Sessio XII – The Red Scarf’s Heart

Two nights after the alliance was sealed, Lorenzo summoned Avicellus, Fiona, Fr. Malachi, and Godefroid to a candle-lit cellar beneath a ruined chapel in the Oltrarno. His face was graver than any of them had yet seen it.

“The documents you stole from the Whispering Frog were only the first layer,” he began, spreading a charcoal sketch across the table. “They mention a meeting at the ‘Charcoal Flame’ beneath the Taverna del Fuoco on the new moon, three nights from now. But there is a deeper secret the Red Scarf guards with their lives.”

He tapped a red-ink symbol on the parchment: a stylized heart pierced by a dagger and wrapped in a crimson scarf.

“This is the sigil of their inner circle. They call it the Cuore Rosso: the Red Heart. It is not a metaphor. It is an actual reliquary: a fist-sized ruby said to have been cut from the heart of a Byzantine saint-prince executed in 1204. The stone is powerfully enchanted; whoever holds it can command the loyalty of the Carbonari and Red Scarf cells across half of Italy. With it, the Medici-Grimani alliance could spark a republic-wide uprising—or crush one—whenever they choose.

“The reliquary is kept in a subterranean vault-complex beneath the old Etruscan necropolis south of the city walls, a place the Red Scarf have been secretly excavating for months. They plan to move the Cuore Rosso to the Taverna del Fuoco the night of the new-moon meeting so their Byzantine paymasters can inspect it before final payment.”

“If we let that happen,” he continued, “Florence burns within a fortnight.”

“I need you to go under the city tonight, reach the vault before the Red Scarf finish their preparations, and bring me the Red Heart. The entrance is an old well in the abandoned Monastery of San Matteo, two miles south along the Via Romana. The monks vanished years ago; the Red Scarf use it as a staging post.”

“Take the ruby, collapse the tunnels behind you if you must, and get out. I will have horses waiting at the monastery ruins at dawn.”

“Fail, and by the next new moon every street in Florence will run with blood.”

Lorenzo slid four small purses across the table containing 200 gold florins each and a rough map showing the well and the first 60 feet of worked stone passage descending from it.

“The Red Scarf already have men below. Expect traps, cultists, and worse. May God walk with you.”

The four of them soon stood at midnight in the moonless cloister of the ruined Monastery of San Matteo. Each was happy to have spent their 200 florins on healing potions. Wind whistled through broken arches. Before them was the ancient stone well, its rope long rotted away, but fresh iron pitons hammered into the wall every five feet show recent use. A faint smell of burning charcoal and incense drifted up from the darkness below.

The party quietly descended the well and found themselves in a small room faced by a wooden door.

Fiona eased the weathered wooden door, its ancient hinges groaning softly in the stillness. Beyond lay a narrow, vaulted chamber that stretched thirty feet from south to north and only fifteen feet east to west. Rough-hewn Etruscan blocks formed the walls, their surfaces blackened by centuries of smoke and recent torch soot. A faint haze of charcoal-scented air hung in the space, and the distant drip of water echoed from somewhere deeper.

Two doors pierced the walls: one of iron-bound oak in the east wall, and another, half-rotted and hanging ajar, in the center of the west wall. At the far northern end, a crude stone altar stood beneath a faded fresco of a heart wrapped in scarlet cloth. Upon the altar rested a small, unlocked iron coffer, its lid slightly askew.

Four Red Scarf thugs lounged about the chamber. Two sat on overturned buckets near the altar, cleaning short swords with oily rags; the third leaned against the east door, idly tossing a dagger; the fourth paced near the west door, a red silk scarf knotted tightly around his upper arm. All four snapped to alertness at the creak of the opening door, blades flashing as they rose with muttered oaths.

Avicellus lunged forward, his dagger sinking into the pacing thug's side. The man grunted but stood firm. Fiona's blade followed, slashing the dagger-tosser's arm, drawing a curse from him. Fr. Malachi charged the altar, his hammer cracking against one thug's ribs, while Godefried's sword whistled wide of the second altar guard.

The thugs counterattacked savagely. The wounded, pacing thug drove his oiled dagger into Avicellus's shoulder. The others lashed out wildly; the tossing thug missed Fiona, the altar pair swung harmlessly past Fr. Malachi and Godefried.

Avicellus remembered why mages typically avoid melee combat. He wasn't used to having friends to back him up. He took another stab at his opponent and missed.

Fiona’s dagger flashed again, carving a second red line across the dagger-tosser’s forearm. The man staggered, blood dripping onto the flagstones, and toppled lifeless to the floor.

Fr. Malachi brought his hammer down in a crushing arc that caught his opponent squarely on the collarbone. Bone cracked audibly; the thug dropped to one knee, gasping.

Godefried’s great swing went high again, whistling harmlessly over the second altar thug’s head.

The three surviving thugs pressed their attack. The pacing thug lunged desperately at Avicellus again, but his blade scraped only empty air. The wounded altar thug tried to crawl away from Fr. Malachi; his backswing missed. The unhurt altar thug slashed at Godefried with renewed fury, but the blade rang uselessly off the fighter’s new steel gauntlet and plate.

Avicellus drove his dagger home with lethal precision, the blade piercing the pacing thug's throat. The man gurgled and collapsed in a heap. Fiona's dagger struck true, plunging into the wounded altar thug's back. He spasmed and fell still.

Fr. Malachi turned to Godefried and said, "My son, can you not hit the broad side of a barn with that thing?" before swinging his hammer in a devastating overhead arc that caved in the last thug's skull. Godefried followed up with a precise stab from his sword, impaling the reeling thug through the chest. The man twitched once and died.

The chamber fell silent save for the drip of blood on stone. Four Red Scarf thugs lay slain, their red scarves dark with gore. The unlocked iron coffer on the altar gleamed invitingly; the east and west doors remained unexplored.

Fr. Malachi laid his hands on Avicellus, murmuring a prayer to St. Joseph as divine light flowed, mending the mage's shoulder wound. Fiona swept the chamber methodically, prodding flagstones and altar edges for hidden dangers, but found nothing amiss. Godefried peered into the unlocked iron coffer on the altar, its lid askew revealing a velvet pouch bulging with twenty turquoises and a plain silver ring etched with faint runes: a ring of protection.

The east door (iron-bound oak, center of east wall) and west door (half-rotted, ajar, center of west wall) remained unexplored. Four red scarves lay amid the thugs' corpses, proof for Lorenzo.

Fiona’s quick search of the four corpses turned up only the expected squalor of hired blades: a total of 27 silver pieces and 14 copper, three flasks of cheap red wine, a half-eaten wheel of hard cheese, a worn set of bone dice, and a crumpled love letter written in Venetian dialect.

Fiona, shrouded in her elven cloak, eased the half-rotted western door open a finger-width at a time. Avicellus glided silently beside her, his own movements masked by practiced care. Godefried and Fr. Malachi pressed themselves flat against the soot-blackened wall just inside the first chamber, out of any possible line of sight.

Beyond the door stretched a wide corridor that ran northward. The passage had been carved straight from the living tufa, its walls damp and glistening with condensation. A single guttering torch in a rusted sconce halfway along the western wall threw long, wavering shadows. The air carried a stronger reek of wet earth and faint incense.

Twenty feet ahead, directly opposite the torch, a single iron-bound door stood in the eastern wall, its surface freshly painted with a crude red heart. At the northern end of the corridor the passage turned sharply eastward; a faint reddish glow flickered around that corner, accompanied by the low murmur of male voices speaking in clipped Venetian.

No one appeared to have noticed the door’s slow movement. The corridor remained empty for the moment.

Fiona and Avicellus glided northward along the damp corridor like twin shadows, their elven cloak and mask-aided stealth rendering them nearly invisible. They reached the northern corner and peered cautiously eastward.

The passage turned into a short, 15 ft east-west stub that ended in a heavy, iron-bound door painted the same fresh scarlet as the heart on the earlier door. Directly in front of that door stood two Red Scarf zealots in crimson-trimmed chain mail. Each held a curved falcata in one hand and a clay pot of alchemist’s fire in the other. A brazier of glowing coals rested between them, its red light spilling across the floor and painting the walls in shifting scarlet. The zealots spoke in low, fervent tones:

“…the Heart must be moved before dawn. The Byzantines grow impatient.”

“Patience is for priests. When the Pyreknight arrives, none will dare—”

They had not yet noticed anything amiss; their attention remained fixed on the brazier and the sealed door beyond.

Behind them, Fr. Malachi and Godefried eased into the corridor and took up positions fifteen feet south of the corner, ready but still unseen.

Avicellus’s hands flashed with arcane sigils. Three shimmering darts of force streaked around the corner and punched into the left-hand zealot’s chest. The impact hurled the man backward against the scarlet door with a wet crunch; he slid to the ground lifeless, chain mail smoking.

Fiona’s light crossbow twanged. Her bolt took the second zealot high in the shoulder, while Fr. Malachi’s sling stone followed a heartbeat later, cracking the man’s temple. The zealot staggered, blood streaming down his face, but did not drop.

The surviving zealot roared in fury, snatched the clay pot of alchemist’s fire from his belt, and hurled it down the corridor. The pot shattered at the corner where Fiona and Avicellus had stood a moment earlier, splashing liquid flame across the stone. A roaring sheet of fire erupted. All three had already melted backward around the corner the instant their missiles flew, so the flames licked only empty air.

The surviving zealot rounded the corner with a bellowed curse, falcata high and clay pot raised for a throw. Godefried met him head-on, his sword cleaving downward in a powerful arc that caught the zealot across the collarbone. Chain mail parted like parchment; the man reeled, blood spraying, but somehow stayed on his feet, snarling through gritted teeth.

Avicellus thrust his dagger into the zealot's side. Fiona's blade followed, slicing the man's thigh. Fr. Malachi's hammer smashed down on his shoulder, pulping flesh and bone. The zealot crumpled lifeless to the floor amid a spray of blood.

Fiona rifled the zealots' corpses and robes. She found three clay pots of alchemist’s fire, two silver heart medallions , and 37 Byzantine hyperpyra sewn into hems. The brazier held only dying coals.

Fiona slipped one silver heart medallion over her own neck; the cool metal settled against her skin with a faint, almost imperceptible warmth. She turned the second medallion once, twice, then extended it toward Avicellus. He accepted it wordlessly, fingers brushing hers for an instant. Beneath the black beak of his mask his eyes widened (surprise, gratitude, something softer) before he lowered the chain over his head. The medallion disappeared beneath his dark cloak, but the small gesture hung in the smoky air between them longer than the metal itself.

The corridor remained quiet. The scarlet-painted door at the end of the stub waited, its fresh paint still glossy in the brazier’s dying light.

Both Fr. Malachi and Godefroid noticed Fiona's gesture. Godefroid rolled his eyes with an impatient huff, while Fr. Malachi broke the silence with a whisper that they should probably check the door just south of the corridor turn before investigating the one at the end of the corridor, as it would appear to be a very small chamber on the other side. Fr. Malachi’s whisper carried just far enough for the others to hear. “Let’s not leave our backs exposed. That iron-bound door on the east wall, the one with the fresh red heart, is only a few paces south of the corner. It looks to open into a very small chamber. We should clear it before we press on to the scarlet door at the end.”

Godefried gave a curt nod, already turning southward. Avicellus tucked the remaining clay pots into his belt. He adjusted his mask, the faintest crinkle at the corners of his eyes betraying the smile beneath.

The door stood barred from this side by a simple iron drop-bar. No sound came from beyond.  Fiona checked it for traps, but muttered in frustration that she had never managed to learn much about them in her thief training. The enhanced perception granted Avicellus by the Raven Mask allowed him to see one, however. Avicellus leaned close to the iron-bound door, his keen eyes tracing the drop-bar's fittings. He spotted a hair-thin poison needle concealed in the bar's release mechanism. Pressure on it would fire the dart into the hand lifting it.

Avicellus extended his staff toward the drop-bar, hooking it carefully and lifting from afar. The mechanism clicked; a slender poison needle shot from the fitting with a sharp hiss, streaking past his mask and embedding in the opposite wall.

The party stepped into the cramped storeroom.

Fiona and Avicellus ran gloved fingers along the empty shelves and tapped the walls. Nothing moved. Godefried kicked at the scuff marks on the floor; they were only drag-marks from recently removed crates. A quick search turned up nothing but dust, red candle-wax drippings, and a single forgotten copper coin.

The tiny chamber held no other exits and no secrets.

Satisfied that their flank was clear, the four withdrew, closed and re-barred the door (leaving the spent needle trap harmless), and returned north along the corridor to the scarlet-painted door at the end of the short east stub.

The brazier’s coals still glowed between the two dead zealots. The scarlet door waited, heavy iron bands gleaming.

Fiona and Avicellus eased the scarlet door inward on silent hinges.

The chamber beyond measured 30 ft north-south by 25 ft east-west, its ceiling lost in drifting charcoal smoke. A single massive brazier of glowing coals dominated the center, its iron tripod painted crimson. Around it, six Red Scarf zealots knelt in a circle, heads bowed, curved falcatas laid across their knees. Their lips moved in low, rhythmic chanting; none had yet noticed the door’s movement.

At the far northern wall stood a rough-hewn stone plinth. Upon it rested a fist-sized ruby heart wrapped in a crimson scarf (surely, the Cuore Rosso itself), pulsing with a dull, malevolent light.

Two exits pierced the walls, a plain wooden door in the center of the east wall, and an archway in the center of the west wall, beyond which faint torchlight flickered.

The six zealots remained oblivious for the moment, their chant rising in volume.

Avicellus stepped forward alone into the doorway’s frame, gently tugging Fiona back into the corridor, out of what he knew was about to become harm’s way, his gloved hand already tracing the final sigil. A bead of orange fire streaked from his fingertip, arced across the chamber, and detonated directly atop the crimson brazier.

A roaring sphere of flame erupted. The six kneeling zealots had no time to scream. The fireball’s heat flash-baked the air, hurling charred bodies outward in smoking heaps. Armor melted into flesh, falcatas glowed cherry-red and clattered away, and the brazier itself toppled with a thunderous crash. When the smoke cleared, only blackened corpses and the lingering stink of scorched hair remained.

The Cuore Rosso on its plinth 20 ft beyond the blast radius sat untouched, still pulsing with sullen red light.

Avicellus scrutinized the plinth and gemstone for traps. Not seeing any, and wanting to be extra cautious, he used his staff to gently knock it from its resting place to the floor. He quickly picked it up and, with the rest of the party in tow, retraced their steps to get back to the entrance at the well. Lorenzo would be pleased!

***

Lorenzo was not pleased, but he wasn’t exactly displeased, either.

“What do you mean it’s a fake?” Godefroid asked, deeply annoyed.

“I mean it’s fake,” replied Lorenzo, allowing the loupe to gently fall from his eye, harmlessly onto the table. “It’s cut glass. I can see the chip from where Avicellus knocked it to the floor. This is not the Cuore Rosso.”

“So this means the whole mission was for nothing?” Avicellus asked.

“No, I wouldn’t say that,” replied Lorenzo. “This tells us something unexpected is going on within the Red Scarf organization. It means that there’s a power struggle.”

“How do you know that?” asked Godefroid.

“Think about it,” replied Fiona, drawing on her experience in the underworld, “either the leadership of the Red Scarf is trying to deceive the Byzantines or someone within the Red Scarf has already deceived their own leadership, swapping the real Cuore Rosso for a fake.”

“Indeed!” cried Lorenzo, a broad smile creeping over his face. “Either way, this could be to our advantage.”

Fr. Malachi piped up, “Let me guess what your next little ‘mission’ for us will be...”

“Yes,” replied Lorenzo, “you’ll need to figure out what’s happening within the Red Scarf organization and its alliance with the Byzantines.”