I cannot clearly say why those years when I met her and loved her (and will do so forever, it seems), when I met Folco and Teobaldo and Ginevra, and my own duke, why those years are so intensely within me always, not just tonight in our council chamber. Perhaps it is true of every life, that times from our youth remain with us, even when the people are gone, even if many, many events have played out between where we are and what we are remembering. I am so full of memories tonight from that time—when I was being changed, made and remade by those I met.
