“Madonna Lucrezia—” I began to move across the room but then I froze, shards of broken majolica plate and splats of pork jelly all about my feet. I could feel Pantisilea gaping at my side, still gripping the wine decanter, both of us staring at our mistress and realizing just why she had not left her bed in a month and why she bathed herself alone.

She heaved again into the basin and then straightened, pushing her loose hair out of her face and wiping her mouth. She saw us staring at the rise of her belly beneath her shift and heaved an impatient, dramatic sigh. “Yes, yes,” she said. “I’m to have a child.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

A prince never lacks legitimate reasons to break his promise.

—MACHIAVELLI

Giulia

My young friends!” Vittorio Capece of Bozzuto approached with open arms as Orsino and I were ushered into his ornate little sala. A sanguine and sophisticated Neapolitan of perhaps fifty, leanly elegant in a sable-furred robe; cheerful, graying, rosy-cheeked. “Your journey was not too tiring?”

“I am too dusty to be allowed in your beautiful home,” I informed him, shaking out my limp skirts. “Evict me at once.”

“Nonsense, m’dear, you’re an ornament to any household. I’m delighted you’ve chosen to adorn mine.” He came to kiss me on both cheeks. “My palazzo is yours, as long as you choose to stay in Rome.”

“Not long,” Orsino hastened to say. His eyes traveled over the coffered ceiling picked out in gilt, the discus thrower carved in exquisite rosy marble beside the doors, the French tapestries of knights and unicorns and maidens skipping through fields of pinks. Fair-haired blue-eyed pages with blue-and-gold livery to match their looks were already taking our dusty cloaks, offering silver basins and rosewater for us to dip our hands, bringing pale sweetened wine in frail-stemmed goblets. “We will be returning to Carbognano soon,” Orsino ventured, looking rather swamped in all the luxurious bustle. “Very soon.”

“Such a pity,” Vittorio Capece said in his Neapolitan drawl. I didn’t think I would ever like any Neapolitans; the Tart of Aragon had spoiled the whole nation for me. But no one could help but be fond of convivial Vittorio, who insisted that even the handles of his doors be works of art. “Haven’t you brought that dwarf bodyguard of yours?” he continued, glancing behind me. “Such a clever little fellow; he admired my red marble and ebony chess pieces so much I didn’t even mind when he beat me three games in a row. I was looking forward to another match . . .”