The men charged Guglielmo. Giancarlo intercepted from the side, distracting one pair and leaving four for Guglielmo. Alexander would have shrieked if he could have gotten breath. Swearing, Guglielmo shoved him towards a wall, freeing himself to move.
"It doesn't look like they have orders to spare you," Guglielmo called to Alexander as he skewered the first man in the throat. He pulled the dagger from inside his left sleeve and used it to parry another incoming blade.
Alexander pressed himself back against the chipped plaster wall and stared in horror at the carnage. He wanted to cross himself when the first man fell to the street, choking on his own blood, but his hand wouldn't move. Giancarlo disposed of one of his opponents with a neat heart thrust. The other man who was attacking Giancarlo suddenly turned and ran. The mercenary immediately went to help Guglielmo. With a bloodthirsty grin, Guglielmo made room for his comrade, but he kept most of the fighting for himself.
"So that's why they call him Il Sanguinante," Alexander whispered to himself. When pressed, Guglielmo was a quick, efficient fighter. Given the chance, though, he went for crippling, messy wounds. He laughed as he fought, even when the blow was against him. A sword point snagged one of his black sleeves. With an intricately blasphemous oath, he gutted the man who had torn the cloth.
"Do you know how much I'm going to have to beg Isabetta to fix that?" he yelled. He turned and sliced the elbow tendons in the sword arm of his last opponent. "And then I'm going to have to make sure she doesn't embroider love knots and roses on the damned thing as well!" He slammed the sole of his boot into the face of the last man, knocking him back and letting Giancarlo finish him.
Alexander finally felt his breath flow normally again. He crossed himself, whispering prayers for the dead and dying. He stepped forward, then saw movement from the corner of his eye. The attacker who had run from Giancarlo was sneaking towards him, a dagger in his hand.
"Guglielmo!"
Il Sanguinante looked up from his inspection of his sleeve and flung the dagger his right hand into the attacker's throat. Blood sputtered from the wound, and the man dropped, gurgling. Alexander, both hands shoved against his mouth, stared into the man's eyes until they froze and gazed at nothing.
Guglielmo appeared at Alexander's shoulder, shaking him and pulling him back. "None of your concern anymore, little priest. Well, except the obvious." Alexander was shaking too hard to make any movement towards a blessing.
Giancarlo came up and stared at the body. "He came back?"
"Apparently so." Guglielmo studied Alexander for several moments, then shook his shoulder again but more gently. "Brother Sandro, we're expected."
"What?" Alexander said, blinking.
"At the Palace. We're supposed to be at a meeting."
"But--you're still going?" He looked around at the bodies. "After this?"
Guglielmo raised an eyebrow at Giancarlo, who only sighed and shook his head. "Of course, I'm still going. Is there a reason I shouldn't?"
"I--but--they just tried to kill you!"
Guglielmo's smile suddenly changed from mocking to amused. "People try to do that all the time, Sandro. That's my job." He reached down and pulled his dagger from his victim's throat.
Alexander watched him clean the dagger. "You're left-handed."
"So?" Guglielmo dug some blood out from a crevice between the blade and the cross guard, then slid the dagger back into its sheath.
"My grandmother said left-handed people were the spawn of the devil."
The mocking smile came back. "We are."
Alexander crossed himself again, then saw his hands were shaking. Giancarlo frowned and took Alexander's arm to drag him down the street away from the bodies.
"Some people may be used to being up to their ankles in blood," Giancarlo told Guglielmo, "but most of the people in the world are nice folks who don't deal with bodies every day. Let's get the boy away from this."
Guglielmo checked his boots for blood, then followed, looking just a little chagrined.