The Borgia Confessions

by Alyssa Palombo

  It was only a few cases at first, in the poorer sections of the cities, where the cloth-dyers and their families lived. Yet, as it often does in the summer in cities where so many live in close quarters, it began to spread.

  You can return to Rome soon, Cesare wrote. I don’t want you at risk of the plague, though there are a few cases here in Rome as well. The Holy Father is in contact with the new Signoria. It will not be much longer now. All thanks to you.

  Though he did not say explicitly what “it” was, I had a good idea.

  A part of me glowed at his words of gratitude, yet I still stubbornly questioned whether I had done the right thing in all of this.

  I had continued attending Fra Savonarola’s sermons every Sunday. And though I dutifully wrote a report on each one, which I dispatched to Cesare, what I left out of those reports was how I was genuinely moved by what the friar said. His criticisms of Pope Alexander and his advisors were, as I knew firsthand, completely true. But beyond such departures into the political, much of what he said made sense to me. He spoke of living simply, of having true repentance, of looking to the teachings of Christ before looking to the Church. It seemed so much simpler to me than the world I’d known, the decadence and opulence and power of the Church.

  It made me feel both ashamed and like I could truly be forgiven.

  But terrible things flowed from Savonarola’s power. Unrest in the city, quarrels among families, neighbors turning on neighbors and denouncing one another for sins real and imagined, women accosted and shamed in the streets, personal belongings all but stolen. This happened with the friar’s permission, if not his active participation. What to make of it all?

  Trying to make sense of it kept me awake at nights, but in the end, I need not make anything of it. I had only report what I learned.

  And so the day after I received Cesare’s letter, when Anna Landucci showed up at my door, eyes shining with excitement, I listened with interest to what she had to say. “You’ll never believe it,” she said, stepping inside and grasping my hands. “I’ve an appointment tomorrow to go make confession to Fra Savonarola!”

  I was surprised. “He is hearing confessions again?” He had done so before being excommunicated, but though he had since returned to preaching he had not heard confessions that I was aware.

  She nodded excitedly. “You must come with me!”

  I shrank away from her. “Oh, he will not meet with me as well, I am sure…”

  “Why not? I shall tell him you are a newcomer, and much impressed with his preaching. He will want to hear your confession!”

  “I do not know…”

  “It will be good for your soul, Maddalena,” she said encouragingly.

  I paused. If only the good Anna Landucci knew of the things that truly ate away at my soul. She could never even imagine.

  “Very well. I will go with you.”

  * * *

  The next day, I found myself at the monastery of San Marco.

  I waited outside as Anna went into the room where the friar would speak to her—not a traditional confessional, but a small cell in the monastery where Fra Savonarola received visitors and counseled those who came to speak to him. I was still not confident he would even see me, and I could not decide if I hoped he would.

  Nearly a half hour had passed before Anna emerged from the small room, her face wreathed in a radiant smile. She took my hands in hers. “Go see him,” she whispered. “I told him of you, how you had accompanied me here, and he will see you and hear your confession.”

  I squeezed her hands. “Thank you,” I said softly, surprising myself with how much I meant those words.

  Hesitantly, I stepped into the room, and immediately the friar’s voice, so well-known to me by then, drifted out. “Shut the door behind you, child.”

  I obeyed, and only after I had completed the task did I turn to face Fra Savonarola.

  He looked slightly larger here in a small room than he did in the pulpit, dwarfed by the immense size and space of the Duomo. He was dressed in his black-and-white Dominican robes, his cowl cast down so his tonsured head was bare. He gave me a small smile and gestured to the hard wooden chair across from him. “Please sit, my child.”

  I did so, smoothing my skirts fastidiously about me. I had worn one of my own dresses, a plain one of rough, dark cloth that I usually wore under my apron when tending to Lucrezia Borgia. Such attire would more endear me to the friar more than anything Cesare had given me, but more so than that it felt right, somehow, to wear my own clothes to this audience.

  “Anna tells me you are newly come to Florence,” Fra Savonarola said. His voice was the same voice of the prophet who preached in the cathedral, and yet not. It still had the same deep timbre, the same resonance, but here was gentle and intimate, his words for my ears alone, and not for the whole massive congregation. “What is your name, child?”

  “Maddalena,” I said. And because I could not lie to this man, I said, “Maddalena Moretti.”

  “Maddalena. A saint’s name, a woman who received mercy and grace from Our Lord’s own hand. Welcome to Florence, Maddalena.”

  “I thank you, Friar,” I said respectfully. “I have been to hear you preach in the Duomo. I am … much moved by your sermons.”

  “Ah.” He smiled beatifically, as if I were the first person to say such to him. “You do me too much honor. My words come straight from the Lord God. All credit is to Him alone.”

  “I have never heard His voice so clearly as when you speak,” I said.

  “If I can be the pathway through which you grow closer to Him, then my work on Earth has been worthwhile,” he said. These were not empty platitudes, such as the politician-churchmen I had grown so familiar with would say them. He meant every word, deeply. And suddenly I was reminded of my Uncle Cristiano, and how he and I had had so many conversations of faith and the nature of God. And I realized how bereft I had been of true spiritual counsel since he had died. He would have liked Fra Savonarola very much. “I will hear your confession, my child, if you’ve one to make.”

  In that moment, all thoughts of why I was there fled from my mind. There was only Fra Savonarola and me, and the feeling, like a thorn from Christ’s crown digging into my flesh, that I had grown so far away from the God I had once feared and revered above all else. “In truth I have much to confess, Fra Savonarola.”

  He nodded encouragingly. “Tell me. God in His mercy sees all and forgives all.”

  “I am guilty of lust, Friar. Lust and fornication.”

  I peeked upward at him, waiting for him to condemn me in the righteous fury for which he was known, but his serene expression did not change. “Many more than you are guilty of such sins. Go on, my child.”

  “It is more than that, I fear. I have lain with … with a man of the Church. I have desired him, and I have gone to his bed.” My face burned with shame as I spoke the words aloud, and to this man of all people.

  “Do you think this surprises me, my dear? So many who claim to be men of God are similarly weak in their resolve and break the vows they have made unto Him. The sin is yours, and his as well, but the difference is that you are here confessing in a true spirit of contrition, and he is not.”

  Inappropriate laughter bubbled behind my lips at the thought of Cesare Borgia confessing anything in a true spirit of contrition, let alone sins like lust and fornication. I doubt he ever lost a night’s sleep over the sins I would spend my life confessing.

  Yet the friar’s last words snagged my attention. A true spirit of contrition. Was I? Is that what I had in my heart, truly? For a true spirit of contrition surely meant that one would not commit the same sin again. Would I tell Cesare Borgia that I would not come to his bed, once I returned to Rome?

  No. I was not that strong.

  But perhaps, I thought—and it was as if the sun broke free from the clouds after a storm—perhaps that is the true greatness, the true mercy of God that we, his flock, can never truly understand. He made us as
we are, He knows we sin and shall sin again, and yet He loves us anyway.

  Perhaps that is the secret.

  “Tell me,” Fra Savonarola said, his voice gently intruding into my thoughts, as though he knew I had been in the midst of a personal revelation, “in going to this man’s bed, did you bear any ill will against the Lord God?”

  “No,” I said vehemently. “No, I swear it.”

  “Did you desire to break His laws?”

  “No,” I repeated, my voice breaking in a sob. “No. I have been in a torment of guilt, Friar. I have.”

  “Then why did you lie with this man?”

  “Because I love him!” I cried. The words seemed to ring within the plain walls of the small room.

  Because I love him. I love him.

  I had never spoken the words aloud to anyone. I had never spoken them even to myself, even in the quiet and darkness of my own heart.

  But they were true.

  And so, in confessing to Fra Savonarola, I had made a confession to myself.

  “Ah,” he said, smiling once more. “Love is something different altogether. Love is the greatest gift God has given us. But we must allow that love to raise us above sin, not tempt us into it. That is what God requires, in giving us this gift. Do you see the difference, my child?”

  I nodded, tears trickling down my face. “I do, Fra Savonarola. I do.”

  “I believe that you do indeed.”

  I nodded again.

  “Kneel, my child.”

  I slid from my chair and knelt before him.

  He placed a hand on my head. “I absolve you of your sins, in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.”

  “Amen,” I murmured, crossing myself.

  “Rise,” he said.

  I did so.

  “For your penance, you must eat only bread and water for two weeks, and give alms to the poor,” he said.

  I thought of all the florins Cesare had given me, more than I would ever need to use, even should I stay in Florence for months on end. “I will, Friar. I will.”

  He smiled again. “My blessings on you, Maddalena Moretti. Your namesake was a sinful woman as well, and Our Lord forgave her and loved her all the same.”

  I smiled in return. “Thank you, Fra Savonarola. You have given me more peace than I have known in some time.”

  “It is the Lord who gives you such peace, sister Maddalena. Go with my blessing.”

  I turned and left the room, shutting the door quietly behind me. Anna was waiting for me in the narrow stone hallway. “Is he not truly a man of God?” she asked rapturously. Then she noticed the tear marks on my face, the tears still falling. “Maddalena! Are you quite well?”

  I nodded, smiling at her. “I am well. Better than I have been in a very long time.”

  Chapter 73

  MADDALENA

  I served out my penance to the letter. I ate naught but bread and water for the following two weeks, though I still went to the market daily for gossip as well as heartier fare for poor Rodolfo. And the day after my confession, I returned to the monastery of San Marco with a purse of coins—about half of what remained—and entrusted it to one of the brothers there, telling him that these were alms intended for the poor. He thanked me profusely and assured that he would personally see it done.

  Unlike the priests and bishops and cardinals of the Vatican, who said one thing and meant another, I believed him entirely.

  Yet the situation was rapidly deteriorating in Florence. The new anti-Savonarola Signoria was encouraging those in Florence who opposed the friar and his methods to cause trouble in the streets, and as such gangs of young men who identified as Compagnacci—largely upper-class youths who resented the puritan strictures Savonarola had imposed upon Florence—began to pick fights in the street with known Piagnoni, throwing rocks and insults alike at them. The friar ever preached nonviolence and turning the other cheek, but human nature being what it was, fights often broke out between the two factions. It became safer, most days, to stay indoors and off the streets. All of this I duly reported to Cesare, as I could not see any way to excuse ceasing to send him reports.

  And, of course, the Signoria was encouraged by the pope, which very few in Florence knew, other than me.

  The tension in the streets of Florence was thicker than holy oil; and, like oil, all it needed was one spark to set everything alight. And soon enough, that spark came.

  I never knew for certain what caused the events of that fateful night. I heard it was a simple fight between the Compagnacci and the Piagnoni, commonplace in the city of late, which started it all. I also heard a rumor it was an attack on Fra Mariano Ughi, one of Fra Savonarola’s brother monks, as he made his way to the cathedral to preach. Perhaps it was some combination of those things. Yet the cause mattered little. However it happened, someone had set a match to the tinderbox that was Florence, and before long the whole city was on fire.

  Soon, there were gangs, small armies, running through the streets, and even within my house I could hear shouting; I could see, even with the curtains drawn, the flicker of torches being carried past my windows. I donned my light summer cloak and pulled up the hood, walking out into the dining room to find Rodolfo eating. “I am going out,” I announced, “to see what is happening in the streets. I will not be gone long.”

  “Wait a bit, Maddalena, and I shall accompany you,” he protested. “It may not be safe for a woman alone. It is late, besides.”

  “I shall be just fine,” I said. “I must report to His Eminence, mustn’t I?” With that I was gone, out and through the door, following the streams of people passing the house to see what the commotion was.

  It was not long before I realized where everyone was headed, where the explosion of tension had centered itself: the monastery of San Marco, not far from the house where I was staying. “Oh, no,” I murmured as I rounded the corner onto the street where the monastery sat, only to see a huge crowd gathering in front of it, the shouts and screams deafening. It was a scene out of hell itself, lit by the dim, flickering lights of torches. “Oh, no. No!” I ran the rest of the way, pushing past curiosity seekers until I was at the edge of the crowd in front of the monastery. From within I could hear screams, the sounds of doors being broken down, and loud booms that seemed to be shots from an arquebus—or, likely, more than one. People stumbled away from the crowd, faces bloody, clutching wounds on their arms and sides and legs.

  San Marco was under siege.

  My legs grew weak underneath me, and I staggered, using all my strength to stop from falling to my knees, for doing so would surely mean being trampled. Had I done this? Had I set this in motion?

  There was nothing I could do to help matters; only injury and perhaps death awaited me inside. Yet I felt compelled to bear witness. To bear witness to what I had wrought.

  I began shoving people out of my way, shoving through the crowd to get to the entrance of the monastery. I had the urgent desire, nonsensical as it was, to find Fra Savonarola in the fray, to beg his forgiveness for what I had done, to confess everything I had left out when I’d met with him.

  I had to make sense of it. For my own peace of mind and soul.

  Soon the crowd parted to allow armed men through into the monastery, and from the calls of those around me, these soldiers had been sent by the Signoria to maintain order. Even as those outside were quieted by the arrival of organized troops, still I tried unsuccessfully to fight my way through to the monastery. At one point, I tipped back my head and howled at the night sky in futile rage and frustration, a sound completely swallowed up by the chaos around me.

  Suddenly, I felt strong arms around me, pulling me backward, wrestling me away from the riot. Instinctually, I struggled. “Let go of me!” I growled, flailing and kicking as my assailant lifted me bodily and carried me away from the crowd.

  “Maddalena! It is me!” a familiar voice said, setting me down some distance from the crowd. I turned to find Rodolfo. “I must get
in there!” I cried, making to run back. “I must see…”

  Rodolfo caught my arm in a vise grip, preventing me from running back. “No,” he said. “His Eminence charged me with your protection, and I mean to do my duty.”

  He pointed ahead. “There is nothing more you can do or see. Look.”

  I watched as, emerging from the crowd, Fra Savonarola came, marched between two armed guards, with more to the front and back of him. “He has been arrested,” Rodolfo yelled in my ear, so he might be heard above the shouts of joy and cries of dismay and pain. “It is over.”

  I made to take another step forward, and Rodolfo seized me again, spinning me to face him. “It is over!” he shouted, shaking me once.

  I began to sob.

  Rodolfo released me, gently draping one arm around my shoulders. “Come. We are going home.”

  He did not mean our borrowed house in Florence.

  * * *

  The next morning, I sent a report on ahead to Cesare. There was no time for me to bid farewell to Anna Landucci, or to Maria the vegetable seller. I would be gone as if I had never been there, just as Cesare had wished. Rodolfo and I packed up our belongings, loaded the cart, and followed the messenger—albeit at a much slower pace—back to Rome.

  Chapter 74

  CESARE

  Rome, August 1497

  I sent a message to Palazzo Santa Maria in Portico, to be left for Maddalena. As soon as she had returned and rested, she was to come to the Vatican to see me.

  I paced my rooms restlessly on the night I expected her to arrive; it had only been a matter of weeks since I had last seen her, yet it felt like a lifetime. I wanted to take her into my arms, whisper to her how well she had done. She had done everything I had hoped she would, and more. She had made a mark on the history of Italy forever. Even if no one else ever knew, she and I would.

  And then I wanted to remove all of her clothing and take her to my bed, to bury myself inside her until I found the relief and ecstasy that had been eluding me these long weeks since her departure. I grew hard just thinking about it and had to do my best to calm myself. There was business to attend to first.