“Did I truly kill my first man in a steam room?” Cesare Borgia was clever; I’d never get this conversation where I wanted it unless I made him curious.

“All right, Messer Leonello.” Cesare Borgia moved a black pawn to meet mine. “Did you?”

“Yes,” I said. “I was seventeen. He stalked me there after a card game. I’d won the last scudi out of his purse, and he was angered.”

“You used a knife?” Another black pawn advanced.

“Poorly—the man slipped on the wet floor, down low enough for me to strike.” I moved a knight out onto the checkered field of battle. “I stabbed until he looked like a cut of cheese.”

“Sloppy,” said Cesare. “Only a clean kill is a good kill.”

“Surely any kill one can walk away from unscathed is a good kill?”

“No. Killing is a skill like any other. It should be practiced until it comes easily.”

“And what was your first kill, Your Eminence?”

“I am a man of the cloth, not the knife.” Cesare moved his bishop toward me, giving its little carved miter a caress.

“But you have killed.” I kept my eyes from straying to the mask on the floor. But I could see it, oh yes, I could see it very clearly. “I know the look.”

He looked at me across the board a moment, then shrugged. “A footpad. He wanted my purse.”

“And did you use a knife too?”

“Poorly.” The gleam of teeth again. “It took me four tries to cut his throat. But I was only sixteen.”

“Young.”

“We Borgias age quickly.” He advanced his queen. “We have to. We all die young.”

“Your father has not.” Another rumble of laughter came from the bolted doors as if in answer, accompanied by Giulia’s throaty murmur. Rodrigo Borgia sounded very vigorously alive indeed.

“The exception to the family rule.” Cesare dismissed his father. “My older brother died young—Pedro Luis. And one of my halfsisters in Spain.” He sounded remarkably unconcerned by their fates. “I imagine I’ll be next.”

“The thought doesn’t seem to trouble you.”

“Better to die young and in a saddle than in bed as an old man.”

“Perhaps.” I fingered my own queen; moved a bishop instead. “Tell me, why did you kill your footpad? Surely you could have chased him off.”

“He angered me. Besides, I wanted to know what it was like.”

“Killing?”

“Yes. I knew I would have to do it one day or another. And I thought, ‘Why not now?’” He took one of my pawns.

I took one of his knights. “Do you remember his face?”

“No. Do you remember your bathhouse drunk?”

“I never remember the men I’ve killed.” True. I gave a reminiscent whistle, tapping the carved crown of my white queen. “The one I remember is the woman.” False.

“A woman?”