Lucrezia

by Denise Robins

Genres: Historical Fiction; Romance; Historical Romance

Synopsis

The wickedest woman who ever loved. Sensual... corrupt... that was the court of Renaissance Italy. And that, too, was Lucrezia Borgia - a woman of infinite guile and indiscriminate passion, whose affairs led her from page boy to prince... and to a reputation called shocking even in a land not easily shocked. Yet no matter how often she strayed, Lucrezia remained faithful - in her special fashion - to the one man she had sworn would be hers. A gripping historical romance from the 100-million-copy bestselling Queen of Romance, first published in 1953, and available now for the first time in eBook.

Release date: July 24, 2014

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton

Print pages: 240

Sample

The heat in Rome on that August day in the year fourteen hundred and ninety-one was oppressive; made worse for Vanozza dei Cattanei by the fact that she was large with child. Half-naked, she lay fanning herself with a huge ostrich feather on the purple velvet and gilded bed in the exotically furnished bedroom of her villa. It was one of the most sumptuous villas in the Piazza Pizzo di Merlo – Cardinal Rodrigo Borgia, her lover, and the father of her children had given it to her after her daughter Lucrezia was born. He was never faithful to her but she had always been and still was the favourite of his mistresses. In another year’s time, he hoped to be elected Pope in the place of Innocent VIII. He was even now surrounded by fawning satellites and followers who were cunning enough to know that the Cardinal was heading for this supreme position.

To Vanozza life was nothing without the hot, passionate embrace of Rodrigo who was notably satisfying to the most demanding woman. The infant kicked and tormented her. She longed to be thin and supple again. She had not really wanted more children. She had enough. Cesare, eldest of four, was fifteen and destined for a splendid future. Her clever, handsome son – who even at such a tender age was a brilliant statesman. At his age during the fifteenth century a boy was already a man. Then there was Lucrezia, her beautiful daughter. Giovanni, who liked soldiering and Gioffredo, still a mere child.

Vanozza stirred fretfully as the flies plagued her, screamed loudly for Maria Uccini, her old nurse, to bring her orange-water and bathe her. She flung off the only garment she wore; a diaphanous wrap through which her olive-tinted swollen body gleamed with pearls of sweat. Maria hastened in with tall gold-topped flasks. A younger maid followed, bearing a porphyry bowl and soft towels.

The nurse’s back was scarred from a whipping she had received only a week ago because she had broken her mistress’s new hand-painted mirror. But she continued to kiss the hand that dealt her such cruel blows. A whipping was nothing. There were worse things to be feared. One heard strange cries at night in the cold white corridors of this bejewelled villa, refractory servants disappeared in the night. Poisons were tested out on animals. Maria had, herself, seen the Lord Cesare test the poisons – and antidotes – on one of his own spaniels; he had watched it writhe in mortal agony before its limbs stiffened in death.

The Lady Vanozza was a curious mixture of cruelty and kindness. Old Maria feared that Lucrezia, now only eleven, was going to follow in her mother’s footsteps. This very morning Maria found the young girl tormenting her page-boy. And Lucrezia was going to be even more lovely and fascinating than Vanozza. But she had little of the cunning and ice-cold ruthlessness that made the Borgias so infamous. She was idly enamoured of Mario, the pretty Venetian boy who had been bought for her a year ago. She knew that he was on fire with passion for her, but that to touch her would mean death – instant death for him. Yes – her brothers might kill him. He was only a bought slave who must not aspire to the kisses of his exalted employer.

Vanozza put on first one necklace, then another, trying effects until she grew bored and with a thrust of tiny slippered feet sent the old nurse sprawling in a sudden manner that ricked her back.

‘Where is the Lady Lucrezia?’ demanded the mother suddenly.

‘Sleeping, madonna. She has given orders not to be disturbed because she needs rest before tonight’s entertainment.’

‘Why must I be on the verge of giving birth just when the Cardinal announces the betrothal of his daughter to Don Cherubin,’ complained Vanozza and tore viciously at a piece of silk which became entangled in her diamond ear-drops.

She had besought Rodrigo last night to wait until this child was born before he gave the festa in his own palace for his favourite and most beautiful daughter. But although Rodrigo had sympathised with her condition and smiled benignly, he had not changed his plans. No Borgia ever changed his mind, reflected Vanozza fretfully. He considered his daughter’s alliance with Spain a useful move in the game of political intrigue which he had played for many years so successfully in Rome.

At the age of eleven or twelve, a Roman girl was ripe for marriage. Rodrigo had received many requests for Lucrezia’s hand. Her accomplishments were numerous. She had been well brought up – she played and sang exquisitely and spoke three or four languages. Leonardo da Vinci, himself, tutored her in the art of painting. She was a skilled dancer.

The mother was proud of her, and envious of her youth. Vanozza was nearly forty. In a Roman matron – that was old age. She was terrified, too, of losing the Rodrigo favours. But she still charmed the man who came to her sated with work, weary of intrigue, sick of the heavy gravity of the papal court.

‘My peerless Vanozza, my sweet song-bird,’ he called her. ‘Mother of my treasures.’ And he was never happier than when he saw her lying here on her couch with her children gathered around her. He had commissioned Michelangelo, the young rising sculptor, to model the family group, white, naked, beautiful, their arms entwined, their shining, scented, curled heads, close to each other.

Vanozza felt an unusually strong wish to see her daughter. With maternal solicitude, however, she decided not to disturb the young girl’s rest.

But Lucrezia was not sleeping as Maria imagined.

She was sitting in a carved high-backed chair whilst her favourite Sicilian maid massaged the slim ankles and tiny feet which rested on a sapphire blue velvet cushion. Lucrezia was clothed only in her hair which fell long past her waist and shone like spun gold. She had large deeply blue eyes with immensely long lashes and cultivated a languishing expression behind which there lay all the sharpness and wit of the Borgias. She had her father’s long thin nose; her mother’s full pouting mouth.

Her brother had just sent a message that he wished to speak to her urgently. Lucrezia dismissed the masseuse and threw a coral silk robe over her rounded, perfectly formed body.

Outside the double carved doors of his sister’s private apartments, Cesare stood impatiently waiting for an audience with his young sister. He was not tall but slender and well formed. His dark good looks were spoiled by the rapaciousness and cruelty written on every feature and the fierce pride in his dark almond-shaped eyes. He was magnificently attired in black satin embroidered with gold thread. He had just come here from the arms of his latest mistress, Maddeleana, Duchess of Farneso.

The young masseuse emerged from Lucrezia’s rooms. Cesare opened his half-shut eyes. He was bored by the heat and by having to wait. He saw the slender girl approaching. She had magnificent red hair which she braided around her small head. He knew her; she had been under his sister’s patronage for some months and was a delicate girl and an orphan. He did not pity her. He found a sensual attraction in her extreme slenderness and delicacy and the way in which her fingers moved so skilfully over his sister’s exquisite skin. He caught and held them now.

For a moment he did not speak but just watched. He felt the fingers flutter in his which were hard as steel. Cesare Borgia was one of the finest swordsmen in Italy and had thin flexible wrists as supple as the blade he wielded. He watched the colour flame into the girl’s pale melancholy young face.

He murmured her name:

‘Leonara!’

A look of terror immediately contorted her delicate features. She knew the character of her young mistress’s infamous brother. Most people in Italy were aware of the dark, and often bloody deeds performed by the heir to the house of Borgia. The youthful Cesare who had only a down for beard on his chin was already old in knowledge and wickedness.

Leonara began to tremble like a bird that has been snared. She tried to draw away from those remorseless imprisoning fingers.

‘My lord!’ she panted.

A little laugh bubbled in his throat. Nobody who knew Cesare Borgia cared for that laugh. He was amused because Leonara was shrinking and virginal.

‘Bambina! Baby,’ he mocked her. ‘My head pains me. Your little hand shall smooth the pain away. Come to my rooms – shall we say, in an hour’s time.’

The young Sicilian girl stood transfixed, the sweat breaking out on her body. Oh, Madonna mia! she thought, were the saints and angels against her that she should have met the Lord Cesare like this and found him in such a mood? She was cornered – trapped. Her mistress might temporarily protect her, yet if Leonara told her – she might also die. Lucrezia could be kind but Cesare, when thwarted, was without mercy.

He laughed again, caught hold of Leonara and threaded his fingers through the red fire of her hair, loosening the braids until they tumbled over her young pointed breasts.

‘Till later,’ he said smoothly and then let her go.

Leonara pressed two shaking hands to her lips and fled down the wide marble corridor. She was betrothed to her childhood sweetheart, Paolo. The Lady Lucrezia had promised that after her marriage, Leonara should be freed from bondage and allowed to join Paolo in the golden Sicilian vineyard where he worked.

But after tonight – oh, heaven protect her – Paolo would have none of her. She would not be able to hold her head up again for shame.

Perhaps the Lord Cesare would forget. Perhaps he would become engrossed with affairs of state, or tonight’s banquet. With a bursting heart, the girl made her way to the chapel, flung herself face downwards before the altar, and started to pray frenziedly that she might be spared.

In his sister’s luxurious bedroom, Cesare stood at the foot of her couch and talked to her. He had already half forgotten Leonara. He was forever scheming – dabbling in the intrigues which were the breath of life to him. In his suave way he complimented his young sister on her beauty.

‘You do not seem to wilt in the summer heat – you bloom in it, cara mia,’ he murmured. ‘None other can hold a candle to you. It is delightfully fresh in here –’ he gazed dreamily around the big room at the end of which a fountain of scented water played into a gold basin which had carved cupids on it. Lucrezia’s bed on the raised dais was half concealed by gauze curtains. The ceiling was handsomely painted. The floor of pure mosaic. A magnificent white fur rug was spread beside the canopied bed.

‘You want something of me – why else have you come?’ Lucrezia asked her brother cynically.

She did not love him. Nobody but Vanozza whose son he was, had any warm affection for Cesare, although many were forced to admire him. Lucrezia had her moments of cruelty but she disapproved of Cesare’s sadism, his unruly profligate life. And she was not afraid of him. She was not afraid of anybody. He said:

‘This betrothal of yours which takes place tonight – has it your personal approval?’

Lucrezia looked into her hand mirror and examined her white glistening teeth.

‘I obey the instructions of our father, Cesare.’

Cesare’s thin fingers drummed on the silver-chased handle of the little dagger which he carried in his belt.

‘H’m … you have not yet seen Don Cherubin, have you?’

‘Only from a distance when he rode into the courtyard on that day when I had fever and could not go down to meet him.’

‘He is excessively dull and plain,’ said Cesare thoughtfully, ‘and I hear that he is a poor gallant, and would have preferred the religious life.’

The girl’s magnificent blue eyes narrowed, but she did not look at her brother. She was wondering how much of what he said was true and how much he exaggerated for his own purposes. Her heart sank a little. She had heard from other sources, too, that her future husband was no gallant and she found most of the noblemen of the Spanish court gloomy – over-formal. With all her beauty and wit and grace, she had no wish to find herself in the bed of a man who preferred the odour of incense to the perfume of her hair. She said:

‘Have you other plans in view for me, dear brother?’ Cesare showed his teeth, which was an apology for a smile. It was more like a snarl. His young sister never failed to amuse him. She and Maddeleana, Duchess of Farneso, were the only two women he knew who were not afraid of him, so he respected them. He decided to be frank with Lucrezia.

‘Our father has made a mistake – rare for him – in arranging this marriage. He has always been anxious for an alliance with one of the noble families of Spain. But Don Cherubin would have been better sent to a monastery than to Lucrezia Borgia’s bed?’

Lucrezia was immensely interested in what her brother had to say, but she maintained a casual attitude. She would not let Cesare guess how furious and frustrated she felt at the idea of taking such a man as Don Cherubin for her affianced husband. And then she remembered Mario, the beautiful page whom she had tempted almost beyond endurance. Why couldn’t Mario have been a Spanish grandee – entitled to pay court to her? Why was it not he who was to slide the betrothal ring on her finger tonight. Mario did not prefer his prayers to her. And suddenly she laughed and a little shiver of delight went through her, remembering his grace – his desire for her.

‘The betrothal will take place but you will not marry Don Cherubin,’ said Cesare abruptly. ‘Before another year is out I shall persuade our father – and I do not think he will take much persuading – that a more brilliant alliance awaits you.’

‘With whom?’

‘With Giovanni Sforza, for instance.’

Lucrezia started. The Lord of Pesaro! He was already married to the younger sister of the Duchess of Urbina. The Sforzas were a famous Italian family. Theirs was a history of extreme violence, and tragedy, but Catarina Sforza, Countess of Forli, was now a friend of the Pope’s and had, with the assistance of Lodovica the Moor, established a very important position in the country. It might, indeed, be of interest to Cardinal Borgia to marry his daughter to one of the young Sforzas. To the Lord of Pesaro in particular. He was married, yes, but Lucrezia knew perfectly well that in these days there were a dozen facile methods of getting rid of an unwanted wife. But he was a fop – a noted dandy – a fawner upon princes. Lucrezia despised his type. She wanted a more virile, masterful husband.

Cesare explained to her that when he had recently mentioned Sforza’s name to their father, the latter had disagreed with him. It was not part of his policy he said, to interfere with Sforza’s present marriage. But in time – Cesare showed his pointed teeth – the change would undoubtedly be effected.

Lucrezia shrugged her matchless shoulders and returned to the examination of her lovely mirrored face.

‘One day – perhaps,’ she murmured, ‘but I do not fancy Sforza. Mind you, I consider him handsome but too effeminate. He actually giggles like a girl.’

Cesare smiled, took one of his sister’s small hands and kissed it lightly.

‘But the marriage would be better for you, mia cara, than this one with Don Cherubin. We will work together,’ he said, and bade her farewell until the evening’s festivities.

Brooding, brow furrowed in thought, he walked down the long cool corridor towards his own rooms. He had every intention of promoting and furthering this idea of an alliance between his sister and the Sforza family. And he intended to make sure that his father came round to the same way of thinking.

Then suddenly he remembered Leonara; how exciting it had been to watch the terror contract that lovely virginal face – and feel those little fingers trembling in his grasp.

He clapped his hands for his personal servant, Marco. The man was sallow-faced and crafty who wore a black beard and whose wet lips twitched perpetually. He was devoted in his fashion to Cesare.

‘After my bath I wish to be alone and quiet,’ said Cesare. ‘And I want you to search for Leonara, masseuse to the Lady Lucrezia. Bring her to me in an hour’s time and see that we are not disturbed.’

The man murmured an assent and bowed. Whistling a little under his breath, Cesare passed into his rooms. The double doors closed softly behind him.

The young Lucrezia gave a last look at herself in her mirror before leaving her bedroom for the great banqueting hall where her father and her future husband and the cream of Roman society waited for her.

The gleaming wax candles in their gilt sconces all around the frescoed walls, turned her into a fabulous glittering figure. Her dress was of white satin cut so low in the front as to show most of her glorious young bosom. Her golden hair, braided with seed pearls, hung in two braids to her knees and they had pinned a jewelled net cap upon her small head. It flashed like a prism whenever she moved. A jewel-encrusted belt confined her tiny waist. The closely fitting sleeves were of cream brocade slashed with gold and the hem of the skirt was encrusted with gold thread.

She was very pale. Now that the moment had come when she was to face Don Cherubin, she was reluctant to proceed with what she knew to be a farce, having had that short but revealing conversation with her brother. She was angry with her father for insisting upon this affair and with her mother because she was about to give birth to another child so was not in the condition to beguile Rodrigo Borgia into changing his mind about this betrothal.

Lucrezia felt suddenly bowed down by the weight of jewellery she wore and the oppressive heat of the night. All the windows were thrown open to the star-studded beauty of this summer evening but there was a terrible humidity in Rome and Lucrezia’s young body steamed inside its casing of ivory-satin.

The chattering and giggling of her servants suddenly annoyed her. And she saw Mario in a corner of the room. He was going to carry her train during the procession before the banquet commenced. She knew that he would be tortured by the whole proceedings and that he wished that lightning would strike Don Cherubin dead before his lady could enter the chapel at the Spaniard’s side.

All Lucrezia’s pleasure and excitement in this event which was to mark a definite end to her life as a carefree maiden evaporated. She felt fretful and lonely – even defenceless – a rare sensation for a Borgia. Suddenly she told herself that she was in love with Mario, who, alone, loved her not because she was Lucrezia Borgia but because she was his idol – to be worshipped more than the saints.

She looked towards him, he looked back at her with a terrible hunger in his liquid brown eyes. She felt a thrill of ecstasy at the sight of his slender graceful body in the velvet doublet and silken hose which he was wearing for his State occasion; his feathered cap striped in the white and gold dei Cattanei colours was tucked under his arm. How thin he had grown lately – he was positively sick with love for her, she knew. It was rumoured among her servants that he had not eaten for three days. Perhaps he was going to die of love for her – that would be thrilling. But it would be more practical for her point of view if he died after he had tasted the nectar of her lips.

Her beautiful blue eyes grew passionate and dreamy. Vanozza, her mother, was safely incarcerated in her own wing – and Maria, that old spy who told tales, was with her. The birth of the new infant was imminent. Lucrezia thought rapidly of what could and could not be done with any degree of safety in this great licentious household where nobody was really safe.

After the vespers with Don Cherubin at her side there would be the banquet – long and wearisome. It would last until the small hours. The Spaniard would expect, little doubt, some dalliance with his future bride, although there would be no honeymoon until the full wedding ceremony which would take place at a later date. But if he was really the monkish reluctant creature Cesare had painted him, Don Cherubin would not want to prolong his love-play with her. She would be able to slip away before dawn. They would all be full of wine by then and ready for sleep.

Lucrezia bit her coral lips with her little sharp white teeth. She clapped her hands and dismissed her retinue – with the exception of Mario. He, alone, stayed in the perfumed bower in which the daughter of the house had just been ceremoniously attired.

He came and bent one knee before her, his curly black head sinking in a dejected way. She felt sorry for him and for herself. Suddenly she laid a little hand on his glossy curls and toyed with them.

‘Oh, Mario,’ she said, ‘I’m not going to have any fun tonight. Are you?’

He raised those beautiful tortured eyes which never failed to excite her because she knew that she was responsible for the agony in them. It gave her such a sensation of power.

‘Fun,’ he repeated. ‘Oh, my dear lady, permit me to die. To die before I watch you place your little lovely hand in his.’

Lucrezia’s heart swelled.

‘Don’t be silly, Mario. Would it not be better for me to bid you live awhile and learn what heaven on earth can be like before you seek that other heaven of which we know so little.’

He caught his breath and snatching the hand that played with his hair, covered it with hot kisses.

‘Ah, bellisimo, madonna mia, you delight in tormenting me. You know that if I seek and find . . .