When it came to our family, the truth meant nothing.
I remained in my bedchamber, tended only by Pantalisea. I would not allow my other women near me, not even Murilla, who tapped plaintively at the door and refused to believe Pantalisea’s explanation that I had contracted a fever and did not wish to expose others to it.
“But you are in there with her.” Murilla’s protest reached me all the way in the refuge of my bed, where I’d huddled under furs despite the warmth of spring in the air. I felt as though I would never be warm again. “Why is my lady not worried for you, if her fever is so catching?”
“Because I’ve already had it,” retorted Pantalisea. “Besides, what matter is it of yours? Step aside. This tray is heavy.”
“Why do we not call for a physician? If she is so ill, we must summon Torella.” My dwarf was persistent; she knew there was more here than anyone would admit, and she was not about to make it easy on us.
“Madre di Dio!” Pantalisea stomped her foot. “Am I to stand here all day with a tray full of dirty dishes? Move from the door this instant and let me pass.”
Rousing myself, I drew back the sheets, which felt heavy as wool, and slid from bed. The air clung to my ankles like icy fingers. I heard Murilla’s gasp from where she peered past Pantalisea: “Madonna is up!” The dishes on the tray clattered as Pantalisea swerved around, her own gasp escaping her as she caught sight of me, one hand clutched about the post of the bed, the other cradling my midriff as I swayed, trying to get my bearings.
I knew I looked terrible, though I had not dared glimpse myself in a mirror since the night I staggered into the palazzo, battered and bruised, with blood drying on my thighs. Pantalisea had not said anything as she undressed me, bathed me, and enveloped me in my robe and put me to bed, as if she knew her questions were futile. Perhaps she had guessed what had befallen me. She couldn’t help but see the bruises; she had wiped away the blood and applied salves to my lip, which grew so swollen I could barely sip gruel. Now the bruises had started to fade, from virulent purple to sickly yellow; my lip had almost healed, too. My private parts no longer throbbed, and the rest of my young body, while still weak, was beginning to resent this enforced hibernation.
Still, I imagined the savagery of the deed must be seared onto my face as surely as it was in my body, and the way Pantalisea now exclaimed, dumping the tray onto the nearest table, “Oh, my lady, it is too soon for you to rise. You must not force yourself!” told me everything she would not say. As she started to steer me back to bed and Murilla slammed the door shut on my gawking women in the antechamber, planting herself in front of it, I made a token gesture of resistance. It was nothing Pantalisea could not overcome, if she had a mind. She did not try, however, pausing to look at me with such fierce concern that I almost started to weep.
“How long…?” I whispered.
“Nearly three weeks.” She lowered her voice. “You needn’t worry. His Holiness and your brothers have not returned from Ostia. There was some delay; I have no idea why, but they sent word through Princess Sancia.” Irritation notched her tone. “She’s been my bane, sending messages here every afternoon, demanding an audience with you. I’ve kept her away thus far, relaying that you are ill with fever and cannot be disturbed. But I do not know how much more I can—”
I held up a hand. “There is no need. I want you to do one more thing for me.”
“Anything,” she said at once, and I had a sudden recollection of a day that now seemed a lifetime ago, when we traveled together by litter to Cesare’s palazzo and I teased her about Perotto. That same day from an upstairs window, with Cesare at my side, I had first seen Giovanni, in his stiff new clothes, pacing the garden.
He’s to be my husband. I hardly think feelings matter.
The memory clutched me. I bit back my anguish, thinking that if I had known then what I did now, my answer would have been so different; the trajectory of my life to this moment would have been diverted to an unknown but surely less arduous path than the one I now must tread.
“My lady?” said Pantalisea. “What is it? Tell me what I can do for you, please.”
“I must be gone from here before my father and brother return,” I said. “Send urgent word to the prioress of San Sisto. Tell her I wish to seek sanctuary behind her walls. As soon as possible.”
I HAD FORGOTTEN how quiet it was.
As a child, I had spent so much time here, my days punctuated by the tolling bells of the Romanesque tower calling the nuns to prayer, my ink-stained hours divided by lessons, and my nose forever in a book, drowning me in words, so many words that it seemed the entire world was but an unexplored story, waiting for me to turn its pages.
San Sisto was a wealthy convent. In the centuries since its founding, the Dominican house had benefited from papal generosity. Innocent III paid for its restoration and a series of frescoes in the chapel, celebrating the New Testament. The relics of Sixtus II had been transferred from the old catacombs for display here, to attract pilgrims and their offerings. Noble widows seeking placid finales, surfeit daughters whose families could not afford a dowry, unfortunates who’d sowed insurmountable scandal in their wake—all paid for peace within these cream-brick walls, where vanity was eschewed and former names renounced in favor of appellations like Annuziata and Magdalena. Here, the inviolate rule of St. Dominic brought order to the unpredictable chaos of life.
Nevertheless, I was certain San Sisto had never seen anyone arrive as I did. I scarcely allowed the prioress advance warning before I was at the gates facing the Via Appia, shrouded in my cloak, valise in hand, and my maidservant at my side. The prioress knew me; my education here had been overseen by her. She was too self-contained to show any consternation that I had returned after years of absence, but I gleaned in her stance that unexpected guests were rare. Other convents might be open to visitors, their barricaded façades and grilled windows mere foils to disguise illicit brothels that peddled novices like bottles of olive oil; but not San Sisto. Here, no impropriety must soil the house’s holy repute.
I knew this. I depended on it. No man, not even my father, would reach me here.
“I trust these rooms will suffice,” said the prioress. She led us into a small apartment composed of a sparsely furnished chamber with a small sleeping area separated by an archway without a door, hung with a gauze curtain that would discourage any unauthorized entertainments.
“Perfect,” I murmured, even as Pantalisea stiffened. “Please,” I told her, “give Mother Superior the gifts we brought.”
“Oh, you should not have, my child,” protested the Prioress, her seamed face creasing as Pantalisea set the valise on the table to remove a bundle of scented beeswax tapers. I had remembered at the penultimate hour, as we were about to abandon my palazzo, recalling Adriana’s adage that I must never visit a sacred place empty-handed. “And the cloth,” I said, ignoring Pantalisea’s scowl. I did not care if our surroundings were stark to the point of austerity, if I slept on a pallet with nothing but moldering linen to cover me. To obtain the safety I needed to determine my fate, luxury must be sacrificed.
Pantalisea reluctantly extended the folded blue Venetian velvet with its golden pomegranate motifs, which my father had given to me.
“For your Virgin’s mantle,” I said.
The prioress sighed. “Thank you, my child.” She made a slight motion; from the passageway outside, a nun slipped in to retrieve the gifts, leaving as silently as she had appeared. “You must be weary,” said the prioress. “I will leave you to rest. But”—she lifted her gaze before Pantalisea could usher her out—“first I think we should speak alone.”
I nodded. After Pantalisea had trudged out, closing the door behind her, I faced the prioress. “I have not come here to make your life difficult,” I began, “nor do I wish to be an imposition.”
“And yet you will do both.”
My throat knotted. “Yes. I am afraid I will.” I stood quiet, hands folded at my stomacher, my cloak
falling about me. My stance conveyed what I could not bring myself to admit; I saw it in her gaze as it rested on my midriff and then lifted again to my face.
“When are you due?” she asked. There was no judgment in her voice. Had I not known better, I would have thought she had asked the same question innumerable times before.
“I may not…” I faltered. “It might not be what I fear.”
“But you are here nevertheless.” While she did not smile, her expression softened, in the manner of a woman who might dwell apart from the world yet was not ignorant of its vicissitudes. “To seek refuge within these hallowed walls.”
“Yes.” I struggled against the sudden urge to confide everything. “I need time, a place to rest. Until I know for certain.” Even as I spoke, I wondered at my own deceit. Though nothing had happened in my body to confirm my supposition, though I had no sense of what a woman in my assumed state should feel, I knew it already, as I had known nothing else.
Already, my brother’s seed grew inside me.
The prioress remained quiet for a moment. Then she assented, turning to the door. As she reached for the latch, she said, “You have requested sanctuary, and we must do everything in our power to uphold it. Should what brought you here turn with time into a desire to renounce the world and take the veil, we will uphold that, too, as we must for any sinner who seeks redemption. But we cannot endanger ourselves. We cannot put this house and our fellow sisters of Christ in harm’s way, not for you or any other. Above all else, we must protect our sanctity.”
“I understand,” I said.
“I hope that you do. For should this fear that brought you to us come to pass, you must stay in this room and a designated section of the cloister. It will not do for the others to see you in such a state. Once the child is born, if you choose to remain, you must surrender it. It cannot stay with you under any circumstance. Should you decide to leave, then you must go with the child as soon as possible. We cannot have our order disrupted for too long. There are those among us who would find the sight and sound of a babe too harsh a reminder of what we have renounced. Temptation must be removed for the safety of all.”
She did not wait for my reply. Opening the door, she left me to contemplate the choices she had given me, neither of which I could even start to consider.
Pantalisea returned. “Are we staying?” Her undertone of anxiety betrayed that she still was not sure I was making the right decision. She had not yet realized the precise reason for my exodus from my palazzo and my family, though she knew Giovanni had left for Pesaro and something terrible, unspeakable, had befallen me in the wake of his absence.
“Yes,” I said. “We are staying. Or I am. You are free to leave.”
“Leave? Why would I leave? Are servants not allowed to serve their ladies here?”
“No, it’s allowed, if you abide by their rules. We both must abide by the rules.” I sighed, unclasping my cloak and dragging it from my shoulders to drape it across one of two hard-backed chairs in the room. I glanced at the uninviting woven seat; in a few months, I would need an upholstered cushion if they expected me to spend my days here, sewing and waiting—
I shook my head, forcing these thoughts aside. There would be time enough to reflect. Instead, I said, “If you stay, however, you must know the reason. It would not be fair, or safe, otherwise. When Cesare and my father find out where I am, they will not be pleased. There will be questions—difficult questions. If they cannot ask me, they may try to ask you.”
She frowned. “But I thought my lady came here because…” Her voice drifted into abrupt awareness. “It is not because you seek to flee the signore?”
“No.” I beckoned her close, clasping her hands in mine. I’d never had a sister. I had never known another woman in whom I trusted enough to confide, not with the truths I kept deep within my heart. Giulia had been an idol turned rival, and Sancia, while delightful, was too recent a companion. Perhaps if we’d had more time together, Sancia could have helped see me through this trial; I had no doubt she had the courage and strength. But it would put her at odds with my family, and I did not want that for her, for anyone. Pantalisea, on the other hand, had been at my side since I was eleven. She had been my most loyal servant, upon whom I had come to rely, always knowing that if ever I had a secret to entrust, she would keep it for me, regardless of the cost. Or so I now desperately needed to believe. For this secret could get us both killed. I did not doubt Juan’s threats. After what he had done, I must never doubt the extent of his malice again.
I drew her to the other chair and quietly, without any tears, I told her everything. By the time I finished, her face had turned white. I added, “As I told you, you need not stay. I know how much I ask of you, how dangerous this could be.” I heard myself trying to soften once more my harsh reality, though this time it was for her sake, not mine. “I may not be with child. If I am, however, nothing will be the same. You must choose now. If you stay, if you share this with me, then you put yourself at risk, from Juan, certainly, and perhaps from others, as well.”
“Others?” she echoed.
“Giovanni,” I said. “He left by Juan’s order, but our marriage is not yet annulled. He may try to stop Papa from petitioning the Curia, claim we indeed consummated our union. He’s a coward and a villain, and if he suspects I am with child, he will try to claim it. I must do whatever is necessary to protect the babe. Giovanni can never have the opportunity to call it his.”
“But you speak as if you want it. There must be another way. Surely here in Rome, we can find someone we can pay, a midwife who knows how to rid you of it.”
“And how do you suggest we find this midwife without alerting Juan or having rumor make its way through the city? I am His Holiness’s daughter; I have no coin to purchase such enormous silence. No,” I said, making my decision in that moment. “I will not destroy it to save myself, nor will I remain shackled to Giovanni.”
It was the first stance I’d ever made for myself, the first time I stood on my own, without anyone to cajole or persuade me. After everything I had endured, I felt as if I were sloughing off the skin of one existence to become someone new.
“I too am a Borgia,” I said. “The time has come for me to show it.”
Pantalisea whispered, “What shall we do?”
The smile on my lips felt as cold as the price that I knew I must exact. “What would any girl do in such circumstances? When the time comes, I must send for my mother.”
A FEW WEEKS later, Vannozza arrived swathed in her antiquated black, although in the convent garden where we met, seated before a table with sugared fruits and a decanter of light wine, she seemed appropriately dressed, if overlarge, in the delicate symmetry of our surroundings, the spidery arches of the cloister enclosing us as starlings darted in the sky above.
I did not have to say anything at first. “I thought you never wanted to see me—” she started to declare, and then she paused, scouring me with her gaze. “Dio mio. You are with child.” How she knew so easily was unimportant; she’d always cultivated a keen eye. Or perhaps her painted cards had given her a sign. That, too, I no longer doubted. She had known things about me that she never should have. When it came to her children, she indeed had the sense of a witch.
I reached for the decanter. “Perhaps.”
“There is no ‘perhaps’ about it,” she barked. “You are. I see it on you. Have you been sick?”
“Sick?” I poured wine, began ladling refreshments onto the plates, keeping my voice and expression calm. “How so?”
“Do not play the fool with me.” She thrust out her hand, detaining me. I sat still, the plate I held extended between us. “I mean sick, as in nausea and vomiting; as in malaise. Women often feel ill when they first breed. I never did, but it happens. The bleeding stops and they feel sick. Even the smell or taste of certain foods can send them rushing to the privy. Has any of this happened to you?”
“No.” I pushed the plate past her on the
table. “But, as you say, you never felt ill. I am your daughter.” I met her stare. “Do you want to know how it happened?”
I knew it was dangerous, summoning her like this. I’d spent the days before her arrival planning our meeting to the last detail: how I would act, what I would say and, more important, what I would not. I must be clever this time, more so than she. It would not be simple, I realized, now that she sat before me, with her preternatural capacity to see past my every ploy.
With a chuckle, she popped a candied apricot into her mouth. “I assume it happened in the usual manner. What I want to know is, why come here instead of staying in your palazzo until Rodrigo returned? He’s very unhappy. He says you have engaged in such a public act of renunciation by entering a convent, you set every tongue in Rome to wagging. By now there isn’t a vagrant on the street who hasn’t heard of how your husband left you, forcing you to seek refuge to ease your anguish.” She went quiet for a moment. “Or is this your plan? To leave your father with no choice but to proceed with the annulment, regardless of how much those Sforza threaten?”
She went on before I could answer. “Not that I fault you. A wife so neglected: Where else can she turn but to her faith?” She retrieved the goblet of wine I’d poured for her. “When Rodrigo petitions for the annulment, your retirement here, however temporary, can only support his claim that your husband was unable to perform as he should.”
I remained silent, watching her empty the goblet.
“But as you’re surely aware,” she chided, “there can be no such claim. A pregnant wife cannot accuse her husband of neglect, at least not in the bedchamber. As soon as he hears, Rodrigo must cancel the proceedings and dispatch you forthwith to Pesaro. Hiding will only spare you so much. Slim as you are, you’ll start showing within a few months, and then the blessed sisters themselves will send you packing.”
“I think not.” When I finally spoke, I kept my voice as smooth as the goblet stem I caressed. “I’ve confided in the prioress, and she has agreed to let me stay until after the birth. And,” I added, “this child, if indeed I am to bear one, is not my husband’s.”
The Vatican Princess Page 27
