Chapter 13
Cal could reasonably have objected. Said that the palace would be my home soon.
Yet while he loomed, spoke, and dominated like the prince he was, he understood more than anyone what it felt like to have the earth move beneath one’s feet.
His own experiences made him comprehend what it was to look on that moment when my indomitable father had almost died and even now kept a precarious hold on his life, when the man who had first moved me to love was in danger, when menace pressed me all around.
Not that I hadn’t seen firsthand what could happen when passion and power mixed, but I thought that part of my life over as I fixated on decorating with ribbons and wedding flowers and lace for my veil.
Cal said, “Let me escort you.”
“No! Please, no, I need to think.” Awkward and badly spoken, but I trembled in reaction to what had occurred in this past hour, and to tell the truth, what I longed to say was, “I want my mommy.”
Marcellus, always critical of me, watched us as he ordered the servants to take Lysander to a bed in the soldiers’ dormitory—not a place of honor, but a place where he’d be safe. Lysander seemed to have lost all use of his limbs and dangled while they carried him away.
I was still so embarrassed by Friar Laurence’s strictures, I was almost glad to see him go. “I need to be alone for as long it takes to arrive at Casa Montague. There the uproar of the wedding preparations will be intermixed with the horror of Papà’s near death, and I simply … I need …”
“To be alone.” Cal nodded, not graciously or with grace, but he nodded nevertheless. “You’ll travel in the royal sedan chair.”
“As you wish.”
“Marcellus will lead. Your man, Tommaso, will run behind with his sword drawn. No one shall stop you until you arrive at your destination.”
“My destination. Yes.” I ached to be in the midst of my loud, obnoxious, always outspoken family, to hover over Papà and comfort Mamma and my siblings. Casa Montague offered safety and familiarity, and I’d not yet cleaved to This Man who was my betrothed. I had not yet left the house of my father.
“I’ll stay at the palace and seek answers,” This Man said.
At once I felt less trembly and more irritated. Was he trying to make me feel guilty? Because he had managed very well. “Before I go, I’ll speak to Nonna Ursula and ask what she thinks of this development.” Take that, Prince Escalus!
“I would appreciate your help in dealing with my grandmother.” After taking my hand, he towed me toward her suite.
I’d been manipulated by a master. Damn! He really believed he had me figured out. Which worried me … When had I become so transparent?
Oh. When he’d spent three years studying me, assessing me as his potential mate, wife, and princess, before determining I would do despite my faults. A win I hadn’t planned or desired, but so it goes.
“Here we are.” Cal pulled me to a stop in front of Nonna Ursula’s chambers and studied my face. “Rosie. Even these events, horrendous though they were and are, are but a drop of water in the long course of time that will carry our marriage.”
Much more than me, he had a poetic soul, and how did I dare explain I had moved on from anxiety about the potential of a poisoner in our midst to worrying about my own piddly ability to disguise my feelings from Cal? “You’re right.” Telling a man he was right was always the right response.
To be fair, telling anyone they were right was always the right response, but I was in no mood to be fair. When with Cal, I seldom am. Being overmatched and outreasoned brought out the petty in me.
I led the way into Nonna Ursula’s bedroom to find her and Lady Pulissena on their beds and snoring at a volume associated with a street brawl.
The maid woke from her nap on the chair and viciously glared at us.
Not that we’d done anything annoying; Old Maria had the disposition of a raging toothache.
I was ready to back out and go home when Nonna Ursula woke with a snort. She blinked at us and smiled the smile of the innocent. “Have you come to tell me someone was murdered?”
It was obviously a quip, a reminder of the triumph she’d scored with her séance, but the shock of recent events rocked me back on my heels, and Nonna Ursula’s smile faded. With the imperial snap of the whip, she demanded, “What’s happened?”
Lady Pulissena came awake and jested, “Now what?” When she, too, saw the gravity of the situation, her skinny face grew gaunt with worry.
Both women, fragile and aged, thrashed among the covers as they tried to sit up. At the same time, Old Maria struggled to get to her feet to help them.
Cal assisted Nonna Ursula, and I assisted Lady Pulissena, and Old Maria arrived in time to tuck pillows behind them and glare and mutter.
Cal brought a chair for me and helped me to sit, which told me exactly how unlike my usual robust self I appeared.
He didn’t have to project his voice as I did to make the ladies hear him; something about a man’s deeper tones still carried to their ears.
As he described the poisoning, how it came about, who was affected, who had died, Nonna Ursula and Lady Pulissena exchanged constant glances.
When he finished, Nonna Ursula admitted, “I may have had knowledge about the Leonardi lion and that it would be placed among the gifts.” She held up her hand to preclude Cal’s questions. “Don’t ask. I swore an oath.”
Cal didn’t like it, but he grudgingly nodded.
“Wasn’t me!” Lady Pulissena announced. For of course that was what he thought.
Nonna Ursula said, “You’ve accused me time and again of merely acting the part of a seer, and I do admit, you’re right.
When I predicted murder, I thought, Well …
it’s interesting.” Nonna fluttered her hands like a butterfly.
“It’ll divert everyone from their silly quarrels.
They’ll all be on guard against a knife in the dark.
” She looked to Lady Pulissena. “Poison … That’s so not Verona. ”
As if she’d been invited to the podium, Lady Pulissena spoke. “Poison is a respected weapon in Venice, much admired for its subtlety. Used by the Consiglio dei Dieci, the Council of Ten. There are, of course, many simple poisons from herbs, berries, stones …”
“This was a common mushroom, the Homewrecker,” I told her. “As wine came out of the barrel, the fruity notes masked the mushroom odor, but once in the goblet, the scent grew and dominated the nose.”
“Very potent. I’m surprised any survived.” Lady Pulissena ignored my shudder and continued, “More subtle are the poisons that, mixed and measured, target one part of the body or another, that have no taste or odor, that work slowly from one dose or many.”
I worked as an apprentice apothecary, so naturally I did know all that. But it was a far cry from knowing to seeing, and to have my own father stricken …
Cal placed a comforting hand on my shoulder, squeezed, then removed it, reminding me of Friar Laurence’s decree that we not touch.
“Adding poison to a cask of wine is easily done,” Cal said.
“It could even have been an accident at the time of the wine making.” I was a Montague, I knew my wines and how they were made, and a mushroom might grow on the wood of the cask and be scraped away and leave enough of itself to poison the whole.
That was doubtful, and Nonna Ursula brushed it aside. “More likely done to cast a shadow on this joyous event.”
“Or to implicate you, Nonna Ursula, in a charge of witchcraft.” Cal couldn’t resist pointing that out.
“Pooh!” Nonna Ursula dismissed that. “When I was younger, and a power to be feared, yes. Not now. There’s nothing to be gained from harming me. Pulissena? You ever have a subtle mind. What thoughts have you?”
“Sometimes those who kill do so without regard to a target and with no more reason than to see death occur. That’s the truest danger, the most unlikely person to be caught, for there’s no logic or malice, simply selfish desire.”
I hadn’t imagined such a fearful and straightforward analysis as Lady Pulissena laid out. But she wasn’t done.
“On the other hand, if there’s motivation for the murders, if someone has a goal we cannot yet discern, then we have a chance to discover it and the killer and stop her before she kills again.”
I glanced at Cal to see how he received a second opinion stating the killer could be female. His exalted opinion: “Let us assume there will be no other poisoning yet remain vigilant as a peregrine falcon watching over its young.”