A Waltz With Wolves (Book II in The Harrison Inc. Series) | ✓

Chapter Thirty: Venetia

**

"Benvenidad a ele paisia bella,Venetia. Welcome to the beautiful land of Venetia."

I've been cramming as much Venetian as I can since I got onto the 15-hour flight here. Luckily, Venetian is a Romanic language like Spanish and Italian (one of these languages I happen to be fluent in) so it hasn't been a lethal task. Still, it's a bit hard to keep up.

I clutch my Guide to the Beautiful Venetian Language pocketbook close to me as I try to navigate my way through the airport. The intercom above broadcasts important information to the many tourists scrambling around in the airport, but unlike the first welcome message transmitted in Venetian and English, the speaker over the intercom decides to talk only in Venetian; the only takeaways I get are the weather and some instructions about entering the terminal.

Once finally out of the airport, I flag down a cab to make my way to the hotel I'm staying at.

"Bonieva!" the cab driver greets happily, helping me put my bags in the trunk of the car.

"Bonieva," I reply before opening my language pocketbook guide. "Um...ye quierer ele Hotel Castiano, p'ier se foré? Wait I don't think that sounds right."

"You want me to take you to Hotel Castiano?" the cab driver suddenly says. I look up at him, his smile wide on his aged face.

I nod before we both laugh at my sorry attempt at Venetian. "Yes, that's...that's exactly right. I'm sorry, I didn't know that you spoke English."

"No, it's no problem at all! Come, I take you to Hotel, yes?"

"Yes. Thank you."

When we both get into the car, the cab driver, Alandrio, pulls out of the loading zone. I make a mental note about Venetian people - their smiles. So far, from the flight attendants to the locals I have accidentally bumped into, they are all happy and full of life. I wish I could say the same; maybe I'll pick up on Venetian's secret to happiness while I'm here.

"I've noticed," I begin, "that your accent is much different from the accent of someone I spoke to from here."

Alandrio nods. "Ah, yes. Do you know where they were from?"

"Um, not really. I just know that they worked at the Palace."

Alandrio coos, "Oh, I understand. Their accent sounded like it had a little French in it, sí?"

"Yes, exactly. Why is that?"

Alandrio began to give me a detailed lesson on Venetian history. Around the early and mid 1800's, parts of Venetia were actually occupied by the French, mostly the upper-class areas like Elessiago and Ele Colinias de L'ves Verront (The Hills of L'ves Verront. Thank God for my language pocketbook and my Italian fluency). But towards the end of the century, the French wanted to broaden their control over the entire country, which made the Venetian Parliament, the royal family and especially the Venetian people very unhappy. Therefore, Venetia forced French influence out of their country, but not completely; the upper-class still spoke the language and practiced French customs. Hence why today, the elite and upper-class tend to have this hybrid mix of French and Venetian in their accent, explaining why I thought Petra's accent was French and Greek or something of that concoction.