Free The Scarlet Contessa by Jeanne Kalogridis Page B

now, don’t spoil our fun!” His temper was rising, and he would have lashed out at his wife had Caterina not interrupted.
    “One for me then! One for me!”
    Lorenzo said cheerfully, “It seems, Your Grace, that the young lady does not wish to be kept waiting.”
    The duke sighed, yielding, and gestured for me to give his impatient daughter a card. I set it down and pushed it in Caterina’s direction. Rather than wait for the others, she reached out and turned her card over immediately. As she stared down at it, her expression soured. “But it is only the Fool! I want another!”
    Lorenzo looked to me before saying, very softly, “It can be a good card, Madonna Caterina. You might not want to dismiss it.”
    I studied it. The Fool’s eyes were fearless and innocent, his posture unguarded. He was on the verge of a long and tumultuous experience, ignorant as a child of the perils awaiting him. He might well decide to turn and head for the serene mountains behind him, in which case, he could reach the highest pinnacle—or he could just as well take a single step forward and fall into the dark, yawning chasm.
    “A long journey awaits you,” I said. Caterina leaned past Bona, the better to see and hear me. Expression avid, the girl propped an elbow on the table and rested her chin upon her hand; the long golden curls framing her face spilled forward and caught the light. “The most important journey of your life,” I continued. “Be cautious and reflective, lest you fall into danger.”
    She drew back, mollified. Aware that Lorenzo’s eyes were on me, I did not wait for his prompting, but drew one last card, for myself, and set it aside.
    Galeazzo was intrigued and once again smiling. “Let us go in ascending order now. Her card first”—he indicated me—“and then yours, Lorenzo, and Cicco’s, and last of all, mine.”
    I turned over my card, and fell into the image, scarcely hearing Bona’s soft, shocked inhalation.
    I saw a woman dressed in flowing golden robes and cape and seated upon a throne. She wore a nun’s white wimple, and upon her head, unmistakably, rested the triple crown of the papal tiara; in one hand, she held a holy book, in the other, a long staff atop which rested a large gold cross.
    She was a female pope, a papess—a scandalous image, yet I was not in the least appalled. I trusted her, with the same unreasoning certainty I trusted Lorenzo. I stared at the landscape around her, seeking clues as to where I might find her; a green, carefully tended orchard lay in the distance behind her.
    I must have stared for some time, but my reverie was interrupted by a sharp pain in my shin as Caterina kicked me beneath the table.
    “She is . . .” I began, and searched desperately for a word that would not offend Bona; papess was out of the question, as was priestess . Finally I said, “The Abbess. She holds much wise spiritual advice.”
    Lorenzo’s card was the male version of mine—a white-haired, bearded man wearing the gold papal crown, with a gold cross atop his staff. But the card had been accidentally turned upside down, and at the sight of it, I felt a thrill of fear.
    Lorenzo’s homely face grew solemn as he gazed upon it. “The pope, ill-dignified,” he said.
    I stared back at it, too, and saw a thousand fleeting things, too numerous to give voice to: an old, vengeful man weeping over a dead son, the swirl of frankincense, the glint of a blade, a spray of blood, an oddly familiar voice sighing, Lorenzo . . . My fear must have been visible, for when I looked up again, the women were wide-eyed and silent, and Galeazzo, though frowning, was chastened.
    I struggled to put all that I had seen into words. “There is vengeance here,” I said, “and sorrow, and great treachery. You must take care, or there will be blood.”
    Bona crossed herself; the duke and Lorenzo shared a troubled, knowing glance. “I know how to deal with the matter now,” Lorenzo said, his tone firmly