City of God by Cecelia Holland Page A

creature?”
    â€œThe Lady Caterina Sforza.”
    She jerked her head away. The hairdresser murmured, plucking at the smooth curls of hair on the crown of the Pope’s daughter. “My brother’s prisoner,” Lucrezia Borgia said. “I have nothing to do with that.”
    â€œYour brother’s victim, Madonna.”
    â€œHer cities belonged to us. We were right to take them back from her.” Still she would not look at him. He went down on one knee before her.
    â€œForli and Imola are yours, as they have ever been the Pope’s cities. She cannot take them back. Even her children have deserted her cause—signed their patrimony over to your brother Valentino and sworn never to help her. Madonna, she has nothing left, nor beauty, nor wealth, nor even the privacy of her body. Valentino has taken everything.”
    Her blue eyes flashed; she faced him again, leaning forward. The hairdresser caught at the mass of sliding uncurling hair and Lucrezia struck over her shoulder at her.
    â€œNo—leave it! You, Messer whatever-your-name is—you insinuate that my brother violated—had her by force? That whore! How many lovers has she had?”
    â€œMadonna,” Nicholas said, “surely a woman may give, herself endlessly without consenting to a rape.
    â€œI do not believe it. Not my brother.”
    â€œMadonna, let me ask only this—that you visit her in her dungeon. See for yourself what has become of her, and remind yourself that once she was a woman much like you.”
    The princess stared at him, her cheeks patched with red and her hands clenched in her lap. The hairdresser was standing behind her, arms folded. In the mirrors Nicholas saw their backs, their profiles, all sides of them at once.
    She took her eyes away from his. The masses of her hair were spilling down over her shoulders and her breast and throat.
    â€œWell,” she said, “you are right, Messer who-ever-you-are. “Someday I may need mercy too.” She lifted her hand, palm out, a gesture much like the Pope’s in blessing. “But that changes nothing—I cannot help you. You may go.”
    â€œMadonna.” Nicholas left.
    Yet a few days later he received a summons from the Madonna Lucrezia to attend her at Castel Sant’ Angelo. Surprised, he hurried there—the message commanded him immediately —and found the Pope’s daughter already in the courtyard of the fortress.
    Her cheeks were sucked hollow, and her eyes looked damp. She wore a gown whose heavy satin skirt was picked out with tails of ermine and rows of seed pearls. Two or three handsome men in her livery attended her; she had brought no women.
    â€œMadonna,” Nicholas said, kneeling. “I dare hope that you have called on me to mediate at an interview between you and Madonna Caterina Sforza.”
    He reached for her hand, expecting to be given it to kiss, but she recoiled at his touch. She backed away from him.
    â€œI have seen her just now,” she said, her voice sibilant. “I have no will to talk to her. Men say she was beautiful! Oh, I could not face her.”
    Nicholas got up off his knees. Dust clung to the knees of his hose. He held his hat in his two hands before him.
    â€œI shall—” her voice was low. “You may tell your principals that I shall—Oh God, here is Cesare.”
    Nicholas startled. She was looking beyond him, into the courtyard by the gate, and he jerked his gaze around over his shoulder.
    Valentino was dismounting from his horse, only a dozen feet away. He strode down on Nicholas and his sister, coming fast at them; Nicholas he brushed aside, without noticing him, and his sister he caught by the wrist.
    â€œWhat are you doing here? This is no place for you.”
    Lucrezia pulled her hand back from his grasp, as she had from Nicholas’s, but Valentino would not let her go. She said, between her teeth, “I have just seen your victim