A/N: Wow, this took me a while! SO sorry, I couldn't find it in myself to complete this :/ This story is what made me start to write again, nearly two years ago. I can't believe it's coming to an end!

If people knew the reasons for my fear, they'd be able to understand my pain. - Lucrezia Borgia

Chapter 26

Time seemed to have stopped for a moment, and then Jane was running. She was running down the halls, shouting for help. A physician finally came to her rescue, following her hasty steps down the corridor.

Rodrigo was still alive, only barely holding consciousness. He was choking on his own vomit, on the foam that dripped from his open mouth. Servants entered and the doctor ordered them about, his voice far away; sent them to clear tables and lift the old man. They laid him down on his side, to make sure that he wouldn't choke if he threw up again.

"Giovanna?" The physician cut through the mist that seemed to be around her, blocking out almost everything but the sight of the running servants. "Giovanna?"

"Yes," she finally answered, shakily.

"He has been poisoned." Jane closed her eyes for a moment. "Cantarella. There isn't anything we can do."

In that moment, the door flew open. For all his fury and hate, Cesare's face was grey as ashes long gone cold. The moment he saw his father, his lips quivered as if to say something, something for which he had no words.

Behind him, both Vanozza and Giulia followed. Vanozza eyes were red and wet from tears, but she dried them and went to cover the body of the assassin. Amadeo, the vampire whose existence was already a mystery. Now his death would form another one.

While Giulia had sat down to clench her former lover's hand as she screamed for the physician to do something, Lucrezia entered.

Her hair was a mess of curls that fell down over her shoulders. She wore the white dress that she slept in but her eyes saw clearly. Cesare tried to reach for her, but she ran past him. "What happened?" she hissed, leaning over her dying father.

"Cantarella, milady. I wish…"

Jane moved to look at Lucrezia. Her eyebrows were drawn together, eyes clenched, as though she was trying to remember.

"There is no remedy for this, milady. His Holiness is too far gone…"

Lucrezia didn't listen; instead she stood up straight and walked to the table where the jug of wine still stood. She took hold of it and walked to one of the torches that illuminated the room. "There is a remedy," she finally said as she upturned the jug over the fire. It sputtered and wheezed, but then a thick white smoke emerged and covered the people around the drying man. "Charcoal. Give me that."

A servant, who in that moment seemed more worried for his own life than that of the Pope, handed her the mortar that he was holding. Lucrezia then grabbed a handful of the still-hot coals, not even flinching, and threw them into the bowl before crushing them. "Water."

Vanozza was quickest, taking the glass of water meant for the Pope and handing it to her daughter. It was poured into the bowl and blended together with the coal. "I have never seen it done, but I've heard of it," Lucrezia explained as she handed it to the physician. "Get it down."

"Milady, I don't think…" the physician began to protest.

"It will work," she insisted. The look that she gave him was filled with the fire that she had just killed. No one could have resisted her in that moment. So the physician did as she bid.

And it worked.

At least for the next moment, it did, and for the moment after that. No one truly dared hope he would last the night, yet by the time morning came, his shallow breaths had grown even.

"You saved him," Jane told Lucrezia in the early morning hours. Lucrezia had left the room, seeking air and silence on a balcony overlooking the fields beyond the city walls. She didn't answer. Jane walked to stand beside her, hands clenching the fence that kept them from falling. Her eyes were closed, face relaxed. "How did you know that charcoal would work?"

"Micheletto told me once." Jane couldn't hide her surprise. She hadn't known that Micheletto had ever spoken to Lucrezia. "Apparently to be the master of death, you must also be the master of life."

Jane thought about Amadeo, of his strange life and even stranger death. "He is the master of many things."

Blonde curls blew in the wind as Lucrezia sighed. "You could have saved him. I know you could." She looked at Jane, brushing the hair from her face. "Why did you not?"

Jane blinked a few times. The sky was red this morning, but the color was slowly fading. "I don't know."

"I think I do." She looked down, down to the streets so far below. "You have to leave soon. You are distancing yourself, trying to make it easier." Then their eyes met, for a second. "You wanted to see this to the end.

"But it wouldn't have ended with my father's death. It wouldn't have changed anything. My brother would take over for him. He wants to join Italy, make it one, did you know?" Jane shook her head. "He does, like my father. And no matter if he won or lost, it would not be the end of it." Her voice grew weaker and she looked down, at her feet. "Pain and misery will not end with one man's death. It goes on and grows the more you fight against it. And we will not give up, Giovanna. We are Borgias. We will not bow down and accept defeat if the sky cracked open and God himself tried to fight us.

"And once our enemies are all defeated, we will fight death, we will fight nature itself." She stopped speaking, sucked in a breath just as a tear fell. "Even if fighting means that in the end, we must fight ourselves. I just… I just hope it will not all be in vain."

"You will marry again," Jane stated, unsure where the realization came from. The broken and beaten part of her heart which held her love for Lucrezia ached.

"Whomever my father chooses."

And then she left, walking back into the shadows of the Vatican. Instinctively, Jane reached up and wiped her eyes. Blood stained the fence when her hand returned to clench around it.

"How did she know you could save him?"

Jane recognized the voice as Caius'. He was pleased. Of course he was pleased. "She must have guessed," Jane forced out between her teeth.

"A remarkably good guesser. Perhaps it could be used." He moved to stand beside her. "Italy is very beautiful."

"What are you doing here, Caius?"

"Keeping an eye on you." He looked at her, only moving his head slightly. "And I believe you will have to follow me back to Volterra."

Suddenly, Jane was overwhelmed by a feeling of tiredness. She reveled in it; it was the first time in years that she had felt like this. Weak, like she could be moved. "And why is that?"

"Do you know what the Pope asked me when he saw me?" When Jane ignored his question, he answered it himself. "He asked me if I was a vampire, too. I almost killed him, except I figured there had to be a reason why you weren't willing to save him. Whatever the reason…"

"Caius." She looked at him, only barely able to focus her eyes on him. "There is no reason but the rules of the Volturi."

"The rules of the Volturi also…"

"Take me to Volterra." Jane looked back at the view. She had already defied death, so surely she could defy the Volturis also. "Just… let me stay for a little longer."

"How much time will you need?"

Jane wished she could tell him that she wanted to see the end of this, but Lucrezia was right. There was no end, only an eternity of fighting. "Tomorrow morning we'll leave."

Caius nodded his head in acceptance and backed away slowly. There was nothing more to be said, after all. He knew that something had changed that night, and maybe before that night, too. One thing he knew for certain, had to know for certain, was that Jane was no longer the same as before she went to Rome to raise funds.

The Borgia family did not leave the side of their patriarch for much. He was in too great dangers and had too many enemies. But when Jane asked to say goodbye, this time forever, they let her have the Pope alone, for but a moment.

He was still weak, and his hair had gone white from his struggle. "I have to go," she told him. "I can't stay."

She took his hand in hers and clenched it. "You won't be back," he stated in a raspy voice.

"No," she replied, incapable of anything but honesty. There was no point, no point to anything.

"I can't forgive you," he said.

"Forgive me?"

"You know." He waved a hand dismissively. "It is nothing, nothing but the gift of eternity that I am talking about."

Jane looked away from him. "Believe me, every day I wish that Aro would just have let me die in the flames. Every day, I wish I could have been given the gift of death." She wasn't sure if that was true but she hoped that he would believe it.

"Well, I'm glad he saved you." He gave her a small smile, and for a moment he was the same charismatic man whom she had met only days after arriving in Rome, six years earlier. The man whom no woman could have resisted. "You are a remarkable woman. A remarkable human, although I suspect that's not the right word for someone like you."

"I suppose not."

None of them cried when she left and she doubted he ever cried. After all, he had not forgiven her, and he probably never would. Contrary to Lucrezia, he was willing to fight until the end of days, willing to fight God himself. He had started the Borgia legacy, after all. She wasn't sure if it was a legacy of greatness or just of great suffering.

It was hard to say goodbye to Lucrezia. Tears flooded her beautiful, blue eyes and she shook when Jane held her.

"You were my pillar and my rock," she said between sobs. "And now I have lost you. Soon I'll lose Cesare, too, I know it. In my blood, I feel it."

"No, no," Jane said and caressed the young woman. She had always been thin but Jane just then noticed how you could feel the bones, even through the layers of clothing. "No, you will never lose Cesare."

They attempted to part several times, but every time they somehow ended back in each other's arms. Finally, after more than two hours, Jane broke from her and left her, unceremoniously and without a word. When Jane left their house, she left a note for her, telling her how much she wished she could turn back time to when they sat in the garden together, sipping wine and judging Lucrezia's talents for painting.

Giulia offered her a hug, a few consoling words, but then they parted. Somehow Jane had known that Giulia would not be sentimental. When the Pope had discarded her, she had not stopped to cry before negotiating terms. Even if there were no terms to be negotiated in this farewell, she was an Italian woman, disgraced but rich, and she did not have time for tears.

Cesare seemed uncertain of what to say. "I'll have my army," he said.

"Of course," Jane said, mostly to herself.

"Will you keep an eye on us?" Cesare asked. "Will you listen for news about us?"

"I doubt I'd be able to help myself," she told him and wondered of the truth in her words. To be honest, she doubted she would be able to bear hearing the name 'Borgia' ever again.

She didn't say goodbye to Ascanio or Micheletto, but as she rode towards the gates of Rome, someone rode up to her side. He was young and handsome, dark-haired with deep brown eyes. He looked like a kind man.

"This is from Micheletto." Her had a farmer's accent.

Jane took the letter that he handed to her. "Who are you?"

"I'm nobody," he told her and Jane knew what it meant. She smiled and he smiled back, secretively. "He thought you would understand."

Then he rode off. The letter was short and matter-of-factly. Micheletto told her that the unnamed assassin had shown signs of having used cantarella for a long period of time, in doses that he had earlier though impossible. The letter finished:

I am sure that you must have an explanation. It seems you do whenever no one else does. This is why I send you my gratitude and my luck. Goodbye.

Caius met her outside of the gates. They did not exchange many words, not even in quarrels. After they arrived in Volterra, she found that both Alec and Julio were already there.

"I heard what happened," Julio said that night, when they were finally alone. "What are you going to do?"

"Nothing." She sat down on his lap, a knee on each side of his body, and leant in to kiss her. He yielded for a moment or two, but then he pushed her back.

"Nothing? They're going to kill you, Jane."

Her fingers began unlacing his tunic. "I don't think so. Anyway, there's nothing I can do."

"So you're just going to give up?"

She kissed him full on his mouth, knowing it might be one of her last chances to do so. "I love you, Julio. Please, I need you."

"I can't let them kill you," he whispered desperately. "I won't."

She kissed him again, hoping to silence him. "Don't think about that now. I don't care if they kill me tomorrow, just make it worth it tonight."

She had never thought she could say something like that and mean it. But she did. She really did. That night seemed to never end, yet when it finally did, it seemed it had never really begun. She felt she had not had time to even begin to appreciate it.

The court was filled, all of the vampires mumbling excitedly amongst themselves as Aro read up the accusations.

"Jane, you stand accused for telling not one, but several humans of the existence of vampires as well as the possibility of eternal life," he began. "Creating awareness of our existence is punishable by death. The list of humans involves, but is possibly not limited to, Rodrigo Borgia, Pope Alexander Sixtus of Rome, his daughter, Lucrezia Borgia, and son, Cesare Borgia. Furthermore, we suspect the list to include one Micheletto Corella. Do you have any objections?"

Jane looked at her hands, folded neatly in her lap. She was about to open her mouth to form that one word, that one word that might finally rid her of this cage.

"I do."

The room was filled with the sound of gasps. Jane turned around to find Julio stand, eyes filled with tears and sorrow. He was looking at her, as though he was looking at the only thing standing between him and Hell.

"It was not Jane who told those people, it was not her who revealed our existence."

Jane stood up, her mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water, but her voice would not come, it would not form words.

"It was me," he said, loud enough for everyone to hear. The court erupted in excited and dreadful whispers.

"No," Jane whispered and then, screamed, "No!"

But Caius was already smirking at her. Aro stepped forward. "Are you sure that you wish to take this crime upon you?"

"No!" Jane screamed as loud as she possibly could. "Say no!"

But he didn't. "Yes," was the word that escaped his pale lips, and then he was surrounded by guards. His arms were grabbed and he was escorted to stand before Aro. He kneeled willingly, not facing the vampire who would soon enough kill him, but the full courtroom.

Jane's feet moved at their own accordance, running towards him, but two guards quickly stepped forwards and held her in place. Aro grabbed Julio's head tightly.

The last second seemed to stretch on and on. Julio looked at her with intent and his lips formed his last words. Then his eyes went empty and his head crack.

Jane did not hear her own scream, she did not feel the guards let go of her, she did not feel her feet running over the floor. She did not feel any pain as she fell to her knees, felt nothing but the searing pain of having her heart ripped in sheds.

The last thing that Julio's eyes had seen was her. But Julio was not the only one who died that day; the part of her that Jane had called Giovanna died, too.

Jane never listened for news about the Borgia family. She never heard of Lucrezia's many husbands. She never took notice in Cesare dying. When she read Il Principe many years later, as a favor to an old friend and lover, she made sure not to think of Cesare. Giovanna was dead Jane had never known Cesare, or Rodrigo, or Lucrezia.

The last thing that Giovanna's eyes had seen was the death of her one true love. They had died together, the best way one could die.