Friar Bartolomeo shrugged his shoulders. ‘That may be so, and nothing can diminish the need of a father for sons to ensure a family’s legacy, but men and women die the same, and you should take comfort in knowing, Luna, that in the afterlife, when we become angels, your sex will lose all significance. For all God’s children are born with a divinely created soul. I say this to you as your priest and friend, but will deny it should you think to repeat my words.’

‘I fear I will never be allowed to speak with my own true voice again.’ She thought of the unfinished treatise in her father’s studiolo with frustration.

‘Do not despair, child,’ he answered, ‘but rather try to understand your father’s actions, even if you’re unable to control them. You can still live a worthy life if you are governed by your God.’

He made the Sign of the Cross and Luna did the same and it felt as though he were talking solely to her future.

*

It was not many morns after the friar’s visit when Luna woke to be told by her step-mamma that she could leave her chamber and re-join the family. Relief and pleasure showed in her smile as she followed Mamma Lucrezia downstairs. It seemed the friar had told Papa he’d found Luna contrite and humbled by her confinement and her father had relented.

The servants were preparing the house for the colder months. Young men carried heavy tapestries outside to air before they would be laid upon the stone floors. The kitchen girls were busy making room in the dry store for additional flour and grain. Luna stood back against the wall as Alessandro passed her with a heavy sack thrown over his shoulder. She waited till he’d disappeared into the kitchen. She couldn’t hear her papa so, with cautious steps, she made her way to his studiolo, hopeful of finding it empty so she could retrieve the parchment and take it back to her chamber to finish writing her defence of the Sun-centred argument. The friar might have found her humbled but she still planned on changing her papa’s mind and the course of her future.

She paused in the hallway, listening outside the studiolo, and was disappointed to hear her father’s raised voice within. She turned away, already wondering what she would do with her afternoon, when she heard her step-mamma mention Professor di Novara. They were discussing the lecture. Quietly, Luna moved closer so that she could eavesdrop.

Mamma Lucrezia was in a fury. ‘What madness came over you to take your daughter?’

‘This is why I keep things from you, mistress. If you do not lower your shrieking, I will say no more.’

‘Did you think about Leonarda when you put her in that ridiculous disguise?’

‘Do not make this about Luna.’