Miranda did not see Dorothea at all the next day. As her rooms darkened, night sapping the sunlight from every surface, her dread grew stronger. One of the servants she had seen before, a meek girl with furze-colored hair, came to prepare her chambers for sleeping but scurried off as soon as Miranda tried to speak to her. Miranda meant to discover if the girl knew where Dorothea was tonight, if Agata had taken the customary wine with her evening meal, but there was no way to know.
When the girl was gone, Miranda rose from her bed and changed from her nightclothes into the simplest shift she could find in her wardrobe, a garment that might pass as a servant’s at a glance. She combed her fingers through her long hair so that it hung before her face, hoping that the halls would be almost empty at this hour, and that the shadows might act as her shroud.
Dorothea had tucked the key into the space between Miranda’s wooden bed frame and mattress, and as she reached to retrieve it she felt a now-familiar sensation on her skin, a phantom breeze that raised the fine hair on her arms. She turned, half expecting to see the door pushed open and Agata standing there, but it was shut. Her hand closed around cold metal, and she pulled the key from its hiding place. She let it rest for a moment in her palm, taking a deep breath, and then moved towards the door, which opened easily as Miranda inserted the key in its lock.
Outside her chambers, nothing stirred. She stepped gingerly, fearful of her echoing footfalls on the stone floor. As she passed the door to her father’s rooms, she paused mid-step before remembering that his chambers were empty, that he was far from the castle. He had no Ariel to spy for him here, and he would not return from France for days.
She came to Agata’s door and unlocked it before she could think better of it. She eased it open with the barest creaking and crept inside, pulling it shut behind her.
Agata slept in chambers far more austere than Miranda’s own. Her bed was simple and small, and the gilded trinkets and sumptuous touches adorning Miranda’s rooms were absent. In the dim moonlight, Miranda could make out some details of the paintings Agata had hung in place of the grand tapestries she had seen elsewhere in the castle. There was a man with long dark hair and hollow eyes who reminded her a little of Antonio, whose hands bore marks as though the palms had been pierced straight through. She thought that he might be the man on the cross in the Duomo, and the woman in blue in the next portrait his mother. Their gazes seemed to linger on her as she walked towards the bed, where Agata lay on her side, her face turned to the window.
As Dorothea had promised, Agata slept soundly, dead to the world. On her pillow Miranda found a few loose strands of hair and threaded them around her fingers, breathing a sigh of relief. While she trusted Dorothea’s magic, she’d been dreading the thought of plucking hair from Agata’s head, for she could imagine Agata’s thin fingers closing around her wrist, could picture her dark eyes burning as she awoke to find Miranda violating the sanctity of her chambers.
She stood for a moment, watching Agata sleep. In repose, Agata looked happier than Miranda had ever seen her, at far greater peace. The deep lines around her mouth and eyes had smoothed, and she looked ten years younger. Miranda could almost imagine Agata waking and greeting her with kindness, acknowledging Miranda as her kin, for Miranda could see now how much Agata looked like her mother. She longed for Agata to rise and embrace her, to tell her that she had been wrong to treat Miranda with such cruelty, that she and all the citizens of Milan were overjoyed to have Miranda home.
She turned away from the woman and her own foolish thoughts. Near the bed she saw a chest of drawers and bent to examine its contents. She could take something small, something Agata wouldn’t miss, and be on her way. In the top drawers she found instruments for sewing, several long strings of beads with crosses hanging from them, and a thick sheaf of papers, bound with a cardinal ribbon. Miranda drew the papers out of the drawer and squinted at the looping script. They were letters, she saw. Letters addressed to her.
Miranda stared at the letters, uncomprehending. My dearest Miranda. My beloved Miranda. She flipped fumblingly through the pages, her fingers gone numb. We await you in Naples. We ask your father to send you as soon as he’s able. I remain steadfast, my maiden mistress. My queen. My faithful wife.
The adoring pronouncements, in Ferdinand’s hand, blurred before her eyes. Agata couldn’t have concealed messages from Naples from Prospero. She must have acted at his command. Her father had lied to her, from their very first days in Milan. Her father, who had brought them together. Her father, who kept her in this castle, against Ferdinand’s wishes.
Her father clearly owed no fealty to Naples, or truly feared their king. Why, then, had he brought her here to rot? What did he intend by locking her away behind these walls, by separating her from Ferdinand?
Behind her, the bed creaked as Agata shifted in her sleep. Miranda shut the drawer quietly and left with the letters in hand, not caring if Agata noticed their absence. They were hers. They were proof that she had allies beyond these walls. Though all Milan might be against her, she still had friends in Naples.