Chapter 24: I Heard You
Ferrante sat beneath the grape trellis on the colonnade. Lush green leaves, as large as an adult’s palm, hung down, and curling vines wrapped around the slender, plaster columns. Sunlight, dappled like shattered gold, filtered through the gaps and fell on Ferrante’s legs. The dark-haired youth tilted his head back slightly with the curve of his profile smooth and flowing, his high nose bridge and a delicate jaw. He looked like Narcissus, sitting by the lake in deep thought.
He felt a little cold.
It was a sensation he hadn’t felt in a long time, but thinking back, it was only a few months ago that he was wearing the thin robes of the church, gritting his teeth and enduring illness brought on by the cold wind, feeling the sensation of an ever-present chill eroding his skin.
And now, the Papal Palace had provided him with warm clothes and delicious food, making him quickly forget those days of hunger and cold. He had mistakenly thought he had always lived in such a magnificent palace. What was this, a rubbish instinct for warmth?
But reality would eventually wake him from his dream.
He stripped off the uniform of the Papal Guard – a rather formal outfit, consisting of a white silk shirt, a double-breasted coat and trousers, a short white cape slung across his chest, and calf-length leather boots, all topped with a triangular hat adorned with white thorn and lily patterns, symbolizing the Holy See and the Pope. In the uniform of the Papal Guard, everyone could look tall and handsome; the uniform erased the barriers of wealth and origin. For a long time, Ferrante even forgot where he had grown up.
He unconsciously touched the cold, smooth fabric of his sleeve. This expensive silk came from the distant East, a vast empire that produced spices and silk. Countless covetous eyes were fixed upon it, but due to the empire’s formidable military strength, no nation could cross the strait and set foot on that land flowing with gold and fragrance.
In the past, Ferrante didn’t even know that such precious fabric existed. It was as soft as water and as light as moonlight, shimmering with a gem-like lustre under the sun.
These were gifts that François gave to the most beautiful boys and girls in the garden, and just like the diamond brooches, tiaras, and ivory that were given away in piles – they were trivial things in his eyes.