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Chapter One

CARMINE

To My Husband,

It will benefit us both if I bring us to the point.

Louise’s husband is of the impression that you acted as an arquebusier for the Papal Army at Pavia.

Do not spill the ink required to deny it. I know it is true. I expect it of the title I was compelled to marry for the sake of a dying treaty.

You are a man. So you are free to go into battle with whichever side you please and no one will say otherwise.

But all I have of my own is my mind. To kill my people from behind such a weapon is disgusting.

To slaughter from afar is the act of a coward.

Your bloodline was never strong, but I thought you at least a brave fighter. What a fool I was.

The choices of a woman are subject to the whims of society.

However, my affections are my own. They can be neither forced nor coerced.

I am not a whore. The whole of this filthy land is not enough to buy my love.

I hate it here. I hate that Laro is trapped here.

I cannot send enough warmth in your direction to light the tiniest candle.

Know then, every time you point that disgusting arquebus at a Frenchman, you are a weakling, and every one of the men you murder is my brother.

Do not show your face where your son may notice the cowardice painted on it.

~ Jacqueline

The first and last wife I took as a human man never grew a single hair on her tongue. At first, I liked how straightforward she was, but in the end, I wished her honesty had been put to better use.

My marriage sealed a treaty between the Kingdoms of France and Naples that fell apart like a clump of mud in the sun.

My country changed hands between fearful men and greedy ones.

We were a rich land traded, bartered, and surrendered, but she and I were wedded before God, so our legal bond outlasted its reason to exist. My wife gave me Laro, but once it became clear that my marriage to her was not a marriage to the Kingdom of France, her bedroom door closed.

In Pavia, in the name of the Papal States, I murdered and maimed men she considered her brothers.

I’d do it again, and my loyalty to Rome meant I was not welcome home.

“Twenty thousand men this time?” Paolina is on her belly, naked, with her fingernail drawing the numbers on the sheet.

Her fuzzy black hair is loose over her back, and her dark eyes seem to be able to calculate from the creases in the bed.

She’s mid-conversation with the whore next to her, a lovely auburn-haired Northerner named Agata.

“They came right up to the gate.”

“I have to get out of Rome.” Paolina rolls onto her back. “This is exhausting.”

“Their armor was shining in the sun, and the duke had this glorious long white cloak.”

A white cloak? I snap out of a reverie. “Charles? Of the Bourbons?”

“He’s not from here, I guess.” Paolina shrugs and rolls over. “My cunt is so sore.” She calls to the third woman in the house, “Lucia! Do you have that cream?”

“Is that his name?” Agata asks me, brown eyes as wide as the copper coins I paid her. “Charles the Third of the Bourbons?”

“Which gate?” I’m already standing.