Ludovico Sforza, the Duke of Milan, was in mourning for his beloved wife the Duchess Beatrice, who had died in childbirth, alongside their son, four months ago. The Duke's grief was as luxurious as the thick black velvet curtains he had insisted were hung upon every wall of his personal chambers. He nurtured the growth of his beard to prodigious length, and robed himself in black rags, sourced by his servants (at considerable expense) from the poorest beggar in the city. All talk in court of the Duchess, and all commiserations, were forbidden, and every Tuesday, the day of her passing, was devoted to prayer and fasting. The Duke insisted that he would only eat standing, his food lifted from a silver plate proffered by a servant clad in black silk. It was the opinion of much of the nobility that these extremities were more indicative of great guilt than madness, as it was understood that he had been far from the perfect husband.

How Ludovico hated himself. He was a shadow of a man, a fool whose weakness sullied the great office he occupied. His wife had been a saint, and he'd betrayed their marriage in the grossest manner. Hadn't she taken over his duties when he fell sick, her conference with the captains at Vigevano averting military disaster and forcing his enemy the Duke of Orleans to retreat to Novara? Hadn't she steered him, like a wise navigator, through the stormy seas of his despair and depression? And how had he repaid her? By impregnating her lady in waiting and thus humiliating her in front of the whole court.

At these, his lowest and most self-pitying moments, Ludovico would often find himself recalling his conversations with Messer Leonardo concerning the Roman architect Vitruvius, upon the essential qualities of strength, utility and grace that had been identified as applying not only to buildings, but to the great men who commissioned them. Ludovico reflected that he was as far from the Vitruvian man as it was possible to be. Ugly and graceless in his stinking beggar's weeds; good for nothing in his wretched state; and bereft of the strength and stability endowed upon him by his beloved Duchess. He was thinking of all these things while staring at a copy of Leonardo's remarkable drawing one April morning when his Chancellor tapped upon the courtroom door.

'Forgive me, your Grace. Messer Leonardo has called and begs your attention.'

'Send him away, Girolamo. Have I not been clear enough in my instructions to admit no one?'

'Yes, your Grace. But- he has come to deliver a gift. We think- you might find it of interest.' He coughed. 'He has constructed- a rather remarkable thing.'

Despite the Duke's determination to appear miserable he found his interest piqued. Leonardo's creations always filled him with childlike wonder.

'Tell him to bring it in here.'

'The maestro respectfully requests that your Grace might join him in the courtyard. It is very heavy.'

'I see. The Duke should come to his workman, yes? I swear Leonardo imagines he runs this court.'

Sforza threw a silken cape over his beggar's rags and followed by the Chancellor and a brace of guards, stamped outside into the pale spring sunshine. Leonardo Di Vinci was waiting with an assistant, next to a man-sized angular object concealed beneath a sheet. Sforza concealed a smile as he approached his old friend, who he hadn't seen since Beatrice's death, and pointedly ruffled his own beard.

'See, Maestro Leonardo, my beard is nearly as full as your own now.'

Leonardo bowed. 'But not nearly as grey, most illustrious Duke, despite our being of the same age. Your excellency bears his years lightly.'

The Duke, who deep down was a good-humored man, nodded at the familiarity. 'Indeed, I do. You, however, have spent too long in dark studios and beset by poisonous fumes. Now it is cold, so show me my present so I can return to the darkness of my desolation.'

'Of course.' Leonardo nodded to his assistant, who tugged off the sheet with a flourish. Sitting upon a large, heavy looking wooden chair was a gleaming suit of armor in the German-Italian style.

'You have built me a metal suit?' snorted the Duke. 'I have armorers to do that for me.'

'With your Grace's permission?' said Leonardo, stepping towards the figure. As the Duke watched with curiosity, the maestro busied himself with a grey metal panel on the suit's breastplate, twisting a small silver knob while simultaneously sliding an adjacent lever downwards. Upon this action the suit of armor emitted the most peculiar grinding sound, accompanied by a rapid clicking, and its top half jerked forward spasmodically. Its legs extended and it rose to a standing position. Leonardo lifted his hand as Sforza's alarmed guards drew their swords.

'There is no man hiding inside, gentlemen, no danger. This is my mechanical knight. Remember, excellency, the drawings I showed you of the metal lion? How we spoke of how it might stroll, as if upon the fields of Africa, and lay flowers at the King of France's feet? Well, this is its likeness. Please, your excellency's attention.'

Leonardo again consulted the panel and turned a brass knob. The murmuring clunk resumed, and the suit of armor raised both its arms sideways to shoulder height; then the right arm bent at the elbow with a metallic squeal, and the gauntleted hand moved to touch the helmet. Instantly the helmet's vizor sprang up, accompanied by a new, disconcerting sound- a rhythmic, muffled drumbeat, as if the knight were being summoned into battle. Finally, the knight's torso began to rotate at the waist, emitting grinding clunks throughout this motion, until Sforza found himself staring into an empty helmet.

'Surely, there must be a child or a dwarf person inside, working the mechanism?' said the Chancellor.

'Sir, this is no deceit.' Leonardo turned to his patron. 'The knight is powered by a series of pullies and cables, regulated by a worm gear. If their excellencies look inside, they will be able to see them.' The chancellor followed Leonardo's instructions, but Sforza held back. There was something about this hollow man that disturbed him.

'The hands have wires inside the fingers that can be tightened and released, so they can grip,' continued the great artist. 'If your man offers me his sword, I can show you how our bold warrior can hold a blade and wield it in a chopping motion.'

'No. I believe you. Can it walk? I notice its lower legs are clamped to the chair.'

'The power of walking is beyond my poor art currently. But as his excellency has pointed out, the legs have been secured for balance and stability.' Leonardo's quiet voice quickened with excitement. 'You will remember our discussions on the Vitruvian Canon of Proportions? The knight's anatomy mirrors the proportions and musculature of a man. He has strength and firmness, anchored to the chair; a sort of usefulness, to entertain and to frighten the ladies; and grace, in the beautiful armor.'

Sforza frowned. 'It has no intellect, no soul, this knight of yours. There can be no grace in a man without a working mind.'

'Yes, your Excellency.'

Sforza walked around the standing figure, peering into the empty zone of its face. 'You say its purpose is for entertainment. Could it not be used as a weapon, on the battlefield?' He turned to his Chancellor. 'Imagine, Girolamo, a hundred of these knights, a thousand, terrifying our enemy, killing them, while we stayed at home, safe and getting fat. They would put the wind up of the Duke of Orleans for sure!' He paused. 'These substitute soldiers could banish the necessity of death in battle, once and for all.'

'Such circumstances would also remove its glory, too, excellency,' said the Chancellor.

The Duke frowned. 'I have seen precious little of that glory in recent years. There is no glory in watching your opponent die of famine or disease during a siege. But the maestro's knight- he requires no food, no water, does not fall sick- he is the perfect soldier, and immune to death.' He sighed. 'It is such a pity he cannot walk.'

'Yes, excellency,' said Leonardo.

The Duke considered the standing figure for a few more silent moments. He felt a strange sadness looking at this empty man, almost an affinity, which worried and fascinated him at once. Almost to himself, he said, 'Perhaps it would be possible to build a mechanical woman, too?'

'Excellency?'

'A woman of steel, with a womb like a kettle, who can bear children on behalf of our fragile ladies. Do you think that might be possible, sirs?'

Both Leonardo and the Chancellor bowed their heads, unsure what to say in response to this expression of melancholy.

'Ah well. Perhaps this knight has none of the Vitruvian qualities after all. I thank you for your efforts, Messer Leonardo. If you and Girolamo meant to divert me, you have succeeded. This metal man can be moved to the far end of the Castello- into the Rocchetta, maybe- where it can impress our guests as profoundly as any of your grand paintings. In the meantime, perhaps we can move onto more pressing matters- you can explain your latest ideas for the fortifications of the Castello.'

'Yes, Excellency.'

'And Chancellor, after dinner I wish to meet with you and the steward of my wardrobe. I think it is time I exchanged these rags for more dignified apparel, don't you think?'

He lay in his bed that night, staring at his father's suit of armor next to the curtained window. The suffocating darkness of the early hours had been relieved by the pale light of the crescent moon that had just peeked above the palace roof. The moonlight touched the shoulder of the armor and made it gleam. He thought of Leonardo's mechanical man and the principles of anatomy and philosophy that had underpinned its design. The melancholy that had lessened during the day came back to him in a great wave of sadness. Both the mechanical man that he had admired, and the one that stood silently in the corner, possessed greater dignity and substance than he. Ludovico rolled over, gazed at the wall. There was a giant tapestry of scenes from Ovid on this side of the room, and the face of one of the female figures- Atalanta- reminded him of Beatrice's. He focused upon the dim image as a thin moonbeam moved across it and his eyes grew heavy.

He dreamed. In his dream, his father's suit of armor had come alive, and was lurching across his bedroom towards him, emitting that hateful drumming sound, and reaching up with its silver gloves, fumbling to spring up the visor to the great helmet.

When his servants found him in the morning, Ludovico was lying naked on his bed upon a pool of dried urine, half conscious, twitching and blinking as though possessed. His servants tried to wake him but to no avail. No one understood his strange, garbled utterances, the significance of his appeals to his dead father, or his passionate expressions of Leonardo's name. And no one quite understood why the heavy suit of armor that had stood by the window seemed to have been carefully laid upon the carpeted floor, facing upwards, its arms lifted and its legs spread apart, so that the prostrate body formed the shape of a cross.

'Tell Leonardo she has been here!' Ludovico was heard to shout from some dungeon beneath his palace of nightmares. 'She visited me and kissed me with her metal lips, said she would never forgive. My Beatrice! My Vitruvian woman!'

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