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The old man emerged from the study with red-rimmed eyes.
He hadn’t expected to encounter such a thing.
Indeed… that woman...
Hedy let out a sigh of relief, thinking that at least this commission was resolved.
She stared at the colorful murals in the palace for a while, her mind suddenly bringing up a familiar yet unfamiliar term: Prussian blue.
Prussian blue, also known as Berlin blue, is a deep, clear color with an indescribable beauty.
Hedy suddenly saw a similar hue in the duke’s mural.
Modern paints are easy to mix because they are chemically stable, and with a little water, they blend easily. But in this era, where even the progress of chemistry was waiting for alchemiststo unlock its secrets, mixing paints was much more difficult and prone to failure.
She couldn’t quite recall the exact origin of this pigment, but she had heard related stories. After all, Prussian blue was used as the color for German military uniforms before World War I.
Was this blue color perhaps also called "iron blue"?
Iron rusts and turns red, so why would it turn blue?
Due to the passage of many years, recalling certain knowledge had become quite a challenge.
The duke didn’t invite them to a meal, only sending a message with Da Vinci for the lord.
On the way back, Hedy continued to ponder the issue, feeling as though she were trapped in a maze.
Da Vinci, originally thinking about the duke’s secrets, noticed her distracted state and curiously asked, “What are you thinking about?”
“Iron,” she responded instinctively.
Hedy hadn’t intended to discuss this with Da Vinci, but she briefly explained her thoughts.
“Iron is a fascinating substance,” Da Vinci remarked. “It can turn red, it can turn green—it’s like a chameleon.”
“I suddenly remembered that my teacher once said you could extract some kind of blue from iron.”
“Isn’t there already the blue from copper sulfate ores?” Da Vinci replied. “Thanks to this ore, the prices of the once-expensive lapis lazuli have started to drop.”
“That’s the blue of a clear sky,” Hedy said, still somewhat fixated. “Iron blue should be... a color like the deep sea.”
Deep, heavy, and quieting to the soul.
They returned to the Palazzo Vecchio to rest briefly and have some communication.
Da Vinci relayed the business updates to Lorenzo and explained the progress on the blood type paper. He then called Hedyto accompany him to the workshop to look at the dissection manuscripts he had been organizing.
As Hedy was about to get into the carriage, a thought suddenly crossed her mind. After confirming that there were no prying ears nearby, she quietly asked Da Vinci a question.
"Do you... have a darkroom?"
Da Vinci chuckled. "I really enjoy engineering, so of course, I designed one for myself."
Hedy appeared uneasy and a bit nervous. She took out a willow wood box and brought the key and lock along with it.
"I’d like to ask you... to keep a few things for me."
Da Vinci hesitated for a moment but quickly nodded. "Hmm, I won’t let anyone else know."
