“It’s all the fault of that wretched Savonarola,” my skinny and acerbic older sister fretted. But even in the safety of her own cozy sala, she gave a quick glance to make sure the maids were busy clearing the credenza at the other end of the room, and the servers occupied decanting the wine rather than eavesdropping on our conversation. I hadn’t been in Florence a day before I knew about Savonarola’s Angels: the young men and boys of Florence who had answered all that Dominican thundering from the pulpit to join God’s militia. That nice young page with the chestnut curls—who knew if after cena he might slip out of the house, don a white robe, and join bands of fellow Angels in singing hymns and roaming the streets looking for sinners to reprimand? Best to be careful; Savonarola had a great many Angels. Much like God Himself, I suppose, though I doubted God’s angels were quite so obnoxious and pimply.

“So it’s not enough now that we’ve been instructed to forswear sloth and luxury and idle pastimes,” Gerolama complained as she passed me a cup of warmed wine. “We’re now to be inspected, to make sure our houses contain nothing ungodly! It’s all for that wretched bonfire Fra Savonarola’s determined to build—you can already see the pyre being built in the Piazza della Signoria. We’re to toss everything vain onto it—jewels, lip rouge, perfumes, cards—”

“Then Madonna Giulia will return to Rome with no baggage at all,” remarked Leonello from his corner. It did not matter whether the room my bodyguard entered was my private chamber, the great Sala dei Santi in the Vatican, or my sister’s overdecorated little chamber with its too-ornate credenza and garishly embroidered wall hangings—Leonello’s hazel eyes always flicked briefly in each direction, measuring angles of attack in the event of any assassins lurking about, and then he took the corner with the best view of the room regardless of who might already be seated there, propped up his black boots, and took out a book. Currently the book was some salaciously illustrated volume of tales from the Orient that he had borrowed from Cesare Borgia’s collection, and Leonello flicked the pages with great interest. “Such utter rubbish,” he remarked. “I must be sure to finish it quickly, as I’m sure this city’s dirty literature will all be required as fuel for Fra Savonarola’s bonfire.”

I made a private note to keep my jewels in their boxes during this visit. I didn’t really see any reason why God would want me to burn up my teardrop pearl necklace or my diamond hair roses. Besides, according to Fra Savonarola and his ilk, a woman of my stature was thoroughly damned anyway, so why not at least go down to hell in all my finery? And how can you burn diamonds, anyway?