Carpathian 00 - The Scarletti Curse

in trouble. Do you know the name of that maid?" She indicated a young woman who was industriously sweeping out the alcove with the shrine to the Madonna.
    Sophie shook her head, but Nicoletta was undeterred from her quest. Within a matter of moments the maid was laughing with her, and the broom was in Nicoletta's possession. The guards shook their heads at her unpredictable ways but followed her back up the stairs to her room. Nicoletta's eyes danced at them. "You be certain and keep a good watch out there, and warn us if the don or Maria Pia happen to come by."
    The guards looked at one another suspiciously. "Signorina Sigmora?" one asked her.
    Sophie nodded vigorously. "We are going to—" She clapped her hand over her mouth and looked up at Nicoletta.
    "Clean," Nicoletta supplied hastily. "A surprise for Maria Pia. She has a distaste of dust, and the room is heavy with dust."
    "The don would want a domestica to do the cleaning, certainly not his bride," the guard pointed out. He raised his eyebrows at his partner, who only shrugged and smiled at the strange ways of their charge.
    "Signorina Sigmora likes things a certain way," Nicoletta amended, pushing Sophie into the room, where they both burst out laughing. "I am quite used to doing things the way she likes." Nicoletta hastily shut the door on the guards' startled expressions. "I could not tell a lie, or Maria Pia would have me light many candles to the good Madonna and kneel in prayer for a long, long time."
    "Are you sure you will not meet i fantasmi?" Sophie asked. What had seemed a great adventure was a bit more frightening when they were actually about to do it.
    "If there really is such a thing," Nicoletta said as she searched beneath the smooth edge of the wall for the hidden mechanism, "it would only come out at night."
    Sophie sighed and wiggled her body to fit between Nicoletta and the wall so she could guide Nicoletta's hand to the right place. "It is dark in there," Sophie cautioned. "Perhaps i fantasmi cannot tell the difference."
    They moved back as the wall seemed to shimmer with life. The sun had changed position, and Nicoletta noted that the strange differences brought on by the stained-glass window were no longer apparent.
    Back were the images of wickedness and doom. Or were they? She peered closer. Were the winged creatures embedded in the marble reaching to free the hapless victims from the sea serpents?
    "Nicoletta!" Sophie tugged at her skirt. "See how dark it is?"
    Nicoletta looked into the interior and was astonished at how dark it really was. As there were no windows, the passageway looked black inside. When she lit a taper and held it up, it illuminated shiny spider webs, white tapestries of silken threads covering the walls and hanging from the ceilings. She looked up the walls in hopes of finding a sconce for her candle, but found none. She was forced to set Generated by ABC Amber LIT Conv erter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
    the taper precariously on the floor.
    Nicoletta studied the passageway. It was narrow in comparison to the cavernous corridors in the palazzo, but a man with wide shoulders, such as Giovanni Scarletti, could still pass through without scraping his skin. The ceiling was much lower, too, so that she felt closed in by the heavy stone. She very much wanted to explore, to see where the passage led, but Sophie was frightened, breathing fast, nearly jumping up and down in her terror. Nicoletta contented herself with bashing spiders and sweeping away the webs between the nursery and her room. The walls of the passage appeared smooth, the secret doors obviously hidden from both sides. The floor immediately outside the room was constructed of marble but soon gave way to rougher, grainy stone.
    She retrieved the taper and went farther into the dark interior, holding up the light so she could see beyond the nursery. Tentatively she reached out with the broom, swiping at the seamless wall in hopes of discovering another door. Instead, something dropped out of the top of the wall, a heavy, flat, sharp object that cut right through the broom handle, so that the bristles end clattered to the floor. Her heart nearly stopped as the huge blade disappeared with menacing silence back into the ceiling as if it had never been Gasping, Nicoletta dropped the taper, which fell to the stone floor and rolled away, extinguishing the flame. At once the passageway seemed a dark, sinister place, a death trap, and she shuddered to