Author's Note:
Having finished reading the "conclusion" to my favourite TV show (probably ever!), I find myself highly dissatisfied with it. I don't want to give too much away so you should all read it yourselves and reach your own decisions but lately I have found that no matter what I watch or read I manage to think of something good that I can put in this fiction or adapt for this fiction, but for that e-book: nothing! If it had been made into an episode or TV movie, or whatever, I would not be more impressed but less so as the actors would have portrayed it so well that I would not have been able to get it out of my head. I will say this though (spoiler alert!) that it undermines the entire last scene of the show, which I really liked, aside from the fact that it marked the end. Showtime, you are still inept and as unfair to fans of this show as Fox was to fans of "Firefly"! Rant is over now, so I hope you enjoy this chapter…
Chapter XXXVII - First Impressions
Cesare and Lucrezia strode into His Holiness' main audience room, having abandoned Micheletto, who did not wish to meet his master's lawful mistress, but preferred to go to the nursery and ensure that the three Borgia children were safe and taken care of. The Borgia siblings were steeling themselves for an awkward and uncomfortable encounter and needed no more witnesses to the interview between estranged husband and wife than was absolutely essential.
The woman walking to meet her sister-in-law for the first time recollected her words as she had watched her brother write to his wife and the feelings of resentment and envy that had accompanied them. She still felt inferior to the Duchess of Valentinois, the renowned beauty, Charlotte d'Albret, even though she was a celebrated beauty herself and the Dowager Duchess of Bisceglie, though some forgot that her title was still that of her late husband and his family not her own, so she was no longer the Duchess. She recalled Cesare telling her that she and Charlotte were similar in some respects and that the two women would probably get along with each other as long as they both kept their claws at bay. This diagnosis of the situation did not help in the slightest. She was still predisposed not to like – let alone love – her brother's bride; she would leave that to her mother.
More pressing matters than those of affections were plaguing the husband about to see his wife. He could not help but feel that in the room only paces ahead of him was the woman who was going to shred him to pieces for daring to adopt a child for her and for demanding anything of her, for both had made their expectations of the match incredibly clear at its inception. He had fulfilled his side of the bargain in a manner of speaking, for he had given her the child she craved but it was not a child born of her womb or conceived with her blood. He would face her wrath for that, or at least, he would be expected to impregnate her quickly so she could return to France with a child of her own. He suspected she would also require an explanation as to why he had named his sister's son as his heir when he was by no means incapable of siring children and his wife was not barren. It worried him that he had not yet managed to devise an excuse for that particular deed.
"She has arrived early…" he murmured hesitantly as they both stood before the immense oak doors that separated them from the unexpectedly early guest.
Lucrezia grasped his hand, "Steel yourself, my love, you would have had to face her sooner or later and better that it be when she is inclined to feel some pity for you."
He chuckled at how his sister had a knack for hitting the nail directly on the head and with a final groan he pushed against the hard wood and entered the papal audience chamber where his wife awaited him.
"My lord husband," Charlotte greeted him with false warmth, ignoring her sister-in-law completely, "what a pleasure it is to see you again…in Rome!"
Her husband grimaced, "Charlotte dear, it is lovely to have you by my side once more, though I am sorry you had to make such an arduous journey with such short notice. I do wish I could have introduced you to my family under better circumstances. Yet it appears that if I waited much longer I might not have as many relatives to introduce you to…"
Lucrezia smiled, impressed with her brother's suave manner of making it impossible for his wife to blame him or scold him for carting her from France to Rome. She knew that he was a talented wordsmith and he most certainly had a way with the ladies. It was that aspect of him that had made his wife believe he would make an ideal mate for her, it had made her think that their forbidden and sacrilegious love would withstand everything the world had to throw at it.
Charlotte laughed sweetly at her husband as she glided towards him with all the grace she had learnt in the bosom of the French court, "Cesare Borgia, you will not sweet talk me into forgiving you for this, but I will leave that conversation for later tonight. Right now, I wish to meet my new daughter…Oriana, is it?"
He nodded, oddly pleased that she was so keen to see the light of his life and had actually correctly remembered her name. All he managed to do was extend his hand and offer his arm to his wife to escort her up to the nursery that the three Borgia babies shared. The Duke and Duchess walked right past Lucrezia without a word to her, but the Duke did give her hand a fleeting squeeze as he left the room.
When the couple reached the nursery, Charlotte instantly released her husband's arm and plunged forwards toward the infants lying in their cribs. She noticed Giovanni playing with a wooden horse that was carved for him by Micheletto on the floor, but already knew he was the eldest illegitimate child of Lucrezia Borgia. The only girl in the room was sleeping in a cot opposite her adopted brother, her thumb planted sweetly in her small mouth. It was unseemly how she had managed not only to wrap her adopted father around her little finger, but now her adopted mother as well.
Charlotte hoisted the precious bundle up into her arms and waltzed around the room singing an old French tune quietly to ensure that the small baby remained happily slumbering against her breast. She smiled in contentment at her husband, all anger and disappointment forgotten. All she desired from this life was a child to call her own, hopefully more than one if she could coax her reluctant husband into bed more than once and when she had read the concise note that informed her that she was a mother and that she was expected to be in Rome for her brother-in-law's funeral, she had seen red. Now, holding the sweet, little baby that she could see as her daughter, her mind had entirely changed. She utterly forgave her spouse for imposing this charge on her, but she still expected some of her terms to be met before she returned to Avignon.
"She is beautiful, non, Cesare?" Charlotte asked, "Quite the petite mademoiselle."
He nodded in response, walking over to them and softly caressing Oriana's smooth cheek, "She is, indeed. She also seems very happy to meet you."
"She knows her maman, n'est pas, ma petite? I love her already, Cesare."
Those words made Cesare do a double take as he really did not expect his wife to bond with his daughter so quickly, but before he could ask her opinion on the little girl and how she should be raised, Lucrezia arrived on the scene with the Pope on her heels.
"Ah, hello, Oriana," Lucrezia said happily, gesturing to be handed the child, who had begun to wake, making her rival incredibly aware that she was the second maternal figure to the baby, "how are you today, my love? Have you met somebody new? Yes, yes, you did, my lovely."
While the others in the room watched as Lucrezia cooed at her adopted daughter, Rodrigo greeted his daughter-in-law and welcomed her to the Vatican and was very cordial to her, with the exception of his rather inappropriate jest concerning the need for her to produce a trueborn heir for her husband, which prompted said husband to pinch her elbow in support of her.
"Father, my wife must be tired after such a long trip," he announced, "and I want to introduce her to the family properly at supper. I have already sent a messenger to mother informing her of Charlotte's arrival, so we are all to dine together at her house. The children will be with us, so we will be travelling with a full retinue. There is much preparation to be done, so if you could have Charlotte shown to the chambers alongside my own. I would like to sit with Oriana for a while seeing as she is awake now."
"Very well, very well, spend time with your bast-," his father said, "adopted child instead of accompanying your wife to her chambers to conceive a legitimate heir to our dynasty."
The rage that ploughed over Cesare and Lucrezia's faces at their father's words could have slain their brothers and Caterina Sforza and Vitelli all over again. Daggers tipped with poison were flying out of their eyes towards their father's heart and all Charlotte could do was spectate as the Borgia family fought amongst themselves, a family she had married into.
"Leave, father, please leave now," Lucrezia counselled, "leave before you embarrass us further in front of my dear sister-in-law."
The Pope flew out of the nursery, taking Charlotte with him, leaving the lovers with their children, both appalled by his behaviour. Lucrezia still had Oriana safely in her embrace and Cesare whose arms were feeling bereft, bent down to where Giovanni was sitting placid as ever just happily playing, oblivious to the tension in the room, and pulled him into his lap to let him play with the laces on his doublet (one of his favourite pastimes).
"I see what you meant."
Cesare looked up at his sister swaying above him, "What are you talking about?"
"When you spoke of the similarities between your wife and me, Cesare, I understand what you were referring to."
He chuckled slightly, "Found a friend in someone of whom you were so vehemently jealous, sis? How quaint…but I expected such a turn of events. It is funny that if you were not my sister and the one, true love of my life and she was not my wife, the two of you might have been close in another life, I suppose."
"Alas, brother," his sister and lover replied with a coy smile, "I am who I am and she is who she is and there is nothing you, I or God can do about that. All I know is that I would love you no matter who I was and I believe, Cesare, that you would still love me if you were not the Duke of Valentinois or the Gonfaloniere or a former cardinal. For us, titles and our name are of little import. The only things they affect are the clothes we wear and the number of people we can kill to achieve what power our father craves, what power you crave, my love. If we were poor, country peasants, the only thing you would control at the most is how our sons would harvest our crops and the only husbands I would be able to be rid of would be farmers and blacksmiths and carpenters, not Princes and Dukes and Counts, but our cards have been dealt and we have to live as Borgias."
Cesare Borgia stared into the beautiful orbs of Lucrezia Borgia with teary eyes, completely blown away by her profound words to him. He was ever staggered by her ability to show wisdom in times of distress or hardship. After he picked up Giovanni, he looked down into her stunning eyes and kissed her striking lips, "You are the life of me, Lucrezia Borgia and you are right. I would love you even if you were a commoner dressed in rags and I was the highest prince in the land, I would still seek you out and fall in love with you the instant I laid eyes on your beautiful, gorgeous face."