Page 2 of Peasants and Kings
There was a folded letter inside with my name scrolled in her elegant handwriting.
But that wasn’t all. I grabbed the thick envelope and turned it upside down so its contents spilled out. Bundles of bright green bills tumbled onto the questionable paisley bedspread.
I reached for the letter and unfolded it. It was written in Italian, my mother’s native language.
Dear Sterling,
I’ve started this letter so many times, never feeling like I said everything I needed to say or that I was able to say it coherently.
So, I guess I’ll start writing and pray this is a decent goodbye.
God, I wish there had been more time.
There are so many things I want to tell you. So many moments I wish I could do over. Our estrangement hurts me more than you know. And you may not understand this because you’re not a mother, but everything I did, every choice I made, and every town I moved us to was to protect you.
It’s always been about you, Sterling.
There is nothing—NOTHING—a mother wouldn’t do to protect her child, as I’ve tried to protect you. Even by committing this cardinal sin, I have to believe that God will forgive me because in taking my own life, I have given you a chance to live yours.
It was the only way.
All these years, I’ve let you think the worst of me. That I was unreliable, that I couldn’t ever hold down a job long enough to give you roots or provide a good life for you. The lie was easier to believe than the truth, a truth I never wanted to share with you, but now I must because your survival is at stake.
What I’m about to tell you means life or death for you, Sterling.
Do you remember the stories I told you when you were a child? About a beautiful princess who rode bareback on a great black stallion through the luscious green forest and rolling hills of her family’s estate? An estate so grand and opulent that it rivaled the great palaces of Europe? Those stories weren’t fiction. They weren’t made up to lull you to sleep with your head full of dreams and whimsy. Those were stories from my own childhood.
I come from a family called Moretti, and we can trace our lineage back to The Crusades. Within our veins runs the blood of the Compagnia Bianca del Falco, known as The White Company. We are fantastically wealthy Italian mercenaries that yield great power and influence amongst Western Europe, and our family name is known within elite circles.
We are one of the five powerful families who control Italy. The other families are Lanza, Borgia, Sforza, and the Foscari.
Power, bloodlines, archaic alliances…that is all my family—and the other four families—care about. A feud had erupted between our family and the Foscari, but in our world, grievances can be mended if bloodlines are united…
For that reason, before I was even born, I was promised to a Foscari for a grand marriage that would unite two great Italian families, putting an end to past injustices. But when I was seventeen, I fell in love with a boy who was not my intended. Foolish, young, and drunk on first love, we married in secret beneath the stars. We plotted and planned how to flee, wishing to escape the bonds of our social classes. We chose love over family and obligation.
When the Foscari learned of my betrayal, they found and murdered my husband—your father—in cold blood. After the punishment was complete, the families still wished to join our bloodlines and even though I was no longer a virgin, the Foscari were willing to forge ahead with the marriage. Secrets can be kept within families, but a public failure to unite the bloodlines was impermissible.
Grieving the loss of my love, I was numb to everything around me. I had plans to go through with the marriage. After all, I saw the power of the Foscari firsthand, the brutality of them. What choice did I have?
But then I realized I was pregnant with you.
For myself, I was willing to be a sacrificial lamb. But God knows what they would’ve done if they’d realized I was pregnant with a peasant’s child. The child of a man they had no qualms about murdering. What would they do to you to protect their own family name, their own legacy?
I went to the Catholic Church to seek guidance, and there I crossed paths with a nun, Sister Agatha, who was sympathetic to my situation. She saw my marriage to your father as valid in the eyes of God and believed her duty was to protect you and me from such horrible people at all costs. You were not even born yet, but she knew what would happen when you were. Risking her own life, she helped me escape to the United States and stayed with me here until you were more than a year old. I changed my last name to Miller, wanting nothing more than to disappear and to blend in, leaving the Moretti name behind forever. I wanted to shield you from what I feared most in this world…
I know it sounds like I’ve lost my mind, but you need to trust me, Sterling. It’s all so very real.
I know how hard it’s been all these years, never settling down long enough for you to form lasting friendships, never letting you get too close to anyone except for Tiffany. Against my better judgement, I let you have one summer. A golden summer of fun and laughter. It was dangerous, but necessary. I’ve never seen your smile so carefree as I did that summer. Tiffany saved you in a way that I couldn’t.
I’m sorry I had to rip you away from that small glimmer of normal life. I’m sorry for the years of animosity between us, but I hope you can understand why it had to be this way.
You are in great danger, Sterling.
The Foscari have never stopped hunting me, and even though I’ve managed to evade them, they finally found Sister Agatha. Something went wrong. A slip of the tongue, a comment in passing, someone she knew who had connections back home. She died a horrible death to try to protect us, but no one can withstand torture. She knew you were alive, knew your given name, and she had already seen you begin to grow as a child. There was no hiding your eyes from her…
You have a genetic trait called heterochromia. That in and of itself is not unheard of, but once or twice every generation, a Moretti woman is born with one turquoise colored eye and the other a vibrant green. It wasn’t random like I told you when you were a child.
Though Sister Agatha knew about your Moretti trait, that was all she knew. She couldn’t lead them directly to you, only tell them that twenty-four years ago, I had born a healthy baby girl.
