in my outfit. “To spread the word of God?”
“Better than that.” I take my Bible and slip it between the bars of the cell.
Allegreza draws back. “I told you I have no need of prayers,” she says, almost angry.
“Look inside,” I tell her in a whisper.
Allegreza opens the thin pages. Last night I gouged out a coarse hole in their center with a knife. Inside it rests the vial my brother gave me.
The woman who saved me from a ruined life looks up into my face.
“What’s this?” Though her eyes tell me that she already understands.
“Your escape.”
A glossy sheen spreads in Allegreza’s eyes, but the tears evaporate before they’re shed.
“Thank you.” With shaking hands, she starts to prise the cork out. “Now you must leave,” she says firmly. “Let the others know—I have not spoken a word about us.”
“I will.”
I reach between the bars to retrieve my Bible. Then I wipe the tears from my cheeks, smooth down my skirts and straighten my back. As I walk down the stairs, I don’t look back.
When I step outside, the light hurts my eyes, and they water. I take in a deep lungful of the salty air coming off the sea.
“Did the prisoner find her solace?” the guard asks gruffly.
“I think so,” I say.
39
News of Allegreza’s death leaks out by breakfast the following day. Emilia and Lysander are long gone, and Father is out of sorts. Cold silence fills the air between us as we eat soft-boiled eggs and warm bread. A manservant comes in and whispers something in Father’s ear. He grunts and scrapes back his chair.
“Halim has docked in the harbor,” he announces, wiping his hands on a linen napkin. “The impudence of that man!” He throws the napkin on the floor and the servant has to bend to retrieve it, but Father is already striding around the room in agitation. He throws me an angry look, as though this is all my fault, forgetting that, not long ago, he was all too happy to throw his own daughter at the prince. “Your beloved fiancé has saved his own skin and served up Venice to the Turks.” He turns and gazes out of the window, his hands behind his back.
“Is there no other way of appeasing Halim?” I ask.
Father scoffs. “Appeasement? No, my girl. Roberto may not care about Venice, but others do. We have Massimo and we have Vincenzo. We’ll bury that Turkish upstart beneath the waves!” He grinds one fist into the other.
“Yes, but how many innocents will pay for victory with their lives?”
“Pah!” He waves a hand as if the matter is of little consequence. “You know, a resounding victory will make Vincenzo even more of a catch for a bride.”
I wipe the corners of my mouth and stand up. “I’d rather die than marry that man,” I say.
Father’s smile fades. “Do you think I took you out of that convent to live as a spinster?”
“Of course not, but I could find a husband who isn’t Vincenzo. He’s older than you are.”
“You’ve not done such a fine job husband-hunting, though, have you?”
I don’t deign to respond to this remark. I make my exit.
A boat is soon taking me to the harbor, the gondolier’s oar carving a path through the water. As we move across the lagoon, I see that the canals are busier than usual. Families are loading their possessions and heading towards the harbor too. Like my brother and his wife, people are vacating the city. I can only guess that they want to avoid the troubles that lie ahead.
Our boat passes the shuttered palace. At least with Allegreza’s death, the Doge and his wife can hide their humiliations under a cowl in grief. The sun is out, and I carry a small parasol. I loosen the ribbon on my bodice. My upper chest and shoulders are bare, and I am wearing a saffron silk gown, hair snaking down my left shoulder in a bouncing curl that has been brushed and wound around warm irons until it sits just so. If I’m going to persuade Halim to call off a war, I have to look my best.
“Who are you trying to impress?” Faustina had asked when she’d poked her head into my room earlier.
I waved her away. “No one.”
She raised her eyebrows at me. “Then ‘No One’—whoever he is—will be grateful for all your efforts, I’m sure.”
I raised the brush in my hand, and the threat was enough to send her ducking from the door, chortling.
Now