by Robyn Young
‘Please, Tommaso.’
As the man bustled in through the door, Marco sat on the bench, his doublet fanning out around him. The silver wolf badge pinned above his heart glinted in the sunlight. Jack sat beside him, trying to keep his gaze away so as not to afford it any importance.
‘So? What advice are you seeking, Sir James?’
Jack paused as if considering his next words, which he’d been running through his head for weeks. ‘At the signore’s party we talked briefly about our fathers – the responsibilities we would inherit as their sons?’ He went on at Marco’s nod. ‘I am honoured to know I will bear my father’s mantle, but, in truth, it weighs heavy on me. I miss my friends. My comrades-in-arms. I did not realise how much until that night – hearing you speak of your company. The strength and unity of the pack?’ He shook his head, feigned chagrin. ‘I apologise if my questions seemed impertinent.’
Marco waved the apology away as Tommaso hurried out, carrying a cracked glazed jug from which he poured two goblets of wine, beaming as he handed them to Marco and Jack.
Jack continued as the man disappeared inside. ‘I was just hopeful of finding a friend here. Someone to watch my back.’ He waited when the portly man reappeared, humming as he brought a tray laden with cheese, black cherries and figs bursting with ripeness.
‘This is good, Tommaso, thank you,’ Marco said when asked if they needed anything else. ‘Go on,’ he prompted Jack, plucking a cherry from the tray. Two gold rings adorned his fingers, one displaying a knuckle-sized ruby.
Jack caught sight of his own hand as he lifted his goblet to drink. The white band left by his father’s ring had disappeared in the Italian sun. In some senses he welcomed its fading. It felt like a clean start: a way to come at his father anew, look upon him with clear eyes as he sought the truth about the man who had sired him.
‘Signor Lorenzo has been extremely generous to me as his guest and I do not wish to sound ungracious . . .’ Jack let another pause do its work. ‘But I do not know if I should put my faith in him? I am well aware that he hopes to gain business from my father, of course. That is why he has agreed to host me. But can I trust him with my father’s company? The company I am to inherit? I have heard things that make me wonder.’
This wasn’t far from the truth. Although the Medici family were clearly honoured as princes in the city, their arms and images everywhere, Jack had sensed wariness, even hostility among some citizens; a cold mutter from a shopkeeper when asked where he was staying, a narrowing of the eyes or sudden silence from a formerly garrulous innkeeper or butcher.
Marco spat a cherry stone into one of the napkins Tommaso had left, then dabbed at his lips. He took up his goblet, swirling it contemplatively. ‘You would do well to be wary in this city, Sir James. There are many wolves here.’ He drank. ‘Some may fit your English perception better than others.’
‘Should I be concerned? I mean, about the soundness of the signore’s promises? His word?’
Laughter rose from a group of young men on the banks nearby, washing wool in the river. There was a sour tang on the air from the horse urine the fleeces had been soaked in.
Marco looked out over the green water, his eyes – a deep, almost indigo blue – narrowing as they filled with sunlight. ‘Tell me, Sir James, in your time at the palazzo, have you noticed if your host is experiencing any troubles?’
Jack’s heart skipped at this. What did Marco mean? Could he be talking about Amaury? The intercepted letter and the priest’s abduction? ‘Troubles?’
Marco’s voice remained light. ‘Any difficulties in his businesses? With his finances? Any uncertainties at all? You must know the Medici were forced to close their bank in London some years ago?’
Jack nodded, thinking of the Trinity’s expeditions, ordered by King Edward and funded by the Medici bank on Lombard Street; a loan that was never repaid.
‘And Naples? What do you know of the signore’s imprisonment there?’ Marco took another cherry when Jack shook his head. ‘Eight years ago there was an attempt on Lorenzo’s life. It was carried out by the Pazzi, an old banking family – long-time rivals of the Medici – who wrested control of the papal accounts from Lorenzo and moved to overthrow him.’ He chewed the fruit, then spat out the stone. ‘The Archbishop of Pisa was involved in the plot, as were two priests. The whole affair was sanctioned by Pope Sixtus.’
Jack thought of the scar on Lorenzo’s neck. Had the pope merely sanctioned it? Or had he orchestrated it as Amaury had implied back in Paris?
‘Lorenzo survived, but his brother, Giuliano, was killed. Lorenzo pursued the assassins – had them hauled naked through the streets and tortured mercilessly before they were hanged. Even in death their bodies were defiled. After that he hunted down virtually every male of the family line and executed them. Anyone accused of aiding the attempted escape of the Pazzi, or sheltering them and their fellow conspirators was rounded up, imprisoned or banished. All their assets were taken, their coats of arms erased from the city. When the pope discovered what had been done to the archbishop and the priests, he excommunicated Lorenzo, putting Florence under interdict. Seizing all Medici assets in Rome and the Papal States, Sixtus declared war on the republic, aided by his ally, King Ferrante of Naples.
‘The war was protracted. Trade suffered, companies – whole families – collapsed. In the end, Lorenzo gave himself up to the King of Naples. He spent months in Ferrante’s custody, an honoured prisoner. Hoping to win his freedom he showered the king with luxuries; put on lavish banquets, organised festivals and tournaments, gave alms to the city’s poor. It is not known how much he spent in his efforts to appease the king, but it was rumoured to be much of the fortune his grandfather and father amassed.
‘In the end, Ferrante made peace with Florence, but more because he did not want to fight a war on two fronts. By then, the Turks had begun massing in the south and their fleet threatened Naples.’
Jack remained silent, his father’s words coming to him in the voice of Prince Edward.
The Turks are not our true enemy. We are all fighting for the same thing. Only the world does not yet see it.
He forced the memory away as Marco continued.
‘Sixtus had to back down in the face of the menace and Lorenzo returned to Florence, hailed a hero. But what many do not know was that during his time in Naples, vast sums of money vanished from the coffers of the republic.’
‘You think Signor Lorenzo used money from the city to bribe King Ferrante?’
Marco shrugged and ate a piece of cheese, but his expression told Jack all he needed to know.
‘But even if he did, his plan worked.’ Jack gestured to the city, buzzing to life around them, people hastening about their day after Mass. ‘The war ended and Florence seems to be thriving. As does the signore. I’ve seen his wealth for myself. It is beyond the telling.’
‘Sometimes even the smallest crack can bring down a mountain.’
‘You worry he has weakened Florence?’ Jack studied Marco’s expression. No, that wasn’t it. ‘Weakened himself?’
There was a twitch in Marco’s lips – a rapid, involuntary tic. Gone in an instant. ‘Florence has suffered through many wars. For now, we enjoy peace, but how long will it last? What good are walls and watchtowers if our leader is enfeebled? We cannot allow ourselves to be vulnerable. Left open to exploitation from our enemies.’
Jack was hearing the words, but he wasn’t really listening. The lie had been exposed by Marco’s own mouth, as if it had been the thing that wanted to jump first from his lips. Lorenzo’s possible weakness didn’t worry the man. It interested him. Jack’s eyes strayed to the wolf’s head on his cloak as Marco chewed one of the figs.
Mercenary captains. Ambitious sons seeking new opportunities.
The door he’d been standing before these past weeks had cracked open. Now, he just needed to walk through it. ‘In truth, I cannot say for certain if Lorenzo is experiencing any difficulties.’ He waited before tak
ing the final step, careful not to seem too keen. ‘But I could perhaps find out?’
Marco drained his wine and tossed the napkin on the tray, before digging into his purse for coins.
God damn it! Jack searched frantically for a way to backtrack.
‘I must be about my day, Sir James. No, no . . .’ Marco said forcefully, as Jack’s hand went to his own purse. ‘If not for you that filching bastard would have these. Please, stay. Enjoy the rest of the meal.’ After dropping a generous handful of coins on the napkin, he looked down at Jack. ‘Many of my brethren have left the city for the summer, heading for their residences in the country. But when the cooler air returns, so will they. I believe they may be interested in meeting you. Until then, my advice would be to keep your own counsel in that house. Trust your instincts.’ Marco inclined his head. ‘You will hear from me, Sir James.’
11
After a brief stop at the Fig to make sure Amelot had safely escaped the scene of her crime and to tell Ned and the others he’d secured Marco’s interest – keeping the young man’s account of Lorenzo to himself – Jack returned to the palazzo.
Slipping past the ragtag beggars clustered near its entrance and the daily queue of guildsmen, officials and businessmen keen for an audience with il Magnifico, he passed the guards’ inspection and entered the shaded sanctuary of the inner courtyard. Sweat trickled down his face and his hair curled damply at his brow. He should wash before he went to Lorenzo’s chamber. Besides which, he wanted a moment in the cool solitude of his room to think.
Since Marco Valori had left him Jack’s mind had been churning. On the one hand he was keen to see Lorenzo – tell him he’d succeeded in snaring the man’s attention. On the other, he felt deeply uneasy. Amaury de la Croix had painted one picture of Lorenzo de’ Medici, but Marco’s words had added new, darker detail to the image: tortured priests and the brutal erasure of an entire family, excommunication and the theft of public money.
There are many wolves in this city.
Jack already held a seed of doubt about the man his father had served in secret, planted back in Paris when Amaury spoke of the Academy and Lorenzo’s personal vendetta with the pope – successor of St Peter, God’s instrument on earth. Now, that seed unfurled, tendrils of distrust curling through him. Did this mean all his fears about his father could be founded? That the man he had revered – had set his life and heart upon – was no more than a thief and a liar, and, worse, a heretic and sympathiser of the Turks? And, if so, were Carlo di Fante and the brute who killed his mother in their attempt to secure the map for Sixtus somehow in the right?
No, that was intolerable.
But, as he climbed the marble staircase, faintly aware of voices and the scrape of furniture coming from somewhere, one question refused to leave Jack’s mind, the ruse by which he’d captured Marco’s interest solidifying into something real and significant. Could Lorenzo de’ Medici be trusted?
Heading past the family’s dining room and the suites of Lorenzo’s sons, a wet-nurse’s chamber and a linen cupboard he’d heard Piero de’ Medici threaten to shut a tearful Giovanni in – promising his younger brother he’d end up like an insubordinate servant, locked in there and forgotten – Jack was approaching the staircase that would take him up to his room, when he smelled it. Orange blossom. At the same time, he heard two female voices, one young and anguished, the other older, soft with reassurance.
For a few days after the party he had thought of the young woman he’d seen disappearing up the stairs; the creak of footsteps beyond the doors to the Sala Grande and the bated silence that had followed his call, that sweet scent hanging in the air and the strange chanted song coming through the locked study door. But she had faded from his mind in his preoccupation with Marco. Now, as he turned the corner of the passage, he saw two figures lingering outside a door.
One was Lorenzo’s daughter, Maddalena. He’d heard the girl was soon to celebrate her fourteenth birthday, but she still looked more like a child than a woman: plump of cheek and fair, more akin to Giovanni than the dark-eyed Lucrezia or the raven-haired Piero. Her face was blotchy from crying. The other figure had her back to him, but Jack could tell it was her. The young woman was dressed in a gown of stiff navy silk. A simple padded headdress netted her hair, a few dark wisps of which floated free at the base of her neck, which was long and slender, the bones of her spine leading like pale stepping stones down beneath the line of her gown.
‘Hush now, Maddalena,’ the woman murmured, as the girl dug the heels of her hands into her eyes. ‘I promise you have nothing to fear. Lucrezia is happy. She has told you so.’
‘What if he is unkind? Or ugly. I know he is older. As old as my father! I cannot—’ Maddalena cut off abruptly as she caught sight of Jack making his way down the passage towards them.
The young woman looked round sharply, meeting his gaze. Jack nodded politely as he passed them, but both girls merely followed him with guarded eyes. As he continued, he heard a murmur and a rustle of skirts, followed by the thud of a door. When he looked back, they had vanished. He had wondered if the woman might be a governess or tutor. But she wasn’t part of the horde of domestic staff whose faces and roles he had become familiar with, and she seemed young for such a position – not many years older than Maddalena herself. He thought of that perfume, lingering in Lorenzo’s rooms. Might she be something else? Something Clarice de’ Medici did not know about? He’d heard rumours Lorenzo had a lover, out on one of the Medici estates.
Jack was approaching the stairs, lost in thought, when a man’s voice came to him, harsh on the quiet.
‘You must talk to him. Demand to know what he is hiding.’
Acerbic, brisk, the voice was instantly recognisable. Giovanni Pico della Mirandola. Jack had glimpsed the enigmatic young man only once since the night of the party, early in the morning when he was walking the halls unable to sleep: Pico slipping from the palace, hair dishevelled, eyes shot with drink or lack of sleep. Jack paused, eyes on the door to Angelo Poliziano’s room.
Another voice – distinguishable as Poliziano’s, but too low for Jack to hear what was said – responded. Glancing round, making sure no one else was in the passage, he moved closer, blinking as he entered a shaft of light that lanced through a gap between the door and the frame. He pressed his face to it and saw a sliver of room beyond: the corner of a bed, crumpled sheets, a window, the shutters open.
‘. . . and you know him well enough, Pico. Lorenzo does not bow to pressure. He will tell us in his own time. If, indeed, there is anything to tell.’
A shadow passed in front of the door, blocking Jack’s view.
‘You are his friend – his dearest friend. By Christ, Poliziano, he owes you his life! The truth is a poor cousin to that debt.’
The shadow shifted and the room came into view again. Now Jack could see Pico standing by the bed, a sinewy shadow, silhouetted in sunlight. The young man was naked.
‘The Academy hasn’t met in months,’ Pico continued, pacing. ‘Why does he avoid us?’
‘We are meeting in—’
‘Yes, yes,’ Pico retorted impatiently. ‘But why so long? And when did you last set foot in his sanctum? Months ago? It seems only Marsilio is permitted in there these days.’ Pico swiped something off a table. A goblet. ‘They have a secret I tell you.’
Were they talking about him? Jack wondered. Or were they sensing Lorenzo’s guardedness, now he feared an enemy in his household? The shadow passed again, then Poliziano appeared. He wore black hose tied at the front with blue laces, but was bare-chested. His hair trailed wet around his shoulders, threading glistening lines down his back. ‘You need to go,’ he murmured. ‘I can hear the household has woken. We have to be more careful.’
‘So I’ll use the window.’ Pico’s tone was now light, teasing. ‘Like I do when you’re sleeping.’
Poliziano wrested the goblet from his hand. ‘Besides, you’ve had enough.’
The young man tutted, but le
t him take it. ‘Save your chiding for your pupils, would you, my dear.’
‘We must keep faith, Pico. Trust him, as we always have.’
‘How can I when everything has stalled? All our plans, our hopes. This world we pledged to build together – what has become of it? New Eden remains a dream. A dream that grows more distant by the day.’ Pico reached up, tugged a strand of wet hair behind Poliziano’s ear. ‘We must set a fire under him. You and I. He cannot be allowed to forget what we have started.’
So gripped was he by their words, Jack only noticed Papi when the man called his name. He jumped back from the door, red-faced, to see the elderly servant frowning questioningly at him.
‘Sir James,’ Papi said warily, ‘the signore has been asking after you. He wishes to see you in his chambers.’
The Sala Grande was alive with activity. Servants moved between the bedchamber and the great hall, bearing baskets stacked with clothes and linens, and coffers and chests that they hauled to a pile near the doors. Porters stood waiting, sleeves rolled up ready. Household officials organised and directed.
Jack, entering with Papi, saw Lorenzo in the midst of the chaos speaking to Bertoldo, his chief steward. Seeing him, Lorenzo hooked a finger and beckoned him to approach. Jack went to him alone, glancing around at the activity. Above him, Hercules snarled across the canvases, battling one foe after another.
‘Look again, Bertoldo. It must be in there. I saw it only last month.’
The steward, a diminutive man with watery eyes and a bristling moustache, inclined his head.
‘Bertoldo.’
The man turned back. ‘Yes, signore?’
‘I will want it for the meeting.’
Watching Bertoldo hurry towards the bedchamber, Jack felt a spark of anticipation. Pico and Poliziano had mentioned a meeting. Was the Academy coming together? Here?