The duca wiped his hands clean on an embroidered linen cloth. He wrinkled his nose, catching a whiff of sweat from the silks of his Florentine ambassador.
“I want you back in Florence as soon as possible.”
CHAPTER 28
Florence, Villa Baroncelli
AUGUST 1574
Morgante, the de’ Medici Court dwarf, drew a deep breath, his barrel chest filling with the good hill air. Time away from the Court in Firenze soothed his nerves. The droning of the bees amid the villa’s flowers eased him into a pleasant calm, which helped him to forget the cruelty of the Pitti Palace.
He could not entertain Francesco’s children as well as he did Isabella’s. They quickly became bored, calling him ugly and small, throwing toys and food at him as he shielded his face with his hands. Elenora, Marie, Anna, and Filippo preferred the antics of the feral children captured from the wilds of the Americas to his juggling, funny faces, and squeaky voice.
Isabella’s Virgino and Nora, on the other hand, adored the dwarf, taking his hand, chattering about their ponies, pets, and lessons. Morgante knew their devotion mirrored the love their mother bestowed on him. The dwarf traveled with the duchessa, entertaining the children, but most of all acting as a faithful servant and confidant.
He was born in a poor village near Pisa, but both mother and father turned their eyes toward Firenze as soon as they saw the deformed infant, knowing that Granduca Cosimo de’ Medici’s family paid handsomely for unnatural children. The de’ Medici ministers scoured the land for deformed children and uomoni selvatici—“wild men”—for entertainment. The favorite Christmas gifts of the de’ Medici children—in particular Francesco—were aberrant people who fascinated their imaginations.
He was the de’ Medici’s second Morgante. The original was a fierce hunter known not only as a Court entertainer, but also as a skilled falconer. In 1550, Bronzino, the de’ Medici court artist, had painted his likeness, naked and posed minutes after a hunt, an owl perched on his shoulder. On the back of the canvas, the feathered kill was thrown over his back, spilling behind his chubby buttocks. Cosimo delighted in walking his guests around clockwise, viewing the front and back of the standing portrait.
This new Morgante was nothing like his predecessor. The owls and falcons terrified him, pecking at his face and hands. But this Morgante adored horses, so Cosimo bought him a fat pony, thinking it hilarious to see the dwarf’s short legs sticking straight out from the pony’s back.
At first, Morgante took the most spectacular falls, his body so ill suited to the roundness of his mount. The hunting party laughed at the dwarf, lying on the ground like a sack of turnips spilt from a wagon.
Still, Morgante climbed back into the saddle, desperate to ride.
“Papa. We must give Morgante a horse,” said Isabella. “He will kill himself one day riding that wicked pony.”
“Why? Does it not amuse you? I laugh until my sides ache,” said the granduca, his eyes crinkling.
“No,” said Isabella. “I think he should have a horse and learn to ride properly.”
“If he learns to ride that cantankerous pony, he will master equitation. Ponies are harder to ride than horses,” said the granduca. “And what fun would it be to see him perched atop a horse?”
Isabella thought.
“A tall horse, an enormous one, like the ones the Germans ride. Now that would be a ridiculous sight, Papa. And far less dangerous than this mean little pony.”
The next week, Morgante was given the tallest horse in the de’ Medici stable, a chestnut mare. He fell in love at first sight, calling her Carissima. Anytime he was not engaged at Court, he could be found in the stables, grooming his new mount and braiding her mane and tail.
“How can I ever thank you, princess?” he asked, bowing to his mistress.
“You shall be my personal servant,” she told him. “Never mind the Court, and especially never mind my brother Francesco. Whenever I can, I will take you traveling with me.”
Now here at Baroncelli, Morgante watched his beloved mistress care for the beautiful lady Leonora. The lazy summer days at Baroncelli without the granduca’s ugly humors and spoiled children made him happy.
He saw Leonora regain her health and beauty day by day. Like so many of the courtiers, he had been certain that the young red-haired mother was being poisoned.
What a lovely sight, he thought, this fairy-tale world. Two beautiful women, two cousins, growing strong and healthy together in the paradise of Baroncelli. As he watched Isabella stroke her cousin’s arm absently, a shiver shook Morgante’s spine, despite the heat of the summer afternoon.
He knew the fairy tale would end.
CHAPTER 29
Florence, Pitti Palace
SEPTEMBER 1574
Leonora watched the thick candles melt in her bedchamber as she waited for the arrival of Pietro.
The unbearable heat of late summer lingered into the evening, the cobblestones of the streets radiating warmth long after sundown. Despite the jasmine-scented gardens, the summer brought wafts of fetid sewage, even here.
Echoes of tension from the piazzas beyond the Pitti Palace haunted the hot night. Foul-tempered shopkeepers drove hard bargains, often ending their negotiations by spitting curses as their lettuces wilted, milk soured, and sugar pastries melted in the cruel Tuscan heat.
Leonora looked out over the city, a flickering nightscape with the black glitter of the Arno cutting across its breast.
Maria, her faithful Spanish maid, sat across from her, knitting.
“Come away from the window, my lady,” she said, dropping the yarn and needles in her lap. “I hear thunder in the distance. Come away.”
“Your hearing is remarkable,” said Leonora. “I smell the wetness of stone. You are right, a storm approaches.”
“When il duca comes, he comes,” said her old maid, sighing.
“I want it to be over with,” said Leonora, biting her lip. It quivered like a bird trying to escape a trap. “The homecoming. The disappointment that will wash over his face, his impatience to leave me. It is always the same, no matter how I prepare.”
Her face crumpled. She raised her hand to cover her mouth.
Maria rose to her feet, her knees creaking.
“There, there,” she said, taking the young woman in her arms.
“It is just—it is just I have been so happy with Isabella in Baroncelli. It was just as if I were a little girl again, loved and coddled by her hands, or by Lucrezia at the di Ferrara Court when I was much younger.”
“You must try to please your husband.”
“I do try, Maria. Am I any safer? And what of Isabella?”
“She trifles with Troilo,” sniffed Maria. “All Florence shares this knowledge. She risks too much.”
“While her husband keeps his mistresses in his villa in Rome, sending the de’ Medici the bills?” said Leonora.
“He is a most disreputable gentleman,” said Maria. “But still he is her husband.”
“A fat, womanizing ogre!” said Leonora. “Why should Isabella not seek companionship?”
“He is a duca,” said Maria, sighing, “and she is his wife. It is dangerous.”
“She is a de’ Medici! I am a di Toledo and a de’ Medici. Have I not even more royal blood than my husband?”
“Of course, my treasure,” said Maria. “But they are men.”
“And what of my poor sister-in-law Giovanna, the grandu-chessa? She is sister to the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. And Francesco, parading about with the Cappello whore!”
A clap of thunder rumbled in the night. Leonora gasped.
“Come away from the window, my beautiful mistress. Come away, bella,” implored her maid, taking the young woman in her arms.
Pietro de’ Medici wasted no time once the Spanish frigate landed in Piombino. His coach was ready and waiting just beyond the docks, with two fine matched gray mares harnessed in de’ Medici livery of red and gold.
�
�Fetch my trunks at once,” he said to the driver and footman. “I will wait in the carriage. I cannot abide to breathe the stinking air of Piombino. It murdered my brothers. It is thick with fever.”
Pietro pulled a lace kerchief from his sleeve, clasping it over his nose and mouth as he climbed into the black lacquered coach. Inside was a wicker basket of food Leonora had sent for him, filled with Tuscan sausages, hams, smoked cheeses, and fresh bread.
My darling Pietro, husband and father of our dearest son. Benvenuto!
Welcome, your own Leonora.
He kicked the basket, breaking the crystal glass meant for the fine red wine from Isabella’s vineyard at Baroncelli.
As the coach descended the Tuscan hills into the Arno Valley, Pietro’s face puckered in disgust. Already he missed the Spanish mistress he had left behind in Madrid.
And now I must return to the bed of the wife I married under duress. My cousin! Are the rumors of her unfaithfulness true? What could she see in another when she has a de’ Medici as a husband?
He looked down, seeing the redbrick cupola of the Duomo, ribbed in white plaster.
Florence loves Leonora. They laugh behind their hands at me.
The young de’ Medici prince rapped hard on the carriage roof.
“Driver! Ascend to Fiesole at once.”
High above the city of Florence, in the hills of Fiesole, stood a small villa tucked away in the woods. A brook rippled past, fed by a spring in a grotto formed by slabs of blue-gray sandstone—pietra serena, coveted by Brunelleschi, Vasari, Michelangelo, and Cellini. There lived Carlotta Spessa, Pietro de’ Medici’s mistress.
Carlotta had everything Leonora did not: tresses the color of wet coal, bright green eyes. A tigress in bed. The villagers whispered that Carlotta was a witch who fed on the vapors from the ancient grotto—and before they even whispered, they looked over their shoulder and spat, for they were terrified of Carlotta Spessa.
The Spessa name had belonged exclusively to women for generations—and they had been feared for centuries. But their beauty and passion had attracted men who found them irresistible despite—or because of—the peril. But the men who visited didn’t stay. Villagers had never known a man to dwell in the villa.
It was no wonder Pietro was infatuated with her. His throat thickened as he thought of her, the carriage bumping over the rutted road toward Fiesole.
CHAPTER 30
Siena, Palazzo d’Elci
OCTOBER 1574
Rain sluiced against the crystal windowpanes of Palazzo d’Elci. A fire blazed in the hearth, but it was the brazier that warmed the Duchessa d’Elci, her feet and legs under a woolen mantle to absorb the heat of the coals.
She had invited her stablemaster to the palazzo to discuss business. She looked up from her ledger and handed it to her private secretary.
“Ernesto Battelli,” she said, rising to meet her horsemaster. “So good of you to join me. What a malevolent day!”
“Thank you, good duchessa,” he said, kissing her hand. “I fear it will turn to snow before nightfall.”
“Come, sit by the fire, Ernesto,” she said. “I have business to discuss.”
Bowing, the horsemaster took his chair.
“I think it is time to begin training Stella’s colt.”
Ernesto nodded. “You are right, of course.”
A twinkle grew in the duchessa’s eye.
“Orione may be difficult,” she said. “Tempesta’s blood is in his veins.”
“Yes, but the dam is Stella,” said Ernesto. He thought of how the duchessa had insisted on breeding the mare to the fiery stallion. “My sincerest hope is that he will not have the ill temper of his sire.”
“I do not know,” said the duchessa. “I have driven out several times to see the colt. He snorts at me, runs away kicking. He is not exactly . . . settled.”
“Carlo is the best trainer we have. He will gentle him in no time.”
“Carlo?” said the duchessa. “He is rather rough with colts, isn’t he?”
Ernesto felt the duchessa’s eyes steady on him.
“Duchessa mia, I think he has just the right firmness to train Tempesta’s colt.”
The duchessa gazed toward the window, watching the raindrops warp the world outside.
“Drink some wine, Ernesto. This is a vintage from my husband’s vineyards,” she said. “If you do not object to drinking from a Selva cellar.”
Ernesto smiled. The duchessa had married into the ancient family whose palazzo was built in the Selva contrada, but that was irrelevant. Like her horsemaster, she was an Oca through and through.
“I suppose I could sip just a little,” he said. “The Goose in me does not object.”
“Have you heard anything from the little villanella who saved my colt? Virginia Tacci?”
“There have been rumors,” he said, taking the proffered glass.
“What is that?”
“Only rumors, Duchessa. Fanciful visions—”
“Tell me.”
“Shepherds near Vignano have seen strange lights in the dark of the moon. When they moved closer, they thought they saw your villanella riding Stella.”
The duchessa caught her breath and stared straight ahead.
“But how queer their visions are,” said Ernesto, dismissing the idea with a wave of his hand. “A shepherdess riding a Palio horse!”
The Duchessa d’Elci brought her fingers to her open lips.
“Mia duchessa?” said Ernesto, rising. He poured a draught of wine into her crystal glass.
“She rides!” whispered the duchessa. Her old eyes shone, glittering with tears.
“Drink, good duchessa. Per favore.”
The duchessa sipped the wine. Her hand fluttered to her heart. “You say she rides. My mare?”
“It is foolish talk of ignorant shepherds. They compete for grazing with the Tacci family, they may invent stories—”
“No!” gasped the duchessa. “I want this dream to be true. You must take me to her, tonight!”
“But my duchessa! It is only—”
“I will witness for myself this apparition,” she said. “Please tell my footman to fetch the coach immediately.”
It was cold and dark when the d’Elci coach arrived at the crest of the hill above the lambing sheds. The lanterns on either side of the coach swung side to side, throwing erratic pools of light as they jolted over the muddy track to the foot of Quattro Torra.
Ernesto pulled back the velvet curtain that blocked the rain and wind.
“It saddens me to see not a single candle lit in Quattro Torra,” said Duchessa d’Elci, looking across at the horsemaster. “Before the siege . . .” Her voice trailed off.
“Are you warm enough, my duchessa?” he asked.
“I am fine, Ernesto,” she said, gazing out at the dark sky.
The horses nickered quietly in the darkness, sensing something below.
The footman knocked. “My duchessa, we have arrived.”
Ernesto and the footman helped the elderly lady descend from the carriage. Ernesto smelled the lemon verbena the duchessa always used on her neck and shoulders.
“Do you see the circle of flickering lights? Just there, below us,” said Ernesto, pointing. “So it is true.”
The Duchessa d’Elci squinted in the dark, just making out the shadow of a horse and rider sweeping past a man on foot, outlined against the lantern light.
Stella ran faster than she ever had that night. Giorgio timed our pace with the beat of his heart, his fingertips pressed against his wrist.
I leaned forward against the mare’s mane, giving Stella more rein, my hands sliding along her neck as she contracted and exploded with each stride. My thighs and calves pressed tight against her barrel, clamped around the warmth of the mare.
I cast a quick glance behind me, smiling at what I saw.
Orione, his gangly legs not able to keep up with his mother, trailed behind, his ears plastered flat against his head.
I pulled up the mare with gradual pressure on the bit, and Orione pranced neck to neck with his mother, snorting.
“Orione did a good job, too. Did you notice?” I said. I reached over to smooth his forelock between his eyes. “You will be a Palio horse someday, too, little one.”
“I wonder,” said Giorgio. “He is fast, yes, but looking at his legs and neck, I would say he is going to be a very big horse. He may not have the agility for the turns.”
“I don’t care. He is fast. And he has heart.”
“What audacity, riding your Palio mare!” stuttered Ernesto, his fists clenched in rage. “A girl, a shepherdess! Shall I arrest her this minute? And the stableman’s son? I know him. Giorgio Brunelli, who paints at the academy. In your palazzo! What nerve!”
“Tranquillo,” said the duchessa, resting her hand on his wrist.
“The driver will wait here while I find a soldier to detain him.”
“You shall do nothing of the sort!” commanded the duchessa.
“But mia duchessa!”
“It seems both Stella and Orione are enjoying the exercise. I may run Stella one more time in the Palio. I consider this excellent training to have such a lightweight rider on her back. A bit extraordinary, but certainly a good workout.”
The duchessa smiled in the dark. “This is my horse, and I will win on my terms. It will be a d’Elci victory, and our noble house will bring honor to all in the Contrada dell’Oca.”
“I want you and the driver to forget what we have just witnessed,” she said. “You must swear to me that you shall not whisper a word of this to anyone.”
“Sì, mia duchessa. Sì.”
“Now take me back to my warm fire. This hill mist will be the death of me. It is far too damp and cold for my old bones.”
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