Servant to the Borgia

by Elizabeth McGlone

  Lucrezia glared at her mother and lifted her chin. "Papa would let me marry for love if I asked."

  This time the Signora laughed until tears streamed down her face, marring the line of black that had been painted around them. "Do you think so, child? Then it is well that you inherited my beauty, for you have not a drop of your father's wit. Now get you back to that place where your father keeps you as treasured as a bird in a cage, waiting for love.”

  Chapter 16

  All of Rome held its breath as July ended, the feeling a lightning flash preceding the sound of thunder, each moment stretching into a lifetime. The momentous tidings were so widely known that they were spoken from every corner, a thousand conversations, from butchers to bakers, cardinals, and courtesans, all proclaiming the same news.

  Pope Innocent was dying.

  Summer heat lay in an oppressive blanket over the streets, smothering laughter and joy. Only impatience remained. Pots of basil and verbena on doorsteps withered despite the nightly showers which released a cooling spray, the relief of which lasted an hour before the stifling heat became unbearable once more. Horses had to be spurred without mercy to urge them past a trot, and dogs no longer chased cats. They lazed in the shade, tongues lolling onto the paving stones, breath rising in steaming pants. Everywhere there were flies, circling the dead and diseased, and the buzz of mosquitoes rose from the swamps, summoning the fevers on tiny wings.

  Those with means fled Rome. Ox carts piled high with furniture and linens clogged the streets leading up into the hills where villas promised relief from the heat and malodorous humors. Those without suffered as crafts and labor ground to a standstill.

  Fear increased as the streets emptied, whispers, and wide eyes marking each passing moment as the news of the Pope's ill health filtered down from the palace. An old man, some said, he'll not last the season. As the summer reached its zenith, the rumors grew more fantastical.

  "He'll take nothing but milk sucked from a woman's teat," the cellarer whispered, cheeks pink with excitement. The servants crowded around the table in the kitchen giggled and elbowed one another in ribald humor. "It's all he can stomach."

  "Ahh, that's one I've never heard," the cook breathed out, jowls swaying as he shook his head from side to side, wondering.

  "I have," mumbled Sofia, the laundress, whose bodice swelled no matter how tightly she laced it, each breast as round as a man's head.

  The stories persisted. Whispers began to circulate of three young boys brought in secret to the Vatican, never to be seen again. Rumors said that their blood had been given to the aging pontiff by a Jewish physician in an effort to revive him, to no avail. The bells began to ring during the night; the tension, which had seemed unendurable a heartbeat before, increased until the weight of it was a knot of lead lodged in every stomach. The Pope was dead. Now the wars would begin.

  Colonna battled Orsini throughout the seven hills, the clash of steel ringing louder than the funeral dirges for the weak pope who had proved unable to control them. Swords and daggers were brought up to settle every petty grievance suppressed during the years of peace; the shrouded forms of the dead soon lined the streets. Speculation as to the new pope vied with the number of the dead as the most pressing matter of the summer. Their numbers increased, first one hundred, then to two.

  The Signora refused to leave Rome for the vineyard in the hills, believing herself safe behind the high walls of the villa. The doors and shutters were closed and bolted, and muscular men with cudgels stood at the gate, put in place, it was said, by Cardinal Borgia, a mark of his care for the woman who had borne his children.

  "Who'll take it, do you think?" Donna Maria asked Clarita as they sipped cold drinks. The mistress had retired hours before, her mind sodden. Betta sat next to them in the shadows beneath one of the pillars that supported the loggia, the stone cool against her back.

  "Della Rovere," Clarita said firmly, placing her cup to the side. "He's a smart one, that man is. No other thought in his mind except to wear the tiara since his uncle passed on, God rest his soul."

  "Uncle?" Maria cocked her eyebrow. "The old pope heaped honors on him, for no closer kin than a nephew. Always thought it was his son."

  "Nephew," Clarita said firmly. "You'll know that I served the de Cattanei since I was no older than your shadow there," she nodded at Betta. "I knew his family, for the della Rovere's were on the next street over in the days before Sixtus became Pope. Quite a lot I saw of young Giuliano, then, with my mistress as young and fresh as a flower."

  Maria's mouth hung open. "You don't mean to say...."

  "I'll say no more, for I keep my mistress’s secrets, but if there was ever a man to sacrifice everything to achieve his ends, its della Rovere. He'll wear the tiara yet, mark my words."

  The white smoke came at dawn, and the city roared, triumph and fear in a thousand voices. A new pope had been chosen. And not della Rovere, as Clarita had predicted. As dawn lightened the sky, the news began to trickle down through the streets like raindrops. Borgia, the Spaniard, was to reign.

  In the villa, the news was a buzz of shock that persisted through the day. Though few of them had seen Cardinal Borgia, his presence was tangible; the benefactor, the father of Vannozza's beautiful children. The Signora's laugh had rung through the tiled halls when she had heard the news.

  "Rodrigo?!" It was a laugh and a sob. "Rodrigo?"

  A feast was ordered for the house, to be shared by the Signora and the servants alike. It was a feast of celebration, for the fortunes of the family had improved, and those of the famiglia with it. The new mistress of the Pope would be honored beyond all women, but the mother of the Pope's children would also be rewarded as well, and generously. Their merriment drifted up to the sky, which no longer rang with screams and the clash of steel; the first act of the new pontiff to send guards throughout the city; the violence had ruthlessly been quelled.

  Betta retired that night with a buzzing head and a smile, thinking of the infrequent visitor whose laughter lightened her days. La Princessa in truth now. The thought made her happy as she could not remember being in a very long time.

  A page in the livery of the Orsini brought a letter to Donna Maria a week later. Before Betta had time to wonder about the contents, she was summoned to the kitchen and told to gather her few possessions.

  "It’s from her steward," Donna Maria said, voice trembling with excitement. "Adriana de Milla's. La Princessa...I mean, the Lady Lucrezia has asked for you. You are to be a servant at the Palazzo."

  "What?"

  "Let me read it through to you. Remembering the devotion of the girl and her skill at performing her duties, the Lady Lucrezia has asked that the scullery maid Betta be brought to the Palazzo of Santa Maria in Portico, there to serve as a maid in her rooms. At the Vatican, Betta! Within the shadow of St. Peter's itself!"

  Weakness spread throughout Betta's legs, and she collapsed back on a stool. Her head bent forward, and she caught it between her hands. The Vatican. A servant in the Vatican. Not caring for the person of the Pope's beloved daughter, there would be ladies for that, only her rooms. The enormity of the sudden elevation struck like a physical blow.

  Fear followed hard upon the shock. Everything would be altered. Her life, the one she had made for the past years, was one that she knew, each duty, each face that presented itself at the gate, every obstacle. All of it was known. The Vatican was filled with dangers, all the more terrible for being faceless, like shadows, like...plague.

  "Can I say no?" Betta asked.

  The housekeeper's brows rose until they disappeared into the cloth covering her hair. "Say no to the Pope's own daughter? You'd do as well to drown yourself in the Tiber for all the good it would do you. If it’s you she wants, then you she will have, and best you become accustomed to it."

  Betta nodded, the movement jerky as her fears overwhelmed, and Maria's face softened.

  "You've been a good girl, Betta, and I am proud to claim you as kin. A worker,
I told your mother that first week, may she rest in peace."

  Wetness fell against Betta's cheek. Only when she wiped it away did she realize that it was tears.

  "But you mark me, girl, and you mark me well. Service to one of the great families is different than what has been here. You are now of the Borgia. One of their famiglia. Keep your mouth shut and your hands busy, and you'll do well. And never forget that the lady Lucrezia is your mistress now, no matter who puts the coin in your hand. Why do you think she sent for you, Betta? A thousand girls in this city could scrub and wash better than you. It is because you talked and laughed with her those days that she came to see her mother. Oh yes, I knew of it, but I said nothing. A lonelier girl than that one I've yet to meet, no matter that she was dressed in silks and velvet. You keep her needs at the front of your mind, and you'll do well for our family, Betta, and for yourself. And never you forget it."

  Chapter 17

  To the Illustrious Archbishop of Valencia, Cesare Borgia, on this day the 1st of September, 1492.

  Our Very Dearest,

  It is with a joyous heart that I write to you, full of congratulations for the extraordinary honor that our father has lately conferred upon you. Archbishop of Valencia! Though you have yet to reach your eighteenth year, you have become a prince of the church where our father reigns supreme. It will take only your recall from Pisa to complete the full measure of the happiness which our father's ascension brought to dizzying heights.

  Though you have doubtless had the tidings of that glad occasion from half a dozen sources, I will add my own recollections in the hope that you will find therein something that will be of use. Of the maneuvering that brought our father to his blessed office, I shall say little, a reflection of the poverty of information I was able to gather from servant's whisperings. The great families of Rome were allied against our father, but like Samson, he triumphed over their mighty armies. Borgia reigns supreme again, and Orsini, Sforza, and Della Rovere pay him tribute.

  The day that the conclave announced their decision, I was woken from my bed by the roar of the crowd, which sounded like a mighty wave crashing to the shore. When I cast open the shutters, doves alit from their perch in a flurry of feathers. As I watched them wind their way across the horizon, the sign appeared that we had each been waiting for: white smoke against the gray clouds. Though you will doubtless attribute it to fancy, at that moment, I knew that our father had been chosen. A lightness had taken root in my chest. Standing there, the wind tossing my hair and watching as the Romans below ran through the streets toward the Lateran, I knew that my life had changed beyond my powers of description.

  It seemed that only a day passed between that and the time of his enthronement, so festive was the mood. Though I was forbidden from viewing the blessed ceremony, I took the precaution of sending a maid proven to have a mind well suited to the remembering of details to St. Peter's. She returned to the Palazzo with the light of the stars in her eyes and her tale filled me with wonder that overcame whatever petty emotions that I might have felt that she was able to view them while I, his daughter, was kept in a closed room less my presence bring dishonor to the Holy Father's name. By her telling, it is as though I saw them with my own eyes. Crowned on the steps of St. Peter's by Cardinal Piccolomini, he accepted the reverence of the great families of Rome there, followed by that of the Curia. Then in solemn procession, the armies of the papacy decked in their most splendid armor made their way through the streets. And most glorious of all, our father, mounted upon a white steed, the tiara of St. Peter's upon his noble brow. Flower petals came down like showers of spring rain, and banners of silk and gold were tossed in the wind. And our name is spoken with praise from every lip. "Under Caesar, Rome was great, but now she is greater still, for Caesar was a man, and Alexander is a God!"

  Already our father's elevation has wrought marvelous changes in our lives, and I think back with wonder at the blissful ignorance I enjoyed only a very short weeks before. I inscribe these words from our new home in the Palazzo of St. Maria in Portico. Our father secured a most magnificent dwelling there together with Adriana de Milla and our dear Giulia. The room wherein I write has been furnished with a table inlaid with marble and exotic woods, and when I cast my eyes upward, the banner displaying our Father's arms, the Borgia bull overlaid with the keys and tiara of that holiest office, is plainly visible to my eyes, and it gladdens spirits which have been known to suffer in your absence.

  Though I could continue on, speaking of the festivities that lit the twilight city until it shone with the radiance of midday, the beautiful gowns and jewels that have been showered upon me, I fear to strain your eyes, which are doubtless wearied from hours of study. Only know this, I am to be married soon, and I bid you hurry back to Rome, that I may enjoy the bliss of your presence before duty impels me to honor another with the whole of my devotion.

  Until such time as you return, I remain your sister who loves you more than she loves herself,

  Lucrezia

  Chapter 18

  A week passed from the time Betta gathered up her collection of belongings into a sack and walked from Ponte across the bridge to the Palazzo of Santa Maria in Portico to the first time that Lucrezia spoke to her.

  The day was quiet, and so early that the morning songbirds still called softly from the bushes in the garden and the scent of night-blooming flowers floated by on the air.

  The noble attendants had not yet arrived from the quarters which they shared, two and three to a bed in sumptuously decorated splendor. Only the maids were about, whispering as they went about their duties. Pantasilea, a tall, prettily featured young woman who rumor named one of Innocent’s grandchildren from an unacknowledged dalliance with a tavern wench, functioned as Lucrezia's personal maid. She was responsible for overseeing the bath, and the elaborate preparations made to ensure that the Pope's daughter was gowned and groomed according to her station; she guarded the appointment with all the ferocity of a hunting dog, snarling at any perceived infraction. For a reason that Betta was not able to determine, Pantasilea hated her on sight; she seldom let a morning pass without driving a hard elbow into Betta’s ribs, knocking her off balance or to the floor.

  The remaining maids were less hostile than Pantasilea, though none were friendly: La Naplitana and her daughter, Tessa, and Camilla la Greeca. Betta committed each of their names to memory on the first day, enduring in return stares that questioned why she, a girl of no family, had been chosen to serve the new pontiff’s daughter.

  Even Betta had to admit that there was little need for her labor. The palazzo was full to bursting with servants who tripped over one another for the honor of serving with the Pope’s cousin, Adriana de Milla, his mistress, Giulia Farnese, or his daughter. That they all lived together in harmony was a source of wonderment to the servants, for each was as unlike the others as could be imagined.

  Betta caught only occasional glances of the older two women. Adriana de Milla had been a regular feature in Lucrezia’s conversation even before her father’s elevation, and her appearance did nothing to dispel the harsh opinion Betta had formed of her. A word entered Betta’s mind each time she saw the tall form sweeping through the halls: panderer, those painted and beribboned aging prostitutes who hawked their children when their charms could no longer find buyers. Black-robed and anxious, she stalked the halls of the palazzo wringing her hands, interested in nothing that did not bring the Pope happiness, even as she made a whore of her son’s wife.

  Of Giulia Farnese Betta saw little, that lady being accustomed to rising late and lolling in her chambers until she was either called upon to entertain His Holiness or attend one of the innumerable banquets held in his honor. But she was beautiful, Betta thought, almost as lovely as rumor had painted her, with long golden hair that she tended each day with sunshine and oil until it shone as lustrous as gold and a sweet disposition to match her lovely face. Her apartments occupied the other end of the second floor, and the sound of her laughte
r was like silver as it tripped down the halls, brightening the frescoes as it sounded at all hours.

  The servants kept to themselves, content to remain within the famiglia. The maids rose early from pallets in the third-floor rooms allotted to them, when the dim light of the morning allowed them to move about the downstairs without disturbing those who slept in curtained beds. All that was not beautiful and elegant was accomplished in the Palazzo before the women that the Pope loved rose from their beds or while they were off finding their amusements. Each day the floors were scrubbed, that the fortunes in gold spent on the women’s garments would not become soiled. Pots were emptied and cleansed with rose water, that no offending odors would be allowed to remain. The frescoes which decorated the walls were dusted with only the lightest touch, that their vibrant colors would not fade. The footrests and bench cushions were shaken out, and the tall windows covered over with iron grates and shutters were polished until the round glass prisms sparkled. Each of the fireplaces and wedge-shaped hoods that covered them were cleaned of ash. Flowers were delivered from the gardens and scattered throughout the rooms in painted pots, lilies, and dianthus that perfumed the air with their scent.

  Maids perched on ladders high in the air to clean the coffered walls while the women attended daily mass and the hanging were beaten to remove dust. Rat and mouse traps were whisked away before the grisly evidence of their effectiveness could be seen.