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tired

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It's quiet here, now, with Jennie and Florian gone. I don't miss Jennie a bit. Dory sits with the Lady every day, bringing her tea and biscuits and listening. She is asked a lot of questions after people leave. I'm not sure what the Lady is about. It worries Silvia, who had thought that maybe Dory would do the things she does; working in the gardens, working with the animals, sewing. I tell her not to worry, but I wish I knew what the Lady was planning. Something, I know. There is always something. Marco says I shouldn't worry, that as long as we do as we're told and are loyal we won't be cast out. She didn't even have to take me in, after all; I came to Britannia after my father left her.

Yvon and Alessio are moving into the townhouse. There's talk of a betrothal for Florian and Kat. It has to be because of the curse; nothing else would make sense. Mr Bradbury was here. Ximena doesn't care. I'm glad she doesn't care, but shouldn't she care? I would care if it were me, and I would never want to marry Florian. They're all afraid the princess, Juliana, will get married without permission. Isn't she afraid that she won't get a dowry? Or that she'll be under a curse if she marries with no blessing from her family?

I miss Mamma. But I don't miss the yellow birds or the yellow-eyed man, and I don't miss my stepfather, and even if the Bois is not Tuscany, at least it is green, and there are horses. The Lady says I'm getting too old to be a stable-hand. She wants me to help Melina write letters. There are a lot of letters to be written and my hand is very pretty. That's why I don't write in here much; my arm gets tired! I think this is her way of making me learn more English, though a lot of the letters are in Latin of course. There are lessons, now, because we're not at school. Not enough for my taste or for Dory's, but enough to make Silvia sad.

I am going to go riding now. Perhaps I can even pretend this is home.

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scared

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Everyone who can fight has gone out to fight, including Marco and Mercutio. We are under siege, although no-one will say so.

Isabella is very afraid.

Jennie is being quiet for once; Signorina Juliana, who wears shocking clothes but carries herself like a princess, has got her working on some sort of puzzle. Maybe she will learn to be a princess now, but I do not have high hopes.

Prince Florian is upset because the prince Yvon, and Alessio, are gone, but I think that if anything were meant to happen to them, it would have, already; it is us I am afraid for.

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worried

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Mercutio is being an idiot again, and the only person who can stand him when he's like this is Isabella. She can have him all to herself as much as she wants!

I'm happy to be here with the horses again. I don't like school. It's such a trial to ride herd on Jennie and Dory and Silvia from Pelby, and to keep them from getting themselves into every imaginable kind of trouble. They love to make bad friends. Not as much as Fiammetta does, but Fiammetta can afford to be like that. She's not here on the Lady's sufferance. Fiammetta's bad friends are at least entertaining. Oldman can be funny if you catch him at the right moment.

Jennie has a ridiculous notion that everyone is exactly equal. I don't know where she got it from. She is glad that Dory is living here, but she does not like it that Dory is bound. She wanted to help do the work that Dory and Silvia were doing yesterday morning and she did not like it when I told her that it was not our place, that I am Don Ercole's daughter and she is the Lady's niece and fosterling. Of course making floral arrangements is fun, I suppose, but I wonder if she wants to do everything that they will have to do some day.

Tadzio likes Dory. I think it would be a good match. His mother is a healer, they're more educated than the rest of the Company. Silvia likes Hamish. I don't know much about his family but I know that Lady Leffoy does write to his father, so I fear that it will not go well for her. I don't really want to get married at all. I wonder if I can be a healer, like Alessio. I'd rather work with animals than people, though. Ximena says yes. (It is such a relief to spend time with Ximena. She at least knows who she is!)

I hope the prince is better soon. Alessio can live without his leg and be just fine some day when he is used to it, but if he has to live without the prince, I don't think he will ever be right again.

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aggravated

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Marco and Melina are married; we put them to bed, and I thought there would be quite a charivari, but La Donna does not allow it. I am perfectly pleased about that for I do not like the noise. But I don't think the Company boys are very pleased. Not that Angelo and Katya need to get themselves into any more trouble. Hopefully Katya will be well entertained tonight; but I cannot imagine she will not be, as it will be up to her to keep both Rodrigo and Angelo happy, and I have heard nothing to indicate that she is not more than equal to that task. At any rate justice has at last been done by Melina and Marco, and that is all for the best; but I do not think I can bear another moment of Mercutio's sulking over Miss Benedetto.

Speaking of Miss Benedetto, Alessio and she are not married. Mamma always said that Alessio was stupid as a rock, but Florian Leffoy does not think so, and Fiammetta doesn't either; they say that this is the best thing that could possibly have happened, but I have to wonder at that, if it made someone curse the prince, Yvon, so badly that he's taken to his bed.

It has been ten days since Pappa wrote to me. I should write to him, because he is at St Pantaleon's and it must doubtless be dreary for him, and sad that he could not be here for Marco's wedding. But I don't know what in the world I can say to him, other than that I hope he is well and that I am sorry he couldn't be here. I am not sorry that he is not going to marry La Donna, for he did not do well by her (or by anyone else!) and we are lucky that she hasn't cast us off. I am sad for him, but I cannot say more than that. It makes me feel disloyal to say so, but it is the truth. I wish sometimes that I could write to Mamma, but I do not know what I would say to her either. Everything that she has ever said about Nicodemo and Alessio is a lie; and they are my uncles, and Nicodemo my only protector.

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unhappy

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Tonight the Avalon prefects are taking over the entire dormitory. I'm not happy about it. I like Miss Davies and Miss Moon (and I barely know Miss Wurfel). They're nice and she's not too hard on us. Some of the other girls need help keeping their things in order (they've clearly never had to live in a large household, where things that you don't keep track of will disappear), but the rest of us take care of it as best we can. Miss Flint especially doesn’t like me, so this is not good. I don't even really understand why the girls are included in this. We're not bad. Claire Jeannot died, but she was mad, and sometimes mad people kill themselves. It happens a lot in my family, actually; not that it isn't shocking or painful.

Mercutio is being very stupid and petty about La Donna and Don Nicodemo, although he's kept it to himself except for Trelawney. Really, why should he care where she sleeps, as long as he has enough to eat? Pappa is alive and with the healers. It could be a lot worse. When I think of people who are likely to kill themselves or someone else, he's so close to the top of that list. I'd be more upset about it, but he left Italia when I was five, and I never saw him again until last month.

Hubert Crockford still tries to talk to Dory, who's ours now, but he knows what I'll do to him if I catch him at that.

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aggravated

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It could be worse. My roommates are quiet and they let me read. I want to go into the forest, but of course they are watching us even more closely than they did before, because of that boy who disappeared. They say it is not Douglas' fault, but I do not think I believe it.

I don't need Latin lessons, and I thought I would get out of languages, and be able to read something else, but I have to do English and Hebrew. At least it doesn't last as long as the flying lessons the first-years are taking right now. I want to finish my book, but I can't find it anywhere. Nerissa says I left it in the common room but it isn't there, and Black Beauty is one of my favourites!

Magistra Mendizabal says they have it in the library, but it's in English. I don't want to read it in English, but Magistra Mendizabal says that I really should, because that's the original language that it was written in. I suppose she is right, but I want my book back anyway.

I cannot believe that Douglas is in our college, not after what he did today! I thought Pelby College was for smart people. He's such a beast. Jennie's brother has to be told, but I can't find him anywhere. At least he won't be going back to the Manor with us any more. The Lady is far too kind to people like that.

I am worried about Silvia. I can't watch her to be sure that she behaves herself and I really can't trust Fiammetta to do it now that everyone knows she's the general's daughter and they all want to know her. Silvia has enough troubles; she does not need bad friends.

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annoyed

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I am so tired of having to chaperone Silvia and Jennie to make sure they don't do anything they shouldn't do. It would be easier if Isabella and Demetria would take their turns but of course, they have all their old friends to catch up with and I just want to read, and so it's no trouble to me, right? Except I can't read when they have that Mira in here and the cats are going mad! And Fiammetta and her friends and Florian Leffoy and his friends come in and out but don't stay, and that aischros boy Douglas is trying to help Jennie and Silvia get around the ban.

Jennie and Silvia are dear to me but neither one of them has the least bit of sense about choosing friends. I know they hate Jonathan but Jonathan was right, it was uncouth of them to call attention to the boys' relationships in the way that Jennie was doing. I should have stopped her, but I can't be responsible for them all the time. Fiammetta used to help me but of course everyone wants to know the Dux Bellorum's daughter, and I cannot fault anyone for that.

I just want to read my book. Whoever gave that stupid Mira all that catnip, I wish I could have five minutes with them.

And Douglas has ideas about Jennie that are completely unbefitting his station. It's only a matter of time before he's under a ban himself, if he isn't careful.

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grumpy

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Pappa is as angry as I've ever seen him. Signor Saunders and Donna Dracaena have spent the last hour talking him out of doing all sorts of crazy things because the laws here are so different than they are at home. Don Nicodemo too. Pappa wanted to have a tombstone made and send it to Signora Pendry, with a note that said that he knew they wouldn't be able to afford it when they needed it!

Silvia is crying because she can't write to Dory any more and we are not supposed to talk to any of the Crockfords or Pendrys at school. We are supposed to pretend that we don't even see them. (Isabella says that we are not missing anything, she told me that Hubert Crockford brought Communist propaganda to the ball she and Florian attended! But Dimity is not very happy, especially since that Rasputin person's family is still talking to her grandmother.) I think we might be allowed to talk to Kat, but I'm not sure, it might just be Florian who's allowed to.

I feel badly for Theo and his parents because his mother is that man's sister and I know the Lady is going to make them choose. Why was that man so stupid!

I'm not looking forward to having this problem at school. I like it here, we have horses and cats and hounds and books and our lessons are so much better than anything we will get at school; I have heard all about that from Tom and Mercutio and Demetria and Melina.

Jennie and Douglas are not going to understand this. I can already tell that they’re not going to follow the rules unless somebody makes them.

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content

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I'm happier here than I have been in a very long time, and now I really, really, really don't want to go away to school. The animals that are here aren't the ones I left behind in Tuscany, but at least there are animals here. I even wake up in the morning rather easily now that I can breathe fresh air again. And I like Jennie, even if Florian doesn't. I wish I could speak to her more easily. Perhaps we can go riding once the Lady gets all of her horses back from Gabrielle Thibault.

I still miss Mamma, and I shall never think of Donna Dracaena as my mother, but she is very kind. She is very beautiful, too, like a night-blooming flower. I am not sure that I understand what sort of relationship it is that she has with my Pappa and Don Nicodemo and some of the other men, but they are very good to all of us as well. It is nice that we all live like a family.

I do miss Zia Lavinia and her daughter Fiammetta. I suppose I would probably miss Kyteler too if I knew him at all well, but his Italian is so very bad, it makes me giggle when he's not around. He is a funny, funny man.

Douglas is annoying to Florian and the older ones, but I feel a sort of sympathy for him, partly because he's just as lost as I was once, and partly because Mercutio and Isabella are so harsh about him...he is aischros, but it's not his fault. And yet he will not understand the rules when I try to explain them, and that I do not understand. How can he not realise that he is here on sufferance?

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awake

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As much as I am going to miss Silvia and Fiammetta, I'm very glad that I don't have to live in the city any more. Florian Leffoy has a wolf, which is not the same as having hounds, but it is a very nice wolf, and there are hounds in the kennels and horses in the stables where we're going to live, even if they do all belong to Madame Gabrielle whom almost no-one here seems to like. Maybe I can get on with her better than other people can.

I have been doing better at talking to people. We stayed up very late with Hadrian, and I met Fiammetta's friend Jennie, who likes me, although she got in a lot of trouble for telling Jennie where we were without permission. I was worried about that, but Zia Lavinia is very kind and I can't think she would be punished too harshly as the Magister feels rather guilty about her.

It still seems very unreal and fantastic to have my father and the fata Donna Dracaena here. And Florian Leffoy, who is also a fata, says we are going to live in a castle. I've never even seen one before. But there are trees! And air! And animals and birds! I don't even mind being up so early. I have no idea what my father is really like, it was so long ago that we lived with him--but he seems very kind. And Donna Dracaena is fata, very much so, and she is good for Isabella. Marco and Melina should be here. It's wrong that they're not and Isabella is upset about it.

Donna Dracaena has called a rade, which means that we are riding up to the Manor all together. I am very excited, but I hope there won't be a siege.

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cold

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My father is alive and well and here. I don't remember him at all. I wish I could, but I don't. He doesn't look much like his pictures. I'm actually a little bit afraid of him, and it doesn't make any sense, so I don't know why. He looks very ill, but Donna Susanna says he is fine.

I want to feel the way I know I ought to feel, but I'm just confused. I gave up thinking he'd come back to us a long time ago. It's like hearing that Julius Caesar or Arthur Pendragon or Frederick Barbarossa's come back. Or Christ, or Aradia. Aradia was more real to me than my father was.

Fiammetta is younger than me and of course, she remembers, because Fiammetta never forgets anything. Apparently this is because of something someone did to her father before she was born. I don't know how it works that she has it too. But she's acting the way I ought to be acting, and I know he won't understand why I'm not, but I can't. I have the black fog with me now. I told him that and he said our mother would fix it.

My mother is in Tuscany, with my horses and Zio Fulvio's hounds. I don't know who this woman is he's talking about that is our mother. Donna Dracaena? I thought she's supposed to be dead.

I don't remember her, either.

Mercutio's angry with me, I can tell. I wonder if Isabella will like me?

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moody

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And to think I thought Melina was the smart one.

Zia Lavinia and the Magister are locked in her room, Zia Alessandra is fuming downstairs, Fiammetta is writing letters and being disgustingly cheerful the way she always is when he is here, Mercutio is being Romantic (in other words, lounging around being an overly dramatic ass bemoaning his lack of True Love), and Melina and Demetria are going through all the loot they bought with their ill-got gains.

O Britannia!