“Not enough sugar,” I called out to one of the apprentices, dashing at my eyes as he stirred a simmering kettle of pomegranate wine sauce. “Six parts sugar per every unit of wine, and don’t forget to skim the top. Here—” I reached out with the skimmer; surely I could do that with a bandaged palm? But my hands were shaking, and I just thrust the skimmer at the apprentice and turned away before he could notice. Shaking hands, leaking eyes—when had I turned into this whimpering quivering ninny? So a brute had knocked me about and tried to pry my legs apart—that wasn’t so uncommon in this world. Plenty of women had brutes like that for husbands. You’re lucky, I reminded myself, you’re very lucky. You didn’t even get raped; Leonello stopped that from happening!

But I was finding it very hard to feel lucky.

“Wine,” Ugo was calling out importantly. “Only the finest Magnaguerra will serve for this royal sauce.”

“The Lagrima will do,” I snapped, finding a stew I could stir one-handed. “That Magnaguerra is far too expensive for ordinary occasions.”

Ugo gave a great sigh to show me how he suffered. I was already regretting leaving him in charge, but who else did I have? “The Lagrima, then,” he allowed. “A small cask from the wine cellar.”

My throat closed up at the mention of the wine cellar. I fumbled with the ladle in my hand, nearly dropping it into the stew, and the bandage about my palm must have come loose because one end trailed in the simmering mix of chard and borage and thick fragrant chicken broth. “Santa Marta,” I swore, and then I did drop the ladle because I could see that my hand was bleeding through its bandage again, and all I could hear was the steady drip-drip-drip of blood through my fingers onto the cellar floor as I waited to see if Juan Borgia would kill me.

“Excuse me,” I muttered, gesturing an apprentice at the stew, which looked about to boil over. “I’ll just tend this—can’t go about bleeding into the food!” And I stretched a rictus grin over my face as I marched out of the kitchens, past the cold rooms and storerooms, tripping over the cat to get to the courtyard outside.