<div align="center">The Home of Fausto d’Arellio</div><div align="center">Lucca, Italy</div><div align="center">Spring, 1525</div><br/>It required a certain measure of introspective consideration and self-awareness, in the end, for him to come to terms with being an utter disappointment to those who loved him dearest.<br/><br/>Such intensive reflection should not have been necessary, for his father had spent much of his youth offering clear counsel on his shortcomings. He drank too much, he was told. One might have an eye for women, he heard, but they should reserve the majority of their other parts for one good woman of decent society. Occupation or avocation, even for one of his birthright, spoke of a man’s character and worthiness, and in him such qualities were prominently lacking.<br/><br/>His older brothers, both, had made matters simpler. For many years merely surly, then progressively violent as they grew into their age of majority, then ultimately dismissive and absent, they ceased contact with him upon reaching their majority. It was felt, it seemed, that disassociation from him was an important measure in preserving their own precious reputations.<br/><br/>He could not disagree.<br/><br/>Curiously, his sister had for most of his childhood found him amusing and clever, and her company had been the one constant source of joy of his youth. It was not until many years after her untimely death that he had reflected upon the patently inappropriate attentions she had begun to bestow upon him as he entered his teens, and how entirely damaged she had been as an individual. To learn that her death had come at her own hand had shaken him to the core; in later years, there had been two different times when it was only that knowledge that kept him from the same act.<br/><br/>He missed her, still. It made him feel considerably more human when he did so, and he took his devotion to her memory to be an atypical weakness in his otherwise solidly reprehensible character.<br/><br/>While his father had found him distasteful and an embarrassment and his brothers considered him downright loathsome, she had in her own flawed way loved him, and had given up on herself before she ever thought to abandon hope for him.<br/><br/>His mother, though… His mother had for so very long and with such fierce tenacity clung to the delusional hopes that he might not be a miscreant before she gave up; even his frequent and demonstrative performances to the contrary had failed to persuade her otherwise for most of the years of his youth and early adulthood. Still, consistency and the shocking degree of the evidence which he provided had, at last, won out.<br/><br/>On quiet nights these days, when too much wine and too few distractions combined to produce a state of melancholy rich enough to drag him back to the last days of his youth in the south, he could still feel the sting of her slap as she cast him from his boyhood home. A frail and delicate woman, the look in her eyes had caused pain so excruciatingly more lasting than did the slight force of her tiny hand.<br/><br/>He had paid women to hit him harder, even then, and to leave brighter blossoms of red upon his skin. Still, no woman had ever<em>hurt</em>him as she did that day.<br/><br/>It was fair trade, he knew, for no man had ever disappointed or hurt her as he, her favored son had done throughout his youth.<br/><br/>Regrets had compiled like debts in those days, and being cast out had at lasted forced him to consider the enormity of his transgressions towards his family. That he did so from the regrettable viewpoint of one largely bereft of any notable measure of decency or self-respect narrowed the options he considered. In the end, of course, he defined only two.<br/><br/>He could have buckled under the enormity or their imposing weight, broken and splintered under their unrelenting crush. It could have been a defining moment in a misspent youth, that clarion call to reformation that would have lead him back to the loving graces of his family, the renewed adoration of society, and the promise of a respectable life.<br/><br/>Or, as hopeless debtors more often did, he could have packed up and left his home by the Serchio in the middle of the night, never again to see the walls of his beloved Lucca or the family he left behind.<br/><br/>He rode from the city gates well before dawn one morning in the spring of his twenty-second year, and as he did so he briefly pondered if he should have left a note, a letter explaining his departure. Resigned that his failure to do so would simply be added to the body of his work in disappointment, he continued to ride north, and towards a new life.<br/><br/>-------------------------------------------------------------<br/><br/><div align="center">One of the Warehouses of Alessandro d’Arellio</div><div align="center">Rialto Island</div><div align="center">Venice, Italy</div><div align="center">Summer, 1546</div><br/><div class="floatright">(http://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/c/ca/Marek_Alessandro.jpg)</div>“Master Alessandro, the girls.”<br/><br/>The young man in his too-bright yellow silks of last year’s fashion said it with such seriousness and formality, clearly hoping to impress his employer with his demeanor, and though the attempt was laughable it nonetheless reminded Alessandro of the gravity of the moment. He was deciding the fate of this new batch of young women, was he not? Another group, destined to ply their trade in one of the perfumed chambers or satiny boudoirs of Alessandro’s many holdings?<br/><br/>He wondered, at times, where they came from, what their stories were. Were they perhaps not dissimilar from himself, some of them? Refugees from homes which might no longer contain them, by economy or tolerance? Cast out by circumstance or fate, mayhaps – widows, or orphans, or worse? Or were they, many, girls that possessed a measure of themselves and had simply come to terms with the fact that the life they now entered held appeal to which they could not admit in open society?<br/><br/>Those were the good ones, the ones that went up.<br/><br/>It mattered little, he supposed. He could neither pass hypocritical judgment upon them nor summon disingenuous displays of charitable concern towards them. They were creatures such as he, in the end, and that was enough.<br/><br/>Though still laced through with those despicable and lascivious characteristics of his youth which had forced him from his home so long ago, however, Alessandro had at least over the past twenty-one years developed a certain business acumen in his chosen profession; putting the new girls where they belonged was important, and he therefore looked up from his table and gave the young man his attention.<br/><br/>“Bring them in. One at a time. You know the routine.”<br/><br/>The warehouse in which they sat was largely cocooned in deep darkness, with the sole source of light coming from one high window and pooling about the area where Alessandro sat. Alongside the warehouse, outside in the warm and humid air, there would be a large gondola, which upon its arrival had contained some twenty young women about to learn their fate as they were brought from the darkness and into the light of his presence. Alessandro knew they waited silently in the dark, and he smiled proudly at the theater of the moment, his own creation.<br/><br/>At the lushly and fashionably set table, there in the light, he and Nicoletta were awaiting them, taking their midday meal as though at some fashionable café.<br/><br/><em>Nicoletta.</em><br/><br/>Ostensibly, Nicoletta was the matron of their several enterprises together and Alessandro was the financier; such an arrangement both satisfied the bewildering array of laws regarding the sale of flesh in his adopted city and kept Alessandro largely free to do with his time and money as he chose. Still, he was not the sort of man that could keep his… hand… out of the affairs of the women that worked for him, and the induction of new girls into his employ was always a day he looked forward to, and a process which he reserved final authority over for himself.<br/><br/>For her part, his beloved Nicoletta both recognized the expertise of her employer and indulged the diversions of her long-time lover, for Alessandro was one and the same to her. Some ten years younger than he, she had once worked for him, only to rise in his favor until they were now inseparable. It amused her to watch him consider each girl carefully and decide whether she was to be sent ‘up’ or ‘down’. As she regarded him, she wondered how many he might choose to take to his bed for a brief time, though the thought caused her no consternation.<br/><br/>Jealousy, in their world, was a trait that simply made no sense, or so she thought.<br/><br/>There were, ultimately, two distinct tiers of the profession into which the new girls were entering. Those who went ‘up’ did so because they either had the proper breeding and background or the clear potential to learn those traits needed to excel as a true courtesan. They were the treasures, bright and glittering gems that could win a wealthy man’s heart and secure for herself – and Alessandro and Nicoletta – countless riches and a life of great comfort.<br/><br/>Nicoletta had been a courtesan, and one of the finest, until Alessandro had plucked her for himself and named her matron of his ventures. He had moved her into his home that same day, and she had never been happier on all accounts. Position might be secured, and wealth won, but true love did not come often enough for courtesans. That she and the incorrigible man she adored had found it with each other was extraordinary, and a gift.<br/><br/>On the other end of the spectrum from the courtesans, though, were those that went ‘down’, destined to be common whores in one of the many brothels that dotted the landscape of Rialto Island. It was only on Rialto that such a fixture of Venetian society was allowed to exist, for there must be rules that governed and contained such practices, or so it was thought.<br/><br/>It amused Alessandro to note that his brothels were not just ‘allowed to exist’, but were in fact courted by the state and encouraged. His businesses and his girls were confined to the main inland of the city, but were also courted as a necessity in order for Venice to survive and flourish, and the thought amused him continuously. There were even proscribed signs of the trade, enforced by the crown itself, and with a glance Alessandro noted the box of yellow silk scarves on a low table just at the edge of the pool of light. All women who plied the trade into which these new girls were entering must carry such a device, so as to notify proper society of her nature and profession.<br/><br/>That it served as an important means of attracting customers was a delightful side effect, and it was for that very reason that Alessandro provided his girls with scarves of silk rather than the common cotton his competitors used. Implied quality, in all things, was important.<br/><br/><em>’If you do away with whores, the world will be consumed with lust.’</em><br/><br/>Saint Augustine of Hippo had said it, so many years ago, and the state recognized that even now in these enlightened times the unshakable fact remained. It was over two centuries ago, in 1358, that prostitution in Venice had not only been legalized but<em>encouraged</em>as a measure against unchecked male ‘desires’; it was better, or so the thought went, to give men a place to vent such urges rather than have them frustrated and seeking some source of release upon their own.<br/><br/>Alessandro, for his part, agreed.<br/><br/>Such thoughts made him smile even as the first girl was led into the room. Her brunette head was slightly down as she walked, though she did look to meet his and Nicoletta’s eyes as she had been instructed. The downward slope of her shoulders and the self-conscious manner in which she sought to shield her body as the light on her thin and gauzy garments showed the contours and delights of her tight little body made the decision clear even before she spoke.<br/><br/>“My name is Lucia, Master.” Her voice was thin and reedy, and had a quaver that showed her nerves.<br/><br/>“Down.” Alessandro said it matter-of-factly, and looked to Nicoletta as she nodded dismissively in concurrence. Satisfied, Alessandro gave his blessing for the event to continue.<br/><br/>“Next.”<br/><br/>Sipping at his wine, his eyebrows raised as the next girl entered the room. She walked ahead of the flustered young man attempting to lead her, as if she neither required nor welcomed his assistance in the matter, and stopped boldly in the center of the pool of light. There was grace and elegance in her movements, and a confidence that caused Alessandro to smile. He noted with approval the manner in which the girl took in both he and Nicoletta, and that her keen eye seemed to register how they were both exquisitely appointed in expensive renditions of the most contemporary fashions. Silks and brocades, lace and satins. Money on display, and refinement made plain, for this was Venice.<br/><br/>The girl seemed drink them in with her eyes, gliding over the plum of Alessandro’s suite to the pale blue of Nicoletta’s, and it was clear that she saw her future in the two powerful people to whom she now presented herself.<br/><br/>“I am called Vittoria, Master d’Arellio. Mistress.” She shifted ever so slightly, the better to show her form, and her blue eyes sparkled in the filtered sunlight in stark contrast to the rich auburn of her hair. Her voice was musical and warm, and Alessandro imagined it making the sounds of delight which would make a man’s mind reel as it gasped and moaned his name.<br/><br/>“Up.” Alessandro and Nicoletta had spoken enthusiastically at the same time, and laughed as they lightly clinked their glasses in a toast to their success.<br/><br/>Vittoria would make them a fortune, and the fact that the girl smiled back at them over her shoulder as she picked up her scarf told them that she not only knew it, but was delighted at such an arrangement.<br/><br/>It went that way for another twenty minutes, until only three girls remained to be seen, when she entered.<br/><br/>She was thin, but not so thin as not to have a body that positively demanded a man’s attention. Her eyes were bright and her gaze steady, but with a hint of shyness that made a man want to win her trust and heart.<br/><br/>She was beautiful, beyond compare, in an understated and dignified way. She was every girl he might have loved, had he not been such a man as he was. She was the promise of a life which he had let slip away through the copious cracks and fault lines of his own character.<br/><br/>Alessandro had been in the process of setting his wine glass down when she walked in with her calm poise. His arm still hung over the table, for he had stopped moving as he watched her, and he could feel Nicoletta’s eyes upon him in curiosity.<br/><br/>“Serafina, Master. My name is Serafina.”<br/><br/>Softly, his voice barely above a whisper, he spoke. “Angel. Yes. Yes, that you are, aren’t you?”<br/><br/>Her smile was soft, and delicate, and utterly devoid of artifice. It had made her smile, this girl of nineteen, that a powerful man had found her special, and she had therefore graced him with her smile.<br/><br/>“House. Send her to my house.”<br/><br/>Alessandro could hear the slight intake of breath through Nicoletta’s teeth as he said it, and he knew that the finality in his tone and the fact that he had not even looked to his matron before pronouncing his decision might have stung her. Still, she had never been jealous before, and he knew that she would forgive this indulgence on his part.<br/><br/>He turned to regard Nicoletta as his confused man led Serafina away, obviously uncertain how to proceed, for such an utterance had never been made before at one of these inductions. His matron regarded him with a smile, at least for appearance sake in front of their employees, although it was clear that she did not entirely endorse or welcome this unexpected and unprecedented development.<br/><br/>“Master… Mistress… Thank you.”<br/><br/>The voice was soft, and delicate, and yet it carried through the darkened warehouse with enough clarity to startle both Alessandro and Nicoletta as it reached them from outside the pool of light.<br/><br/>Alessandro looked to Nicoletta, as if hopeful that the girl’s manners might somehow make her presence in their home less intrusive.<br/><br/>“Yes, my darling girl. You are most welcome.” He smiled as he said it, and was relieved to see the bemused and indulgent smile as it slowly crept its way across his beloved Nicoletta’s lovely face.