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gives the tight little smile with which they have all grown familiar. ‘You need not concern yourself with that. I have written to my son already and the letter is dispatched. With God’s grace he will receive it before the news becomes general knowledge.’
    ‘I… Even so, I should surely add some words of my own… He is my husband… I mean – things will be—’
    ‘Things will be as they will be. Your husband is as much a Borgia as he is an Orsini and he will be proud for the honour of his family. As you should be for yours. There will be wonders in this for everyone. This house will become an embassy for suitors in search of favours. We will have to ask Rodrigo for a full-time secretary to deal with the weight of petitions.’
    Now Lucrezia intervenes, laughing, taking Giulia’s hands. ‘You are not to worry, Liana. Orsino will be happy for you, I am sure.’ She holds her gaze, until she coaxes a smile out of her. ‘And we shall visit him sometimes in the country to cheer him up. But mostly we shall hold court together in the great salon. Aunt Adriana will bring in the visitors and break the seal on the letters, yes? And then you and I will read them and assess each one for its worth. And those we think are worthy we will present their suits to Papà when he comes and he will congratulate us on our judgement, as his domestic ambassadors.’
    And all three women are laughing, because the last few days their nerves have been pulled as tight as garrotting wire and the thing that they have most desired, even if also a little feared, has happened.
    ‘And we will not let Juan or Jofré into the room. For they will all have come to visit
us
, not brawling, spotty boys. Isn’t that so, aunt? Where are they? Do they know? They can’t still be asleep?’
    Oh yes they can, thinks Adriana, for after all these years she knows her charges well. Jofré will be curled up with his thumb in his mouth like the ten-year-baby he still is, while Juan too will be in bed, though most likely it will not be his own. Whoever she is this time, she will probably try to charge him more when she learns who he is now become. Or offer it for free… a set of silken handcuffs. Rome. The city of the Holy Mother Church, renowned for being home to as many courtesans as clerics. There have been moments when Adriana has wondered if God is too busy keeping the Turks at bay to notice the exuberance of sins elsewhere. Still, they must all be more careful now. She must get Rodrigo… no, Alexander – His Holiness – what must they call him now when he visits? – she must get him to talk to the children, especially Juan. Make clear the responsibilities of this new status. Sweet Jesus, how the wheel of fortune spins. While they have been sleeping it has taken all of them and flung their lives around in ways that none of them can yet imagine.

CHAPTER 3
    As the streets of Rome grow raucous with the news, inside the Vatican palace a transformation worthy of Ovid is taking place: a paunchy sixty-one-year-old is turning himself into one of the most powerful men in Christendom.
    Rodrigo Borgia has said his private prayers: a jubilant outpouring of thanks to the Virgin Mary, Mother of God, his guiding light, his constant emissary and the only woman for whom his devotion is matched by unquestioning fidelity. His cardinal’s robes are now discarded on the floor and he stands naked, barrel chest and sagging abdomen over heavy legs, towelling the sweat off his flesh. In front of him, pressed and ready, sit three sets of papal raiments: three white undergarments, three flowing white silk robes and three caps, each set a different size to accommodate whatever shape of man should now find himself deserving of them. Over the course of his career Borgia has watched four men, at least one more dead than alive, emerge from this room transformed by the power of the robes. Each time he has had an image of himself in their place, while in between his body has grown as