The Fool's Girl by Celia Rees

Lady Olivia’s beautiful palazzo had turned fortress. The windows were covered in metal sheets. The fancy bronze gates that gave on to the street had been taken down to be melted into cannon, replaced by wooden doors as thick as a tree. The captain banged with the heel of his sword and there was a lot of throwing back of bolts and removing of barricades. Eventually, the doors creaked open and in we went.
    The courtyard garden was trampled dust dotted with piles of manure. The ante-rooms, once so delicately perfumed, stank of men and horses. We were taken through to the Hall of the Horses. In Lady Olivia’s day it had been the Hall of the Muses, a place for conversation and recitals. Muses dancing with Apollo and playing on the flute and lyre had all been painted over. Replaced by great snorting warhorses, hunting scenes and prick-eared, big-bollocked mastiffs. The room was full of men going about the business of conquering, standing about in huddles talking or hunched over maps, with messengers moving to and fro and boys and women serving wine. Lord Sebastian stood at a table, leaning over a plan of the city, using a Turkish dagger as a pointer. The room went still as we came towards him, but only a lift of an eyebrow showed that he knew we were there. He was going to ignore us for as long as it suited his purpose. It left me time to taste how much I hated him, like bile in my mouth. Eventually he looked up. His eyes are darker than his sister’s and without her depth or sparkle, opaque and lustreless, like lapis. His lip curled, as if he did not like what he was seeing. He left his map and came towards us.
    He had been considered good-looking – my lady thought so anyway – but he would never get back the bloom he had when she first saw him. The weakness that had been there all along was beginning to show; his cheeks were broken-veined and florid from too many nights drinking with his men, the youthful pout was gone from his mouth and the lips were thin and the colour of half-cooked liver, compressed into a line that pulled down at one side. His dark curls were greying and arranged carefully to hide what he was lacking. That jade Francesca was standing near, simpering and fawning, offering a wine cup to him. She had taken my lady’s place in his bed. Now she stood at his side, as bold as you please, the double-dealing Venetian whore.
    Stephano spoke first, trying to soften his father’s wrath. He only made it a thousand times worse. The young are fools enough to put us poor clowns out of a job.
    ‘Father,’ he started, ‘I beg you . . .’
    He made a good start, I grant you. Son begging a father. They all like that.
    ‘I beseech you . . .’
    Beseeching? Even better.
    ‘Have mercy . . .’
    This is where it began to go wrong. Sebastian never had mercy on anyone.
    ‘. . . on the people of this city . . .’
    Sebastian’s face began to colour. As if that was likely to happen. Considering the slights against him, all the times he had been ignored.
    ‘Stop the sacking or you will have nothing left, no people to rule.’
    There was truth in that. Sebastian relaxed a bit, or at least the blood stopped beating in his temple quite so hard.
    ‘That is what I am trying to do. As you would know, if you had not run off to hide like a cowardly child.’
    The young captain who had escorted us smirked. That was unfair. Stephano was as battered, besmirched and battle weary as any there.
    ‘I did my share,’ Stephano said, but his father wasn’t listening.
    ‘Ran off to see her , I’ll warrant!’ He pointed at Violetta. ‘I know what’s been going on between you. Paddling palms in church. My own son consorting with the enemy. I should banish you as a coward and a traitor. You are no son of mine.’
    ‘Disown me if you like,’ Stephano said. ‘Banish me – I’d welcome it. I only have one thing to ask of you.’ The boy linked hands with Violetta. She smiled and nodded, encouraging him, as though they