Servant to the Borgia

by Elizabeth McGlone

  Through the fog of pain, Betta opened her eyes to see that she was still on the bank. Pine needles were sticking to her cheek, dust coated her lips. Ten paces away on the edge of the river, someone knelt over the still body of Pantasilea.

  “Nothing, my lord.”

  “Go and push her far out into the water.”

  Splashing, muffled grunts, then a quick exchange of looks from the two other men. Betta watched as a man wearing a black mask walked toward the water.

  He moved silently. The part of Betta’s mind that could still function through the fog saw the silent, liquid tread, the way he glided through the water without creating a ripple, the grace with which the dagger was removed from a sheath very like her own, strapped to the inside of his arm. And the thrust, finding the place in the back of the neck unprotected by the collar of his doublet. The blade slid home, and the man carrying the woman slowly crumpled into the water.

  “Tie the bitch to my horse.”

  The man was standing over her. Through the slitted eyeholes, she could see no eyes, not even the glimmer of a reflection. It terrified her, the eyeless face that dealt death with the speed of the boatman. She began to struggle as he came near, soundless, creeping up on her as she has always suspected the way that death might move, as it had taken her family…

  A fist smashed into her temple again, and fear melted away into blackness.

  Chapter 65

  Holy Father-

  She clings to life, and the child with her. Though the physician you sent is undoubtedly skilled, the healer that I have in my employ has stopped the bleeding, and she continues to see to Sarifya’s care. Should the need arise, I will send for you. Be content in the knowledge that I care for her as though she were my own beloved, and have not left her side.

  C

  Chapter 66

  Betta blinked her eyes. Pain lanced through her head at the movement, and she flinched, bringing more pain and a moan that she could not stifle.

  “Awake?” From the sound, the speaker was several paces away.

  Phantom images floated through her thoughts. She kept her eyes closed, her body loose as she sought to make sense of them- the flight through the city, the river, and a fist flying towards her face.

  Danger. Her body stiffened at the realization, heightening her senses. She could not open her eyes yet, so she relied on smell and touch. The river water was the dampness that clung to her skirts, but time must have passed because they were no longer sodden. Leather bound her wrists together. She was prone on the wood floor, the grit of dirt hard pressing against her cheek. And smell. Not a noble house. The reek of sewage and mold in the air, stale rushes and badly tanned leather overlaid with cheap wine.

  “I can see your eyelids twitching. Wake, little bird, or I will cut them off.”

  A golden voice rounded the words into music. Obediently, she opened her eyes to see the Duke of Gandia slouched in a chair near the brazier. Only faintly glowing embers remained in the box, enough to show the glint of light hair and the hint of a ruined mouth.

  “Your Grace,” she whispered, working her hands, trying to stretch the leather cords so that she could slip them free. Bound, she was easy prey.

  “You know me,” he sounded delighted at the revelation. Reaching into a bin at the side, he began tossing pieces of charcoal into the fire, stirring the embers with a poker until a blaze emerged. “I seldom do this,” he confided, “but I have sent my servant off to fetch my armor. I will need it before this night is done.”

  Meek, Betta thought, frightened and awed by the grand duke of Gandia.

  “My lord, there has been some terrible mistake. I s.s.serve the noble lady Lucrezia, your sister. The maid, she was stealing from her, and I followed… I was afraid, my lord..”

  “No more lies.” Like a snake striking, a booted foot connected with her middle, driving all of the air from her lungs. Betta clutched her stomach, the pain of the blow where she had been struck before like a fire in her guts. “I saw you from the bridge. You stabbed her.” In his voice, the words were sensual, a delight to his senses. “Why?”

  Betta said nothing. Any explanation would only enrage him further.

  “She was looking for something. A piece of information that I require, and which I believe my sister may possess. Did you see her, as she searched the letter?”

  He began to play with his sword, a threat she did not miss. “Yes, my lord.”

  “Did you stop her?”

  “Yes, my lord. I thought she meant to steal.”

  “Did you see what was contained in the letter? I warn you, it would do well for you to answer me truthfully. If you have the knowledge that I require, I shall make sure that your death is quick and painless. If not, it will take much longer.”

  As he spoke, Betta glanced around the room, the single window darkened by shutters, the high ceiling bracketed by wooden beams where long strands of cobwebs floated down like silk. The top story of a house, she thought, perhaps one of the prosperous merchants. The smell was similar; the scent of the river was not overwhelming, except for the odor which clung to her drying skirts. If she could free herself…

  “Answer me, whore!” The foot struck out, but before it could connect, Betta rolled, placing another foot of distance between them. The look on the Dukes' face was mounting fury.

  “My lord, I cannot read! I saw Pantasilea going through my lady’s letters. We fought, and I chased her through the city. In the water…a madness came over me, and I took the blade from her hand and stabbed her with it.”

  Betta drew herself up to a sitting position, hands on the floor behind her. The leather had grown loose enough that she thought it would be possible for her to draw them over and around her backside. Her hands would still be tied, but with them in front of her, she would be able to reach the dagger resting on the inside of her thigh. That they had not found it when she was tied to the horse and later moved into the house was a miracle.

  “Why would you stab her over so trifling a matter as a letter?” There was lazy amusement in the Dukes' voice; Betta knew that he saw through her lies but was content to let her ramble on, if only for his own enjoyment.

  “She was a bitch, my lord.” She spat out.

  Laughter snorted out through his nose, and Betta thought how strange it was, that the man who held his life in her hands should laugh at her remark. “She was. So full of greed and hate that if I did not know better, I would think my own sire spilled his seed in her mother’s belly. But foul as she was, Pantasilea had a part to play in my plans, and you have taken her away from me. She was one of mine, and I care for them. Until I no longer need them.

  “Perhaps I could serve you, my lord.” Betta looked up at him from beneath her lashes, wishing that she had paid more mind to Signora Vannozza’s lesson, that she had learned how to entice a man.

  “One willing to kill because she thinks another stole from my sister? I think not. And you are not comely enough for bedsport, if that held my interest any longer. Unfortunately, it does not.” He leaned forward. “I will kill you soon, so it little matters if I speak of it. I can feel so little anymore. My cock is useless, and in my head, there is a sound like bees.” He shook his head, as though trying to dislodge them. “So do not think to ensnare me with your whore’s tricks. I have tasted the best in Rome. You are a mongrel by comparison.”

  Desperation loosened her tongue. “Your brother did not think so.” She continued to shift her wrists, forcing them into contact with her skirts, dousing the leather. The knots that held her wrists together were loosening.

  “You bedded his Eminence? I thought…” dawning recognition swept across his face. “The girl in his bed that day.”

  “When you brought Lord Sforza.” Keep him talking, she thought. The longer he spoke, the more she could loosen the strap that bound her hands. If it had been rope, the tightness of the fibers would have prevented her from moving, but instead of using cord, they had used a strip of leather, perhaps part of the l
eather saddle. Fortune was favoring her, if nothing else. They had not meant to take a captive and had no means to bind her properly. And the Duke, alone as he appeared to be, had not thought to change how she was tied.

  The Duke laughed again, a sound of genuine delight. “Perhaps you will be of use after all. It was a nasty ruse he played on me that day. Our darling sister was in his bed, I know it full well. The second that she left the Palazzo, Pantasilea sent word to me. Had he not guessed my stratagem, the scandal of Lord Sforza finding his wife in bed with the Cardinal would have been on every tongue from London to Jerusalem. How did they learn of it?”

  Betta hunched her shoulders. “They will kill me if I speak of it.”

  “I will certainly kill you if you do not.” He still spoke courteously, and all at once, Betta saw that his behavior was different than she had observed in the past. In the dim light, she could see the ruthlessness in his eyes, but no madness.

  The Duke leaned forward in his chair until their faces were close. “You see it, don’t you? The likeness between us. Our tutors and nursemaids would talk of nothing else. The sons of Rodrigo Borgia, like two swords from the same forge. But they were wrong on one count. He is not my father’s son. I heard it from my own mother’s lips. She played him false with Della Rovere and passed the child off as a Borgia, though he lacks the power our blood bestows. Cesare does not have the stones to do what was necessary to gain control of the family, to lead us to greatness. I alone knew what to do. When I awoke from the fever that took me as a child, the way forward was like a smooth path before my eyes. Only one could claim all that my father had built. My oldest brother was too favored. Father would have passed over me and given it all to Pedro, but he was weak, I could see that, even if they could not. To run from something as small as a bee. So I began to plan. I went to the gardener with wine, saying that it would help his aching joints, and when he had drunk his fill, I asked him about bees, how they are tamed, why they sting, and he told me. The next time Pedro came to the Palazzo, I climbed from the window and visited the hives and brought bees back in a leather sack. My hands were red and swollen from the stings, but no one noticed when they found him, only that I cried because my brother was dead.”

  Throat dry with terror, her words were a whisper. There was a fingers width of slack in the leather, enough for her to begin sawing her wrists back and forth, working at the knots, creating an opening lubricated by water and a sticky ooze that must have been blood. “How did the Lady Lucrezia harm you?”

  The Duke looked down, incredulous, as though she were the mad one. “She preferred Cesare over me. I saw how it began, you know, the moment that he began to love her, stroking that long golden hair and spending hours with her, even hiding her from me. As though he would have the power to keep me from what I wanted. Instead, she became the instrument I used to punish him.”

  “What do you mean?

  “By making her want him, of course. Have you never seen a merchant selling their wares? They never offer to sell you the jewel or the cup or the cloth that you desire at first. They praise the beauty of it, tell you how they could never bear to part with an item so precious. Only when the desire is white hot do they name a price. That was how I played the game with Cesare. Each time we were together, I would whisper of it, of Lot and Caligula and the Baglioni. I spoke of those tight little blonde curls and how I dreamed of raping her, of spilling her virgin blood on my cock and how our father would have forgiven me for it. And even as he hated me for it, the seed was planted, and he began to desire her as well. Nothing holds a greater lure for my brother than what is precious and forbidden. In that, we are alike.”

  Betta could remain silent no longer. “He loves her.”

  The Duke shook his head. “He loves himself more. Do you think I don’t know him? If it were a choice between our precious sister and what he desires, he would discard her in a moment. But she aids him, even now. They have taken what I need, and I cannot stop until I find her!”

  “Her?” Another span of slack in the rope. The skin around her wrist was rubbed raw, searing with pain, but she did not stop. Even as she worked them back and forth, she kept her shoulders still so that the movement could not betray her. There was no time. She had to free herself now before the man in the mask returned.

  “Sarifye, my father’s darling. That Farnese whore had too much influence with him. Naming her brother to the College of Cardinals! Had she produced a son for him, he could have taken my place. So I found another to take his interest, one that would be loyal only to me. My father would give the moon to see her safely returned, and the bastard she carries with her. The crowning of a king will seem a small thing by comparison. But they stole her from right under my nose. Pantasilea would have found her for me, I know it. Only you killed her.”

  Folding her fingers into a long tube, Betta pulled, feeling the leather thong slip over the meaty flesh of her palm, the bony knuckles, callouses. Freedom! The bands unwound from her hands. Betta flexed her fingers, delaying the moment when they would fight because she knew that this would be no match against Bernaldino, who held back his strength in check when they fought. She would need to claw and spit and bite, every foul trick that he had taught her if she was to prevail against a man double her size, trained as a warrior.

  “She would have killed me.”

  “I am going to kill you,” he said. “Or perhaps I shall let my friend Berenger dispose of you. He is skilled in such matters. How he howled tonight when I forced him to accompany me to my mother’s house! I think he was afraid that someone would know him. He would only agree to accompany me if I allowed him to wear a mask.”

  She needed more time. Her hands were limp and useless, like moronello fish. But there was no more time. At any moment, the man in the mask, Berenger, could return and then she would have no chance to escape. A mouse would remain crouching, letting words wash over her, waiting for the knife to descend, but she was a mouse no longer. It was time for her to attack.

  “And this is your grand plan? Sending a woman to snoop through your sister’s letters? It is little wonder that your brother and sister laugh behind your back, for I have never heard anything so foolish.” It was her voice of command, the one she seldom used, learned at the feet of Signora Vannozza and Donna Maria.

  Anger tightened the skin on his face; he did not rise, would not rise from his chair, and she needed him to, to rush at her, to hurt her.

  “I have heard them speaking of you a hundred times when they are together in bed. Yes, I know about that. I have seen them together again and again in the last weeks, seen her gasping with pleasure when he moves between her legs. Their brother, their stupid, half-mad brother who thinks himself worthy of commanding the papal armies. It is Cesare that is the warrior, not you, and as soon as he proves it, your father will clap you in scarlet robes and keep you in the Vatican like a trained monkey. Or perhaps he will slap you in a dungeon like the madman you are!”

  The Duke’s mouth hung open with shock at her words. With an inarticulate roar of fury, he rose to his feet, his hand already swinging back. The skin of his knuckles struck her cheek as he slapped her, the force of the blow making stars shine before her eyes. But the slap had done as it needed to. As she fell back, Betta was able to slide her hand beneath her skirts, retrieving the knife that Micheletto had given her, the one she had sharpened every day, wanting, needing the blade close to the heart of her, the one her stepfather had violated again and again. It was in her hand, and before there was enough time for him to see the small stiletto, she lunged, hilt held up, like a novice, the way that Bernaldino had told her to never hold the blade unless she was rising up and stabbing something that towered over her.

  Flesh. Her hand registered it, the tough and yet yielding sensation meeting the knife. Again. It was not enough, she could feel the man between her knees, hear his anguished sobs as he fought. She struggled to free herself, but she had waited for this moment for half for her life, and she stabbed again an
d again and again until all was silence.

  Chapter 67

  “Mother Nuca,” Cesare called into the next room, kept dim except for a brace of candles on the table near the bed.

  Seen in the gloom, the woman lying on the bed was not the creature of unearthly beauty that Juan had found to tempt their father. Her face was a pale smudge surrounded by a cloud of raven hair, her hands clasped protectively over the small mound of her stomach.

  The gray-haired woman at her side patted her, letting gnarled fingers rest on her stomach for a moment. When a small smile crossed the girls sleeping face, the old woman rose, crossing the room to the door where Cesare waited next to a uniformed Papal Guard.

  “Tell him what you have told me. Set the Holy Father’s mind at ease.”

  The old woman brushed back a lock of hair that had come loose and looked up at the Papal Guard. “The babe is well. The woman, too. Only a summer fever.” She wiped her hands on the clean white apron tied around her middle, then smoothed it over her blue gown.

  Cesare watched her behind the guard’s back, concealing a smile. Lucrezia had done well, recommending the woman to him.

  “She will recover?” The guard asked. He very carefully kept his eyes from the figure on the bed.

  Mother Nuca nodded. “God willing,” she murmured, and only Cesare could hear the smirk in her voice.

  “It is well, then. You will remain here?”

  Cesare nodded, burying his hands in his robes. “All night, until the danger is past. Leave guards here, should I have a need to send for you again.”

  “Yes, Your Eminence. Your father…the Holy Father sends his gratitude.”

  Cesare made no reply, only nodded, hiding his face from view.

  Chapter 68

  Betta woke from the fever of blood lust to find that she was sitting astride a corpse.