The night was dark and quiet, when they approached the Palazzo dell’Orologio, the seat of the King of Central Italy. Standing proud on the edge of the Piazza dei Cavalieri, it actually consisted of two separate buildings that were connected by an arch with a clock.
The cells for prisoners were in the building on the right, the Torre della Fame, Tower of Hunger. Named after the fate of its most famous prisoner, Ugolino della Gherardesca was locked inside with his family and left to starve to death. Aurora knew the story, because it was mentioned in Dante’s Divina Commedia, where Ugolino was banished into the lowest circle of hell, entrapped in ice up to his neck in the same hole with his betrayer, Archbishop Ruggieri. According to Dante, his children had begged him to eat their bodies. Au
