Now Cain said to his brother Abel, "Let's go out to the field." And while they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him.

Then the LORD said to Cain, "Where is your brother Abel?"

"I don't know," he replied. "Am I my brother's keeper?"

The LORD said, "What have you done? Listen! Your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground. Now you are under a curse and driven from the ground, which opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. When you work the ground, it will no longer yield its crops for you. You will be a restless wanderer on the earth."

Genesis 4: 1-16

There is a destiny that makes us brothers: None goes his way alone: All that we send into the lives of others comes back onto our own.

Edwin Markham

Prologue

Italy, 1477

Rome, the first city of my region has its roots soaked in blood. The origins of the very nation had been birthed by bloodshed. But, it is not why I am hesitant to return. I believe that the Romans are good people. I am from Tuscany, a different city and I am still a good person. Though, I was not raised in this region.

Where do my roots influence me? Did I carry with me the strong emotion they tend to feel? Did I grow with an innate love of wine and music? No, I cannot say that I am really Tuscan. I am more of a Franc. My grandmother is a member of the French court and decided that I should be the one to be saved from my middle class family.

My three older brothers were lost to this place a long time ago.

Like Rome, I was also born into carnage. My mother died while giving birth to me and the city state we were living in at the time was at war with another. My infant self did not know peace until I escaped Italy and was taken to France.

France... how does one begin to explain France? The French are an interesting and peculiar people. They have a great love of the arts and alcohol, but they also value knowledge. My years in the French court were slightly disastrous, but if there was one thing I learned whilst I was there it was a love of knowledge.

Homer, Plato, Sophocles, literature, music, science and philosophy.

I am living in a period of change. Suddenly it is acceptable for people to challenge and create. Society encourages learning and understanding. Ignorance is becoming a more and more distant disease. And of course, Italy is home to the man leading this movement; DaVinci.

Renaissance... rebirth.

Humankind is being reborn and made a knew. I suddenly have hope again.

"Sonia, you seem deep in thought," my brother, Graziano, quips.

"Am I not permitted to think?" I spit back, tired and moody from the long trip in coach.

Graziano is the second-oldest. He studied the law in Rome and practiced much in Venice. He was commissioned by father to deliver me unto Tuscany, where the family estate resides. He shares the same dark skin and eyes of my father. All of my brothers do. I am the only one in my family that has some semblance to my mother.

I will not blend into Italian culture. Not with my blond hair and blue eyes. I will be a peacock among blue jays.

No, Dante and Vincenzo were meant to be Italian. Without brown eyes I cannot hope to ever call myself one.

"Look sister." Graziano pointed out the window so I could get a clear view of the city appearing ever so slowly before us. "It is Tuscany."