Chapter 58

The forty lashes were not a punishment severe enough to kill a robust adult man, but they were certainly not light enough for him to walk home on his own. After being whipped on his bare upper body until it was torn to shreds, Jano had to receive the remaining lashes on his buttocks, leaving him unable to sit or lie down. In the dead of night, he was carried to the residence of Cardinal de Mare, lying face down on a stretcher, groaning in pain.

Lucrezia was also there, having been brought in early in the evening after fainting. When Cardinal de Mare returned home late from his duties, he was greeted with a chaotic scene.

Cardinal de Mare summoned all the household members to the first-floor living room, including the groaning Jano.

He gritted his teeth and asked Jano,

“I have provided you with a home, clothes, and food for the past 22 years. Why did you harm my daughter today?”

Sobered by the forty lashes, Jano, unlike his behavior before Pope Leo III, tried to defend himself with a semblance of reason.

“It was because Isabella asked me to!”

His plan was to use Isabella as a shield, knowing that Cardinal de Mare cherished his eldest daughter the most. However, Isabella's beautiful eyes widened in shock.

“Are you crazy!”

“I never said that!”

Isabella had no intention of helping Jano in front of her father.

“Dad, Jano is lying! He lied to His Majesty the King, saying he didn’t shoot Ariadne, and now he’s making excuses for himself at home!”

Isabella, who had once flirted with Jano with a honeyed voice, now treated him like a subordinate, sternly reprimanding him and cutting him off.

Jano, surprised by the unexpected turn of events, argued with Isabella.

“You told me to ‘teach that girl a lesson’!”

This was Jano’s interpretation. Strictly speaking, it was Jano who first suggested “teaching that girl a lesson,” and Isabella had only passively agreed. The clever Isabella immediately pointed this out.

“You were the one who said you’d ‘teach her a lesson.’ When did I ever ask you to do it first?”

Isabella was so indignant that she could have jumped out of her skin. This time, she had a legitimate reason to be indignant.

“Besides, I thought you’d just scold her or give her a taste of her own medicine at home. Who would have thought you’d shoot a crossbow at someone in the hunting grounds?”

“It was aimed at the horse!”

Jano had already rationalized this part to himself, even though he had fired the crossbow without caring if it hit a person.

Isabella, judging that she couldn’t reason with this brute, turned to Cardinal de Mare and pleaded with her father.

“Dad, I swear I never asked him to do it. I might have failed to stop him, but I’m not the kind of person who would pay someone to shoot a crossbow!”

Cardinal de Mare had a different kind of doubt.

“Isabella, why do you hate Ariadne so much? Is it because she’s your half-sister?”

“No!”

Isabella hastily denied it, fearing she would be seen as a sibling who lacked affection. In the Etruscan Kingdom, it was considered vulgar to favor one child over another because of a different mother.

In fact, Isabella hated Ariadne because she felt threatened by her glory, not because of a different mother. She would have treated her the same way even if they were full siblings.

“Ariadne is always so arrogant and disrespectful!”

“Arrogant and disrespectful? Your sister?”

“Arrogant and disrespectful! She’s spoiled and doesn’t know the fear of her cousins!”

Jano, who couldn’t distinguish between right and wrong, chimed in. He was more annoyed by Ariadne’s disregard for him than by Isabella’s betrayal.

Isabella was typically beautiful, known for her beauty, and was the daughter of a wealthy aunt and a well-educated noble. In Jano’s mind, she was superior to him.

Being treated poorly by someone he considered superior was something Jano could tolerate.

But Ariadne, born to a servant and raised on a rural farm, was, in Jano’s mind, someone who should be beneath him. He resented her for defying him, which he found intolerable.

Cardinal de Mare looked at Ariadne with a bewildered expression, then alternated his gaze between Jano and Isabella.

“How arrogant and disrespectful could your sister have been to make you shoot a crossbow at her in the Orte forest and have her rescued by a stranger? Spending a night in the forest would be a fatal blow to her reputation! What kind of attitude could have led you to do such a thing to your own sister, to my child?”

Cardinal de Mare’s voice was rising. Although his anger was somewhat misplaced, it was still anger.

Despite managing the Basilica of St. Ercole without ever raising his voice, he had been raising his voice more frequently at home lately.

“Your sister is always cooped up at home reading books. What kind of terrible thing could she have done?”

“Dad! She called me a ‘fucking bitch’ and said she’d ‘drown me’!”

“What?”

Cardinal de Mare doubted his own ears.

“Where did you learn such vulgar language?”

“Ariadne said it! Not me!”

Cardinal de Mare massaged his temples.

“Isabella, are you now lying to defame your sister?”

Isabella was truly indignant this time, but the many lies she had told in the past were now catching up with her.

Cardinal de Mare believed that Isabella had asked Jano to “teach Ariadne a lesson,” a reasonable suspicion given her previous attempts to defame Ariadne at her debutante ball.

Having made up his mind, Cardinal de Mare pronounced his judgment on Isabella.

“I have never interfered with your behavior outside. I thought you could distinguish what was important and what wasn’t. No matter how much you dislike her, your sister is still a member of our family and a comrade who must face difficulties together!”

Isabella, reading the tone of Cardinal de Mare, turned pale. He continued without regard for her reaction.

“Wherever you go, even to your cousins, you should not speak ill of your own sister! I have been watching you closely. I have given you several chances. But today, you have truly disappointed me.”

He looked at Isabella sternly and pronounced his sentence.

“You will remain in the house for a while and refrain from going out. You will not leave until you have read ‘The Tale of the City of Ladies’ and written a book report for me.”

Considering that Arabella was often confined to her room, eating only dry bread and water, this was a relatively lenient punishment. However, it was the first disciplinary action Isabella had ever received from Cardinal de Mare.

“Dad!”

Despite the lenient punishment, Isabella began to shed tears of indignation. Cardinal de Mare, however, showed no sign of changing his decision.

Turning his head from the crying Isabella, he looked at Jano and spoke sternly.

“And you. I have always considered you human trash.”

Jano was shocked to hear such harsh words from Cardinal de Mare, whom he had always thought of as a generous uncle. This was impossible. Knighthood was Jano’s future, but the generosity of his uncle was the only current source of income for Jano and his family.

“I thought it was a foolish investment when I saw Lucrezia investing in you, but I didn’t care as long as it made her happy. But you are not only useless but also harmful.”

Cardinal de Mare looked at Jano as if he were a bug. Jano shuddered under that cold gaze. The disdainful look from someone he had always considered his equal or even superior was as painful as the lashes he had received.

“You shot an arrow at my daughter’s back. I don’t believe you aimed at the horse. You must have thought it was fine if it hit Ariadne.”

Jano shuddered. How did he know? Could he read his mind?

“A lazy and incompetent person like you wouldn’t have the confidence to hit a horse with an arrow.”

It was a father’s insight into his daughter. Cardinal de Mare, shaking his head, then delivered a chilling sentence in a cold, detached voice.

“Take him away and cut the tendons in his arms. This is the price for shooting a crossbow at my daughter. Cut the tendons in his legs as well. This is the price for shooting a crossbow at my daughter and shamelessly crawling into my house. If the Rossi family has any complaints, tell them to pay blood money and the cost of his upbringing before they can even open their mouths!”

If the tendons in his limbs were cut, Jano would never be able to use a crossbow again. He would not be able to walk properly or work.

The household servants, led by the butler Niccolo, rushed to the pale Jano. Up until that moment, Jano, who had thought he had received all the punishment from the king and had successfully avoided the worst, suddenly became extremely submissive.

“Aunt! Aunt! Please save me!”

“Who is your aunt! You insolent brat!”

Cardinal de Mare’s roar prompted the butler Niccolo to strike Jano with a cudgel, showing his master.

“Ouch!”

With Jano curled up like a shrimp, Cardinal de Mare gave another order.

“Before you take him away, make sure he hears this.”

“Yes, Your Eminence!”

He then turned to Lucrezia, his voice soft and affectionate.

“My dear. You need to understand how much I have supported you.”

Lucrezia, who had been crying uncontrollably upon hearing that Jano’s tendons would be cut, looked up at Cardinal de Mare.

She seemed to have no energy to argue. However, Cardinal de Mare showed no sign of compassion.

“I am a clergyman. I cannot have a family. I cannot give you the position of a legitimate wife. I am sorry for that, but I have tried my best to treat you well.”

His