The Medici Girl

In the Night

The Auditore house hold was quiet after the Sun had retreated into the night. Annetta had busied herself with stoking the fire places around the palazzo while the other servant, Silvia, was going around to collect the basins from the rooms in preparation for the morning. Maria had settled down in her sitting room with Claudia by her side as they worked on embroidery. Cammillia sat at the desk in the corner writing a detailed outline of what she wished to see happen in preparation for her child's birth. In all, the only people missing were the men of the house and Contessina. 

Cammillia had seen Contessina talking with her cousin about going for a ride the next morning, so she assumed that the younger girl was getting some much needed rest. Horseback riding could take a toll on a woman, but she knew Contessina loved riding. In fact, the blond girl was very good at it, almost as good as Ezio. Federico, however, did not care for horses. Cammillia smiled at this before pulling out another piece of blank paper from the drawer and began to write. 

I remember one afternoon where Federico had an incident with a horse. It was a hot afternoon, stifiling even. Sweat made my clothes stick to me and there was no relief. Many times during the day I though about jumping into the river to relieve the heat, but instead, I found myself going to a fountain to splash water on my face. It was there that I found the love of my life. 

I had been brought to Firenze with what was left of Volterra. Since my parents were wealthy patrons of the Medici, Lorenzo brought me to Firenze to make amends. At first, I hated Lorenzo for taking me from my home, but it only took a certain boy to change that. That boy happens to be my husband now. Do not get me wrong, Federico is different to any man I have ever known. He is lazy. Frustratingly so. I love him, I do, but he can be bull headed. I love to go on walks in the countryside and even ride. For which I am grateful to Contessina for riding with me on occasion, but Federico, he dislikes horses. 

The incident in question is a humorous tale. On that hot stifiling day next to the fountain happened to be my dear, darling, lazy husband. Now, I had just turned thirteen. A good age of course, but I was stubborn and willful. To be fair, two stubborn people in a match could be disasterous. Either way, we were doomed from the start. Federico had brought his fathers horse to the fountain for a drink and I had been there splashing water on my face and neck. My dress was very much wet at this point, yet I did not care about that. I was hot. My clothes were making me hot. The Sun was making me hot. 

Hearing the sound of horseshoes on the cobbled street as they approached I looked up. The horse was dragging poor Federico to the fountain. I could hear him cursing the horse, a big bay that was lathered in sweat. The horse was obviously too much for a boy to handle and the horse himself was very thirsty. Giovanni Auditore never harmed a creature, but he had ridden this horse hard to get back to Firenze. Even so, watching Federico being dragged to the fountain by the big bay was somewhat a relief. Not from the heat, but from my sultry mood. Poor Federico finally let go of the horse only to run to the fountain himself. I saw his hands were red and blistered from holding the horse's lead too hard. He dipped his hands into the fountain and the relief on his face made me laugh. To this day when ever someone asks him to go riding or even touch a horse, he clenches his hands and his jaw. If it were not for that horse though, I would not have tended to his hands and met the love of my life. 

Cammillia finished the last lines with a smile on her face. She had begun to write down her fondest memories when she was a child because she was afraid to forget what her parents looked like. She even drew portaits of them, though she did not think she had such talent, Leonardo da'Vinci said otherwise. Her writings were her best work. Embroidery was something young women of Firenze learned from the time they were small and she was very good at it, but writing set her mind at ease.