Chapter 57 - THE NORTHERN LEGION
Dante, carrying Rosa in his arms while Sophia marched steadily beside him, climbed out of the foundry tunnel through an auxiliary exit that opened into the private greenhouse behind the main villa.
The estate was in ruins. The ornate marble balustrades overlooking the formal gardens had been pulverized by heavy-caliber fire. The fountains were filled with smoking debris, and the glass domes of the conservatory were shattered into thousands of glittering shards.
In the courtyard, standing guard among the smoking wreckage of three armored SUVs, were the surviving remnants of Dante’s elite guard, led by Marco. Marco had a blood-soaked bandage wrapped around his forehead and carried an empty shotgun, his face gray with exhaustion.
"Don Falcone!" Marco gasped, rushing forward to take Rosa’s weight, but Dante waved him off, carrying her gently toward a stone bench near the intact pavilion. "My God... you're alive. We thought the lower vaults were collapsed on top of you."
"Rosa is stable," Dante said coldly, setting Rosa down and wrapping a heavy wool trench coat around her shoulders. "What is happening on the north ridge?"
Marco swallowed hard, pointing a trembling hand toward the misty hills overlooking Villa Falcone.
Dante stepped to the edge of the terrace, with Sophia stepping right beside him, perfectly aligning her small shoulders with his hips. Together, father and daughter looked out toward the tree line.
Through the pre-dawn fog, dozens of sets of high-intensity halogen headlights cut through the gloom. A massive convoy of black armored personnel carriers, accompanied by heavy tactical transport trucks, was slowly descending the winding mountain road toward the estate gates. There were at least two hundred armed men visible, wearing formal black wool coats bearing a silver crest on their collars—a double-headed viper coiled around an iron cross.
"The Visconti Syndicate," Dante murmured, his eyes narrowing into slits of pure obsidian. "The old Council of Milan. They didn't just back the Archivist. They mobilized their entire northern army."
"Boss," Marco whispered, his voice shaking. "We don't have the ammunition to hold them off. We have twelve men left standing. They have enough heavy armor to level the entire estate in ten minutes. We have to take the helicopter from the south pad and run to the coast."
"No," Dante snapped, his voice cutting like a razor. "We run nowhere. This is Falcone ground. If they want this earth, they will have to choke on every grain of it."
Sophia tilted her head up, looking at the convoy winding down the road. She reached out, taking Dante’s hand in her small, firm grip.
"Daddy," she asked, her voice clear and untroubled. "Are those the cousins from Milan?"
Dante looked down at her, a dark, dangerous smile curling the corners of his lips. "They are not cousins, little one. They are thieves."
"Thieves get locked in the cellar," Sophia stated, reciting another of Dante’s house rules that she had overheard during dinner meetings. "And then we take their cars."
Marco stared at the four-year-old child in utter bewilderment. "Don Falcone... with all respect, the little principessa doesn't understand—"
"She understands better than you, Marco," Dante interrupted smoothly. "She knows that an army that marches in broad daylight with their headlights on is not coming to fight a war. They are coming to claim a surrender."
Dante turned to Marco, his eyes burning with absolute command. "Open the main gates."
Marco’s jaw dropped. "Open... open the gates? Boss, that's suicide!"
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"Open the gates," Dante repeated, each syllable heavy with absolute authority. "And prepare the grand dining table on the terrace. Sophia and I are going to receive our guests."
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