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still occupied stood back from the river.
    The young man wore good boots dirty from his travels. Under his dark hood and cloak his clothes were neat, even the patches where they had been torn. His equipment bag was heavy, and he had carried it a long time. He let it down beside the base of thestatue with care. The dun stone carving was long broken; all that remained were its paws—the perfect monument for the town left behind by History.
    The Doctor walked up and down the toiling rows with eyes closed. The rhythm of banners slicing air when bandieratori fought was distinctive. One could tell how advanced apprentices were by the sounds of sticks clashing.
    “Again.”
    The hallowed Art Bandiera drill: the same set every day, every day the same. Do it a thousand times in the workshop until you fight like an old alley cat—no plan, just the most efficient attack, decided and executed in the same moment. No second chance on the street.
    “Again.”
    They started young. When Rasenneisi were born, the question wasn’t “Boy or girl?” but “Good grip?”
    “Again.”
    After an hour’s review, he retired to the tower. A mournful sound as he climbed the ladder told him the creature he ventured to call Cat was waiting. Its mother had abandoned it without teaching it the most rudimentary skill of its species, so instead of purring, it had an ear-piercing whine for every occasion.
    “Breakfast,” he grunted, throwing the severed head.
    Like any old couple they lived together successfully by ignoring each other. Cat’s best instinct was in judging whether the Doctor would tolerate its presence or was sufficiently angry to kick it. This morning it crept away hastily, gnawing the meat and shuddering with satisfaction.
    The Doctor tore an orange in half and studied his flags. Keeping Valerius alive was going to be tricky if he insisted on putting himself in harm’s way. Second, their ambassador had not returned. Gonfaloniere Morello had been foolish to send his son to Concord, given its reputation. Would grief make a predictable rival unpredictable?Lastly, Concord had given notice of the imminent arrival of an engineer—a captain no less. His mission was unspecified.
    Cat was not around to kick, so he rubbed the stubble of his head and chin with vehemence while looking at the surrounding town with suspicion. Rasenna had changed many times in many centuries, but in one thing it was constant: even when Etruria was known as Etrusca, Rasenna was quarrelsome. A century ago, Rasenna’s population has expanded in step with its dominion. Most of the towers were built in that age of victory. The law forbidding new buildings higher than one hundred and one braccia was enacted to curb the rivalry even then plaguing Rasenna, and the Bardini had obeyed the letter of the law, all the while building on the “healthy” northern hills (those too poor to live in the valley could scarcely afford debilitating indulgence). As a result, their tower of regulation height looked down on all the others.
    The Bardini were proud to have risen high. Their workshop was the most famous school in a town famous for its martial artistry throughout Etruria. Talent was the reason the Scaligeri had winked at Bardini infractions. That age felt like a dream more than memory; it had ended the moment the Wave swept through Rasenna, when the low were made high and the high were swept away. Only a reputation was left, and that, twenty years later, was almost forgotten too.
    The Doctor’s rueful gaze was drawn inevitably across the river to the handsome palazzo at the end of Piazza Luna’s arc. Like the Bardini, the Morello had been far enough from Tower Scaligeri to escape the Wave. Their weakness had made them powerful in the new Rasenna, not a city but the remains of one. The weak had inherited the earth, as the Virgin had predicted; he didn’t think this was what She had actually had in mind.
    While the Doctor studied his enemy, he was himself under