now the one headcanon of mine that has remained the same in the seven months i've been in the fandom is that when cesare lies to lucrezia about how djem died it's because he's very sweetly trying to protect the relationship between juan and lucrezia. because even though he's upset that juan has the position he wants, he's not yet deep enough into hating juan, and even if he is, he doesn't want how he views juan to shape how she does, which is very cute of him I think. though, it could also be that he's trying to protect his own relationship with her since he did encourage juan to finish the job himself, but I prefer thinking it was one of the very few (only??) nice things he did for juan by not telling her the truth. <3
oh i kinda love it tbh? so like cesare putting his pettiness aside and not make lucrezia hate juan? (which i'm sure the main reason is because he doesn't want to break her heart or make her feel unsafe especially considering how cesare himself is a major accomplice in djem's murder)
the murder of djem was rodrigo's idea in the first place because he needed to secure funds for lucrezia’s dowry, and when rodrigo subtly hinted to cesare that they could still obtain the ducats if djem died under their care, cesare questioned whether rodrigo was implying that they should kill djem. rodrigo pretended he had never implied such a thing, and cesare was reluctant to murder djem because of lucrezia's fondness for him...and after learning that cesare wouldn’t go through with killing djem, rodrigo turned to juan (like ofc the idiot accepted the task) cesare denied juan the use of micheletto out of petty rivalry and told him to fuck off and find another assassin lmao. i think juan liked djem too but he was obligated to do it because he was crying while killing him with his own hands (which was also the first time he ever killed someone). also cesare forcing juan to do it as a punishment for failing to poison djem was so flavorsome because it awakened a darker side within juan after the incident.
