Chapter 104

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Translator: Harry Potta
Chapter: 104
Chapter Title: The Secret of Birth
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“Ugh, Mom! Why are you barging into my room first thing in the morning!”

Lucrezia could not contain her fury at her son’s irritation and state of undress. That her sweet, adorable Ippolito would get angry with his mother could only mean one thing.

“Ippolito, what is this? Were you fooling around with that wench this morning?”

“What are you talking about, Mom! Look, she’s not here!”

Ippolito jumped in protest. Lucrezia scanned her son’s room with the eyes of a hawk, but Maletta was nowhere to be seen. Instead, a woman’s clothes and a hairbrush were scattered about the room.

“What does it matter if she’s not here! Look at this!”

Lucrezia picked up a piece of women’s undergarments from the floor. She dangled it with the tips of two fingers as if touching something filthy. She held it up and waved it in front of her son’s nose.

“Your sister is dead, and you’re fooling around with a maid before her funeral is even over?! Have you lost your mind?!”

“Ugh, Mom! I told you, it’s not like that!”

“You might as well try to cover the sky with your hand! How dare you try to deceive your own mother! This is why your uncle says you have no love for your family! Oh, I can’t bear it!”

“…But Mom.”

Ippolito looked at his mother with a strange expression.

“Was she… conceived outside?”

“What?”

“Arabella, I mean. You said she had a different father.”

“What? Where did you hear that!”

“Uncle said so. I heard everything.”

Lucrezia clutched her chest.

“Stefano, that useless man!”

“So it’s true?”

Ippolito finished pulling on the clothes he had been gathering and stood up straight before his mother. He looked at Lucrezia with eyes full of curiosity.

“Who is Arabella’s father?”

“Oh, you foolish boy. Who else would Arabella’s father be but His Eminence, Cardinal Simon de Mare!”

“Come on, Mom, are you still going to lie to me now?”

“You idiot!”

Lucrezia slapped the back of Ippolito’s head. He was her only son, whom she had doted on, fearing he might break at a touch or be swept away by the wind, but this was too much.

“You ungrateful whelp!”

“Ow!”

“Who do you think I’ve been sharing a bed with a man I find dissatisfying my whole life for! How could you, of all people, say such a thing to your mother!”

“Ow, ow!”

Ippolito clutched the side of his head and moaned. Lucrezia’s wrist had grazed his ear while she was hitting the back of his head.

“I don’t understand a word you’re saying. If you don’t want to tell me, just say so. Why are you hitting your innocent son?”

“You ungrateful wretch! Shut up! Shut up! Get downstairs right now and prepare to attend the memorial mass!”

Lucrezia yelled at her son and stormed downstairs. She had come to cheerfully invite him to stand right by her side during the memorial mass, only to have her mood ruined. Ippolito grumbled to himself. Meanwhile, Maletta, who had been holding her breath in a state of undress inside the wardrobe, thought to herself.

*That… It doesn’t seem like Lady Lucrezia got angry because she didn’t want to tell him who Miss Arabella’s father is.*

***

Arabella’s memorial service was held with solemn grandeur. A cloud-like crowd gathered, filling the main hall of the San Ercole Basilica. The service began with a somber liturgy led by Cardinal de Mare.

“Arabella de Mare, a young lamb who grew faithfully in the embrace of our Lord, leaves us today to return to the circle of reincarnation under His guidance.”

Usually, a memorial service begins by identifying the deceased’s parentage. Cardinal de Mare smoothly skipped over any description of whose daughter Arabella was. Furthermore, since Arabella was born outside of a marriage blessed by the church, the customary phrase “born in purity within our Lord” could not be used. It was elegantly replaced with “grew faithfully.” Ariadne found this social grace nauseating. It was a scene where a father could not be called a father.

“Save the innocent lamb…”

Cardinal de Mare’s liturgy continued. Lucrezia, dressed for the day in black mourning clothes with a collar that came up to her neck, sobbed inconsolably in the front row. Beside her, Isabella, wearing a black mantilla, let tears fall drop by drop from her beautiful amethyst eyes.

*Disgusting creatures.*

If the family had held a modest, private service, they could have sent Arabella off after acknowledging whose daughter she was and where she came from. But neither Lucrezia nor Cardinal de Mare were the type to let a family tragedy pass quietly and unnoticed.

“A hymn to bid farewell to the poor soul…”

As a rule, the church did not involve itself in any rites for illegitimate children, including baptisms, marriages, funerals, or requiems. Over the past hundred years, that rule had crumbled in the most inequitable ways. The child of a poor, unmarried mother had to lie about being an orphan, kneel and beg a priest, and barely receive baptism outside the church doors just to be included in the world of the faithful. But the illegitimate daughter of a cardinal was having her funeral in the largest basilica in all of Etruscan, mourned by tens of thousands. Ariadne stood precariously on a foundation of lies piled upon lies, enjoying the benefits of all this absurdity. She was angry, but she was in no position to even express that anger righteously.

“Let us pray. O God, who always takes pity on us and generously forgives…”

This was the part where the priest would lead the first line, and the congregation would repeat the rest.

“May Arabella, who has left our side today, be guided by the holy angels and find a peaceful and tranquil new life in the sacred circle of reincarnation. In the name of God, we pray that she may be born into a good life in her next one, Amen.”

—“In the name of God, we pray, Amen.”

“Oh, my daughter!”

Lucrezia’s tragic wail rose sharply above the people’s chanting. Her plea for attention was just like something Isabella’s birth mother would do. The uninformed people of San Carlo looked upon the grief of a mother who had lost her child with sympathetic eyes. Ariadne’s expression twisted.

*Arabella. I wonder if you would like the blood of your mother being offered upon your own altar.*

She quietly clenched her fists.

*But I will exact the price of that blood and offer it at your shrine. Lucrezia, Isabella. Just you wait.*

***

The sea of mourners that filled the San Ercole Basilica was, of course, mostly guests of Cardinal de Mare. The children’s friends were generally down in Taranto, so most of them sent their condolences by letter. Among the endless stream of letters flooding the house, some were sincere, some were feigned, and some were purely formal.

「To Miss Ariadne de Mare,
Please accept my deepest condolences. Having lost an older brother myself, I can faintly imagine what it must feel like for a younger sister to pass away. Losing a sibling is like… (etc.)
When the court returns from Taranto in March, let us visit the columbarium behind the San Ercole Basilica together. My beloved grandmother was laid to rest there the year before last. The departed will live on forever in the hearts of the living. Once again, I pray for the repose of the deceased.
-Sincerely, Giulia de Valdesal.」

Among them, Giulia’s letter was exceedingly sincere. Many people offered empty words, but few invested the time, sincerity, and effort that Giulia did. Camelia de Castiglione sent a letter that seemed to be a patchwork of five or six excerpts from a book like ‘100 Best Condolence Letters.’ It was a classic case of spouting a lot of lip service and then washing her hands of the matter with a single letter.

Count Cesare expressed his interest with a long, beautiful letter full of concern and a generous sum of money, but for some reason, it felt closer to Camelia’s letter than Giulia’s. Perhaps it was because it paled in comparison to Alfonso, who had come to pay his respects in person.

Ariadne’s assessment was, in fact, a bit unfair to Cesare. At the time Alfonso had his realization upon receiving the Cardinal’s notice and rushed to San Carlo, Cesare was dead drunk at a party. He only heard the news the following morning. By then, word had spread through Taranto’s high society that the deceased was not the second daughter, but the youngest. Naturally, Cesare never had a moment of panic thinking Ariadne had died, and he simply sent her a perfunctory message of condolence for her sister.

However, he was not a man to be stingy with a woman he was courting. Along with the beautifully scripted letter in machine-like black ink came an incredibly luxurious rosary made of ebony and silver, studded with black diamonds. It was very Cesare.

*If I send this back… will a messenger have to carry it all the way to Taranto?*

After a moment’s thought, Ariadne called the servant in charge of mail.

“Send this to the de Como estate.”

“Should I say it’s a return?”

“No, send it as if it’s a new gift from me. Make sure their butler holds onto it, unaware, until his master returns.”

Having confirmed her feelings with Alfonso, she had no desire to accept a gift from Count Cesare. She didn't want to give Cesare the wrong idea and cause trouble later, and more than anything, she hated the thought of the disappointment Alfonso would feel if he found out she had accepted it. But Cesare was the type to become even more persistent if she played hard to get. It was better to distance herself quietly, without a fuss. Even if he found out the gift was rejected when he returned to the capital in a month and a half, he would likely have found some other amusement by then.

The last remaining letter was from Prince Alfonso. Ariadne had deliberately saved it for last. The envelope itself was thick. Prince Alfonso had started writing to her faithfully ever since he returned to Taranto. The letters were not on paper bearing the prince’s seal but on plain paper with a simple outer wrapping. The thickness, however, was more akin to a small package, and when she opened the envelope, inside was, as always, Alfonso’s handwriting in his energetic script, written in blue ink.

「To my dearest Ari,
Taranto is desolate without you. I’m growing tired of the warm air and the salty sea breeze. If you were here, I would gladly and happily stay even in a winter castle battered by blizzards.
Your sister’s memorial mass must be over by now. Please accept my condolences for her. From what you told me, she sounded like a very kind and talented friend… They say God takes the good ones early to have them as angels by His side. Let’s believe that Arabella, too, has gone to a good place.
(…)
I am waiting for the day I can come to you with my head held high. I still have to convince my father the King, but my mind is made up, and the outcome will not change.
I miss you.
-With love, A.」

She carefully folded the letter written on rough paper, placed it in the letterbox in her study, and locked it. She thought she had learned from her past life that a man’s promise was nothing but empty air. But she couldn’t suppress the desire to believe that this time would be different, that this time it would be real. The sweet nothings, the soft lips, the love like a flame. The feeling of his lips that day, the warmth of another person, was interfering with her rational thought.

*…Stop this.*

Ariadne shook her head, trying to clear away the distracting thoughts.

*Sea anemone. Sea anemone.*

Scolding herself for getting lost in romance only days after sending Arabella off, she straightened the mourning dress she was wearing. Only then did her mind feel a little clearer. Ariadne had a great many things to do from now on. She was the type of woman to take care of everything within her power herself, rather than leaving it all to a man and waiting anxiously.

***

The period for wearing mourning clothes for a child or younger sibling was only two weeks. Ippolito cast off his mourning attire as soon as the designated period ended, and even before that, he had secretly indulged in all the forbidden pleasures like drinking and sleeping around. He seemed to be growing more and more dependent on Maletta, confiding in her even his most private thoughts that he couldn’t share with anyone else.

“Maletta. You know, I’ve been thinking, I think I’m the unhappiest person in the world.”

“What? Why would you say that, my lord? You’re rich, handsome, and you have so many friends.”

He let out a deep sigh and shook his head.

“I’ve always thought I grew up in a perfectly happy family, but now that I know my mother is an unfaithful woman and my sister is proof of that infidelity, a cuckoo’s chick with a different father, I can’t help but wonder if all the happiness I enjoyed was just a deception.”

Maletta had lost her parents at a young age, and though she was lucky enough to live under the same roof as her only sister, they were mortal enemies who couldn’t stand the sight of each other. But Ippolito was currently feeling very sorry for himself, and Maletta was in a position where she had to cater to his every whim to get what she wanted. Even though her own misfortune had been usurped, Maletta diligently consoled Ippolito. The process was humiliating, but the result would be glorious.

“It’s so agonizing to know my parents’ relationship isn’t what it used to be. That’s why I couldn’t focus on my studies in Padua and my grades were so bad!”

“Of course, my lord. If you had just been able to concentrate, you would have been the top student in Padua. The circumstances just weren’t right for you!”

Maletta eagerly played along.

“Don’t think about such things now, just think happy thoughts. What’s done is done, right? Here, have a drink and come rest in my arms.”

***

For a month, Ippolito soothed his sorrow and worries with alcohol and lust. And now, Maletta was experiencing the consequences firsthand.

“You’re pregnant.”

In a small hovel in a corner of San Carlo, the city’s resident midwife delivered her verdict.