Still Star-Crossed (2 page)

Those days of romping throughout the palace and House Capulet, teasing Isabella’s older brother, Escalus, and driving Juliet’s nurse to distraction, had been the happiest of Rosaline’s life. Her parents had still been alive then. Her mother was a sister to Lord Capulet, and her father a nobleman from the Western coast; she and Livia were not so grand as their little cousin Juliet, but they were assured of their place in Verona.

But when Rosaline was eleven her father died, and everything
began to change. All the misfortune she had been spared during her happy childhood seemed to arrive in the space of the next few years. As their father had no son, most of his lands and fortunes had gone to a distant relative, leaving the girls and their mother in greatly reduced circumstances. Princess Maria died giving birth to a stillborn babe not long after, and Isabella was sent away to be fostered with the royal family of Sicilia, ending their family’s close association with the palace. Rosaline’s mother had never recovered from the shock of her husband’s loss, and had followed him into death not two years later. Gone were the days when Rosaline and her family lived in a fine house in the center of town, and counted the richest and noblest young ladies in the city as their dearest companions. Instead, Rosaline and Livia had come to live with Lady Capulet’s mother, Rosaline’s great-aunt by marriage. The Duchess of Vitruvio’s estate was on the edge of the city, but it sometimes felt as though they’d moved to another continent. The ambitious Lord and Lady Capulet no longer considered them fit playmates for their daughter, and had all but banished their nieces from their house. Thereafter, they’d seen Juliet only at feasts a few times a year, and then usually at a distance.

It was in those terrible years that Rosaline had grieved for Juliet. Then that she’d weathered the anger and loneliness as she’d learned to comfort a crying Livia, too young to understand why their friend no longer invited them to call. And so now what pierced Rosaline’s heart was that she no longer knew the young lady who’d slain herself in the Capulet tomb at all.

Rosaline sighed, running her fingers over the window’s sill, allowing the vision of the sweet, spoiled child Juliet had been to fade from her mind. Despite all her and Livia’s misfortunes, their current state was well enough. They shared a small, modest cottage toward the back of her great-aunt’s property, and the duchess, who had little interest in the doings of her poor wards, left them mostly to their own devices. If they were ignored by their Capulet kin, Rosaline was not sorry—the summer’s events had surely shown that being a member of the Capulets’ circle was as much a curse as a blessing. And after their mother’s death a rich merchant from Messina had rented their house for a surprisingly generous amount, allowing Livia and Rosaline enough to live on, and to wed when the time came. Well, for Livia to wed, at least. Rosaline’s plans for herself were somewhat different.

Rosaline would never breathe a word of it to her family, but her grief for Juliet was no greater than that she felt for Juliet’s Montague lover. Every time Rosaline thought of Romeo, she was engulfed in a wave of guilt so great she half wished it could wash her away altogether.

Stop it
, she told herself angrily.
Thou knowest that thou couldst not have saved him. Saved any of them
.

But it wasn’t true. All Verona knew that there was at least one man she could have saved. For before he loved Juliet, Romeo had loved her. And now the sweet, lovesick boy was dead.

Prince Escalus rode swiftly out from town.

His doublet was stuck to his back with sweat and he could feel his stallion, Venitio, straining beneath him, but he neither stopped nor slowed as Verona’s walls receded behind him. His daily ride outside the city was the one pleasure he allowed himself in these troubled times, and of late it seemed he had to ride farther and farther afield to escape the sensation that the city would suffocate him.

He’d awoken that morning shaking from a nightmare in which the former monarchs of the city gathered at his bedside to condemn his failure to prevent the slaughter of Verona’s youth. All day it had stayed with him, his mind reflexively mounting counterarguments for his accusing ancestors.
I tried to stop them. Their animosity was too deeply rooted. I have ended it at last
. He tried to bring his mind to bear on that—how he’d induced House Montague and House Capulet to raise statues in memory of each other’s children. He’d been there three days prior when the two lords had unveiled them, in an uneasy but determined show of public unity—Romeo and Juliet, golden and beautiful and together forever. Lammas Day, it was, the first of August, and her father’s voice kept breaking as he gazed on Juliet’s likeness, for it would have been her fourteenth birthday, had she lived. But he’d promised peace as loudly as he could, as had old Montague. None of it seemed to prevent Escalus from imagining his father’s disappointed frown.

Well. There was no time for regrets. Both houses had promised an end to the violence; he would do whatever it took to make them keep to their vows, especially since some
vicious vandal had already defaced Juliet’s memorial. He had a duty to his city.

However much he might currently long to keep riding and riding and leave it behind for good.

With a sigh, he reined Venitio down to a walk at last. The horse complied with a nicker of complaint—his appetite for speed outpaced Escalus’s own. The trees threw long shadows on the road, whose orange dust was darkened to a deep bloodred by the late afternoon sun. It was nearly sunset; time to return to the city. But just as he was about to turn around, he spotted a cloud of dust fast approaching down the road. What in the world—

Oh!

Escalus urged an eager Venitio back to a gallop. As they approached the cloud of dust, it resolved itself into a carriage, surrounded by half a dozen well-armed horsemen. The driver shouted a command to halt as he approached.

“Stand down!” the captain of the horsemen called to him. “Are you friend or foe?”

The man must be a foreigner. Escalus dressed simply for his daily rides, but his subjects in and around the city knew his face. He was about to tell the stranger who he was when the door of the coach opened, and a tall, slim lady emerged. Her gown was rich and her golden hair wound about her head in braids in a style unknown in Verona, but her grin was as familiar as his own face in the mirror.

“Peace, good Captain,” she said. “ ’Tis only my brother. Well met, Escalus.”

“Well met indeed, Isabella.” He moved to help her down
from the carriage and embrace her, feeling a smile spread across his own face—an unaccustomed sensation of late. “I had not expected your party to arrive for several days yet.”

“We made good time from Messina, once my husband’s friends could be persuaded to let me depart. But I could wait no longer to come home.” She laughed in delight. “Verona! How I’ve longed for it in the years since my departure. You must hold a feast for me, Escalus, so I may reacquaint myself with all our old friends.” Escalus smiled but made no reply, and Isabella looked at him quizzically. “I hope I have not arrived in advance of my welcome.”

Escalus shook his head. “Not at all. Your visit is the only good news I have had this fortnight.”

Isabella frowned. “Why? What has passed in our fair city?”

Escalus looked away. “ ’Tis too heavy a tale for one weary from travel. How doth His Grace your husband?”

“Don Pedro is all things mild and kind and virtuous. He stayed in Messina to visit friends. Pray do not try to change the subject. What is it, Escalus?”

He winced. His sister might be a woman grown and a princess in her own right, but she still had an uncanny ability to demand he speak of topics he most wished to avoid. “ ’Tis something touching the Montagues and Capulets.”

Isabella rolled her eyes. “Another street brawl?”

Escalus choked back a grim laugh at that description of the death toll. “Among other things. Come, ride with me and I shall tell you of it.”

Her men brought her a mount. He helped her a-horseback
and they made for the city slowly, her guards and carriage trailing behind. “Sister, do you remember young Juliet?” he asked.

She nodded. “Rosaline’s little cousin, mean you? Old Capulet’s child.”

Few people would describe the flower of the Capulets as “Rosaline’s cousin,” but of course Rosaline had been Isabella’s particular friend when they were children and Rosaline of Tirimo’s mother was a lady-in-waiting in the palace. Escalus himself had spent most days in Rosaline’s company, before he’d been sent away to be fostered—his father had thought it best that both his children live and study in other courts, to be better acquainted with the world outside Verona. Except for one or two short visits, Isabella had been absent from Verona for the past six years, and thus had been spared the worst of the feud. He scarcely saw Rosaline now; four years ago when his father died and he’d come home to be crowned, the merry, clever child had been replaced by a solemn, orphaned young maid, and he himself had been too consumed with royal duties to pass the time with childhood playfellows. “Aye, she was. Juliet is dead.”

“Dead!”

“Aye. Three weeks ago in high July she met with Romeo, son and heir of old Montague. It seems they wed in secret.”

Isabella’s eyes grew wide. “A son of Montague, wed to a lady of Capulet? ’Twere wise they spoke not of it.”

“Aye.” Escalus’s jaw was set. “Though rash and unadvised they were in all other things. Impetuous fools. In any case, Juliet’s cousin Tybalt took a dislike to Romeo and his fellows,
and challenged him on the street to a duel. Romeo’s friend took up his part and was slain at Tybalt’s hand.”

“Romeo’s friend? Another Montague, I suppose?”

“Nay, sister.” Escalus drew close so he could lay a hand over Isabella’s. “ ’Twas Mercutio.”

Isabella pulled sharply on the reins. “Ay me! Mercutio? Our kinsman?”

“Even so.”

“I pray you did not let his murderer go free, brother.”

“Would I had had the chance to punish him. After he cut Mercutio down, Tybalt was himself slain by Romeo straightaway.”

Isabella’s hands were clenched tightly on the reins. Her sunny smile was replaced with a frown. How heavily Verona’s woes returned to those who escaped them. “Good.”

“Isabella! I forbid thee to speak so. Verona must understand that the Crown’s justice—”

“Hang the Crown’s justice,” said Isabella. “And I am a princess now, Escalus; thou canst forbid me nothing. If young Romeo avenged Mercutio’s death, I will thank him for that.”

“Not in this world, thou shalt not. I exiled Romeo for his part in this bloodshed and he fled Verona, leaving his young Capulet wife in her parents’ house. They, unknowing, had arranged for her to wed the county Paris.” Isabella shuddered; Count Paris was another of their kinsmen. “Aye, this sorry tale hath many noble souls ensnared. To escape this adulterous union, Juliet enlisted the help of a friar to feign her death so that she could escape and join her love.”

“Feign death?”

“Aye. The friar gave her a potion that induced a sleep so deep it appeared that life had fled. We entombed her with all sadness in the crypt of her ancestors, where her love was to find her, but he never received the message that was sent and heard only that she had died. Romeo returned to find what he thought was her corpse, and slew himself. Juliet woke, found him dead, and swiftly followed him.”

Isabella sat back in the saddle, staring wide-eyed up at the city walls rising before them. Her hands twitched the reins as though she was having second thoughts about visiting the city of her birth. “In the name of God, a fearful passage. I chose an unhappy time for my homecoming. All those young lives … Tell me that cousin Paris at least kept clear of all this.”

Escalus shook his head. “Romeo slew him at the gate of Juliet’s tomb.”

“All this began three weeks ago, you say?”

“Nearly. As best as we can tell, Romeo and Juliet met at a feast of her father’s on the fourteenth day of July, and they wed and died within a week.”

“And now? Are the houses at peace?”

Escalus gave a heavy shrug. “So they say. The grieving parents have sworn that the deaths of their children have cured them of their enmity. They have even raised statues of the two lovers at their tomb.”

Isabella threw him a sharp glance. “But you have little faith in this oath.”

“If generations could not cure their ire, will a summer of murder really do so? Old Montague and Capulet mean well
enough, but they’ve little control over the youths of their houses, who walk the streets day and night, their hands hovering at their swords. ’Tis but a matter of time.”

“Thou know’st not so. Wilt thou not let them prove their penitence?”

“More likely they will disprove it with the bodies of more of my subjects.” Escalus shook his head. “No, ’twill take more than pretty statues to bring peace to my city.”

“Your city. You sound like Father.”

“Father kept the peace until the day he died.”

“After a fashion. Montagues and Capulets aplenty slew each other under his reign. What mean you to do?”