Napoleone was already having his head near the ear. Lorenzo approached him before Napoleone gave him a moment. His shoes made a noise on the floor, clarifying that someone was passing by. 

While Napoleone’s military boots did not, so Lorenzo took special care to tread over. 

“They haven’t started yet.” Napoleone told him, leaning his door, with a caution. His voice was low. 

Lorenzo thought about asking Napoleone to turn back, right now, when it was possible. Napoleone put his ear to the door, already listening. Lorenzo banished any hesitation and joined him. Whatever that came next, they would accept. 

“This should be enough to help you settle the debts.” Cosimo’s voice was heard, strong. 

Napoleone froze almost immediately, hearing this. 

“Thank you for continuing to help me.” Carlo had a softer, more eloquent, but it was far from soft. He was a lawyer, and dabbled in commerce to get a few really good deals. “And for helping me.” 

Napoleone turned, his eyes staring into Lorenzo. He slumped, perhaps even more so, his eyes bearing disappointment. 

“It’s not for you, it’s for your wife and children. At least until either Giuseppe or Napoleone can make enough money on their own to support their mother.” 

His father was putting it straight. A wife that could not depend on her husband was a pitiable one, as she now depended on another’s charity until her sons were of an adult age and hence could provide for their mother. Though Lorenzo thought it was illogical as a whole that a woman be left destitute for something she could not control. 

Napoleone remained quiet, as though he was thinking. 

“You’ve always kept this habit of yours under control, or at least never to see your children starved, so it puzzled me. Until I almost died this year and then I understood you’ve been in constant pain. You’re not long for this world and you intend to leave them something.” 

Carlo always had extravagant spending habits and a clear fondness for gambling. 

“Don’t tell them. My wife goes every day to church for a miracle. Except God has cured no one with this illness, most die within a few years. he physicians have been prescribing me things, but even I doubt it helps.” He looked. “I’m just making sure that without me, they’ll be fine. It’s just that the thought that maybe just one more game thjey’ll be set for life.” 

Lorenzo glanced at Napoleone. Just how he was. But perhaps it was all his military training. 

“But Letizia would never hear of it,” he said. “Still, I think you need to stop looking at it. There are more paupers created by gambling than there are rich men. Even then, they never bet on luck. My mother never did.” 

“That she shared with Napoleone, they’re both strong, spirited people, stubborn too. I know that he’ll excel in it, that he’ll go the highest he can go. But I fear what he’ll do once he reaches that inevitable limit. I hope you can talk to him,” Carlo said. “And you?” 

“Well, I’m fortunate. The estate will provide for them, Lorenzo will make sure Federico goes into a good profession and his future is set, if not by personality then it’s his influence It was always in his nature, but God had to leave him as my heir and now he’s one of unhappiest young men I’ve seen.” 

His father was anguished. Lorenzo could hear that almost stopping as he almost ended up hitting the door. Napoleone stopped him, despite being quite short. 

“I can talk to him about that as it’s part of my experience, to give up your dreams so that you can fulfill your duties.” Carlo was there.

“I’ll take up on it. He always liked you as an uncle.” He smiled. “Though, I think he’s accepted it, but he seems to have his own reasons other than family.”

“Could you help guide him when I’m gone? As long as possible. I know he seeks you out because you can advise him on military life better than I ever could.”  

Napoleone looked on in surprise, almost to the edge of tears. 

“We should go.” Lorenzo knew it was time. They had heard far more than enough. Even he was feeling guilty. They didn’t need to have their conversation overheard. 

He moved, slowly walking, until he accidentally hit something with a thud. Lorenzo froze and stared, while Napoleone, like a cornered animal, ran, hoping he could escape the inevitable. 

Although he should have, they were up against two men just past their prime so running could actually work. But once Lorenzo heard the creek of the door, all hope was lost.

Lorenzo came to face his father, and Cosimo raised his eyebrow at him. 

“I heard footsteps for a while and then quiet.” 

Napoleone quietly came back to meet him, not wishing to meet their eyes. Carlo gave a glare to him before he ended up with it being so. 

“It was my idea. I was curious.” 

“It’s my fault too. I should have discouraged him.” 

“So, you now know.” Carlo looked at him. 

Napoleone said nothing, for nothing could save them now from their father’s wrath. 

“We’re both going to have a talk.” Carlo looked at Napoleone, who just meekly followed him out of the hallway. 

Now it was between Cosimo and Lorenzo. 

“Come in. I was going to call for you, anyway.” He opened the door. There was something unreadable about him. Lorenzo thought about it and followed. Come what may, he would have entered. 

“I think even you could see it, but Carlo is still thinking about it.” 

“And yet you act the same way, Papa,” he said. “I know you’re preparing me so that if you die, I’ll be ready. Because this was your life’s work, you don’t want to see it ruined to the ground by an incompetent son that you didn’t train.” 

“You’re not wholly incompetent that I need to school you on everything. In fact, you’re better than that. Even if you were, I can always comfort myself with your virtues. Your vices are not like the others.” 

He knew of the women, of the alcohol, or even about gambling. 

It was more certain for Zio Carlo, who was slowly wasting away. With each passing day and year with almost nothing they could do'; it was a cruel way to go compared to a quick death. 

“Why did you want to call me?” 

“I can’t quite remember. I guess it got carried away by my conversation with Carlo,” he said, putting down the cup. 

Lorenzo had something to say after that. Now that he overheard it, there was nothing else. 

“I know it hurts you much to think that this was the only way,” he said. “That you think it’s your fault that I struggled so much?” 

And that was his father’s compassion, though he said little. He taught him, with a firm hand, just what to do and no lies. 

“I should have done more. It is my greatest regret. I didn’t focus that much attention away from you. To not have schooled you in it regardless, it is a benefit.” 

“Back then, I think you did what you thought was best; not to fill a young boy’s head with unlikely dreams. Except it happened and I’m now your heir.” Lorenzo stopped after, still remembering the pain. His voice gotten softer to the end. 

Cosimo gave a sigh, having lost a part of his heart a long time ago. “I thought about why you had such a struggle, then I realised. You were never told that this was you. It was how my father told me, his father told him, and so on.”  

“Instead, I could see just what a cage it can become. Because I never saw it as what belonged to me.” 

“And you still don’t believe it, do you?” Cosimo asked, his eyes hard. “That this spot is not yours. It is now, nothing is more true than that. If not for you, then for your brother.”

Lorenzo widened his eyes, realising what he meant and who he spoke of. “But I found why I want to do this. I want to reform, perhaps to find a way so that my brother would never felt trapped the same way I did, the same so many did.” 

Cosimo looked, putting it down. “Tell me.” 

“In the future I deare, all that follows me would not need to give up their dreams for the sake of the family. I want them to choose what they want to do, but doing so would require changing the world, maybe the estate can pass into the hands of someone who actually knows how to care for it” he said. “Even if I made my peace, but I refuse to accept this as what must be carried on.” 

Cosimo glanced, measuring him every inch, for his guess was right. Lorenzo had his own goal. 

Lorenzo was just a boy who wanted to spend his whole life in his thoughts and logic, making sense of the world by thinking. But now, he realised the contradictions in his own reality and sought to change it. 

“Why?” His father asked, perhaps wanting to understand why he chose this. It was incomprehensible. 

“It makes little sense, does it?” Lorenzo asked. “That you get it by where you were born, not by how good you are. It made no sense to put birth over merit. It’s completely irrational.” 

“I can only warn you that the world does not bend to your will easily. It will be monumental, it will cost you dearly if you choose this path,” Cosimo looked at him, with grave eyes. Perhaps there was a proudness in him, that his son became a man. 

Lorenzo nodded. “So be it.” 

Because the thought of making his mark on a world, that’s better for him, better for people who didn’t exactly have the correct dreams or the correct desires and hence had to be forced into it. That made him smile. It made him realise that this would all be worth it.