Never Expect a Vampire Like You

Chapter 2: The Unseen Mother

According to Vannozza’s letter, Chiara’s birth mother, the unseen Madonna Martina dei Cattanei, was a Mantuan maiden renowned for her beauty and defiance. After Vannozza became Rodrigo’s mistress, the Cattanei family received substantial wealth, secured local ecclesiastical appointments, and gained prestige in Mantua. At fourteen, Martina was betrothed to a member of the Sforza family, kin to the Duke of Milan.

“Yet she seemed displeased with the match. By sixteen, when the Sforzas demanded she fulfill the marriage contract, she struck her maidservant unconscious, packed a single gown and a few valuables, and fled Mantua all the way to Rome.”

Reading this, Chiara felt genuine curiosity stirring for Madonna Martina.

In this era, women rarely chose their own marriages, yet they held status equal to men. Even taking lovers after marriage raised few eyebrows. Few sought “true love” to the point of elopement. With such liberal customs, everyone knew marriage didn’t preclude affairs; why sever family ties over it?

“Martina was wildly headstrong. Chiara, you are not like her. Do not follow her example.” Since learning Chiara knew her birth mother’s identity and planned to visit her in Florence, Adriana had intensified the young noblewoman’s comportment lessons.

Chiara listened absently to Adriana’s lecture as she refolded the letter along its creases and tucked it into her half-read copy of *The Decameron*. She glanced furtively at Adriana, relieved her governess hadn’t noticed the book, then buried it beneath Plato’s *Phaedrus*. Boccaccio’s portrayal of the Papal Court was far from flattering, and Adriana strictly forbade its reading.

The midday heat pressed down like a weight. The shrieking cicadas in the oleander trees alone could lull one to sleep, let alone Adriana’s admonishments.

“They say she left Rome for Florence and married a banker. Bore a son,” Adriana continued. “But no matter her wealth, the Cattaneis will never acknowledge her. She’ll likely never return to Mantua.”

Chiara tidied the books on her desk and lifted two goblets of iced red wine a servant had brought. She glided toward the cassapanca bench where Adriana sat.

Time for distraction by refreshment.

She handed Adriana a goblet, swirled her own, and let the chime of ice against crystal fill the pause. “I was whisked to Father’s apartments by Brandao at dawn and haven’t seen Juan all day. How fares he?”

Perhaps the heat, or perhaps the chilled wine, cooled Adriana’s simmering disapproval. She studied Chiara. Though she shared Martina’s pale gold hair, fair skin, and breathtaking beauty, Chiara was fundamentally different. Adriana had raised this girl herself—quiet, intelligent, the most promising of the brood.

Slightly reassured, Adriana sighed, her thoughts turning to Juan, bedridden for days. “Worse. He clamors endlessly to ride again.”

“So riding is his newest passion?” Chiara smiled. “I shall visit him.”

Besides Chiara, Vannozza and Rodrigo had four children: Cesare, the eldest; Juan; Lucrezia; and seven-year-old Gioffre.

Cesare, barely a year younger than Chiara, possessed an old soul. Save for Vannozza lamenting her eldest never sought her comfort, he caused little trouble.

It seemed Cesare had bequeathed his unused capacity for childishness entirely to his younger siblings.

Juan was brash, obsessed with every passing novelty; Lucrezia, imperious. Together, they sparked like flint and steel. Thanks to Adriana’s tutelage, their quarrels ranged from celestial phenomena to street gossip, delivered with startling eloquence. Chiara, often feeling linguistically inadequate, could only watch wide-eyed and applaud these impromptu debates.

Yet reality denied her the luxury of mere spectatorship.

After sparring, they’d rush to her, each tugging a sleeve: “Chiara, who’s right?”

Chiara’s standard reply: “Both arguments hold merit…”

She swore she meant it.

They’d chorus: “No! The world is black and white! One of us *must* be wrong!”

Chiara: “……”

In moments like these, Chiara vowed never again to curse a World Cup referee.

And Gioffre had been a handful since his first wobbly steps. He cried. Oh, how he cried. Even breathless with sobs, he’d gasp: “Sis…ter…”

Once, when Chiara was biologically seven, she’d rocked him all night. Come morning, her arms were numb lead weights. Whether medieval Romans suffered, she couldn’t say, but *she* certainly had.

Last week, Juan began riding lessons. Knowing his recklessness, the instructor chose a gentle, adolescent mare. Juan struggled into the saddle, fumbling with reins and crop, when he spotted Cesare—barely a year older—galloping effortlessly across the field. Frowning, gritting his teeth, he raised his crop high and brought it down sharply on the mare’s flank.

He’d spent the week since confined to bed.

“The instructor did it on purpose!” Juan fumed from his bed, sipping iced wine a servant held. “He *wanted* me humiliated before Cesare! He chose the fiercest nag! Once my leg’s healed, I’ll have Father dismiss him… No! I’ll feed him to the fishes in the Tiber!”

His vehemence made him choke on his wine, triggering a violent coughing fit.

This was hardly Juan’s first choke. He’d choked on breastmilk as an infant, on milk as a child, and now routinely choked on wine.

Unfazed, Chiara lounged in a dark ebony Dante chair by his bed, flipping through her Greek history book during his hacking spasms. She’d reached the end of the Peloponnesian War: the head of Apollo’s statue in an Athenian temple, desecrated, the culprit never found.

Finally catching his breath with the servant’s help, Juan wiped tears from his eyes and glared at her. “Chiara, are you here to see *me* or read that book?”

Chiara lifted her gaze, smiling faintly. “To read. Here.” She waggled the book. “Adriana likely doesn’t wish to see you right now. So here I am.”

Juan stared at her for a long moment, then snorted. “I see. You favor Cesare and Lucrezia. You don’t care for me at all.”

Chiara braced herself. Another life-or-death question, akin to “Who would you save first if Lucrezia and I fell into the Tiber?”

She closed her book, stood, and stepped onto the dais carved with Roman scrollwork beside his bed.

Juan started to turn away but jostled his injured leg, hissing in pain. Chiara ruffled his dark brown curls. “Juan, aren’t you a bit old for sulking?”

“You said it yourself—I’m still a child,” he grumbled.

Chiara chuckled. “Then why, during our last visit to Father’s apartments, did I hear you thump your chest and declare yourself grown enough to ride?”

Juan: “……”

While he could unleash all his rhetoric lessons on Lucrezia, Chiara’s quiet jabs always left him speechless.

“Turn away now, and you might not see me again,” Chiara added lightly.

Juan whipped his head around, eyes wide. “Why? Is Father marrying you off?”

Chiara’s lip twitched. *He’s only twelve,* she reminded herself, taking a calming breath. She rapped his head gently. “I’m going to Florence in a few days.”

“Florence? Is Father wedding you to the Medici?”

Chiara: “……” *He’s only twelve.*

Chiara, woodenly: “No.”

“No?” Juan scratched his head. “The Pazzis? But… they’re ruined under Medici pressure. Father wouldn’t wed you to a Pazzi…”

Chiara: “……” *He’s only twelve.*

“I’ll protest to Father! Chiara cannot marry a Pazzi!”

Chiara: “……” *Twelve or not…*

She tapped his head with *The Decameron*. “Lucrezia is right. Listening to you for more than three sentences truly does provoke violence.”

…

Dusk found Chiara leaving Juan’s room, books in hand.

The fierce Roman heat began its retreat with the orange-streaked sunset. Chiara, who’d survived the day on iced wine alone, finally breathed easier. Corinthian columns lining the courtyard cloister held brass lanterns now lit, their flames mingling with the twilight glow, illuminating poppies blooming beneath the steps with an ethereal beauty.

Descending the stairs, she glimpsed ivory-white *camicia* fabric behind the poppies.

She paused, peering toward the flowers. “Gioffre, I see you.”

At her voice, the seven-year-old emerged and shuffled toward her. He shared Juan’s dark brown curls but lacked his brother’s arrogance. His eyes darted nervously. “Sister,” he murmured softly. Unlike his siblings, he called her “Sister.”

“Visiting Juan?” Chiara glanced back at the room. “He seemed weary.”

“N-no…” Gioffre’s small hand twisted his shirt hem. He looked toward the sun sinking behind the rooftops. “Sister… will you still fly tonight?”

Chiara’s smile vanished. She knelt, meeting his eyes directly. “What did you see?”

Her sudden seriousness flustered him. He clenched his shirt. “I… I saw you flying on the rooftops. Last night.”

Chiara laughed softly. Standing, she ruffled his curls—they felt just like Juan’s. “Our Gioffre must have had a wondrous dream last night,” she soothed, her voice gentle. “People cannot fly, Gioffre. Not even your sister.”