Veronica COURTESAN (7 page)

Maddalena douses my buttocks with more oil, then she starts massaging my lower cheeks, her breathing heavy. Her fingers graze my labia, and my
figa
moistens
.
Perhaps ’tis thoughts of Marco that are arousing me. ‘Enough,’ I say. I do not wish to corrupt this woman with my wantonness.

‘If you’re sure.’

Is that the hotness of desire that I see in her eyes? Surely not. Must be my imagination. I go to the side table and give her a coin. ‘For making me feel so much better.’

She takes my hand. ‘I could make you feel even better, if you like.’

My mouth loses all its saliva.

Her gaze locking on mine, she unlaces her bodice then lifts off her chemise. She stands in front of me, bare-breasted, her tits small and pert. Maddalena unties her skirt, dropping it to the floor. The bush of her
figa
is dark like the hair on her head, not plucked like mine.

She comes closer. We are the same height. Maddalena turns me around and presses herself against my back and I inhale the scent of lavender and musk. Our bodies fit together like hands in a glove, and my flesh tingles as it feels her softness. She kisses the nape of my neck, her tongue caressing. My
figa
twitches with desire. Maddalena reaches around and strokes my labia.
Gesu Cristo!

I turn and cup my heavy breasts to bring them to Maddalena’s lips. Her tongue licks across my nipples, sending a jolt down to my pearl. We topple onto the bed. Arching my back, I thrust my tits farther into Maddalena’s mouth while she caresses my
figa
; I could reach my joy there and then.

A sound at the door.
Maria santissima!
Andrew strides into the room. He takes a step back. Then he laughs, a deep throaty laugh. ‘I believe this is my time you’re using.’

Maddalena sits up and covers her breasts, clearly startled. ‘I’m so sorry. I don’t know what came over me.’

‘Veronica is what came over you, I believe. Or if she hasn’t done yet she will shortly.’ His laughter booms across the room. ‘Mind if I join you?’

Maddalena gulps, her face scarlet. ‘I’ve never lain with a man before.’

‘You prefer the taste of
figa,
do you?’ Andrew smiles his lopsided grin. ‘Not to worry. We can work this out to our mutual satisfaction. Pray carry on from where I interrupted you.’

‘Andrew,
caro
,’ I say. ‘Maddalena has just soothed my back pain. She’s a healer not a whore.’

My new friend shakes her head. ‘I’m no angel. Although, for a time, I thought I would become a nun. In the convent, the novices had a way of consoling each other that was very much to my taste. I had to leave when Papa died in order to help my mother. I’ve missed the comfort of my friends. Please, let us continue.’

Andrew’s eyes are licking us hungrily. Maddalena’s tits fill my hands, as soft as the inside of a shell. I suck her nipple into my mouth. The feel of it is like a hard cherry against my tongue, flooding me with even more wetness. I take it between my teeth and give it a gentle tug. She lets out a moan, then falls back on the bed, her legs spread wide.

I know what she wants, but can I do this? ‘Suck her, Veronica,’ Andrew says. ‘If you don’t like it you can stop.’

Opening her up with my tongue, I lap at her hot
figa
. She’s tastes of honey and lemon, and, liking it very much, I savour every last drop of her juices.

‘
Oh Dio
,’ she pants, pulling my head in deeper. My own
figa
is slick and swollen, aching to be filled. I lift my arse and rotate it, my baby-filled belly hanging down.

Andrew has stripped off his clothes and has climbed onto the bed. He strokes my nub from behind, and I can feel my joy building from within. Then he slams into my
figa
doggy-style, his prick stretching me while I penetrate Maddalena with two fingers, pushing them deep inside her in the same way Andrew is thrusting into me.

The force of his fucking pushes my face hard into the folds of her
figa
. She grinds against my mouth while I nip and suck at her engorged pearl, feeling it quiver under my tongue as she screams her release and her muscles milk my fingers. I close my eyes, my own joy rippling through me. ‘Ohh!’

Behind me Andrew shudders out a groan, and I feel his hot seed fill me. ‘Let me taste her,’ he says.

I pull out my fingers, coated in Maddalena’s sweet syrup. He sucks them clean, then I kiss him deeply, tasting her again.

We untangle and collapse into a heap of arms and legs. Candlelight casts a glow on our sweat-covered bodies, the air filled with the scent of musk, apples, honey and lemon.

Andrew spoons himself around my back. ‘That was incredible.’ He nuzzles my earlobe.

Maddalena curves around my belly, facing me. She lifts a hand and strokes my cheek. ‘
Bella
Veronica. You are like Venus. A goddess.’

A chuckle from Andrew. ‘Shall we partake again?’

I catch Maddalena’s smile. ‘What say you?’

She laughs. ‘Only if this time you will let me taste
you.
’

‘Just watching you makes me hard,’ Andrew says.

Maddalena goes to the basin by the window and wrings out a cloth. She comes back to the bed and washes all traces of Andrew from my
figa
. As she wipes, she massages my labia. I whimper and push my hips up. The feeling is delicious.

Maddalena pulls my legs forwards so that they hang over the side of the bed. Down on her knees, she spreads my thighs apart and slips her tongue in, licking in slow, wide circles. She draws my nub between her teeth, sucking while she pushes two fingers inside. I lie back, and Andrew stretches himself next to me, his mouth at my breast. My nipples pucker and stiffen as he pinches one and licks the other. Maddalena’s fingers are pushing in and out while she increases the pressure on my pearl. My joy is coming; I can feel it. No yet, I hope. ’Tis too soon.

Andrew straddles my face now, on all fours so his weight doesn’t squash me. His prick is hard and I take it in my mouth, swallowing the length right down. He pulls out and in again and again, picking up the rhythm of Maddalena’s fingers as she fucks me from below. Andrew and I reach our joy together, crying out in unison. His hot salty seed slips down my gullet.

‘Come here,’ I say to Maddalena, my voice throaty. She straddles me, her hips undulating as she pushes herself against my mouth and squeals her release.

The babe moves in my womb. I feel a sharp jab.
Dio mio!
I get to my feet and water gushes out of me onto the marble tiles.

Tight knots of love

’Tis November, but the severe cold of winter has yet to arrive. I remember how the canals froze the year my son, Achiletto, was born. Maddalena said his arrival was one of the fastest deliveries she’d seen, and put it down to our antics beforehand. I need not have worried about dying. Maddalena made sure she washed her hands; she didn’t know why, but keeping them clean increased the survival rate among her clients.

More than six years have gone by since. I’m a woman of twenty-five summers, highly successful in my profession. Mamma registered me in a new catalogue,
The Principal and Most Honoured Courtesans of Venice
, listing our address and the fees we charged. Patrons have kept me busy, yet I’m proud to have maintained a balance between my sense of self-worth and the need to win and keep the support of men. I’m not ashamed to admit that I’ve courted the cultural élite of my city for fame and fortune.

My second son, Enea, Andrew’s boy, arrived three years after Achiletto. Barely a week later, Andrew married the Venetian noblewoman Beatrice da Lezze; it was a marriage of convenience, arranged by his parents, and, happily for me, Andrew is still my lover. He does not say whether his wife is unhappy with the arrangement, and I do not ask.

Tragedy struck two summers ago: Mamma died suddenly in her sleep. Maddalena said it was her heart. Her own mother then passed away during the terrible typhus epidemic that killed thousands, including my husband Paolo Panizza, (I have retrieved my dowry), and my own father. I asked Lena, as I now call her, to move in with me. She’s become my dearest friend and confidante, my go-between with new clients, my children’s nanny, and my housekeeper. Life should be perfect. Yet there’s an ache in my soul, and a longing for…

Laughter echoes from the
piano nobile
, and the door bursts open. ’Tis my boys, my wonderful boys. They’ve been out for a walk with Lena and Ludovico. (Ludovico continues to be one of my regulars, and I love him dearly.)

Achiletto is blond with green eyes (they say he takes after me), and Enea has the dark hair of his father. I open my arms and they rush into them, smothering me with kisses. ‘Mamma, Mamma! We saw the Doge in his state barge,’ my eldest jiggles from one foot to the other. ‘Will he take it to Cyprus to fight the Turks?’

‘No,
tesoro
. The barge is too slow, and I’m afraid the Republic has lost Cyprus.’ Achiletto is bright and nothing seems to escape him…

I catch Lena’s eye, noting her solemn expression. Cyprus was a Venetian possession for more than eighty years. After receiving news of the fall of Famagusta, and the torture to death of Commander Marc’Antonio Bragadin, our brave men have gone with the Holy League to fight the Ottoman forces. Our marines have to stop them or they will sail into our lagoon and occupy us too. I shudder at the prospect of being carted off to the Sultan’s harem, my children and household taken from me.

I glance at Lena. ‘Where’s Ludovico?’

‘We left him at Rialto. He has business to which he must attend.’

Enea tugs at my sleeve. ‘Will my Papa come back soon?’

I pull my youngest close. ‘I hope so.’ Andrew is in command of a galley and has sailed with the Venetian fleet.

Enea nods. ‘I’m hungry. What’s for supper?’

I laugh in spite of my worry for his father. Enea’s priorities have always been with his stomach. He’s a chubby little fellow, all dimples and puppy fat. I tickle his tummy. ‘You’re on the menu, my sweet. I could eat you up you’re so tasty.’ I burrow my head into his chubbiness, opening my mouth and pretending to bite him. Enea unleashes a peal of giggles.

I carry him, for he’s only three years-old and I can just about manage his weight. Lena takes Achiletto by the hand and we troop down to the kitchen. Anna, as ever my faithful cook, puts plates of ravioli stuffed with minced rabbit in front of the boys. I thank her. ‘All set for tonight?’

‘Yes, signora. Everything is ready.’

‘
Grazie
.’ This evening I’m hosting a dinner party, and I want everything to be perfect.

After we’ve put the boys to bed, Lena helps me to dress. She pulls the laces on my bodice tight, and my breasts rise so high the pink of my nipples is showing.

‘Delicious,’ she says, her fingers lingering.

I give her hand a playful slap. ‘Not now,
cara
. There isn’t time.’

‘We can make up for it later. There’s no one booked in.’

Whenever I have a free night, Lena and I sleep together. ’Tis the least I can do for her; she’s given up her life’s work for me, and I know she’s in love with me. I love her too, of course I do, except I’m not in love with her. I wish I could be: it might make me happy. Instead, I’m aching for the one man who persists in ignoring me. Marco Venier. I’ve invited him to attend the dinner with his uncle this evening, but have yet to receive a response. Marco Venier only recently returned to Venice from a period overseeing our military affairs on the mainland. Will he condescend to cross the threshold of a courtesan’s house?

Lena runs a comb through my hair, twisting plaits and threading ribbons studded with pearls. I do not let her twist it into the devil’s horns that are the current fashion, for I’m superstitious about such things. Pearls are forbidden to courtesans by the sumptuary laws, but I wear them anyway. I glance at myself in the full-length glass mirror I purchased from Murano last year. I’m wearing a heavily brocaded burgundy-red dress with a starched white ruff at the back of the neck.

‘Will I do?’

‘You’ll more than do.’

I laugh. ‘I wish you would join us.’

‘I’m not clever like you. I can’t sing or play the lute. And I don’t write poetry. No. I prefer to help Giulia, Anna and Domisilla in the kitchen. When the dishes have been done, I’ll go to bed and wait for you. Maurizio has the night off tonight, but his services won’t be needed, will they?’

Maurizio has become a manservant as well as my boatman. A man is needed to discourage violence among my clients. There have been some, over the years, who would take me too roughly for my tastes. I always keep a bell handy, and if I ring it, Maurizio arrives almost immediately. I kiss Lena’s cheek. ‘You know I couldn’t manage without you, don’t you?’

‘Even if I continue to resist Count Tron’s pleas to join in with your trysts?’

‘He teases you,’ I laugh. ‘For him ’tis but a game.’ And it is, of course. A dalliance, a distraction, a way of defusing the tensions of his duties. I’m under no illusions that he could be in love with me.

My guests and I dine on roast goose and chestnuts, after an antipasto of sliced cold meats and a primo of pumpkin gnocchi. Domisilla and Anna wait on us and serve a fresh green salad mixed with chopped goose liver. Red wine from the mainland flows freely throughout the meal, and we finish with grapes, apples, and cheese from the Dolomite mountains. I nibble my food; I don’t wish to grow fat like many of the noblewomen I see in church. They must have little with which to occupy themselves other than eating…

Domenico, Marco (praise God), and the artist, Tintoretto, grace my company this evening. Talk soon turns to the war against the Turks.

‘There’s been a battle off the south-west of Greece at Lepanto,’ Domenico says. ‘Our 44 gun galleasses have routed the sultan’s forces.’

I tremble. ‘What news of casualties?’

‘About 8,000 dead on each side, but our victory was complete. The Holy League captured over a hundred Ottoman galleys and many thousands of men, liberated about 15,000 enslaved Christians, and sank or burned about 50 galleys.’

‘How many galleys did we lose?’

‘Only twelve.’

I clasp my shaking hands. ‘What news of Andrew Tron?’

‘He’s safe.’

Relief washes through me. ‘
Grazie a Dio!
’

‘I propose to paint a masterpiece depicting the battle,’ Tintoretto announces. The artist takes a sip of wine before wiping his bushy grey beard and moustache. ‘’Tis our first great defeat of a Turkish fleet.’

Marco Vernier picks up a grape from his plate, pops it into his mouth, and then spits out the seeds into his hand. ‘They say it will be the last and greatest engagement with oar-propelled vessels. We are moving away from galleys to galleons in our Navy.’

‘And not before time,’ says Domenico. He smiles at the artist. ‘You should paint Veronica too.’

‘That would be my pleasure.’

I catch Marco looking at me, his eyes burning, and my heartrate quickens.

We retire to the
portego,
where I entertain them by playing the lute, a
Fantasia
by Francesco Canova da Milano which I’ve been practising for days.

Domenico applauds as I strum the last notes, ‘Brava! Brava! Tell me, Veronica! What are you writing now?’

‘I’m thinking of following Tullia d’Aragona’s example and setting my poems in
Capituli
’

Marco shuffles forwards in his chair. ‘
Capituli
?’

‘A poem from a different poet, followed by a response from me. Or a poem from me, followed by a response from another poet.’

‘Sounds like a challenge.’

‘Do you accept the challenge, my lord?’

‘Absolutely.’

Clasping my hands together, I give him my widest smile.

I spend the next two months waiting for Marco’s challenge. Nothing. He doesn’t even attend his uncle’s literary salon. When I find out that he has returned to the mainland, I resolve to try and forget him. My beloved crow, Andrew, is back in Venice; I shall give him a hero’s welcome. Nothing will be too much trouble for my brave defender of the
Serenissima.
He’s my best lover, too, the one who sparks my desire the most. Truly, I’ve missed him. My other patrons take their pleasure too quickly, and leave me unsatisfied. Lena’s soft loving is generous, but I long for Andrew’s hard prick inside my
figa
.

A message has come; he’s due to visit tonight, after he’s dined at home with his wife. Lena has helped me prepare. ’Tis thanks to her that I have acquired the habit of bathing, and I love it. The feeling of cleanliness is like no other and my patrons often remark on the sweet fragrance of my
figa
. I wish my clients’ pricks smelt as sweet to me, for most people believe that bathing weakens the body so much they will catch diseases. The opposite, thanks to Lena, I now know to be true. I’ve taken to wiping my patrons’ underarms with scented cloths, and washing their pricks with soap and water before I suck them. They tell me I’m mad, but put up with it anyway for my sucking is second to none.