“Can’t a fond brother come visit his little sister?” Juan was very much the handsome young gallant this morning in his embroidered hose, his velvet cloak with the red satin lining, his spurred boots and the mirror-bright breastplate he now wore at all times to emphasize his position as Gonfalonier. He struck a pose for the courtyard full of grooms and rushing pages and bustling squires. “Don’t be sour, Giulia Farnese, let me in to see ’Crezia—”

“Lucrezia left for the Convent of San Sisto already, as you would know if you had bothered to ask Cesare or Messer Burchard or the Holy Father, or anyone else.” My lover’s daughter was just a day departed, and after the whirlwind of packing and unpacking and repacking, the palazzo seemed very empty without her. Or perhaps the palazzo just was empty: Adriana gone to her niece, Lucrezia to her convent, Cesare preparing for a journey south since he had just been made papal legate to Naples (and hadn’t that ruffled a few feathers, given his youth). Rodrigo was not much in evidence either; still embroiled up to his ears in the wake of a consistory so private and secret that it had taken a full twenty-four hours for the news to spread across the city that various papal fiefs—Pontecorvo, Terracina, not to mention the Duchy of Benevento—were all to be given to Juan.

I didn’t dare tell Rodrigo just what a dreadful idea I thought that was. As if Juan needed any more reasons to puff himself up!

“If you wish to visit Lucrezia, you are too late,” I continued crisply to the Duke of Gandia and Benevento and all the rest. “She missed you yesterday, when she made her departure. I can’t think why.”

“Then let me in to visit my other sister,” Juan said, not turning a hair. “My dear little Laura. Can’t a big brother play with his favorite girl?”

“I don’t like how you play with my daughter, Juan.” Far too roughly: tossing Laura overhead first until she squealed, and then until she screamed. Or if it wasn’t tousling and pinching and pushing, he was jesting in that mean way I so disliked: hiding Laura’s favorite doll, the one she loved so much it was bald and faceless, as she hunted all over the palazzo weeping.

“Why so cross, Giulia? Don’t tell me you’re breeding again. That always makes a woman bad-tempered!” Juan’s squires and soldiers behind him gave obedient snickers. Juan grinned, offering me a bow as I glared, and presented me with the little nosegay of fresh violets and rosebuds that he had presumably brought for Lucrezia. “Even when you’re scowling, you’re beautiful—”