So crawl on my belly 'til the sun goes down
I'll never wear your broken crown
I can take the road and I can fuck it all away
But in this twilight, our choices seal our fate
Mumford and Sons, Broken Crown

Chapter 18:
August 3rd 1498

"The Pope sends a message," Giulia said as she entered the door to the dining hall. Jane looked up from the food that she'd been pretending to be eating for the last half hour.

"Of what?"

Giulia smiled and sat down. Lifting a hand, she denied the food that one of the maids tried to place on the table in front of her. "Of a meeting. He would have you meet with him and Cesare at noon today."

Jane observed Giulia closely; her eyes shone and her back was straight. "Did you sleep well tonight?"

She blushed, but with a growing smile. "Barely at all."

"Oh…" Jane looked into her food. She was happy for Giulia, yet her relationship seemed to remind Jane too much of Julio.

"But you must leave, mustn't you? The streets are filled with people at this time of day." Jane was relieved that Giulia didn't seem to notice her change of mood.

She stood up, smiling. "You are right. I will see you tonight." As Jane passed Giulia, she bent down and placed a kiss to her cheek.

It was hot outside and the streets were so crowded that Jane was more than happy that she'd taken her brother's potion so close to her departure. It had a cooling effect, she had realized, within the first couple of hours of taking it.

It took a while getting through the crowds, especially since she, with her fine clothes as evidence for her wealth, was stopped often by poor beggars asking for a spare coin. It wasn't hard to reject them; Jane never had been one to feel sorry for the weaker ones. Still, she worried for the Pope's sake. The poverty that the city showed evidence of, once you looked closer, had most definitely been created during the wars of the past many years. Soon, the Papacy would have to start fixing these problems or find itself faced with a riot.

Once she reached the Vatican, a servant led her to an office within the Pope's private residence. Cesare was already there, sitting on a chair facing his father.

Jane hesitated once she had entered, looking at the two men. "You must excuse me if I am late."

The Pope simply smiled and gestured for her to sit. "Quite the contrary. You are right on time."

Once Jane had sat down, she said, "It seems like a long time since the last time you consulted with me."

"I fear I have grown accustomed with the poor advices of the cardinals." He huffed, spreading his arms. "And look what has happened. Nothing!"

Jane smirked at his hidden compliments. "Something did happen; the war ended. And now you must adjust yourself to more peaceful times." She seemed to have his attention, so she continued. "Might I suggest that you turn your eyes inwards? To your own state, I mean."

The Pope leaned backwards in his chair. "What are your thoughts?"

"Not so long ago, you spoke reforming the state; to look back in inspiration for times to come." He nodded. "When I look around me, out there-" Jane nodded to the window, revealing the streets of Rome beneath them, "-I see too many cast into poverty and begging. There is a lack of water and work."

"She is right," Cesare cut in. "Lucrezia told me of a nun who took care of her; she said that her family was without home, food or water, and that they had lost two children within a year."

"The old aqueducts – can they still function?" The Pope asked.

Cesare shrugged. "I do not know, but I doubt it."

"Then I would have someone look at them, find the failures and repair them."

Cesare nodded in agreement. "You could get Cardinal Sforza to collect someone with the needed skills to organize such a project."

The Pope shrugged. "I could commission Sforza, yet I would rather have someone more trusted to do it. Why not you, Cesare?"

Cesare sighed. "Father, you know that I wish to be your hands in Florence. Soon we will have the rest of the cardinals' support in the ban of Savonarola's preaches and you will need someone in Florence to keep an eye on him."

The Pope shook his head disappointingly. "I do not need anyone in Florence to keep an eye on him; the entire world can hear him and his roaring crowd once he raises his voice!"

"And if he breaks the ban? I would not want to be distracted by charity work when that happens."

"Why not?"

Cesare returned his father's angry gaze. "You know why. You know that I wish to be the one to arrest him when the time comes. I will have Micheletto…"

"You will have Micheletto do what?" The Pope had grown tired of the subject now and Jane found herself wanting to be somewhere else. "Torture him? If he breaks his ban, all we can do is excommunicating the man." Cesare shook his head. "Besides, I would have Juan arrest Savonarola if and when the time comes."

Cesare looked up. "Juan? Why?"

"I have already told you this, my son, and I hope this will be the last time I need to." The Pope seemed to have forgotten Jane's presence by now, focusing his gaze on his son. "I need one son in the cloth and one in the armor."

"I could wear both cloth and armor." Cesare's voice was stern, filled with regret.

"And have Juan wear what?"

"The clothes of the drunk that he is!" Cesare half stood up in anger as he said those words, his father leaning back a bit in shock.

"I will not have you speak like that!" The Pope stood up as well. "We are family, and we shall stand united as such."

Cesare's jaw flexed as his eyes searched the ones in front of him. "What is it about him that makes you so ignorant of his failures?"

"Yes, father." Jane turned around quickly, looking to the door where Juan had appeared. "What is it about me?"

Jane looked to Cesare, expecting him to say something. He didn't. Juan blinked when they didn't say anything, then turned around and left.

The three that were left in the room stood in silence for a few seconds. "I will leave you to yourselves," Jane said in a low voice before she too fled the room.

Jane had not meant to follow him; in fact, she had not even seen in which direction he went, nor had she followed that path had she been aware of it. Yet she found herself stilling her steps only minutes after leaving the meeting upon seeing Juan.

He was leaning his front against the fence that was the only barrier between standing inside the Pope's private residences and falling down unto the crowded streets. His arms were folded in front of him, on top of the railing, and he held a round brown roll of a sort in his hand. Out of one of its ends, a thick smoke emerged.

Jane walked to stand beside him, grasping the fence with both hands. "What is that?" She nodded to the roll.

"A cigar." He made the pronunciation clear. "The Spanish smoke them."

Jane looked from the cigar to Juan. "You smoke them?"

He nodded. "Like this." He put the end of the roll – cigar – that wasn't smoking in between his lips and inhaled. Once he exhaled, he blew out the same thick smoke. "Would you like to try?" He held out the cigar, raising his eyebrows in question.

Jane hesitated before nodding. "Alright."

Juan smiled, taking a step towards her. Jane turned to him and listened carefully as he gave her directions. "First, you inhale a bit of fresh air. Then you put the cigar in your mouth and inhale through it."

Jane nodded in understanding before taking the cigar, holding it in the way that he had done. She looked at it intently, feeling Juan's amused eyes on her. Then she inhaled slowly, put the cigar to her lips and inhaled further.

Seconds later, she was in a painful cramp of harking and coughing. She handed the cigar back to Juan, shaking her head in distaste. "It is terrible."

Juan laughed at her. "It takes time to get used to it."

Jane found herself staring at Juan. It was the first time that she had heard him laugh – really laugh. In a way that wasn't mocking or selfish. He held a certain attraction to him when he smiled, one that his brooding eliminated.

"What?" he asked under her stare.

Jane shook her head. "Nothing."

Juan shifted a bit, then turned back, once more leaning his weight against the fence. "This is the first time that I speak to you. You surprise me."

Jane looked at him with raised eyebrows. "How so?"

He once more put the cigar to his lips. He blew out the thick smoke. "You are not as boring as you seemed. Or as cold."

"You thought I was boring?"

"My father has a habit of working with people of lesser interest to me."

Jane laughed. "What else did you think of me?"

Juan smirked. "That you were arrogant and that you were only here to use my father's influence." He looked at her, his eyes narrow from the sun. "I was right about those two, though."

Jane laughed in disbelief, shaking her head. "You are not very polite."

Most of the cigar was gone now. Juan shut one of his eyes, as if to take aim, while saying, "Did you think any better of me?" Then he threw the little that was left of the cigar and smiled in pride when it hit its target; a wagon with various fruits for sale. The Syrian man who seemed to be the owner of the shop caught sight of it and began screaming at two young boys who stood close by. Jane couldn't help but laugh.

"You did not answer."

Jane turned to Juan, still laughing. "I thought you were weak," she said honestly. "I thought you were arrogant and lazy. I believed you to be the lesser one in the family."

Juan looked away, down to the streets where the two boys were now running out of sight from the Syrian. "It sounds as if you knew me better than I knew you after all."

It took Jane all of five seconds' thought before she shook her head. "You do not seem very arrogant to me as you stand now."

"Maybe."

"And had you been weak and lazy, do you think that he would have denied Cesare the position of 'son in armor'?"

Juan laughed. "The reason why I hold that position is simply that it is the easier job compared to cardinal."

"I think it is because your father loves you." Jane had never been fond of Juan, but it had been obvious that the Pope favored this son.

"There were never any doubt about that." With those words, Juan left. As Jane watched him leave, she realized that perhaps she wasn't wrong; he was arrogant. She had often heard him brag about his own position, priding himself with his meaning to his father. Perhaps it was his shield, protecting him from whatever dark creature that lurked inside of him, eating him away.

Jane let the thoughts about Juan go. She drew in a deep breath, watching the people beneath her walk in great masses. Once, she caught a woman looking up at her. She wondered what that woman was thinking of when her eyes landed upon the stranger in rich clothes high up on the balcony.

Then Jane's eyes fell upon a more known face; Cesare was standing in a corner, just outside of the large masses in the shadows of a roof. He was talking to Micheletto, who was standing beside him. Jane watched as Micheletto offered an encouraging hand on the shoulder.

She suddenly remembered something about the man, something that had happened what seemed a lifetime ago. She remembered that she met him during the first few days of her stay in Rome, and that he had scared her. He still did.

Jane had long since forgotten what her first meeting with the Pope and his family was; she had forgotten her introduction to Lucrezia and Giulia; she had even forgotten the first time that she had ever seen Julio. But the first time she laid eyes on Micheletto was still etched onto her mind.

He had escorted her to and from a meeting with the Pope. After the meeting, she had spoken to him, about the Papacy, the Borgia family and how he knew them. He'd told her… Jane tried hard to remember his exact words. We're just old friends.

Could the possibly be any more than that? No, he had said, but she knew now, looking at the way Micheletto comforted his old friend, that they could be more.

There had always been doubts as to his reliability, but now she knew; now she knew something that not even the closest of his friends and allies did not know about him. And she also knew that it was something he wished to stay a secret.

Jane smiled somehow dangerously, looking at the man. All that he did, all that he said could easily be disguised as friendly gestures, unless of course you knew. She had Micheletto at her mercy now, and with the most dangerous, cunning and lethal assassin at your feet, what was out of your reach?