This is going to be a short chapter, but it is wrapping up the Medici plot (sort of) involving Florence. I also wanted to close off Giuliano's arc and how it has affected Contessina. We will also be introduced to another antagonist in this chapter who was also introduced in the game, but we never saw his face. All you history buffs out there will know who he is.
I would like to thank AFan for their lovely review! I would send cookies, but I will likely eat them before getting around to it. Hehe.
I hope everyone is still happy and healthy!
There was a silence in the basilica of San Lorenzo as members of noble families came to see the last of Giuliano de'Medici. Contessina stood beside Ezio in silence as she watched family after family enter the great hall. She knew they had all come out of respect for Lorenzo more so than his brother, but also that some of the families owed money to the Medici bank. They had no choice but to come and pay respects. Lorenzo stood off to the side next to Clarice and his children while Ginevra stood close to Cammillia. To Contessina's right stood Fioretta with her hand on her swollen belly and tears falling down her cheeks. The blond felt nothing but sympathy for the woman who loved her cousin.
Contessina reached out and grabbed Fioretta's hand in comfort and the woman gladly took the support given from her friend. The blond woman felt her heart breaking for the child that Giuliano would never meet, which began to make her eyes water as she looked on her cousin's body in the center of the cathedral. She could not understand how Giuliano of all people had been snuffed out because of someone's ambitions. Giuliano had been so full of life and vigor that he was the opposite of his brother. When Contessina first looked upon his body, she half expected him to open his eyes and scare her, but it never happened.
Now they were going to put him in the ground next to his father, Piero de'Medici, and their grandfather. He did not belong in the ground or in a marble tomb. He belonged to life itself and the freedoms that came with it. That was what broke her heart the most. Sure, the memories of the Medici were bound to be controversial in the future, but Giuliano was not part of that corruption. He would never be. Contessina's memories of her cousin would be pure and she hoped someone else had the pleasure of knowing him as such.
When all the families left the Medici to mourn their own, Contessina stayed back as Fioretta cried over Giuliano's corpse. Ezio had given the family space by going into the courtyard alone, but he promised her that he was close if she needed him. Clarice had to pull Fioretta away as her cries became hysterical in nature and all the blond could do was watch from where she stood. She had begun to turn her wedding ring in anxiety as the moment approached for her to say goodbye to Giuliano. She was not ready to do so just yet, but she did not have a choice when Lorenzo held out his hand to her.
"Come, it is time." He told her as she looked up at him through her watery eyes and then took his hand as he escorted her to the altar where Giuliano slept for eternity. There she looked upon the peaceful face of her cousin once more as Lorenzo stood behind her in silence. She reached into the pocket of her dress and pulled out the book of poems she had always read and put it into his hands.
"Don't lose this, Giuliano. One day, I will want it back." She said with a shaky voice as tears began to fall from her eyes. "Requiescat in Pace, dearest cousin." Contessina said before kissing Giuliano's cold forehead.
"What are you doing here?" Lorenzo's voice said as the sound of several footsteps entered the basilica. Contessina looked up to see a man she had never met before entering with several guards behind him. He was tall, dark of hair with the eyes of a power-hungry wolf and he gave off an aura of someone in search of a conflict. "You have no business here."
"Giuliano is not even in the ground yet and you dare to show yourself here?" Clarice said knowing who she was speaking too without a doubt in her voice. "You are not welcome here!" The Medici woman said putting herself in front of her children and next to her husband.
"Peace, I only came to pay my respects and apologize for the death of your brother, Messere Medici." The man spoke, his voice like silver that Contessina did not trust in the least. Out of the corner of her eyes she saw Ezio silently come in from the outside upon hearing the commotion within the building. "I swear that is all." There was a convincing smile on the man's face.
"After you post your armies outside of Firenze's gates in threat? I think not." Lorenzo said moving to put himself in the line of fire towards the man. Contessina looked over at Ezio hoping he could diffuse the situation, but instead he kept a watchful eye out. "What is it you hope to gain, Riario?"
"Nothing." There was a pause and then a smile came over his face. "And everything." There was something familiar about the name and she had seen it somewhere before. The sinking feeling in Contessina's gut told her that he was a man to be feared only because he sought power above all. Then it hit her. Girolamo Riario had successfully bought Imola out from under the Medici by sheer genius and a marriage to Galeazzo Sforza's daughter, Caterina. The man before her was as much of a snake as he was ruthless. "That is beside the point, Medici. I have come to tell you that my forces will be stationed a few miles outside the walls of Firenze for the foreseeable future as requested by Pope Sixtus."
"You mean to starve out Firenze?" Clarice asked wanting to know what exactly it was that Riario wanted from the Medici and from Firenze. "Is that it?"
"No, I mean to negotiate first, but if nothing can be reached then, I will take extreme measure to see that the demands of the Holy See are given." Riario said with a sly smirk on his face as he knew how to get the reactions he wanted from both Clarice and Contessina. "Due to your loss, I will give you one month to negotiate terms."
"A loss that you instigated, Riario. I will see that all those involved with the Pazzi and my brother's death are dealt with in finality." Lorenzo's voice deepened at the end of his statement giving it a hard edge. Contessina knew from that moment her cousin was not the same man he used to be days ago. Lorenzo de'Medici was becoming something else entirely and it scared her to think he was on the path of vengeance. "You made the mistake of underestimating the Medici."
"Perhaps I did this time, but I am not the sole instigator in this. You know who it is that is the real puppet master in all of this, I'm just a messenger." The man said before giving a chuckle upon seeing Contessina standing by her dead cousin. "I have a message for you as well."
"Speak your message, Messere." Contessina said standing up straight with an impassive look on her face. She would not let this man phase her into thinking he had control of the situation, when it was clear to her, he was boasting his presence to size up his enemies. "I am listening."
"Tell the assassin not to interfere and you will be left alone." Riario said to her with a bow and his eyes bore right into hers making her skin crawl and her stomach turn. She tried her best not to show it on her face, but she was disgusted by the man. "My sympathies to you all on the loss of your loved one." The slimy man said before turning around and leaving the cathedral.
"That cazzo thinks he can scare us." Lorenzo said as Riario disappeared from view as Ezio came from his own hiding spot to stand next to Contessina with a serious look on his face. "I did not expect him to be here."
"Does it matter? He is giving us time to come up with a plan, Lorenzo." Clarice said grabbing on to her husband's arm as Ginevra came to stand by Contessina. Lorenzo looked as though he were going to harm something then and there, but thankfully Clarice had a tight grip on him. Contessina felt that if that were not the case, Lorenzo would have started gathering his own forces to meet Riario in battle sooner than later. "Lorenzo, please, let us find a solution."
"Damn him!" The Medici patriarch yelled, and his voice rang out through the cathedral drawing the attention of the friars in the corner. Clarice put a hand on Lorenzo's back and began to rub it in comfort before he shied away and walked out of the building in a fit of rage.
"Let him go, Clarice." Ginevra told the younger woman knowing a man in rage was not to be reasoned with until he calmed down. Riario's visit was in poor taste, especially when Giuliano was not yet buried, and the threat of war was in the air. Contessina looked at Ezio who had been silent the entire time knowing that this was a matter for the Medici and not the Auditore. "He will calm eventually." Ginevra said nothing more to the Medici women. Ezio shook his head as Contessina made to say something. He knew she was going to try and argue with her mother at that moment on how best to approach Lorenzo.
Instead of listening to Ezio, she quickly left the cathedral with her mind made up. She could hear her husband's heavy footsteps behind her as he made to catch up, but she stopped when she saw Lorenzo at the bottom of the steps with the merchants of Firenze surrounding him. They all had come to pay their respects to the man they now called the Magnificent. Contessina could not believe what she was seeing in front of her as the common men and women of Florence were reaching out to her cousin with sorrowful eyes.
Lorenzo looked as though he were Christ come again to save the sinners of the land from themselves. If Contessina believed in such things, she would have knelt down and praised God for the second coming, but Lorenzo was no saint. If the people knew what the Medici had done in the past to secure their place in Firenze, they would not be worshiping Lorenzo as they were now. Contessina looked to Ezio when he came up beside her. The look on his face was the same as hers and she felt him grab on to her elbow before he pulled her away.
"We need to leave." Ezio told her as he pulled her down the steps and into a side alley before undoing the first four buttons of his doublet to give himself room to breathe. "As soon as possible."
"What is wrong?" Contessina asked not understanding as he looked around him to see if anyone was near before he moved closer. She could feel a change in the air, and something did not sit right with her on how Lorenzo was acting. Riario's impromptu visit had changed something in her older cousin and with the adoration of the public, she was sure that she and Ezio were going to be caught up in something they could not control.
"Riario is a Templar, most likely working for Rodrigo Borgia and he knows who you are." Ezio said with a protective look in his eyes. Contessina could not help but to agree with him on this as she had already been a target in the past just to keep Ezio from his goals. It would be the same if Riario somehow had targeted Clarice to take away Lorenzo's will to fight and she knew her cousin always put his family first. As did Ezio. She put a hand on her husband's forearm and looked him in the eyes.
"Alright." She nodded in confidence of her decision. "We leave as soon as we can." She smiled at him knowing this was probably the beginning of the rest of her life with him. Somehow this terrified her as much as it excited her even though they had been married for two years.
"I will see you at the Palazzo Medici later." Ezio said before giving her a kiss and then leaving her to go back to her family. All she could do in that moment is watch his retreating form in the alley.
When Contessina had returned to her room in the Palazzo in the late afternoon, she had found Ezio's assassin garb gone and the doublet he wore earlier neatly placed out on her bed. Next to the clothing was a note that read he would be back soon and that she should be ready to go home. This gave her a smile, but at the same time there was sorrow as she was going to have to say goodbye to her family. She wondered if they would miss her or if they were going to be happy for her, or perhaps they were going to rejoice in her absence. She wanted to laugh at the last though because it seemed ridiculous that Lorenzo or Clarice would do such a thing.
Ginevra was a different story. Contessina knew her mother would sigh in relief for her leaving Firenze. The old woman never liked Florence to begin with and the reason was because all that was here for her was sorrow and a family she could not really stand. Ginevra had said many times that she cursed the day she was brought to Firenze and that she knew she was going to die a miserable death within its walls. Contessina hoped that was not going to happen, because she did love her mother even though they did not get along.
She sighed before she started to undo the laces of her dress. There was no turning back now when Ezio was determined to leave the city of his birth for the hunger for revenge. Deep down Contessina knew that Ezio's vengeance was going to consume him and if he did not make in progress on it, she was afraid he would lose sight of himself. Her only hope was that if she loved him enough, she could keep that from happening. She wanted to be the dutiful wife that stood beside her husband like she had been raised to do, but she knew she would have freedom loving Ezio. She felt silly in that moment because she sounded like a little girl who had fantasies of true love.
"Contessina?" She heard Clarice's voice as there was a knock on her door which caused the girl to come out of her thoughts.
"Come in." Contessina said as she pulled the black dress over her head and put it on the bed in front of her. The Medici woman opened the door slowly before coming in and then closing it behind her giving the blond a distinct impression that Clarice was there to interrogate her on Ezio's disappearance. "If you've come to ask me where my husband is, I can't give you an answer because I do not know." The girl said as she moved to the chest at the foot of her bed and opening it before pulling out the satchel she had packed days ago.
"You are leaving?" Clarice asked wanting confirmation on the young woman's intentions while stating her opinion on the matter. It sounded like Clarice was not pleased that Contessina was leaving, but the blond knew the dark-haired woman would not let her go so easily. "You cannot leave when we have just buried Giuliano." Contessina heard the protest in Clarice's voice as she pulled out the blue traveling dress and the velvet cloak Leonardo had given her. "What would he think?"
"Giuliano would want me to live my life instead of mourning him. Just as he would want his family to move on." Contessina said closing her eyes as she felt a pang in her chest and the image of her deceased cousin's face in her mind. He was smirking at her for standing up to Clarice. Even in death Giuliano was there to praise her, even if it was only in her head. "I cannot stay where there is no future for me."
"But what about us? Your mother and Lorenzo?" The older woman asked putting a hand on her chest and gave Contessina a sorrowful look, however the younger woman was wise to what her cousin was attempting. "Have we not taken care of you?" The blond closed her eyes feeling hounded for the last time. "What about Cammillia and Renato? They need you." Clarice said going on and on about how her family needed her there with them, but they forgot about Ezio.
"Clarice! Please let me live my life!" Contessina cried out with tears coming to her eyes. "I have been a prisoner here all of my life." She put a hand to her chest as she began to cry angrily. "Ever since I came here as a child I have been told how to think, how to act, and how to be a Medici. I have been told I should please everyone but myself in order to keep the peace or to be the perfect girl. I'm none of those things." She said as Clarice was taken aback by the words coming from her mouth. "The only freedom I have ever had was with the family I married into and that freedom was taken away. I want it back. I want all of it back." The young woman finally broke down and Clarice did not know what to say as the blond fell to her knees. "I want Giuliano back." Contessina cried as she felt Clarice's arms wrap around her in comfort. She had not expected her cousin to comfort her, but somehow, she had known that Clarice had some empathy despite her cold demeanor.
There had been no more words said as Contessina sobbed in Clarice's arms and when there were no tears left to cry, the two women sat there next to the foot of the bed. Contessina had put her head on her cousin's shoulder as the older woman sat there staring out of the window. The only sound in the room was of the dying fire crackling as the sun began to set. Both women had come to an understanding by the time their tears had run dry. After a while, Clarice spoke.
"Contessina, all this time I thought you were an unruly child with no sense of direction. Now that Giuliano is gone, I see that you and he were free spirits that kept all of us questioning life. I believed God was to be feared, but Giuliano had no fear of him and neither do you. Instead you both walk in his light because you both love life. I became jealous of this because I could not find God in the cathedrals or in books." Clarice said pulling out her rosary and holding the beaded cross in her hand. Contessina did not follow God's teachings like her family had wanted her to for a long time, but she still made the effort to attend church every Sunday. "Can you forgive me for my wrongs towards you?" The blond pulled her head off of Clarice's shoulder and the put her hand on her cousin's forearm.
"There is nothing to forgive, Clarice." Contessina said with a smile as she stood up. "Will you come with me to say goodbye?"