The Scarlet Contessa
The Scarlet Contessa
Jeanne Kalogridis
From Jeanne Kalogridis, critically acclaimed author of The Borgia Bride, Painting Mona Lisa and The Devil’s Queen, comes another irresistible historical novel about a countess whose passion and willfulness knew no bounds: Caterina Sforza.Daughter of the Duke of Milan and wife of the conniving Count Girolamo Riario, Caterina Sforza was the bravest warrior Renaissance Italy ever knew. She ruled her own lands, fought her own battles, and openly took lovers whenever she pleased.Her remarkable tale is told by her lady-in-waiting, Dea, a woman knowledgeable in reading the ‘triumph cards’ – the predecessor of modern-day Tarot. As Dea tries to unravel the truth about her husband’s murder, Caterina single-handedly holds off invaders who would steal her title and lands. However, Dea’s reading of the cards reveals that Caterina cannot withstand a third and final invader – none other than Cesare Borgia, son of the corrupt Pope Alexander VI, who has an old score to settle with Caterina. Trapped inside the Fortress at Ravaldino as Borgia’s cannons pound the walls, Dea reviews Caterina’s scandalous past and struggles to understand their joint destiny, while Caterina valiantly tries to fight off Borgia’s unconquerable army.
The
Scarlet Contessa
A NOVEL OF THE ITALIAN RENAISSANCE
JEANNE KALOGRIDIS
Dedication (#u8d88a456-e87d-5eed-9532-78be0b2239e1)
FOR HELEN,
FOR SAVING MY LIFE
Contents
Cover (#u9687c88f-fdc3-5358-86b4-9e32494be0b2)
Title Page (#ub9f6bc81-c37a-52ac-9780-eba076111c3e)
Dedication
The Tower
Prologue
PART I
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
PART II
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
PART III
Chapter Twenty-six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
Chapter Thirty-two
Chapter Thirty-three
Chapter Thirty-four
Chapter Thirty-five
Chapter Thirty-six
Afterword
Acknowledgements
About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)
Also by Jeanne Kalogridis
Copyright
About the Publisher
The Tower
Ravaldino Fortress
December 10, 1499
Prologue
The end of the world will arrive, say the mendicant preachers, on the first of January 1500; God can no longer bear the deeds of evil men and will strike them down. That most famous Cassandra, the monk Savonarola of Florence, says that God is especially outraged by the blatant sexual crimes of Pope Alexander VI, who brought his sixteen-year-old mistress and his illegitimate children to live with him in the Vatican.
On that terrible day, the prophets say, the earth will shake until it crumbles to dust, and we sinners will fall howling to our knees. For the wicked there will be no mercy. Those of us who have been faithless will be cast forever into the lake of fire. The world will perish in a cataclysm, and a new kingdom will take its place.
Christmas is a fortnight away, which means the coming wrath of God is barely three weeks away, according to the faithful. I wonder whether my lady Caterina and I will live long enough to see it.
For now, however, it is midnight, and beyond Ravaldino’s fortress walls all is quiet. I lie upon the little cot in my lady’s roomy closet—used now for storing ammunition and gunpowder instead of Caterina’s headdresses and gowns, and thus stinking of war. I yearn for sleep, but it does not come easily these days.
Especially not tonight, with the noise emanating from the bed out in my lady’s chamber. My arm has gone numb, and to wake it, I turn over on the narrow cot; it is lumpy and uncomfortable, and I am unused to sleeping on it. This leaves me facing the velvet curtain that covers the closet door.
Unfortunately, it does not cover it well enough. The swath of velvet is slightly too narrow, and through the cracks between it and the stone, I glimpse Caterina sitting up in the middle of her large bed, illuminated by the lamp on the night table. She is entirely naked, and the light infuses her white skin with a warm glow, as if she has been dipped in honey; her torso is long and lean, her waist, after many children, narrow. Her back is to me as she straddles her supine lover, and as she rides him vigorously, the handsome muscles of her shoulders, back, and arms ripple, and her thick dark blond braid, terminating at the base of her spine, swings like a pendulum across her back.
Her latest lover, Giovanni di Casale, lies passively beneath her, groaning with pleasure and exhaustion, his head thrown back against the pillow, his long, bony legs emerging from beneath my lady’s firm buttocks. He is forty—only four years older than the insatiable Caterina—but he seems twenty decades older. He is red-haired, balding, with flabby skin the unhealthy white of a fish’s belly; Caterina reaches out to brace herself against his chest for a moment, and his skin jiggles beneath her hands. He is my lady’s secretary, not a soldier.
After a full day of leading military drills and testing the artillery, the Contessa Caterina Sforza, Lady of Forlì, is still full of lust and energy. She releases her hold on Giovanni’s freckled chest and circles her hips atop his in a slow, grinding motion, as if to crush him. Inspired, Giovanni releases a gasp of mounting ecstasy.
The scene causes a faint, pleasurable stirring between my own legs, but anxiety steals my desire to seek release. Instead, I squeeze my eyes shut and turn my back to the curtain, wishing I had the energy to stick my fingers into my ears.
It is hard enough to sleep these days, even without such an interruption. A week ago, we left the comfort of Paradise, the name Caterina had given her magnificent apartments inside the fortress, with their breathtaking view of the nearby Apennine Mountains. A week before that, she secretly sent all her valuables—fine gowns, jewelry, furniture, carpets, as well as all her children, save one—to the safe haven of Florence. Now we are in the most secure tower in the fortress of Ravaldino, on the edge of the town Forlì, which Caterina rules. She is contessa, too, of Imola, a larger town half a day’s ride away, which is now under attack by the Pope’s army.
If Imola falls, odds are we shall fall, too.
There are few windows here in the main tower, no paintings or tapestries covering the drab walls, no carpets upon the rough stone floors, no furniture save for the bed, a single armoire, a night table, and a table for the washbasin, above which hangs the large, finely polished mirror Caterina insisted on bringing. The Lady of Forlì’s cries of pleasure grow louder and more urgent, joining with those of Giovanni, finally fully inspired by her efforts.
Just as Giovanni lets go a howl of ecstatic release—and my lady laughs softly with delight at his abandon—a hammering comes at the thick wood and iron door. There is such urgency in the knock that I roll from my cot at once, slip the shawl folded near my pillow over my shoulders, and push the curtain to the closet aside. Politely, I avert my gaze as the lovers hastily uncouple, pull on their clothing, and move quickly to the door.
“Who calls?” I shout.
“Ridolfo Naldi, come from the fortress of Imola this night. I bear a message from my brother, Dionigi.”
A thrill—hope and fear combined—passes through me. I peer through the peephole to confirm the identity of the messenger, and to ensure that he is alone. Satisfied, I nod over my shoulder at Caterina, who then curtly tells her lover with the brisk authority of a military commander: “Ser Giovanni. Fetch my son at once.”
She nods at me to open the door.
I do. It swings outward; Giovanni exits and Ridolfo enters. The two men pass each other closely, emphasizing the difference in height and build. Giovanni is short and rather slender, though soft and unmuscled; Ridolfo is a full head taller and almost thrice as wide. His head is entirely bald, with folds of skin at the base of his burly skull; his neck is as broad as Caterina’s thigh. Yet the huge hands that clutch his cap are trembling, and his round, thick features are slack with shock and fright. As Caterina gestures, rather impatiently, at him, he steps heavily inside; a pungent waft of aged sweat emanates from him as he passes. His blue uniform, clearly worn for days on end, is stained from the oil used to lubricate the cannons. As I close the door behind him, he does not merely genuflect, but sinks to his knees in front of the contessa.
I have met Ridolfo many times. Like his brother, Dionigi—castellan of the fortress at Imola—he is no coward, yet there is such panic in his eyes I expect him to start weeping at any instant. My lady and I know, of course, what he is about to say, but I will not allow myself to believe it until I hear the words.
“Your Illustrious Excellency,” he says to Caterina. His voice, too high pitched for so great a body, wavers. “I bring news from my brother.”
“So you’ve said,” Caterina replies softly, and waits.
Ridolfo draws a shuddering breath and releases said news in a torrent. “The citizens, perhaps you know, all surrendered to the Duke of Valentino’s army without a struggle. My brother, Dionigi, was able to hold the fortress for you . . . but Valentino’s artillery breached the wall at last. Dionigi fought courageously and well, but without the support of the city, he could not hold them off forever.” He bows his head and releases a small sob. “Dionigi showed such bravery. He is wounded, Your Illustriousness, in the head. Even after it was clear he would be defeated, and despite his pain, Dionigi would not surrender, would not leave his post, would not listen to the duke’s threats and promises. He was so persistent in his loyalty to you, in his willingness to die for you, that Valentino was moved. He granted my brother a three-day truce, so that Dionigi might send me to you, to ask whether you wish to send reinforcements to try to hold the fortress.”
As he speaks, a burning chill has forced its way upward from the base of my spine and spread outward, leaving me sickened.
The Lady of Forlì turns her face away from the kneeling giant; her lips twist with fury. “Bastards,” she mutters. “Dionigi would have prevailed if they hadn’t spread their legs like whores for Valentino!”
She is speaking of her subjects in Imola, who so feared the duke’s army that they surrendered to him before he ever entered the city.
“They have paid for it, Your Illustriousness,” Ridolfo says. “Valentino’s army has pillaged the city and raped every woman, even those in the convent. The duke himself took the prettiest women; it’s said he sleeps with a new one every night.”
At this, Caterina’s anger hardens. She composes herself, squares her shoulders, smoothes her brow, and assumes an air of dignity and confidence. Were it not for her disheveled hair and rumpled chemise, one might think she was holding court. But a long moment passes before she can gather herself to speak.
“Valentino knows that I can spare no troops,” she says at last. “The fortress is lost, through no fault of Ser Dionigi’s. He has behaved admirably. I must know, however, what the duke plans for him.”
“He will allow Dionigi and his men to leave the fortress with a safe escort to Forlì,” Ridolfo answers swiftly. “The duke is sincere, Your Illustriousness, else he would not have let me come. He says . . .” His voice begins to tremble again. “He says to tell you that he is coming next for you.”
Caterina lifts a golden brow at the duke’s threat, but otherwise refuses to respond to it. “Go back to Imola,” she tells Ridolfo, “and relay our deep gratitude to Ser Dionigi. Tell him he has discharged his duty with honor, and that I am releasing him and his men from my service.”
“Thank you, Your Illustriousness!” Ridolfo’s broad face crumples with relief; he puts his massive hands to his eyes and weeps briefly, then looks up, cheeks and eyes shining. “May I . . . that is, my brother wished to know, with all respect . . . Does this mean you will now release his wife and children, that they might join him?”
Caterina lets go a short laugh; apparently she forgot that she had secured Dionigi’s excessive loyalty by imprisoning his family. “Of course, of course!”
Just as Ridolfo thanks her profusely, the Lady of Forlì’s lover and secretary, Giovanni, reappears with her eldest son, twenty-year-old Ottaviano. Caterina takes her secretary aside, all business, and whispers detailed instructions to him. When she is finished, Giovanni nods and helps the overwhelmed Ridolfo to his feet. The two disappear out the door, and Caterina turns her attention to her son while I try not to be noticed. Caterina is not shy about sending me away when she desires privacy; the fact that she has not dismissed me means that she wishes me to remain. And so I watch, at a respectful distance, the poignant exchange between mother and son.
Ottaviano is not an easy youth to love. He is as slothful and unmotivated as his mother is tireless and ambitious, as full of complaints as she is courage. Nor did he inherit Caterina’s good looks, wit, or athletic talent. Though she has drilled him in the martial arts daily for months, his cheeks and body have not lost their childish plumpness; the swell of his belly is easily visible beneath his long wool nightshirt. His nose and lips are broad and thick, his face round, his general demeanor one of listlessness. He wears his dull brown hair in the manner of a page, chopped short so that it falls three fingers below his chin, with straight bangs ending just above his eyebrows. Even now, after the urgent summons to his mother’s quarters in the middle of the night, he is still rubbing his eyes and scowling fretfully at being awakened. Though he is already twenty years old and will soon be the ruler of Imola and Forlì, he has little interest in the details of government and prefers to leave such matters in his mother’s hands.
Caterina steps up to him and puts her arms upon his shoulders. He is less than half a head taller than she is, but much, much broader.
“My son,” she says briskly, without drama. “The fortress at Imola has fallen. Ser Giovanni is fetching a scout; he will guide you to Florence. We cannot wait another minute. Your trunk and horse will be waiting at the western gate. Get ready at once and go to them.”
“Imola has fallen?” Ottaviano’s eyes widen; he seems honestly surprised, as if he had expected some other news to have caused Caterina to drag him from his bed at such an hour. “Mother, are you sure?” He glances to me as if seeking another opinion; I drop my gaze.
“Yes,” my lady says firmly. “We’ve discussed this several times. Now we must act.” She leans forward on tiptoe and kisses the center of his forehead. “Go. I will see you again soon—here, in this very fortress, when Valentino has been routed.”
He hesitates. “But . . . are you sure you will be safe?”
Caterina laughs at the question and gives him a little shove. “Foolish boy! Hurry! Others will be waiting for you.”
Ottaviano gives her a last woeful look; apparently this is the first time he has considered that he ought not leave his mother to fight the French and papal armies alone. But Caterina pushes him again, this time with a hint of irritation. He gives her a slow, solemn kiss on the lips, then turns and lumbers out of the chamber.
“I will summon you home as soon as it is safe,” Caterina calls after him, her tone gay.
Once the door has closed behind him, her false cheer evaporates; she goes to the bed and sits down abruptly, heavily, on the edge. She presses her palms to her eyes, and as her lips suddenly contort, I go to stand beside her, and rest a hand gently upon her shoulder.
“I’m all right,” she says from behind her hands, but I hear the tears in her voice. We remain as we are for a long moment, and then she lowers one hand and pats the mattress beside her. “Giovanni is not coming back tonight. Sleep here, beside me.”
I do as I am told, and lie down beside her. For a long time, she does not extinguish the bedside lamp, but stares up at the ceiling, thinking. I close my eyes and do my best to feign sleep. After an hour, perhaps two, Caterina puts out the light. Some time later, I can tell from her breath that she will not fall asleep. Nor will I. We lie awake together until dawn, each of us lost in dread of what is to come.
News of Imola’s fall spreads quickly throughout the town of Forlì; Valentino’s massive army is only two days’ march away. By the following evening, two town elders come to Ravaldino’s fortress, where the Contessa of Forlì has taken refuge.
Unfortunately, I am not available to serve as my lady’s ever-present talisman at the meeting. Caterina indulged in a hot bath half an hour before, and I am making use of the still-warm water when the elders arrive and request an audience with my lady. She gives me leave to remain behind, even though I suspect the citizens’ appearance does not bode well. I therefore bathe as quickly as possible, and struggle to pull my chemise and gown over still-damp skin.
The encounter between Caterina and the elders lasts only minutes. By the time I hurry out of Caterina’s new chamber and up the vertiginous steps to Paradise—the lavish apartment she had built for herself in more peaceful times and where she receives all her guests—the elders, Ser Ludovico and Ser Niccolò, are coming down the stairs and pass me. With them is one of the contessa’s personal bodyguards, guiding them out of the maze that is Ravaldino Fortress.
They nod politely and cordially enough to me, though they seem preoccupied—who would not be, with Valentino’s army on the way? I nod in response and make way for them to pass, deeply relieved that they seem calm. Obviously, there had been no argument with the contessa; perhaps they had come to express support for her.
Buoyed, I lift my skirts and hurry upstairs to find Caterina in the nearly bare reception chamber. She has left her chair, behind which a second impassive bodyguard stands, and is on her toes at the window, craning her neck to stare down at the stone courtyard Ser Niccolò and Ser Ludovico will cross on their way out of the fortress.
When I enter and pause to curtsy, she jerks her head over her shoulder to look back at me, and I know in an instant that all is lost.
“Bastard!” she swears. “Son of a filthy whore . . . !” Her lips are trembling, her teeth gritted, her blue eyes wide with rage. I do not move, but remain genuflected as she turns her face back to the window and continues her tirade.
“Luffo Numai!” she shouts. Numai is the richest man in Forlì; he has served on the city council for some years and considers himself the spokesman for the townspeople. “That’s who it was—that’s the traitor! He convinced them all that they had no chance with me, that Valentino’s army would slaughter them, that they were safer surrendering to him.” She lets go a wild laugh. “They’ll learn soon enough what becomes of those who trust the Duke of Valentino!”
I lift my head. “The Forlivese?” I whisper.
“They will not fight in my defense,” she says, still facing the window. The bitter words steam the glass, and she wipes them away angrily as she stares down at the courtyard below. “They are sending a messenger to Valentino to tell him so. And according to my apologetic guests, it was Luffo Numai who worked tirelessly to convince the citizens that surrender was their only hope for survival. Many of the people supported me, wanted to raise their swords for me, but Numai bullied them until they gave in.” She lurches toward the window as her eye catches something below. “Hah! There they go!”
She turns toward me, skirts whirling, words tumbling out of her so rapidly I can scarcely follow them. “I was polite to Niccolò and Ludovico, of course. I was gracious; I told them that, given the fall of Imola, I could not expect the citizens of Forlì to defend me. But they would have, had it not been for Numai. How much money, do you think, Valentino promised him? And governorship, of course, since Valentino will not be able to look after the cities himself.”
She moves swiftly to the chair and throws on her cloak, then strides out of the chamber, through the door, and down the same steps Niccolò and Ludovico had recently trodden; since she continues to address me, I follow, breathless from the effort to keep pace with her.
“Numai thinks he will steal my lands from me,” she says darkly, “and from my sons, but he will pay. The bastard will pay! I will see to it personally.”
I follow her down to the second level, where tunnels have been cut deep into the stone wall to accommodate artillery. Caterina leads me to the end of one of them and calls to a nearby soldier.
“Bring the gunners!” she shouts, and as the soldier runs off to obey, Caterina moves to the side of one of the long bronze cannons, which is tilted upward forty-five degrees.
My lady does not need to search for the long-handled ladle, or the great wooden box that houses the gunpowder; she knows where both are kept, and fills the ladle full of the sulfurous powder with practiced ease, then pushes it down the cannon’s long barrel. At her bidding, I run and fetch a huge handful of hay to serve as wadding from a pile kept near the gunpowder box, and the long wooden rammer.
As I drop the hay into the muzzle and push it down with the rammer, Caterina goes to fetch the ball from a large pyramid-shaped stack. She staggers beneath the weight of the dressed stone sphere; she can carry it only crouched over, in both hands, with the ball at mid-thigh. But carry it she does, and as she steps toward the muzzle, I join her, and together we manage to lift the ball high enough to push it into the barrel.
By this time, six gunners have finally assembled, and they take over the rest of the duties.
“Aim it at Numai’s palace,” Caterina orders, knowing full well the likelihood of accurately striking such a distant target at dusk is poor. Even so, she watches avidly as one of the artillerymen uses a weighted plummet line to find the true perpendicular, then measures the angle with a quadrant and adjusts the muzzle accordingly. And when at last the metal cover is lifted at the cannon’s base, and the botefeux holding the lighted match is applied to the touchhole, she claps her hands with dark glee.
“For you, Luffo Numai!” she cries, a split second before the officer in charge waves us back, then orders:
“Fire!”
I flinch and put my hands over my ears.
At once, I find myself living the fortune-telling card known as the Tower. The cannon roars, paining my ears, and the heavy stone of the fortress walls, of the solid floor beneath my feet, trembles. In my mind, I feel myself falling, falling amid shattered stone, to the ground, to certain doom, to the end of everything I know.
At Caterina’s command, the cannon fires again, and again.
The Lady of Forlì and I have been through the experience of the Tower twice now, and survived. But this third time will surely be our last.
In the midst of the deafening song of the artillery, I see our end and our beginning. And my mind turns to the distant past. . . .
PART I
Milan
December 1476–April 1477
Chapter One
At dusk the screams came—outraged, feminine, shrill. We would never have marked them had it not been for the smoke and the singers’ sudden silence. I heard them eight days before Christmas as I stood in the loggia, gasping in stinging cold air from the open window, brusquely unshuttered by a quick-thinking servant.
A moment earlier, I had been sitting in front of the snapping hearth in the duchess’s quarters while one of her chambermaids roasted pignoli on a wood-handled iron peel—treats for the ducal heir, seven-year-old Gian Galeazzo Sforza, who stared blankly into the flames while his nurse brushed out the straw-colored curls covering his frail shoulders. Beside him sat his six-year-old brother, Ermes—thick-limbed and thick-waisted, slow to move or think—with a straight cap of dull red hair. To their left sat their mother, Duchess Bona, a sheer white veil wrapped about her coiled, muddy braids, her lips pursed as she squinted down at the needle and silk in her plump hands. She was twenty-seven and matronly; God had dealt her a stout frame, squat limbs, and a short, thick neck that dwarfed her broad face. Though her features were not unpleasant—her nose was short and round, her skin powder-soft and fine, her teeth small and fairly even—she had a low forehead with thick, overwhelming eyebrows. Her profile was flat, her eyes wide set, her small chin lost in folds of fat, most of it acquired after the birth of her first child; yet at the court of Duke Galeazzo, to my thinking, there was no lovelier soul.
To Bona’s left sat the duke’s two natural daughters, results of his dalliance with a courtier’s wife. The elder, Caterina, was, at thirteen, an example of physical perfection, with a lithe body that promised full breasts, clear skin, and a straight, well-proportioned nose, though her lips were rather thin. Two attributes propelled her past mere attractiveness into true beauty: full, loose curls of a gold so pale and bright it glittered in the sun, and eyes of a blue so intense that many who met her for the first time let go an involuntary gasp. The effect was enhanced by the natural confidence of her gaze. That afternoon, however, her gaze was sullen, for she had no patience with the needle and she hated sitting still; she paused often in her embroidery to glare at the fire and emit sighs of vexation. Had it been summer, she would have ignored the duchess’s insistence on a sewing lesson and joined her father on the hunt, or gone riding with her brothers, or chased them across the sprawling courtyard. No matter that such activities were exceedingly inappropriate for a young woman, already betrothed and certain to wed within three years. Caterina had no fear of the duchess’s wrath, not just because Bona was disinclined to anger, but also because her father the duke favored her and rarely allowed her to be punished.
The same could not be said of her nine-year-old sister, Chiara, a rail-thin, timid mouse with bulging brown eyes and a narrow, sharp-featured face. For all the attention the duke showed Caterina, Chiara—a slow-witted, obedient girl—received only his unwarranted abuse; she rarely met another’s gaze and kept close to Bona’s side. For Bona’s heart was so great that she treated all the duke’s children equally; her own son, Gian Galeazzo, who would someday rule Milan and all her territories, was shown the same tender kindness as Caterina and Chiara, both living proof of her husband’s philandering. She was also good to his two bastard sons, who were then almost men, off in Milan learning the military arts at their stepfather’s home. Although she had encouraged all of us children to address her as our mother, Chiara alone called her Mama. Caterina called her Madonna, my Lady; I called her Your Grace.
Bona was kind even to me, a foundling of murky origin. She claimed publicly that I was the natural child of one of her disgraced cousins in Savoy, and therefore related to the king of France. I had only the vaguest memory of a beautiful raven-haired woman, her features blurred by time, who murmured endearments to me in French; surely this had been my mother. I had recollections, too, of kindly nuns who cared for me after the raven-haired woman had disappeared. But when I pressed Bona privately on the subject, she refused to give any details, hinting that I was better off not knowing. She adopted me as her daughter—if a lesser one, fated to spend my days as her most coddled lady-in-waiting. I was grateful, but ashamed of my origins. And being ashamed, I imagined the worst.
Almadea, she named me: soul of God. Over the years, I came to be called simply Dea, but Bona made sure I never lost sight of my soul. She was a pious woman, given to prayer and charity, eager to raise her children to serve God. Since Caterina took no interest in the invisible world, Gian Galeazzo was destined for a secular fate, and Chiara was slow, I alone was the diligent recipient of her ardent religious instruction.
The duke, who praised Caterina to the skies and cursed poor Chiara, had little to say to or of me. I was strictly Bona’s project—although I, four years older than Caterina and often her chaperone, had many opportunities to be in the presence of His Grace, who doted on his blue-eyed, golden-haired daughter and paid her frequent visits. At those times, his eyes belonged to Caterina, and in those rare instances when his gaze strayed and caught mine, he quickly averted it.
On that eighth day before the Feast of the Nativity, the castle at Pavia—the duke’s favorite country lodgings—was bustling. Every servant’s expression was one of harried determination, every courtier’s one of eager anticipation. In two days, the entire court of several hundred would make the daylong procession to the city, Milan, and the majestic Castle of Porta Giovia. There, on the day before Christmas, the duke would address the people, issue pardons, and distribute charity; when the sun set, he would ceremonially light the ciocco, the great Yule log, for his staff and servants in the great banquet hall. The fire would be faithfully tended throughout the night. The duke had never lost his childhood love of the holiday, so he also privately celebrated the ciocco ritual with his family each Christmas Eve, followed by a lavish banquet.
On that particular afternoon, in a festive gesture anticipating the annual pilgrimage, the duke sent a quartet of carolers to his wife’s chambers. These were members of Duke Galeazzo’s choir, the most magnificent in all Europe. The duke took only a vague interest in the arts, leaving the acquisition of books and paintings to his underlings, but music was his passion, and he took great care to seek out the most talented vocalists and composers in all of Europe.
Gian Galeazzo, Ermes, Duchess Bona, Caterina, Chiara, and I sat facing west before the fire, with the open doorway to our left, while the carolers—two men and two lads, the latter chosen by the duke for their pretty bodies as much as their talent—stood just left of the hearth, lifting their amazing voices in song. Behind us, two chambermaids were busy packing Bona’s Christmas wardrobe into two large trunks. Sitting on the floor by his elder brother’s feet, Ermes dozed while little Gian Galeazzo sat dutifully enduring his nurse’s brush as he stared into the fire and listened; Duchess Bona hoped that the boys would catch their father’s passion for music. She and Chiara were distracted by their embroidery, and Caterina by a wooden ball at her foot, a toy belonging to her younger half-brothers. She slyly nudged it with her toe until it rolled a short distance and gently bumped the nose of the dozing greyhound coiled at Bona’s feet. The dog—three-legged and, like me, one of Bona’s rescues—opened one eye and promptly returned to its nap.
The duchess’s chamber was of comfortable size, with a large arched window, vaulted ceilings, and walls paneled in dark, ornately carved wood. Unlike the duke’s, it consisted of a single room that featured a sitting area in front of the fireplace, a dressing area shielded from view by several garderobes, and a platform upon which rested a mahogany bed, its brocade curtains drawn. Near it were three cots, one of which I occupied on those nights my husband traveled. Bona’s chamber resembled most of the other rooms in Castle Pavia, which consisted of a two-story stone square large enough to comfortably house five hundred souls. Each corner of the square was marked by a great tower, and these corner suites were reserved for the most important personages and functions. On the upper floor, the northeast tower housed the duke’s suite of rooms, the northwest, his heir’s; the southeast and southwest towers served as the chancery and the library, respectively. On the ground floor, the tower rooms held the reliquary and the prison. Except for the duke’s, all rooms opened onto a long common hall, or loggia, overlooking the massive interior courtyard; the loggia on the first floor, which housed the servants, lesser visitors, butchery, prison, bathhouse, laundry, and treasury, was open to the elements. For the comfort of the duke and his family, however, the upper loggia was bricked in, though there were windows to catch summer breezes, with shutters to close out winter winds.
As a girl, I used to race down the long, seemingly endless halls, barely avoiding collisions with the servants who filled them. One day I determined to count every room on both floors: There are eighty-three if you include the saletti, the little sitting rooms that protrude from the chapel, the chamber of rabbits, and the chamber of damsels and roses, the last two named for their murals. My favorite was the first-floor chamber of mirrors, with a floor of glittering mosaic and a ceiling of brightly colored glass.
Bona’s fireplace rested in the center of the wall adjoining her son’s apartment, and so we sat many steps away from either the window or the chamber door. I sat nearest the latter, which was open to allow the servants who were packing the duchess’s Christmas luggage easy access.
I should have relaxed in the fire’s warmth and simply listened to the singing. One lad’s voice was so hauntingly beautiful that when he performed a solo, Bona stopped in her sewing and closed her eyes at its sweetness.
I closed my eyes, too, but opened them immediately at the sudden welling of tears and the unwanted tightness in my throat. For the third time in the last hour, I set my sewing down and—as discreetly as possible, moving behind the seated group—stepped rapidly away from the hearth into the cool shade at the arched window, and looked out.
To my left, the feeble sun was dying behind thick winter clouds that threatened snow; before me stood the formal garden, withered save for spots of evergreen. Straight ahead, to the north, the Lombard plain stretched out, much of it obscured by the bare, spidery-limbed trees in the nearby park where the duke hunted. A day’s ride away, beyond the plain and my sight, stood the Alps; to the east, the kingdom of Savoy, where Bona had been born.
My Matteo would not be coming from the north, but court life required me to attend the duchess, and quash all yearning to run southward down the endless loggia to the library, where I could climb the steps to the southwest watchtower and stare out toward Rome.
Matteo da Prato served the duke as a scribe, occasional courier, and minor envoy. His mother had died giving life to him, and his father had died not long afterward; like me, he had been adopted by a wealthy family and educated. His talent for breaking ciphers and creating impenetrable code had earned him the attention of the duke’s top secretary, Cicco Simonetta. I first set eyes on him seven years ago, when I was ten and he seventeen, new to Milan and freshly apprenticed to Cicco; I never dreamed then that we should ever marry.
I had never expected to marry at all.
Back at the hearth, Bona noted my dismay. When the singers caught their breath between arrangements, she called softly, “He will not come today, Dea. I’ve said a hundred times, there is nothing more certain than delays during winter travel. Don’t fret; they’ve already found lodging and are sitting comfortably right now just as we are, in front of a fire.” She paused. “Time to shutter the windows now, anyway. It’s growing bitter.”
She did not remark on the fact that it had been the coldest winter anyone at court could remember.
“Of course, Your Grace,” I said. At my words, a gust of wind stirred the clouds; before my eyes they writhed and reformed into a haunting image: the shape of a man dangling in the darkening sky as if an invisible God held him by one ankle, his opposite leg bent at the knee to create an upside-down four.
The hanged man, Matteo had called him.
I pushed the heavy slatted panels into place and latched them, then hesitated an instant to flick away a tear. When I faced Bona again, it was with a false smile.
Reason, if not the clouds, said that I had no cause to worry. Matteo was a seasoned traveler, and the guests he was escorting from Rome to Milan were papal legates, too precious to risk by traveling in bad weather. Matteo was also armed against bandits, and the legates traveled with attendants and bodyguards. Yet my anxiety would not ease. I had awakened that morning in a peculiar panic from a dream of a double-edged sword pointed downward, dripping blood onto the frozen earth, while a voice whispered flatly in my ear, Matteo is dead.
Before morning mass, I had lit a second candle for Matteo, so that God would be doubly sure to hear my prayers. Bona noted it when she arrived in the chapel, and when I knelt beside her, she set a comforting hand upon my forearm.
“God hears,” she said softly, “and I am praying, too.”
Her kindness forced me to flick away tears, yet my worry did not lift; in my mind’s eye, I saw Matteo suspended upside-down, pale and unconscious.
After mass, I was gratefully distracted by the task of supervising the chambermaids as they prepared the duchess’s and children’s households for the return to Milan.
At noon, I noted the gathering snow clouds but told myself stubbornly that Matteo, the smartest man I knew, would mark them, too, and hasten his progress; but as the sky darkened, so did my mood, and sunset brought a growing dread. By the time I shuttered Bona’s window, I was again fighting back tears.
Yet I returned to my embroidery with a vengeance, and with each jab of the needle uttered a silent prayer: God, protect my husband. Surely God would hear. No one was more deserving of protection than Matteo; no prayers were worthier of being granted than Bona’s.
My stitches were large and careless and later would have to be snipped and resewn—not today, though, for the light was failing and soon, when Bona gave the word, all needlework would be retired. The male quartet began again to sing, a lively folk tune that made Bona smile and Caterina keep time with her feet.
My eyes were on the pool of white silk in my hands; I did not see what caused the first loud clatter, but I looked up in time to see Francesca’s iron peel drop with a resounding clang to the stone fireplace floor, scattering nuts in the flames. Francesca looked down at the carpet in horror, and threw up her hands; the act caused her shawl to slip from her shoulders. One edge spilled into the hearth and ignited, while she, unaware, stared down at a red-hot stone smoldering on the carpet at the very feet of the ducal heir.
Francesca let go a shriek, which was quickly seconded by Bona and the nurse, who dropped the brush at once and lifted her charge, Gian Galeazzo, straight up out of his chair, overturning it in the process. Ermes screamed for his mother. The quartet of singers—the coddled cream of Europe’s musical talent, and loyal to the duke’s family insofar as their generous salaries were paid—were quickly out the door.
While the area of the hearth filled with smoke and shouts, I rose, determined to stamp out the fire before it caught in earnest, and tried to move toward Francesca. But Caterina, already on her feet, blocked my way. Her blue eyes were wide and blank, her manner that of a mindless, terrified beast. As I pressed toward the fire and she away, she gave my shoulders such a mighty shove that I staggered backward and nearly lost my footing. She ran past me, the three-legged greyhound at her heels, out the door and into the loggia.
Behind her, Bona had gotten Chiara, stiff and weeping with fright, from her chair and was herding her, Gian Galeazzo, and Ermes toward the door. With her charges safe, she moved past me, allowing me to help Francesca stamp out the woolen shawl, now a heap on the carpet, its edges burning steadily, filling the room with the smell of burning hair.
One of the maids who had been packing the duchess’s things ran forward and, with a poker, pushed the errant hearthstone—which had initiated the calamity by tumbling from the chimney and striking Francesca’s peel—back into the fireplace. A second ran up and doused both the shawl and the smoldering carpet with water from the duchess’s slop jar.
By this time, the nuts had begun to give off a scorched stink; the air grew noxious. Gasping, Francesca hurried to the window I had so recently shuttered and opened it, letting in the chimes from the nearby Certosa monastery and the freezing alpine air.
I joined the others outside in the loggia, where the window overlooking the interior courtyard had been thrown open. Gian Galeazzo’s nurse was leading him, his brother, and the still-weeping Chiara next door, to the ducal heir’s chamber in the northwest tower; the singers had all disappeared from sight. A few nervous servants had appeared in Gian Galeazzo’s doorway in response to the outcry, but seeing the danger past, they were already receding back into the tower room.
Bona remained by the loggia window, waiting to make sure I was unscathed; she clucked maternally at the sight of my coughing and steered me directly to the opening. I bared my face to the painfully cold air and filled my lungs. When my coughing finally eased, I wiped my streaming eyes and drew back to examine the duchess.
The incident had left her unharmed, but some new disaster had claimed her attention: I followed her gaze east down the long loggia and saw Caterina standing at the far end of the great hall that separated the duchess’s quarters from the duke’s.
In the yellow light cast by a wall sconce, Caterina stood profoundly still with her back to us, her normally exuberant aspect hushed, her chin lifted and head canted to one side; I was reminded of a cat that, before pouncing on a bird, pauses to listen to its song. I paused, too: a woman was screaming in terror and outrage somewhere in the opposite wing of the palace.
The five doors that led into the great hall were uncharacteristically closed, and the servants inside oddly silent. The loggia, too, had grown abruptly deserted, save for an old servant who paused to light each wall sconce with the long taper in his hand; he made his way slowly toward us from the direction of the duke’s apartments. Surely he had heard the lady’s cries; perhaps he had even seen her, struggling in the grasp of Bruno, strongest of all the duke’s bodyguards. Yet like all good servants of Galeazzo Sforza, Duke of Milan, he had learned to keep his eyes downcast, his pace steady, his expression blank as though he could not hear her ragged screams.
They emanated from the east, from the loggia in the men’s wing, and they grew ever louder as they moved toward the northeast tower, and the duke’s quarters.
Let me go, let me go!
For the love of God . . .
You there, help me! Someone, help!
I understood at once why everyone else had so efficiently departed the scene.
Caterina whirled to face us, her blue eyes avid, bright; she did not quite smirk.
“Madonna,” she called, almost gaily, to Bona. “Shall we pray?”
Bona’s dark, bovine eyes were wide with hurt. Yet she mastered her pain and, ignoring the servant and Caterina’s insolent, knowing gaze, lifted her skirts. With calm, deliberate steps and all the grace her square, portly frame allowed, she moved down the loggia, past the closed doors of the great hall, to the open entrance of the family chapel.
Caterina and I entered the chapel with her. Just inside, to our right, stood the interior door that connected the chapel to the duke’s dressing chamber. For safety and privacy, none of the duke’s rooms opened directly onto the loggia. Instead, one had to enter the chapel and from there, gain entry to the duke’s dressing chamber, which in turn led to the duke’s bedchamber, which in turn led to the duke’s private dining hall in the northeast tower. The dining hall opened onto the northernmost room of the men’s east wing, the chamber of rabbits. This sported a life-sized mural of the duke on horseback in the summer-green park, following greyhounds in pursuit of a warren of hares; the chamber opened directly onto the eastern loggia. In sum, there are only two ways to reach the duke’s suite from the common hallway: either from the chapel off the north loggia, or from the chamber of rabbits off the east.
They planned, of course, to drag the girl in through the chamber of rabbits, so that she could not be seen by anyone passing in or out of the duchess’s chambers. If a stone had not chanced to tumble from the chimney in Bona’s hearth, the duchess would have heard no one but the singers, and would have remained cheerfully unaware of the rape occurring under her husband’s roof.
The chapel smelled of hot candle wax. It was paneled in ebony wood, like the duchess’s chamber; the choir stalls were carved from the same. The room’s sole spot of color could be found in the large stained-glass window, which depicted Milan’s patron saint, Ambrose, white-bearded and stern in his golden bishop’s mitre against a garden backdrop of emerald green. The sunlight had almost disappeared, leaving the window dark and the chapel shrouded in shadow, broken only by the glow from lamps flanking the entry and tapers burning on the altar, beneath the large wooden crucifix where a bronze Christ hung, his head bowed in death. The room was hearthless, dreary, and chill; Bona believed that God paid closer attention to the prayers of the suffering, which was why she often wore a hair shirt hidden beneath her fine silk chemise. No doubt she hoped God might post some of her excessive contrition to her husband’s account.
Beneath the altar, a dozen votive candles burned, two of them for my Matteo’s safety. By the time Bona knelt at the altar and I lifted one of the burning tapers to light two new votives—one for the duke’s soul, one for his victim’s—the shrieking had stopped. I replaced the taper on the altar, then returned and knelt on the cushion next to the duchess, who smelled of rosewater and smoke.
Bona’s deep-set eyes were fast shut, her dimpled hands clasped, her lips moving silently. Her features were pinched but set; one who did not suspect her personal agony would think she was simply earnest at prayer.
Caterina did not kneel, but unabashedly pressed her ear against the door adjacent to the duke’s dressing room; she did not test it, for she knew that it would be bolted from the other side. When Caterina was still quite young, but old enough to suspect what was happening, Bona had tried to send her to her quarters for the duration. The girl disobeyed and kept escaping to the men’s wing in an effort to catch a glimpse of her father in flagrante. She was stronger, faster, and far cleverer than her nurses, with the result that Bona finally acknowledged the duke’s trangressions and brought Caterina with her to the chapel, insisting that the girl should pray for her father. But Caterina refused to waste her time.
“If it is wrong of my father to do such a thing,” she asked reasonably, “then why does no one stop him?”
Bona, devoted to God but no philosopher, had no answer. She soon despaired of trying to influence Caterina for the good, as the girl was obviously as stubborn as her father and most likely just as inclined to wickedness.
I, on the other hand, was desperately beholden to the duchess and eager to please her. My parents had no doubt been so horribly damned—my mother perhaps a shamed woman, my father perhaps too wicked to care for his own children—that Bona, unshakable in the face of evil, had never been able to bring herself to say much about them. I feared that whatever had driven them to unspeakable sin had infected me, and so I embraced the duchess’s assiduous instruction concerning religion.
God is loving, Bona always said, but also just. And though you might not see results at once, He surely hears the prayers of the meek. Pray for justice, Dea, and in good time it will come; and pray for yourself, that you might be wise enough to love sinners while abhorring their deeds.
For Bona’s sake, I believed it all, prayed often and sincerely, and waited on God to reward the faithful and punish the wicked. The duke was all-powerful, his bodyguards cunningly armed and ready to deal death to those who interfered with their master’s pleasure; what else could I, a mere seventeen-year-old woman, do other than pray and offer Bona my comfort and companionship?
Yet when it came to sinners who relished cruelty, such as the duke and his coldhearted pet, Caterina, I could not match Bona’s saintliness. My heart held hate, not love. And so, as I began to mouth silent prayers beside the duchess, I asked God not for patience or for charity, but for vengeance, of a swifter sort than He was accustomed to meting out.
In my mind’s eye I pictured not the dying Christ or the Holy Mother, but the duke, who had invited the current silence by holding out his hand to the girl and speaking gently, quickly, as if soothing a frightened beast. He was telling her that all the stories about him were lies, that he was in fact a kindly man who wished her no harm.
And she—fifteen years old at most, lovely, unmarried, and a virgin from a decent family—was crazed with fear and desperate to believe him.
I yearned to be a man, one with a sword and the access to His Grace Duke Galeazzo. I pictured myself stealing up behind him as he murmured to the girl, and ending his crime with one short, swift, avenging thrust of my blade. Instead, I had only the opportunity to whisper one Our Father and two Ave Marias before Caterina, her expression one of fascination, hissed, “They are moving into his bedchamber now.”
The screaming began again, this time wordless, outraged, animal. I clasped my hands until they ached and tried desperately to quash my imagination. From behind the altar wall came muffled thumping—bodies or limbs striking walls, perhaps—and the tinkling of glass. Beneath it all was the very faint, vicious sound of male laughter.
Holy Mother, take pity upon her. Lord, let the duke taste justice.
“Why do you not help her?” Caterina demanded. There was no concern or frustration in her tone, only a dogged insistence. “He is hurting her, after all. Surely God does not mean for you to stand idly by.”
Without lifting her head, Bona replied, “We are only women, and far frailer than men. Should they not come to our aid, we can rely only on the goodness of God.”
A corner of Caterina’s lip twitched in disgust. “Only a coward waits on God.”
Angered by the attack on Bona, I jerked my face toward Caterina’s. “If that is so, Madonna, then why do you not stop your father? You’re his favorite; persuade him. Save him from sin and protect the lady.”
Without lifting her ear from the door, Caterina stuck out her tongue at me; still at prayer, Bona did not see.
“You all speak nonsense,” Caterina said. “First you say that my father sins. Then you say that God chose my father to rule, so his will must be respected. Well, it’s his will to lie with pretty young women. So where is the sin? And if it is sin, then why would God have such bad judgment as to anoint my father duke?”
Bona did not open her eyes, but behind her veil, a fat tear spilled from the corner of her eye and slid down her cheek. It was not her way to question God or her husband. “If you will not pray for your father,” she said, her voice husky and uneven with sorrow, “then at least pray for the girl.”
“The fact is,” Caterina countered, “a duke can do whatever he pleases.”
She began to say more, but her words were drowned out by a man’s shouts coming from the direction of the chamber of rabbits: “Duca! Duca! Your Grace!” His rasping, nasal voice was soon joined by others, and grew muffled by the sounds of scuffling.
Intrigued, Caterina hurried into the hall to learn the source of the noise. Within a minute, she retreated back into the chapel in a fright, and dropped to her knees at the altar on the far side of Bona.
Boot heels rang against the loggia’s stone floor; soon a trio of cloaked men armed with drawn short swords stood in the chapel archway. One of them, of powerful shoulders and good height, stepped inside. Upon seeing the interior door leading to the duke’s suite, he rattled the handle, found it locked, then nodded to the other two, who began in turn to throw themselves at the door to break it down.
Ashamed, Bona turned her face from them.
Meanwhile, the first man—with straight dark brown hair, parted down the middle and falling a few fingers shy of his shoulders—bowed low to us, then straightened and said, “Good ladies. My deepest apologies for disturbing you at prayer and disrupting the peace in God’s chamber, but one of your fair sex is in danger. I beg your forbearance while we work to bring this matter to a happy end.”
His dialect was Tuscan, and his diction revealed an education reserved for the highest born, yet his voice was peculiarly nasal. He was in his twenties or thirties, but it was difficult to judge, for his face was remarkably strange. His jaw was very square, and his chin jutted far forward; he had a noticeable underbite and when he spoke, his lower lip stuck out while his upper disappeared. This would not have seemed so unfortunate had it not been combined with his huge nose, which was flat at the bridge where it met the inner corners of his eyebrows, then rose and swooped alarmingly off to one side; it had an unusually long, sloping tip. It made me think of a clay likeness that had waited too long for the kiln and begun to droop. He might have looked foolish or unforgivably ugly had it not been for the rare intelligence in his eyes and his unselfconscious, confident grace.
I stood, curtsied reluctantly, and said, with as much contained fury as I dared show a noble, “You have disturbed my mistress at prayer, my lord. And you have violated the sanctity of the chapel.”
I looked pointedly at his two companions, gasping after their few failed attempts to break down the door. Like him, they were dressed in new winter cloaks trimmed with brown marten fur at the collars and sleeves.
“I am no lord,” he replied, clearly troubled by the fact that the screams had turned ominously to muffled groans. “Only a commoner trying to help in an emergency. I beg your forgiveness in what surely must be a difficult time for you all. But can no one else in this palace hear that the lady needs help?”
Bona bowed her head low, still too mortified to speak; Caterina stayed on her knees but peered past Bona at the speaker, clearly eager to see where this unexpected development would lead. Before the man could say more, a low wail emanated from a distant room behind the door, followed by wracking sobs.
The self-professed commoner’s strong, homely faced twisted with pity at the sound; pushing aside his fellows, he threw his shoulder against the door with all his force. The thick, solid wood did not so much as tremble at the blow. Rather than leave in frustration, the commoner knocked the wood with the hilt of his short sword.
“Your Grace! Good Your Grace!” he called, his tone playfully cajoling. “It is I, your secret guest, freshly arrived to enjoy your legendary hospitality. Let me repay it in small part now by offering the young lady an escort home.” And when no reply came, he added cheerfully, “I am determined, Your Grace; I shall wait at this door, and my fellows at the other, until we have her.”
With that, he turned to his men and gestured in the direction of the chamber of rabbits; they understood and left at once, while the so-called commoner remained, his ear to the door.
A long moment passed, during which Bona found her composure. She then crossed herself, rose, and turned to the man; at her side, Caterina rose as well, and watched with unselfconscious fascination.
“Your Magnificence,” Bona said softly, slowly, as always in control, though I knew her heart was breaking. “My lord the duke informed me to prepare for a guest’s arrival, but he did not tell me that it was you. I fear I cannot greet you properly at this time, given the unpleasant circumstance.”
He squinted hard at her and took a slow step toward her, frowning, until his eyes suddenly widened and his jaw dropped.
“Your Grace!” he exclaimed softly, his voice hushed with embarrassment; his cheeks reddened. “Oh, my lady Duchess!” He bowed deeply from the shoulders, and remained in that position as he spoke. “I cannot— I would never have— Your Grace, I beg forgiveness for my cruel thoughtlessness! My judgment has failed me once again. Had I recognized you, I would have been far more discreet.”
I applauded his desire to save the distressed lady, but could not forgive the humiliation he had just inflicted on Bona; my temper took abrupt control of my tongue. “How could you not recognize the duchess, good sir, when she stands directly before you? A poor excuse for such rudeness!”
Bona moved to me and caught my elbow. “Dea,” she said, her voice very low. “His sight is poor. Now you, too, must apologize.”
Behind us, Caterina giggled. Tongue-tied, I looked back at His Magnificence, and he looked back at me.
“Dea,” he said, with faint surprise, and in his eyes curiosity dawned. He uttered my name as if it were a familiar one.
Before he could say more, we all turned at the sound of footsteps approaching the door leading to the duke’s dressing chamber, and the squeal of the bolt being drawn. The door opened a crack; His Magnificence inclined his ear to it, and listened to whispered instructions from one of the duke’s valets. He gave a sharp nod to show he had understood, and the door closed again.
His Magnificence turned to Bona and bowed to take his leave. “Your Grace, my apologies once more. When we meet tomorrow, I will greet you as you deserve and do my best to make full reparation.”
“When we meet tomorrow, or any other day, dear Lorenzo,” Bona said softly, “we shall not speak of this.”
“Agreed,” he answered, then nodded to Caterina and last of all, me. “Ladies,” he said briskly, and was gone; I listened to his ringing steps as he made his way down the loggia toward the chamber of rabbits.
Like everyone else in Italy, I had heard tales about Lorenzo the Magnificent. At the tender age of twenty, he had become the de facto ruler of Florence upon his father’s death. I had glimpsed him only once, in 1469, when I was nine and had been living in Bona’s household only a year. Along with four other prominent rulers in Milan’s great Duomo, Lorenzo de’ Medici stood as godfather at Gian Galeazzo’s christening. Unlike us lesser mortals, Lorenzo possessed such intelligence, confidence, and charm that he could speak bluntly to Duke Galeazzo without provoking his wrath, and the duke, who routinely abused his family, courtiers, servants, and peers, treated Lorenzo with respect.
Once Lorenzo had left the chapel, Bona turned to me, her eyes brimming with tears. “God surely answered our prayers, sending him to help the lady . . . and to teach me humility.”
“Surely,” I gently agreed, though I did not believe for an instant that Bona had any pride left after eight years of marriage to Galeazzo Sforza. But I was grateful for Lorenzo’s attempt to intervene.
“Take Caterina with you,” Bona ordered, “and make sure she gets to her quarters and stays there. You’re free to do as you wish until I summon you again.”
“I will deliver her to her nurse, then return, if you like,” I said softly. I could see the duchess was in need of comfort. It is a hard thing to accept that one’s husband is a monster, and harder still to endure that monstrousness in polite company.
Her gaze averted, Bona shook her head, and I suddenly understood: Lorenzo’s appearance had so shamed my mistress that she was no longer able to control her tears. As I herded Caterina out, Bona knelt again at the altar railing, pausing before she returned to her prayers to call: “Please close the door behind you.”
I did, leaving her to weep in private.
Caterina broke away from me the instant we were out in the loggia; she turned toward the men’s wing and, cursing her full woman’s skirts, lifted them high and half ran in the direction of the chamber of rabbits. I was taller, with a longer stride, and easily caught her by the elbow.
She tried to shake free, but I held fast, wheeled her about, and dragged her with me toward the women’s wing.
“Bitch!” she snapped. “I’ll tell my father!”
“That I am following the duchess’s orders?” I paused. “What would your father say, were he to see you waiting in the chamber of rabbits?”
She said nothing, but accompanied me, sourly, back down the loggia toward Bona’s chambers, where servants had managed to clear out the smoke and close the windows, though the smell of burnt wool and nuts lingered. Next to it was little Gian Galeazzo’s and Ermes’s quarters in the northeast corner, and just past them was the northernmost room in the ladies’ wing, the pink chamber, so named because its walls were covered in rose moiré silk. It served as nursery to Bona’s daughters, five-month-old Anna and four-year-old Bianca Maria, who had already been married off to her first cousin, Philibert, Duke of Savoy. Just past it was Caterina’s room. I deposited her there and informed her nurse of Bona’s order, knowing all the while that the duke’s headstrong daughter would likely dash off the instant I had left.
I did not care. I proceeded southward down the endless ladies’ loggia, with its life-sized murals of those in Bona’s household, framed against a summer garden backdrop. Near the duchess’s quarters, there was a painting of Bona, seated and gazing proudly down at the infant Gian Galeazzo in her arms. Her courtiers clustered around her: the duke’s aunt, Elena del Maino; Emilia Attendoli, who had served Duke Galeazzo’s mother; and Emilia’s daughter, Antonia. Farther down the hall, in the newest mural, Ermes handed his baby sister Bianca Maria an apple picked from a tree, while the image of ten-year-old Caterina made one of her beloved greyhounds sit for a morsel.
My likeness, like my heritage, was nowhere to be seen.
At last I arrived at the open door of the library, in the southwest corner tower. Here, the plain stone flooring became gray-veined white marble, and the ceiling rose three stories high. There were no murals here; the vast walls were covered in tall oak shelves. Upon the last rested stacks of parchments bound in brocade, damask, or velvet. Despite the duke’s lack of interest in literature, his collection was priceless; he owned a copy of Virgil’s Aeneid, annotated in Petrarch’s very hand. For this reason, all works were attached to the shelves by silver chains.
Only three souls stood inside the vast chamber: the librarian and two young monks from the nearby monastery at Certosa. Unable to leave his domain unguarded, yet eager to retire now that the sun had set, the librarian scowled as I entered. I ignored him, knowing that I would be gone well before the monks, who stood with reverent awe in front of one of the manuscripts.
I passed them and headed for the library’s interior staircase, thinking to climb all the way to the fourth-floor perch, where I could stare far to the southern horizon toward Rome, looking for signs of my husband.
As I moved to the landing, movement outside the window caught my eye. On the banks of the moat near the castle’s main entry, two courtiers stood next to a servant who held the reins to two horses in one hand and a lamp in the other. In the faint arc of light, snowflakes sailed relentlessly downward.
I paused to stare at them. Though I could not make out their faces clearly, I recognized the build of one of them: Carlo Visconti, a black-haired courtier and member of Milan’s Council of Justice, his bearing and gestures betraying violent emotion. Beside him was an older, white-haired man who might have been his father.
Approaching them from the direction of the castle was a third man carrying a swooning young woman. At the sight, the older man beat his chest, then threw open his arms; gently, the third man handed her to her father.
Visconti was not so conciliatory; he drew his sword and lunged at the man who delivered the girl. The third man reacted by taking a great step backward, then spreading his arms in a gesture of peace.
For the space of several seconds, neither party moved; I supposed that one of them was speaking. Abruptly, Visconti sheathed his sword and sagged with grief. The man he had threatened stepped forward to put a hand upon Visconti’s shoulder, and in doing so, stepped into the lamplight.
I watched as Lorenzo the Magnificent kept his hand upon the courtier’s shoulder, then put another on the father’s, and spoke for a moment. Afterward, he dug into a pocket and discreetly handed Visconti a purse. The latter pocketed it without argument.
The snow grew heavier, prompting the father to mount one of the horses. He reached for his daughter, who was unsteady on her legs; it took both Visconti and Lorenzo to get her up into the saddle. Visconti and the servant then mounted the remaining horse; Visconti paused long enough to bow from the shoulders to Lorenzo, who returned the gesture before the trio galloped off across the drawbridge.
I remained at the window as Lorenzo turned, the wind whipping his dark hair across his face, and watched as he made his way grimly back to the castle. At its entrance he paused to glance pointedly up at the library window—at me, as if, impossibly given his poor eyesight, he saw me standing there.
Chapter Two
Snow fell that night. By morning, the clouds had gone, leaving behind a blue sky and an infinite white expanse that glittered beneath the sun. The weather was still bitter, but the wind had died; a good day for travel, Bona told me brightly, and promised that Matteo would be home within two days.
I smiled faintly at her cheer, though my anxiety had not eased; I woke with a gut so clenched I could not face breakfast. Instead I prayed earnestly beside Bona in the chapel: Lord, guard Your servant Matteo da Prato and bring him safely home to me. Blessed Virgin, Mother of God, keep my husband from harm. Saint Christopher, patron of travelers, protect him . . .
Afterward, I put on my heavy cloak and went downstairs to the passage that led to the garden, where the woodsmen had piled boughs of evergreen as high as my shoulders. I gathered several boughs into my arms, and made my way carefully over the slippery floor of the open loggia; on the opposite side, an old serving woman swept away the snow with a broom while her frailer husband followed, sprinkling ash from a pail onto the stone.
Matteo’s chamber, situated on the first level, directly beneath the duke’s bedroom, stood two doors from the garden passage. Only the highest of Galeazzo’s officials were housed on the second floor along with the ducal family; Galeazzo’s secretary and right-hand man, Cicco Simonetta, was privileged to live right next to the duke’s suite, closer even than Bona. In recognition of Matteo’s intelligence and loyalty, however, he had been rewarded with one of the better downstairs chambers.
I paused at the entrance to my husband’s room, wrestling with my fragrant burden in order to get the key from my cloak pocket. Like his immediate superior, Cicco, Matteo always kept his chamber locked; the duke entrusted all his state secrets to Cicco, who in turn shared a few of them with my husband. In these perilous times, a prince was wise to encrypt any correspondence he did not want read by anyone other than the intended recipient; couriers could not always be trusted. The duke had promoted Cicco to a position of great power because of the latter’s natural grasp of the art of encryption, and Cicco had promoted my husband because of Matteo’s ability to create and memorize hard-to-break ciphers. Matteo could look at a letter in Latin or the vernacular and encrypt it in a matter of minutes, an unheard-of feat. After seven years of acquainting himself diligently with the duke’s most confidential matters, Matteo was chosen to serve as a junior envoy to Rome. He had visited there once in the spring, before we were married, and was soon to return from his second visit. I asked him no questions, but I was proud: I had no doubt that he dealt with members of the Sacred College, perhaps even with the pope himself.
The melting snow had caused the wooden door to swell; even unlocked, it would not open until I gave it a hard kick. Once it was open, I set down a branch and wiped my feet upon it, then closed the door behind me and scattered the rest of the perfumed boughs onto the stone floor.
Matteo had been gone almost two months, but the room still smelled of him, of rosemary water and olive oil soap, of parchment and iron-gall ink, of the indescribable scent of male flesh. The room was chilly, the hearth long-unlit; I had told God that morning that I would set my oddly persistent fear for Matteo’s safety aside and trust that my prayers on his behalf would be answered. As proof of my conviction, I would perform an act of faith and light the fire, so that the room would be cozy by the time my husband arrived.
Yesterday, I had loaded wood onto the grate, with strategically placed juniper bark as tinder; today, I took the tinderbox from the mantel and retrieved the flint and steel. It took several tries before a spark fell and caught; I sat on my heels and fanned it, thinking of my strange marriage.
Other women would think me exceedingly lucky. Though lacking noble blood and the convenience of well-placed family, Matteo had succeeded in using his wits to rise to an admirable station. And he was good-looking enough—taller than most of the other men, and long-limbed, if a bit too slender, with straight, thick auburn hair so dark it looked black after sunset. He kept it cut short and often hidden beneath a red felt cap, of the same close-fitting sort his master Cicco wore. His skin was naturally pale, though it had browned during his travels; his eyes were a clear, light hazel, thoughtful and calm. His lips were full and pretty, though the bow of his upper lip bore a scar from a childhood mishap. His words were spoken softly and always kind. Occasionally, when he was tired or forgot himself, his Tuscan accent became noticeable.
Over the seven years he had spent at Duke Galeazzo’s court, Matteo was never far from me. On holidays, at picnics, at summer games in the courtyard, or at the hunt, Matteo always managed to seek out my company; he seemed to know a good deal about the particular circumstances of my life, and was always interested in how I was faring, especially in my studies. He wanted to know whether Bona was good to me, or Caterina rude, what my favorite subjects and hobbies were, what books I had read. I responded with questions of my own, and learned that he was from Florence—or rather, from the Ospedale degli Innocenti, the city’s largest orphanage.
“I grew up there,” he said, “but was rescued in my youth by a patron. I got my education from the monks at San Marco in Florence. When I was older, I went to the University of Pavia, where Cicco recruited me.”
“So there is no one in Florence for you?” I asked. “No patron? No adopted family to return to?”
He almost answered, then stopped himself and gave a crescent moon smile. “None. But I have many dear friends there.” He hesitated. “You would love it. There is no fear there, as there is here. . . .” He dropped his gaze suddenly, realizing that he had said a politically dangerous thing. “The people are happier and speak freely. The world’s best artists live there because the nobles support them.”
“Nothing could be more beautiful than Milan,” I said firmly. I had never traveled and therefore feared it; Bona was my refuge.
“Once you see Florence, you’ll change your mind,” Matteo replied.
I did not think much about my friendship with Matteo, for his interest in me was kindly but not obsessive, though at times, I would look up from a conversation during a gathering for the ducal staff, and see Matteo looking at me; he always flushed and averted his eyes.
Perhaps, as I grew older, I was a bit attracted to him, but given Bona’s stern religious instruction and my desire to cast off my parents’ sin, I had no interest in marriage or the pleasures of the flesh. The world was a fearsome, wicked place, and I lucky to be alive and under Bona’s pious wing; when I was twelve, I begged her to send me to a convent, but she would not. (I am grateful now she did not sent me to one, for I later learned that, when drunk, Galeazzo liked to pay nocturnal visits to the nunneries, in order to assert what he considered his ducal privilege upon the poor women there.) I vowed never to marry, but to remain celibate and serve none but God and Bona all my days. And so I paid no mind to Matteo’s fraternal attentions.
The duke, however, paid no mind to my vow. When I turned sixteen, he pressed Bona to find a husband for me—no matter that I had no dowry, so that a decent match was impossible. After some months, when the duke realized that she was intentionally delaying the matter, he announced that I was to marry the master of Bona’s stables, one Ridolfo, who had recently lost his wife. Ridolfo was gray-haired, potbellied, and profoundly uninterested in the arts. He understood only dogs and horses, and those none too well, for he had lost his front teeth to a stallion unappreciative of his constant lashes. His dogs despised him for similar cause; I had no doubt his late wife had been relieved to quit his company. Even before she died, Ridolfo always leered at me and the youngest women. Apparently the thought of tender virgin flesh made up for the lack of a dowry.
When I learned of the marriage, I wept and begged Bona to cancel the wedding or let me flee. She had enormous sympathy for my situation, but she could not disobey her husband. As my wedding day grew closer, I grew more frantic.
Then Matteo went to the duke and asked for my hand.
At the July wedding—a small affair in the ducal chapel, attended by Bona, her ladies, Cicco, and Matteo’s fellow scribes—my groom was too stunned by his own decision to meet my gaze. After the ceremony, he kissed me not on the lips, as was proper for man and wife, but upon the brow. At the small banquet in the ground-floor servants’ hall, his gaze was, for once, directed at everyone but me. He drank a bit more than his portion of wine that night, and I more than mine; clearly, the bride was not the only one to dread the wedding night.
We went to his chambers to find the bed strewn with rose petals; Bona’s maid Francesca helped me quickly to undress down to my chemise, while Matteo hid behind the open doors of his wardrobe and fumbled with his own clothing. Once Francesca had left, I climbed into the bed, drew the covers up, and waited for my naked husband to appear.
Matteo emerged minus his doublet but still dressed in his short chemise and leggings. He pointed to a fur rug in front of the cold hearth. “I will sleep there tonight,” he said, still without looking at me.
I stared at him in amazement. The thought of sexual congress had left me terrified, but the priest had pronounced us wed. We were, to my thinking, obliged to couple whether we wanted to or not. “Why do you not come to bed?”
“I . . .” His cheeks flamed. “Dea, I could not bear to see you forced into such a terrible marriage, to a cruel man far beneath your station. But I—”
“You do not love me,” I finished calmly. How had I so misinterpreted all those longing glances over so many years? “You are doing this out of kindness, of course.”
He drew a breath, squared his shoulders, and sat down beside me. Taking my hand, he finally looked into my eyes. “I love you more than anyone else in all the world, Dea,” he said fiercely. “And I vow to protect you from harm and care for you tenderly. I am your truest friend, but I can never be more than that. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” I said. “You don’t fancy women, then.”
He let go a short, unhappy laugh. “It’s not that at all. It’s . . . simply a very complicated situation. The time will come soon, though, when I can explain why things must be so. But for now, I ask you to trust me. And one more thing . . .”
I lifted an expectant brow.
“For your sake, and mine, we must pretend that we have consummated our marriage. It is the safest course. Could you do that, Dea, knowing that I love you and want only the best for you?”
His words and eyes radiated compassion; I imagined I heard honest anguish in his tone. Even so, my temper flared. He was lying about preferring women to men, I decided, because it was a mortal sin and one that, discovered, could lead to his disgrace and even death. Yet I was furious that he would not trust me with the truth. He had said we were true friends.
I dropped his hand, picked up the feather pillow beside me, and, with all my strength, struck him hard in the face with it. Then I flung myself down on the bed, turned my back to him, and lay there a few minutes before my indignation yielded to tears. Even now, I am not sure why I cried so abruptly and bitterly; I should have been relieved.
When he lay down beside me and put his arm around my shoulder, I did not pull away. We passed the whole night thus.
My pride was wounded, but I quickly recovered. After all, I now had something I had never known before: a family, even if it consisted only of Matteo. For the first time I truly belonged to someone else, and he belonged to me. And I did not, like all other women, crave children—in fact, I privately thought it cruel to bring a new soul into such a wicked world. I enjoyed Matteo’s company, and resolved to live contentedly with him without relations.
Resolutions are such feeble things.
I had expected to love him as I might a friend, a brother. I had not expected that he would be ever thoughtful of me, that he would daily do me small kindnesses, bring me small gifts, take joy in my delight. I had not expected that I would lie in his bed pretending to sleep while he worked late at the small trestle desk in his chambers; I had not expected the way the lamplight would paint his skin golden, would cause shadows to nestle in the hollows of his cheeks and throat, would spark glints of copper in his hair.
During the days he worked upstairs in the men’s wing with Cicco and the rest of the clerical staff while I spent the time with Bona. At night, he worked alone, in our chamber, on the most secret projects. I was proud that Cicco had entrusted the most delicate matters to him, even at the same time that I was annoyed that Cicco overworked him so. Matteo was discreet: he never discussed his work, nor left the papers out where I could see them. Sometimes he read; most of the time, he wrote and wrote. When he was finished, he gathered his papers together and quietly placed them in a compartment hidden in the wainscoting, which he locked; the key hung from a leather thong about his neck.
Once I passed by while he was working at his desk and failed to avert my gaze in time. I got a glimpse of cipher rendered in Matteo’s even hand. It was a beautiful creation, a tapestry of numbers and Latin letters and mathematical symbols, elegantly woven upon the page without space or punctuation. I tried to forget what I had seen, but that was impossible—like Matteo, I was good at keeping secrets, too. Only Bona, who had taught me my letters, knew the truth: that once I saw something in writing, in my native tongue or French or Latin, I could not forget it. Bona was scandalized that God should have given a woman such a useless gift; at her urging, I kept my talent to myself.
I hid it from Matteo, too, for it comforted me to have him there as I fell asleep; I did not want him to worry I might be too curious.
Not long after we were married, I woke one night to find the lamplight blue and sputtering, and Matteo still in his chair. He had put away his work and was sitting up very straight, his arms by his sides. His eyes were closed, his face utterly relaxed; the corners of his lips were faintly turned up in the most beatific of smiles. Dreaming, I thought, and I stirred, thinking to rise and lead him to bed, but the instant I moved, his eyes opened slowly. He had been full awake.
“I thought you were asleep,” I said, startled.
“I was just thinking,” he said, as if that were explanation enough. His eyes were extraordinarily bright and loving. “If you don’t mind, I would like to think for a bit longer.”
“Suit yourself.” I rolled back over, but I could not go back to sleep; I kept thinking of the look on his face.
In all dealings with me Matteo was patient, in all dealings kind. I saw his anger only once, one evening when his master Cicco kicked open our chamber door and hurled Matteo inside. As Matteo struck the floor full force, I yelped and ran to him. His upper lip was split and bleeding, his left eye swelling shut. I put my arms about his shoulders and pulled him up to sitting; trembling with rage, he pushed me away and tried to get to his feet, but Cicco moved quickly into the room and kicked him back down.
“Fool!” Cicco barked. He was forty years Matteo’s senior and gray-haired, but stout and tall as an oak. “Are you thinking to get yourself killed? Stay here and soak your head in cold water until you can think clearly!”
With that, Cicco turned and left, slamming the door behind him.
I fussed over Matteo and cleaned the blood away. His front tooth had been chipped on the outside edge, his upper lip was split at the same spot as his childhood scar, and the tender skin around his eye was badly bruised. I asked a gentle question as to the cause of the fight, but Matteo was too troubled to speak for hours. I suspected that he had probably seen a woman being dragged through the loggia, and tried to intervene. After all those years of working for the duke, he should have known better.
We did not speak that night; I helped him undress and turned down the covers for him, but he would not go to bed. Nor did he bring out his papers to work; instead, he sat at his desk and stared straight ahead at the wainscoting.
It was well after midnight when I woke to see the lamp still burning, and Matteo still in his chair. His eyes—the one swollen and an alarming shade of purple now—were closed, and his expression was, if not blissful, then at least serene.
“What do you do in that chair?” I asked softly.
He drew in a long breath and released it with a faintly shuddering sigh. “I try,” he said, “to see things as they really are.”
There was something surprisingly optimistic in his tone. Barefoot, I went to him and blew out the lamp, then led him to bed. He slept with his arm around my shoulder. We did not speak of the fight with Cicco again, but I watched day after day as the swelling of his upper lip gradually retreated, leaving behind a thicker scar.
The months of our marriage passed quickly. July left, and August came; at every feast day, every wedding, Matteo and I sat together and danced, beaming as newlyweds ought. We blushed at jokes about the conjugal relations we were surely enjoying, and answered questions about the possible arrival of children with smiles and shrugs.
I began to fall in love. I had not meant to; I had not believed that any man could be as kind as Bona, or as gentle, or as able to put my needs before his. I blamed Matteo for my feelings. I would not have come to love him so much had he not gazed on me so often with such genuine affection, and I saw, from close daily observation, that he did not favor men over women.
What, then, kept him from my arms?
By late August, I began to experiment with small signs of affection. When the entire court celebrated the end of summer with an outdoor picnic, I held his hand after the dances had ended, and led him to a pond on the edges of the duke’s hunting park. The moon was waxing fat and reflected in the dark, still water; I drew his attention upward, to the glittering diamond sky, and pointed at a cluster of stars.
And I shared with Matteo something I had never revealed to anyone. Somehow I knew that Matteo would understand.
“See those stars.” I pointed up at the sky. “And the wisps of clouds beside them. Together, they make an upside-down numeral four.”
Matteo noted them and looked sharply at me. “They do,” he said.
“It’s a man, do you see? He’s upside down—and his one leg is bent and crossed over the straight one, to make the four.”
“The hanged man,” he whispered. I could not read his tone.
“Well, perhaps,” I said, relaxing my focus and letting my imagination roam. “Perhaps, if one slipped a rope over his ankle and dangled him upside down, and he bent one knee . . . Matteo, that man is you.”
I looked back at him to see his reaction. I expected him to smile and think it was a fanciful little joke. But he was studying me with the same intensity he turned on his ciphers.
“What does it mean?” he asked.
I looked back at the hanged man, and was filled with sudden dread. Some very bad things were going to happen, but they would bring about great good. Good that Matteo would heartily approve of.
“Changes are coming,” I said truthfully. I could not bring myself to say that they would be unbearably hard.
It was a warm night, but the breeze stirred as I spoke. He shivered slightly, and composed himself.
“How often do you see these . . . signs, Dea?”
“They’re everywhere,” I answered, heartened by the fact that he did not scoff. “I just notice them at some times more than others. But they are always true.” I hesitated. “Bona would say this was from the Devil.”
“Bona would be wrong,” he said, more quickly than I think he wanted to, for he stopped himself and remained silent for a moment. “Have you mentioned this to anyone else?”
“No one. I hoped you might understand.”
“I do. And you should never, ever speak of this to Bona or anyone else.” He paused. “It’s not from the Devil. But some people think it is, and that makes it dangerous to discuss. People have been killed for less.”
“I’ll speak of it only to you.”
“I would appreciate that—if you see something you think I should know about.” His tone warmed. “You must be who you are, Dea, and must never stifle such a talent. But only you and I should know.”
I smiled, pleased that my husband and I shared a secret.
He glanced back up at the sky. I took advantage of the moment to reach up and press my hand to his warm cheek. He smiled down at me, but upon seeing the look in my eye, drew away, and went back to the others.
I was, however, not easily discouraged. In those days my chaste pecks upon waking and retiring began to stray from his cheek toward his lips. I remarked on the fine appearance he made, on my great good luck of having him for a husband, on my constant gratitude for his kindness. When he worked too long past midnight, I would go to him and set my cheek upon his shoulder and plead sweetly for him to join me in bed. I yearned for yet feared his touch.
In every case, I was rebuffed kindly, subtly: Matteo avoided my kisses by turning his face gently away, and slipped his hand from my grip when I held on too long. My compliments brought small, tenuous smiles and averted gazes. In the first few days of November, as Matteo settled at his desk, while I, in my nightgown, stoked the fire, I asked over my shoulder:
“Would it be so horrible, then, if we were to truly live as man and wife?”
His long silence served as answer. I looked back at the flames, humiliated and struggling to hide my tears.
After a time, he said softly, “I love you, Dea. But never in that way.” He paused. “I’ll be leaving in a few days for Rome. Cicco has asked me to go on the duke’s behalf. Perhaps when I return, I’ll be able to explain things. Perhaps later we could go together to Florence, to meet some of my friends there.”
“Florence!” I whispered harshly. “What has Florence to do with anything?”
His expression grew sorrowful; after a long moment, he said, “If you understood, you would not be angry. Please, Dea, trust me for a little while longer.”
I answered nothing, but took a few more savage thrusts at the fire with the poker, then went to bed sulking. Eventually, I tired of my self-pity and fell asleep.
Some hours later I woke in the dead of night. The room was black; the single window was shuttered and Matteo had put out the lamp, but he did not lie beside me. Instead, he trod with bare feet slowly, lightly, over the carpet and the stone, gesturing with his arms in the darkness. As my eyes grew accustomed to the lack of light, I saw him pause in front of the south wall and make a complicated, sweeping gesture, and heard the faintest of murmurs—softer than a whisper, yet oddly authoritative—issue from his lips. After this, he made a quarter-turn to face west, and again gestured; by the time he faced the north wall, I surmised that he was drawing stars in the air, and connecting them with a circle.
The realization pricked the hairs on the back of my neck: Stars and circles belonged to the realm of magic, and Bona had drilled into me that such things were of the Devil. Yet only half of me took fright; the other half was keenly interested, and even comforted, for Matteo’s circle enclosed the entire room, including the bed where I lay. Like him, I was sheltered from whatever evil lurked beyond the perimeter.
In the darkness, my husband summoned no demons, invoked no dead. Instead, he stood in the circle’s center, at the foot of our bed, and spread his arms, his face turned toward the invisible sky. He was, I decided, praying.
The next morning I did not speak of it to him; nor did I mention it over the next few days, though he continued nightly to draw the stars. As he packed for his Roman journey, he grew increasingly pensive; I felt at times that he was on the verge of telling me a great secret, but something held him back.
Morning and evening, I prayed at Bona’s side in the chapel: Let Matteo’s acts be good, not evil. Let him love me. Keep him safe.
He departed for Rome on a chill November dawn. He would not let me go with him to the stables, even though it was early and Bona would not expect me for an hour. Instead, he turned, dressed in his heavy woolen cloak and cap, and stopped as I tried to follow him out the door of our chamber.
“Dea,” he said. “Let me take my leave now, and quickly.” To my surprise, he clasped both my hands very tightly, and studied my face as if he thought to find something unexpected there; his eyes were so bright, so filled with affection that I thought he was about to kiss me full on the lips.
“Quickly,” I agreed. “I don’t care for good-byes.” I closed my eyes and leaned in, eager for the kiss.
It did not come. He let go of my hands abruptly, and when I opened my eyes, he was reaching for something around his neck. He pulled it over his head and handed it to me; I stared at it for an instant as it dangled from his long fingers.
A tiny black key, strung upon a leather thong. I stared at it in surprise.
“Use it,” he said, “in case of emergency.”
“For the compartment in the wall,” I said, disbelieving, “where you keep your papers.”
He nodded.
“Why do you not just give it to Cicco?”
“Because those papers are not for Cicco,” he said, in a way that awakened gooseflesh on my arms. “Or for anyone else but you, and then only in an emergency.”
“There will be no emergency,” I warned him sternly as I took the key and hung it round my own neck. His statement provoked a thousand anxious questions: If you haven’t been working for Cicco, then who? Why? What sort of papers are these? But I asked none of them; he was standing in his cloak in the doorway, ready to leave. “I’ll return this to you when you come home.” At Christmas, I almost added, and realized how very long he would be gone.
“Dea,” he said softly, and tried to take my hands again; I threw my arms around him and hugged him. This time, my embrace was fully returned. “My Dea,” he repeated, then drew back and gave me that pure, loving smile. “God keep you.”
“And you,” I said, struggling to keep my composure. “Oh, Matteo, be careful!” I wanted to say Don’t go to Rome! I felt that if I dared let go, Matteo would slip from my grasp forever.
He leaned down and gave me a solemn, fraternal kiss upon the lips, then said, “You will see me again, Dea.”
“Of course,” I said, and he turned and was gone.
The whole time Matteo was away, I slept on the little cot near Bona’s feet, where I had always slept in the years before my marriage. Without Matteo, his chamber seemed forlorn and empty; I could not sleep in his bed alone. I did not linger long; Bona would be waiting for me that morning, and there were countless preparations left before the annual Christmas trek to Milan.
Even so, I paused before leaving, and prodded the fire one last time, making sure that the smoke drew properly. As I stared down into the golden flames, I saw the chance design made by the smaller limbs I had heaped upon the logs: an upside-down four. The hanged man.
Chapter Three
Bona was surprisingly cheerful that morning. Normally, her husband’s violent infidelities would have left her shaken and sorrowful for a few days, but the instant I arrived in her chamber, she informed me that Duke Galeazzo had yielded to her request that she be allowed to honor his “secret guest” with a luncheon. The duke was reluctant, but, apparently, Lorenzo was eager to make amends for “startling the ladies in the chapel.”
It was to be an intimate event. Situated in a corner tower, Galeazzo’s private dining chamber had an unusually high vaulted ceiling; the stone floors were covered in Persian carpets in shades of scarlet, pine, and gold to mute the echoing tread of servants and the clatter of goblets and plates. Two arched windows faced north and east; these were shuttered that morning to keep out prying eyes and the bitter cold, and the great hearth contained such a fierce crackling blaze that I began to sweat the instant I entered the room. A pair of large tapestries covered the walls on either side of the eastern window, and the bare walls had been painted with trellises of flowers. But what was most remarkable, to my mind, were the eight long oval mirrors—four hung on the wall behind the table, four on the wall in front—that allowed the duke to see his reflection’s reflection, as well as those of everyone in front of or behind him. These, combined with his four tasters—who sampled everything before it appeared on Galeazzo’s plate or in his cup—gave him some measure of comfort, for even he realized that he had earned many enemies.
Lorenzo was waiting when we women arrived, an hour before midday. He wore a great smile that emphasized his jutting lower jaw by revealing his bottom row of teeth, yet it somehow served to ease his ugliness. That morning, he was unaccompanied and dressed in a plain, long tunic of gray wool. He wore no jewelry, nor had his straight locks felt the kiss of a curling iron. Yet when Bona’s arrival was announced, he bowed and kissed her extended hand with a seasoned courtier’s finesse; though he presented himself as a commoner, his confidence and self-possession marked him as an equal. Caterina, too, was announced and received a similar reception. I entered silently, to no fanfare, and expected no greeting, but Lorenzo bowed deeply to me, and when I responded with a curtsy, said warmly, “Dea, isn’t it? The wife of Matteo da Prato?”
“I am,” I said, blushing. I was unaccustomed to being acknowledged by anyone save Bona.
“I am an acquaintance of your husband’s,” he said. “I have known him for many years. It was I, in fact, who recommended him to the duke for employment.”
Tongue-tied in the face of his composure and charm, I had no response.
Duke Galeazzo was late, requiring Bona and Lorenzo to engage in small talk for half an hour. Galeazzo’s secretary and right-hand man, the thick-necked, burly Cicco Simonetta, arrived first. With his peasant’s hair—long on top, cropped sharply above his oddly small ears—and round, heavy face, Cicco could easily have been mistaken for an ignorant bumpkin were it not for his fine dress and the shrewdness in his eyes. The duke kept no secrets from Cicco, who greeted Lorenzo with no smile and much reticence.
After the silent appearance of three sullen, armed bodyguards, and the emergence of attendants and the ducal cupbearer from the kitchen, Galeazzo arrived—without the usual blare of trumpets, given that Lorenzo’s arrival was to be known by as few residents of Castle Pavia as possible. The duke’s pride, however, required that his entry be accompanied by the sung praises of one of the castrated tenors who had entertained us in Bona’s chamber the day before.
A month shy of his thirty-third birthday, Galeazzo Maria was in his prime. Like all the Sforza, he was sturdy, muscular, and passionately devoted to sport. His tunic, of gray-green watered silk embroidered with bronze fleur-de-lis, with white ermine trim at the collar, was tailored to show off a powerful chest and shoulders. His cap of light reddish brown hair was cut in layers, long enough to cover his ears but too short to touch his collar; as was the fashion, carefully crimped curls framed his face. The latter was dominated by a strong nose, so badly broken in his youth that the bridge had a large bump. His green eyes were deep set, round, and ringed by shadows, his lips thin and permanently pursed in an arrogant sneer.
This was the man who had ordered one of his enemies to be nailed to his coffin before being buried alive; who had, instead of showing generosity to a starving peasant who dared catch a hare in the hunting park, killed him by forcing him to swallow the unskinned animal whole; and who had, in a spasm of jealousy, chopped off the hands of a courtier who had caressed one of Galeazzo’s former lovers. The duke had been born not to heartless parents but to a brave warrior, Francesco Sforza, and a proud, strong-willed but charitable woman, Bianca Maria Visconti, daughter of the Duke of Milan. His parents were much loved, and as their eldest son grew to maturity, they were perplexed by his arrogance and cruelty. When his father died and Galeazzo claimed the duchy, he resisted his mother’s advice; she died of a mysterious fever—or poison, some say, on the order of her own son.
As the singer’s voice faded, Galeazzo glared at his wife and jerked his chin in my direction. “What is she doing here? I wanted as few people as possible to know of this!”
I stared intently at the carpet while Bona stammered.
Lorenzo interjected smoothly, “It is on my account, Your Grace; do you recall? I disturbed the three of them at prayer yesterday, and wished to make my apologies to each one today.”
Galeazzo frowned; the weather had kept him from the hunt, which added to his usual irritability. I feared he would lose his temper at the subtle reference to yesterday’s incident with the screaming young woman. The sight of Lorenzo, however, distracted him enough so that he gave a small, tight smile.
“Good Lorenzo! How do you fare?”
“Well, Your Grace,” Lorenzo replied, “especially when I am surrounded by such lovely women.” He gestured at us three.
Galeazzo’s smile widened at the compliment. “She is beautiful, is she not?” he asked proudly, and went to take his daughter Caterina’s hand. He kissed her on the lips, after which Caterina curtsied and shot the rest of us a gloating glance.
The duke moved to Lorenzo next. The two clasped hands and slapped each other upon the shoulder with more affection than I had ever seen the duke show his brothers. Milan and Florence were solid allies; Lorenzo’s grandfather, Cosimo, had supported Galeazzo’s father’s claim to the duchy of Milan.
Questioning Lorenzo about his journey from more temperate Florence through the freezing weather, the duke passed by his wife with a careless nod, and took no further notice of me. As he moved toward the massive ebony table—carved, at the top of each leg, with the symbol of the Sforza, of a dragon-headed serpent swallowing a naked child—a servant scrambled to pull out the tallest chair for him. He settled against the red leather padding and snapped his fingers; instantly, his cupbearer leaned forward and set an amethyst-studded golden goblet into the duke’s waiting hand. Galeazzo told each of us where to sit: Lorenzo on his right, the silent, stolid Cicco on his left. Bona sat directly across from her husband; Caterina sat to her left, facing Lorenzo, while I sat on Bona’s right.
A pair of servants hurried to light the tapers in two heavy candelabra upon the table; Galeazzo turned to one of them. “Bring the wine now, and the food; besides, I’m hungry, and Lorenzo cannot tarry.” He looked back at Bona. “Once we have eaten, you women must depart; we men have private business to discuss.”
“Then with your leave, Your Grace,” Lorenzo said, “I should like to present Her Grace the Lady Bona with a gift, for her hospitality, with hopes that it will ease some of the difficulties I have caused her.”
If Galeazzo was angered or insulted by Lorenzo’s second veiled reference to the violated woman, he did not show it. He nodded, faintly bored, and watched as Lorenzo reached into the pocket of his tunic and produced a box of red velvet studded with tiny diamonds.
“For you, Your Grace,” he said to Bona, and smiling, rose slightly in order to hand it to her across the table. “I pray this humble gift pleases you.”
Bona forgot her embarrassment and beamed. “Your Magnificence,” she said, “dear Lorenzo, no guest of mine has ever been more welcome . . . or more gracious.” She took it from him and held the box so that the gold embroidery and the diamonds glittered in the candlelight. “How very handsome.”
“Look inside, Your Grace,” Lorenzo prompted.
Carefully, the duchess opened the lid. Inside, tied together with a silk ribbon, was a thick rectangular object, slightly longer and broader than Bona’s hand; she lifted it out of the box, revealing a deck of cards made of thick parchment coated with white gesso and painted.
She did her best to mask her response, but I knew that she did not approve of playing cards. She forced a smile as she undid the ribbon. I stared with her at the backs, prettily illustrated with flowers and vases, and bordered by angels.
“They’re lovely,” she said to Lorenzo. “Thank you.”
“Turn it over,” Caterina said impatiently.
She did, and like Caterina, let go a slight gasp of amazement at the sight.
The front side of the card was covered in gold leaf, which had been painstakingly etched with numerous fine geometric designs; the texture made the bright gold flash with reflected light. Upon this dazzling backdrop was painted the image of a pauper, a young, wide-eyed man barefoot and dressed in tatters, with a walking stick resting against one shoulder. He stood on the very edge of a dark chasm; emerald and sapphire hills sprawled out behind him.
Bona began to set the cards out in front of her, one by one. “But these are beautiful,” she breathed.
“I know of your love for illustrated manuscripts,” Lorenzo explained. “I had hoped that these might please you. That one is the first in the deck; he is called the Fool.”
Galeazzo let go a laugh. “I know of these!” he said. “These are triumph cards. Oh, I will dazzle my companions with these!” He lowered his voice and winked slyly at Lorenzo. “Yet another way for me to lose money at the gambling table!”
The duchess tensed; Lorenzo saw, and said diplomatically to Galeazzo, “It’s true, my lord, that these are triumph cards. Yet this deck is special. Some would prefer to use it for more serious pursuits.”
Galeazzo scowled in puzzlement. “Such as?”
“Seeing the future.”
The duke lifted a brow and peered down at the cards with renewed interest. “Really?”
Beneath the table, Bona clenched one fist; only I could see, and only I knew that she wanted to cross herself out of fear. “These are devilish,” she whispered, so faintly that I was surprised that Lorenzo heard.
“Far from it, Your Grace,” he told her. “They reveal what God wishes us to see of the future, that he may deal more directly with our souls. Yet they could, I suppose, be misused by those with evil in their hearts.”
He said more, but I did not hear it, for Bona had just turned over the twelfth card. I found myself staring down at the image of a man suspended upside down from a rope bound to his ankle. His hands were hid, helpless, behind his back, and his unbound leg was bent at the knee and crossed behind the other, to form an upside-down numeral four.
I was too riveted to stop myself from reaching for the card, from taking it and holding it before my eyes. At the time, I could not see the painting on the card of a man with golden curls; instead I saw Matteo, with his dark auburn hair falling straight beneath his head. On the card, the man’s eyes were dark and open, but I saw only Matteo’s eyes, shut, his features white and deathly still. Matteo, limp and dying . . .
It was the image I had read in the stars, in the fire. Despite the blazing hearth, I grew cold. Matteo was in danger of dying, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.
“Dea,” Bona said sharply in my ear, and snatched the card from my grasp. I looked up and realized that the others had been speaking for some time; I had been somewhere else entirely. In the interim, the soup had magically arrived; a plate sat steaming in front of me.
Lorenzo was studying me intently. “Madonna Dea,” he asked softly, “what do you see?”
“My husband,” I murmured, stricken.
He reached across the table and set a long, tapered finger down, pointing to the card. “This is called the Hanged Man. Yet you can see, he does not struggle.” Surrender to evil forces, I imagined him saying, though he uttered not another word, with the intent of sacrifice.
“Does she see things in the cards?” the duke called gaily over Lorenzo. “Can she tell our future, then?” Ignoring Bona’s tense expression, Galeazzo pointed at me. “Gather them up,” he directed. “Mix them, and choose our futures.” He chuckled. “No gambling, so long as the ladies are here.”
Bona had stiffened in her chair, but she handed me the deck; Caterina’s eyes were gleaming with curiosity and amusement at her and my discomfort. Galeazzo snapped his fingers again, and with a gesture, bade a servant clear away my plate.
The cards were overlarge, unwieldy, stiff from the gesso plaster. I had expected them to be cool to the touch, yet they were warm in my hands, as if they were living things. I stared down at the table’s ebony surface, polished to a reflective sheen, and felt the present melt away.
I set them down and fanned them out facedown upon the ebony. They were too stiff to be shuffled, so I moved them about, again and again, until it was impossible to identify the cards that Bona had turned over earlier. When I was satisfied, I gathered them together and fanned them out again, and said to Galeazzo, “Your Grace, choose one card.”
He shot an excited glance at Lorenzo and grinned, then indicated his choice by pointing. I took the card and pushed it slightly toward him but decided that it was not yet time to reveal it.
“Now His Magnificence,” the duke said.
Lorenzo’s smile was encouraging as he met my gaze. It was unsettling to encounter a stranger who was exposing my ability to recognize portents, yet I trusted him. He reached out and tapped the wood near his chosen card.
I pushed it from the deck toward him. Cicco, as always carefully appraising the others without revealing his own feelings, accepted a card without comment.
“Would it please Your Grace for the ladies each to have one, as well?” Lorenzo asked with consummate politeness.
Galeazzo gave a loud sniff of impatience, but nodded to me. I shifted in my chair toward Bona, but the duchess gently shook her head.
“The cards are exquisite,” she said sweetly, “and I shall treasure them always, just as I shall treasure my friendship with the magnificent Lorenzo. But I am content to wait upon God to reveal the future in His own good time.”
Galeazzo scowled at her and clicked his tongue. “Come now, don’t spoil our fun!” His temper was rising, and he would have lashed out at his wife had Caterina not interrupted.
“One for me then! One for me!”
Lorenzo said cheerfully, “It seems, Your Grace, that the young lady does not wish to be kept waiting.”
The duke sighed, yielding, and gestured for me to give his impatient daughter a card. I set it down and pushed it in Caterina’s direction. Rather than wait for the others, she reached out and turned her card over immediately. As she stared down at it, her expression soured. “But it is only the Fool! I want another!”
Lorenzo looked to me before saying, very softly, “It can be a good card, Madonna Caterina. You might not want to dismiss it.”
I studied it. The Fool’s eyes were fearless and innocent, his posture unguarded. He was on the verge of a long and tumultuous experience, ignorant as a child of the perils awaiting him. He might well decide to turn and head for the serene mountains behind him, in which case, he could reach the highest pinnacle—or he could just as well take a single step forward and fall into the dark, yawning chasm.
“A long journey awaits you,” I said. Caterina leaned past Bona, the better to see and hear me. Expression avid, the girl propped an elbow on the table and rested her chin upon her hand; the long golden curls framing her face spilled forward and caught the light. “The most important journey of your life,” I continued. “Be cautious and reflective, lest you fall into danger.”
She drew back, mollified. Aware that Lorenzo’s eyes were on me, I did not wait for his prompting, but drew one last card, for myself, and set it aside.
Galeazzo was intrigued and once again smiling. “Let us go in ascending order now. Her card first”—he indicated me—“and then yours, Lorenzo, and Cicco’s, and last of all, mine.”
I turned over my card, and fell into the image, scarcely hearing Bona’s soft, shocked inhalation.
I saw a woman dressed in flowing golden robes and cape and seated upon a throne. She wore a nun’s white wimple, and upon her head, unmistakably, rested the triple crown of the papal tiara; in one hand, she held a holy book, in the other, a long staff atop which rested a large gold cross.
She was a female pope, a papess—a scandalous image, yet I was not in the least appalled. I trusted her, with the same unreasoning certainty I trusted Lorenzo. I stared at the landscape around her, seeking clues as to where I might find her; a green, carefully tended orchard lay in the distance behind her.
I must have stared for some time, but my reverie was interrupted by a sharp pain in my shin as Caterina kicked me beneath the table.
“She is . . .” I began, and searched desperately for a word that would not offend Bona; papess was out of the question, as was priestess. Finally I said, “The Abbess. She holds much wise spiritual advice.”
Lorenzo’s card was the male version of mine—a white-haired, bearded man wearing the gold papal crown, with a gold cross atop his staff. But the card had been accidentally turned upside down, and at the sight of it, I felt a thrill of fear.
Lorenzo’s homely face grew solemn as he gazed upon it. “The pope, ill-dignified,” he said.
I stared back at it, too, and saw a thousand fleeting things, too numerous to give voice to: an old, vengeful man weeping over a dead son, the swirl of frankincense, the glint of a blade, a spray of blood, an oddly familiar voice sighing, Lorenzo . . . My fear must have been visible, for when I looked up again, the women were wide-eyed and silent, and Galeazzo, though frowning, was chastened.
I struggled to put all that I had seen into words. “There is vengeance here,” I said, “and sorrow, and great treachery. You must take care, or there will be blood.”
Bona crossed herself; the duke and Lorenzo shared a troubled, knowing glance. “I know how to deal with the matter now,” Lorenzo said, his tone firmly optimistic; I felt his words were not so much true as intended to comfort Duke Galeazzo. “I will take care. Thank you, Madonna Dea.”
“All this seriousness!” Galeazzo scolded. “Here now, this was meant as lighthearted entertainment.” He gazed sternly at me. “Read Cicco’s card now, and see to it that it doesn’t spoil our luncheon!” He nudged Lorenzo playfully as he addressed me. “Speak to us now of song and sport and love!”
I murmured an apology and turned over Cicco’s card. Ten glittering golden coins rested against a white backdrop decorated with flowers; I sighed with relief. “You will come into a good sum of money,” I told him.
Cicco gave the slightest of smiles and nodded; the duke grinned, pleased.
“That’s because I pay him too well!” Galeazzo quipped. “Now, let’s see if I am luckier than my secretary!”
I turned over the duke’s card. Like Lorenzo’s, it was upside down. Upon a throne, a crowned king sat in full gilded armor. In his left hand was a gilded shield, in his right, a long sword with a wicked sharp point. His hair appeared golden on the card, but my internal eye recognized a dark-haired man, a courtier wild with outrage, who had waved his sword at Lorenzo de’ Medici.
I felt a welling of dark satisfaction. “Here is justice at last,” I said.
The duke frowned. “Regarding which matter?”
I shook off the pull of the card and kept my wits. I wanted desperately to see what action this king of swords would take, and whether that action would succeed; I hoped that vengeance was coming at last to His Grace, but feared warning him. I did not want him to be able to protect himself.
And so I pretended to study the card further, then said, in as casual a tone as I could muster, “There is business that soon will be concluded, though not to His Grace’s favor, unless he take exceptional care.”
“Which business?” he persisted. The appearance of another negative symbol had awakened his ire; if I answered in a manner that displeased him, we would all pay.
I replied smoothly, “Political. I will speak no more of it, for I believe it concerns a secret matter. I have confidence that, should his Grace ponder the card, he will come to a clever solution to avoid the difficulty.”
He nodded, feigning understanding, and studied the card thoughtfully until Caterina, her blue eyes narrowed with curiosity, said to me, “So it’s true . . . your mother was a witch!”
I looked up sharply. Beside me, Bona turned to Caterina and hissed: “Mind your tongue!”
I had spent the past nine years of my life with Bona and had never heard her criticize Caterina, much less scold her in anger. Nor had the duke, who leaned across the table to give his wife a look that threatened imminent physical violence.
“Caterina jests,” Galeazzo said witheringly. And to prove it, he laughed, but when by accident I caught his eye, I saw the fear in it.
An hour before dusk I made my way down to Matteo’s chamber, ostensibly to rekindle the fire. In truth, I wanted to be alone so that I could cry. Since the appearance of the Hanged Man, I had been increasingly worried about Matteo. Bona had said that he would come today, but Bona was wrong; the triumph card had merely confirmed my feeling that something terrible had happened.
My mood had not been helped by Bona’s reaction to the deck—or, more to the point, her reaction to my reaction. After bidding Lorenzo a warm farewell, the duchess had returned to her chambers in uncharacteristic silence, clutching the red velvet box containing the cards. Upon arriving in her quarters, Bona had given it to one of the chambermaids, with instructions to “hide it well, where I will not soon set eyes upon it again.” Caterina, too, was unusually quiet, though her eyes were adance with amusement at the duchess’s and my discomfort.
I confess, I paid close attention when the chambermaid moved toward a trunk set in a corner near the duchess’s bed, opened it, and slipped the box beneath a fur throw.
While Bona retreated to her wardrobe to change into less restrictive attire, I moved to the front of the chamber to gaze anxiously out the window overlooking the duke’s hunting park. Caterina followed, and when I was certain the duchess was thoroughly distracted, I asked the girl, “Madonna, why did you say that? About my mother being a witch?”
“You should have seen your eyes,” Caterina hissed, widening her own until the whites showed ghoulishly. “There were times, I swear, when you had no idea where you were . . . you were carried off by visions!”
Impatient, I pressed: “What has this to do with my mother, Madonna? You speak as though you’ve heard rumors.”
“I have,” she said coyly.
“From whom?”
“From Nonna Beatrice,” she replied. Nonna had been Bona’s girlhood nurse and had accompanied the duchess from Savoy when the latter had married Galeazzo; Nonna had died the previous year. “She said your mother was a witch and saw the future.”
I controlled the urge to shake the duke’s favorite daughter by her shoulders. “What else did she say about her? What else?”
Caterina shrugged; her shell pink lips curved upward in delight at my agitation. “Just that.”
Nothing I said could force her to say more. Shortly afterward the duchess joined us, with the curt remark: “No good ever came of fortune-telling.”
With that, Bona dismissed the subject completely and ignored all of Caterina’s attempts to revive it. I spent the rest of the day marking the movement of the sun and struggling to suppress my growing dread. When dusk came, Bona dismissed me. While she was undressing and the chambermaids distracted, I did an unthinkable, inexplicable thing: I went to the trunk, slipped my hand beneath the fur throw, and made off with the diamond-littered velvet box. I wrapped my shawl tightly around me, tucking the hand that held the box beneath it, around my waist, and headed down to the first-floor loggia, bound for Matteo’s apartment.
Lorenzo was there, leaving one of the guest quarters with his two gentlemen; the three of them wore cloaks and caps and riding gloves, and carried saddlebags. My hand was on the door when Lorenzo caught sight of me and waved.
“Madonna,” he called, and handed his saddlebag to one of the men, then gestured to both of them to go on to the stables ahead of him. It was an odd hour, I thought, to be setting out for distant Florence.
“A word with you,” he said as he approached. But the loggia was crowded with servants headed wearily back to their quarters; a pair of Cicco’s apprentice clerks brushed past us, laughing and joking. Lorenzo looked pointedly at the door handle to Matteo’s room. “Might it be a private word, Madonna Dea?”
I dropped my gaze. He was a man in his late twenties—homely, to be sure, but with an accomplished swordsman’s shoulders—and I a young woman. His request was faintly inappropriate, but his manner held no whiff of impropriety. He was also unquestionably my better, so I unlocked the door and gestured for His Magnificence to enter. As I did so, I could not help but reveal the velvet box in my hand; he marked it without comment, and I offered no explanation.
Inside, the fire was reduced to glowing embers, but the hearthstones still gave off a good deal of warmth. I stood near the door, the box still in my hand.
Lorenzo removed neither cloak nor glove; his expression was as darkly serious as I had ever seen it. “Forgive my brazen request, Madonna,” he began. “I intend nothing improper. But I did not wish to be overheard.” He paused. “As I said, I know your husband well. It was my understanding that he was to have arrived home yesterday.”
“Yes,” I said, embarrassed that my voice betrayed all my repressed tears. I expected him to reassure me then, to say something comforting, but Lorenzo was, apparently, no liar. Or perhaps, like me, he had recognized the danger in the Hanged Man.
“I am sorry for that,” he said softly, “and for your worry. I had hoped for a word with him in private. But I can tarry no longer, as my wife and children will never forgive me if I’m not home by Christmas.” He studied me for a long moment. “I can trust you to deliver a message for his ears alone, can’t I, Madonna?”
“Of course,” I answered, and he smiled faintly at my indignant tone.
“If Matteo returns before tomorrow evening, would you tell him that I have taken the route to the north, and will await him at the lodge? He knows which one.”
I lifted my brows in surprise at the direction; Florence lay well to the south of Pavia and Milan. “I will be sure to tell him, Your Magnificence.”
“Lorenzo,” he admonished me cheerfully, then grew serious again; his gaze strayed to the velvet box in my hand. “God gave you a gift, Madonna Dea, one best practiced with discretion, and shown to few. I am glad to see your interest in it. It is not my place to give such a new acquaintance advice, but—”
“I should like to hear it,” I interrupted bluntly.
“The duchess and others mean well, but . . . Do not let them keep you from it. Such a gift was meant to be used. Remember the parable of the servant and the talents.”
“I will,” I said.
“Good. Then God keep you, Madonna Dea, until we meet again.”
“And you,” I responded.
As I watched him slip out the door, I felt a sudden conviction that our next encounter would come too soon.
Chapter Four
I spent that evening staring at the gilded illustrations on the cards. At times, the images evoked something very like recognition in me, so much so that for long moments, I was able to forget my worry. When exhaustion overwhelmed me, I stacked the cards neatly and returned them to the box, which I hid in the trunk at the foot of the bed.
I slept poorly that night, pulled from sleep again and again by the clatter of frozen rain pelting Bona’s window. By dawn, the storm had passed, leaving the glass coated with a wavy layer of ice; even though the window stayed closed and shuttered, the groaning of the trees was audible, and the occasional ear-splitting crack of a breaking limb made me start. By midday, all clouds had cleared, and the sun gained strength. The ice on Bona’s window began to melt, revealing the hunting park beyond, glazed and glittering like a jewel.
On the sixth day before Christmas, all at Castle Pavia were filled with festive cheer as preparations for the procession to Milan intensified; even Bona had forgotten her distress over the incident with the young woman and my reaction to the triumph cards. The season inclined Bona to be even more generous than usual. She feted her servants and courtiers in the great dining room, setting out the Milanese sweet bread called panneton, cheese, and good wine. I had no taste for any of it. When the duchess kindly released me in the early afternoon to do as I wished, I went to light the fire in Matteo’s quarters, then climbed the southwest tower steps and stood staring out toward Rome for hours.
They came at dusk, galloping across the Lombard plain: a solitary horse and rider, black against the graying sweep of snow and ice and sky. I let go a cry of infinite relief; my breath clouded the glass, and I wiped it away, compelled and squinting as I struggled to recognize the rider.
At last he reached the moat, reined in his horse, and shouted for the castellan to lower the drawbridge. Only then did I see the body slung over the saddle; I gasped and pressed my fingertips to the freezing glass.
Somehow I calmed myself, gathered my skirts, and hurried down the stairs. I ran outside, across the cold, endless courtyard to the main gate just as the horse’s hooves struck a last, hollow thud against the wooden bridge and passed, ringing, onto the cobblestones inside the gate.
I ran to Matteo, his belly pressed against the saddle, his long legs hanging down one flank of the lathered steed, his head and torso down the other, his arms horribly limp and dangling. He would have slipped easily to the ground had the rider not held him firmly in place.
I cried out, thinking he was dead, but when the rider dismounted and helped him slide into my arms, he groaned.
I do not remember the rider carrying him to his bed or shouting for the doctor. Others ran to help, but I do not remember them at all. Of the breathless moments before the doctor came, I recall fragments: Matteo’s hazel eyes, the whites now red, sparkling, utterly lost; Matteo’s brow and cheeks, an ugly mottled violet; his skin slick and glistening; Matteo’s limbs, spasming as cramps seized his gut. I held his head as he retched yellow-green vomit streaked with bright blood. I wiped his sunken face with a cold cloth that appeared magically in my hand and called his name, but he did not know me.
If I had to lose him, if he had to die, why did he not die as the Hanged Man, limp, peaceful, resigned? Why did he have to suffer horribly? God is merciful, Bona said, and just, but there was no mercy, no justice in Matteo’s dying, only the most savage cruelty.
Plague, someone whispered, and crossed himself, but it was not plague. Bona’s physician appeared with leeches and a bitter draught, but Matteo vomited up what little he was able to swallow, and his limbs convulsed so violently at times that he crushed many of the leeches and the doctor removed the rest for fear of losing them.
Fever, the doctor said, but it was like no fever I had ever seen. Matteo’s master Cicco came, his huge bulk huddled, his tiny eyes wide, his rounded features slack with fright; Matteo did not know him, either, and he did not stay long. Bona came and said that I must rest—a ridiculous suggestion, I thought, for I had no idea then that it was nearly dawn—and that she would sit with Matteo. I sent her away. I sent the doctor away. I sent the hovering rider away, until my husband and I were alone.
As the morning light filtered through the open shutters, Matteo’s thrashing eased at last, and I closed them, hoping he might sleep. Amazingly, the hearth was still crackling; someone must have stoked it. As I turned to where my husband lay, his long, naked torso and limbs motionless against the dark soaked sheets, I heard a rasping croak.
“Lorenzo.”
I moved swiftly to the chair by the bedside and put my cool hand to his cheek. His eyes were frighteningly dull; the purple flush had faded from his cheeks, now ashen.
“Lorenzo has gone back to Florence,” I said. There was no point in mentioning Lorenzo’s diversion to the north in hopes of a secret rendezvous. His Magnificence was already well on his way home. “You must not worry about him now.”
His eyelids fluttered. “Dea,” he gasped. His voice was so hoarse as to be unrecognizable; his throat must have been terribly sore.
I pressed my knuckles to my lips. “Oh, Matteo. Matteo, my poor darling . . .”
“I am dying,” he whispered, and I felt as though I would melt—my blood, my bones, my flesh—and only the blinding pain in my throat and chest would remain.
“I won’t let you,” I sobbed, but he gestured desperately, impatiently with his right hand. He was so weak that I had to fall silent to hear him.
“My quill,” he said.
I ran to his desk, retrieved the quill, and lifted the inkpot from its place, my hands shaking, clumsy. I fetched a piece of parchment along with his little lap desk, and propped him up against the pillows.
Once situated, he tried to dip the nib into the inkpot I held for him, but tremors plagued him; he dropped the quill. He squeezed his eyes shut and let go a moan of frustration, then gathered himself and looked back at me. His lips were dove gray and trembling.
“Swear,” he whispered.
“Anything,” I said. “Anything for you.”
It pained him to speak; sweat dripped from his forehead as he formed the words. “On your life,” he gasped. “Take me to San Marco. And my papers . . . Read them in secret. Tell Lorenzo: Romulus and the Wolf mean to destroy you.”
He fell abruptly silent.
“I swear,” I said.
As I spoke, his body stiffened, and he let go a terrible strangled sound and lost control of his bowels. For several seconds, he lay thus—stiff and trembling—and then his arms and legs began to thrash. I cried his name and tried to hold him down, lest he harm himself, but I was not strong enough.
In the end, he fell still; his eyes closed, and his breathing grew harsh. Half an hour later, it stopped, and his eyes slowly opened; I looked in them and knew that he was dead.
I stripped the soiled sheets and set them outside, and used the basin of water someone had left behind to wash my husband. When he was clean, I dressed him in his finest tunic and leggings, then lay down beside him and held him until someone knocked upon the door.
I did not answer, but I had forgotten to throw the bolt and Bona entered. She tried to coax me away; I would not hear, would not leave Matteo. She left, and when she came again, she brought others, including Cicco, his foolish hair disheveled from sleep. The lumbering bear of a man, normally stoic, burst out weeping at the sight of Matteo, his star pupil. He tried gently to pull me from my husband, but again, I would not go; he had to recruit a second man. I clawed and kicked, to no avail; they caught my arms and tore me from my beloved.
I screamed, I thrashed; the sobbing Cicco held me lest I hurt myself. When I finally grew tired and had to sit, Bona convinced me to take a sip of strangely bitter wine. She had brought her priest, Father Piero, and after I had fallen into a strange state between sleep and waking, Father Piero told me, “You must accept this. We are human and frail, and do not understand as yet, but it is God’s will.”
“God is a murderer,” I said listlessly, “and a liar. He bids us pray, yet will not hear us. He sets evil men over us, and takes no pity on their victims.”
“Dea,” Bona chided, aghast. “God have mercy on you!” She crossed herself, covered her eyes with her hands, and wept.
I turned calmly to her. “When did He hear us? When did He ever hear us?”
She never answered. To my astonishment, a scarlet-robed cardinal entered and produced a vial of holy oil, dipped his finger into it, and touched my darling’s eyes, ears, nose, lips hands, feet, and loins, praying: Per istam sanctam unctionem et suam piissimam misericordiam, indulgeat tibi Dominus . . .
Through this holy unction and His own most tender mercy may God forgive whatever sins you have committed . . .
Matteo needed no forgiveness, I decided. It was God who needed to apologize to my husband.
When Bona’s draught had left me sufficiently compliant, Francesca and the chambermaids took me away to the duchess’s room and dressed me in black skirts that were too long, and a veil that filmed the world darkly; I did not care. I did not want to see.
Miserable, pointless hours passed, after which I was taken to the ducal chapel to discover Matteo in front of the altar, lying in a wooden box, his arms crossed, a crucifix over his heart. The votive candles I had lit for his safety still burned upon the altar. I threw them across the room, ignoring the startled gasps of onlookers and the scalding wax that spilled down my arm.
I did not sleep at all that first night.
The next day, I sat beside Matteo in the chapel, Bona at my side, while most of the courtiers filed past his body. In the midst of familiar faces, one unknown appeared, with beard and hair and eyes black and shining as jet. I did not know him, yet felt I had laid eyes upon him before. He bore a saddlebag slung over his shoulder, and when he approached, he went down upon one knee and presented the saddlebag as if it were a gift.
I realized then that he was the rider, the man who had broken away from the caravan of papal legates my husband was leading from Rome to Milan, in order to bring Matteo swiftly home. He had remained in Matteo’s room, awaiting the outcome, until I had thrown him out.
“This was your husband’s, Madonna,” he said. His voice was deep and soft, his gaze averted; if he felt any emotion, it was carefully contained. “He asked me to be certain you received it.” He looked to be Matteo’s age and would have been pretty enough to capture the duke’s attention—Galeazzo occasionally indulged in affairs with his male staff—had it not been for his great sharp nose.
I thanked him. The bag was heavier than I expected, and when he handed it to me, it slipped from my grasp to the ground. I could not bring myself to look inside, not there, with others watching. The man bowed and retreated, and I thought no more about him.
Duke Galeazzo was last to appear. He stared with distaste at my husband’s corpse and said flatly, “A pity. He was one of my most talented scribes. Poison, was it?”
At those last words, I gasped. The red-eyed Cicco was with the duke and drew him away with a word, but I rose, and called after him to explain himself. What poison? Had the doctor said this? Why had no one mentioned this to me?
I tried to push through the crowd and find the black-haired man who had given me Matteo’s saddlebag. He had traveled with Matteo; surely he would know if my husband had been poisoned.
But the man was nowhere to be found, and Francesca and Bona pleaded with me to sit back down. His Grace was mistaken, they insisted. He was confusing Matteo with another man, another matter, but I did not believe them, and broke down sobbing.
After a time, there were priests and Roman legates, public prayers and psalms, but there was no burial. For the first time in anyone’s memory, the ground was coated with a layer of solid ice; we could not lay him in the earth until it thawed.
Matteo’s corpse was taken away—somewhere outside, I suspected, sheltered from animals but not the freezing cold; they were wise not to tell me where. Bona led me to a nauseating display of food in the common dining chamber near the chapel. I could not bear the sight of it, so her ladies returned me to Bona’s chamber, where I drank more of the wine laced with the bitter tang of poppies. For hours I stared into the glittering fire.
Matteo had been murdered. Romulus and the Wolf had killed him in order to silence him, and they would kill Lorenzo next. And I was stripped of reason and will and could do nothing to stop it. Whom should I tell? Whom should I trust?
When night fell, Francesca helped me undress and put on my nightgown. She offered me more bitter wine, but I refused and was taken to my little cot. When Bona arrived, she paused before climbing into her own bed to pray; I lay listening to her whispers and began to tremble with silent rage. I wanted to strike her, to tear the rosary from her fingers, to scream that she had taught me only lies: God was neither loving nor just, and I hated Him.
I held my tongue and waited, anguished, until Bona fell asleep, until Francesca snored. By the light of the hearth, I rose and found my shawl and slippers, then slipped out into the loggia.
I pattered downstairs, gasping at the freezing air when I hit the open hallway. I staggered in the blackness, twice almost slipping on the ice, and was shivering uncontrollably by the time I got to Matteo’s room. It was cold and dark and drafty; the fire had gone out and the flue was still open, but I did not bother to light it, as I did not care whether I caught cold or froze to death. I would have been pleased to die.
I am unsure why I went to my husband’s chamber. I believe I meant to scream myself hoarse, though even with the windows shuttered, I would have been overheard. I only know that when I arrived and drew the bolt behind me, I spied Matteo’s quill upon the carpet.
It must have been tangled in the bedding and fallen when I removed the sheets to clean him. I dropped to my knees before it and grief rushed out of me in a torrent. The sobs wracked me so that I sank down upon the carpet, the quill clutched to my chest.
I wept a good half an hour. When I was done, my eyes, nose, and mouth were streaming, the poor feather crushed. Gasping for breath, I pushed myself up to sitting, and felt something small and metal brush against my breastbone, beneath my nightgown.
Matteo’s key.
Use it in case of emergency.
I drew my sleeve across my eyes and nose, and stared across the room at Matteo’s writing desk and the secret panel next to it, hidden in the dark wooden wainscoting. Weak and trembling after the paroxysm of tears, I crawled on my hands and knees to Matteo’s desk, and pulled myself up into his chair to light the lamp. The oil was low, and the flame feeble; I leaned down and had to run my fingertips over the wall to find the tiny black keyhole.
I slipped the leather thong over my hand, and put the little key into the lock.
The door to the compartment popped open with a faint click. Behind the wood panel, a large stone brick was missing from the wall; in the gap sat a thick stack of papers the size of a library manuscript. I drew them out carefully, set them upon my husband’s desk, and pulled the lamp closer.
On the very top was a tiny black silk pouch, tied with a red ribbon, and beneath that, a letter on fresh paper, folded into thirds, sealed with wax, and addressed For my Beloved. At the sight, I braced myself for the emotional upheaval to come as I opened the little black pouch. I thought it contained jewelry—a keepsake, perhaps, by which I could remember him, but it contained only a coarse grayish-brown powder.
I turned to the letter, expecting to learn, at long last, why my husband had rejected my amorous advances.
I did not expect to be frightened.
It was not a heartfelt farewell letter but a diagram, in Matteo’s hand, of a circle with the cardinal directions marked—oddly, with east at the top of the circle instead of north, and west at the bottom. At each direction, he had put a five-pointed star, with arrows carefully indicating how it should be drawn, and beneath each star, a word in what I suspected was Hebrew; underneath these were written phonetic translations in the vernacular, but no meaning was given.
Beneath this was a diagram of a second circle, again with the cardinal directions, this time accompanied by hexagrams and more barbarous words.
It was magic, the same magic I had seen him work at night when I pretended to be sleeping in our bed, and I remembered snatches of our conversation the night I had first told him that I saw portents in the clouds and sky and stars.
Bona would say this was from the Devil, I had said, and he had answered swiftly: Bona would be wrong.
Beneath both circles were sets of instructions in Milanese describing the rites that accompanied each. I could not focus my shattered mind long enough to make sense of them, nor could I keep the hairs on my arms and the back of my neck from lifting when I set down Matteo’s diagram to examine the next page upon the stack.
It was a piece of yellowed vellum, brittle with age, many times folded and in danger of falling apart. Gingerly, I unfolded it upon the desk. The ink was rust brown, faded, the handwriting ancient, unfamiliar; Bona had permitted me no Greek, though I recognized it readily enough, and understood most of the Latin translation written in a later hand beneath it.
It was an invocation—of what, I could not fathom in my grief-addled state. I set it delicately aside; beneath it rested an unbound manuscript of text, consisting of several dozens of pages in Latin. The paper and the author’s hand were modern; the title page read De Mysteriis Aegyptiorium, Of the Egyptian Mysteries.
Last in the stack of writing was a document written in Matteo’s careful, even script. The letters of the Latin alphabet were written across the page, in order, and beneath each letter was written a different, random letter, number, or symbol. The letter a for example, was represented by the number 9, the letter b by an x, and c by an l. At the very top of the document was written strike out every fourth. It was, I realized, a key—one Matteo must have used when encrypting secret correspondence.
I propped an elbow on the desk and put my fingertips to my brow. “Why do you want me to have this?” I asked aloud.
The impulse to cast it all into the dying fire overtook me. Magic had been no more able to protect wicked men from killing Matteo than had God. But another thought damped my anger: the memory of the gilded triumph card displaying the Hanged Man. Surrender to evil forces with the intent of sacrifice.
I pressed the heels of my palms to my burning eyes and tried to make sense of it all. Matteo had clearly had a sense of his impending death before he left, else he would not have given me the key.
He had sacrificed himself to me in marriage out of innocent love. Had he again sacrificed himself to protect me? Had he left all this behind to warn me?
Had I not been furious with God, I would have burned it all. Instead I stared down at the meaningless tapestry of numerals and letters on the page and heard Lorenzo the Magnificent speaking.
It was I, in fact, who recommended Matteo to the duke for employment.
As if in answer, I heard Matteo in my memory.
I was rescued in my youth by a wealthy patron. . . .
Perhaps later we could go together to Florence.
Bury me in San Marco, the monastery in Florence that had educated him.
Read them in secret. And tell Lorenzo: Romulus and the Wolf mean to destroy you.
I sat very still, for perhaps an hour, then stoked the fire and stirred it until the flames leapt high and the room grew warm. I opened the shutters and discovered my husband’s saddlebag, leaning against the wall beneath a window. I undid the straps and emptied it onto the bed. It held another quill, a vial of ink, a blotter, two pairs of leggings and two wool undershirts, a brass mug, comb, and a small book, bound in leather. Half its pages were covered in the same unfathomable cipher—numbers and letters mixed with an occasional star or other symbol—I had found on the papers hidden in the compartment. I examined the little book for some time, but could make no sense of it.
When the blackness outside eased to gray, I went back upstairs to the duchess’s chamber, where Bona lay sleeping. I tiptoed up onto the platform, slid the bed curtains aside, and set a hand gently upon her shoulder. Even so, she wakened with a start.
“I must take Matteo to Florence,” I said.
Chapter Five
The duke refused my request to take Matteo to Florence to be buried in the churchyard of San Marco. For one thing, Galeazzo said, the winter was far too treacherous for a woman to attempt five days’ hard ride, even if it be southward—no matter that a day of feeble sun had melted most of the ice. For another, he insisted that every member of court attend the Christmas celebrations in Milan, whether they were in mourning or not.
Of the myriad princes in Italy, none celebrated Christmas with greater zeal than Duke Galeazzo. He required all courtiers, all ambassadors, all feudatories to come to Milan to celebrate the Nativity and renew their vows of fealty to him the day after, on the feast of Saint Stephen. Everyone, except the dying and the mortally ill, was required to attend, for the holiday marked the end and beginning of the year. The duke gave gifts to his underlings, alms to the poor, pardons to the convicted; during the week, he attended mass at different venues, the better to be seen by his loyal subjects. On the twenty-sixth, Saint Stephen’s Day, he went to the church of Santo Stefano; on the twenty-seventh, Saint John the Evangelist’s Day, he went to the church of San Giovanni, and so forth.
Bona had tears in her eyes when she told me of the duke’s decision; the court was leaving the next morning for the Castle Porta Giovia in the center of Milan, and I, in my black veil, was required to go, too. I turned from her, speechless, but she put a hand upon my shoulder to draw me back.
“He is being embalmed,” she said, and I realized she meant Matteo. “Come with me to Milan, please. And when we return to Pavia, the duke will be distracted, and I will see to it that you are able to take Matteo to Florence for burial.”
The following morning found me riding silently on horseback alongside Francesca and the other chattering chambermaids next to the furnished, velvet-draped wagon that held Bona and the children. It was a sunny winter’s day, harshly bright and blue, with a wind that stole all warmth. The roads were slush and mud; my cape grew quickly spattered. Matteo’s saddlebag, packed with the little book in cipher and Bona’s triumph cards, was strapped to my mount. From time to time, it brushed the back of my leg, bringing fresh grief.
Milan lies due north of Pavia, one day’s easy ride away, on flat roads across the Po River basin. Given the size and lumbering pace of our caravan, however, we set out at dawn and did not reach our destination until well after dusk.
Nestled on a plain, the city stretches out to the horizon, where the distant, snowy flanks of the Alps graze the heavens. The light was failing by the time my horse’s hooves struck cobblestone, but I could still see the four towers of the ducal castle, Porta Giovia, and the flickering yellow glow emanating from its windows. Across the broad avenue was the cathedral, the Duomo, its face covered with dark, skeletal scaffolding. Spires from other cathedrals—San Giovanni, Santo Stefano, Sant’ Ambrogio—reared up from an endless span of red-tiled rooftops.
Normally I would have taken pleasure in the journey and the sights of the city, which we frequented only once or twice a year because the palace there was cramped compared to Pavia, and the city streets noisier and dirtier than the countryside. But that night I felt only bitterness; the festive spirits of those surrounding me were rude, the glory of Milan mocking. The ducal apartments were adorned with pomanders and evergreen, and fragrant with mulled wine; I found it all offensive.
In the little closet off Bona’s room, I shared a bed with Francesca. Happily, she fell quickly asleep. I brought out the little book from Matteo’s saddlebag and lit the lamp, and stared at page after page of my husband’s mysterious cipher. After an hour, I realized that the headings for each separate entry must have been days or dates or times, and I distracted myself from miserable grief by trying possible substitutions for the different symbols.
I did not put out the light until Francesca stirred and complained drowsily a few hours before dawn. Even then, I did not sleep, but lay still, thinking of Matteo, the cipher, and the triumph cards.
Two days passed in a blur of audiences, masses, banquets, dances, and concerts, the last performed by Galeazzo’s magnificent choir of thirty souls. Despite the weather, the streets of Milan were crowded with those who had come to watch the ceremony of the Yule log, and those who had come to proclaim their loyalty to Galeazzo for another year.
On Christmas Eve Day, the duke held a grand audience for petitioners; when sunset approached, we courtiers and servants stood in the first-floor great hall as His Grace lit the ciocco, the Yule log that was to be tended so that it burned for as long as possible. Once darkness had taken hold, Bona called for me to attend her in the ducal chambers. There, in the family’s private dining chamber, I stood while Bona, her two daughters, two sons, and Caterina sat at the table watching the duke direct his brothers Ottaviano and Filippo. Together, Ottaviano—the youngest brother, slight and willowy, with a delicate, feminine face and long dark hair uncharacteristic of the Sforzas—and Filippo—second eldest, sturdy of body but feeble of intellect—carried a huge log of oak through the doorway and set it down atop a bough of juniper set in the hearth.
Despite the closed windows, the reedy wail of the traditional zampogni, the pipes played only at Christmas, filtered up from the duke’s private courtyard below.
“Ugh!” Filippo exclaimed, once freed of his burden. “It’s fatter than Cicco! This one will surely burn till New Year’s.”
“Back away, back away!” Galeazzo scolded excitedly, and took his place in front of the fireplace. His face was flushed, his words thick; he had already drunk a good deal of wine. A servant handed him a lit taper, and he held the flame to the juniper; it caught with a fragrant flare, and he laughed, pleased, as he handed the candle back.
With his right hand, he made the sign of the cross, and snapped his fingers at his cupbearer, who filled his goblet with fresh wine and gave it to him. Once the juniper had caught in earnest, the duke splashed a bit of wine on the log, as custom required, and took a long swallow from his cup. This he passed to Filippo, who handed it to Ottaviano, who respectfully delivered it to Bona; it made its way down the hierarchy to arrive last of all to me.
I emptied the cup, although there was less than a full sip left, thanks to Caterina swallowing far more than her share.
The duke then tossed a gold ducat onto the fire, and from a red velvet bag, handed one gold coin apiece to his brothers, children, and wife. My lowly status stifled his generosity, however, and he turned his back to me; Bona pressed her coin into my palm, so that I might enjoy an increase in wealth in the coming year.
Fortunately, the duke was not so stingy when it came to food and drink, and I was allowed to sit between his natural daughters, Chiara and Caterina. There was a surfeit of marvelous food, including a pigeon tart with prunes that normally would have tempted me, and ravioli stuffed with pig’s liver and herbs, but I had no taste for it. I had not wanted to attend the family gathering, and had asked Bona to excuse me, but the duke had gotten wind of it and insisted that I come so that “things would be as they are every year.” And to make sure of it, he had ordered that I dispense with mourning and dress in holiday attire; I had no choice but to obey, and so chose a gown of dark green velvet, but wore no gold and no smile.
Galeazzo and Filippo proceeded to get very drunk indeed, and by the time the feast was well under way, their conversation grew peppered with thinly veiled metaphors about the pleasures of defiling virgin flesh. At one point, the duke began to thrust a grilled sausage in and out of the stuffed capon on his plate, in a pointedly sexual manner, while Filippo howled with laughter. Caterina grinned, and Bona flushed and grew quiet. By the time supper was finished, Bona was eager to shoo the children out of the chamber and leave herself. I rose with her and accompanied her to the door; as she turned and bade her husband good night, he looked up from the table, his eyes heavy-lidded and glittering from drink, and said:
“Not her. You can go, but she must stay.”
He had never made such a request, and both the duchess and I were troubled by it, until Galeazzo repeated, “She must stay. And you must have one of your ladies fetch the triumph cards Lorenzo gave you straightaway.” When Bona hesitated to direct a fearful glance at me, he slammed his fist upon the table so hard that the empty platters rattled.
When silence followed, I said to her, “Your Grace, please forgive me, but the cards are in your quarters, inside the trunk at the foot of my cot.”
Bona stared at me as if I were the Devil himself, come to steal her soul. Without a word, she curtsied to her husband and left, taking all the children with her; Caterina passed by last, pausing briefly to study me, her expression both curious and oddly worried. I stood awkwardly by the door for a quarter hour while the duke and his drunken brothers ignored me and the conversation grew ever more raucous. When Francesca finally arrived with the diamond-studded red velvet box, my anxiety increased.
“Sit,” Galeazzo said, slurring, gesturing at the chair directly across from him. His brother Filippo made an exaggerated show of hurrying to pull the chair out for me, as if I were the duchess. He and the duke laughed, but I curtsied and sat with dignity, placing the box in front of me on the table and resting one hand atop it.
Only the girlish, delicate Ottaviano said hesitantly, “But you are in mourning, Dea. Was the loss recent?”
“My husband,” I answered, and acknowledged his kindness with a nod. At that instant, a wave of grief mixed with rage overtook me, and I resolved that I would speak the truth to Galeazzo without fear. I would have been grateful to incur his wrath and die for it.
“Enough of that,” the duke said, dismissing the gloomy subject with a curt gesture. “She’s going to tell me my fortune for the coming year, boys.” He leveled his dangerous gaze at me; for once, I returned it without disguising my hatred. “Except that this time”—his voice dropped to a malicious whisper—“my luck will be quite good, won’t it, my dear?”
“Can we know our fortunes?” Filippo asked, with inebriated enthusiasm. His face was flushed, his lips crooked in an intoxicated grin. “My lord, may we know, too?”
Ottaviano seconded him so eagerly that the duke waved for silence.
“It all depends,” he said, with a wink to his brothers, “on how cooperative the lady is. And such a lovely lady she has recently become.”
Filippo laughed—half from nerves, half from delight—as the duke reached out and put a warm, sweating hand upon mine. Disgusted, I slipped mine out from under his and instinctively glanced behind me to confirm that Bona was indeed gone, as were all the servants save the duke’s cupbearer and a pair of bodyguards who had appeared silently in front of the closed, and now bolted, doors.
I suppose I should not have been surprised, yet I had always believed that my relationship with Bona protected me, that the duke would no more lay a hand on me than he would his own daughters. For an instant, I considered screaming and pounding on the door, but I had heard too many times how little such behavior availed the other women who sought escape. I could rely only on my wits.
“Your Grace,” I said, with feigned confidence, “I will read your cards. For the sake of accuracy, let us have silence. You must think only of the question you would ask and nothing else.”
“I stated the question,” the duke countered, with a hint of irritation, and slouched forward with both elbows on the table. He propped his chin upon both hands, as if his head had grown too heavy to hold up. “My future for the coming year.”
“Then think on that, Your Grace,” I said coolly, and took the cards from the velvet box. They were warm, as if they had been stored close to a hearth, and despite the fact that they were much larger than playing cards, they shuffled easily this time, as if tailored to my grasp. I mixed them for as long as I dared, praying silently all the while. I saw no point in calling upon God; I spoke to the only one I still trusted.
Matteo, help me. Help me to get out of here untouched and alive.
Filippo broke the silence with a drunken giggle; Ottaviano joined in, but the duke had grown serious and hissed at them to be quiet.
I, too, grew deeply still, and surrendered even my prayers in order to listen to the cards whispering in my hands. Instinct directed me to gather them up, stack them neatly, and push the pile to the center of the dining table, within Galeazzo’s reach.
“Cut them, Your Grace,” I directed. An odd calm descended upon me, turning my feigned confidence into something real, a strange and ancient authority.
Leaning heavily upon his left elbow, chin still propped upon a fist, Galeazzo reached out with his right hand. It was unsteady, and on his first attempt to cut the deck, he dropped the cards, overturning some, and swore.
“No matter, Your Grace,” I said smoothly. “Gather them up, and cut again. It is all as fate wishes it to be.”
By then, Galeazzo was scowling and visibly unnerved. Filippo’s drunken grin had vanished; he and Ottaviano were paying careful attention to their brother’s changing mood. Galeazzo pushed the cards back into a pile and cut them. I placed one stack atop the other, and took them back across the table.
I drew a card from the top of the deck, turned it over, and dropped into another world.
Before me, a glittering marble tower reared up against the bright blue sky, its pinnacle so high that wisps of clouds kissed it. At the top—so far up, they appeared as small as flies—two stonemasons wielded mortar and plane to build ever higher. This was the Tower of Babel, I realized, representing the hubris of man; and as I tilted my head far back to study its apex and the men working there, a roiling indigo cloud rushed from the horizon and enclosed the pinnacle and the men.
It was the wrath of God, this cloud, and it birthed a blue-tinged, blinding bolt of lightning; the crack and roar was so ominous, I shrieked and covered my ears. At the same instant, the Tower exploded, sending shards of shattered marble hurtling to earth. The masons’ screams grew louder as they fell, headfirst, into oblivion. One of them, flailing a steel blade, I recognized as the King of Swords, he who metes out justice. I dropped to my knees and covered my head as he and a second man struck the earth beside me.
Just as swiftly, God’s dark wrath disappeared, and the sky was again an unmarred blue—but the Tower was reduced to a shambles. Beside me lay the body of the second man. Impossibly, he was whole, and his eyes open in stark surprise, but he was no less dead and bloody, pierced through the heart by the King of Swords’ weapon. His hair was a light chestnut, his lips thin, the bridge of his nose marked by a single large bump. He was Duke Galeazzo, and I knew that he had at last paid for his sins, and was glad.
“What does it mean?” Galeazzo demanded, and when I did not immediately reply, his tone changed from impatient to apprehensive. “What does it mean?”
Matteo, help me, I prayed again. I drew a deep breath and spoke the truth. My words were just loud enough to be heard over the crackling fire and the duke’s quickened breath.
“That you will be attacked, my lord, by those against whom you have sinned. That unless you repent immediately and make reparation, you will not live to see the coming year.”
His brothers looked on while Galeazzo let go a ragged gasp of amazement and clumsily pushed himself to his feet. Grimacing with fury, he let go a snarl and raised an arm to strike.
I glared back, defiant and ready to face my own unhappy fate. Matteo was dead, and I did not care to live. Yet it brought me wicked comfort to know that Duke Galeazzo would quake with fear until his own time came.
“You!” he roared, his voice shrill with outrage. “You rotting bitch, how dare you speak to us so! How dare you . . .”
He struck out. The stinging blow caught my upper lip, and almost tipped me backward in my chair. Stubbornly I held on and would not stir from my place, though my lip smarted enough to provoke tears. I refused to shed them, but looked boldly back at him.
“You,” he hissed, his anger transforming in that exhaled word to curiosity. He stared at me, and his eyes narrowed in disbelieving recognition, then widened as his brows rushed together in fear. “Mother of God, it’s her, she’s a ghost! A ghost come back to haunt me! God help me . . . Save me, someone!”
He crossed himself and staggered backward, promptly falling over his own chair; Ottaviano and Filippo rushed to help him. As he struggled back to his feet, his brothers clutching his elbows, he bellowed, “Get her out of here! Get her out!”
I rose, and when the guards caught hold of my arms, I did not struggle, but let myself be pushed through the swiftly opened doors, and flung down upon the cold, hard marble in the loggia. Once there, I sat up and gingerly fingered my lip to find it greatly swollen. I touched my tongue to it, and tasted blood and morbid satisfaction.
Bona was sitting in front of her fireplace beside Caterina and Chiara when I returned from the duke’s chambers. I knew she still felt betrayed over the cards, but at the sight of me, she let go a cry and rushed to embrace me. I put my hands upon her shoulders to comfort her, and when she realized I was otherwise untouched, she let go a sob of relief.
I admit, I was surprised to find Caterina there, wearing an unusually somber expression. Once she learned I was mostly undamaged, however, she grew at once insolent. While Francesca went downstairs to the larder to find a piece of fresh meat for a poultice, Bona made me sit in front of the fire and gently pressed her own kerchief to my lip to staunch the bleeding. She could not bring herself to ask how her husband had behaved, but Caterina, who had settled in the chair beside me, had no such reluctance.
“Did the king appear?” she asked.
Bona, Chiara, and I looked at her in puzzlement.
“The king,” she prompted. “The one with the sword. You drew that card for my father before, when Lorenzo came to visit. Did it come again? Or does some new future await him?”
Bona’s lip curled. “You ought not ask such impertinent questions,” she said, with uncharacteristic asperity. “Let Dea rest. She’s tired and has been through enough.”
Caterina ignored her and turned her whole body toward me. “It must have not been a very good future, or he wouldn’t have hit you.”
Bona was right: I was tired—tired of secrets and lies. And Galeazzo’s reaction had left me with an odd sense of power. No matter what punishment he was planning for me, I no longer cared. I had spoken the truth and it had squarely hit its mark; now I did not want to stop.
“The king was there,” I said, my words muffled by Bona’s kerchief and my huge upper lip. “But he appeared inside another card: the Tower.”
Caterina leaned closer with avid curiosity. “And the Tower means?”
“The wrath of God will strike your father down,” I said flatly, and tried not to care when Bona flinched.
Caterina caught her breath, her eyes oddly bright. “When?”
“I will not hear of this,” Bona interjected. “Fortune-telling is pure wickedness, an abomination. . . . I wish to God that you had never seen those accursed cards! How could you have taken them from me?”
“Soon,” I answered Caterina. To Bona I said, “Forgive me, Your Grace. Of late, my mind seems not to be my own.”
Bona crossed herself. She was on the verge of weeping, I realized, and so I fell silent and answered no more of Caterina’s questions.
The duchess never said anything more about the cards that I had taken without her permission, yet from that moment on, she developed a perceptible coolness toward me. I had stolen from her, and Bona would not forget it.
Chapter Six
On Christmas Day, three masses were said in the duke’s chapel; custom demanded that Galeazzo and all of his courtiers attend. I missed the first, however, as I slept poorly, given my throbbing lip, and Bona told me to stay abed when the others rose.
I attended the other services and the great banquet, but wore my black veil to hide my swollen lip, and ate and drank little. When the dancing began, I retreated to Matteo’s chamber and tried again to make sense of the cipher in the little leather-bound book from his saddlebag, without success. I also wondered what became of the triumph cards I had left with the duke and his brothers, but did not dare ask Bona.
The next day was the feast of Saint Stephen, the first martyr. As such, the duke was expected to attend mass at the church of Santo Stefano in the southeastern quarter, a short ride away. But normally temperate Milan was in the grip of the coldest weather most of its citizens had ever seen; an ice storm had glazed the city during the night, and been followed by a dusting of snow and a fierce wind that blew the clouds away, leaving trees, bushes, and roofs glittering in the early-morning sun.
The wind howled as I rose and dressed in my black mourning. A quick glance in the duchess’s large hand mirror revealed that the swelling in my upper lip had gone down, though the skin was still purplish and bore a dark red scab where it had neatly split; I lowered my dark veil again. Bona kept her bed curtains pulled; she had been up retching during the night, and Francesca, I, and the chambermaids all agreed we would not wake her, but send a message to the duke that she was too ill to rise. Beyond the window, branches bowed low, snapping from the weight of the ice and groaning in the wake of the wind; I expected that most of the court, Galeazzo and his magnificent choir included, would refuse to go out in such weather, and instead celebrate the saint’s day here at the castle.
I was wrong. An hour after we sent word to the duke that the duchess was indisposed, Caterina came running into Bona’s chamber, her pale, pretty cheeks flushed and damp with tears. Her mother, Lucrezia Landriani, one of the duke’s dearest, and most prolific, mistresses, lingered in the doorway, lest her presence offend the duchess.
“I won’t go!” Caterina exclaimed, pouting, as she entered. She was dressed in a confection of white watered silk trimmed lightly in crimson velvet and studded with gold beads; her long yellow curls had been neatly contained in a hairnet littered with diamonds and tiny rubies. “Where is the lady duchess? I must speak to her!”
“Duchess Bona is ill, Madonna Caterina, and cannot be disturbed,” I said in a hushed, warning tone.
Caterina recoiled slightly at the word ill and moved no farther; she gestured at me. “Help me, then! My father the duke is insisting that all of his”—she lowered her voice out of respect for Bona—“ladies and children accompany him to Santo Stefano!” His mistresses, she meant; perhaps it was Galeazzo’s way of getting even with his wife for not accompanying him in the cold.
“In this weather?” Even I was surprised.
Caterina nodded; a cascade of diamonds and rubies sparkled at her ears. She was truly magnificent to behold that day, a porcelain beauty with gleaming golden hair, dressed in shimmering white, the dark red trim serving to accentuate her pale glory.
“He would have us walk halfway across the city in this wind,” she said, and as if on cue, a gust rattled at the window. “Only the bishop and the ambassadors will be allowed to ride beside him on horseback. Please, Dea,” she said, “can you not wake the lady duchess? She could send a note asking His Grace if my mother and I could ride beside him in the Lady Bona’s stead. She could even say that I am weak from a recent illness. . . .”
Bona’s flat, weary voice emanated from behind the tapestry bed curtains. “Have you been ill, Caterina?”
From the doorway, her mother, Lucrezia, called softly back, “Your Grace, she is being difficult because she is jealous—the duke called upon his sons to visit him this morning, but has ignored Caterina, who is eager to show him her lovely new dress. She thinks that if she rides beside him in a place of honor, he and everyone else in Milan will have a chance to admire her.” She shot a sour look at her daughter. “You must not bother Her Grace. The duke has decided to go, and we must hurry. His priest and choir are already waiting at Santo Stefano; the others have all gathered in the courtyard.”
“Dea,” Bona called weakly, “will you go with her in my stead? And relay to the duke that I would humbly ask his favor for a horse for Caterina and her mother?”
“Of course, Your Grace,” I answered, and in a lower voice said to Caterina, “but he will not give them if I ask.”
“Why not?” she said, studying me carefully, and I remembered that I had, in fact, predicted Galeazzo’s doom and walked out of his chamber alive and barely scathed.
I took a step closer to Caterina. “You must get your cloak and gloves, Madonna,” I told her. “The duke will not suffer our being late.”
Bona called again from behind the curtains. “Go,” she said to me, “and pray for my husband. I have had a night of evil dreams.”
We almost were late. I would have far preferred to remain inside the warm castle to tend the duchess that morning, but for Bona’s sake, I borrowed Francesca’s black woolen cloak and gloves and went down to the huge courtyard with Caterina and her mother. By the watchtowers, a crowd of perhaps fifty nobles—most of them women with their children, the duke’s illegitimate get, and the rest of the duke’s favorite male courtiers—had gathered, their splendid attire hidden beneath swaths of fur and thick wool. Nearby, a half dozen grooms held the reins to some thirty horses.
The mood of the waiting nobles was sour, their teeth chattering. Caterina and I joined them, and stamped our feet to keep warm until the grinning duke at last appeared in a crimson cloak lined with white ermine, his arms linked with a fellow hellion, Zaccaria Saggi, the Mantuan ambassador. The stooped, gold-mitered Bishop of Como and the duke’s brothers, Filippo and Ottaviano, followed close behind, trailed by the Florentine ambassador and a dozen gentlemen of the chamber. The whole was flanked by a score of guards in full armor, long swords sheathed at their hips; among their ranks was a great tall Moor with yellow eyes and dark brown skin. In place of a helmet, he wore a large white turban; in place of a sword, a scimitar.
I moved toward the duke, paused a generous distance away, and bowed deeply as I relayed Bona’s request.
He stiffened, unnerved by the sight of me, but cupped a hand to his ear to catch my words. A sudden bitter gust drove them away; impatient, he frowned and waved me off. Caterina thinned her lips and uttered an indignant curse beneath her breath as I returned to her side.
Galeazzo then briefly addressed the waiting crowd, speaking perhaps of the holiday and his gratitude for our loyalty, but his words, too, were swallowed by the wind. We shouted a perfunctory greeting, and watched as he climbed atop his black charger, caparisoned in white and crimson, the Sforza colors. Immediately, his inner circle and the guards mounted their steeds and closed ranks around him; we lesser beings were confined outside the protected inner circle.
Like the others, I drew the cowl close to my face and made my way over the slippery drawbridge and out into the street, across which stood the city cathedral, its unfinished walls covered with latticework scaffolding; the Alps loomed in the distance behind us. We kept pace with the horses for half an hour over icy cobblestones; on two occasions, Caterina slipped and her mother and I caught her before she fell to her knees. The wind drove my veil into my eyes, and would have blown it and my cowl off had I not clutched the edges of the latter. No one engaged in festive, lighthearted chatter; the howling wind drowned all other sounds, and forced us to walk with faces downcast against the stinging cold. Tradition demanded that the streets be filled with throngs cheering the duke, but on this feast day after Christmas only a few hardy souls huddled on the treacherous, snow-dusted ice and called out feebly when the duke and his entourage passed.
I was shivering uncontrollably by the time we arrived at the little plaza in front of the church of Santo Stefano, an ancient, unimpressive two-story edifice with a crumbling stone façade. The plaza was filled with merchants, peasants, and the starving poor; the church was so crowded inside that they had waited here in hopes of catching a glimpse of His Grace. The guards, their armor glinting with light reflected from the snow, dismounted and began to clear the plaza while several young grooms ran forward to take the horses.
Galeazzo dismounted and handed over his reins without looking at his groom; he squinted nervously at the plaza and, beyond it, at the door to the church. Like his daughter, he enjoyed public attention, but he also took enormous care to protect his person, and did not relax until the way was clear and the guards signaled him. The bishop, who was to celebrate the mass, moved ahead of him, and the ambassadors took their places at his left; his brothers moved to his right, so that the men stood five abreast, with the duke in the protected center. Behind them, in the favored retinue, walked Cicco’s younger brother, the secretary Giovanni Simonetta, and a military adviser, Orfeo da Ricavo, followed by a row of camerieri, the nobles who attended the duke in his chamber and were considered his closest friends. The big Moor—a full head taller than any other man present, his hand on the hilt of his scimitar—led them into the church, while a pair of armored bodyguards flanked each row of the ducal procession.
Caterina pushed her way forward until we stood just behind the camerieri. When we finally made our way through the open door, she let go a sigh of relief at the rush of warmth emanating from the bodies of some three hundred faithful. At the front of the church, near the altar, scores of empty chairs awaited the duke and his party; most of the worshippers were obliged to stand and crane their necks as the duke passed by.
At the instant Galeazzo set foot inside, the choir, situated at the back of the sanctuary, burst into song, and a valet ran forward to relieve the duke and his companions of their cloaks. As the duke handed off his cloak, I saw he was dressed in a handsome doublet, the left half of which was gleaming watered white silk embroidered with tiny gold fleur-de-lis, the right of lush crimson velvet. His leggings were also of velvet—crimson for the left leg, white for the right.
I was not surprised to see that he sported his family’s heraldic colors, but I was startled indeed to see that he wore no armor. It was the first time I ever saw Duke Galeazzo appear in public without a breastplate. Perhaps he shied from wearing metal so close to his skin in such cold weather, or perhaps it was an issue of vanity and the breastplate did not suit his fine new doublet; I will never know.
Beside me, Caterina let go a little gasp of pride, tinged with impatience, at her father’s appearance. As we women handed off our cloaks, I saw why she was so eager for the duke to take note of her: her gown was made from the very same fabrics, with the same gold embroidery upon the white watered silk—a clever Christmas surprise for her father.
As the duke and his company followed the bishop down the center aisle, the rows of worshippers bowed, rippling like wheat in the wind. I kept an eye on Caterina; though she bore herself proudly, her gaze was riveted on her father and those surrounding him. She was seeking an opportunity, I knew, to get the duke’s attention.
Midway to the altar, her opportunity came. Santo Stefano was very old, though not so old, it was claimed, as one great old stone abutting the sanctuary floor. Planted in the very center of the church, this large stone was unpolished and unremarkable, but it was nothing less than the Point of the Innocents, where, it was said, the blood of the innocent infants slain by King Herod had been spilled.
Galeazzo paused in mid-conversation and step to glance down at the stone and contemplate it in a show of false piety.
Seeing her opportunity, Caterina pushed forward, surging past the last row of the duke’s chamber attendants and moving directly behind Cicco’s brother Giovanni and the military adviser Ricavo. She was just one row from her father, and when her mother and I simultaneously hissed at her for such outrageous behavior, she glanced over her shoulder at us with a sly grin.
Her mother nudged me and gestured with her chin at her unruly daughter. I was of less importance than anyone else in the procession, so the task fell to me to retrieve her. I whispered apologies as I sidled between pairs of indignant camerieri and finally got directly behind Caterina.
As I touched her elbow, a cry went up—Make room!—and a middle-aged courtier stepped into the aisle just after the bishop passed. He was large and barrel-chested, with powerful shoulders, but one of his legs was withered; he moved haltingly, with a limp, and went down unsteadily on one knee right at the Point of the Innocents, blocking Duke Galeazzo’s path.
His waving pale brown hair, brushed straight back and falling to his shoulders, was thinning at temples and crown; his anxious smile revealed overlarge yellow teeth. The soldiers nearby stiffened, and the big Moor stopped at once and drew his scimitar, but all relaxed upon recognizing Giovanni Lampugnani, a noble with a large estate just outside the city, and therefore bound to swear his fealty to the duke that very afternoon at Porta Giovia. I thought at first he wore the Sforza colors, white and crimson, but the red was far too bright. Lampugnani had long been a friend to Galeazzo, although rumor said the duke had lately taken notice of his comely young wife and vowed to bed her.
“A word, Your Grace,” he said. His grinning lips trembled. It was not uncommon for a petitioner to stop the duke as he made his way to his seat near the altar, but Galeazzo’s curled lip indicated it was unappreciated.
At the same time, Caterina reacted to my touch by surging forward to stand beside the military adviser, who walked immediately behind the duke. Ricavo, gray-haired but solid, glanced down at her with amused surprise.
Caterina reached out to tap her father’s shoulder, and that was when another, younger man stepped out into the aisle to stand beside Lampugnani. His hair and beard were very dark, his long face handsome, his eyes hate-filled and haunted; he was Carlo Visconti, the man whose sister had been raped by Galeazzo. His hand was clutching the hilt of his long, sheathed blade. Like Lampugnani, he wore white and vibrant red.
He was the King of Swords.
I felt myself fall into another world, one where the wrath of God was gathering and roiling, a monstrous cloud about to birth a shattering bolt. With both arms, I pulled Caterina away from her father and held her fast.
“Not now, not now,” Duke Galeazzo hissed at Lampugnani and waved him away just as dark-haired Visconti slipped beside the kneeling man.
Lampugnani began to rise awkwardly and fumbled with his sleeve. Still half crouched, he said distinctly, “Oh, yes, now. Now.”
With the swiftness of a viper, he struck. I did not see him draw the dagger, but I saw it come away bloodied, and heard the duke’s horrified gasp. Beside him, the Mantuan ambassador made a feeble attempt to push the attacker away, but Lampugnani was on fire. He rose to his full impressive height, seized the duke’s arm so that he could not run away, and thrust the dagger to the hilt into Galeazzo’s chest. It came free with a sucking sound, and Lampugnani, his lips twisting with distaste and determination, plunged it into the duke again.
“I am dead!” Galeazzo exclaimed in surprise, and fell straight back against the chest of Orfeo da Ricavo, who tried vainly to support him.
Visconti was on the duke then, too, slashing with his long sword, and was joined by a younger third man. The Mantuan ambassador, Saggi, and Ricavo both began screaming for the guards.
The choir fell silent, its sweet strains replaced by a swell of frantic voices, the sounds of struggle. Bodies surged from the once-orderly rows; the church doors were flung open, and the crowd swelled toward them like a rising tide. The bodyguards were caught in the rush and fought their way back to their master, who had fallen upon the Point of the Innocents.
By then, even Saggi and Ricavo were struggling to flee; the duke’s brothers Ottaviano and Filippo almost knocked me down as they pushed toward the door. I held fast to Caterina and pulled her away from the horror; she was limp and unresisting in my grasp.
The church emptied with astonishing speed. Outside in the plaza, courtiers and the duke’s favorite chamber attendants called for their horses; those who had come on foot, including Caterina’s mother, Lucrezia, were half running over treacherous ice back toward the castle. I paused in the doorway, the stunned Caterina still in my arms, and looked back into the sanctuary.
It was deserted save for the guards and the bloodied corpse of Giovanni Lampugnani, whose lameness no doubt hindered his escape. I watched as the tall, turbaned Moor, one hand pressed to his shoulder to staunch the weeping wound there, knelt over the motionless form of the Duke of Milan. Galeazzo lay sprawled on his back, mouth agape, sightless eyes open, arms flung upward as if in defense. Blood spattered his clean-shaven face and soaked his doublet, now scarlet with no trace of white.
The tower of the duchy had crumbled.
Bona would have said that God had finally delivered His judgment, but that day, I knew she was wrong. God had had nothing to do with it; it had been the work of the King of Swords, who had avenged his sister. I looked upon the duke’s pale corpse and felt exhilarating, if cold, satisfaction.
Justice: it was what I wanted for Matteo, and I would not rest until I found it.
Chapter Seven
Caterina and I returned to Porta Giovia to discover that, although the courtiers on horseback had arrived well ahead of us, none of them had had the courage to speak to Bona, who was still abed. Caterina, who was crying unrestrainedly, not so much from grief, I think, as terror, clung to me as I entered the duchess’s chamber. I wound an arm about her shoulder as though I were her mother, who had so feared retribution from the duke’s enemies that she had deserted her daughter and fled to her husband’s house in the city. Together, Caterina and I went to Bona’s bedside, where Francesca was just taking away a tray.
The curtains were open, and the lady duchess was sitting propped upon her pillows and wrapped in a heavy shawl, her disheveled dark blond hair plaited into a single thick braid. Her broad, ponderous face was drawn, her eyelids drooping with exhaustion, but she straightened at the sound of our footsteps and tried to arrange her features into a more pleasant expression. But at the sight of Caterina, who was pressing her tear-streaked face into my shoulder, Bona paled and grew very, very still.
My voice emerged, cracking and unsteady. “His Grace, the Duke of Milan is dead,” I said. I expected her to shriek, to weep, to be inconsolable.
Bona’s eyes widened, but the rest of her features did not move. A long silence passed between us, punctuated by Caterina’s muffled sobs.
At last Bona’s lips parted and formed a single word. “How?”
“At the swords of assassins,” I answered. “Giovanni Lampugnani and Carlo Visconti. His Grace still lies on the Point of the Innocents.”
“Visconti,” she repeated tonelessly. “Is everyone else safe?”
I nodded. “I think so.”
“Good.” She looked at Caterina and sighed. “Poor child.”
Francesca had set down the tray and was crying, but Bona threw back the covers and swung her thick legs over the side of the bed.
“Francesca,” she said, a bit sharply. The chambermaid stopped her tears and looked up, anguished.
“Call Leonora, and help me get dressed,” she said, and glanced up at me. “And Dea, go and tell Cicco the news if he hasn’t already heard, then bring him to me.”
After speaking with her husband’s top aide, Bona ordered that Galeazzo’s body be washed at Santo Stefano and dressed in a suit of gold brocade. By dusk, the duke’s clean corpse was resting on a table in Santo Stefano’s sacristy. There was no public viewing—or private, for that matter—as the duke had suffered fourteen disfiguring wounds. His mortal remains lay in the sacristy another full day, the twenty-seventh, the day His Grace was to have visited the church of San Giovanni to celebrate the feast of Saint John the Evangelist. All the while, Bona and Cicco worked together to prevent any chance of an uprising against the Sforza dynasty; soldiers were stationed at strategic points along Milan’s empty streets.
Late that night, Bona sent a few trusted servants to Santo Stefano. Under cover of darkness, they stole into the church, removed the corpse, and took it across town to the cathedral known as the Duomo, across the broad street from Porta Giovia. There, they pried open the top of the casket holding the remains of the duke’s father, Francesco Sforza, and laid Galeazzo on top of them.
Many a mass was said later for Galeazzo’s soul, but there was to be no funeral, public or private, no tomb, no monument of stone, no plaque revealing where the duke lay. He had provoked such enmity during his thirty-two years that it was deemed safest to dispense with such things, lest those who despised him take revenge on his corpse.
Bona never came to bed that night, but remained conferring with Cicco and Galeazzo’s other advisers. I undressed in the small closet off the duchess’s chamber and, as I was pulling my nightdress over my head, Caterina’s nurse entered and begged me to come attend her young charge.
I found Caterina huddled on her bed, arms wrapped around her knees, rocking. The slender, long lines of her girlish body showed beneath the fine wool nightgown; her long pale curls had been neatly plaited, though shorter tendrils framed her oval face. Her cheeks were flushed, the lids of her bloodshot eyes swollen. When I entered the room, she glanced up, oddly hopeful, and curtly motioned for her nurse to leave the room. I was surprised to see that the three cots where her attendants slept were empty, though the blankets were disheveled and the sheets still bore the impress of bodies. No doubt their mistress had thrown them from their beds without warning.
When we two were alone, she motioned for me to sit on the bed beside her—an unusual liberty for her to grant—and said, in a voice that was hoarse from weeping:
“You knew my father was going to die. You knew the very moment. How?”
“I don’t know,” I began, but she made an impatient gesture for silence.
“I will pay you.” Her gaze was as naked and earnest as I had ever seen it. “Whatever you want, and I will say nothing to anyone about it. Only you must tell me the secrets of your magic.”
I shook my head. “There is no secret, Madonna.”
Her features contorted with anger. “Or I can have you tortured until you confess everything you know. I could turn you over to the Church as a witch.”
I was too weary from grief to care, and it surely showed in my voice and expression. “Then turn me over to them, Madonna, and I will tell them what I am telling you: I know nothing about magic.” It was true; I had not yet studied Matteo’s ritual. “I saw your father’s death, but I don’t understand how I knew.”
She remained silent. I rose, intending to ask permission to leave, but she motioned sternly for me to sit back down.
“Why did you save me?” Her voice was taut with emotion.
“Why would I not?” I countered.
She drew a long hitching breath and loosed a torrent of childish tears. “Don’t leave me,” she sobbed, and threw her arms about my shoulders, pulling me to her. “Don’t ever leave me, Dea!”
Her distress was so honest, so wrenching, that I returned the embrace. “Hush, Madonna, hush,” I murmured maternally. “I’ll stay as long as you like.”
I soothed her for several minutes until she finally fell quiet, then let loose a hiccup.
“I hated my father,” she said suddenly, her chin resting upon my shoulder. “Hated him.” I waited for her to speak of his heinous crimes, but instead, she added, “He never loved me—not at all. He loved my beauty. I was only a bauble to him, like his jewels or his choir or his mistresses . . . something he would parade in front of others to provoke their envy.”
“That’s not true,” I said perfunctorily, but she drew back and looked solemnly into my eyes.
“It is true, Dea. Men don’t deserve to be loved.”
“I knew one who did,” I said with sudden vehemence.
Caterina did not let me leave her that night. She would not even let me go to one of the cots, but insisted I lie beside her on her soft feather bed. She was exhausted from weeping and quickly fell asleep; I lay listening to her soft breath and thought about the duke, and Matteo, and the mysterious cards.
On the next day, the Feast of Saint John, news of the duke’s assassins arrived in the afternoon and spread swiftly throughout the court. Shortly after the murder, Lampugnani’s body had been stolen from the Church of Santo Stefano by a group of young toughs and dragged over the city’s cobblestones. By the time the crowd was done, the corpse was mutilated beyond recognition, and the citizens took gruesome glee in feeding the tattered remnants to pigs.
Visconti and the third conspirator, a youth named Olgiati, who had gone into hiding shortly after the murder, had been betrayed by relatives and captured; they were awaiting their fates in Porta Giovia’s dungeon. Bona had coolly sentenced them to the wheel, where they would be ripped in two from neck to loins while still alive.
According to her chambermaids, the duchess had not shed a single tear since hearing of her husband’s death. Newly widowed myself, I felt certain grief would soon overcome her, and wanted to be at her side when the storm finally broke. But one of Galeazzo’s attendants informed me that the duchess would not need my services that day; I was at liberty, except for the fact that I needed to gather up my belongings, as the court was to return to Pavia the very next morning.
I headed for my little closet, thinking to make quick work of packing. I had not made it far, however, when Caterina, curiously unaccompanied, came running after me. She was breathless and pale in a high-necked black velvet gown; her hair had not yet been crimped, but hung uncombed and tousled about her shoulders, free of nets or veils. Apparently she had seen me pass by her chambers while her ladies were in the midst of grooming her. I stopped and turned to look askance at her, until I noticed the red velvet box in her hands.
“Where are you going?” she gasped.
There was no point in lying; Caterina would have her way regardless. “To my closet, Madonna,” I admitted. I could scarcely lift my gaze from the box.
She looked about to reassure herself no one could hear us. A pair of launderesses were down at the far end of the loggia, laughing as they collected soiled linens from the rooms and paying us no heed.
“I will go with you,” she said softly.
I bowed to indicate assent. Together we entered the little closet adjacent to Bona’s chamber, and pulled the curtain so we would not be seen. I gestured for Caterina to sit upon the cot I shared with Francesca. She did so, and set the box down upon the mattress with a look of sly complicity.
With a small, triumphant smile, she said, “Ask me no questions; suffice it to say that Bona does not know I have the cards, and she need never know. You may keep them, on one condition.”
“That I read them for you, whenever you wish,” I said slowly. “Madonna, I cannot do that. Bona will discover the theft, and I will be blamed.” I picked up the box and proffered it to her. “This was a priceless gift to her from Lorenzo de’ Medici. It must be returned.”
She rose quickly and stamped her foot, a childishly imperious gesture. “You will obey me!”
She would have added the phrase, or I shall tell my father, but clearly realized that she had lost a great deal of bargaining power. Instead she sputtered and cast about for some new threat to evoke my obedience.
Softly, I responded, “Bona of Savoy is my mistress. I am obliged to obey her.”
“You took the cards from her once before!”
“Yes,” I allowed, “but that was before I saw how it offended her. Surely you have seen it, too, Madonna; she no longer trusts me with her whole heart. And now she is regent of Milan, and obliged to mete out justice. Should she find me to be a thief—with me knowing full well she did not want me to touch the cards ever again—she would be forced to punish me.”
Caterina sat back down and let go a grudging sigh. Without looking at me, she admitted, “That’s true. But . . .” She leaned sideways and lifted the diamond-studded lid, exposing the cards inside. They were facedown, revealing the floral design on the back. I reached for them involuntarily, and Caterina caught my wrist.
“Read them for me,” she said. “Tell me my future.”
The fire flared suddenly as it found a bit of pitch; Caterina and I both started. She laughed nervously, and let go of my wrist.
I took hold of the cards. “Only this once, Madonna,” I warned. My lip still felt the sting of the duke’s blow. “And if you wish me to be honest with you, you must swear that if the future is not to your liking, you will not turn your anger on me. Otherwise, I will confess everything to Bona.”
Caterina nodded eagerly in agreement. I did not trust her, but I also could not resist the cards.
Just as I had for the duke, I mixed the cards thoroughly, instructed Caterina to cut them, then gathered them up and set three cards facedown in front of her.
“The past,” I said, turning over the first card. Four golden goblets were painted against a white background decorated with green leaves and tiny flowers; a banner reading a bon droyt, rightfully, was unfurled across the center of the card. It was a motto often used by the Sforza, indicating that God had made them earthly princes because they were deserving of it.
Words came unbidden to my lips. “The Four of Cups. Luxury. A coddled childhood, and much wealth.” I paused; the shining, gilded cups held something as dark and bitter as the draught Bona had forced me to drink when Matteo had died. “Yet this is not a good thing, but a tarnished past to be overcome. This is a dream from which you must wake.”
I turned over the second card. There again was the image of a barefoot young man in rags, with a walking stick resting upon his shoulder.
“The present,” I said. “Once more, the Fool. The beginning of a long journey, one that will leave she who takes it much changed. The fool loses his naïveté in the end.”
Caterina leaned an elbow upon the desk and frowned down at the image. “Of course, we’re returning to Pavia, but there will be no more journeys after that.”
“Perhaps not immediately,” I countered, “but soon.” I turned over the third card, and announced, “The future.”
I had barely set it down again when Caterina reared up, almost knocking the cards from the bed.
“No!” she whispered harshly. “It’s a trick, all of it! You’re doing this to frighten me!”
She began to weep as I stared down at the image of the Tower, torn asunder by a lightning bolt. Abruptly, I saw myself standing inside a wall made of thick stone; not only Caterina but I, too, dwelled inside the very Tower that would someday be blasted to its foundations. I heard a sudden deafening boom, like thunder, and put my hand against the wall to steady myself. It trembled violently, but did not fall.
A second boom, and the wall quaked harder, but it did not crumble. Not yet.
But in time it would be lost, just as the duchy of Milan had been torn from Galeazzo’s iron grip.
My attention returned suddenly to Caterina; I cast about for whatever truth might calm her. I, too, was shaken. I had not wanted to scare her.
“This does not mean death,” I said honestly. “Not for you. You will not die as your father did, Madonna. But . . .” I gazed at the image, and fancied the ground shook beneath my feet. “This is an upheaval, an end to old ways. This is destruction.”
“I don’t want it!” Tears streaked Caterina’s cheeks as she wrung her hands. “I don’t want any trouble! A bon droyt! A bon droyt! Why does God give us noble blood? Why does He give us power, but refuse to protect us? It isn’t right!”
“Perhaps not,” I answered soothingly. “But the Tower stands a long way from you, and you have a long journey ahead. Perhaps along the way you will find the means to avert whatever disaster this represents.” I paused. “But there is one thing you must know.”
She looked over at me, stricken.
“These are castle walls. Your castle, Madonna. You will rule someday.”
She wiped her streaming eyes and nose upon her black sleeve and settled back onto the cot, faintly mollified.
“You must never leave me,” she said. “Never.”
Though I was sorely tempted to keep the triumph cards, I convinced Caterina to return them to the duchess’s trunk. Early the next morning, on the twenty-eighth of December, the court returned to bucolic Pavia. Bona traveled in a private carriage, accompanied only by Galeazzo’s right-hand man, Cicco, and the military adviser, Orfeo da Ricavo, in whose arms the duke had taken his last breath. I would have made my way on horseback, but Caterina insisted that I sit in the wagon beside her on the long ride home, along with Bona’s children and their nurses. Caterina had frantically demanded that I sleep in her chamber every night, and Bona kindly allowed it, even though I far preferred the duchess’s calm company to that of the duke’s selfish daughter. The weather had finally warmed, and a slow drizzle of rain accompanied us as the wagon’s wooden wheels slung mud on the soggy journey home.
Once back in Pavia, eight-year-old Gian Galeazzo and his younger brother, Ermes, moved into their father’s luxurious bedchamber, while their mother, Bona, declared herself regent and formally assumed power until Gian Galeazzo reached his majority. She spent her first day back privately consulting Cicco in the duke’s gloriously appointed study.
She summoned me briefly to the study, where she sat at Galeazzo’s huge ebony desk. The new regent of Milan looked haggard and distracted by numerous worries; at the same time, there was unmistakable relief, even lightness, in her gaze and bearing.
As Cicco looked on, Bona handed me a letter. I glanced down at it. It was dated the twenty-fourth of December, and it bore the signature of the abbott of the monastery of San Marco in Florence.
“You will be allowed to bury your husband at San Marco,” Bona said gently. “I have made arrangements for your travel. When you arrive in Florence, you will stay at the convent of Le Murate.”
I put my hand to my mouth in an effort to stifle a sob, but failed altogether. Bona rose from Galeazzo’s desk and wrapped her arms around me as I wept.
Late that afternoon, I resorted to subterfuge by asking Francesca to pack my things and leave them in Matteo’s room. After nightfall, when Caterina was fast asleep, I went to my husband’s chamber and retrieved his secret papers and the little black pouch containing the mysterious brown powder, and slipped them into the trunk Francesca had filled with my things.
At Caterina’s insistence, I lay beside her in her feather bed, and woke well before dawn. Happily, Galeazzo’s daughter did not stir, but lay so silent I could not hear her breath. I slipped from the bed, dressed quickly, and hurried down to Matteo’s chamber. Just before sunrise, a pair of grooms came to take my trunk, and the three of us headed for the stables. The cold, light mist settled upon my cheeks and eyelashes.
My covered wagon was waiting. The driver, who before age had taken its toll had been master of Bona’s stables, was a tall, skeletal man with sunken cheeks and a cottony white beard. Beside him sat his aged wife, a tiny, equally frail-looking creature with one blind, clouded eye. To my amazement, the driver leapt from his seat and helped the young grooms push my trunk into the back of the wagon with ease. He then caught my elbow and, with an arm thinner than my own, pulled me up into the wagon with impressive strength.
I would have sat beside the pair, but the driver, Gennaro, gestured emphatically for me to sit in the back, and held open the canvas flap for me; he pointed in the direction of the sun, which had just begun to infuse the thick, gathering clouds with a pinkish red glow. The mist would soon turn to cold rain.
I yielded, and crouched low as I moved inside the wagon, half of which was covered with cushions, pillows, and fur throws. The other half bore my trunk, and a coffin fashioned from fresh-hewn, fragrant pine.
I fell to my knees upon the cushions and threw my arms about the coffin as if it were Matteo himself; I put my cheek against the smooth, sanded wood and wept. I had known, of course, that my husband would accompany us, but I had not realized he would travel at my side.
Perhaps later we could go together to Florence.
In the distance, thundered rumbled, and the mist turned abruptly to steady rain. The driver called to the horses; the wagon shuddered and began to sway. I held fast to the coffin, and did not look up until I heard a girl shriek and the horses neigh. I poked my head out through the half-open flap and saw Caterina.
She was barefoot, clad only in her woolen nightgown, her long braid bouncing as she rushed toward the wagon. I watched, stricken, as she waved her arms, her face contorted with grief, and shrieked my name.
“Dea! Dea!”
Her desperation and fear were unfeigned, her voice so heartrendingly shrill that I squeezed my eyes shut.
I retreated back into the wagon and clutched the coffin, sobbing, until distance and pelting rain swallowed the sound of her cries.
Chapter Eight
We traveled southeast across the plain, along the banks of the Po, and crossed the rushing waters at San Pietro, before the river grew wildly serpentine. From dawn to dusk I rode inside the covered wagon next to the pine coffin, my palm pressed to the wood as if it were Matteo’s hand. From time to time, the rain grew deafening as it pelted the canvas, but it stopped altogether as we passed Piacenza’s city walls in the late afternoon; I opened the back flap and glimpsed the region known as the Emilia, its hillsides terraced with vineyards. We did not pause there, but continued half an hour after the sun had set, coming to rest finally at an inn. By then, I was chilled to the bone; the wagon’s interior had been so cold I could see my breath.
There was but one room to be found, so I took the straw mattress while the driver and his wife—who, I learned, was totally deaf—lay snoring upon pillows on the floor. While they slept like the dead, I left the candle burning and delved into my trunk to take out Matteo’s papers. I meant to slip them into my cloak, intending to read them the next day, but was so restless that I began to read On the Egyptian Mysteries, attributed to Iamblichus.
I did not read for long. It had been four years since I had applied myself to Latin, and my understanding was at times wanting, but what I understood frightened me. Iamblichus spoke of pagan gods, demons, astrology—and a personal demon whose name could be known by studying one’s natal stars. Worse, it spoke of telling the future: Ecstasy or alienation of mind is the basis of divination, also the mania which accompanies disease.
Troubled, I soon left off reading. Even so, I slipped the papers into my cloak; if Matteo had thought this subject worthy, I was obliged to understand why.
The next day we passed Parma, and more carefully terraced rows of grapevines, bare and gnarled in winter. I had no opportunity to read more; the elderly wife had begun to cough, and I made her lie in the wagon beside Matteo while I sat beside the old driver and stared at the nearby Apennine Mountains, forested with bare-limbed chestnut, beech, and oak.
That night we stopped some hours past Modena. This time, the accommodations were better, and I had my own room. I stayed up quite late rereading Iamblichus; at the manuscript’s end was a letter in the vernacular, written in the same modern hand that had provided the translation of the ancient Greek ritual, yet not part of it.
To my beloved, it said,
This is in reference to the ritual I sent for your edification, in hopes it—and this translation of Iamblichus of Syria, a follower of our dear Plato—will set you well upon the path to union with the Divine.
The ritual predates both men by centuries, but was assuredly used by them and their students. Its purpose: to invoke the personal daemon, as the Greeks called him; we know him better as the Holy Guardian Angel, that divine inner genius which guides our soul surely to union with its Creator. For God cannot be grasped through the mind, or through contemplation alone, but through the heart, which is exalted in ritual. As a pagan, Iamblichus was not blessed with the knowledge of our Savior, and so much of his writing reflects this ignorance, but much of it is of great use to us today. I am of the belief that God granted His grace even to the heathens, in order that those ignorant of Christ yet men of good will could come to know Him through the dedicated practice of the rite of the Bornless One.
How shall we know, you ask, whether the ritual has been successful? Heed Iamblichus, who says, “The arrival of the archangels is preceded by the appearance of light.”
Of the angel, I must say little, for each man has his own, and each soul must travel its own path to divine union; one man’s salvation cannot be another’s. It is therefore imperative that once you have attained conversation with the angel, you speak of it to no one, lest you fall into the error of believing that you alone have a special connection to the Divine, or that the lessons meant for you alone should be inflicted upon others.
As for the precious contents of the little bag: Immediately before commencing the ritual, take half a small spoonful, no more; use wine to cut the bitterness. See that it never falls into the hands of the profane, or is used wastefully. This, too, must be accomplished in strict privacy, and never be mentioned to outsiders.
May this rite, which was handed down to us by the ancients, guide you to a greater knowledge of the One Who created us all.
In eternal friendship,
Your servant,
Marsilio
On the third day, the wife was so ill that she lay coughing all day inside the wagon; I sat beside the driver again as we skirted the mountains. The weather was dry, sunny, and mild, and remained that way on the fourth day. We stopped at other inns, but I read no more; the letter by the mysterious Marsilio had assuaged some of my fears, but raised other uncomfortable questions. I remained puzzled, confused, thoroughly intrigued.
Late on the morning of the fifth day, we passed over a series of gentle hills; at the apex of the last one, I spied Florence, nestled in the basin below, and let go a gasp of appreciation. Beneath a dazzling blue sky, the city looked golden, its southern flank bisected by the winding silver Arno. As we descended, the separate rooftops grew distinct, and the driver, who knew the city well, began to point out landmarks. The greatest of them, dominating the skyline, was the vast orange-red dome of the great cathedral, Santa Maria del Fiore, Our Lady of the Lilies, matched in height only by its slender campanile; farther south lay the tower of the Palazzo della Signoria, the Palace of Lords, seat of the city’s government.
Most of the buildings were made of stone—some of the costly pietra serena, a dove gray rock that turned shimmering white in the strong sun, others of a pale brown or gold. Some were of stucco, but almost all had the same orange-red brick roof and were built in the classical style, which lent a pleasant uniformity. Perhaps it was the light or the clement weather or the languid hills that embraced the outskirts, but I judged Florence to be the prettiest city I had ever seen. Next to it, Milan seemed drab and cold and dirty.
We passed through the northern gate onto the broad, cobblestoned Via Larga, swarming with pedestrians, wagons, carriages, horses, and street merchants; the sun hung at mid-heaven, and all over the city, church bells were chiming to mark Sext, the sixth hour after sunrise. From the upper-floor windows of all the buildings, fluttering banners hung. Most bore the city standard, a bright red fleur-de-lis against a white background, or the Medici crest, a gold shield adorned with six balls, five of them red and the topmost blue, with tiny gold stylized lilies.
I was so exhilarated that I wanted to keep riding, but we arrived at San Marco all too quickly, and the wagon wheels slowed to a stop at last. I was disappointed; I had wanted a cathedral with a great dome and tall spires for Matteo, but instead saw a spare single-nave church with a bland stone façade, and tucked next to it, a square, plain, two-story cloister. I climbed down from the wagon, my legs wobbly from disuse, and waited with the horses while the driver entered the monastery.
He returned with a lay brother, Domenico, a cheerful young man with red curls who wore a white tunic and scapular beneath a black cape that fell below his ankles. Domenico led me just inside the cloister, to a public area known as the chapter house. He explained in a whisper that San Marco’s church and convent had been some two hundred years old when Lorenzo de’ Medici’s grandfather, Cosimo, paid for their renovation thirty years earlier; the crumbling wood and mortar were replaced by the more durable and handsome pietra serena and cream stucco.
I sat, only half listening as Domenico spoke in hushed tones. He told me that the abbot was expecting me, and that the next afternoon at None, the ninth hour after dawn, a service for Matteo would be held in the sanctuary, followed by burial in the churchyard. I left, relieved that I had survived the discussion without tears, and returned to the waiting driver, his wife, and the now-empty wagon.
We continued south down the wide Via Larga and the driver continued his narration. He pointed out the home of Lorenzo the Magnificent, an unremarkable, square, three-story fortress of stone, with the Medici banner hanging from every window.
The driver pointed straight ahead. “And that way lies the church of San Lorenzo, where Lorenzo’s father and grandfather are buried.”
We rolled past similar palazzos and gardens, then artists’ workshops, goldsmiths, and jewelers. Not long after, we approached the massive cathedral of Florence, also called the Duomo because of its magically unsupported dome, the largest in all the world. Across from it stood the pale stone octagon of the Baptistry of Saint John, its gilded bronze doors dazzling in the sun.
We turned east to drive alongside the long stone spine of the cathedral, and followed the road as it curved due south again. Eventually, we came to a grim, four-story fortress with a crenellated tower, which housed the city magistrate; there we veered sharply left onto the Via Ghibellina. A few minutes later, the driver pulled the horses over to the curb.
“The convent of Le Murate,” he announced, and hopped down from his seat to help me down.
I descended to find a long expanse of stone wall broken by a tall, narrow wooden gate. Two rusting iron grates, one at the level of my eyes, the other of my ankles, were set into the door; the uppermost grate was covered on the inside by a black cloth. While the driver waved down a street lad to help him fetch my trunk, I clanged the brass knocker and called out softly; as I did, I caught a sudden whiff of vinegar and felt inexplicably nauseated.
Within a few minutes, the gate opened far enough to allow the driver to shove my trunk inside the door, though he was not allowed entry himself. He promised to come for me the next afternoon, and as I passed through the convent walls I saw the vinegar—used to prevent plague—in a bucket that held alms thrown through the grate by passersby.
Le Murate was old but in good repair and very clean; the furnishings were spare but elegant and comfortable, even by the court of Milan’s standards. The abbess, who had received Bona’s letter, welcomed me personally and gratefully accepted the duchess’s generous donation, which I pressed into her palm. Even so, the place evoked a strange anxiety in me.
I went at once to the cell assigned me, closed my door, and studied the star rituals written in Matteo’s hand. “For banishing,” he had written beneath the first, “start here.” I was not certain I wanted to know what needed banishing, but the alternative was to sit and think deeply on the funeral that was to come. I chose instead to practice drawing the five-pointed stars in the air with my index finger, the way I had seen Matteo do it in the darkness. I began, also, to memorize the strange words that went with the banishing. I did not emerge from my cell until supper; afterward I walked the grounds alone, and came upon the carefully tended gardens. In the center of them stood an unusual tree: a cedar, as tall as four men standing upon each other’s shoulders, its branches broad and sweeping.
The sight jolted me, as if I had seen Matteo himself standing there. I hurried to the tree and reached past the bristling blue-green needles to press my hand to the bark; it was ridged and rough, as I knew it would be, though I had supposedly never seen such a tree before. I leaned against it and drew in its pungent fragrance; tears came to my eyes as I heard a woman’s voice whisper in my memory.
A cedar of Lebanon.
My mother’s voice. The convent’s outer walls loomed close and began to spin; I closed my eyes, panicked. The Duomo’s red cupola, the cobblestoned streets, the whitewashed convent walls, even the grates on the door and the smell of vinegar . . . hadn’t I recognized them all?
I do not know this place, I told myself firmly, and hurried back to my cell through halls grown terrifyingly familiar.
That night, I silently performed Matteo’s banishing ritual, and did not emerge from my cell until the next day at half past two, when it was time to leave for my husband’s funeral.
The driver delivered me to the main entrance of the church of San Marco, where the redheaded Brother Domenico waited for me. He led me into a modest chapel, where a small candelabrum burned in front of a magnificent altarpiece painted with a scene of the Last Judgment. Nearby, a balding priest was lighting coals for the censer, muttering prayers as he did so. Two monks in white tunics and black capes stood together just left of the altar, and lowered their gazes as I entered.
As the church was the recipient of the Medicis’ charity, there were wooden chairs for the worshippers. In the last row sat a tall, spare woman dressed in a rich but modest gown of dark gray velvet; her face and bowed head were veiled in black silk gauze. She did not look up as I passed, but kept her head inclined toward the rosary in her prayer-steepled hands.
Domenico deposited me in my seat, in the first row directly before the altar, and departed without a word to the woman. The priest sprinkled frankincense upon the now-hot coals, and put the lid on the censer; smoke streamed out through the holes. Swinging the censer from a chain, he made his way down the aisle, chanting. I turned as the door to the chapel opened and Domenico and five other men carried Matteo’s casket as far as the threshold. There they waited while the priest censed the casket, then took a brass asperger from the font by the door and sprinkled Matteo with holy water.
As he did, the two monks by the altar began to sing a hollow, aching melody.
De profundis clamavi ad te, Domine . . .
Out of the depths have I cried unto Thee, O Lord . . .
The priest then led the slow procession into the chapel. I turned away, struggling to contain my tears, and did not look at the coffin again until the priest took his place at the altar, and the pallbearers gently set the casket down a few steps from him.
For the first time, I noticed the pallbearers. One was Brother Domenico and two others his fellow monks. But three of the men were wealthy gentlemen, given their exceedingly fine but unostentatious clothes. The first was small and delicate-looking, with graying red-gold hair; the second was Matteo’s age, young, handsome, dark-haired and muscular. And the third was Lorenzo de’ Medici.
At the sight of Lorenzo, my tenuous grip on my emotions failed. Tears spilled from me, hot and fierce. I remembered Matteo’s suffering on that last horrible night; I thought of how Lorenzo must have waited for him and finally realized that something had gone horribly wrong.
I heard Matteo’s ragged whisper: Tell Lorenzo . . .
I remember little else of the ceremony—only the sacred Host dry upon my tongue, and the priest circling the coffin twice with more incense, more holy water. Only when it was over, and the pallbearers returned to take the coffin, did I realize that they had been sitting behind me the entire time.
The priest caught my arm and led me after the coffin; as I left the chapel, the tall veiled woman rose and stood respectfully.
We went to a deep hole flanked by a large mound of reddish dirt in the churchyard; the gravediggers were waiting for us, leaning on their shovels. The coffin was set upon ropes, which the diggers used to lower it into the ground. Matteo was laid to rest so that his head lay due east of his feet, since Christ would appear in the eastern sky when He returned to raise the dead.
Lorenzo and the younger man flanked the veiled woman, their arms wound about hers in support; the delicate middle-aged man stood on Lorenzo’s other side and dabbed at his red-rimmed eyes. They remained a short distance from me, as if unwilling to intrude on my grief.
I listened, dazed, as the priest spoke of Saint Martha and her profession of faith that her brother would indeed rise from the dead.
At last, the priest made the sign of the cross over the grave, and chanted: Requiem aeternam dona ei, Domine, et lux perpetua luceat ei . . .
It was over. At the priest’s prompting, I clutched a fistful of cold, wet soil and sprinkled it onto Matteo’s coffin. The other four mourners watched me, hesitant. I turned to them, gesturing at the mound of earth.
“Please,” I said.
The woman was first to add her handful of dirt; the men followed. Once I had handed a coin to the priest for his services, and a purse for the monastery from Bona to Brother Domenico, the gravediggers took to their work with haste. I turned to the others.
“Ser Lorenzo,” I asked, “may I have a private word with you?”
He nodded, and moved to my side; the others retreated a few steps, while Lorenzo led me over to a bare-limbed tree, swollen with pink-red bud in response to the unusually mild weather. I tried not to flinch each time a clod of earth struck Matteo’s coffin.
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/jeanne-kalogridis/the-scarlet-contessa/) на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.
Jeanne Kalogridis
From Jeanne Kalogridis, critically acclaimed author of The Borgia Bride, Painting Mona Lisa and The Devil’s Queen, comes another irresistible historical novel about a countess whose passion and willfulness knew no bounds: Caterina Sforza.Daughter of the Duke of Milan and wife of the conniving Count Girolamo Riario, Caterina Sforza was the bravest warrior Renaissance Italy ever knew. She ruled her own lands, fought her own battles, and openly took lovers whenever she pleased.Her remarkable tale is told by her lady-in-waiting, Dea, a woman knowledgeable in reading the ‘triumph cards’ – the predecessor of modern-day Tarot. As Dea tries to unravel the truth about her husband’s murder, Caterina single-handedly holds off invaders who would steal her title and lands. However, Dea’s reading of the cards reveals that Caterina cannot withstand a third and final invader – none other than Cesare Borgia, son of the corrupt Pope Alexander VI, who has an old score to settle with Caterina. Trapped inside the Fortress at Ravaldino as Borgia’s cannons pound the walls, Dea reviews Caterina’s scandalous past and struggles to understand their joint destiny, while Caterina valiantly tries to fight off Borgia’s unconquerable army.
The
Scarlet Contessa
A NOVEL OF THE ITALIAN RENAISSANCE
JEANNE KALOGRIDIS
Dedication (#u8d88a456-e87d-5eed-9532-78be0b2239e1)
FOR HELEN,
FOR SAVING MY LIFE
Contents
Cover (#u9687c88f-fdc3-5358-86b4-9e32494be0b2)
Title Page (#ub9f6bc81-c37a-52ac-9780-eba076111c3e)
Dedication
The Tower
Prologue
PART I
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
PART II
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
PART III
Chapter Twenty-six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
Chapter Thirty-two
Chapter Thirty-three
Chapter Thirty-four
Chapter Thirty-five
Chapter Thirty-six
Afterword
Acknowledgements
About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)
Also by Jeanne Kalogridis
Copyright
About the Publisher
The Tower
Ravaldino Fortress
December 10, 1499
Prologue
The end of the world will arrive, say the mendicant preachers, on the first of January 1500; God can no longer bear the deeds of evil men and will strike them down. That most famous Cassandra, the monk Savonarola of Florence, says that God is especially outraged by the blatant sexual crimes of Pope Alexander VI, who brought his sixteen-year-old mistress and his illegitimate children to live with him in the Vatican.
On that terrible day, the prophets say, the earth will shake until it crumbles to dust, and we sinners will fall howling to our knees. For the wicked there will be no mercy. Those of us who have been faithless will be cast forever into the lake of fire. The world will perish in a cataclysm, and a new kingdom will take its place.
Christmas is a fortnight away, which means the coming wrath of God is barely three weeks away, according to the faithful. I wonder whether my lady Caterina and I will live long enough to see it.
For now, however, it is midnight, and beyond Ravaldino’s fortress walls all is quiet. I lie upon the little cot in my lady’s roomy closet—used now for storing ammunition and gunpowder instead of Caterina’s headdresses and gowns, and thus stinking of war. I yearn for sleep, but it does not come easily these days.
Especially not tonight, with the noise emanating from the bed out in my lady’s chamber. My arm has gone numb, and to wake it, I turn over on the narrow cot; it is lumpy and uncomfortable, and I am unused to sleeping on it. This leaves me facing the velvet curtain that covers the closet door.
Unfortunately, it does not cover it well enough. The swath of velvet is slightly too narrow, and through the cracks between it and the stone, I glimpse Caterina sitting up in the middle of her large bed, illuminated by the lamp on the night table. She is entirely naked, and the light infuses her white skin with a warm glow, as if she has been dipped in honey; her torso is long and lean, her waist, after many children, narrow. Her back is to me as she straddles her supine lover, and as she rides him vigorously, the handsome muscles of her shoulders, back, and arms ripple, and her thick dark blond braid, terminating at the base of her spine, swings like a pendulum across her back.
Her latest lover, Giovanni di Casale, lies passively beneath her, groaning with pleasure and exhaustion, his head thrown back against the pillow, his long, bony legs emerging from beneath my lady’s firm buttocks. He is forty—only four years older than the insatiable Caterina—but he seems twenty decades older. He is red-haired, balding, with flabby skin the unhealthy white of a fish’s belly; Caterina reaches out to brace herself against his chest for a moment, and his skin jiggles beneath her hands. He is my lady’s secretary, not a soldier.
After a full day of leading military drills and testing the artillery, the Contessa Caterina Sforza, Lady of Forlì, is still full of lust and energy. She releases her hold on Giovanni’s freckled chest and circles her hips atop his in a slow, grinding motion, as if to crush him. Inspired, Giovanni releases a gasp of mounting ecstasy.
The scene causes a faint, pleasurable stirring between my own legs, but anxiety steals my desire to seek release. Instead, I squeeze my eyes shut and turn my back to the curtain, wishing I had the energy to stick my fingers into my ears.
It is hard enough to sleep these days, even without such an interruption. A week ago, we left the comfort of Paradise, the name Caterina had given her magnificent apartments inside the fortress, with their breathtaking view of the nearby Apennine Mountains. A week before that, she secretly sent all her valuables—fine gowns, jewelry, furniture, carpets, as well as all her children, save one—to the safe haven of Florence. Now we are in the most secure tower in the fortress of Ravaldino, on the edge of the town Forlì, which Caterina rules. She is contessa, too, of Imola, a larger town half a day’s ride away, which is now under attack by the Pope’s army.
If Imola falls, odds are we shall fall, too.
There are few windows here in the main tower, no paintings or tapestries covering the drab walls, no carpets upon the rough stone floors, no furniture save for the bed, a single armoire, a night table, and a table for the washbasin, above which hangs the large, finely polished mirror Caterina insisted on bringing. The Lady of Forlì’s cries of pleasure grow louder and more urgent, joining with those of Giovanni, finally fully inspired by her efforts.
Just as Giovanni lets go a howl of ecstatic release—and my lady laughs softly with delight at his abandon—a hammering comes at the thick wood and iron door. There is such urgency in the knock that I roll from my cot at once, slip the shawl folded near my pillow over my shoulders, and push the curtain to the closet aside. Politely, I avert my gaze as the lovers hastily uncouple, pull on their clothing, and move quickly to the door.
“Who calls?” I shout.
“Ridolfo Naldi, come from the fortress of Imola this night. I bear a message from my brother, Dionigi.”
A thrill—hope and fear combined—passes through me. I peer through the peephole to confirm the identity of the messenger, and to ensure that he is alone. Satisfied, I nod over my shoulder at Caterina, who then curtly tells her lover with the brisk authority of a military commander: “Ser Giovanni. Fetch my son at once.”
She nods at me to open the door.
I do. It swings outward; Giovanni exits and Ridolfo enters. The two men pass each other closely, emphasizing the difference in height and build. Giovanni is short and rather slender, though soft and unmuscled; Ridolfo is a full head taller and almost thrice as wide. His head is entirely bald, with folds of skin at the base of his burly skull; his neck is as broad as Caterina’s thigh. Yet the huge hands that clutch his cap are trembling, and his round, thick features are slack with shock and fright. As Caterina gestures, rather impatiently, at him, he steps heavily inside; a pungent waft of aged sweat emanates from him as he passes. His blue uniform, clearly worn for days on end, is stained from the oil used to lubricate the cannons. As I close the door behind him, he does not merely genuflect, but sinks to his knees in front of the contessa.
I have met Ridolfo many times. Like his brother, Dionigi—castellan of the fortress at Imola—he is no coward, yet there is such panic in his eyes I expect him to start weeping at any instant. My lady and I know, of course, what he is about to say, but I will not allow myself to believe it until I hear the words.
“Your Illustrious Excellency,” he says to Caterina. His voice, too high pitched for so great a body, wavers. “I bring news from my brother.”
“So you’ve said,” Caterina replies softly, and waits.
Ridolfo draws a shuddering breath and releases said news in a torrent. “The citizens, perhaps you know, all surrendered to the Duke of Valentino’s army without a struggle. My brother, Dionigi, was able to hold the fortress for you . . . but Valentino’s artillery breached the wall at last. Dionigi fought courageously and well, but without the support of the city, he could not hold them off forever.” He bows his head and releases a small sob. “Dionigi showed such bravery. He is wounded, Your Illustriousness, in the head. Even after it was clear he would be defeated, and despite his pain, Dionigi would not surrender, would not leave his post, would not listen to the duke’s threats and promises. He was so persistent in his loyalty to you, in his willingness to die for you, that Valentino was moved. He granted my brother a three-day truce, so that Dionigi might send me to you, to ask whether you wish to send reinforcements to try to hold the fortress.”
As he speaks, a burning chill has forced its way upward from the base of my spine and spread outward, leaving me sickened.
The Lady of Forlì turns her face away from the kneeling giant; her lips twist with fury. “Bastards,” she mutters. “Dionigi would have prevailed if they hadn’t spread their legs like whores for Valentino!”
She is speaking of her subjects in Imola, who so feared the duke’s army that they surrendered to him before he ever entered the city.
“They have paid for it, Your Illustriousness,” Ridolfo says. “Valentino’s army has pillaged the city and raped every woman, even those in the convent. The duke himself took the prettiest women; it’s said he sleeps with a new one every night.”
At this, Caterina’s anger hardens. She composes herself, squares her shoulders, smoothes her brow, and assumes an air of dignity and confidence. Were it not for her disheveled hair and rumpled chemise, one might think she was holding court. But a long moment passes before she can gather herself to speak.
“Valentino knows that I can spare no troops,” she says at last. “The fortress is lost, through no fault of Ser Dionigi’s. He has behaved admirably. I must know, however, what the duke plans for him.”
“He will allow Dionigi and his men to leave the fortress with a safe escort to Forlì,” Ridolfo answers swiftly. “The duke is sincere, Your Illustriousness, else he would not have let me come. He says . . .” His voice begins to tremble again. “He says to tell you that he is coming next for you.”
Caterina lifts a golden brow at the duke’s threat, but otherwise refuses to respond to it. “Go back to Imola,” she tells Ridolfo, “and relay our deep gratitude to Ser Dionigi. Tell him he has discharged his duty with honor, and that I am releasing him and his men from my service.”
“Thank you, Your Illustriousness!” Ridolfo’s broad face crumples with relief; he puts his massive hands to his eyes and weeps briefly, then looks up, cheeks and eyes shining. “May I . . . that is, my brother wished to know, with all respect . . . Does this mean you will now release his wife and children, that they might join him?”
Caterina lets go a short laugh; apparently she forgot that she had secured Dionigi’s excessive loyalty by imprisoning his family. “Of course, of course!”
Just as Ridolfo thanks her profusely, the Lady of Forlì’s lover and secretary, Giovanni, reappears with her eldest son, twenty-year-old Ottaviano. Caterina takes her secretary aside, all business, and whispers detailed instructions to him. When she is finished, Giovanni nods and helps the overwhelmed Ridolfo to his feet. The two disappear out the door, and Caterina turns her attention to her son while I try not to be noticed. Caterina is not shy about sending me away when she desires privacy; the fact that she has not dismissed me means that she wishes me to remain. And so I watch, at a respectful distance, the poignant exchange between mother and son.
Ottaviano is not an easy youth to love. He is as slothful and unmotivated as his mother is tireless and ambitious, as full of complaints as she is courage. Nor did he inherit Caterina’s good looks, wit, or athletic talent. Though she has drilled him in the martial arts daily for months, his cheeks and body have not lost their childish plumpness; the swell of his belly is easily visible beneath his long wool nightshirt. His nose and lips are broad and thick, his face round, his general demeanor one of listlessness. He wears his dull brown hair in the manner of a page, chopped short so that it falls three fingers below his chin, with straight bangs ending just above his eyebrows. Even now, after the urgent summons to his mother’s quarters in the middle of the night, he is still rubbing his eyes and scowling fretfully at being awakened. Though he is already twenty years old and will soon be the ruler of Imola and Forlì, he has little interest in the details of government and prefers to leave such matters in his mother’s hands.
Caterina steps up to him and puts her arms upon his shoulders. He is less than half a head taller than she is, but much, much broader.
“My son,” she says briskly, without drama. “The fortress at Imola has fallen. Ser Giovanni is fetching a scout; he will guide you to Florence. We cannot wait another minute. Your trunk and horse will be waiting at the western gate. Get ready at once and go to them.”
“Imola has fallen?” Ottaviano’s eyes widen; he seems honestly surprised, as if he had expected some other news to have caused Caterina to drag him from his bed at such an hour. “Mother, are you sure?” He glances to me as if seeking another opinion; I drop my gaze.
“Yes,” my lady says firmly. “We’ve discussed this several times. Now we must act.” She leans forward on tiptoe and kisses the center of his forehead. “Go. I will see you again soon—here, in this very fortress, when Valentino has been routed.”
He hesitates. “But . . . are you sure you will be safe?”
Caterina laughs at the question and gives him a little shove. “Foolish boy! Hurry! Others will be waiting for you.”
Ottaviano gives her a last woeful look; apparently this is the first time he has considered that he ought not leave his mother to fight the French and papal armies alone. But Caterina pushes him again, this time with a hint of irritation. He gives her a slow, solemn kiss on the lips, then turns and lumbers out of the chamber.
“I will summon you home as soon as it is safe,” Caterina calls after him, her tone gay.
Once the door has closed behind him, her false cheer evaporates; she goes to the bed and sits down abruptly, heavily, on the edge. She presses her palms to her eyes, and as her lips suddenly contort, I go to stand beside her, and rest a hand gently upon her shoulder.
“I’m all right,” she says from behind her hands, but I hear the tears in her voice. We remain as we are for a long moment, and then she lowers one hand and pats the mattress beside her. “Giovanni is not coming back tonight. Sleep here, beside me.”
I do as I am told, and lie down beside her. For a long time, she does not extinguish the bedside lamp, but stares up at the ceiling, thinking. I close my eyes and do my best to feign sleep. After an hour, perhaps two, Caterina puts out the light. Some time later, I can tell from her breath that she will not fall asleep. Nor will I. We lie awake together until dawn, each of us lost in dread of what is to come.
News of Imola’s fall spreads quickly throughout the town of Forlì; Valentino’s massive army is only two days’ march away. By the following evening, two town elders come to Ravaldino’s fortress, where the Contessa of Forlì has taken refuge.
Unfortunately, I am not available to serve as my lady’s ever-present talisman at the meeting. Caterina indulged in a hot bath half an hour before, and I am making use of the still-warm water when the elders arrive and request an audience with my lady. She gives me leave to remain behind, even though I suspect the citizens’ appearance does not bode well. I therefore bathe as quickly as possible, and struggle to pull my chemise and gown over still-damp skin.
The encounter between Caterina and the elders lasts only minutes. By the time I hurry out of Caterina’s new chamber and up the vertiginous steps to Paradise—the lavish apartment she had built for herself in more peaceful times and where she receives all her guests—the elders, Ser Ludovico and Ser Niccolò, are coming down the stairs and pass me. With them is one of the contessa’s personal bodyguards, guiding them out of the maze that is Ravaldino Fortress.
They nod politely and cordially enough to me, though they seem preoccupied—who would not be, with Valentino’s army on the way? I nod in response and make way for them to pass, deeply relieved that they seem calm. Obviously, there had been no argument with the contessa; perhaps they had come to express support for her.
Buoyed, I lift my skirts and hurry upstairs to find Caterina in the nearly bare reception chamber. She has left her chair, behind which a second impassive bodyguard stands, and is on her toes at the window, craning her neck to stare down at the stone courtyard Ser Niccolò and Ser Ludovico will cross on their way out of the fortress.
When I enter and pause to curtsy, she jerks her head over her shoulder to look back at me, and I know in an instant that all is lost.
“Bastard!” she swears. “Son of a filthy whore . . . !” Her lips are trembling, her teeth gritted, her blue eyes wide with rage. I do not move, but remain genuflected as she turns her face back to the window and continues her tirade.
“Luffo Numai!” she shouts. Numai is the richest man in Forlì; he has served on the city council for some years and considers himself the spokesman for the townspeople. “That’s who it was—that’s the traitor! He convinced them all that they had no chance with me, that Valentino’s army would slaughter them, that they were safer surrendering to him.” She lets go a wild laugh. “They’ll learn soon enough what becomes of those who trust the Duke of Valentino!”
I lift my head. “The Forlivese?” I whisper.
“They will not fight in my defense,” she says, still facing the window. The bitter words steam the glass, and she wipes them away angrily as she stares down at the courtyard below. “They are sending a messenger to Valentino to tell him so. And according to my apologetic guests, it was Luffo Numai who worked tirelessly to convince the citizens that surrender was their only hope for survival. Many of the people supported me, wanted to raise their swords for me, but Numai bullied them until they gave in.” She lurches toward the window as her eye catches something below. “Hah! There they go!”
She turns toward me, skirts whirling, words tumbling out of her so rapidly I can scarcely follow them. “I was polite to Niccolò and Ludovico, of course. I was gracious; I told them that, given the fall of Imola, I could not expect the citizens of Forlì to defend me. But they would have, had it not been for Numai. How much money, do you think, Valentino promised him? And governorship, of course, since Valentino will not be able to look after the cities himself.”
She moves swiftly to the chair and throws on her cloak, then strides out of the chamber, through the door, and down the same steps Niccolò and Ludovico had recently trodden; since she continues to address me, I follow, breathless from the effort to keep pace with her.
“Numai thinks he will steal my lands from me,” she says darkly, “and from my sons, but he will pay. The bastard will pay! I will see to it personally.”
I follow her down to the second level, where tunnels have been cut deep into the stone wall to accommodate artillery. Caterina leads me to the end of one of them and calls to a nearby soldier.
“Bring the gunners!” she shouts, and as the soldier runs off to obey, Caterina moves to the side of one of the long bronze cannons, which is tilted upward forty-five degrees.
My lady does not need to search for the long-handled ladle, or the great wooden box that houses the gunpowder; she knows where both are kept, and fills the ladle full of the sulfurous powder with practiced ease, then pushes it down the cannon’s long barrel. At her bidding, I run and fetch a huge handful of hay to serve as wadding from a pile kept near the gunpowder box, and the long wooden rammer.
As I drop the hay into the muzzle and push it down with the rammer, Caterina goes to fetch the ball from a large pyramid-shaped stack. She staggers beneath the weight of the dressed stone sphere; she can carry it only crouched over, in both hands, with the ball at mid-thigh. But carry it she does, and as she steps toward the muzzle, I join her, and together we manage to lift the ball high enough to push it into the barrel.
By this time, six gunners have finally assembled, and they take over the rest of the duties.
“Aim it at Numai’s palace,” Caterina orders, knowing full well the likelihood of accurately striking such a distant target at dusk is poor. Even so, she watches avidly as one of the artillerymen uses a weighted plummet line to find the true perpendicular, then measures the angle with a quadrant and adjusts the muzzle accordingly. And when at last the metal cover is lifted at the cannon’s base, and the botefeux holding the lighted match is applied to the touchhole, she claps her hands with dark glee.
“For you, Luffo Numai!” she cries, a split second before the officer in charge waves us back, then orders:
“Fire!”
I flinch and put my hands over my ears.
At once, I find myself living the fortune-telling card known as the Tower. The cannon roars, paining my ears, and the heavy stone of the fortress walls, of the solid floor beneath my feet, trembles. In my mind, I feel myself falling, falling amid shattered stone, to the ground, to certain doom, to the end of everything I know.
At Caterina’s command, the cannon fires again, and again.
The Lady of Forlì and I have been through the experience of the Tower twice now, and survived. But this third time will surely be our last.
In the midst of the deafening song of the artillery, I see our end and our beginning. And my mind turns to the distant past. . . .
PART I
Milan
December 1476–April 1477
Chapter One
At dusk the screams came—outraged, feminine, shrill. We would never have marked them had it not been for the smoke and the singers’ sudden silence. I heard them eight days before Christmas as I stood in the loggia, gasping in stinging cold air from the open window, brusquely unshuttered by a quick-thinking servant.
A moment earlier, I had been sitting in front of the snapping hearth in the duchess’s quarters while one of her chambermaids roasted pignoli on a wood-handled iron peel—treats for the ducal heir, seven-year-old Gian Galeazzo Sforza, who stared blankly into the flames while his nurse brushed out the straw-colored curls covering his frail shoulders. Beside him sat his six-year-old brother, Ermes—thick-limbed and thick-waisted, slow to move or think—with a straight cap of dull red hair. To their left sat their mother, Duchess Bona, a sheer white veil wrapped about her coiled, muddy braids, her lips pursed as she squinted down at the needle and silk in her plump hands. She was twenty-seven and matronly; God had dealt her a stout frame, squat limbs, and a short, thick neck that dwarfed her broad face. Though her features were not unpleasant—her nose was short and round, her skin powder-soft and fine, her teeth small and fairly even—she had a low forehead with thick, overwhelming eyebrows. Her profile was flat, her eyes wide set, her small chin lost in folds of fat, most of it acquired after the birth of her first child; yet at the court of Duke Galeazzo, to my thinking, there was no lovelier soul.
To Bona’s left sat the duke’s two natural daughters, results of his dalliance with a courtier’s wife. The elder, Caterina, was, at thirteen, an example of physical perfection, with a lithe body that promised full breasts, clear skin, and a straight, well-proportioned nose, though her lips were rather thin. Two attributes propelled her past mere attractiveness into true beauty: full, loose curls of a gold so pale and bright it glittered in the sun, and eyes of a blue so intense that many who met her for the first time let go an involuntary gasp. The effect was enhanced by the natural confidence of her gaze. That afternoon, however, her gaze was sullen, for she had no patience with the needle and she hated sitting still; she paused often in her embroidery to glare at the fire and emit sighs of vexation. Had it been summer, she would have ignored the duchess’s insistence on a sewing lesson and joined her father on the hunt, or gone riding with her brothers, or chased them across the sprawling courtyard. No matter that such activities were exceedingly inappropriate for a young woman, already betrothed and certain to wed within three years. Caterina had no fear of the duchess’s wrath, not just because Bona was disinclined to anger, but also because her father the duke favored her and rarely allowed her to be punished.
The same could not be said of her nine-year-old sister, Chiara, a rail-thin, timid mouse with bulging brown eyes and a narrow, sharp-featured face. For all the attention the duke showed Caterina, Chiara—a slow-witted, obedient girl—received only his unwarranted abuse; she rarely met another’s gaze and kept close to Bona’s side. For Bona’s heart was so great that she treated all the duke’s children equally; her own son, Gian Galeazzo, who would someday rule Milan and all her territories, was shown the same tender kindness as Caterina and Chiara, both living proof of her husband’s philandering. She was also good to his two bastard sons, who were then almost men, off in Milan learning the military arts at their stepfather’s home. Although she had encouraged all of us children to address her as our mother, Chiara alone called her Mama. Caterina called her Madonna, my Lady; I called her Your Grace.
Bona was kind even to me, a foundling of murky origin. She claimed publicly that I was the natural child of one of her disgraced cousins in Savoy, and therefore related to the king of France. I had only the vaguest memory of a beautiful raven-haired woman, her features blurred by time, who murmured endearments to me in French; surely this had been my mother. I had recollections, too, of kindly nuns who cared for me after the raven-haired woman had disappeared. But when I pressed Bona privately on the subject, she refused to give any details, hinting that I was better off not knowing. She adopted me as her daughter—if a lesser one, fated to spend my days as her most coddled lady-in-waiting. I was grateful, but ashamed of my origins. And being ashamed, I imagined the worst.
Almadea, she named me: soul of God. Over the years, I came to be called simply Dea, but Bona made sure I never lost sight of my soul. She was a pious woman, given to prayer and charity, eager to raise her children to serve God. Since Caterina took no interest in the invisible world, Gian Galeazzo was destined for a secular fate, and Chiara was slow, I alone was the diligent recipient of her ardent religious instruction.
The duke, who praised Caterina to the skies and cursed poor Chiara, had little to say to or of me. I was strictly Bona’s project—although I, four years older than Caterina and often her chaperone, had many opportunities to be in the presence of His Grace, who doted on his blue-eyed, golden-haired daughter and paid her frequent visits. At those times, his eyes belonged to Caterina, and in those rare instances when his gaze strayed and caught mine, he quickly averted it.
On that eighth day before the Feast of the Nativity, the castle at Pavia—the duke’s favorite country lodgings—was bustling. Every servant’s expression was one of harried determination, every courtier’s one of eager anticipation. In two days, the entire court of several hundred would make the daylong procession to the city, Milan, and the majestic Castle of Porta Giovia. There, on the day before Christmas, the duke would address the people, issue pardons, and distribute charity; when the sun set, he would ceremonially light the ciocco, the great Yule log, for his staff and servants in the great banquet hall. The fire would be faithfully tended throughout the night. The duke had never lost his childhood love of the holiday, so he also privately celebrated the ciocco ritual with his family each Christmas Eve, followed by a lavish banquet.
On that particular afternoon, in a festive gesture anticipating the annual pilgrimage, the duke sent a quartet of carolers to his wife’s chambers. These were members of Duke Galeazzo’s choir, the most magnificent in all Europe. The duke took only a vague interest in the arts, leaving the acquisition of books and paintings to his underlings, but music was his passion, and he took great care to seek out the most talented vocalists and composers in all of Europe.
Gian Galeazzo, Ermes, Duchess Bona, Caterina, Chiara, and I sat facing west before the fire, with the open doorway to our left, while the carolers—two men and two lads, the latter chosen by the duke for their pretty bodies as much as their talent—stood just left of the hearth, lifting their amazing voices in song. Behind us, two chambermaids were busy packing Bona’s Christmas wardrobe into two large trunks. Sitting on the floor by his elder brother’s feet, Ermes dozed while little Gian Galeazzo sat dutifully enduring his nurse’s brush as he stared into the fire and listened; Duchess Bona hoped that the boys would catch their father’s passion for music. She and Chiara were distracted by their embroidery, and Caterina by a wooden ball at her foot, a toy belonging to her younger half-brothers. She slyly nudged it with her toe until it rolled a short distance and gently bumped the nose of the dozing greyhound coiled at Bona’s feet. The dog—three-legged and, like me, one of Bona’s rescues—opened one eye and promptly returned to its nap.
The duchess’s chamber was of comfortable size, with a large arched window, vaulted ceilings, and walls paneled in dark, ornately carved wood. Unlike the duke’s, it consisted of a single room that featured a sitting area in front of the fireplace, a dressing area shielded from view by several garderobes, and a platform upon which rested a mahogany bed, its brocade curtains drawn. Near it were three cots, one of which I occupied on those nights my husband traveled. Bona’s chamber resembled most of the other rooms in Castle Pavia, which consisted of a two-story stone square large enough to comfortably house five hundred souls. Each corner of the square was marked by a great tower, and these corner suites were reserved for the most important personages and functions. On the upper floor, the northeast tower housed the duke’s suite of rooms, the northwest, his heir’s; the southeast and southwest towers served as the chancery and the library, respectively. On the ground floor, the tower rooms held the reliquary and the prison. Except for the duke’s, all rooms opened onto a long common hall, or loggia, overlooking the massive interior courtyard; the loggia on the first floor, which housed the servants, lesser visitors, butchery, prison, bathhouse, laundry, and treasury, was open to the elements. For the comfort of the duke and his family, however, the upper loggia was bricked in, though there were windows to catch summer breezes, with shutters to close out winter winds.
As a girl, I used to race down the long, seemingly endless halls, barely avoiding collisions with the servants who filled them. One day I determined to count every room on both floors: There are eighty-three if you include the saletti, the little sitting rooms that protrude from the chapel, the chamber of rabbits, and the chamber of damsels and roses, the last two named for their murals. My favorite was the first-floor chamber of mirrors, with a floor of glittering mosaic and a ceiling of brightly colored glass.
Bona’s fireplace rested in the center of the wall adjoining her son’s apartment, and so we sat many steps away from either the window or the chamber door. I sat nearest the latter, which was open to allow the servants who were packing the duchess’s Christmas luggage easy access.
I should have relaxed in the fire’s warmth and simply listened to the singing. One lad’s voice was so hauntingly beautiful that when he performed a solo, Bona stopped in her sewing and closed her eyes at its sweetness.
I closed my eyes, too, but opened them immediately at the sudden welling of tears and the unwanted tightness in my throat. For the third time in the last hour, I set my sewing down and—as discreetly as possible, moving behind the seated group—stepped rapidly away from the hearth into the cool shade at the arched window, and looked out.
To my left, the feeble sun was dying behind thick winter clouds that threatened snow; before me stood the formal garden, withered save for spots of evergreen. Straight ahead, to the north, the Lombard plain stretched out, much of it obscured by the bare, spidery-limbed trees in the nearby park where the duke hunted. A day’s ride away, beyond the plain and my sight, stood the Alps; to the east, the kingdom of Savoy, where Bona had been born.
My Matteo would not be coming from the north, but court life required me to attend the duchess, and quash all yearning to run southward down the endless loggia to the library, where I could climb the steps to the southwest watchtower and stare out toward Rome.
Matteo da Prato served the duke as a scribe, occasional courier, and minor envoy. His mother had died giving life to him, and his father had died not long afterward; like me, he had been adopted by a wealthy family and educated. His talent for breaking ciphers and creating impenetrable code had earned him the attention of the duke’s top secretary, Cicco Simonetta. I first set eyes on him seven years ago, when I was ten and he seventeen, new to Milan and freshly apprenticed to Cicco; I never dreamed then that we should ever marry.
I had never expected to marry at all.
Back at the hearth, Bona noted my dismay. When the singers caught their breath between arrangements, she called softly, “He will not come today, Dea. I’ve said a hundred times, there is nothing more certain than delays during winter travel. Don’t fret; they’ve already found lodging and are sitting comfortably right now just as we are, in front of a fire.” She paused. “Time to shutter the windows now, anyway. It’s growing bitter.”
She did not remark on the fact that it had been the coldest winter anyone at court could remember.
“Of course, Your Grace,” I said. At my words, a gust of wind stirred the clouds; before my eyes they writhed and reformed into a haunting image: the shape of a man dangling in the darkening sky as if an invisible God held him by one ankle, his opposite leg bent at the knee to create an upside-down four.
The hanged man, Matteo had called him.
I pushed the heavy slatted panels into place and latched them, then hesitated an instant to flick away a tear. When I faced Bona again, it was with a false smile.
Reason, if not the clouds, said that I had no cause to worry. Matteo was a seasoned traveler, and the guests he was escorting from Rome to Milan were papal legates, too precious to risk by traveling in bad weather. Matteo was also armed against bandits, and the legates traveled with attendants and bodyguards. Yet my anxiety would not ease. I had awakened that morning in a peculiar panic from a dream of a double-edged sword pointed downward, dripping blood onto the frozen earth, while a voice whispered flatly in my ear, Matteo is dead.
Before morning mass, I had lit a second candle for Matteo, so that God would be doubly sure to hear my prayers. Bona noted it when she arrived in the chapel, and when I knelt beside her, she set a comforting hand upon my forearm.
“God hears,” she said softly, “and I am praying, too.”
Her kindness forced me to flick away tears, yet my worry did not lift; in my mind’s eye, I saw Matteo suspended upside-down, pale and unconscious.
After mass, I was gratefully distracted by the task of supervising the chambermaids as they prepared the duchess’s and children’s households for the return to Milan.
At noon, I noted the gathering snow clouds but told myself stubbornly that Matteo, the smartest man I knew, would mark them, too, and hasten his progress; but as the sky darkened, so did my mood, and sunset brought a growing dread. By the time I shuttered Bona’s window, I was again fighting back tears.
Yet I returned to my embroidery with a vengeance, and with each jab of the needle uttered a silent prayer: God, protect my husband. Surely God would hear. No one was more deserving of protection than Matteo; no prayers were worthier of being granted than Bona’s.
My stitches were large and careless and later would have to be snipped and resewn—not today, though, for the light was failing and soon, when Bona gave the word, all needlework would be retired. The male quartet began again to sing, a lively folk tune that made Bona smile and Caterina keep time with her feet.
My eyes were on the pool of white silk in my hands; I did not see what caused the first loud clatter, but I looked up in time to see Francesca’s iron peel drop with a resounding clang to the stone fireplace floor, scattering nuts in the flames. Francesca looked down at the carpet in horror, and threw up her hands; the act caused her shawl to slip from her shoulders. One edge spilled into the hearth and ignited, while she, unaware, stared down at a red-hot stone smoldering on the carpet at the very feet of the ducal heir.
Francesca let go a shriek, which was quickly seconded by Bona and the nurse, who dropped the brush at once and lifted her charge, Gian Galeazzo, straight up out of his chair, overturning it in the process. Ermes screamed for his mother. The quartet of singers—the coddled cream of Europe’s musical talent, and loyal to the duke’s family insofar as their generous salaries were paid—were quickly out the door.
While the area of the hearth filled with smoke and shouts, I rose, determined to stamp out the fire before it caught in earnest, and tried to move toward Francesca. But Caterina, already on her feet, blocked my way. Her blue eyes were wide and blank, her manner that of a mindless, terrified beast. As I pressed toward the fire and she away, she gave my shoulders such a mighty shove that I staggered backward and nearly lost my footing. She ran past me, the three-legged greyhound at her heels, out the door and into the loggia.
Behind her, Bona had gotten Chiara, stiff and weeping with fright, from her chair and was herding her, Gian Galeazzo, and Ermes toward the door. With her charges safe, she moved past me, allowing me to help Francesca stamp out the woolen shawl, now a heap on the carpet, its edges burning steadily, filling the room with the smell of burning hair.
One of the maids who had been packing the duchess’s things ran forward and, with a poker, pushed the errant hearthstone—which had initiated the calamity by tumbling from the chimney and striking Francesca’s peel—back into the fireplace. A second ran up and doused both the shawl and the smoldering carpet with water from the duchess’s slop jar.
By this time, the nuts had begun to give off a scorched stink; the air grew noxious. Gasping, Francesca hurried to the window I had so recently shuttered and opened it, letting in the chimes from the nearby Certosa monastery and the freezing alpine air.
I joined the others outside in the loggia, where the window overlooking the interior courtyard had been thrown open. Gian Galeazzo’s nurse was leading him, his brother, and the still-weeping Chiara next door, to the ducal heir’s chamber in the northwest tower; the singers had all disappeared from sight. A few nervous servants had appeared in Gian Galeazzo’s doorway in response to the outcry, but seeing the danger past, they were already receding back into the tower room.
Bona remained by the loggia window, waiting to make sure I was unscathed; she clucked maternally at the sight of my coughing and steered me directly to the opening. I bared my face to the painfully cold air and filled my lungs. When my coughing finally eased, I wiped my streaming eyes and drew back to examine the duchess.
The incident had left her unharmed, but some new disaster had claimed her attention: I followed her gaze east down the long loggia and saw Caterina standing at the far end of the great hall that separated the duchess’s quarters from the duke’s.
In the yellow light cast by a wall sconce, Caterina stood profoundly still with her back to us, her normally exuberant aspect hushed, her chin lifted and head canted to one side; I was reminded of a cat that, before pouncing on a bird, pauses to listen to its song. I paused, too: a woman was screaming in terror and outrage somewhere in the opposite wing of the palace.
The five doors that led into the great hall were uncharacteristically closed, and the servants inside oddly silent. The loggia, too, had grown abruptly deserted, save for an old servant who paused to light each wall sconce with the long taper in his hand; he made his way slowly toward us from the direction of the duke’s apartments. Surely he had heard the lady’s cries; perhaps he had even seen her, struggling in the grasp of Bruno, strongest of all the duke’s bodyguards. Yet like all good servants of Galeazzo Sforza, Duke of Milan, he had learned to keep his eyes downcast, his pace steady, his expression blank as though he could not hear her ragged screams.
They emanated from the east, from the loggia in the men’s wing, and they grew ever louder as they moved toward the northeast tower, and the duke’s quarters.
Let me go, let me go!
For the love of God . . .
You there, help me! Someone, help!
I understood at once why everyone else had so efficiently departed the scene.
Caterina whirled to face us, her blue eyes avid, bright; she did not quite smirk.
“Madonna,” she called, almost gaily, to Bona. “Shall we pray?”
Bona’s dark, bovine eyes were wide with hurt. Yet she mastered her pain and, ignoring the servant and Caterina’s insolent, knowing gaze, lifted her skirts. With calm, deliberate steps and all the grace her square, portly frame allowed, she moved down the loggia, past the closed doors of the great hall, to the open entrance of the family chapel.
Caterina and I entered the chapel with her. Just inside, to our right, stood the interior door that connected the chapel to the duke’s dressing chamber. For safety and privacy, none of the duke’s rooms opened directly onto the loggia. Instead, one had to enter the chapel and from there, gain entry to the duke’s dressing chamber, which in turn led to the duke’s bedchamber, which in turn led to the duke’s private dining hall in the northeast tower. The dining hall opened onto the northernmost room of the men’s east wing, the chamber of rabbits. This sported a life-sized mural of the duke on horseback in the summer-green park, following greyhounds in pursuit of a warren of hares; the chamber opened directly onto the eastern loggia. In sum, there are only two ways to reach the duke’s suite from the common hallway: either from the chapel off the north loggia, or from the chamber of rabbits off the east.
They planned, of course, to drag the girl in through the chamber of rabbits, so that she could not be seen by anyone passing in or out of the duchess’s chambers. If a stone had not chanced to tumble from the chimney in Bona’s hearth, the duchess would have heard no one but the singers, and would have remained cheerfully unaware of the rape occurring under her husband’s roof.
The chapel smelled of hot candle wax. It was paneled in ebony wood, like the duchess’s chamber; the choir stalls were carved from the same. The room’s sole spot of color could be found in the large stained-glass window, which depicted Milan’s patron saint, Ambrose, white-bearded and stern in his golden bishop’s mitre against a garden backdrop of emerald green. The sunlight had almost disappeared, leaving the window dark and the chapel shrouded in shadow, broken only by the glow from lamps flanking the entry and tapers burning on the altar, beneath the large wooden crucifix where a bronze Christ hung, his head bowed in death. The room was hearthless, dreary, and chill; Bona believed that God paid closer attention to the prayers of the suffering, which was why she often wore a hair shirt hidden beneath her fine silk chemise. No doubt she hoped God might post some of her excessive contrition to her husband’s account.
Beneath the altar, a dozen votive candles burned, two of them for my Matteo’s safety. By the time Bona knelt at the altar and I lifted one of the burning tapers to light two new votives—one for the duke’s soul, one for his victim’s—the shrieking had stopped. I replaced the taper on the altar, then returned and knelt on the cushion next to the duchess, who smelled of rosewater and smoke.
Bona’s deep-set eyes were fast shut, her dimpled hands clasped, her lips moving silently. Her features were pinched but set; one who did not suspect her personal agony would think she was simply earnest at prayer.
Caterina did not kneel, but unabashedly pressed her ear against the door adjacent to the duke’s dressing room; she did not test it, for she knew that it would be bolted from the other side. When Caterina was still quite young, but old enough to suspect what was happening, Bona had tried to send her to her quarters for the duration. The girl disobeyed and kept escaping to the men’s wing in an effort to catch a glimpse of her father in flagrante. She was stronger, faster, and far cleverer than her nurses, with the result that Bona finally acknowledged the duke’s trangressions and brought Caterina with her to the chapel, insisting that the girl should pray for her father. But Caterina refused to waste her time.
“If it is wrong of my father to do such a thing,” she asked reasonably, “then why does no one stop him?”
Bona, devoted to God but no philosopher, had no answer. She soon despaired of trying to influence Caterina for the good, as the girl was obviously as stubborn as her father and most likely just as inclined to wickedness.
I, on the other hand, was desperately beholden to the duchess and eager to please her. My parents had no doubt been so horribly damned—my mother perhaps a shamed woman, my father perhaps too wicked to care for his own children—that Bona, unshakable in the face of evil, had never been able to bring herself to say much about them. I feared that whatever had driven them to unspeakable sin had infected me, and so I embraced the duchess’s assiduous instruction concerning religion.
God is loving, Bona always said, but also just. And though you might not see results at once, He surely hears the prayers of the meek. Pray for justice, Dea, and in good time it will come; and pray for yourself, that you might be wise enough to love sinners while abhorring their deeds.
For Bona’s sake, I believed it all, prayed often and sincerely, and waited on God to reward the faithful and punish the wicked. The duke was all-powerful, his bodyguards cunningly armed and ready to deal death to those who interfered with their master’s pleasure; what else could I, a mere seventeen-year-old woman, do other than pray and offer Bona my comfort and companionship?
Yet when it came to sinners who relished cruelty, such as the duke and his coldhearted pet, Caterina, I could not match Bona’s saintliness. My heart held hate, not love. And so, as I began to mouth silent prayers beside the duchess, I asked God not for patience or for charity, but for vengeance, of a swifter sort than He was accustomed to meting out.
In my mind’s eye I pictured not the dying Christ or the Holy Mother, but the duke, who had invited the current silence by holding out his hand to the girl and speaking gently, quickly, as if soothing a frightened beast. He was telling her that all the stories about him were lies, that he was in fact a kindly man who wished her no harm.
And she—fifteen years old at most, lovely, unmarried, and a virgin from a decent family—was crazed with fear and desperate to believe him.
I yearned to be a man, one with a sword and the access to His Grace Duke Galeazzo. I pictured myself stealing up behind him as he murmured to the girl, and ending his crime with one short, swift, avenging thrust of my blade. Instead, I had only the opportunity to whisper one Our Father and two Ave Marias before Caterina, her expression one of fascination, hissed, “They are moving into his bedchamber now.”
The screaming began again, this time wordless, outraged, animal. I clasped my hands until they ached and tried desperately to quash my imagination. From behind the altar wall came muffled thumping—bodies or limbs striking walls, perhaps—and the tinkling of glass. Beneath it all was the very faint, vicious sound of male laughter.
Holy Mother, take pity upon her. Lord, let the duke taste justice.
“Why do you not help her?” Caterina demanded. There was no concern or frustration in her tone, only a dogged insistence. “He is hurting her, after all. Surely God does not mean for you to stand idly by.”
Without lifting her head, Bona replied, “We are only women, and far frailer than men. Should they not come to our aid, we can rely only on the goodness of God.”
A corner of Caterina’s lip twitched in disgust. “Only a coward waits on God.”
Angered by the attack on Bona, I jerked my face toward Caterina’s. “If that is so, Madonna, then why do you not stop your father? You’re his favorite; persuade him. Save him from sin and protect the lady.”
Without lifting her ear from the door, Caterina stuck out her tongue at me; still at prayer, Bona did not see.
“You all speak nonsense,” Caterina said. “First you say that my father sins. Then you say that God chose my father to rule, so his will must be respected. Well, it’s his will to lie with pretty young women. So where is the sin? And if it is sin, then why would God have such bad judgment as to anoint my father duke?”
Bona did not open her eyes, but behind her veil, a fat tear spilled from the corner of her eye and slid down her cheek. It was not her way to question God or her husband. “If you will not pray for your father,” she said, her voice husky and uneven with sorrow, “then at least pray for the girl.”
“The fact is,” Caterina countered, “a duke can do whatever he pleases.”
She began to say more, but her words were drowned out by a man’s shouts coming from the direction of the chamber of rabbits: “Duca! Duca! Your Grace!” His rasping, nasal voice was soon joined by others, and grew muffled by the sounds of scuffling.
Intrigued, Caterina hurried into the hall to learn the source of the noise. Within a minute, she retreated back into the chapel in a fright, and dropped to her knees at the altar on the far side of Bona.
Boot heels rang against the loggia’s stone floor; soon a trio of cloaked men armed with drawn short swords stood in the chapel archway. One of them, of powerful shoulders and good height, stepped inside. Upon seeing the interior door leading to the duke’s suite, he rattled the handle, found it locked, then nodded to the other two, who began in turn to throw themselves at the door to break it down.
Ashamed, Bona turned her face from them.
Meanwhile, the first man—with straight dark brown hair, parted down the middle and falling a few fingers shy of his shoulders—bowed low to us, then straightened and said, “Good ladies. My deepest apologies for disturbing you at prayer and disrupting the peace in God’s chamber, but one of your fair sex is in danger. I beg your forbearance while we work to bring this matter to a happy end.”
His dialect was Tuscan, and his diction revealed an education reserved for the highest born, yet his voice was peculiarly nasal. He was in his twenties or thirties, but it was difficult to judge, for his face was remarkably strange. His jaw was very square, and his chin jutted far forward; he had a noticeable underbite and when he spoke, his lower lip stuck out while his upper disappeared. This would not have seemed so unfortunate had it not been combined with his huge nose, which was flat at the bridge where it met the inner corners of his eyebrows, then rose and swooped alarmingly off to one side; it had an unusually long, sloping tip. It made me think of a clay likeness that had waited too long for the kiln and begun to droop. He might have looked foolish or unforgivably ugly had it not been for the rare intelligence in his eyes and his unselfconscious, confident grace.
I stood, curtsied reluctantly, and said, with as much contained fury as I dared show a noble, “You have disturbed my mistress at prayer, my lord. And you have violated the sanctity of the chapel.”
I looked pointedly at his two companions, gasping after their few failed attempts to break down the door. Like him, they were dressed in new winter cloaks trimmed with brown marten fur at the collars and sleeves.
“I am no lord,” he replied, clearly troubled by the fact that the screams had turned ominously to muffled groans. “Only a commoner trying to help in an emergency. I beg your forgiveness in what surely must be a difficult time for you all. But can no one else in this palace hear that the lady needs help?”
Bona bowed her head low, still too mortified to speak; Caterina stayed on her knees but peered past Bona at the speaker, clearly eager to see where this unexpected development would lead. Before the man could say more, a low wail emanated from a distant room behind the door, followed by wracking sobs.
The self-professed commoner’s strong, homely faced twisted with pity at the sound; pushing aside his fellows, he threw his shoulder against the door with all his force. The thick, solid wood did not so much as tremble at the blow. Rather than leave in frustration, the commoner knocked the wood with the hilt of his short sword.
“Your Grace! Good Your Grace!” he called, his tone playfully cajoling. “It is I, your secret guest, freshly arrived to enjoy your legendary hospitality. Let me repay it in small part now by offering the young lady an escort home.” And when no reply came, he added cheerfully, “I am determined, Your Grace; I shall wait at this door, and my fellows at the other, until we have her.”
With that, he turned to his men and gestured in the direction of the chamber of rabbits; they understood and left at once, while the so-called commoner remained, his ear to the door.
A long moment passed, during which Bona found her composure. She then crossed herself, rose, and turned to the man; at her side, Caterina rose as well, and watched with unselfconscious fascination.
“Your Magnificence,” Bona said softly, slowly, as always in control, though I knew her heart was breaking. “My lord the duke informed me to prepare for a guest’s arrival, but he did not tell me that it was you. I fear I cannot greet you properly at this time, given the unpleasant circumstance.”
He squinted hard at her and took a slow step toward her, frowning, until his eyes suddenly widened and his jaw dropped.
“Your Grace!” he exclaimed softly, his voice hushed with embarrassment; his cheeks reddened. “Oh, my lady Duchess!” He bowed deeply from the shoulders, and remained in that position as he spoke. “I cannot— I would never have— Your Grace, I beg forgiveness for my cruel thoughtlessness! My judgment has failed me once again. Had I recognized you, I would have been far more discreet.”
I applauded his desire to save the distressed lady, but could not forgive the humiliation he had just inflicted on Bona; my temper took abrupt control of my tongue. “How could you not recognize the duchess, good sir, when she stands directly before you? A poor excuse for such rudeness!”
Bona moved to me and caught my elbow. “Dea,” she said, her voice very low. “His sight is poor. Now you, too, must apologize.”
Behind us, Caterina giggled. Tongue-tied, I looked back at His Magnificence, and he looked back at me.
“Dea,” he said, with faint surprise, and in his eyes curiosity dawned. He uttered my name as if it were a familiar one.
Before he could say more, we all turned at the sound of footsteps approaching the door leading to the duke’s dressing chamber, and the squeal of the bolt being drawn. The door opened a crack; His Magnificence inclined his ear to it, and listened to whispered instructions from one of the duke’s valets. He gave a sharp nod to show he had understood, and the door closed again.
His Magnificence turned to Bona and bowed to take his leave. “Your Grace, my apologies once more. When we meet tomorrow, I will greet you as you deserve and do my best to make full reparation.”
“When we meet tomorrow, or any other day, dear Lorenzo,” Bona said softly, “we shall not speak of this.”
“Agreed,” he answered, then nodded to Caterina and last of all, me. “Ladies,” he said briskly, and was gone; I listened to his ringing steps as he made his way down the loggia toward the chamber of rabbits.
Like everyone else in Italy, I had heard tales about Lorenzo the Magnificent. At the tender age of twenty, he had become the de facto ruler of Florence upon his father’s death. I had glimpsed him only once, in 1469, when I was nine and had been living in Bona’s household only a year. Along with four other prominent rulers in Milan’s great Duomo, Lorenzo de’ Medici stood as godfather at Gian Galeazzo’s christening. Unlike us lesser mortals, Lorenzo possessed such intelligence, confidence, and charm that he could speak bluntly to Duke Galeazzo without provoking his wrath, and the duke, who routinely abused his family, courtiers, servants, and peers, treated Lorenzo with respect.
Once Lorenzo had left the chapel, Bona turned to me, her eyes brimming with tears. “God surely answered our prayers, sending him to help the lady . . . and to teach me humility.”
“Surely,” I gently agreed, though I did not believe for an instant that Bona had any pride left after eight years of marriage to Galeazzo Sforza. But I was grateful for Lorenzo’s attempt to intervene.
“Take Caterina with you,” Bona ordered, “and make sure she gets to her quarters and stays there. You’re free to do as you wish until I summon you again.”
“I will deliver her to her nurse, then return, if you like,” I said softly. I could see the duchess was in need of comfort. It is a hard thing to accept that one’s husband is a monster, and harder still to endure that monstrousness in polite company.
Her gaze averted, Bona shook her head, and I suddenly understood: Lorenzo’s appearance had so shamed my mistress that she was no longer able to control her tears. As I herded Caterina out, Bona knelt again at the altar railing, pausing before she returned to her prayers to call: “Please close the door behind you.”
I did, leaving her to weep in private.
Caterina broke away from me the instant we were out in the loggia; she turned toward the men’s wing and, cursing her full woman’s skirts, lifted them high and half ran in the direction of the chamber of rabbits. I was taller, with a longer stride, and easily caught her by the elbow.
She tried to shake free, but I held fast, wheeled her about, and dragged her with me toward the women’s wing.
“Bitch!” she snapped. “I’ll tell my father!”
“That I am following the duchess’s orders?” I paused. “What would your father say, were he to see you waiting in the chamber of rabbits?”
She said nothing, but accompanied me, sourly, back down the loggia toward Bona’s chambers, where servants had managed to clear out the smoke and close the windows, though the smell of burnt wool and nuts lingered. Next to it was little Gian Galeazzo’s and Ermes’s quarters in the northeast corner, and just past them was the northernmost room in the ladies’ wing, the pink chamber, so named because its walls were covered in rose moiré silk. It served as nursery to Bona’s daughters, five-month-old Anna and four-year-old Bianca Maria, who had already been married off to her first cousin, Philibert, Duke of Savoy. Just past it was Caterina’s room. I deposited her there and informed her nurse of Bona’s order, knowing all the while that the duke’s headstrong daughter would likely dash off the instant I had left.
I did not care. I proceeded southward down the endless ladies’ loggia, with its life-sized murals of those in Bona’s household, framed against a summer garden backdrop. Near the duchess’s quarters, there was a painting of Bona, seated and gazing proudly down at the infant Gian Galeazzo in her arms. Her courtiers clustered around her: the duke’s aunt, Elena del Maino; Emilia Attendoli, who had served Duke Galeazzo’s mother; and Emilia’s daughter, Antonia. Farther down the hall, in the newest mural, Ermes handed his baby sister Bianca Maria an apple picked from a tree, while the image of ten-year-old Caterina made one of her beloved greyhounds sit for a morsel.
My likeness, like my heritage, was nowhere to be seen.
At last I arrived at the open door of the library, in the southwest corner tower. Here, the plain stone flooring became gray-veined white marble, and the ceiling rose three stories high. There were no murals here; the vast walls were covered in tall oak shelves. Upon the last rested stacks of parchments bound in brocade, damask, or velvet. Despite the duke’s lack of interest in literature, his collection was priceless; he owned a copy of Virgil’s Aeneid, annotated in Petrarch’s very hand. For this reason, all works were attached to the shelves by silver chains.
Only three souls stood inside the vast chamber: the librarian and two young monks from the nearby monastery at Certosa. Unable to leave his domain unguarded, yet eager to retire now that the sun had set, the librarian scowled as I entered. I ignored him, knowing that I would be gone well before the monks, who stood with reverent awe in front of one of the manuscripts.
I passed them and headed for the library’s interior staircase, thinking to climb all the way to the fourth-floor perch, where I could stare far to the southern horizon toward Rome, looking for signs of my husband.
As I moved to the landing, movement outside the window caught my eye. On the banks of the moat near the castle’s main entry, two courtiers stood next to a servant who held the reins to two horses in one hand and a lamp in the other. In the faint arc of light, snowflakes sailed relentlessly downward.
I paused to stare at them. Though I could not make out their faces clearly, I recognized the build of one of them: Carlo Visconti, a black-haired courtier and member of Milan’s Council of Justice, his bearing and gestures betraying violent emotion. Beside him was an older, white-haired man who might have been his father.
Approaching them from the direction of the castle was a third man carrying a swooning young woman. At the sight, the older man beat his chest, then threw open his arms; gently, the third man handed her to her father.
Visconti was not so conciliatory; he drew his sword and lunged at the man who delivered the girl. The third man reacted by taking a great step backward, then spreading his arms in a gesture of peace.
For the space of several seconds, neither party moved; I supposed that one of them was speaking. Abruptly, Visconti sheathed his sword and sagged with grief. The man he had threatened stepped forward to put a hand upon Visconti’s shoulder, and in doing so, stepped into the lamplight.
I watched as Lorenzo the Magnificent kept his hand upon the courtier’s shoulder, then put another on the father’s, and spoke for a moment. Afterward, he dug into a pocket and discreetly handed Visconti a purse. The latter pocketed it without argument.
The snow grew heavier, prompting the father to mount one of the horses. He reached for his daughter, who was unsteady on her legs; it took both Visconti and Lorenzo to get her up into the saddle. Visconti and the servant then mounted the remaining horse; Visconti paused long enough to bow from the shoulders to Lorenzo, who returned the gesture before the trio galloped off across the drawbridge.
I remained at the window as Lorenzo turned, the wind whipping his dark hair across his face, and watched as he made his way grimly back to the castle. At its entrance he paused to glance pointedly up at the library window—at me, as if, impossibly given his poor eyesight, he saw me standing there.
Chapter Two
Snow fell that night. By morning, the clouds had gone, leaving behind a blue sky and an infinite white expanse that glittered beneath the sun. The weather was still bitter, but the wind had died; a good day for travel, Bona told me brightly, and promised that Matteo would be home within two days.
I smiled faintly at her cheer, though my anxiety had not eased; I woke with a gut so clenched I could not face breakfast. Instead I prayed earnestly beside Bona in the chapel: Lord, guard Your servant Matteo da Prato and bring him safely home to me. Blessed Virgin, Mother of God, keep my husband from harm. Saint Christopher, patron of travelers, protect him . . .
Afterward, I put on my heavy cloak and went downstairs to the passage that led to the garden, where the woodsmen had piled boughs of evergreen as high as my shoulders. I gathered several boughs into my arms, and made my way carefully over the slippery floor of the open loggia; on the opposite side, an old serving woman swept away the snow with a broom while her frailer husband followed, sprinkling ash from a pail onto the stone.
Matteo’s chamber, situated on the first level, directly beneath the duke’s bedroom, stood two doors from the garden passage. Only the highest of Galeazzo’s officials were housed on the second floor along with the ducal family; Galeazzo’s secretary and right-hand man, Cicco Simonetta, was privileged to live right next to the duke’s suite, closer even than Bona. In recognition of Matteo’s intelligence and loyalty, however, he had been rewarded with one of the better downstairs chambers.
I paused at the entrance to my husband’s room, wrestling with my fragrant burden in order to get the key from my cloak pocket. Like his immediate superior, Cicco, Matteo always kept his chamber locked; the duke entrusted all his state secrets to Cicco, who in turn shared a few of them with my husband. In these perilous times, a prince was wise to encrypt any correspondence he did not want read by anyone other than the intended recipient; couriers could not always be trusted. The duke had promoted Cicco to a position of great power because of the latter’s natural grasp of the art of encryption, and Cicco had promoted my husband because of Matteo’s ability to create and memorize hard-to-break ciphers. Matteo could look at a letter in Latin or the vernacular and encrypt it in a matter of minutes, an unheard-of feat. After seven years of acquainting himself diligently with the duke’s most confidential matters, Matteo was chosen to serve as a junior envoy to Rome. He had visited there once in the spring, before we were married, and was soon to return from his second visit. I asked him no questions, but I was proud: I had no doubt that he dealt with members of the Sacred College, perhaps even with the pope himself.
The melting snow had caused the wooden door to swell; even unlocked, it would not open until I gave it a hard kick. Once it was open, I set down a branch and wiped my feet upon it, then closed the door behind me and scattered the rest of the perfumed boughs onto the stone floor.
Matteo had been gone almost two months, but the room still smelled of him, of rosemary water and olive oil soap, of parchment and iron-gall ink, of the indescribable scent of male flesh. The room was chilly, the hearth long-unlit; I had told God that morning that I would set my oddly persistent fear for Matteo’s safety aside and trust that my prayers on his behalf would be answered. As proof of my conviction, I would perform an act of faith and light the fire, so that the room would be cozy by the time my husband arrived.
Yesterday, I had loaded wood onto the grate, with strategically placed juniper bark as tinder; today, I took the tinderbox from the mantel and retrieved the flint and steel. It took several tries before a spark fell and caught; I sat on my heels and fanned it, thinking of my strange marriage.
Other women would think me exceedingly lucky. Though lacking noble blood and the convenience of well-placed family, Matteo had succeeded in using his wits to rise to an admirable station. And he was good-looking enough—taller than most of the other men, and long-limbed, if a bit too slender, with straight, thick auburn hair so dark it looked black after sunset. He kept it cut short and often hidden beneath a red felt cap, of the same close-fitting sort his master Cicco wore. His skin was naturally pale, though it had browned during his travels; his eyes were a clear, light hazel, thoughtful and calm. His lips were full and pretty, though the bow of his upper lip bore a scar from a childhood mishap. His words were spoken softly and always kind. Occasionally, when he was tired or forgot himself, his Tuscan accent became noticeable.
Over the seven years he had spent at Duke Galeazzo’s court, Matteo was never far from me. On holidays, at picnics, at summer games in the courtyard, or at the hunt, Matteo always managed to seek out my company; he seemed to know a good deal about the particular circumstances of my life, and was always interested in how I was faring, especially in my studies. He wanted to know whether Bona was good to me, or Caterina rude, what my favorite subjects and hobbies were, what books I had read. I responded with questions of my own, and learned that he was from Florence—or rather, from the Ospedale degli Innocenti, the city’s largest orphanage.
“I grew up there,” he said, “but was rescued in my youth by a patron. I got my education from the monks at San Marco in Florence. When I was older, I went to the University of Pavia, where Cicco recruited me.”
“So there is no one in Florence for you?” I asked. “No patron? No adopted family to return to?”
He almost answered, then stopped himself and gave a crescent moon smile. “None. But I have many dear friends there.” He hesitated. “You would love it. There is no fear there, as there is here. . . .” He dropped his gaze suddenly, realizing that he had said a politically dangerous thing. “The people are happier and speak freely. The world’s best artists live there because the nobles support them.”
“Nothing could be more beautiful than Milan,” I said firmly. I had never traveled and therefore feared it; Bona was my refuge.
“Once you see Florence, you’ll change your mind,” Matteo replied.
I did not think much about my friendship with Matteo, for his interest in me was kindly but not obsessive, though at times, I would look up from a conversation during a gathering for the ducal staff, and see Matteo looking at me; he always flushed and averted his eyes.
Perhaps, as I grew older, I was a bit attracted to him, but given Bona’s stern religious instruction and my desire to cast off my parents’ sin, I had no interest in marriage or the pleasures of the flesh. The world was a fearsome, wicked place, and I lucky to be alive and under Bona’s pious wing; when I was twelve, I begged her to send me to a convent, but she would not. (I am grateful now she did not sent me to one, for I later learned that, when drunk, Galeazzo liked to pay nocturnal visits to the nunneries, in order to assert what he considered his ducal privilege upon the poor women there.) I vowed never to marry, but to remain celibate and serve none but God and Bona all my days. And so I paid no mind to Matteo’s fraternal attentions.
The duke, however, paid no mind to my vow. When I turned sixteen, he pressed Bona to find a husband for me—no matter that I had no dowry, so that a decent match was impossible. After some months, when the duke realized that she was intentionally delaying the matter, he announced that I was to marry the master of Bona’s stables, one Ridolfo, who had recently lost his wife. Ridolfo was gray-haired, potbellied, and profoundly uninterested in the arts. He understood only dogs and horses, and those none too well, for he had lost his front teeth to a stallion unappreciative of his constant lashes. His dogs despised him for similar cause; I had no doubt his late wife had been relieved to quit his company. Even before she died, Ridolfo always leered at me and the youngest women. Apparently the thought of tender virgin flesh made up for the lack of a dowry.
When I learned of the marriage, I wept and begged Bona to cancel the wedding or let me flee. She had enormous sympathy for my situation, but she could not disobey her husband. As my wedding day grew closer, I grew more frantic.
Then Matteo went to the duke and asked for my hand.
At the July wedding—a small affair in the ducal chapel, attended by Bona, her ladies, Cicco, and Matteo’s fellow scribes—my groom was too stunned by his own decision to meet my gaze. After the ceremony, he kissed me not on the lips, as was proper for man and wife, but upon the brow. At the small banquet in the ground-floor servants’ hall, his gaze was, for once, directed at everyone but me. He drank a bit more than his portion of wine that night, and I more than mine; clearly, the bride was not the only one to dread the wedding night.
We went to his chambers to find the bed strewn with rose petals; Bona’s maid Francesca helped me quickly to undress down to my chemise, while Matteo hid behind the open doors of his wardrobe and fumbled with his own clothing. Once Francesca had left, I climbed into the bed, drew the covers up, and waited for my naked husband to appear.
Matteo emerged minus his doublet but still dressed in his short chemise and leggings. He pointed to a fur rug in front of the cold hearth. “I will sleep there tonight,” he said, still without looking at me.
I stared at him in amazement. The thought of sexual congress had left me terrified, but the priest had pronounced us wed. We were, to my thinking, obliged to couple whether we wanted to or not. “Why do you not come to bed?”
“I . . .” His cheeks flamed. “Dea, I could not bear to see you forced into such a terrible marriage, to a cruel man far beneath your station. But I—”
“You do not love me,” I finished calmly. How had I so misinterpreted all those longing glances over so many years? “You are doing this out of kindness, of course.”
He drew a breath, squared his shoulders, and sat down beside me. Taking my hand, he finally looked into my eyes. “I love you more than anyone else in all the world, Dea,” he said fiercely. “And I vow to protect you from harm and care for you tenderly. I am your truest friend, but I can never be more than that. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” I said. “You don’t fancy women, then.”
He let go a short, unhappy laugh. “It’s not that at all. It’s . . . simply a very complicated situation. The time will come soon, though, when I can explain why things must be so. But for now, I ask you to trust me. And one more thing . . .”
I lifted an expectant brow.
“For your sake, and mine, we must pretend that we have consummated our marriage. It is the safest course. Could you do that, Dea, knowing that I love you and want only the best for you?”
His words and eyes radiated compassion; I imagined I heard honest anguish in his tone. Even so, my temper flared. He was lying about preferring women to men, I decided, because it was a mortal sin and one that, discovered, could lead to his disgrace and even death. Yet I was furious that he would not trust me with the truth. He had said we were true friends.
I dropped his hand, picked up the feather pillow beside me, and, with all my strength, struck him hard in the face with it. Then I flung myself down on the bed, turned my back to him, and lay there a few minutes before my indignation yielded to tears. Even now, I am not sure why I cried so abruptly and bitterly; I should have been relieved.
When he lay down beside me and put his arm around my shoulder, I did not pull away. We passed the whole night thus.
My pride was wounded, but I quickly recovered. After all, I now had something I had never known before: a family, even if it consisted only of Matteo. For the first time I truly belonged to someone else, and he belonged to me. And I did not, like all other women, crave children—in fact, I privately thought it cruel to bring a new soul into such a wicked world. I enjoyed Matteo’s company, and resolved to live contentedly with him without relations.
Resolutions are such feeble things.
I had expected to love him as I might a friend, a brother. I had not expected that he would be ever thoughtful of me, that he would daily do me small kindnesses, bring me small gifts, take joy in my delight. I had not expected that I would lie in his bed pretending to sleep while he worked late at the small trestle desk in his chambers; I had not expected the way the lamplight would paint his skin golden, would cause shadows to nestle in the hollows of his cheeks and throat, would spark glints of copper in his hair.
During the days he worked upstairs in the men’s wing with Cicco and the rest of the clerical staff while I spent the time with Bona. At night, he worked alone, in our chamber, on the most secret projects. I was proud that Cicco had entrusted the most delicate matters to him, even at the same time that I was annoyed that Cicco overworked him so. Matteo was discreet: he never discussed his work, nor left the papers out where I could see them. Sometimes he read; most of the time, he wrote and wrote. When he was finished, he gathered his papers together and quietly placed them in a compartment hidden in the wainscoting, which he locked; the key hung from a leather thong about his neck.
Once I passed by while he was working at his desk and failed to avert my gaze in time. I got a glimpse of cipher rendered in Matteo’s even hand. It was a beautiful creation, a tapestry of numbers and Latin letters and mathematical symbols, elegantly woven upon the page without space or punctuation. I tried to forget what I had seen, but that was impossible—like Matteo, I was good at keeping secrets, too. Only Bona, who had taught me my letters, knew the truth: that once I saw something in writing, in my native tongue or French or Latin, I could not forget it. Bona was scandalized that God should have given a woman such a useless gift; at her urging, I kept my talent to myself.
I hid it from Matteo, too, for it comforted me to have him there as I fell asleep; I did not want him to worry I might be too curious.
Not long after we were married, I woke one night to find the lamplight blue and sputtering, and Matteo still in his chair. He had put away his work and was sitting up very straight, his arms by his sides. His eyes were closed, his face utterly relaxed; the corners of his lips were faintly turned up in the most beatific of smiles. Dreaming, I thought, and I stirred, thinking to rise and lead him to bed, but the instant I moved, his eyes opened slowly. He had been full awake.
“I thought you were asleep,” I said, startled.
“I was just thinking,” he said, as if that were explanation enough. His eyes were extraordinarily bright and loving. “If you don’t mind, I would like to think for a bit longer.”
“Suit yourself.” I rolled back over, but I could not go back to sleep; I kept thinking of the look on his face.
In all dealings with me Matteo was patient, in all dealings kind. I saw his anger only once, one evening when his master Cicco kicked open our chamber door and hurled Matteo inside. As Matteo struck the floor full force, I yelped and ran to him. His upper lip was split and bleeding, his left eye swelling shut. I put my arms about his shoulders and pulled him up to sitting; trembling with rage, he pushed me away and tried to get to his feet, but Cicco moved quickly into the room and kicked him back down.
“Fool!” Cicco barked. He was forty years Matteo’s senior and gray-haired, but stout and tall as an oak. “Are you thinking to get yourself killed? Stay here and soak your head in cold water until you can think clearly!”
With that, Cicco turned and left, slamming the door behind him.
I fussed over Matteo and cleaned the blood away. His front tooth had been chipped on the outside edge, his upper lip was split at the same spot as his childhood scar, and the tender skin around his eye was badly bruised. I asked a gentle question as to the cause of the fight, but Matteo was too troubled to speak for hours. I suspected that he had probably seen a woman being dragged through the loggia, and tried to intervene. After all those years of working for the duke, he should have known better.
We did not speak that night; I helped him undress and turned down the covers for him, but he would not go to bed. Nor did he bring out his papers to work; instead, he sat at his desk and stared straight ahead at the wainscoting.
It was well after midnight when I woke to see the lamp still burning, and Matteo still in his chair. His eyes—the one swollen and an alarming shade of purple now—were closed, and his expression was, if not blissful, then at least serene.
“What do you do in that chair?” I asked softly.
He drew in a long breath and released it with a faintly shuddering sigh. “I try,” he said, “to see things as they really are.”
There was something surprisingly optimistic in his tone. Barefoot, I went to him and blew out the lamp, then led him to bed. He slept with his arm around my shoulder. We did not speak of the fight with Cicco again, but I watched day after day as the swelling of his upper lip gradually retreated, leaving behind a thicker scar.
The months of our marriage passed quickly. July left, and August came; at every feast day, every wedding, Matteo and I sat together and danced, beaming as newlyweds ought. We blushed at jokes about the conjugal relations we were surely enjoying, and answered questions about the possible arrival of children with smiles and shrugs.
I began to fall in love. I had not meant to; I had not believed that any man could be as kind as Bona, or as gentle, or as able to put my needs before his. I blamed Matteo for my feelings. I would not have come to love him so much had he not gazed on me so often with such genuine affection, and I saw, from close daily observation, that he did not favor men over women.
What, then, kept him from my arms?
By late August, I began to experiment with small signs of affection. When the entire court celebrated the end of summer with an outdoor picnic, I held his hand after the dances had ended, and led him to a pond on the edges of the duke’s hunting park. The moon was waxing fat and reflected in the dark, still water; I drew his attention upward, to the glittering diamond sky, and pointed at a cluster of stars.
And I shared with Matteo something I had never revealed to anyone. Somehow I knew that Matteo would understand.
“See those stars.” I pointed up at the sky. “And the wisps of clouds beside them. Together, they make an upside-down numeral four.”
Matteo noted them and looked sharply at me. “They do,” he said.
“It’s a man, do you see? He’s upside down—and his one leg is bent and crossed over the straight one, to make the four.”
“The hanged man,” he whispered. I could not read his tone.
“Well, perhaps,” I said, relaxing my focus and letting my imagination roam. “Perhaps, if one slipped a rope over his ankle and dangled him upside down, and he bent one knee . . . Matteo, that man is you.”
I looked back at him to see his reaction. I expected him to smile and think it was a fanciful little joke. But he was studying me with the same intensity he turned on his ciphers.
“What does it mean?” he asked.
I looked back at the hanged man, and was filled with sudden dread. Some very bad things were going to happen, but they would bring about great good. Good that Matteo would heartily approve of.
“Changes are coming,” I said truthfully. I could not bring myself to say that they would be unbearably hard.
It was a warm night, but the breeze stirred as I spoke. He shivered slightly, and composed himself.
“How often do you see these . . . signs, Dea?”
“They’re everywhere,” I answered, heartened by the fact that he did not scoff. “I just notice them at some times more than others. But they are always true.” I hesitated. “Bona would say this was from the Devil.”
“Bona would be wrong,” he said, more quickly than I think he wanted to, for he stopped himself and remained silent for a moment. “Have you mentioned this to anyone else?”
“No one. I hoped you might understand.”
“I do. And you should never, ever speak of this to Bona or anyone else.” He paused. “It’s not from the Devil. But some people think it is, and that makes it dangerous to discuss. People have been killed for less.”
“I’ll speak of it only to you.”
“I would appreciate that—if you see something you think I should know about.” His tone warmed. “You must be who you are, Dea, and must never stifle such a talent. But only you and I should know.”
I smiled, pleased that my husband and I shared a secret.
He glanced back up at the sky. I took advantage of the moment to reach up and press my hand to his warm cheek. He smiled down at me, but upon seeing the look in my eye, drew away, and went back to the others.
I was, however, not easily discouraged. In those days my chaste pecks upon waking and retiring began to stray from his cheek toward his lips. I remarked on the fine appearance he made, on my great good luck of having him for a husband, on my constant gratitude for his kindness. When he worked too long past midnight, I would go to him and set my cheek upon his shoulder and plead sweetly for him to join me in bed. I yearned for yet feared his touch.
In every case, I was rebuffed kindly, subtly: Matteo avoided my kisses by turning his face gently away, and slipped his hand from my grip when I held on too long. My compliments brought small, tenuous smiles and averted gazes. In the first few days of November, as Matteo settled at his desk, while I, in my nightgown, stoked the fire, I asked over my shoulder:
“Would it be so horrible, then, if we were to truly live as man and wife?”
His long silence served as answer. I looked back at the flames, humiliated and struggling to hide my tears.
After a time, he said softly, “I love you, Dea. But never in that way.” He paused. “I’ll be leaving in a few days for Rome. Cicco has asked me to go on the duke’s behalf. Perhaps when I return, I’ll be able to explain things. Perhaps later we could go together to Florence, to meet some of my friends there.”
“Florence!” I whispered harshly. “What has Florence to do with anything?”
His expression grew sorrowful; after a long moment, he said, “If you understood, you would not be angry. Please, Dea, trust me for a little while longer.”
I answered nothing, but took a few more savage thrusts at the fire with the poker, then went to bed sulking. Eventually, I tired of my self-pity and fell asleep.
Some hours later I woke in the dead of night. The room was black; the single window was shuttered and Matteo had put out the lamp, but he did not lie beside me. Instead, he trod with bare feet slowly, lightly, over the carpet and the stone, gesturing with his arms in the darkness. As my eyes grew accustomed to the lack of light, I saw him pause in front of the south wall and make a complicated, sweeping gesture, and heard the faintest of murmurs—softer than a whisper, yet oddly authoritative—issue from his lips. After this, he made a quarter-turn to face west, and again gestured; by the time he faced the north wall, I surmised that he was drawing stars in the air, and connecting them with a circle.
The realization pricked the hairs on the back of my neck: Stars and circles belonged to the realm of magic, and Bona had drilled into me that such things were of the Devil. Yet only half of me took fright; the other half was keenly interested, and even comforted, for Matteo’s circle enclosed the entire room, including the bed where I lay. Like him, I was sheltered from whatever evil lurked beyond the perimeter.
In the darkness, my husband summoned no demons, invoked no dead. Instead, he stood in the circle’s center, at the foot of our bed, and spread his arms, his face turned toward the invisible sky. He was, I decided, praying.
The next morning I did not speak of it to him; nor did I mention it over the next few days, though he continued nightly to draw the stars. As he packed for his Roman journey, he grew increasingly pensive; I felt at times that he was on the verge of telling me a great secret, but something held him back.
Morning and evening, I prayed at Bona’s side in the chapel: Let Matteo’s acts be good, not evil. Let him love me. Keep him safe.
He departed for Rome on a chill November dawn. He would not let me go with him to the stables, even though it was early and Bona would not expect me for an hour. Instead, he turned, dressed in his heavy woolen cloak and cap, and stopped as I tried to follow him out the door of our chamber.
“Dea,” he said. “Let me take my leave now, and quickly.” To my surprise, he clasped both my hands very tightly, and studied my face as if he thought to find something unexpected there; his eyes were so bright, so filled with affection that I thought he was about to kiss me full on the lips.
“Quickly,” I agreed. “I don’t care for good-byes.” I closed my eyes and leaned in, eager for the kiss.
It did not come. He let go of my hands abruptly, and when I opened my eyes, he was reaching for something around his neck. He pulled it over his head and handed it to me; I stared at it for an instant as it dangled from his long fingers.
A tiny black key, strung upon a leather thong. I stared at it in surprise.
“Use it,” he said, “in case of emergency.”
“For the compartment in the wall,” I said, disbelieving, “where you keep your papers.”
He nodded.
“Why do you not just give it to Cicco?”
“Because those papers are not for Cicco,” he said, in a way that awakened gooseflesh on my arms. “Or for anyone else but you, and then only in an emergency.”
“There will be no emergency,” I warned him sternly as I took the key and hung it round my own neck. His statement provoked a thousand anxious questions: If you haven’t been working for Cicco, then who? Why? What sort of papers are these? But I asked none of them; he was standing in his cloak in the doorway, ready to leave. “I’ll return this to you when you come home.” At Christmas, I almost added, and realized how very long he would be gone.
“Dea,” he said softly, and tried to take my hands again; I threw my arms around him and hugged him. This time, my embrace was fully returned. “My Dea,” he repeated, then drew back and gave me that pure, loving smile. “God keep you.”
“And you,” I said, struggling to keep my composure. “Oh, Matteo, be careful!” I wanted to say Don’t go to Rome! I felt that if I dared let go, Matteo would slip from my grasp forever.
He leaned down and gave me a solemn, fraternal kiss upon the lips, then said, “You will see me again, Dea.”
“Of course,” I said, and he turned and was gone.
The whole time Matteo was away, I slept on the little cot near Bona’s feet, where I had always slept in the years before my marriage. Without Matteo, his chamber seemed forlorn and empty; I could not sleep in his bed alone. I did not linger long; Bona would be waiting for me that morning, and there were countless preparations left before the annual Christmas trek to Milan.
Even so, I paused before leaving, and prodded the fire one last time, making sure that the smoke drew properly. As I stared down into the golden flames, I saw the chance design made by the smaller limbs I had heaped upon the logs: an upside-down four. The hanged man.
Chapter Three
Bona was surprisingly cheerful that morning. Normally, her husband’s violent infidelities would have left her shaken and sorrowful for a few days, but the instant I arrived in her chamber, she informed me that Duke Galeazzo had yielded to her request that she be allowed to honor his “secret guest” with a luncheon. The duke was reluctant, but, apparently, Lorenzo was eager to make amends for “startling the ladies in the chapel.”
It was to be an intimate event. Situated in a corner tower, Galeazzo’s private dining chamber had an unusually high vaulted ceiling; the stone floors were covered in Persian carpets in shades of scarlet, pine, and gold to mute the echoing tread of servants and the clatter of goblets and plates. Two arched windows faced north and east; these were shuttered that morning to keep out prying eyes and the bitter cold, and the great hearth contained such a fierce crackling blaze that I began to sweat the instant I entered the room. A pair of large tapestries covered the walls on either side of the eastern window, and the bare walls had been painted with trellises of flowers. But what was most remarkable, to my mind, were the eight long oval mirrors—four hung on the wall behind the table, four on the wall in front—that allowed the duke to see his reflection’s reflection, as well as those of everyone in front of or behind him. These, combined with his four tasters—who sampled everything before it appeared on Galeazzo’s plate or in his cup—gave him some measure of comfort, for even he realized that he had earned many enemies.
Lorenzo was waiting when we women arrived, an hour before midday. He wore a great smile that emphasized his jutting lower jaw by revealing his bottom row of teeth, yet it somehow served to ease his ugliness. That morning, he was unaccompanied and dressed in a plain, long tunic of gray wool. He wore no jewelry, nor had his straight locks felt the kiss of a curling iron. Yet when Bona’s arrival was announced, he bowed and kissed her extended hand with a seasoned courtier’s finesse; though he presented himself as a commoner, his confidence and self-possession marked him as an equal. Caterina, too, was announced and received a similar reception. I entered silently, to no fanfare, and expected no greeting, but Lorenzo bowed deeply to me, and when I responded with a curtsy, said warmly, “Dea, isn’t it? The wife of Matteo da Prato?”
“I am,” I said, blushing. I was unaccustomed to being acknowledged by anyone save Bona.
“I am an acquaintance of your husband’s,” he said. “I have known him for many years. It was I, in fact, who recommended him to the duke for employment.”
Tongue-tied in the face of his composure and charm, I had no response.
Duke Galeazzo was late, requiring Bona and Lorenzo to engage in small talk for half an hour. Galeazzo’s secretary and right-hand man, the thick-necked, burly Cicco Simonetta, arrived first. With his peasant’s hair—long on top, cropped sharply above his oddly small ears—and round, heavy face, Cicco could easily have been mistaken for an ignorant bumpkin were it not for his fine dress and the shrewdness in his eyes. The duke kept no secrets from Cicco, who greeted Lorenzo with no smile and much reticence.
After the silent appearance of three sullen, armed bodyguards, and the emergence of attendants and the ducal cupbearer from the kitchen, Galeazzo arrived—without the usual blare of trumpets, given that Lorenzo’s arrival was to be known by as few residents of Castle Pavia as possible. The duke’s pride, however, required that his entry be accompanied by the sung praises of one of the castrated tenors who had entertained us in Bona’s chamber the day before.
A month shy of his thirty-third birthday, Galeazzo Maria was in his prime. Like all the Sforza, he was sturdy, muscular, and passionately devoted to sport. His tunic, of gray-green watered silk embroidered with bronze fleur-de-lis, with white ermine trim at the collar, was tailored to show off a powerful chest and shoulders. His cap of light reddish brown hair was cut in layers, long enough to cover his ears but too short to touch his collar; as was the fashion, carefully crimped curls framed his face. The latter was dominated by a strong nose, so badly broken in his youth that the bridge had a large bump. His green eyes were deep set, round, and ringed by shadows, his lips thin and permanently pursed in an arrogant sneer.
This was the man who had ordered one of his enemies to be nailed to his coffin before being buried alive; who had, instead of showing generosity to a starving peasant who dared catch a hare in the hunting park, killed him by forcing him to swallow the unskinned animal whole; and who had, in a spasm of jealousy, chopped off the hands of a courtier who had caressed one of Galeazzo’s former lovers. The duke had been born not to heartless parents but to a brave warrior, Francesco Sforza, and a proud, strong-willed but charitable woman, Bianca Maria Visconti, daughter of the Duke of Milan. His parents were much loved, and as their eldest son grew to maturity, they were perplexed by his arrogance and cruelty. When his father died and Galeazzo claimed the duchy, he resisted his mother’s advice; she died of a mysterious fever—or poison, some say, on the order of her own son.
As the singer’s voice faded, Galeazzo glared at his wife and jerked his chin in my direction. “What is she doing here? I wanted as few people as possible to know of this!”
I stared intently at the carpet while Bona stammered.
Lorenzo interjected smoothly, “It is on my account, Your Grace; do you recall? I disturbed the three of them at prayer yesterday, and wished to make my apologies to each one today.”
Galeazzo frowned; the weather had kept him from the hunt, which added to his usual irritability. I feared he would lose his temper at the subtle reference to yesterday’s incident with the screaming young woman. The sight of Lorenzo, however, distracted him enough so that he gave a small, tight smile.
“Good Lorenzo! How do you fare?”
“Well, Your Grace,” Lorenzo replied, “especially when I am surrounded by such lovely women.” He gestured at us three.
Galeazzo’s smile widened at the compliment. “She is beautiful, is she not?” he asked proudly, and went to take his daughter Caterina’s hand. He kissed her on the lips, after which Caterina curtsied and shot the rest of us a gloating glance.
The duke moved to Lorenzo next. The two clasped hands and slapped each other upon the shoulder with more affection than I had ever seen the duke show his brothers. Milan and Florence were solid allies; Lorenzo’s grandfather, Cosimo, had supported Galeazzo’s father’s claim to the duchy of Milan.
Questioning Lorenzo about his journey from more temperate Florence through the freezing weather, the duke passed by his wife with a careless nod, and took no further notice of me. As he moved toward the massive ebony table—carved, at the top of each leg, with the symbol of the Sforza, of a dragon-headed serpent swallowing a naked child—a servant scrambled to pull out the tallest chair for him. He settled against the red leather padding and snapped his fingers; instantly, his cupbearer leaned forward and set an amethyst-studded golden goblet into the duke’s waiting hand. Galeazzo told each of us where to sit: Lorenzo on his right, the silent, stolid Cicco on his left. Bona sat directly across from her husband; Caterina sat to her left, facing Lorenzo, while I sat on Bona’s right.
A pair of servants hurried to light the tapers in two heavy candelabra upon the table; Galeazzo turned to one of them. “Bring the wine now, and the food; besides, I’m hungry, and Lorenzo cannot tarry.” He looked back at Bona. “Once we have eaten, you women must depart; we men have private business to discuss.”
“Then with your leave, Your Grace,” Lorenzo said, “I should like to present Her Grace the Lady Bona with a gift, for her hospitality, with hopes that it will ease some of the difficulties I have caused her.”
If Galeazzo was angered or insulted by Lorenzo’s second veiled reference to the violated woman, he did not show it. He nodded, faintly bored, and watched as Lorenzo reached into the pocket of his tunic and produced a box of red velvet studded with tiny diamonds.
“For you, Your Grace,” he said to Bona, and smiling, rose slightly in order to hand it to her across the table. “I pray this humble gift pleases you.”
Bona forgot her embarrassment and beamed. “Your Magnificence,” she said, “dear Lorenzo, no guest of mine has ever been more welcome . . . or more gracious.” She took it from him and held the box so that the gold embroidery and the diamonds glittered in the candlelight. “How very handsome.”
“Look inside, Your Grace,” Lorenzo prompted.
Carefully, the duchess opened the lid. Inside, tied together with a silk ribbon, was a thick rectangular object, slightly longer and broader than Bona’s hand; she lifted it out of the box, revealing a deck of cards made of thick parchment coated with white gesso and painted.
She did her best to mask her response, but I knew that she did not approve of playing cards. She forced a smile as she undid the ribbon. I stared with her at the backs, prettily illustrated with flowers and vases, and bordered by angels.
“They’re lovely,” she said to Lorenzo. “Thank you.”
“Turn it over,” Caterina said impatiently.
She did, and like Caterina, let go a slight gasp of amazement at the sight.
The front side of the card was covered in gold leaf, which had been painstakingly etched with numerous fine geometric designs; the texture made the bright gold flash with reflected light. Upon this dazzling backdrop was painted the image of a pauper, a young, wide-eyed man barefoot and dressed in tatters, with a walking stick resting against one shoulder. He stood on the very edge of a dark chasm; emerald and sapphire hills sprawled out behind him.
Bona began to set the cards out in front of her, one by one. “But these are beautiful,” she breathed.
“I know of your love for illustrated manuscripts,” Lorenzo explained. “I had hoped that these might please you. That one is the first in the deck; he is called the Fool.”
Galeazzo let go a laugh. “I know of these!” he said. “These are triumph cards. Oh, I will dazzle my companions with these!” He lowered his voice and winked slyly at Lorenzo. “Yet another way for me to lose money at the gambling table!”
The duchess tensed; Lorenzo saw, and said diplomatically to Galeazzo, “It’s true, my lord, that these are triumph cards. Yet this deck is special. Some would prefer to use it for more serious pursuits.”
Galeazzo scowled in puzzlement. “Such as?”
“Seeing the future.”
The duke lifted a brow and peered down at the cards with renewed interest. “Really?”
Beneath the table, Bona clenched one fist; only I could see, and only I knew that she wanted to cross herself out of fear. “These are devilish,” she whispered, so faintly that I was surprised that Lorenzo heard.
“Far from it, Your Grace,” he told her. “They reveal what God wishes us to see of the future, that he may deal more directly with our souls. Yet they could, I suppose, be misused by those with evil in their hearts.”
He said more, but I did not hear it, for Bona had just turned over the twelfth card. I found myself staring down at the image of a man suspended upside down from a rope bound to his ankle. His hands were hid, helpless, behind his back, and his unbound leg was bent at the knee and crossed behind the other, to form an upside-down numeral four.
I was too riveted to stop myself from reaching for the card, from taking it and holding it before my eyes. At the time, I could not see the painting on the card of a man with golden curls; instead I saw Matteo, with his dark auburn hair falling straight beneath his head. On the card, the man’s eyes were dark and open, but I saw only Matteo’s eyes, shut, his features white and deathly still. Matteo, limp and dying . . .
It was the image I had read in the stars, in the fire. Despite the blazing hearth, I grew cold. Matteo was in danger of dying, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.
“Dea,” Bona said sharply in my ear, and snatched the card from my grasp. I looked up and realized that the others had been speaking for some time; I had been somewhere else entirely. In the interim, the soup had magically arrived; a plate sat steaming in front of me.
Lorenzo was studying me intently. “Madonna Dea,” he asked softly, “what do you see?”
“My husband,” I murmured, stricken.
He reached across the table and set a long, tapered finger down, pointing to the card. “This is called the Hanged Man. Yet you can see, he does not struggle.” Surrender to evil forces, I imagined him saying, though he uttered not another word, with the intent of sacrifice.
“Does she see things in the cards?” the duke called gaily over Lorenzo. “Can she tell our future, then?” Ignoring Bona’s tense expression, Galeazzo pointed at me. “Gather them up,” he directed. “Mix them, and choose our futures.” He chuckled. “No gambling, so long as the ladies are here.”
Bona had stiffened in her chair, but she handed me the deck; Caterina’s eyes were gleaming with curiosity and amusement at her and my discomfort. Galeazzo snapped his fingers again, and with a gesture, bade a servant clear away my plate.
The cards were overlarge, unwieldy, stiff from the gesso plaster. I had expected them to be cool to the touch, yet they were warm in my hands, as if they were living things. I stared down at the table’s ebony surface, polished to a reflective sheen, and felt the present melt away.
I set them down and fanned them out facedown upon the ebony. They were too stiff to be shuffled, so I moved them about, again and again, until it was impossible to identify the cards that Bona had turned over earlier. When I was satisfied, I gathered them together and fanned them out again, and said to Galeazzo, “Your Grace, choose one card.”
He shot an excited glance at Lorenzo and grinned, then indicated his choice by pointing. I took the card and pushed it slightly toward him but decided that it was not yet time to reveal it.
“Now His Magnificence,” the duke said.
Lorenzo’s smile was encouraging as he met my gaze. It was unsettling to encounter a stranger who was exposing my ability to recognize portents, yet I trusted him. He reached out and tapped the wood near his chosen card.
I pushed it from the deck toward him. Cicco, as always carefully appraising the others without revealing his own feelings, accepted a card without comment.
“Would it please Your Grace for the ladies each to have one, as well?” Lorenzo asked with consummate politeness.
Galeazzo gave a loud sniff of impatience, but nodded to me. I shifted in my chair toward Bona, but the duchess gently shook her head.
“The cards are exquisite,” she said sweetly, “and I shall treasure them always, just as I shall treasure my friendship with the magnificent Lorenzo. But I am content to wait upon God to reveal the future in His own good time.”
Galeazzo scowled at her and clicked his tongue. “Come now, don’t spoil our fun!” His temper was rising, and he would have lashed out at his wife had Caterina not interrupted.
“One for me then! One for me!”
Lorenzo said cheerfully, “It seems, Your Grace, that the young lady does not wish to be kept waiting.”
The duke sighed, yielding, and gestured for me to give his impatient daughter a card. I set it down and pushed it in Caterina’s direction. Rather than wait for the others, she reached out and turned her card over immediately. As she stared down at it, her expression soured. “But it is only the Fool! I want another!”
Lorenzo looked to me before saying, very softly, “It can be a good card, Madonna Caterina. You might not want to dismiss it.”
I studied it. The Fool’s eyes were fearless and innocent, his posture unguarded. He was on the verge of a long and tumultuous experience, ignorant as a child of the perils awaiting him. He might well decide to turn and head for the serene mountains behind him, in which case, he could reach the highest pinnacle—or he could just as well take a single step forward and fall into the dark, yawning chasm.
“A long journey awaits you,” I said. Caterina leaned past Bona, the better to see and hear me. Expression avid, the girl propped an elbow on the table and rested her chin upon her hand; the long golden curls framing her face spilled forward and caught the light. “The most important journey of your life,” I continued. “Be cautious and reflective, lest you fall into danger.”
She drew back, mollified. Aware that Lorenzo’s eyes were on me, I did not wait for his prompting, but drew one last card, for myself, and set it aside.
Galeazzo was intrigued and once again smiling. “Let us go in ascending order now. Her card first”—he indicated me—“and then yours, Lorenzo, and Cicco’s, and last of all, mine.”
I turned over my card, and fell into the image, scarcely hearing Bona’s soft, shocked inhalation.
I saw a woman dressed in flowing golden robes and cape and seated upon a throne. She wore a nun’s white wimple, and upon her head, unmistakably, rested the triple crown of the papal tiara; in one hand, she held a holy book, in the other, a long staff atop which rested a large gold cross.
She was a female pope, a papess—a scandalous image, yet I was not in the least appalled. I trusted her, with the same unreasoning certainty I trusted Lorenzo. I stared at the landscape around her, seeking clues as to where I might find her; a green, carefully tended orchard lay in the distance behind her.
I must have stared for some time, but my reverie was interrupted by a sharp pain in my shin as Caterina kicked me beneath the table.
“She is . . .” I began, and searched desperately for a word that would not offend Bona; papess was out of the question, as was priestess. Finally I said, “The Abbess. She holds much wise spiritual advice.”
Lorenzo’s card was the male version of mine—a white-haired, bearded man wearing the gold papal crown, with a gold cross atop his staff. But the card had been accidentally turned upside down, and at the sight of it, I felt a thrill of fear.
Lorenzo’s homely face grew solemn as he gazed upon it. “The pope, ill-dignified,” he said.
I stared back at it, too, and saw a thousand fleeting things, too numerous to give voice to: an old, vengeful man weeping over a dead son, the swirl of frankincense, the glint of a blade, a spray of blood, an oddly familiar voice sighing, Lorenzo . . . My fear must have been visible, for when I looked up again, the women were wide-eyed and silent, and Galeazzo, though frowning, was chastened.
I struggled to put all that I had seen into words. “There is vengeance here,” I said, “and sorrow, and great treachery. You must take care, or there will be blood.”
Bona crossed herself; the duke and Lorenzo shared a troubled, knowing glance. “I know how to deal with the matter now,” Lorenzo said, his tone firmly optimistic; I felt his words were not so much true as intended to comfort Duke Galeazzo. “I will take care. Thank you, Madonna Dea.”
“All this seriousness!” Galeazzo scolded. “Here now, this was meant as lighthearted entertainment.” He gazed sternly at me. “Read Cicco’s card now, and see to it that it doesn’t spoil our luncheon!” He nudged Lorenzo playfully as he addressed me. “Speak to us now of song and sport and love!”
I murmured an apology and turned over Cicco’s card. Ten glittering golden coins rested against a white backdrop decorated with flowers; I sighed with relief. “You will come into a good sum of money,” I told him.
Cicco gave the slightest of smiles and nodded; the duke grinned, pleased.
“That’s because I pay him too well!” Galeazzo quipped. “Now, let’s see if I am luckier than my secretary!”
I turned over the duke’s card. Like Lorenzo’s, it was upside down. Upon a throne, a crowned king sat in full gilded armor. In his left hand was a gilded shield, in his right, a long sword with a wicked sharp point. His hair appeared golden on the card, but my internal eye recognized a dark-haired man, a courtier wild with outrage, who had waved his sword at Lorenzo de’ Medici.
I felt a welling of dark satisfaction. “Here is justice at last,” I said.
The duke frowned. “Regarding which matter?”
I shook off the pull of the card and kept my wits. I wanted desperately to see what action this king of swords would take, and whether that action would succeed; I hoped that vengeance was coming at last to His Grace, but feared warning him. I did not want him to be able to protect himself.
And so I pretended to study the card further, then said, in as casual a tone as I could muster, “There is business that soon will be concluded, though not to His Grace’s favor, unless he take exceptional care.”
“Which business?” he persisted. The appearance of another negative symbol had awakened his ire; if I answered in a manner that displeased him, we would all pay.
I replied smoothly, “Political. I will speak no more of it, for I believe it concerns a secret matter. I have confidence that, should his Grace ponder the card, he will come to a clever solution to avoid the difficulty.”
He nodded, feigning understanding, and studied the card thoughtfully until Caterina, her blue eyes narrowed with curiosity, said to me, “So it’s true . . . your mother was a witch!”
I looked up sharply. Beside me, Bona turned to Caterina and hissed: “Mind your tongue!”
I had spent the past nine years of my life with Bona and had never heard her criticize Caterina, much less scold her in anger. Nor had the duke, who leaned across the table to give his wife a look that threatened imminent physical violence.
“Caterina jests,” Galeazzo said witheringly. And to prove it, he laughed, but when by accident I caught his eye, I saw the fear in it.
An hour before dusk I made my way down to Matteo’s chamber, ostensibly to rekindle the fire. In truth, I wanted to be alone so that I could cry. Since the appearance of the Hanged Man, I had been increasingly worried about Matteo. Bona had said that he would come today, but Bona was wrong; the triumph card had merely confirmed my feeling that something terrible had happened.
My mood had not been helped by Bona’s reaction to the deck—or, more to the point, her reaction to my reaction. After bidding Lorenzo a warm farewell, the duchess had returned to her chambers in uncharacteristic silence, clutching the red velvet box containing the cards. Upon arriving in her quarters, Bona had given it to one of the chambermaids, with instructions to “hide it well, where I will not soon set eyes upon it again.” Caterina, too, was unusually quiet, though her eyes were adance with amusement at the duchess’s and my discomfort.
I confess, I paid close attention when the chambermaid moved toward a trunk set in a corner near the duchess’s bed, opened it, and slipped the box beneath a fur throw.
While Bona retreated to her wardrobe to change into less restrictive attire, I moved to the front of the chamber to gaze anxiously out the window overlooking the duke’s hunting park. Caterina followed, and when I was certain the duchess was thoroughly distracted, I asked the girl, “Madonna, why did you say that? About my mother being a witch?”
“You should have seen your eyes,” Caterina hissed, widening her own until the whites showed ghoulishly. “There were times, I swear, when you had no idea where you were . . . you were carried off by visions!”
Impatient, I pressed: “What has this to do with my mother, Madonna? You speak as though you’ve heard rumors.”
“I have,” she said coyly.
“From whom?”
“From Nonna Beatrice,” she replied. Nonna had been Bona’s girlhood nurse and had accompanied the duchess from Savoy when the latter had married Galeazzo; Nonna had died the previous year. “She said your mother was a witch and saw the future.”
I controlled the urge to shake the duke’s favorite daughter by her shoulders. “What else did she say about her? What else?”
Caterina shrugged; her shell pink lips curved upward in delight at my agitation. “Just that.”
Nothing I said could force her to say more. Shortly afterward the duchess joined us, with the curt remark: “No good ever came of fortune-telling.”
With that, Bona dismissed the subject completely and ignored all of Caterina’s attempts to revive it. I spent the rest of the day marking the movement of the sun and struggling to suppress my growing dread. When dusk came, Bona dismissed me. While she was undressing and the chambermaids distracted, I did an unthinkable, inexplicable thing: I went to the trunk, slipped my hand beneath the fur throw, and made off with the diamond-littered velvet box. I wrapped my shawl tightly around me, tucking the hand that held the box beneath it, around my waist, and headed down to the first-floor loggia, bound for Matteo’s apartment.
Lorenzo was there, leaving one of the guest quarters with his two gentlemen; the three of them wore cloaks and caps and riding gloves, and carried saddlebags. My hand was on the door when Lorenzo caught sight of me and waved.
“Madonna,” he called, and handed his saddlebag to one of the men, then gestured to both of them to go on to the stables ahead of him. It was an odd hour, I thought, to be setting out for distant Florence.
“A word with you,” he said as he approached. But the loggia was crowded with servants headed wearily back to their quarters; a pair of Cicco’s apprentice clerks brushed past us, laughing and joking. Lorenzo looked pointedly at the door handle to Matteo’s room. “Might it be a private word, Madonna Dea?”
I dropped my gaze. He was a man in his late twenties—homely, to be sure, but with an accomplished swordsman’s shoulders—and I a young woman. His request was faintly inappropriate, but his manner held no whiff of impropriety. He was also unquestionably my better, so I unlocked the door and gestured for His Magnificence to enter. As I did so, I could not help but reveal the velvet box in my hand; he marked it without comment, and I offered no explanation.
Inside, the fire was reduced to glowing embers, but the hearthstones still gave off a good deal of warmth. I stood near the door, the box still in my hand.
Lorenzo removed neither cloak nor glove; his expression was as darkly serious as I had ever seen it. “Forgive my brazen request, Madonna,” he began. “I intend nothing improper. But I did not wish to be overheard.” He paused. “As I said, I know your husband well. It was my understanding that he was to have arrived home yesterday.”
“Yes,” I said, embarrassed that my voice betrayed all my repressed tears. I expected him to reassure me then, to say something comforting, but Lorenzo was, apparently, no liar. Or perhaps, like me, he had recognized the danger in the Hanged Man.
“I am sorry for that,” he said softly, “and for your worry. I had hoped for a word with him in private. But I can tarry no longer, as my wife and children will never forgive me if I’m not home by Christmas.” He studied me for a long moment. “I can trust you to deliver a message for his ears alone, can’t I, Madonna?”
“Of course,” I answered, and he smiled faintly at my indignant tone.
“If Matteo returns before tomorrow evening, would you tell him that I have taken the route to the north, and will await him at the lodge? He knows which one.”
I lifted my brows in surprise at the direction; Florence lay well to the south of Pavia and Milan. “I will be sure to tell him, Your Magnificence.”
“Lorenzo,” he admonished me cheerfully, then grew serious again; his gaze strayed to the velvet box in my hand. “God gave you a gift, Madonna Dea, one best practiced with discretion, and shown to few. I am glad to see your interest in it. It is not my place to give such a new acquaintance advice, but—”
“I should like to hear it,” I interrupted bluntly.
“The duchess and others mean well, but . . . Do not let them keep you from it. Such a gift was meant to be used. Remember the parable of the servant and the talents.”
“I will,” I said.
“Good. Then God keep you, Madonna Dea, until we meet again.”
“And you,” I responded.
As I watched him slip out the door, I felt a sudden conviction that our next encounter would come too soon.
Chapter Four
I spent that evening staring at the gilded illustrations on the cards. At times, the images evoked something very like recognition in me, so much so that for long moments, I was able to forget my worry. When exhaustion overwhelmed me, I stacked the cards neatly and returned them to the box, which I hid in the trunk at the foot of the bed.
I slept poorly that night, pulled from sleep again and again by the clatter of frozen rain pelting Bona’s window. By dawn, the storm had passed, leaving the glass coated with a wavy layer of ice; even though the window stayed closed and shuttered, the groaning of the trees was audible, and the occasional ear-splitting crack of a breaking limb made me start. By midday, all clouds had cleared, and the sun gained strength. The ice on Bona’s window began to melt, revealing the hunting park beyond, glazed and glittering like a jewel.
On the sixth day before Christmas, all at Castle Pavia were filled with festive cheer as preparations for the procession to Milan intensified; even Bona had forgotten her distress over the incident with the young woman and my reaction to the triumph cards. The season inclined Bona to be even more generous than usual. She feted her servants and courtiers in the great dining room, setting out the Milanese sweet bread called panneton, cheese, and good wine. I had no taste for any of it. When the duchess kindly released me in the early afternoon to do as I wished, I went to light the fire in Matteo’s quarters, then climbed the southwest tower steps and stood staring out toward Rome for hours.
They came at dusk, galloping across the Lombard plain: a solitary horse and rider, black against the graying sweep of snow and ice and sky. I let go a cry of infinite relief; my breath clouded the glass, and I wiped it away, compelled and squinting as I struggled to recognize the rider.
At last he reached the moat, reined in his horse, and shouted for the castellan to lower the drawbridge. Only then did I see the body slung over the saddle; I gasped and pressed my fingertips to the freezing glass.
Somehow I calmed myself, gathered my skirts, and hurried down the stairs. I ran outside, across the cold, endless courtyard to the main gate just as the horse’s hooves struck a last, hollow thud against the wooden bridge and passed, ringing, onto the cobblestones inside the gate.
I ran to Matteo, his belly pressed against the saddle, his long legs hanging down one flank of the lathered steed, his head and torso down the other, his arms horribly limp and dangling. He would have slipped easily to the ground had the rider not held him firmly in place.
I cried out, thinking he was dead, but when the rider dismounted and helped him slide into my arms, he groaned.
I do not remember the rider carrying him to his bed or shouting for the doctor. Others ran to help, but I do not remember them at all. Of the breathless moments before the doctor came, I recall fragments: Matteo’s hazel eyes, the whites now red, sparkling, utterly lost; Matteo’s brow and cheeks, an ugly mottled violet; his skin slick and glistening; Matteo’s limbs, spasming as cramps seized his gut. I held his head as he retched yellow-green vomit streaked with bright blood. I wiped his sunken face with a cold cloth that appeared magically in my hand and called his name, but he did not know me.
If I had to lose him, if he had to die, why did he not die as the Hanged Man, limp, peaceful, resigned? Why did he have to suffer horribly? God is merciful, Bona said, and just, but there was no mercy, no justice in Matteo’s dying, only the most savage cruelty.
Plague, someone whispered, and crossed himself, but it was not plague. Bona’s physician appeared with leeches and a bitter draught, but Matteo vomited up what little he was able to swallow, and his limbs convulsed so violently at times that he crushed many of the leeches and the doctor removed the rest for fear of losing them.
Fever, the doctor said, but it was like no fever I had ever seen. Matteo’s master Cicco came, his huge bulk huddled, his tiny eyes wide, his rounded features slack with fright; Matteo did not know him, either, and he did not stay long. Bona came and said that I must rest—a ridiculous suggestion, I thought, for I had no idea then that it was nearly dawn—and that she would sit with Matteo. I sent her away. I sent the doctor away. I sent the hovering rider away, until my husband and I were alone.
As the morning light filtered through the open shutters, Matteo’s thrashing eased at last, and I closed them, hoping he might sleep. Amazingly, the hearth was still crackling; someone must have stoked it. As I turned to where my husband lay, his long, naked torso and limbs motionless against the dark soaked sheets, I heard a rasping croak.
“Lorenzo.”
I moved swiftly to the chair by the bedside and put my cool hand to his cheek. His eyes were frighteningly dull; the purple flush had faded from his cheeks, now ashen.
“Lorenzo has gone back to Florence,” I said. There was no point in mentioning Lorenzo’s diversion to the north in hopes of a secret rendezvous. His Magnificence was already well on his way home. “You must not worry about him now.”
His eyelids fluttered. “Dea,” he gasped. His voice was so hoarse as to be unrecognizable; his throat must have been terribly sore.
I pressed my knuckles to my lips. “Oh, Matteo. Matteo, my poor darling . . .”
“I am dying,” he whispered, and I felt as though I would melt—my blood, my bones, my flesh—and only the blinding pain in my throat and chest would remain.
“I won’t let you,” I sobbed, but he gestured desperately, impatiently with his right hand. He was so weak that I had to fall silent to hear him.
“My quill,” he said.
I ran to his desk, retrieved the quill, and lifted the inkpot from its place, my hands shaking, clumsy. I fetched a piece of parchment along with his little lap desk, and propped him up against the pillows.
Once situated, he tried to dip the nib into the inkpot I held for him, but tremors plagued him; he dropped the quill. He squeezed his eyes shut and let go a moan of frustration, then gathered himself and looked back at me. His lips were dove gray and trembling.
“Swear,” he whispered.
“Anything,” I said. “Anything for you.”
It pained him to speak; sweat dripped from his forehead as he formed the words. “On your life,” he gasped. “Take me to San Marco. And my papers . . . Read them in secret. Tell Lorenzo: Romulus and the Wolf mean to destroy you.”
He fell abruptly silent.
“I swear,” I said.
As I spoke, his body stiffened, and he let go a terrible strangled sound and lost control of his bowels. For several seconds, he lay thus—stiff and trembling—and then his arms and legs began to thrash. I cried his name and tried to hold him down, lest he harm himself, but I was not strong enough.
In the end, he fell still; his eyes closed, and his breathing grew harsh. Half an hour later, it stopped, and his eyes slowly opened; I looked in them and knew that he was dead.
I stripped the soiled sheets and set them outside, and used the basin of water someone had left behind to wash my husband. When he was clean, I dressed him in his finest tunic and leggings, then lay down beside him and held him until someone knocked upon the door.
I did not answer, but I had forgotten to throw the bolt and Bona entered. She tried to coax me away; I would not hear, would not leave Matteo. She left, and when she came again, she brought others, including Cicco, his foolish hair disheveled from sleep. The lumbering bear of a man, normally stoic, burst out weeping at the sight of Matteo, his star pupil. He tried gently to pull me from my husband, but again, I would not go; he had to recruit a second man. I clawed and kicked, to no avail; they caught my arms and tore me from my beloved.
I screamed, I thrashed; the sobbing Cicco held me lest I hurt myself. When I finally grew tired and had to sit, Bona convinced me to take a sip of strangely bitter wine. She had brought her priest, Father Piero, and after I had fallen into a strange state between sleep and waking, Father Piero told me, “You must accept this. We are human and frail, and do not understand as yet, but it is God’s will.”
“God is a murderer,” I said listlessly, “and a liar. He bids us pray, yet will not hear us. He sets evil men over us, and takes no pity on their victims.”
“Dea,” Bona chided, aghast. “God have mercy on you!” She crossed herself, covered her eyes with her hands, and wept.
I turned calmly to her. “When did He hear us? When did He ever hear us?”
She never answered. To my astonishment, a scarlet-robed cardinal entered and produced a vial of holy oil, dipped his finger into it, and touched my darling’s eyes, ears, nose, lips hands, feet, and loins, praying: Per istam sanctam unctionem et suam piissimam misericordiam, indulgeat tibi Dominus . . .
Through this holy unction and His own most tender mercy may God forgive whatever sins you have committed . . .
Matteo needed no forgiveness, I decided. It was God who needed to apologize to my husband.
When Bona’s draught had left me sufficiently compliant, Francesca and the chambermaids took me away to the duchess’s room and dressed me in black skirts that were too long, and a veil that filmed the world darkly; I did not care. I did not want to see.
Miserable, pointless hours passed, after which I was taken to the ducal chapel to discover Matteo in front of the altar, lying in a wooden box, his arms crossed, a crucifix over his heart. The votive candles I had lit for his safety still burned upon the altar. I threw them across the room, ignoring the startled gasps of onlookers and the scalding wax that spilled down my arm.
I did not sleep at all that first night.
The next day, I sat beside Matteo in the chapel, Bona at my side, while most of the courtiers filed past his body. In the midst of familiar faces, one unknown appeared, with beard and hair and eyes black and shining as jet. I did not know him, yet felt I had laid eyes upon him before. He bore a saddlebag slung over his shoulder, and when he approached, he went down upon one knee and presented the saddlebag as if it were a gift.
I realized then that he was the rider, the man who had broken away from the caravan of papal legates my husband was leading from Rome to Milan, in order to bring Matteo swiftly home. He had remained in Matteo’s room, awaiting the outcome, until I had thrown him out.
“This was your husband’s, Madonna,” he said. His voice was deep and soft, his gaze averted; if he felt any emotion, it was carefully contained. “He asked me to be certain you received it.” He looked to be Matteo’s age and would have been pretty enough to capture the duke’s attention—Galeazzo occasionally indulged in affairs with his male staff—had it not been for his great sharp nose.
I thanked him. The bag was heavier than I expected, and when he handed it to me, it slipped from my grasp to the ground. I could not bring myself to look inside, not there, with others watching. The man bowed and retreated, and I thought no more about him.
Duke Galeazzo was last to appear. He stared with distaste at my husband’s corpse and said flatly, “A pity. He was one of my most talented scribes. Poison, was it?”
At those last words, I gasped. The red-eyed Cicco was with the duke and drew him away with a word, but I rose, and called after him to explain himself. What poison? Had the doctor said this? Why had no one mentioned this to me?
I tried to push through the crowd and find the black-haired man who had given me Matteo’s saddlebag. He had traveled with Matteo; surely he would know if my husband had been poisoned.
But the man was nowhere to be found, and Francesca and Bona pleaded with me to sit back down. His Grace was mistaken, they insisted. He was confusing Matteo with another man, another matter, but I did not believe them, and broke down sobbing.
After a time, there were priests and Roman legates, public prayers and psalms, but there was no burial. For the first time in anyone’s memory, the ground was coated with a layer of solid ice; we could not lay him in the earth until it thawed.
Matteo’s corpse was taken away—somewhere outside, I suspected, sheltered from animals but not the freezing cold; they were wise not to tell me where. Bona led me to a nauseating display of food in the common dining chamber near the chapel. I could not bear the sight of it, so her ladies returned me to Bona’s chamber, where I drank more of the wine laced with the bitter tang of poppies. For hours I stared into the glittering fire.
Matteo had been murdered. Romulus and the Wolf had killed him in order to silence him, and they would kill Lorenzo next. And I was stripped of reason and will and could do nothing to stop it. Whom should I tell? Whom should I trust?
When night fell, Francesca helped me undress and put on my nightgown. She offered me more bitter wine, but I refused and was taken to my little cot. When Bona arrived, she paused before climbing into her own bed to pray; I lay listening to her whispers and began to tremble with silent rage. I wanted to strike her, to tear the rosary from her fingers, to scream that she had taught me only lies: God was neither loving nor just, and I hated Him.
I held my tongue and waited, anguished, until Bona fell asleep, until Francesca snored. By the light of the hearth, I rose and found my shawl and slippers, then slipped out into the loggia.
I pattered downstairs, gasping at the freezing air when I hit the open hallway. I staggered in the blackness, twice almost slipping on the ice, and was shivering uncontrollably by the time I got to Matteo’s room. It was cold and dark and drafty; the fire had gone out and the flue was still open, but I did not bother to light it, as I did not care whether I caught cold or froze to death. I would have been pleased to die.
I am unsure why I went to my husband’s chamber. I believe I meant to scream myself hoarse, though even with the windows shuttered, I would have been overheard. I only know that when I arrived and drew the bolt behind me, I spied Matteo’s quill upon the carpet.
It must have been tangled in the bedding and fallen when I removed the sheets to clean him. I dropped to my knees before it and grief rushed out of me in a torrent. The sobs wracked me so that I sank down upon the carpet, the quill clutched to my chest.
I wept a good half an hour. When I was done, my eyes, nose, and mouth were streaming, the poor feather crushed. Gasping for breath, I pushed myself up to sitting, and felt something small and metal brush against my breastbone, beneath my nightgown.
Matteo’s key.
Use it in case of emergency.
I drew my sleeve across my eyes and nose, and stared across the room at Matteo’s writing desk and the secret panel next to it, hidden in the dark wooden wainscoting. Weak and trembling after the paroxysm of tears, I crawled on my hands and knees to Matteo’s desk, and pulled myself up into his chair to light the lamp. The oil was low, and the flame feeble; I leaned down and had to run my fingertips over the wall to find the tiny black keyhole.
I slipped the leather thong over my hand, and put the little key into the lock.
The door to the compartment popped open with a faint click. Behind the wood panel, a large stone brick was missing from the wall; in the gap sat a thick stack of papers the size of a library manuscript. I drew them out carefully, set them upon my husband’s desk, and pulled the lamp closer.
On the very top was a tiny black silk pouch, tied with a red ribbon, and beneath that, a letter on fresh paper, folded into thirds, sealed with wax, and addressed For my Beloved. At the sight, I braced myself for the emotional upheaval to come as I opened the little black pouch. I thought it contained jewelry—a keepsake, perhaps, by which I could remember him, but it contained only a coarse grayish-brown powder.
I turned to the letter, expecting to learn, at long last, why my husband had rejected my amorous advances.
I did not expect to be frightened.
It was not a heartfelt farewell letter but a diagram, in Matteo’s hand, of a circle with the cardinal directions marked—oddly, with east at the top of the circle instead of north, and west at the bottom. At each direction, he had put a five-pointed star, with arrows carefully indicating how it should be drawn, and beneath each star, a word in what I suspected was Hebrew; underneath these were written phonetic translations in the vernacular, but no meaning was given.
Beneath this was a diagram of a second circle, again with the cardinal directions, this time accompanied by hexagrams and more barbarous words.
It was magic, the same magic I had seen him work at night when I pretended to be sleeping in our bed, and I remembered snatches of our conversation the night I had first told him that I saw portents in the clouds and sky and stars.
Bona would say this was from the Devil, I had said, and he had answered swiftly: Bona would be wrong.
Beneath both circles were sets of instructions in Milanese describing the rites that accompanied each. I could not focus my shattered mind long enough to make sense of them, nor could I keep the hairs on my arms and the back of my neck from lifting when I set down Matteo’s diagram to examine the next page upon the stack.
It was a piece of yellowed vellum, brittle with age, many times folded and in danger of falling apart. Gingerly, I unfolded it upon the desk. The ink was rust brown, faded, the handwriting ancient, unfamiliar; Bona had permitted me no Greek, though I recognized it readily enough, and understood most of the Latin translation written in a later hand beneath it.
It was an invocation—of what, I could not fathom in my grief-addled state. I set it delicately aside; beneath it rested an unbound manuscript of text, consisting of several dozens of pages in Latin. The paper and the author’s hand were modern; the title page read De Mysteriis Aegyptiorium, Of the Egyptian Mysteries.
Last in the stack of writing was a document written in Matteo’s careful, even script. The letters of the Latin alphabet were written across the page, in order, and beneath each letter was written a different, random letter, number, or symbol. The letter a for example, was represented by the number 9, the letter b by an x, and c by an l. At the very top of the document was written strike out every fourth. It was, I realized, a key—one Matteo must have used when encrypting secret correspondence.
I propped an elbow on the desk and put my fingertips to my brow. “Why do you want me to have this?” I asked aloud.
The impulse to cast it all into the dying fire overtook me. Magic had been no more able to protect wicked men from killing Matteo than had God. But another thought damped my anger: the memory of the gilded triumph card displaying the Hanged Man. Surrender to evil forces with the intent of sacrifice.
I pressed the heels of my palms to my burning eyes and tried to make sense of it all. Matteo had clearly had a sense of his impending death before he left, else he would not have given me the key.
He had sacrificed himself to me in marriage out of innocent love. Had he again sacrificed himself to protect me? Had he left all this behind to warn me?
Had I not been furious with God, I would have burned it all. Instead I stared down at the meaningless tapestry of numerals and letters on the page and heard Lorenzo the Magnificent speaking.
It was I, in fact, who recommended Matteo to the duke for employment.
As if in answer, I heard Matteo in my memory.
I was rescued in my youth by a wealthy patron. . . .
Perhaps later we could go together to Florence.
Bury me in San Marco, the monastery in Florence that had educated him.
Read them in secret. And tell Lorenzo: Romulus and the Wolf mean to destroy you.
I sat very still, for perhaps an hour, then stoked the fire and stirred it until the flames leapt high and the room grew warm. I opened the shutters and discovered my husband’s saddlebag, leaning against the wall beneath a window. I undid the straps and emptied it onto the bed. It held another quill, a vial of ink, a blotter, two pairs of leggings and two wool undershirts, a brass mug, comb, and a small book, bound in leather. Half its pages were covered in the same unfathomable cipher—numbers and letters mixed with an occasional star or other symbol—I had found on the papers hidden in the compartment. I examined the little book for some time, but could make no sense of it.
When the blackness outside eased to gray, I went back upstairs to the duchess’s chamber, where Bona lay sleeping. I tiptoed up onto the platform, slid the bed curtains aside, and set a hand gently upon her shoulder. Even so, she wakened with a start.
“I must take Matteo to Florence,” I said.
Chapter Five
The duke refused my request to take Matteo to Florence to be buried in the churchyard of San Marco. For one thing, Galeazzo said, the winter was far too treacherous for a woman to attempt five days’ hard ride, even if it be southward—no matter that a day of feeble sun had melted most of the ice. For another, he insisted that every member of court attend the Christmas celebrations in Milan, whether they were in mourning or not.
Of the myriad princes in Italy, none celebrated Christmas with greater zeal than Duke Galeazzo. He required all courtiers, all ambassadors, all feudatories to come to Milan to celebrate the Nativity and renew their vows of fealty to him the day after, on the feast of Saint Stephen. Everyone, except the dying and the mortally ill, was required to attend, for the holiday marked the end and beginning of the year. The duke gave gifts to his underlings, alms to the poor, pardons to the convicted; during the week, he attended mass at different venues, the better to be seen by his loyal subjects. On the twenty-sixth, Saint Stephen’s Day, he went to the church of Santo Stefano; on the twenty-seventh, Saint John the Evangelist’s Day, he went to the church of San Giovanni, and so forth.
Bona had tears in her eyes when she told me of the duke’s decision; the court was leaving the next morning for the Castle Porta Giovia in the center of Milan, and I, in my black veil, was required to go, too. I turned from her, speechless, but she put a hand upon my shoulder to draw me back.
“He is being embalmed,” she said, and I realized she meant Matteo. “Come with me to Milan, please. And when we return to Pavia, the duke will be distracted, and I will see to it that you are able to take Matteo to Florence for burial.”
The following morning found me riding silently on horseback alongside Francesca and the other chattering chambermaids next to the furnished, velvet-draped wagon that held Bona and the children. It was a sunny winter’s day, harshly bright and blue, with a wind that stole all warmth. The roads were slush and mud; my cape grew quickly spattered. Matteo’s saddlebag, packed with the little book in cipher and Bona’s triumph cards, was strapped to my mount. From time to time, it brushed the back of my leg, bringing fresh grief.
Milan lies due north of Pavia, one day’s easy ride away, on flat roads across the Po River basin. Given the size and lumbering pace of our caravan, however, we set out at dawn and did not reach our destination until well after dusk.
Nestled on a plain, the city stretches out to the horizon, where the distant, snowy flanks of the Alps graze the heavens. The light was failing by the time my horse’s hooves struck cobblestone, but I could still see the four towers of the ducal castle, Porta Giovia, and the flickering yellow glow emanating from its windows. Across the broad avenue was the cathedral, the Duomo, its face covered with dark, skeletal scaffolding. Spires from other cathedrals—San Giovanni, Santo Stefano, Sant’ Ambrogio—reared up from an endless span of red-tiled rooftops.
Normally I would have taken pleasure in the journey and the sights of the city, which we frequented only once or twice a year because the palace there was cramped compared to Pavia, and the city streets noisier and dirtier than the countryside. But that night I felt only bitterness; the festive spirits of those surrounding me were rude, the glory of Milan mocking. The ducal apartments were adorned with pomanders and evergreen, and fragrant with mulled wine; I found it all offensive.
In the little closet off Bona’s room, I shared a bed with Francesca. Happily, she fell quickly asleep. I brought out the little book from Matteo’s saddlebag and lit the lamp, and stared at page after page of my husband’s mysterious cipher. After an hour, I realized that the headings for each separate entry must have been days or dates or times, and I distracted myself from miserable grief by trying possible substitutions for the different symbols.
I did not put out the light until Francesca stirred and complained drowsily a few hours before dawn. Even then, I did not sleep, but lay still, thinking of Matteo, the cipher, and the triumph cards.
Two days passed in a blur of audiences, masses, banquets, dances, and concerts, the last performed by Galeazzo’s magnificent choir of thirty souls. Despite the weather, the streets of Milan were crowded with those who had come to watch the ceremony of the Yule log, and those who had come to proclaim their loyalty to Galeazzo for another year.
On Christmas Eve Day, the duke held a grand audience for petitioners; when sunset approached, we courtiers and servants stood in the first-floor great hall as His Grace lit the ciocco, the Yule log that was to be tended so that it burned for as long as possible. Once darkness had taken hold, Bona called for me to attend her in the ducal chambers. There, in the family’s private dining chamber, I stood while Bona, her two daughters, two sons, and Caterina sat at the table watching the duke direct his brothers Ottaviano and Filippo. Together, Ottaviano—the youngest brother, slight and willowy, with a delicate, feminine face and long dark hair uncharacteristic of the Sforzas—and Filippo—second eldest, sturdy of body but feeble of intellect—carried a huge log of oak through the doorway and set it down atop a bough of juniper set in the hearth.
Despite the closed windows, the reedy wail of the traditional zampogni, the pipes played only at Christmas, filtered up from the duke’s private courtyard below.
“Ugh!” Filippo exclaimed, once freed of his burden. “It’s fatter than Cicco! This one will surely burn till New Year’s.”
“Back away, back away!” Galeazzo scolded excitedly, and took his place in front of the fireplace. His face was flushed, his words thick; he had already drunk a good deal of wine. A servant handed him a lit taper, and he held the flame to the juniper; it caught with a fragrant flare, and he laughed, pleased, as he handed the candle back.
With his right hand, he made the sign of the cross, and snapped his fingers at his cupbearer, who filled his goblet with fresh wine and gave it to him. Once the juniper had caught in earnest, the duke splashed a bit of wine on the log, as custom required, and took a long swallow from his cup. This he passed to Filippo, who handed it to Ottaviano, who respectfully delivered it to Bona; it made its way down the hierarchy to arrive last of all to me.
I emptied the cup, although there was less than a full sip left, thanks to Caterina swallowing far more than her share.
The duke then tossed a gold ducat onto the fire, and from a red velvet bag, handed one gold coin apiece to his brothers, children, and wife. My lowly status stifled his generosity, however, and he turned his back to me; Bona pressed her coin into my palm, so that I might enjoy an increase in wealth in the coming year.
Fortunately, the duke was not so stingy when it came to food and drink, and I was allowed to sit between his natural daughters, Chiara and Caterina. There was a surfeit of marvelous food, including a pigeon tart with prunes that normally would have tempted me, and ravioli stuffed with pig’s liver and herbs, but I had no taste for it. I had not wanted to attend the family gathering, and had asked Bona to excuse me, but the duke had gotten wind of it and insisted that I come so that “things would be as they are every year.” And to make sure of it, he had ordered that I dispense with mourning and dress in holiday attire; I had no choice but to obey, and so chose a gown of dark green velvet, but wore no gold and no smile.
Galeazzo and Filippo proceeded to get very drunk indeed, and by the time the feast was well under way, their conversation grew peppered with thinly veiled metaphors about the pleasures of defiling virgin flesh. At one point, the duke began to thrust a grilled sausage in and out of the stuffed capon on his plate, in a pointedly sexual manner, while Filippo howled with laughter. Caterina grinned, and Bona flushed and grew quiet. By the time supper was finished, Bona was eager to shoo the children out of the chamber and leave herself. I rose with her and accompanied her to the door; as she turned and bade her husband good night, he looked up from the table, his eyes heavy-lidded and glittering from drink, and said:
“Not her. You can go, but she must stay.”
He had never made such a request, and both the duchess and I were troubled by it, until Galeazzo repeated, “She must stay. And you must have one of your ladies fetch the triumph cards Lorenzo gave you straightaway.” When Bona hesitated to direct a fearful glance at me, he slammed his fist upon the table so hard that the empty platters rattled.
When silence followed, I said to her, “Your Grace, please forgive me, but the cards are in your quarters, inside the trunk at the foot of my cot.”
Bona stared at me as if I were the Devil himself, come to steal her soul. Without a word, she curtsied to her husband and left, taking all the children with her; Caterina passed by last, pausing briefly to study me, her expression both curious and oddly worried. I stood awkwardly by the door for a quarter hour while the duke and his drunken brothers ignored me and the conversation grew ever more raucous. When Francesca finally arrived with the diamond-studded red velvet box, my anxiety increased.
“Sit,” Galeazzo said, slurring, gesturing at the chair directly across from him. His brother Filippo made an exaggerated show of hurrying to pull the chair out for me, as if I were the duchess. He and the duke laughed, but I curtsied and sat with dignity, placing the box in front of me on the table and resting one hand atop it.
Only the girlish, delicate Ottaviano said hesitantly, “But you are in mourning, Dea. Was the loss recent?”
“My husband,” I answered, and acknowledged his kindness with a nod. At that instant, a wave of grief mixed with rage overtook me, and I resolved that I would speak the truth to Galeazzo without fear. I would have been grateful to incur his wrath and die for it.
“Enough of that,” the duke said, dismissing the gloomy subject with a curt gesture. “She’s going to tell me my fortune for the coming year, boys.” He leveled his dangerous gaze at me; for once, I returned it without disguising my hatred. “Except that this time”—his voice dropped to a malicious whisper—“my luck will be quite good, won’t it, my dear?”
“Can we know our fortunes?” Filippo asked, with inebriated enthusiasm. His face was flushed, his lips crooked in an intoxicated grin. “My lord, may we know, too?”
Ottaviano seconded him so eagerly that the duke waved for silence.
“It all depends,” he said, with a wink to his brothers, “on how cooperative the lady is. And such a lovely lady she has recently become.”
Filippo laughed—half from nerves, half from delight—as the duke reached out and put a warm, sweating hand upon mine. Disgusted, I slipped mine out from under his and instinctively glanced behind me to confirm that Bona was indeed gone, as were all the servants save the duke’s cupbearer and a pair of bodyguards who had appeared silently in front of the closed, and now bolted, doors.
I suppose I should not have been surprised, yet I had always believed that my relationship with Bona protected me, that the duke would no more lay a hand on me than he would his own daughters. For an instant, I considered screaming and pounding on the door, but I had heard too many times how little such behavior availed the other women who sought escape. I could rely only on my wits.
“Your Grace,” I said, with feigned confidence, “I will read your cards. For the sake of accuracy, let us have silence. You must think only of the question you would ask and nothing else.”
“I stated the question,” the duke countered, with a hint of irritation, and slouched forward with both elbows on the table. He propped his chin upon both hands, as if his head had grown too heavy to hold up. “My future for the coming year.”
“Then think on that, Your Grace,” I said coolly, and took the cards from the velvet box. They were warm, as if they had been stored close to a hearth, and despite the fact that they were much larger than playing cards, they shuffled easily this time, as if tailored to my grasp. I mixed them for as long as I dared, praying silently all the while. I saw no point in calling upon God; I spoke to the only one I still trusted.
Matteo, help me. Help me to get out of here untouched and alive.
Filippo broke the silence with a drunken giggle; Ottaviano joined in, but the duke had grown serious and hissed at them to be quiet.
I, too, grew deeply still, and surrendered even my prayers in order to listen to the cards whispering in my hands. Instinct directed me to gather them up, stack them neatly, and push the pile to the center of the dining table, within Galeazzo’s reach.
“Cut them, Your Grace,” I directed. An odd calm descended upon me, turning my feigned confidence into something real, a strange and ancient authority.
Leaning heavily upon his left elbow, chin still propped upon a fist, Galeazzo reached out with his right hand. It was unsteady, and on his first attempt to cut the deck, he dropped the cards, overturning some, and swore.
“No matter, Your Grace,” I said smoothly. “Gather them up, and cut again. It is all as fate wishes it to be.”
By then, Galeazzo was scowling and visibly unnerved. Filippo’s drunken grin had vanished; he and Ottaviano were paying careful attention to their brother’s changing mood. Galeazzo pushed the cards back into a pile and cut them. I placed one stack atop the other, and took them back across the table.
I drew a card from the top of the deck, turned it over, and dropped into another world.
Before me, a glittering marble tower reared up against the bright blue sky, its pinnacle so high that wisps of clouds kissed it. At the top—so far up, they appeared as small as flies—two stonemasons wielded mortar and plane to build ever higher. This was the Tower of Babel, I realized, representing the hubris of man; and as I tilted my head far back to study its apex and the men working there, a roiling indigo cloud rushed from the horizon and enclosed the pinnacle and the men.
It was the wrath of God, this cloud, and it birthed a blue-tinged, blinding bolt of lightning; the crack and roar was so ominous, I shrieked and covered my ears. At the same instant, the Tower exploded, sending shards of shattered marble hurtling to earth. The masons’ screams grew louder as they fell, headfirst, into oblivion. One of them, flailing a steel blade, I recognized as the King of Swords, he who metes out justice. I dropped to my knees and covered my head as he and a second man struck the earth beside me.
Just as swiftly, God’s dark wrath disappeared, and the sky was again an unmarred blue—but the Tower was reduced to a shambles. Beside me lay the body of the second man. Impossibly, he was whole, and his eyes open in stark surprise, but he was no less dead and bloody, pierced through the heart by the King of Swords’ weapon. His hair was a light chestnut, his lips thin, the bridge of his nose marked by a single large bump. He was Duke Galeazzo, and I knew that he had at last paid for his sins, and was glad.
“What does it mean?” Galeazzo demanded, and when I did not immediately reply, his tone changed from impatient to apprehensive. “What does it mean?”
Matteo, help me, I prayed again. I drew a deep breath and spoke the truth. My words were just loud enough to be heard over the crackling fire and the duke’s quickened breath.
“That you will be attacked, my lord, by those against whom you have sinned. That unless you repent immediately and make reparation, you will not live to see the coming year.”
His brothers looked on while Galeazzo let go a ragged gasp of amazement and clumsily pushed himself to his feet. Grimacing with fury, he let go a snarl and raised an arm to strike.
I glared back, defiant and ready to face my own unhappy fate. Matteo was dead, and I did not care to live. Yet it brought me wicked comfort to know that Duke Galeazzo would quake with fear until his own time came.
“You!” he roared, his voice shrill with outrage. “You rotting bitch, how dare you speak to us so! How dare you . . .”
He struck out. The stinging blow caught my upper lip, and almost tipped me backward in my chair. Stubbornly I held on and would not stir from my place, though my lip smarted enough to provoke tears. I refused to shed them, but looked boldly back at him.
“You,” he hissed, his anger transforming in that exhaled word to curiosity. He stared at me, and his eyes narrowed in disbelieving recognition, then widened as his brows rushed together in fear. “Mother of God, it’s her, she’s a ghost! A ghost come back to haunt me! God help me . . . Save me, someone!”
He crossed himself and staggered backward, promptly falling over his own chair; Ottaviano and Filippo rushed to help him. As he struggled back to his feet, his brothers clutching his elbows, he bellowed, “Get her out of here! Get her out!”
I rose, and when the guards caught hold of my arms, I did not struggle, but let myself be pushed through the swiftly opened doors, and flung down upon the cold, hard marble in the loggia. Once there, I sat up and gingerly fingered my lip to find it greatly swollen. I touched my tongue to it, and tasted blood and morbid satisfaction.
Bona was sitting in front of her fireplace beside Caterina and Chiara when I returned from the duke’s chambers. I knew she still felt betrayed over the cards, but at the sight of me, she let go a cry and rushed to embrace me. I put my hands upon her shoulders to comfort her, and when she realized I was otherwise untouched, she let go a sob of relief.
I admit, I was surprised to find Caterina there, wearing an unusually somber expression. Once she learned I was mostly undamaged, however, she grew at once insolent. While Francesca went downstairs to the larder to find a piece of fresh meat for a poultice, Bona made me sit in front of the fire and gently pressed her own kerchief to my lip to staunch the bleeding. She could not bring herself to ask how her husband had behaved, but Caterina, who had settled in the chair beside me, had no such reluctance.
“Did the king appear?” she asked.
Bona, Chiara, and I looked at her in puzzlement.
“The king,” she prompted. “The one with the sword. You drew that card for my father before, when Lorenzo came to visit. Did it come again? Or does some new future await him?”
Bona’s lip curled. “You ought not ask such impertinent questions,” she said, with uncharacteristic asperity. “Let Dea rest. She’s tired and has been through enough.”
Caterina ignored her and turned her whole body toward me. “It must have not been a very good future, or he wouldn’t have hit you.”
Bona was right: I was tired—tired of secrets and lies. And Galeazzo’s reaction had left me with an odd sense of power. No matter what punishment he was planning for me, I no longer cared. I had spoken the truth and it had squarely hit its mark; now I did not want to stop.
“The king was there,” I said, my words muffled by Bona’s kerchief and my huge upper lip. “But he appeared inside another card: the Tower.”
Caterina leaned closer with avid curiosity. “And the Tower means?”
“The wrath of God will strike your father down,” I said flatly, and tried not to care when Bona flinched.
Caterina caught her breath, her eyes oddly bright. “When?”
“I will not hear of this,” Bona interjected. “Fortune-telling is pure wickedness, an abomination. . . . I wish to God that you had never seen those accursed cards! How could you have taken them from me?”
“Soon,” I answered Caterina. To Bona I said, “Forgive me, Your Grace. Of late, my mind seems not to be my own.”
Bona crossed herself. She was on the verge of weeping, I realized, and so I fell silent and answered no more of Caterina’s questions.
The duchess never said anything more about the cards that I had taken without her permission, yet from that moment on, she developed a perceptible coolness toward me. I had stolen from her, and Bona would not forget it.
Chapter Six
On Christmas Day, three masses were said in the duke’s chapel; custom demanded that Galeazzo and all of his courtiers attend. I missed the first, however, as I slept poorly, given my throbbing lip, and Bona told me to stay abed when the others rose.
I attended the other services and the great banquet, but wore my black veil to hide my swollen lip, and ate and drank little. When the dancing began, I retreated to Matteo’s chamber and tried again to make sense of the cipher in the little leather-bound book from his saddlebag, without success. I also wondered what became of the triumph cards I had left with the duke and his brothers, but did not dare ask Bona.
The next day was the feast of Saint Stephen, the first martyr. As such, the duke was expected to attend mass at the church of Santo Stefano in the southeastern quarter, a short ride away. But normally temperate Milan was in the grip of the coldest weather most of its citizens had ever seen; an ice storm had glazed the city during the night, and been followed by a dusting of snow and a fierce wind that blew the clouds away, leaving trees, bushes, and roofs glittering in the early-morning sun.
The wind howled as I rose and dressed in my black mourning. A quick glance in the duchess’s large hand mirror revealed that the swelling in my upper lip had gone down, though the skin was still purplish and bore a dark red scab where it had neatly split; I lowered my dark veil again. Bona kept her bed curtains pulled; she had been up retching during the night, and Francesca, I, and the chambermaids all agreed we would not wake her, but send a message to the duke that she was too ill to rise. Beyond the window, branches bowed low, snapping from the weight of the ice and groaning in the wake of the wind; I expected that most of the court, Galeazzo and his magnificent choir included, would refuse to go out in such weather, and instead celebrate the saint’s day here at the castle.
I was wrong. An hour after we sent word to the duke that the duchess was indisposed, Caterina came running into Bona’s chamber, her pale, pretty cheeks flushed and damp with tears. Her mother, Lucrezia Landriani, one of the duke’s dearest, and most prolific, mistresses, lingered in the doorway, lest her presence offend the duchess.
“I won’t go!” Caterina exclaimed, pouting, as she entered. She was dressed in a confection of white watered silk trimmed lightly in crimson velvet and studded with gold beads; her long yellow curls had been neatly contained in a hairnet littered with diamonds and tiny rubies. “Where is the lady duchess? I must speak to her!”
“Duchess Bona is ill, Madonna Caterina, and cannot be disturbed,” I said in a hushed, warning tone.
Caterina recoiled slightly at the word ill and moved no farther; she gestured at me. “Help me, then! My father the duke is insisting that all of his”—she lowered her voice out of respect for Bona—“ladies and children accompany him to Santo Stefano!” His mistresses, she meant; perhaps it was Galeazzo’s way of getting even with his wife for not accompanying him in the cold.
“In this weather?” Even I was surprised.
Caterina nodded; a cascade of diamonds and rubies sparkled at her ears. She was truly magnificent to behold that day, a porcelain beauty with gleaming golden hair, dressed in shimmering white, the dark red trim serving to accentuate her pale glory.
“He would have us walk halfway across the city in this wind,” she said, and as if on cue, a gust rattled at the window. “Only the bishop and the ambassadors will be allowed to ride beside him on horseback. Please, Dea,” she said, “can you not wake the lady duchess? She could send a note asking His Grace if my mother and I could ride beside him in the Lady Bona’s stead. She could even say that I am weak from a recent illness. . . .”
Bona’s flat, weary voice emanated from behind the tapestry bed curtains. “Have you been ill, Caterina?”
From the doorway, her mother, Lucrezia, called softly back, “Your Grace, she is being difficult because she is jealous—the duke called upon his sons to visit him this morning, but has ignored Caterina, who is eager to show him her lovely new dress. She thinks that if she rides beside him in a place of honor, he and everyone else in Milan will have a chance to admire her.” She shot a sour look at her daughter. “You must not bother Her Grace. The duke has decided to go, and we must hurry. His priest and choir are already waiting at Santo Stefano; the others have all gathered in the courtyard.”
“Dea,” Bona called weakly, “will you go with her in my stead? And relay to the duke that I would humbly ask his favor for a horse for Caterina and her mother?”
“Of course, Your Grace,” I answered, and in a lower voice said to Caterina, “but he will not give them if I ask.”
“Why not?” she said, studying me carefully, and I remembered that I had, in fact, predicted Galeazzo’s doom and walked out of his chamber alive and barely scathed.
I took a step closer to Caterina. “You must get your cloak and gloves, Madonna,” I told her. “The duke will not suffer our being late.”
Bona called again from behind the curtains. “Go,” she said to me, “and pray for my husband. I have had a night of evil dreams.”
We almost were late. I would have far preferred to remain inside the warm castle to tend the duchess that morning, but for Bona’s sake, I borrowed Francesca’s black woolen cloak and gloves and went down to the huge courtyard with Caterina and her mother. By the watchtowers, a crowd of perhaps fifty nobles—most of them women with their children, the duke’s illegitimate get, and the rest of the duke’s favorite male courtiers—had gathered, their splendid attire hidden beneath swaths of fur and thick wool. Nearby, a half dozen grooms held the reins to some thirty horses.
The mood of the waiting nobles was sour, their teeth chattering. Caterina and I joined them, and stamped our feet to keep warm until the grinning duke at last appeared in a crimson cloak lined with white ermine, his arms linked with a fellow hellion, Zaccaria Saggi, the Mantuan ambassador. The stooped, gold-mitered Bishop of Como and the duke’s brothers, Filippo and Ottaviano, followed close behind, trailed by the Florentine ambassador and a dozen gentlemen of the chamber. The whole was flanked by a score of guards in full armor, long swords sheathed at their hips; among their ranks was a great tall Moor with yellow eyes and dark brown skin. In place of a helmet, he wore a large white turban; in place of a sword, a scimitar.
I moved toward the duke, paused a generous distance away, and bowed deeply as I relayed Bona’s request.
He stiffened, unnerved by the sight of me, but cupped a hand to his ear to catch my words. A sudden bitter gust drove them away; impatient, he frowned and waved me off. Caterina thinned her lips and uttered an indignant curse beneath her breath as I returned to her side.
Galeazzo then briefly addressed the waiting crowd, speaking perhaps of the holiday and his gratitude for our loyalty, but his words, too, were swallowed by the wind. We shouted a perfunctory greeting, and watched as he climbed atop his black charger, caparisoned in white and crimson, the Sforza colors. Immediately, his inner circle and the guards mounted their steeds and closed ranks around him; we lesser beings were confined outside the protected inner circle.
Like the others, I drew the cowl close to my face and made my way over the slippery drawbridge and out into the street, across which stood the city cathedral, its unfinished walls covered with latticework scaffolding; the Alps loomed in the distance behind us. We kept pace with the horses for half an hour over icy cobblestones; on two occasions, Caterina slipped and her mother and I caught her before she fell to her knees. The wind drove my veil into my eyes, and would have blown it and my cowl off had I not clutched the edges of the latter. No one engaged in festive, lighthearted chatter; the howling wind drowned all other sounds, and forced us to walk with faces downcast against the stinging cold. Tradition demanded that the streets be filled with throngs cheering the duke, but on this feast day after Christmas only a few hardy souls huddled on the treacherous, snow-dusted ice and called out feebly when the duke and his entourage passed.
I was shivering uncontrollably by the time we arrived at the little plaza in front of the church of Santo Stefano, an ancient, unimpressive two-story edifice with a crumbling stone façade. The plaza was filled with merchants, peasants, and the starving poor; the church was so crowded inside that they had waited here in hopes of catching a glimpse of His Grace. The guards, their armor glinting with light reflected from the snow, dismounted and began to clear the plaza while several young grooms ran forward to take the horses.
Galeazzo dismounted and handed over his reins without looking at his groom; he squinted nervously at the plaza and, beyond it, at the door to the church. Like his daughter, he enjoyed public attention, but he also took enormous care to protect his person, and did not relax until the way was clear and the guards signaled him. The bishop, who was to celebrate the mass, moved ahead of him, and the ambassadors took their places at his left; his brothers moved to his right, so that the men stood five abreast, with the duke in the protected center. Behind them, in the favored retinue, walked Cicco’s younger brother, the secretary Giovanni Simonetta, and a military adviser, Orfeo da Ricavo, followed by a row of camerieri, the nobles who attended the duke in his chamber and were considered his closest friends. The big Moor—a full head taller than any other man present, his hand on the hilt of his scimitar—led them into the church, while a pair of armored bodyguards flanked each row of the ducal procession.
Caterina pushed her way forward until we stood just behind the camerieri. When we finally made our way through the open door, she let go a sigh of relief at the rush of warmth emanating from the bodies of some three hundred faithful. At the front of the church, near the altar, scores of empty chairs awaited the duke and his party; most of the worshippers were obliged to stand and crane their necks as the duke passed by.
At the instant Galeazzo set foot inside, the choir, situated at the back of the sanctuary, burst into song, and a valet ran forward to relieve the duke and his companions of their cloaks. As the duke handed off his cloak, I saw he was dressed in a handsome doublet, the left half of which was gleaming watered white silk embroidered with tiny gold fleur-de-lis, the right of lush crimson velvet. His leggings were also of velvet—crimson for the left leg, white for the right.
I was not surprised to see that he sported his family’s heraldic colors, but I was startled indeed to see that he wore no armor. It was the first time I ever saw Duke Galeazzo appear in public without a breastplate. Perhaps he shied from wearing metal so close to his skin in such cold weather, or perhaps it was an issue of vanity and the breastplate did not suit his fine new doublet; I will never know.
Beside me, Caterina let go a little gasp of pride, tinged with impatience, at her father’s appearance. As we women handed off our cloaks, I saw why she was so eager for the duke to take note of her: her gown was made from the very same fabrics, with the same gold embroidery upon the white watered silk—a clever Christmas surprise for her father.
As the duke and his company followed the bishop down the center aisle, the rows of worshippers bowed, rippling like wheat in the wind. I kept an eye on Caterina; though she bore herself proudly, her gaze was riveted on her father and those surrounding him. She was seeking an opportunity, I knew, to get the duke’s attention.
Midway to the altar, her opportunity came. Santo Stefano was very old, though not so old, it was claimed, as one great old stone abutting the sanctuary floor. Planted in the very center of the church, this large stone was unpolished and unremarkable, but it was nothing less than the Point of the Innocents, where, it was said, the blood of the innocent infants slain by King Herod had been spilled.
Galeazzo paused in mid-conversation and step to glance down at the stone and contemplate it in a show of false piety.
Seeing her opportunity, Caterina pushed forward, surging past the last row of the duke’s chamber attendants and moving directly behind Cicco’s brother Giovanni and the military adviser Ricavo. She was just one row from her father, and when her mother and I simultaneously hissed at her for such outrageous behavior, she glanced over her shoulder at us with a sly grin.
Her mother nudged me and gestured with her chin at her unruly daughter. I was of less importance than anyone else in the procession, so the task fell to me to retrieve her. I whispered apologies as I sidled between pairs of indignant camerieri and finally got directly behind Caterina.
As I touched her elbow, a cry went up—Make room!—and a middle-aged courtier stepped into the aisle just after the bishop passed. He was large and barrel-chested, with powerful shoulders, but one of his legs was withered; he moved haltingly, with a limp, and went down unsteadily on one knee right at the Point of the Innocents, blocking Duke Galeazzo’s path.
His waving pale brown hair, brushed straight back and falling to his shoulders, was thinning at temples and crown; his anxious smile revealed overlarge yellow teeth. The soldiers nearby stiffened, and the big Moor stopped at once and drew his scimitar, but all relaxed upon recognizing Giovanni Lampugnani, a noble with a large estate just outside the city, and therefore bound to swear his fealty to the duke that very afternoon at Porta Giovia. I thought at first he wore the Sforza colors, white and crimson, but the red was far too bright. Lampugnani had long been a friend to Galeazzo, although rumor said the duke had lately taken notice of his comely young wife and vowed to bed her.
“A word, Your Grace,” he said. His grinning lips trembled. It was not uncommon for a petitioner to stop the duke as he made his way to his seat near the altar, but Galeazzo’s curled lip indicated it was unappreciated.
At the same time, Caterina reacted to my touch by surging forward to stand beside the military adviser, who walked immediately behind the duke. Ricavo, gray-haired but solid, glanced down at her with amused surprise.
Caterina reached out to tap her father’s shoulder, and that was when another, younger man stepped out into the aisle to stand beside Lampugnani. His hair and beard were very dark, his long face handsome, his eyes hate-filled and haunted; he was Carlo Visconti, the man whose sister had been raped by Galeazzo. His hand was clutching the hilt of his long, sheathed blade. Like Lampugnani, he wore white and vibrant red.
He was the King of Swords.
I felt myself fall into another world, one where the wrath of God was gathering and roiling, a monstrous cloud about to birth a shattering bolt. With both arms, I pulled Caterina away from her father and held her fast.
“Not now, not now,” Duke Galeazzo hissed at Lampugnani and waved him away just as dark-haired Visconti slipped beside the kneeling man.
Lampugnani began to rise awkwardly and fumbled with his sleeve. Still half crouched, he said distinctly, “Oh, yes, now. Now.”
With the swiftness of a viper, he struck. I did not see him draw the dagger, but I saw it come away bloodied, and heard the duke’s horrified gasp. Beside him, the Mantuan ambassador made a feeble attempt to push the attacker away, but Lampugnani was on fire. He rose to his full impressive height, seized the duke’s arm so that he could not run away, and thrust the dagger to the hilt into Galeazzo’s chest. It came free with a sucking sound, and Lampugnani, his lips twisting with distaste and determination, plunged it into the duke again.
“I am dead!” Galeazzo exclaimed in surprise, and fell straight back against the chest of Orfeo da Ricavo, who tried vainly to support him.
Visconti was on the duke then, too, slashing with his long sword, and was joined by a younger third man. The Mantuan ambassador, Saggi, and Ricavo both began screaming for the guards.
The choir fell silent, its sweet strains replaced by a swell of frantic voices, the sounds of struggle. Bodies surged from the once-orderly rows; the church doors were flung open, and the crowd swelled toward them like a rising tide. The bodyguards were caught in the rush and fought their way back to their master, who had fallen upon the Point of the Innocents.
By then, even Saggi and Ricavo were struggling to flee; the duke’s brothers Ottaviano and Filippo almost knocked me down as they pushed toward the door. I held fast to Caterina and pulled her away from the horror; she was limp and unresisting in my grasp.
The church emptied with astonishing speed. Outside in the plaza, courtiers and the duke’s favorite chamber attendants called for their horses; those who had come on foot, including Caterina’s mother, Lucrezia, were half running over treacherous ice back toward the castle. I paused in the doorway, the stunned Caterina still in my arms, and looked back into the sanctuary.
It was deserted save for the guards and the bloodied corpse of Giovanni Lampugnani, whose lameness no doubt hindered his escape. I watched as the tall, turbaned Moor, one hand pressed to his shoulder to staunch the weeping wound there, knelt over the motionless form of the Duke of Milan. Galeazzo lay sprawled on his back, mouth agape, sightless eyes open, arms flung upward as if in defense. Blood spattered his clean-shaven face and soaked his doublet, now scarlet with no trace of white.
The tower of the duchy had crumbled.
Bona would have said that God had finally delivered His judgment, but that day, I knew she was wrong. God had had nothing to do with it; it had been the work of the King of Swords, who had avenged his sister. I looked upon the duke’s pale corpse and felt exhilarating, if cold, satisfaction.
Justice: it was what I wanted for Matteo, and I would not rest until I found it.
Chapter Seven
Caterina and I returned to Porta Giovia to discover that, although the courtiers on horseback had arrived well ahead of us, none of them had had the courage to speak to Bona, who was still abed. Caterina, who was crying unrestrainedly, not so much from grief, I think, as terror, clung to me as I entered the duchess’s chamber. I wound an arm about her shoulder as though I were her mother, who had so feared retribution from the duke’s enemies that she had deserted her daughter and fled to her husband’s house in the city. Together, Caterina and I went to Bona’s bedside, where Francesca was just taking away a tray.
The curtains were open, and the lady duchess was sitting propped upon her pillows and wrapped in a heavy shawl, her disheveled dark blond hair plaited into a single thick braid. Her broad, ponderous face was drawn, her eyelids drooping with exhaustion, but she straightened at the sound of our footsteps and tried to arrange her features into a more pleasant expression. But at the sight of Caterina, who was pressing her tear-streaked face into my shoulder, Bona paled and grew very, very still.
My voice emerged, cracking and unsteady. “His Grace, the Duke of Milan is dead,” I said. I expected her to shriek, to weep, to be inconsolable.
Bona’s eyes widened, but the rest of her features did not move. A long silence passed between us, punctuated by Caterina’s muffled sobs.
At last Bona’s lips parted and formed a single word. “How?”
“At the swords of assassins,” I answered. “Giovanni Lampugnani and Carlo Visconti. His Grace still lies on the Point of the Innocents.”
“Visconti,” she repeated tonelessly. “Is everyone else safe?”
I nodded. “I think so.”
“Good.” She looked at Caterina and sighed. “Poor child.”
Francesca had set down the tray and was crying, but Bona threw back the covers and swung her thick legs over the side of the bed.
“Francesca,” she said, a bit sharply. The chambermaid stopped her tears and looked up, anguished.
“Call Leonora, and help me get dressed,” she said, and glanced up at me. “And Dea, go and tell Cicco the news if he hasn’t already heard, then bring him to me.”
After speaking with her husband’s top aide, Bona ordered that Galeazzo’s body be washed at Santo Stefano and dressed in a suit of gold brocade. By dusk, the duke’s clean corpse was resting on a table in Santo Stefano’s sacristy. There was no public viewing—or private, for that matter—as the duke had suffered fourteen disfiguring wounds. His mortal remains lay in the sacristy another full day, the twenty-seventh, the day His Grace was to have visited the church of San Giovanni to celebrate the feast of Saint John the Evangelist. All the while, Bona and Cicco worked together to prevent any chance of an uprising against the Sforza dynasty; soldiers were stationed at strategic points along Milan’s empty streets.
Late that night, Bona sent a few trusted servants to Santo Stefano. Under cover of darkness, they stole into the church, removed the corpse, and took it across town to the cathedral known as the Duomo, across the broad street from Porta Giovia. There, they pried open the top of the casket holding the remains of the duke’s father, Francesco Sforza, and laid Galeazzo on top of them.
Many a mass was said later for Galeazzo’s soul, but there was to be no funeral, public or private, no tomb, no monument of stone, no plaque revealing where the duke lay. He had provoked such enmity during his thirty-two years that it was deemed safest to dispense with such things, lest those who despised him take revenge on his corpse.
Bona never came to bed that night, but remained conferring with Cicco and Galeazzo’s other advisers. I undressed in the small closet off the duchess’s chamber and, as I was pulling my nightdress over my head, Caterina’s nurse entered and begged me to come attend her young charge.
I found Caterina huddled on her bed, arms wrapped around her knees, rocking. The slender, long lines of her girlish body showed beneath the fine wool nightgown; her long pale curls had been neatly plaited, though shorter tendrils framed her oval face. Her cheeks were flushed, the lids of her bloodshot eyes swollen. When I entered the room, she glanced up, oddly hopeful, and curtly motioned for her nurse to leave the room. I was surprised to see that the three cots where her attendants slept were empty, though the blankets were disheveled and the sheets still bore the impress of bodies. No doubt their mistress had thrown them from their beds without warning.
When we two were alone, she motioned for me to sit on the bed beside her—an unusual liberty for her to grant—and said, in a voice that was hoarse from weeping:
“You knew my father was going to die. You knew the very moment. How?”
“I don’t know,” I began, but she made an impatient gesture for silence.
“I will pay you.” Her gaze was as naked and earnest as I had ever seen it. “Whatever you want, and I will say nothing to anyone about it. Only you must tell me the secrets of your magic.”
I shook my head. “There is no secret, Madonna.”
Her features contorted with anger. “Or I can have you tortured until you confess everything you know. I could turn you over to the Church as a witch.”
I was too weary from grief to care, and it surely showed in my voice and expression. “Then turn me over to them, Madonna, and I will tell them what I am telling you: I know nothing about magic.” It was true; I had not yet studied Matteo’s ritual. “I saw your father’s death, but I don’t understand how I knew.”
She remained silent. I rose, intending to ask permission to leave, but she motioned sternly for me to sit back down.
“Why did you save me?” Her voice was taut with emotion.
“Why would I not?” I countered.
She drew a long hitching breath and loosed a torrent of childish tears. “Don’t leave me,” she sobbed, and threw her arms about my shoulders, pulling me to her. “Don’t ever leave me, Dea!”
Her distress was so honest, so wrenching, that I returned the embrace. “Hush, Madonna, hush,” I murmured maternally. “I’ll stay as long as you like.”
I soothed her for several minutes until she finally fell quiet, then let loose a hiccup.
“I hated my father,” she said suddenly, her chin resting upon my shoulder. “Hated him.” I waited for her to speak of his heinous crimes, but instead, she added, “He never loved me—not at all. He loved my beauty. I was only a bauble to him, like his jewels or his choir or his mistresses . . . something he would parade in front of others to provoke their envy.”
“That’s not true,” I said perfunctorily, but she drew back and looked solemnly into my eyes.
“It is true, Dea. Men don’t deserve to be loved.”
“I knew one who did,” I said with sudden vehemence.
Caterina did not let me leave her that night. She would not even let me go to one of the cots, but insisted I lie beside her on her soft feather bed. She was exhausted from weeping and quickly fell asleep; I lay listening to her soft breath and thought about the duke, and Matteo, and the mysterious cards.
On the next day, the Feast of Saint John, news of the duke’s assassins arrived in the afternoon and spread swiftly throughout the court. Shortly after the murder, Lampugnani’s body had been stolen from the Church of Santo Stefano by a group of young toughs and dragged over the city’s cobblestones. By the time the crowd was done, the corpse was mutilated beyond recognition, and the citizens took gruesome glee in feeding the tattered remnants to pigs.
Visconti and the third conspirator, a youth named Olgiati, who had gone into hiding shortly after the murder, had been betrayed by relatives and captured; they were awaiting their fates in Porta Giovia’s dungeon. Bona had coolly sentenced them to the wheel, where they would be ripped in two from neck to loins while still alive.
According to her chambermaids, the duchess had not shed a single tear since hearing of her husband’s death. Newly widowed myself, I felt certain grief would soon overcome her, and wanted to be at her side when the storm finally broke. But one of Galeazzo’s attendants informed me that the duchess would not need my services that day; I was at liberty, except for the fact that I needed to gather up my belongings, as the court was to return to Pavia the very next morning.
I headed for my little closet, thinking to make quick work of packing. I had not made it far, however, when Caterina, curiously unaccompanied, came running after me. She was breathless and pale in a high-necked black velvet gown; her hair had not yet been crimped, but hung uncombed and tousled about her shoulders, free of nets or veils. Apparently she had seen me pass by her chambers while her ladies were in the midst of grooming her. I stopped and turned to look askance at her, until I noticed the red velvet box in her hands.
“Where are you going?” she gasped.
There was no point in lying; Caterina would have her way regardless. “To my closet, Madonna,” I admitted. I could scarcely lift my gaze from the box.
She looked about to reassure herself no one could hear us. A pair of launderesses were down at the far end of the loggia, laughing as they collected soiled linens from the rooms and paying us no heed.
“I will go with you,” she said softly.
I bowed to indicate assent. Together we entered the little closet adjacent to Bona’s chamber, and pulled the curtain so we would not be seen. I gestured for Caterina to sit upon the cot I shared with Francesca. She did so, and set the box down upon the mattress with a look of sly complicity.
With a small, triumphant smile, she said, “Ask me no questions; suffice it to say that Bona does not know I have the cards, and she need never know. You may keep them, on one condition.”
“That I read them for you, whenever you wish,” I said slowly. “Madonna, I cannot do that. Bona will discover the theft, and I will be blamed.” I picked up the box and proffered it to her. “This was a priceless gift to her from Lorenzo de’ Medici. It must be returned.”
She rose quickly and stamped her foot, a childishly imperious gesture. “You will obey me!”
She would have added the phrase, or I shall tell my father, but clearly realized that she had lost a great deal of bargaining power. Instead she sputtered and cast about for some new threat to evoke my obedience.
Softly, I responded, “Bona of Savoy is my mistress. I am obliged to obey her.”
“You took the cards from her once before!”
“Yes,” I allowed, “but that was before I saw how it offended her. Surely you have seen it, too, Madonna; she no longer trusts me with her whole heart. And now she is regent of Milan, and obliged to mete out justice. Should she find me to be a thief—with me knowing full well she did not want me to touch the cards ever again—she would be forced to punish me.”
Caterina sat back down and let go a grudging sigh. Without looking at me, she admitted, “That’s true. But . . .” She leaned sideways and lifted the diamond-studded lid, exposing the cards inside. They were facedown, revealing the floral design on the back. I reached for them involuntarily, and Caterina caught my wrist.
“Read them for me,” she said. “Tell me my future.”
The fire flared suddenly as it found a bit of pitch; Caterina and I both started. She laughed nervously, and let go of my wrist.
I took hold of the cards. “Only this once, Madonna,” I warned. My lip still felt the sting of the duke’s blow. “And if you wish me to be honest with you, you must swear that if the future is not to your liking, you will not turn your anger on me. Otherwise, I will confess everything to Bona.”
Caterina nodded eagerly in agreement. I did not trust her, but I also could not resist the cards.
Just as I had for the duke, I mixed the cards thoroughly, instructed Caterina to cut them, then gathered them up and set three cards facedown in front of her.
“The past,” I said, turning over the first card. Four golden goblets were painted against a white background decorated with green leaves and tiny flowers; a banner reading a bon droyt, rightfully, was unfurled across the center of the card. It was a motto often used by the Sforza, indicating that God had made them earthly princes because they were deserving of it.
Words came unbidden to my lips. “The Four of Cups. Luxury. A coddled childhood, and much wealth.” I paused; the shining, gilded cups held something as dark and bitter as the draught Bona had forced me to drink when Matteo had died. “Yet this is not a good thing, but a tarnished past to be overcome. This is a dream from which you must wake.”
I turned over the second card. There again was the image of a barefoot young man in rags, with a walking stick resting upon his shoulder.
“The present,” I said. “Once more, the Fool. The beginning of a long journey, one that will leave she who takes it much changed. The fool loses his naïveté in the end.”
Caterina leaned an elbow upon the desk and frowned down at the image. “Of course, we’re returning to Pavia, but there will be no more journeys after that.”
“Perhaps not immediately,” I countered, “but soon.” I turned over the third card, and announced, “The future.”
I had barely set it down again when Caterina reared up, almost knocking the cards from the bed.
“No!” she whispered harshly. “It’s a trick, all of it! You’re doing this to frighten me!”
She began to weep as I stared down at the image of the Tower, torn asunder by a lightning bolt. Abruptly, I saw myself standing inside a wall made of thick stone; not only Caterina but I, too, dwelled inside the very Tower that would someday be blasted to its foundations. I heard a sudden deafening boom, like thunder, and put my hand against the wall to steady myself. It trembled violently, but did not fall.
A second boom, and the wall quaked harder, but it did not crumble. Not yet.
But in time it would be lost, just as the duchy of Milan had been torn from Galeazzo’s iron grip.
My attention returned suddenly to Caterina; I cast about for whatever truth might calm her. I, too, was shaken. I had not wanted to scare her.
“This does not mean death,” I said honestly. “Not for you. You will not die as your father did, Madonna. But . . .” I gazed at the image, and fancied the ground shook beneath my feet. “This is an upheaval, an end to old ways. This is destruction.”
“I don’t want it!” Tears streaked Caterina’s cheeks as she wrung her hands. “I don’t want any trouble! A bon droyt! A bon droyt! Why does God give us noble blood? Why does He give us power, but refuse to protect us? It isn’t right!”
“Perhaps not,” I answered soothingly. “But the Tower stands a long way from you, and you have a long journey ahead. Perhaps along the way you will find the means to avert whatever disaster this represents.” I paused. “But there is one thing you must know.”
She looked over at me, stricken.
“These are castle walls. Your castle, Madonna. You will rule someday.”
She wiped her streaming eyes and nose upon her black sleeve and settled back onto the cot, faintly mollified.
“You must never leave me,” she said. “Never.”
Though I was sorely tempted to keep the triumph cards, I convinced Caterina to return them to the duchess’s trunk. Early the next morning, on the twenty-eighth of December, the court returned to bucolic Pavia. Bona traveled in a private carriage, accompanied only by Galeazzo’s right-hand man, Cicco, and the military adviser, Orfeo da Ricavo, in whose arms the duke had taken his last breath. I would have made my way on horseback, but Caterina insisted that I sit in the wagon beside her on the long ride home, along with Bona’s children and their nurses. Caterina had frantically demanded that I sleep in her chamber every night, and Bona kindly allowed it, even though I far preferred the duchess’s calm company to that of the duke’s selfish daughter. The weather had finally warmed, and a slow drizzle of rain accompanied us as the wagon’s wooden wheels slung mud on the soggy journey home.
Once back in Pavia, eight-year-old Gian Galeazzo and his younger brother, Ermes, moved into their father’s luxurious bedchamber, while their mother, Bona, declared herself regent and formally assumed power until Gian Galeazzo reached his majority. She spent her first day back privately consulting Cicco in the duke’s gloriously appointed study.
She summoned me briefly to the study, where she sat at Galeazzo’s huge ebony desk. The new regent of Milan looked haggard and distracted by numerous worries; at the same time, there was unmistakable relief, even lightness, in her gaze and bearing.
As Cicco looked on, Bona handed me a letter. I glanced down at it. It was dated the twenty-fourth of December, and it bore the signature of the abbott of the monastery of San Marco in Florence.
“You will be allowed to bury your husband at San Marco,” Bona said gently. “I have made arrangements for your travel. When you arrive in Florence, you will stay at the convent of Le Murate.”
I put my hand to my mouth in an effort to stifle a sob, but failed altogether. Bona rose from Galeazzo’s desk and wrapped her arms around me as I wept.
Late that afternoon, I resorted to subterfuge by asking Francesca to pack my things and leave them in Matteo’s room. After nightfall, when Caterina was fast asleep, I went to my husband’s chamber and retrieved his secret papers and the little black pouch containing the mysterious brown powder, and slipped them into the trunk Francesca had filled with my things.
At Caterina’s insistence, I lay beside her in her feather bed, and woke well before dawn. Happily, Galeazzo’s daughter did not stir, but lay so silent I could not hear her breath. I slipped from the bed, dressed quickly, and hurried down to Matteo’s chamber. Just before sunrise, a pair of grooms came to take my trunk, and the three of us headed for the stables. The cold, light mist settled upon my cheeks and eyelashes.
My covered wagon was waiting. The driver, who before age had taken its toll had been master of Bona’s stables, was a tall, skeletal man with sunken cheeks and a cottony white beard. Beside him sat his aged wife, a tiny, equally frail-looking creature with one blind, clouded eye. To my amazement, the driver leapt from his seat and helped the young grooms push my trunk into the back of the wagon with ease. He then caught my elbow and, with an arm thinner than my own, pulled me up into the wagon with impressive strength.
I would have sat beside the pair, but the driver, Gennaro, gestured emphatically for me to sit in the back, and held open the canvas flap for me; he pointed in the direction of the sun, which had just begun to infuse the thick, gathering clouds with a pinkish red glow. The mist would soon turn to cold rain.
I yielded, and crouched low as I moved inside the wagon, half of which was covered with cushions, pillows, and fur throws. The other half bore my trunk, and a coffin fashioned from fresh-hewn, fragrant pine.
I fell to my knees upon the cushions and threw my arms about the coffin as if it were Matteo himself; I put my cheek against the smooth, sanded wood and wept. I had known, of course, that my husband would accompany us, but I had not realized he would travel at my side.
Perhaps later we could go together to Florence.
In the distance, thundered rumbled, and the mist turned abruptly to steady rain. The driver called to the horses; the wagon shuddered and began to sway. I held fast to the coffin, and did not look up until I heard a girl shriek and the horses neigh. I poked my head out through the half-open flap and saw Caterina.
She was barefoot, clad only in her woolen nightgown, her long braid bouncing as she rushed toward the wagon. I watched, stricken, as she waved her arms, her face contorted with grief, and shrieked my name.
“Dea! Dea!”
Her desperation and fear were unfeigned, her voice so heartrendingly shrill that I squeezed my eyes shut.
I retreated back into the wagon and clutched the coffin, sobbing, until distance and pelting rain swallowed the sound of her cries.
Chapter Eight
We traveled southeast across the plain, along the banks of the Po, and crossed the rushing waters at San Pietro, before the river grew wildly serpentine. From dawn to dusk I rode inside the covered wagon next to the pine coffin, my palm pressed to the wood as if it were Matteo’s hand. From time to time, the rain grew deafening as it pelted the canvas, but it stopped altogether as we passed Piacenza’s city walls in the late afternoon; I opened the back flap and glimpsed the region known as the Emilia, its hillsides terraced with vineyards. We did not pause there, but continued half an hour after the sun had set, coming to rest finally at an inn. By then, I was chilled to the bone; the wagon’s interior had been so cold I could see my breath.
There was but one room to be found, so I took the straw mattress while the driver and his wife—who, I learned, was totally deaf—lay snoring upon pillows on the floor. While they slept like the dead, I left the candle burning and delved into my trunk to take out Matteo’s papers. I meant to slip them into my cloak, intending to read them the next day, but was so restless that I began to read On the Egyptian Mysteries, attributed to Iamblichus.
I did not read for long. It had been four years since I had applied myself to Latin, and my understanding was at times wanting, but what I understood frightened me. Iamblichus spoke of pagan gods, demons, astrology—and a personal demon whose name could be known by studying one’s natal stars. Worse, it spoke of telling the future: Ecstasy or alienation of mind is the basis of divination, also the mania which accompanies disease.
Troubled, I soon left off reading. Even so, I slipped the papers into my cloak; if Matteo had thought this subject worthy, I was obliged to understand why.
The next day we passed Parma, and more carefully terraced rows of grapevines, bare and gnarled in winter. I had no opportunity to read more; the elderly wife had begun to cough, and I made her lie in the wagon beside Matteo while I sat beside the old driver and stared at the nearby Apennine Mountains, forested with bare-limbed chestnut, beech, and oak.
That night we stopped some hours past Modena. This time, the accommodations were better, and I had my own room. I stayed up quite late rereading Iamblichus; at the manuscript’s end was a letter in the vernacular, written in the same modern hand that had provided the translation of the ancient Greek ritual, yet not part of it.
To my beloved, it said,
This is in reference to the ritual I sent for your edification, in hopes it—and this translation of Iamblichus of Syria, a follower of our dear Plato—will set you well upon the path to union with the Divine.
The ritual predates both men by centuries, but was assuredly used by them and their students. Its purpose: to invoke the personal daemon, as the Greeks called him; we know him better as the Holy Guardian Angel, that divine inner genius which guides our soul surely to union with its Creator. For God cannot be grasped through the mind, or through contemplation alone, but through the heart, which is exalted in ritual. As a pagan, Iamblichus was not blessed with the knowledge of our Savior, and so much of his writing reflects this ignorance, but much of it is of great use to us today. I am of the belief that God granted His grace even to the heathens, in order that those ignorant of Christ yet men of good will could come to know Him through the dedicated practice of the rite of the Bornless One.
How shall we know, you ask, whether the ritual has been successful? Heed Iamblichus, who says, “The arrival of the archangels is preceded by the appearance of light.”
Of the angel, I must say little, for each man has his own, and each soul must travel its own path to divine union; one man’s salvation cannot be another’s. It is therefore imperative that once you have attained conversation with the angel, you speak of it to no one, lest you fall into the error of believing that you alone have a special connection to the Divine, or that the lessons meant for you alone should be inflicted upon others.
As for the precious contents of the little bag: Immediately before commencing the ritual, take half a small spoonful, no more; use wine to cut the bitterness. See that it never falls into the hands of the profane, or is used wastefully. This, too, must be accomplished in strict privacy, and never be mentioned to outsiders.
May this rite, which was handed down to us by the ancients, guide you to a greater knowledge of the One Who created us all.
In eternal friendship,
Your servant,
Marsilio
On the third day, the wife was so ill that she lay coughing all day inside the wagon; I sat beside the driver again as we skirted the mountains. The weather was dry, sunny, and mild, and remained that way on the fourth day. We stopped at other inns, but I read no more; the letter by the mysterious Marsilio had assuaged some of my fears, but raised other uncomfortable questions. I remained puzzled, confused, thoroughly intrigued.
Late on the morning of the fifth day, we passed over a series of gentle hills; at the apex of the last one, I spied Florence, nestled in the basin below, and let go a gasp of appreciation. Beneath a dazzling blue sky, the city looked golden, its southern flank bisected by the winding silver Arno. As we descended, the separate rooftops grew distinct, and the driver, who knew the city well, began to point out landmarks. The greatest of them, dominating the skyline, was the vast orange-red dome of the great cathedral, Santa Maria del Fiore, Our Lady of the Lilies, matched in height only by its slender campanile; farther south lay the tower of the Palazzo della Signoria, the Palace of Lords, seat of the city’s government.
Most of the buildings were made of stone—some of the costly pietra serena, a dove gray rock that turned shimmering white in the strong sun, others of a pale brown or gold. Some were of stucco, but almost all had the same orange-red brick roof and were built in the classical style, which lent a pleasant uniformity. Perhaps it was the light or the clement weather or the languid hills that embraced the outskirts, but I judged Florence to be the prettiest city I had ever seen. Next to it, Milan seemed drab and cold and dirty.
We passed through the northern gate onto the broad, cobblestoned Via Larga, swarming with pedestrians, wagons, carriages, horses, and street merchants; the sun hung at mid-heaven, and all over the city, church bells were chiming to mark Sext, the sixth hour after sunrise. From the upper-floor windows of all the buildings, fluttering banners hung. Most bore the city standard, a bright red fleur-de-lis against a white background, or the Medici crest, a gold shield adorned with six balls, five of them red and the topmost blue, with tiny gold stylized lilies.
I was so exhilarated that I wanted to keep riding, but we arrived at San Marco all too quickly, and the wagon wheels slowed to a stop at last. I was disappointed; I had wanted a cathedral with a great dome and tall spires for Matteo, but instead saw a spare single-nave church with a bland stone façade, and tucked next to it, a square, plain, two-story cloister. I climbed down from the wagon, my legs wobbly from disuse, and waited with the horses while the driver entered the monastery.
He returned with a lay brother, Domenico, a cheerful young man with red curls who wore a white tunic and scapular beneath a black cape that fell below his ankles. Domenico led me just inside the cloister, to a public area known as the chapter house. He explained in a whisper that San Marco’s church and convent had been some two hundred years old when Lorenzo de’ Medici’s grandfather, Cosimo, paid for their renovation thirty years earlier; the crumbling wood and mortar were replaced by the more durable and handsome pietra serena and cream stucco.
I sat, only half listening as Domenico spoke in hushed tones. He told me that the abbot was expecting me, and that the next afternoon at None, the ninth hour after dawn, a service for Matteo would be held in the sanctuary, followed by burial in the churchyard. I left, relieved that I had survived the discussion without tears, and returned to the waiting driver, his wife, and the now-empty wagon.
We continued south down the wide Via Larga and the driver continued his narration. He pointed out the home of Lorenzo the Magnificent, an unremarkable, square, three-story fortress of stone, with the Medici banner hanging from every window.
The driver pointed straight ahead. “And that way lies the church of San Lorenzo, where Lorenzo’s father and grandfather are buried.”
We rolled past similar palazzos and gardens, then artists’ workshops, goldsmiths, and jewelers. Not long after, we approached the massive cathedral of Florence, also called the Duomo because of its magically unsupported dome, the largest in all the world. Across from it stood the pale stone octagon of the Baptistry of Saint John, its gilded bronze doors dazzling in the sun.
We turned east to drive alongside the long stone spine of the cathedral, and followed the road as it curved due south again. Eventually, we came to a grim, four-story fortress with a crenellated tower, which housed the city magistrate; there we veered sharply left onto the Via Ghibellina. A few minutes later, the driver pulled the horses over to the curb.
“The convent of Le Murate,” he announced, and hopped down from his seat to help me down.
I descended to find a long expanse of stone wall broken by a tall, narrow wooden gate. Two rusting iron grates, one at the level of my eyes, the other of my ankles, were set into the door; the uppermost grate was covered on the inside by a black cloth. While the driver waved down a street lad to help him fetch my trunk, I clanged the brass knocker and called out softly; as I did, I caught a sudden whiff of vinegar and felt inexplicably nauseated.
Within a few minutes, the gate opened far enough to allow the driver to shove my trunk inside the door, though he was not allowed entry himself. He promised to come for me the next afternoon, and as I passed through the convent walls I saw the vinegar—used to prevent plague—in a bucket that held alms thrown through the grate by passersby.
Le Murate was old but in good repair and very clean; the furnishings were spare but elegant and comfortable, even by the court of Milan’s standards. The abbess, who had received Bona’s letter, welcomed me personally and gratefully accepted the duchess’s generous donation, which I pressed into her palm. Even so, the place evoked a strange anxiety in me.
I went at once to the cell assigned me, closed my door, and studied the star rituals written in Matteo’s hand. “For banishing,” he had written beneath the first, “start here.” I was not certain I wanted to know what needed banishing, but the alternative was to sit and think deeply on the funeral that was to come. I chose instead to practice drawing the five-pointed stars in the air with my index finger, the way I had seen Matteo do it in the darkness. I began, also, to memorize the strange words that went with the banishing. I did not emerge from my cell until supper; afterward I walked the grounds alone, and came upon the carefully tended gardens. In the center of them stood an unusual tree: a cedar, as tall as four men standing upon each other’s shoulders, its branches broad and sweeping.
The sight jolted me, as if I had seen Matteo himself standing there. I hurried to the tree and reached past the bristling blue-green needles to press my hand to the bark; it was ridged and rough, as I knew it would be, though I had supposedly never seen such a tree before. I leaned against it and drew in its pungent fragrance; tears came to my eyes as I heard a woman’s voice whisper in my memory.
A cedar of Lebanon.
My mother’s voice. The convent’s outer walls loomed close and began to spin; I closed my eyes, panicked. The Duomo’s red cupola, the cobblestoned streets, the whitewashed convent walls, even the grates on the door and the smell of vinegar . . . hadn’t I recognized them all?
I do not know this place, I told myself firmly, and hurried back to my cell through halls grown terrifyingly familiar.
That night, I silently performed Matteo’s banishing ritual, and did not emerge from my cell until the next day at half past two, when it was time to leave for my husband’s funeral.
The driver delivered me to the main entrance of the church of San Marco, where the redheaded Brother Domenico waited for me. He led me into a modest chapel, where a small candelabrum burned in front of a magnificent altarpiece painted with a scene of the Last Judgment. Nearby, a balding priest was lighting coals for the censer, muttering prayers as he did so. Two monks in white tunics and black capes stood together just left of the altar, and lowered their gazes as I entered.
As the church was the recipient of the Medicis’ charity, there were wooden chairs for the worshippers. In the last row sat a tall, spare woman dressed in a rich but modest gown of dark gray velvet; her face and bowed head were veiled in black silk gauze. She did not look up as I passed, but kept her head inclined toward the rosary in her prayer-steepled hands.
Domenico deposited me in my seat, in the first row directly before the altar, and departed without a word to the woman. The priest sprinkled frankincense upon the now-hot coals, and put the lid on the censer; smoke streamed out through the holes. Swinging the censer from a chain, he made his way down the aisle, chanting. I turned as the door to the chapel opened and Domenico and five other men carried Matteo’s casket as far as the threshold. There they waited while the priest censed the casket, then took a brass asperger from the font by the door and sprinkled Matteo with holy water.
As he did, the two monks by the altar began to sing a hollow, aching melody.
De profundis clamavi ad te, Domine . . .
Out of the depths have I cried unto Thee, O Lord . . .
The priest then led the slow procession into the chapel. I turned away, struggling to contain my tears, and did not look at the coffin again until the priest took his place at the altar, and the pallbearers gently set the casket down a few steps from him.
For the first time, I noticed the pallbearers. One was Brother Domenico and two others his fellow monks. But three of the men were wealthy gentlemen, given their exceedingly fine but unostentatious clothes. The first was small and delicate-looking, with graying red-gold hair; the second was Matteo’s age, young, handsome, dark-haired and muscular. And the third was Lorenzo de’ Medici.
At the sight of Lorenzo, my tenuous grip on my emotions failed. Tears spilled from me, hot and fierce. I remembered Matteo’s suffering on that last horrible night; I thought of how Lorenzo must have waited for him and finally realized that something had gone horribly wrong.
I heard Matteo’s ragged whisper: Tell Lorenzo . . .
I remember little else of the ceremony—only the sacred Host dry upon my tongue, and the priest circling the coffin twice with more incense, more holy water. Only when it was over, and the pallbearers returned to take the coffin, did I realize that they had been sitting behind me the entire time.
The priest caught my arm and led me after the coffin; as I left the chapel, the tall veiled woman rose and stood respectfully.
We went to a deep hole flanked by a large mound of reddish dirt in the churchyard; the gravediggers were waiting for us, leaning on their shovels. The coffin was set upon ropes, which the diggers used to lower it into the ground. Matteo was laid to rest so that his head lay due east of his feet, since Christ would appear in the eastern sky when He returned to raise the dead.
Lorenzo and the younger man flanked the veiled woman, their arms wound about hers in support; the delicate middle-aged man stood on Lorenzo’s other side and dabbed at his red-rimmed eyes. They remained a short distance from me, as if unwilling to intrude on my grief.
I listened, dazed, as the priest spoke of Saint Martha and her profession of faith that her brother would indeed rise from the dead.
At last, the priest made the sign of the cross over the grave, and chanted: Requiem aeternam dona ei, Domine, et lux perpetua luceat ei . . .
It was over. At the priest’s prompting, I clutched a fistful of cold, wet soil and sprinkled it onto Matteo’s coffin. The other four mourners watched me, hesitant. I turned to them, gesturing at the mound of earth.
“Please,” I said.
The woman was first to add her handful of dirt; the men followed. Once I had handed a coin to the priest for his services, and a purse for the monastery from Bona to Brother Domenico, the gravediggers took to their work with haste. I turned to the others.
“Ser Lorenzo,” I asked, “may I have a private word with you?”
He nodded, and moved to my side; the others retreated a few steps, while Lorenzo led me over to a bare-limbed tree, swollen with pink-red bud in response to the unusually mild weather. I tried not to flinch each time a clod of earth struck Matteo’s coffin.
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/jeanne-kalogridis/the-scarlet-contessa/) на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.
Jeanne Kalogridis
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современная зарубежная литература
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
Отзывы: Пока нет Добавить отзыв
О книге: From Jeanne Kalogridis, critically acclaimed author of The Borgia Bride, Painting Mona Lisa and The Devil’s Queen, comes another irresistible historical novel about a countess whose passion and willfulness knew no bounds: Caterina Sforza.Daughter of the Duke of Milan and wife of the conniving Count Girolamo Riario, Caterina Sforza was the bravest warrior Renaissance Italy ever knew. She ruled her own lands, fought her own battles, and openly took lovers whenever she pleased.Her remarkable tale is told by her lady-in-waiting, Dea, a woman knowledgeable in reading the ‘triumph cards’ – the predecessor of modern-day Tarot. As Dea tries to unravel the truth about her husband’s murder, Caterina single-handedly holds off invaders who would steal her title and lands. However, Dea’s reading of the cards reveals that Caterina cannot withstand a third and final invader – none other than Cesare Borgia, son of the corrupt Pope Alexander VI, who has an old score to settle with Caterina. Trapped inside the Fortress at Ravaldino as Borgia’s cannons pound the walls, Dea reviews Caterina’s scandalous past and struggles to understand their joint destiny, while Caterina valiantly tries to fight off Borgia’s unconquerable army.