Giovanna had managed to convince the sisters of the Lazzaretto that her father was merely exhausted. That his loss of consciousness at the burying ground was from a lack of proper sleep, and his sickly pallor was due to a need for a hearty, home cooked meal. But even as the oarsman helped him into the boat to take them across the lagoon, she feared the worst.

Unfortunately, her instincts turned out to be correct.

By the time she'd dragged Agostino up the three flights of stairs to their tiny loft apartment off a landlocked square in Campo San Polo, he was shaking in spite of the sweat dripping from his face. And when she attempted to cool his skin with a wet cloth, Giovanna finally saw the tell-tale signs: swelling at the base of the jaw, previously hidden by the doctor's high collar.

"Lord have mercy," she had whispered before getting to work. Her father wouldn't fall victim to the plague. Not if she could help it.

All day she had kept vigil, probably the same way he had done at that boy's bedside. Knowing that the first hours after manifestation of symptoms were critical, she daren't let him out of her sight. That decision not only endangered her own health, but it was also unlawful. Anyone diagnosed with the plague was obliged to be handed over to the proper authorities, in this case to a gondolier headed straight back to Lazzaretto Vecchio. For those harboring the sick without placing them in the prescribed quarantine, prison awaited.

Giovanna had every intention of returning her father to the Lazzaretto. She truly did. Its existence and the strict enforcement of rules around handling and caring for the sick had kept Venice from being ravaged even more than it had been already. Yet as the hours passed and her thoughts wandered back to the stench and wretchedness, she became less and less sure about the wisdom of sending him back to the island of death.

Instead, using hourly precision kept with the help of the bell from the neighboring church dedicated to Saint Paul, she urged Agostino to drink a concoction of his own invention. The tea made with chamomile flowers infused with dry ginger eventually stopped his shivering and allowed him to sleep. Giovanna did not have that luxury.

Her stock of elixirs had to be replenished, and only after she had boiled all of her Angelica root and ground up the remaining bay laurel did she notice that the sun had set once more. She was wiping off her bronze pestle—a family heirloom handed down through the generations—when her eyes fell upon the beam of moonlight through the dormer window, reminding her of a standing obligation.

Ottavia! With the distractions brought on by her father's sudden illness, Giovanna had nearly forgotten an earlier promise to her friend. Tossing the pestle aside, she rummaged through a collection of glass vessels on a high shelf before finding the one she sought. The iridescent green bottle only had two fingers-worth of liquid at the bottom.

It would have to do. Giovanna had neither time nor resources to brew another batch of the potion, and it would still need to sit untouched for a few days to properly mature. Left with no other choice, she poured the precious medicine into a small vial and corked it closed. After one more peek at her father to confirm he was now comfortably resting in the bed behind a fabric partition hung from the rafters and could do without her for the next few hours, she donned her mask and cloak, and set out on her way.

Because of the mandatory curfew prohibiting anyone other than doctors of the plague, ferrymen of the sick, and soldiers of the watch from traversing Venice at this late hour, the city was practically deserted. Giovanna kept to the shadows and made as little disturbance as possible while hurrying across the city. She timed her sprint across the Rialto bridge to avoid an armed patrol, getting to the other side of the Grand Canal and disappearing into an adjacent alley before the two men doubled-back on their rounds.

Already late and unsure of whether she'd even be welcome at this hour, Giovanna chose an unusual—yet not completely untested—way into Palazzo Michiel.

"Finally, my bosom friend! I thought you had forsaken me," Ottavia exclaimed as Giovanna pushed open the bedchamber's window and hoisted her leg over the sill, entering with the cool night's breeze.

The salutation was more dramatic than the petite girl's usual manner, but with her face contorted and her hand clutching her belly as she sat in a plush, gilded chair, it was clear she had been in pain for quite some time.

"Forgive me, dear one," Giovanna said when her feet had descended upon the soft, Ottoman rug covering the exquisitely crafted, inlaid wood floor. The dark walnut popped in a clever geometric pattern against the warm cherry tones even in the faint candlelight. Deliberately staying her breathing from the two story climb, she continued. "I hadn't realized that my supplies had depleted. I've been brewing elixirs since dawn."

After tossing her cloak aside, she crossed the darkened room hoping her closest confidant wouldn't notice that although she was telling the truth, she was also holding back a significant detail. Because while Giovanna had known Ottavia Michiel—just a year younger than herself at seventeen years of age—since childhood and had shared her deepest hopes and fears with the outspoken, blonde firebrand, she wasn't sure it was wise telling the daughter of the most senior member of the Doge's Council of Ten that her father (the doctor entrusted to heal) may have succumbed to the plague himself.

"As long as you have my relief, I suppose I can hold no ill will," Ottavia said with a forced smile as Giovanna kneeled in front of her. Taking her friend's face in her hands, she kissed Giovanna on the lips.

It was an intimate greeting oft used by the closest of friends, but one that was still only exchanged in private. Anywhere else, the act would have surely elicited censure from onlookers who rarely displayed public affection even to their divinely blessed spouses. If only these same pious fathers of the republic knew about the existence of other girls lucky enough not just to be kissed by Ottavia's supple lips, but to also share the clandestine touch of the rest of her lithe and winsome body. What scandal would that revelation bring? For her friend's benefit, Giovanna hoped to never find out. Even her noble birth, wealth, and father's status couldn't protect Ottavia from the wrath of punishment for such profane deeds.

With her eyes still closed to relish the blissful moment for a bit longer, Giovanna smiled. Although Ottavia's affection to her was unquestionably familiar, she treasured her maidenly connection to the girl just the same. When Ottavia whimpered in discomfort, Giovanna snapped back to attention, digging the precious vial out of her skirt's pocket and uncorking the top.

"Drink half now and half in the morning," she said, handing over the tincture of Monk's pepper, fennel, and turmeric. It was only as Ottavia wiped her mouth with her delicate fingers that Giovanna noticed the redness around her eyes. "Have you been crying? I will never forgive myself for arriving so late if—"

Ottavia shook her fair head. "No. I mean yes. But not out of torment. Well, not as much physical torment as an emotional one . . .," she rambled before trailing off.

On a better look, she appeared more despondent than Giovanna had ever seen her, and she truly began to worry. From her experience, physical ailments were always easier to alleviate than spiritual ones.

"Here," Giovanna said, standing and offering her hands. When Ottavia slowly took them, Giovanna helped the frail girl to the nearby bed and folded back the blankets. "You must make yourself comfortable, and I shall climb in by your side before you tell me everything."

Ottavia complied, carefully nestling under the damask bedspread and adjusting the goose down pillows behind her back. After kicking off her shoes, Giovanna laid next to her.

"What can be worse than the agony of your moon cycle?" she asked with a chuckle, hoping her lighthearted tone would reveal that Ottavia had exaggerated her woes. But the tremble of the girl's lips and the tears that flooded her eyes as she struggled for words already demonstrated that her problems were undeniably dire.

"I . . . I am to marry Niccolo Grimani," Ottavia sobbed before burying her face in her hands.

Confused, Giovanna scooted closer and patted her shoulder. "But that's nothing new. You've told me of this development months ago. What has changed to make you so melancholy now?" she asked.

Without lifting her head, Ottavia continued to sniffle. "Prior to today, it had been easy to imagine as fabricated when it was knowledge held only between our two families, but . . . but do you realize how I spent my evening, dear friend? There's no need to guess because I will tell you! For I have just endured the precursor to a hellish future in the guise of a public celebration of my engagement."

Giovanna gasped. "How could that be? Did your betrothed not convince the Doge to delay the announcement until our city could recover from this plague?" she asked.

Ottavia looked up, a grotesque grimace distorting her usually angelic features as she began to laugh hysterically. "What good is the word of men when their fortunes are on the line?"