Blood & Beauty The Borgias

Chapter 46



In Rome, the year 1500 begins benignly with bright skies and a crystal frost. In the south of the city, the paths and wasteland around the cathedral of St John Lateran are crammed with pilgrims, ready to greet the Pope and his beloved daughter, Lucrezia, Duchess of Bisceglie, who rides in place of honour inside a cavalcade of churchmen and nobles. The service they attend in the cavernous old church of Constantine marks the official start of the great jubilee year. Later, as darkness falls, the battlements of Castel Sant’ Angelo are lit up by great wheels of fizzing, spitting fireworks that squeal their way into the night sky, exploding over the city like showers of comets.

Two hundred and fifty miles to the north-east, outside the fortress of Forlì, another kind of firework display is about to begin. It is still dark when the boys from the supply carts hand out small beads of tallow to the men of the artillery. The helpers and shot handlers press them quickly into their ears, securing them with rag bandannas to soak up the worst of the sweat to come. The gunners are more careful, playing with them like rosary beads, softening them between the pads of their fingers so that they will mould better into the ear. A few offer a fast prayer to St Lucy, the virgin martyr of the blind who carries her eyes before her on a tray, a reminder of the torture she suffered before execution. Such is the hatred for this new mobile artillery, raining death from the skies with no respect for the skill or courage of the men it crushes, that captured gunners have been known to have their eyes gouged out as punishment. With their hearing already damaged by the blasts, they become walking dead men.

Now, though, their sight is the sight of the guns, accurate enough to pound any fortress wall to smithereens. The cannons are lowered into position, the powder poured in. The balls are rolled into the breech – the rounder they come, the better they fly – then rammed into position hard against the wad which covers the charge, while the gunner pours more powder into the touch-hole. A group of young boys stand ready with burning torches: the only heat in the bitter cold of a breaking dawn. As daylight stains the eastern sky, the first boy hands a taper to the first gunner, who lights the charge, waiting to check that it has caught, and then moves out of range fast in readiness for the violent recoil of the cannon.

The roar rips through the morning silence. Then another. And another. By the time the tenth cannon is fired, the first is already halfway to reloading, men shoving the sticks with swabs of soaked cloth deep into the bore to clean the sides and extinguish any lingering sparks, making it safe for the gunpowder again.

Soon the iron dragons are all belching fire and the air is filled with thunder and the screaming smash of stone on stone. From the top of the towers the smaller fixed guns blaze back, but their range is too short and with no room for manoeuvre they are more vulnerable to direct hits. The smoke from the cannons merges with the exploding clouds of debris. In the perpetual twilight they create it becomes impossible for even the most sharp-sighted gunners to assess the damage.

The bombardment goes on unabated until early afternoon, when a halt is called to bring up further ammunition and the men, now black as their guns, rest awhile. From their vantage point on an elevated tower to the side of the artillery, Cesare and the other commanders wait as the air clears. The shattered outline of the battlements to the left of the drawbridge comes into view. There is no one in sight, though as their ears adjust to the silence, a soundscape of human shouts and cries becomes audible. The top of one tower is in ruins, the guns disabled, small fires breaking out everywhere. The walkway of the battlement and the walls beneath are holed and pock-marked. But there is nothing as conclusive as a breach. Cesare turns to d’Alegre and Vitelli. They nod. As the first men emerge up on the tower, buckets of water in hand, he sends the order down the line for firing to begin again. This time it is only darkness that stops them.

The fortress, for so many years impenetrable, takes another full day of punishment. Then on Sunday morning, as snow begins to fall, in a single thunder crash a great section of the outer southern wall collapses into the moat, the chunks of masonry and debris throwing up a makeshift path halfway across the water. On Cesare’s side the rafts are ready. The men cram on to them, the Swiss and Gascon troops pushing their way to the fore, punting across the water and clambering over the stones, so that before the remaining guns inside can offer any resistance the breach is taken.

Wave upon wave of men flood into the fortress, their hunger for victory in bloody proportion to how long they have been kept waiting for a fight. Corpses pile at their feet. Inside the fortified keep where Caterina and her officers have taken refuge, the order is given to set fire to the stores and magazines. But in the chaos that follows, the smoke and fire blind the defenders more than the attackers and the Gascon soldiers and swordsmen are soon storming their way in, wielding a battering ram against the door of the spiral staircase. Above, Caterina Sforza and her entourage are barricaded in, waiting.

The rest of the army now streams over the lowered drawbridge, cavalry first, Cesare and d’Alegre riding at the head. The temperature is dropping rapidly as the horses move through flurries of sleet and snow, picking their way over bodies and rubble. But once inside the keep, Cesare finds himself frustrated: the door to the prisoner’s room, though smashed open, is blocked by a dozen bloodstained Gascon fighters.

The Bailly de Dijon, their leader, hurries forward to greet him, bracing himself for the fury that will follow.

‘I… It is the rule of war, Duke Valentino. It was my troops who took the citadel, and the Duchess of Forlì has already surrendered to my own constable on the understanding that she would be a prisoner of Fra—’

‘Ah, you wouldn’t dare.’ Cesare shouts in his face. ‘I lead this army and you and your poxy constables are fighting for me.’

‘Sire, we are Frenchmen first, and our loyalty is to our—’

‘Duke Valentino,’ d’Alegre, at Cesare’s side, interrupts smoothly. ‘As a great noble of France you know it is military law that a woman cannot be taken as a prisoner of war. The Bailly de Dijon’s men only hold the lady in the name of King Louis. Under whose protection she now resides.’

‘“Protection”! God’s blood. Officers’ plunder, more like.’ Cesare gives a bitter laugh. ‘You want money. A ransom. That’s what this is about.’ Even d’Alegre looks sheepish. Had they been planning it from the start? No wonder they had fought so hard to be the first in. ‘I had forgotten – you are an expert on such things. It was you who took “care” of Giulia Farnese and my aunt when they were on their way back to Rome before the invasion, right?’

D’Alegre shrugs. He is not to be embarrassed by this. ‘It was my pleasure as well as my duty to accept their surrender and keep them safe under the King’s jurisdiction until I could deliver both ladies back to His Holiness. Safe – and very much sound.’

‘Oh yes. So – would you say this “lady” upstairs is worth more or less than them?’

Three thousand ducats. That’s what his father had paid. He remembers it well because the joke on the streets was that it was a cheap price for the Pope’s courtesan; implying that, in his chivalry, it was d’Alegre who had been robbed. No doubt he intends to make up for it now. You laugh at us behind our backs, Cesare thinks. But I wonder if it is as hard as we laugh at you. He turns back to the Gascon leader.

‘Six thousand.’

‘What?’

‘I’ll take her off your hands for six thousand ducats.’

Just behind the Bailly de Dijon a man, evidently the constable himself, splutters, his eyes wide as saucers.

‘I… I don’t know—’

‘Very well, five thousand.’

‘But—’

‘It goes down with each refusal. Be careful. You had better be sure that when this reaches the King’s ears he does not come to take my side over yours. Five. Or do I go lower?’

The head of the Gascon troops glances anxiously to d’Alegre, but it is clear the negotiations are over. The Bailly de Dijon steps aside and Cesare’s men throw themselves up the staircase. There are raised voices and the floorboards thump. A chorus of women starts howling, a high-pitched ululating, as if murder is taking place, and the struggle grows louder as the men stagger down the spiral stairs, holding a screaming, kicking, flailing Caterina Sforza between them.

‘Scum bastards,’ she screams as she is dragged across the room. ‘I surrendered to the King of France, and no one else. You will all rot in hell for this dishonour.’

The nobles drop their eyes. Though ransom is a valued perk of war, the erotic possibilities of chivalry that this magnificent Amazon has aroused have become an open secret in the tents of the French commanders: as if such a woman might be persuaded to give freely what others would have to forcibly take.

She is still screaming as they pull her out of the door.

The celebrations go on into the night, the thumping pulse of victory running through everyone. The men who took the breach are exultant with it, each with his own near-death story to tell, some showing off wounds, the narcotic of battle numbing them to injuries which will bring agony by the morning. Cesare moves through the makeshift camp, talking and laughing with the troops, embracing the soot-stained gunners and their handlers, eager to relive the beauty of the bombardment, edging it towards legend with each retelling.

By the time he and his guards ride back into the town, it is deep night and the streets are empty except for a few drunken stragglers, the coating of snow now freezing into ice. The quiet after so many days of deafening cannon fire feels unnerving.

The woman who once ruled two cities is held in a boarded-up room on the top floor of his billeted palace. Cesare does not bother to wash or change his clothes. He cannot remember when he last slept. But the conquest is not finished yet.

The next morning his receiving-rooms swarm with well-wishers, town leaders, French nobles, even a few of his own condottieri, each man nursing a curiosity greater than his hangover. A dawn dispatch rider is already halfway to the Apennines with news of the spectacular victory, but another stands waiting for whatever further details might be worth the extra journey. The Pope’s appetite for every breath his son takes is well known; but when the exploits are so glorious, the longer the wait, the better the story.

When the door to Cesare’s room finally opens, it is not the duke but his most faithful fellow Spaniard who comes out, closing the door firmly behind him.

‘Gentlemen, gentlemen! I am to bid you welcome and good-morning from Duke Valentino, ruler of Imola and Forlì. He is grateful for your good wishes and sends them back manyfold. But at present he is busy on dispatches to his father. And when they are finished he will rest for a while. It has been a… a very busy night,’ he says carefully, and a leering cheer goes up from the men. ‘As I am sure you can imagine.’

‘And how “busy” was it for the Virago?’ Vitellozzo Vitelli’s voice rises up from the rest. If a man’s prowess is to be judged on numbers alone, Vitelli would be more lauded than he is; but more often than not these days he is plagued with blotches over his face and sword-stabbing pains through his whole body. War booty. It brings with it all manner of riches. ‘Come on, Michelotto. You can’t send us away empty-handed. There are ten thousand men out there who risked their lives to make it a memorable night. Give us something to offer them back.’

Michelotto shrugs. ‘One does not like to sully reputations,’ he says, playing the courtier with more verve than usual. ‘But the duke did have something to say when we met earlier this morning.’ And he repeats the words to them now.

There is a howl of laughter round the room. Oh, this is exactly what they wanted to hear. Michelotto watches the vicarious pleasure it brings. There will be no need of a dispatch rider now. It will be halfway round Italy by the end of the week.

‘I couldn’t care less, but you have to give them something,’ he had said as Cesare had flung himself on the bed, an avalanche of sleep ready to engulf him.

‘What? Testimony? Is that what they want? So – tell them that the duchess defended her fortress better than she did her virtue.’

He had closed his eyes and within seconds was asleep. Yes, Michelotto thought, ‘her fortress better than her virtue’. That will go down well. Though knowing his master as well as he does, he wonders how far it is the whole truth.