellata because it was held, unfortunately as most Remorans thought, on the same day as the Zinti’s major festival — the Day of the Goddess. They liked horses and could do anything with them, but they were not interested in the great race or the spectacular procession that preceded it.

The Zinti gathered in the City of Stars to stay up all night on 14th August, worshipping their goddess and greeting her consort, the sun, at daybreak on the fifteenth. Their ceremonies and rituals were over long before the race began, which is why they were allowed to carry them out in the circular Campo.

But their presence made native Remorans uneasy. The Zinti were strange people, nomadic, carrying all their possessions with them — and those possessions mainly outlandish colourful clothing and musical instruments. They slept in the open air under the stars; no member of their tribe ever lay down in a house, although they would accept hospitality in the daytime. They were always courteous to citizens and caused no trouble in the city, but their coming made Remorans restless and their departure always brought a slight feeling of relief. Antonio had no idea why these ones were still in the city nearly a month after the August Stellata.

Still, he raised his hat to them as they passed him and the man who seemed to be the leader of this group returned the courtesy with his own red velvet cap. He looked keenly into Antonio’s face as their paths crossed and Antonio had the strangest feeling that the stranger could read the secrets of his heart.

And that was an uncomfortable thought — because at that moment Antonio was thinking, “Surely to meet the Zinti in the Scorpion is a bad omen to set against the two good ones?”

Now in his head he seemed to hear a voice say, “Why so? The Zinti bear no ill will to the Scorpion, or any other Twelfth,” even though no one had spoken out loud.

Antonio stopped, ashamed of his discourteous thought, and the group of Zinti halted too, their music dwindling to a close.

“Capitano?” said the man with the red cap, squashing it back on his long light brown hair. Antonio was surprised that his position was known, although officially Horsemasters assume the title of Capitano only in the week of the race. He had again the disconcerting feeling that the Zinti knew so much more about him than he did about them.

Now he had to say something, so he invited the colourful group back to his stables for refreshment.

“That is very kind,” said the man in the red cap. “Let me introduce myself. I am Indro and we are Manoush.” He gestured to his companions, who smiled and doffed their many colourful hats and made elaborate bows. Soon, Antonio found himself at the centre of the group of Zinti, or Manoush as they preferred to be known, feeling like a cabbage in the middle of a bouquet of spring flowers.

Ciro was astonished to hear the sounds of many people entering the stable yard and even more so when he looked out and saw the outlandish company that the Horsemaster had brought back with him. It was not yet the end of siesta-time and Antonio’s wife, Stefania, looked bemused to be called out from the house and asked to entertain about a dozen strangers. But she saw the light in Antonio’s eyes and didn’t argue.

Soon the little band of Zinti were sitting at the stone table on the terrace behind the Horsemaster’s house, jostling elbows as they drank ale and ate bread and cheese and olives. The impromptu meal over, they got out their instruments and played while Indro serenaded their hosts. Stefania, now in a clean apron and with her hair combed, turned pink with pleasure. Ciro watched wide-eyed from the stables, where three strange horses were now munching hay alongside the other Scorpion animals, as the Zinti got up and danced around the yard, playing their flutes and fiddles; nothing like that had ever been seen in the Scorpion stables before.

By the time they left, Antonio had stopped thinking that the Zinti were a bad omen. And Ciro had decided there was nothing he wanted more than to join them.

* * * * *

Benedetta didn’t like the heats at all — the crowds, the noise, the banners and the other horses. It didn’t bode at all well for the race itself. Gloomy Scorpion Twelvers were shaking their heads and thinking they had not spent their money wisely. But real disaster did not strike until the night of the last heat, the Prova Generale.

The Rincorsa, the mount who entered the race at a running start, was the Scorpion’s enemy, the Archer. And because fate had decreed that Benedetta was in the eleventh position, the Archer’s jockey cut at the Scorpion’s man with his whip as the horse ran past. The Scorpion’s jockey flinched, Benedetta reared and, as her forefeet landed back on the track, her leg got entangled with that of the water-bearer’s mount.

Within minutes, Antonio knew that his horse was lame and would be unfit to ride in the next day’s Stellata.

He was in despair. Consulting with his jockey, he knew there was no choice but to run Matteo again, even though he thought their chances slim. Matteo had run no heats and had been eating too much to be a good racing choice. But anything was better than scratching at this stage. Matteo would run in the morning heat and then the Scorpion’s jockey would register his name with the mayor and there would be no backing out for horse or rider.

Antonio took no pleasure in the dinner held in the Scorpion that night. The wine ran as freely as usual, the food laid out on the blue and purple tablecloths was as good as ever, but Antonio’s heart was not in it. He had treasured such high hopes this time and now their expensive grey mare was lame and they had to run a last-minute horse. He resigned himself to the Scorpion remaining the “grandmother” for nearly another year.

But in the early dawn light Ciro was woken from his sleep in the hayloft above Matteo’s stall by a soft whistle. He slid down the ladder and found himself face to face with the man the Zinti called Indro. The man searched the boy’s face, then asked, “Is it true the Scorpion’s horse is wounded?”

“Aye, lame,” said Ciro, his heart leaping at the thought that this strange man might have some subtle horsecraft that would cure Benedetta.

But Indro was shaking his head. “That is bad luck, indeed,” he said. “What will you run instead?”

“This horse, Matteo,” said Ciro. “He’s a good one, but he hasn’t been prepared for the race. Antonio has little hope of victory.”

“Tell the Horsemaster I shall meet him up at the Gate of the Sun, for the morning heat,” said Indro, and was gone before Ciro could ask why.

The last heat was run and Matteo, surprised to be asked to race so early in the morning, came last. Antonio sat on the marble bench around the fountain in the Campo, with his head in his hands. He had run behind the horses all the way from the Gate of the Sun and been greeted with bad news by the Scorpion’s jockey as soon as he reached the Campo. Now he felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up.

The man in the red cap, who had also been at the start of the heat, sat down beside him. “You must register the horse and jockey now, I think,” he said quietly. Antonio nodded.

“I have an offer to make,” said Indro. “You can of course go ahead with your brown horse and your chosen jockey or you can take me and my palomino, Malassa. I will ride for the Scorpion if you want.”

Antonio knew it would be madness to change jockey as well as horse on the day of the Stellata. To trust one of the Zinti. And it would cost him a fortune in pacts broken. But he looked at Indro and saw that he was slight of build and not tall; he could be a jockey. And the Zinti’s skill with horses was legendary. He remembered the palomino from a few days before and she had been beautiful.

“What do I have to lose?” asked Antonio.

* * * * *

The Stellata Ortolano of 1450 became famous in the history of Remora and its Race of the Stars. There was a sensation at the registering of mounts and riders when the Scorpion announced it would be running Malassa, ridden by Indro Vivoide, instead of Benedetta or Matteo and its previous jockey, who stood glowering nearby, in spite of the large bag of silver Antonio with which had paid him off.

And it was the Manoush, dressed in blue and purple, who led Indro’s palomino mare into the church of San Gianbattista that afternoon for the blessing. “Dia! Dia!” went up the cry when the mare relieved herself on the red carpet, for there was no more lucky sign in the rituals surrounding the Stellata.

Antonio was marching in the solemn procession before the race, dressed in his best ceremonial clothes, behind the drummer and the ensigns waving the giant banners of Scorpione, so he was already at the finish line when the race began from the Gate of the Sun. Ciro had gone with him and heard the cry of “Ottimo!” which meant that a clean start had taken place first time.

He was gripping his master’s hand so tightly that afterwards Antonio found the boy’s nails had drawn blood, but he didn’t notice at the time, because he was screaming encouragement, along with all the other Remorans massed in the Campo.

And suddenly, there were the horses! A blur of colours and sounds and they swept up to the finish line so tightly bunched that none but the official positioned there could tell who had won.

And then, “Scorpione! Scorpione!” echoed round the circular Campo and Antonio nearly fainted with joy. Even his deposed jockey was thumping Indro on the back; the great drought had ended and the Scorpion was the grandmother no longer.

The Duomo roiled with bodies and flags as the special Stellata banner was borne in triumph up to the altar. Antonio couldn’t see his successful jockey; he himself was carried on the shoulders of enthusiastic Scorpions and he expected that Indro was enjoying the same acclaim somewhere in the cathedral. Eventually the priest’s bell brought some sort of order to the mob and the short service of Thanksgiving began.

The next stop was to take the banner to their own church in the Twelfth. But first the priest led the way through the crowd to a corded-off side chapel, where a canvas cloth lay on the floor. Antonio was at the front when the cloth was removed and joined in the gasp as Giovanni Ortolano’s masterpiece was revealed in its entirety for the first time.

The Duomo echoed to the applause and the sculptor himself stood with head bowed to receive it. When he looked up, he exchanged glances with Antonio and came over to clap him on the shoulder.

“Congratulations,” he said. “You are the Capitano of the Scorpion, aren’t you? I saw you here earlier in the week.”

“Thank you, yes,” said Antonio. “And congratulations to you too. The pavement is magnificent.”

It was almost the last thing he could remember about that night. The feasting and drinking in the Twelfth went on till dawn and most Scorpions had spectacular hangovers the next day. Antonio had a vague recollection of toasting Indro but couldn’t remember his being at the feast.

And strangest of all, next day Ciro was nowhere to be found. He was never seen in the Twelfth again and nor was the little band of Zinti, at least not in Antonio’s lifetime.

The Horsemaster continued in his post for eight years and retired after two more wins; the luck of the Scorpion had really changed with the Stellata Ortolano.

But the oddest thing was that, although everyone agreed that Scorpion had won the Stellata Straordinaria of 1450, after a few years everyone was a bit hazy about the horse and jockey who had ridden for them. Including Antonio.

As he got older, he sometimes said that it had been Benedetta, sometimes Matteo. (It was before consistent written records of the Stellata were kept.) When asked the jockey’s name, sometimes he said it had been a young boy called Ciro, other times he gave the name of the jockey who should have run in the race.

One thing he was clear about till his dying day: there had been three good omens for the Scorpion that year. He had seen the workman lowering the section of his Twelfth into Ortolano’s masterpiece pavement, the sculptor had smiled at him and he had met a band of Zinti on his way to the stable.

And when people said, “But surely the Zinti are a bad omen? Aren’t they a wandering and untrustworthy people?” Antonio never missed the opportunity to give them a lecture on acceptance and hospitality towards strangers.

“After all,” he said. “No one can deny they brought me luck.”

* * * * *

Note: Readers of City of Stars will notice that the celestial pavement has been moved in this story, from Santa Fina to Remora. In fact it is the other way round: Ortolano’s masterpiece was moved from the cathedral in Remora to the one in Santa Fina after part of the Duomo floor subsided and the pavement was in danger of being destroyed. The move was supposed to be temporary, and indeed the problem in Remora was soon sorted out, but the next Pope was sensitive about having such a non-Christian work of art in his Duomo and somehow by 1578 it had become a fixture in the place where Georgia saw it.

#I'm not sure if the title is supposed to have tail or tale #because the website has both #stravaganza #mary hoffman

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