She got up and leant out over the window frame, breathing in the morning air. The garden spread out below and from so high its patterned pathways looked like a mathematical diagram. At its centre was the walled pond where all the paths collided. She’d best get started if she was going to write an argument so astonishing as to put an end to Leonarda Lunetta Fusili becoming any man’s wife.

*

The Palagios would soon be arriving to celebrate the signing of the marriage contract. Papa would not be home till his guests were due. He’d left early, as he so often did these days. Luna had heard him on the landing by her chamber, shouting to a stable boy to get Apollonius ready. Then she heard him tell Mamma Lucrezia that all of his children must be present for the Palagios’ visit; anything less would be disrespectful. Luna would be expected to sit at the table and eat but not to speak. Her inclusion in the celebration was only a pretence of family unity and seemed cruel indeed. Till she was summonsed, she’d fix her thoughts on the book she was reading and how she was going to use astronomy to free herself.

Luna prayed for patience and forbearance as she dressed; she’d endure the gathering for Maria’s sake. Signore Palagio and his wife and son would hardly view her any more kindly, since her step-mamma had made it very clear that all of Florence had now heard about her brazen attack on the man on the steps of the cathedral who, not surprisingly, had been deemed the wronged party. She fastened the belt at her waist and took one last look at her reflection in the pane of glass. Her skirts fell cleanly over her peg-leg and the stump that so offended all of Florence society and condemned her as nothing more than a cripple. She shook her skirts to add lightness and volume and liked the way she now appeared bigger. All of her was hidden.