Free Futile Flame by Sam Stone

respectability that I had never thought I would achieve, as the scandal from my first marriage had always seemed to follow me. This of course was aided by Caesare’s presence and his drunken rants about the lust he had for me to seemingly close friends. So the rumours about us never fully died. People remembered our escapades, my shocking urge to dress as a boy, and stories and gossip were exaggerated way beyond the truth. It was even attributed to me that I once shot at servants with bow and arrow from a window of the palazzo. Of course this was all nonsense. The wild life I’d led had died the day I gave birth to my brother’s child.
    The collapse of the house of Borgia began the day our father was buried. Scandal once again returned to my household. Caesare no longer had someone holding him back (although I never knew how Father had managed it). One week after Father’s death, my brother’s real reign of terror began.
    Caesare turned up at my palazzo and took my husband out riding one day. Alfonso never entered my bedchamber again. He changed his suite of rooms. Caesare moved into our household and into Alfonso’s bedroom, which linked to mine, the next evening.
    In a state of confusion I watched the servants bring in his possessions and unpack.
    ‘Why are you here?’ I asked Caesare.
    ‘Why, sister. Your dear husband has offered me a home for the time being. He did not want me out on the streets after Father’s death.’
    ‘I want you to leave.’
    Cold, dark green eyes studied me. ‘How uncharitable of you.’
    Caesare turned to the servants as they removed his expensive clothing from trunks and hung them in the wardrobes my husband’s clothing had once occupied.
    ‘Leave us.’
    The servants scurried away. They recognised the violence in him, even more than I did at that time.
    ‘Luci, I thought you’d be pleased to have a real man return to your bed.’
    ‘Is that what you think? That I would let you near me again, Caesare? I hate you and all you stand for. You have debauched your life, escalating the scandal of our family. I have a respectable life with Alfonso and I won’t give that up. So, I’m asking you once more to leave here. I won’t do as you wish and my door will remain locked to you.’
    His eyes were molten rage as he grabbed me, dragging me by the hair across the room. He flung me down in the centre, hit and punched me. Blood burst from my lips, splattering the lampshade by the four-poster bed. I screamed and he fell on me, his blows matched by kisses as he ripped at my bodice. I fought free, raking my nails down his arm. He hit me once more with the back of his hand, sending me crashing back against the bedpost.
    My head smashed into the frame and I slipped stunned to the floor.
    His hands grabbed viciously at my breasts bruising my flesh. There was none of the old tenderness between us. Those days were gone. My brother was not the same. The things we had endured had changed him irrevocably. He held me down, making no attempt to stifle my screams. He knew that no help would come from my husband or the servants. All the gossip I’d heard about his treatment of women was confirmed that night as he ripped my clothing from me and brutally raped me, forcing unwanted kisses on my bleeding lips. My strength gave out and I lay in a stupor.
    ‘You will never refuse me again,’ he told me. ‘I am the power now in this household, and your children will suffer unless you please me.’
    Despite my screams and cries at his door, Alfonso refused to see me and my attempts to gain his help only resulted in further and more violent beatings. I knew that Alfonso was afraid too, though I did not know why or what had occurred between him and Caesare on that ride. This fear was so elevated that I knew Caesare would make good any threats he had made. Though I screamed and called for help night after night, no one came to my rescue.
    Caesare dismissed the nursery staff and brought in his own loyal