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"I, uh, am not sure how to address you. I have always known you as 'Augustin,' while your good sister called you by another name, a name I was never allowed to say out loud. Still others in my hearing called you 'Sir Augustin of St. Ives.' And now I am told you are called 'Agostino of Australia' by some. While sailors and the men and women of the docks all call you 'Sea Wolf.'"

"In light of our previous acquaintance you may call me 'Agostino.'"

"Much obliged. The message your good sister gave you is in plain before you. But some things she bade me to say to you alone."

"Speak."

Salvatore licked his already moist lips and flicked the briefest glance at the armed copper haired woman.

"Uh, I do not mean to... But she was quite insistent for you to be alone."

"I hold no secrets before Lady Olympia."

"As you wish. Ashley, that is Lady Ashley, does not trust Franciotti."

"Continue."

"She is much worried of their continued conduct towards her should you reject their scheme."

"I understand. Tell her I shall not let her fall to harm. As to the Franciotti, tell them I shall assist."

"Uh, will you?"

"Sal, I shall not let my sister come to harm."

"Yes, yes, but will you truly help Franciotti."

"You may tell my sister that I shall ensure her safety. Good day."

Salvatore opened his mouth just then, but Olympia's right hand found the butt of her old pistol. And Salvatore found himself bowing low and fleeing scene.


"Jesu, the Franciotti? Our plans are...! Lucca? We are to waste your breath on that?"

"She is my sister."

"Aye, but if we interfere in the affairs of Lucca before we...! We shall lose our..."

"I understand. But many things have changed since we departed Genoa and our plans now change as well. The Grand Duke is dead. As is the Pope."

"Yes, yes, but Lucca is no Rome, or even Florence. We cannot..."

"I know. Right now we have good will. We cannot squander on it so mean a place as Lucca."

"What shall you do then?"

"Listen to you. I understand the heavens and the oceans. But Italian politics... They're your seas."

"And we're in deep waters. We must not act in haste. As you said, much has changed. The moment we set foot in Rome or Florence, we shall be drawn into such politics as to diminish you."

"Therefore...?"

"I do not follow."

"We must not set foot in Rome or Florence."

"Until?"

"Until such a time as you think it is right for us to enter those hornets' nests."

At this Olympia blinked. For the words of the Sea Wolf stirred in her a curious notion.


That day and night, as Olympia worked out the finer points of her plan, more sealed letters arrived, bearing messages of promises, hints, half-truths and outright lies from Gian Carlo Medici, his brother Leopoldo, Antonio Barberini, his brother Taddeo, the head of the household Farnese (brother-in-law to Medici, and the principal figure in starting the Medici-Barberini conflict), then Doge of Venice and half dozen grandees of Spain. As well certain private individuals filled with lust for money who were heads of households of which you have never heard and this we will not waste your time. Though, in the interest of history (or at least gossip that passes for it in some academia), it does bear saying the Sea Wolf got a letter from one Lucy Hay, the Countess of Carlisle of England, the loveliest daughter of the wizard Earl of Northumberland. The letter's contents we shall not reveal in detail, since our tale is possibly read by those of an impressionable age, but we can say it contained hints of such a nature as to make us fear for the life for the beautiful Countess should Olympia have gotten to the letter first and read it. But the Sea Wolf read it himself, blushed several times and had it burned, lest it be discovered.

The less intimate letters, written by male hand, were set aside for a discussion by both parties. But while Olympia busied herself with her plan, the Sea Wolf got to the business of crafting a joint-stock company to finance the second voyage to Australia with the help of the finest and most debased lawyers in the whole of Genoa. It was a dreary affair, punctuated by noxious Latin, discussion of fingers versus hands (please don't ask us to explain the last part), but the upshot of it was that the company was not done in the Sea Wolf's name, but that of the Durazzo. The Sea Wolf got 40% of the shares, to dispose of as he wished. The surviving crew of the two-ship fleet from first voyage was granted 10% to be spread out among them, and the rest (that is 50%) was to be sold by Durazzo (in conjunction with Grimaldi). To telescope ahead of our story, the shares sold out in three days and made the Durazzo rich beyond most of their wildest dreams, as a whole family. While the Sea Wolf became millionaire.


By end of second day, when dusk came (we use the motions of the Sun to denote time instead of our previous use of prayers, for the individual involved in this sentence did not have much faith, though it may be most indecent of us to declare), Olympia had worked out her plans in detail and discussed them with the Sea Wolf, who nodded his ascent as mere formality. Olympia was quite prepared for combat, to defend her views, but the Sea Wolf meant what he had said, while there was a deck beneath his feet, he was master of his fates, while on the slippery as eel lands of Italies, he was a mere stranger in a much strange land filled with most dangerous people. Thus, the Sea Wolf agreed with all Olympia had outlined. And they then informed the Durazzo of what shall come next, as courtesy.

Next day, dressed in wolf furs garbed he heartily despised, and sweating freely, the Sea Wolf declared that he had come to Genoa because it was a town and polity at peace and it fairly disgusted him that war was waged between good Christian now in Italies. He therefore declared he shall not set one foot in Florence, nor in Rome, until such a time as truce was declared between the two principal powers engaged in fratricidal conflict, made all the more dangerous to decent souls with the loss of a Holy Father and presence of a Vacant Seat in Rome, and instead, he would focus on his second voyage to the Gold Mines, and hoped that all will take advantage of the shares of the joint-stock company now going on sale. The effect the latter day portion of his speech we will not recount, for we had telescoped it earlier in this very chapter, but the first portion was a bolt of lightning that made him many friends, but also no few foes. For war hurts some and profits others.


The mercenaries were certainly most furious when word got out to them by dribs and drabs, but in Rome and Florence, once the message was spread, there was rejoicing and petitions were written to celebrate the great Agostino of Australia, the mighty Sea Wolf as the Prince of Peace of Italies.


Leopoldo seized the chance right away and declared in the midst of Florentine mob, to cheers, he would hold truce if only his Barberini partners in the senseless struggle would agree. The Doge of Venice breathed a sigh of relief in private and in public in equal measure and too endorsed peace. The head of the family Farnese spat fire, for he knew truce meant Castro would stay under Barberini occupation, but those members of his family who held Parma (in the North) much dear to their hearts than Castro quite agreed with the words and declaration of the Sea Wolf. So did the other junior partners of the Medicean coalition, who, after all these years could not intelligently describe the reason for the war or its reasonable objective.


In Rome, Taddeo Barberini was confused. On the one hand, he wanted truce to give respite to his forces. On the other, he feared what such a respite would do to the Medicean armies now arrayed. Antonio Barberini was utmost delighted and even spread a rumor that the Sea Wolf acted on his notion. Francesco Barberini was opaque. He praised the idea of a truce in public and in private alike, but not even his brothers could know what went through his head.


Meanwhile, the ruling entity of Spain (at least on paper, for in truth Spain was a beast of many backs, each ridden by a different grandee at cross purposes with his fellows) and the (much more centralized) Dutch East India Company both ignored the grand entreaties of truce and sent peevish notes to the Sea Wolf, declaring that Australia and Gold Mines of King Solomon were theirs and he had no right to mount the first expedition to it, much less a second. These notes were dully ignored by nearly all, and the grand fleet for the second voyage began to be slowly assembled, as the money trickled in, while the preliminary truce was being hammered out by seasoned diplomats armed with even more noxious Latin than what the Sea Wolf endured when creating the joint-stock company.


The truce, while being officially debated and its council's location and terms deliberated upon, took, however, immediate hold upon the battlefields and sieges. No soldier, not even a mean mercenary of not much wit, would have any wish to be killed in a senseless slaughter. And with the truce looming, no one wanted to risk life and limb. Thus the truce came long before Latin stopped being spewed and discussions on the order of precedence of people entering the hall where the negotiations were to be conducted was settled. The latter point may seem much silly to us now, but it was such "disrespect" of people being seated ahead of those who thought it was their due to find the cushion chair with their asses before that of others that played no small part in inflaming the passions that lead to the start of the War of Castro in the first place.

But even the most careful of plans can be torn asunder by any little thing, and so it was while it truce was being endlessly negotiated and the Franciotti grew more frantic still, and the Cardinal-Inquisitor Francesco Barberini plotted his own dark plots, did an incident occur which upended all these things.