SIX

Abigail adored every aspect of her life at the Castel sant’Agata, but she especially enjoyed breakfast.

“Jolly splendid of them, to find kidneys and kippers for us,” she said, tucking in half an hour later with all the gusto of an Englishwoman eating her morning ration of organ meats. “I wonder how they managed it.”

Lilibet was chewing her toast with all the gusto of an Englishwoman eating roof shingles, seasoned with coal dust. There were just the three of them at the moment, Abigail and Lilibet and Philip, three tiny outposts of humanity set around the broad swathe of the ancient trestle table. The gentlemen made a point of breakfasting early, and Alexandra made a point of breakfasting late. “I suppose one can order these things,” she said. “There are hundreds of English in Florence.”

“Yes, but how would they know?” Abigail rested her cutlery against her plate in a pregnant pause. “Don’t you think there’s something a bit odd about the old place?”

“I don’t know what you mean. It’s an old castle, that’s all.” Lilibet lifted her teacup and closed her eyes.

Abigail tilted her head and observed her cousin’s face, which seemed rather pale and ghostly itself at the moment. She could not understand why no one else sensed the undercurrents drifting about the Castel sant’Agata; to Abigail they were as obvious as the sunshine in the morning.

“Really? You don’t feel it? As if there are ghosts hanging about every corner?”

“Ghosts!” Philip bounced in his seat. “Real live ones?”

“No, darling,” said Abigail. “Ghosts are generally dead. But real dead ones, certainly.”

Lilibet sent her a quelling frown. “What nonsense. Ghosts, indeed.”

As she spoke, a parcel of air seemed to brush the back of Abigail’s neck, making it tingle.

She turned to the doorway, where Signorina Morini stood quite still, headscarf like a bright red slash against the shadowed corridor behind her, teapot and toast rack in her hands. She was regarding Lilibet with a pensive expression.

“I have more toast, Signora Somerton, and more of the tea,” she said.

“Thank you, Morini. Are the gentlemen about yet? Lady Morley?” She asked the question with casual indifference, as if it were not common knowledge that the gentlemen and the ladies never breakfasted together, rarely lunched together, and only dined together because of the supreme inconvenience of having dinner at any other hour.

Morini stepped forward into the dining room, sparing not a glance for Abigail. Abigail was not surprised. She’d been trying for weeks to hold a private conversation with the dark-haired housekeeper of the Castel sant’Agata, to no avail. Every time Abigail entered into the kitchen, Morini slipped away on some urgent task, her skirts swishing behind her, the faint scent of baking bread dissolving into the empty air in her wake. Like a wraith, Abigail thought, with just a touch of pique: pique, because surely no one else in the house was better suited to speaking with a wraith—to getting to the bottom of her wraithlike secrets, as it were—than Miss Abigail Harewood.

Even now, Morini was focusing all her solicitous attention on Lilibet. She placed a fresh rack of toast on the table next to the countess’s plate, tilted the teapot above her empty cup, and answered her in a private tone. “Signore Burke, Signore Penhallow, they both had the breakfast, it is an hour ago. Of the duke, I see nothing.”

Abigail set down her fork. Enough was enough.

“Morini,” she said, quite loud, “I wonder if I could have a few words with you on the subject of ghosts.”

Morini’s hands froze in place around the teapot.

“Morini! The tea!” exclaimed Lilibet.

Morini straightened the pot just in time. She stood for a moment, holding the pot with both hands, and glanced at last at Abigail. A short glance only, a tiny stroke of lightning, and then she turned back to Lilibet.

But still, a glance. That was progress.

“Ghosts,” she said. “Of ghosts, there are none.”

Abigail smiled. “Something else, then? Because I think the air’s humming with them.”

“Is nothing, signorina. Only the old stones, the wind rattling the old walls. You are wanting more tea?” She offered the pot, and this time her eyes met Abigail’s with resolution, with intent and dark-eyed meaning.

Abigail tapped her finger against the table and returned the housekeeper’s gaze. Not a muscle moved in Morini’s face, not a flicker. The teapot in her hands, the clothes on her body: everything was still and focused on Abigail.

The tingling began again at the nape of her neck.

“I see,” she said. “Yes, more tea. I like your blend extremely, Morini.”

“But what about the ghosts?” Philip broke in cheerfully, reaching for his mother’s toast.

“Darling, don’t reach. There are no ghosts, Morini says.” Lilibet took the toast from Philip’s fingers, spread it thickly with butter, and returned it to him.

“No ghosts,” said Morini. She shot another glance at Abigail and swept from the room.

Abigail lifted the teacup and rested it against her chin. The shadowed passageway outside the door seemed full of secrets. “She’s lying, of course. Did you see the look she gave me?”

“Nonsense. Philip, for heaven’s sake, don’t lick the butter from your toast. It isn’t considered at all polite.”

Abigail leaned back in her chair and tapped her finger against the rim of her teacup. “Very interesting.”

“I assure you, he doesn’t do it often . . .”

“Not the butter, Lilibet. I mean Morini.”

“Why? Surely you don’t think she’s hiding something.” Lilibet wiped her hands on her stiff linen napkin.

“Of course I do,” said Abigail. She set down her teacup and rose from the table. “And I mean to find out exactly what it is.”

*   *   *

Upon his return to the castle, the Duke of Wallingford found himself obliged, for the first time in his life, to unsaddle his own horse.

He found he rather liked the exercise, though he should never have let it become known among his acquaintances at the club.

He liked, for example, the little sigh Lucifer gave as the girth loosened and the saddle and cloth slid from his smooth back.

He liked the way Lucifer’s coat quivered and shone, as he brushed it afterward.

He liked the quiet of the stable, the slow drone of passing flies, the scent of hay as he refilled the net in Lucifer’s stall. He liked leading the horse outside and setting him free again in the paddock, to enjoy the sunshine and the clean, new-washed air, the soft early grass underfoot, the scent of growing things.

“Rather a nice holiday for you, isn’t it, old chap?” he said, latching the gate and setting his elbows atop the edge. Lucifer tossed his head and took off, giving his hind legs a little kick, frolicsome as a colt in the limpid spring morning. His hooves thumped the turf in a reassuring beat. Wallingford felt his lips stretch slowly into a . . . what was it?

A smile.

“Signore Duca,” came a petulant voice behind him.

Wallingford heaved a resigned sigh. So much for peace and solitude.

“What is it now, Giacomo?” he asked, without turning. Lucifer had settled himself in the shade of a tree and began to snatch at the tender new grass.

“Is the women, signore.”

“It’s always the women with you, Giacomo. What have you got against the poor creatures?”

Giacomo’s voice slid into an abject whine. “They are trouble, signore. They are always making the trouble. The signorina, the young one, she . . .”

“Stop. I don’t want to hear it.”

“She is spreading the stories, signore. She is saying we are . . . I am not knowing the word . . . the castle, she is saying, has the spirits . . .”

That chill again, tickling the base of Wallingford’s neck. He set his booted foot squarely on the lowest bar of the gate and ignored it.

“Of course there are no spirits,” he said. “We poured out everything in the library, directly we arrived. Except the sherry, of course.”

“Not the spirits for the drinking, signore! The spirits, the souls . . . you are not understanding?”

“Oh, as to that, I’ve been told many times I have no soul at all, on good authority.”

“Signore!” Giacomo’s voice was reproachful. “You are making the joke.”

Wallingford sighed and turned at last. “I never joke, Giacomo. I am much too dignified for something so vulgar as humor. I suppose you mean the castle is haunted?”

Giacomo nodded his head vigorously. “Haunted. Is the word.”

The damned chill again.

Wallingford folded his arms. The sunshine struck Giacomo’s gnarled body like a bolt of clear gold, illuminating the very fibers of his clothing with eye-watering detail. He stood with his legs planted far apart, as if withstanding a flood, his hands attached to his hips. He was wearing a queer old-fashioned jacket, made of some sort of rough wool, and the same flat cap he always had on his head, obscuring his hair and most of his forehead, leaving only a pair of broad ears that looked as if they meant to lift him off into flight at any moment. He seemed quite solid, quite corporeal. Quite un-ghostly.

“Well, is it?” Wallingford inquired dryly. “Haunted?”

Giacomo swallowed heavily. “Of course the castle is not being haunted! Is a story, an evil story spread by the devil-woman . . .”

“Devil-woman! Look here, Giacomo, Miss Harewood may be a mischievous little sprite, but she’s hardly the spawn of . . .”

“Not the girl! The . . . the kitchen, the house . . . she keeps the house . . .” Giacomo snapped his fingers impatiently.

“The housekeeper? Who the devil’s that?”

“Signorina Morini. You do not see her. She is staying in the kitchen. She tells the stories to the girl, and the girl, she . . . she . . .”

“She what?”

“She tells them to everyone!”

“She hasn’t told me.” Wallingford felt a hard nudge at his back: Lucifer, prodding him with his muzzle. Wallingford was surprised he’d left his grazing to come over again. “At least, not since the first night.”

Giacomo frowned. “What is she saying, then?”

“Only that she felt something odd lurking about. Female vapors, nothing more. Look here, old man, you’re making the old mountain out of a molehill, as they say. Simply ignore the women. It’s what I always do.”

Giacomo’s black eyes cast down to the beaten earth. “Is making the trouble.”

Wallingford uncrossed his arms and waved his hand dismissively. “What’s a few ghost stories, after all? Merely a little fun. I daresay nobody takes it seriously. I’ve never believed in ghosts, and I don’t intend to begin now.”

“Is true, signore?” Giacomo looked up at him anxiously. “You are not believing?”

“Of course not. Silly feminine twaddle.” Lucifer pushed right between his shoulder blades, with such force Wallingford nearly stumbled forward. “Look here, old chap,” he said, turning back to the horse.

“You are not listening to the stories, signore?” Giacomo asked, behind him.

Wallingford rubbed between Lucifer’s eyes, right in the center of the white lightning strike. “God, no. I never listen to women, as a matter of policy.”

Giacomo sighed deeply. “Is good. You are wise, Signore Duca. Is no wonder you are duke. Very wise, very good, very . . . very wise man.”

Wallingford closed his eyes and pressed his forehead against Lucifer’s long nose. The warmth, the solid clunk of bone soothed the tingling along his spine.

“Yes,” he said. “So I’ve been told.”

Then he straightened and turned to dismiss the groundskeeper, but the man had already disappeared.

*   *   *

If you leave this room, signorina, I shall tell everybody my suspicions. Everybody. I shall tell them the place is haunted, inside and out.”

Signorina Morini, in the very act of swishing her skirts through the doorway at the opposite end of the kitchen, halted herself in mid-swish. “Che cosa?”

“You know exactly what I mean. You understand English perfectly well.” Abigail had no idea how one ought to interact with ghosts, but she imagined it was best to speak with self-command. After all, she was the one made of good, solid, respectable living flesh.

Though that flesh was quivering rather disgracefully, at the moment.

Morini turned, and Abigail experienced an instant of doubt. The housekeeper was so full of color, her red headscarf burning against the shadows, the few escaping tendrils of her hair gleaming black against her pale skin. “Your suspicions. What are these . . . suspicions?”

“Why, that you’re a ghost, of course. If that’s the word.”

Morini shook her head. “I am not a ghost, signorina.”

“You’re not a regular person. Not a . . . a mortal person.”

Morini’s shoulders moved, a kind of flinch. She turned her face away, looking at the great hearth with its low-simmering fire, its fire irons in place nearby, its black long-handled utensils hung with care alongside.

“I’m sorry. I don’t know how to describe any of this. I’ve never made much study into the occult. Now, Tom Thomason, down the pub, he’s a regular expert, sees spirits everywhere, even in the lavatory, which is quite unnerving when you think . . .”

“Why you are saying these things, signorina?”

“. . . and more than a little unsanitary, though I suppose if one belongs to the spirit world one’s quite above worries about germs and . . .”

“You are not making sense, signorina.”

“Yes, I am.” Abigail took a step forward. “Please, Morini. Tell me what’s going on. I know there’s something, I can sense it; I’ve sensed it from the beginning. There’s some mystery, I know it.”

Morini stood there across the room, her arms still crossed above the neat homespun of her dress, the white linen of her apron. Beneath the loose material of her sleeves, her chest rose and fell in a slight but rapid rhythm.

Did ghosts actually breathe? Or was this movement simply some mimicry of human activity, some half-remembered reflex?

Was the woman alive, or not?

Something gave way in Morini’s face. Her black eyes softened, in sympathy or perhaps defeat. She sighed, lifting her arms up and down on her chest, and stepped toward the fire. “Signorina, you are perhaps wanting some tea?” she asked, over her shoulder.

Abigail let loose a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding, and tottered forward to sink herself into a chair at the rough-hewn table in the center of the room. “Yes, signorina. I believe I should like some tea very much.”

*   *   *

Is many years ago,” said Morini, bustling about the fire with the black teakettle.

“It always is. Once upon a time and all that.” Abigail propped her elbow on the table and leaned her cheek into her palm. Morini’s slender body wove before her in practiced movements, as if she’d been making English tea for English visitors for . . . well, for how long? “How long ago?” she asked.

Morini sighed and glanced back at her. “You are not believing me, if I say.”

“Oh, I’ll believe whatever you say. My mind is quite open, I assure you. Amaze me.”

“Is . . .” Morini paused and looked up at the ceiling, as if the years were marked on the heavy wooden beams above. “Is three hundred years.”

Abigail’s elbow gave way, nearly crashing her head into the table. “Three hundred years!”

“Three hundred. Very long ago. The castle, it was almost new, built by the great lord, the Signore Monteverdi, who . . .”

“Signore Monteverdi! But the castle’s owned by a fellow named Rosseti, isn’t it?”

Morini spooned the tea leaves into the teapot. “Now, is different. Then, is the castle of the Monteverdi. He and the Medici in Firenze, the great prince, they are friends, they make much gold together. The signore’s father, he start the castle, and the signore finish it. He comes with his new bride, the daughter of the Medici . . .”

“A princess!”

“No, not the princess. She is the daughter of his lover, his mistress, not the daughter of the wife. But she is . . . how do you say? The apple of his mouth?”

“His eye, I believe.”

“She is his apple, his best-beloved, and he give her in the marriage to Signore Monteverdi, his great friend, so she will live not far away.” The teakettle sang; Morini took her cloth and wrapped it around the handle and poured the water into the curving blue and yellow teapot. “She is beautiful, she is charming, she is kind and wise. Everybody love the new signora. Signore Monteverdi, he is mad for her, he has the frenzy of love, he adore the stones because she put her feet on them. It is nine months, she give him a beautiful baby son.”

“Of course she does.”

Morini was bustling about, fetching the pot of fresh cream, the sugar, the silver spoon. The air seemed to swirl around her in the warm, fragrant kitchen, made of old stone and old wood. The same stone, the same wood, that this long-ago Signore Monteverdi and his lady would have known; the same hearth that had cooked their food. Abigail laid her hand against the table and traced her finger along the grain.

“The signore is so happy. The baby is strong, the mother is safe. He buy her many jewels, many clothes. His love grow and grow. It fill the castle and the vines and the village below. It is not a year, and the signora’s belly is great again with another baby.”

“Oh, the brute!”

Morini shrugged and poured the tea through the strainer into Abigail’s cup. “He love her. She is young, she is beautiful. Is the way of nature. Her belly grow, the summer come. Her time, it is upon her, and the signore wait in the library all through the night, while she has the labor.”

Abigail’s hand began to tremble as she lifted the teacup to her lips. “I take it this birth was not so straightforward?”

“No, signorina. It is not.” Morini’s voice roughened. “The beautiful signora, she has much pain, much struggle. The sound of her scream, her pain, it fill the castle. The signore wait and he wait in the library, and he hear her screams all the night. He lock the door, he let in nobody.”

“How dreadful! Though of course he had only himself to blame, the unruly satyr.”

Morini shot her a quelling look. “In the morning, there is a tiny baby, a little girl, but the mother . . . the dear signora . . .” She choked and swallowed.

“Bled out, I suppose. The poor thing.” Abigail bowed her head. “And her babies never even knew her.”

“She is carry to Firenze, where the Medici and the signore, they put her in the tomb in the Duomo and have a great . . . a marble . . .” She shaped her hands.

“A statue?”

“Yes! A statue for her tomb. Is very beautiful, they say. And the little girl . . .”

“Did she live?”

Morini eased herself into the chair opposite Abigail. “She live.”

“I suppose Signore Monteverdi hated her for it. Your great men are all alike, blaming everyone but themselves, holding grudges and whatnot. You’d think a simple mea culpa would kill them . . .”

“No, he is not hating her. He love her. All the love he is having for the signora, he give to her. He say, the signora give her her spirit, she is like the signora reborn.”

Abigail frowned. “Isn’t that a little . . . well . . .” She twirled her finger in an expressive circle.

“She look exactly like the signora, her mother. Leonora, he name her, just like his bride. She is beautiful. She smile, she laugh, all the day she is happy and filling of joy. The signore, he spend every minute with her.”

“Do you know, I rather dread to hear what comes next,” said Abigail, drinking her tea.

Morini’s eyes drifted to the wall behind Abigail, as if she could see the castle’s ancient occupants dancing in the distance. “The years, they pass, and the Signorina Leonora grow and grow, until she is nearly a woman. The most beautiful girl in all Toscana. When she is turning sixteen, the signore, he take her to Firenze, they stay with his old friend the Medici.”

“Oh, haven’t those two fallen out by now and poisoned each other?” Abigail said dryly.

“No, they are still the friends, by the grace of God,” said Morini, quite seriously. “Now, the Medici, he has a young man staying at his palazzo, a young Englishman, making his travels. He is a great man in England, they say. A lord. The lord of . . . I forget the name . . . Copperbridge?”

“Haven’t heard of him.”

“He is a great man, a handsome man, tall and strong and brave. He travel to Italy to learn, to study the art.”

“A perfect Renaissance prince. How charming for Leonora! I expect they fell in love directly,” said Abigail.

Morini’s gaze returned, shining, to meet Abigail’s. “Oh, the love! It is instant, like this.” She snapped her fingers. “They are in love, they dance all the night, they cannot take the eyes from the other. Everyone watch them together, everyone is happy. Everyone except . . .”

“Monteverdi, I expect, the old letch.” Abigail sighed. “Men, really.”

Morini’s eyebrows lifted. “What is this letch?”

“Generally speaking, a chap who . . . well, never mind. Carry on. I suppose Signore Monteverdi ordered the poor Englishman away, forbade him to visit, locked up sweet Leonora in a nunnery . . .”

Morini’s eyes grew round. “You are hearing the story already?”

“Call it intuition.”

“It is not this nunnery, however,” said Morini, settling back in her chair. “Is only the castle, the Castel sant’Agata, these stones.” She waved her hand at the walls. “But it is prison to Leonora. She is not going outside, she is not leaving her room. The signore, he lock all the doors, he sit in his library, he drink the wine and the grappa . . .”

“But hold on a moment.” Abigail set her teacup in the saucer with a clatter. “Didn’t he have a son, as well? Didn’t he care about the boy at all?”

Morini looked down at her hands, spread like fans across the worn wooden table. “The young Monteverdi, he is like other boys. He is strong and brave, he studies with the tutors, he is sent to Firenze. He love his sister very much.”

“Then he must have felt things dreadfully.”

“He does not say. He try to speak to the signore, to allow the marriage. He is the friend, the great friend of the Englishman, you see.”

“Oh! Well, that’s awkward.”

“But there is not hope. The signorina, she is a prisoner, and the young English lord, he is growing mad with his love, he is desperate. He find a house in the village, he put on the clothes of the peasant, he watch the castle day and night. He find the signorina’s maid when she is outside, he beg her to help.” Morini reached for the teapot and refilled Abigail’s cup. “The maid, she say she will help, she take the signorina a note.”

“Plucky maids! Clandestine correspondence! Oh, marvelous,” said Abigail. “Did she get the note, or did old Monteverdi waylay the maid first?”

“She has the note. She is so happy! She dry her tears, she write back to her English lord. She will change the dress with her maid, they will meet in the night, when the castle is sleeping.”

“Oh, heavens! Say no more, Morini. You must recall my virgin ears.” Abigail paused. “So did they? Meet?”

“Si, signorina. Young love, it must have its way. All the spring, they meet, they have comfort in the other, until it is June, and the signorina, the poor Leonora, she find out . . .” Morini’s voice trailed off. She looked down at her hands.

“Copperbridge is courting another girl? He’s drinking in the village tavern all night, gambling away his fortune?”

Morini whispered, “She is with child.”

“Oh.” Abigail, who did not generally blush, felt an unaccustomed warmth rise into her cheeks. “Yes, quite. Midnight meetings have that effect, I suppose.”

“Leonora does not want to tell to her lover the baby,” Morini went on, “but the maid, she has much worry, she write a note. The Englishman read the note and he say, it is enough, Leonora must be mine now. They will run away together. He will come at midnight on the evening of the Midsummer, when the castle and the village have the festa, and take her away.”

“Midsummer’s Eve! I swoon,” said Abigail. “Did they manage it?”

Morini rose and picked up a fire iron and nudged at the fire. “The signorina, she dress as a servant, she put on her mask. The maid, she steal the key and let out the signorina from her room at midnight, as she has done all the spring. Leonora, she wait in the courtyard for her English lord. She is happy, she is sad. She love her English lord, but she is hurting her father, who love her, too. She is making dishonor for him. Her heart is so soft, so tender.”

“She’s a better woman than I am, by God. I’d have stuck a dagger between his ribs by now,” said Abigail.

“At last her lord come to the courtyard to take her. She say to him, wait, I must say the good-bye. The Englishman say to her no, if you say good-bye, the Monteverdi will never let you go. Then the maid, the maid of the signorina, she run into the courtyard, she say to hurry, the Signore Monteverdi is coming! Hurry, she say to them. Hurry! But . . .” Morini replaced the fire iron and stared at the coals. “Is too late.”

“Of course it was. All that dithering about. What were they thinking?”

“The signore rush in, he see the lovers. He insult the Englishman, say to him, he is a dog, a mongrel. He will call the guards for to take him to prison. The English say he will not go to prison like a criminal, he is a man of the honor. If the signore wish to have the duel he will meet him.”

“How medieval.”

“The Signorina Leonora, she tell him no, no! She cannot see her lover do the duel with her father. Then Signore Monteverdi, he turn to his daughter and call her terrible names, names of dishonor. So the English lord, he . . . he . . . oh, the good English lord.” Morini shook her head. “He tell Signore Monteverdi his Leonora is the angel from heaven, she is pure, that the sin is all to him. He take out his pistol, he say to the signore, see? I give you my pistol, do what you will to me. And he throw down his pistol to the ground.” She made a motion with her hand. “Right down to the stone of the courtyard.”

“Well, that was downright silly,” said Abigail. “What use is he to Leonora without a pistol?”

“He mean to do the honor, to make himself sacrifice for the lady. And do you know what is happen?”

“Something horrible, I’m sure.”

“The pistol, it fire. It hit the ground, and it fire, right into the chest of the old signore.” Morini pointed her finger like a gun, and fired it off against the wall.

“What? That’s impossible!” Abigail leapt to her feet.

“No, signorina. Is possible. It happen. Signore Monteverdi, he fall to the ground, crying the murder. He is dying. With the last of his breath, he curse the poor signorina, he curse my poor Leonora. Her father, the last of his breath, and he curse her and her English lord. He say, they shall never again know the true love, shall never be free, until his soul is revenge.”

Morini’s face was pink, her eyes glittering. Her hands clenched into fists at her sides. Behind her, the fire gave a little pop of sympathy.

“Oh, Morini,” breathed Abigail. “Oh, signorina.”

“He curse her,” whispered Morini. “She and the English lord, they run into the night, and no one hear the word from them. The young Signore Monteverdi, her brother, he search and search for her. And the castle . . .”

Abigail wiped her cheeks. “What of the castle, Morini?”

“The castle, ever since, it hold the breath. It wait and it wait for the curse to end.”

“The curse? Her father’s curse?” Abigail looked back up at Signorina Morini.

Morini eased herself back into the chair opposite Abigail and reached one hand across the table. “The servants, they leave. The brother, the young signore, he never return. Is only two left, waiting and waiting, until the curse is no more.”

“Two left?” Abigail reached out her own hand and touched Morini’s fingertips. They were solid flesh, real beyond question. “You and Giacomo?”

“Si, signorina,” said Morini. Her eyes were still brimming. “Me and Giacomo. I have the indoors, he has the outdoors. I have the ladies, he has the gentlemen.”

“What does that mean?”

“Until the curse is lift. Until the debt, the blood debt of the young lovers, is made to pay.”

“But what is the debt? What must be paid?”

“Signorina, is impossible. You must not ask. For three hundred years, we try and we try, we wait and we wait. Is impossible.”

Abigail leaned forward and took Morini’s other hand in hers. “Please, Morini. Tell me. I swear, I’ll do everything in my power. I’ll bring you justice, I swear it.”

Morini stroked Abigail’s fingertips and looked into her eyes. She sighed, so deeply it seemed to come from the very center of her soul.

“An English, signorina,” she said softly. “An English lord give his true love, pledge his life, to the lady who live in the castle.”

Abigail felt her heartbeat slow, as if time itself were dragging to a halt. “Which English lord, Signorina Morini?” she whispered.

Morini closed her eyes and spoke so quietly, the words nearly dissolved into the air before Abigail could hear them.

“Who is to know, until the deed is done, the curse is broken? I say only, the English lord and his lady, to join in faithful love, before the end of the midsummer moon. To give life again, to give back to the Monteverdi the life it lose.”