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Where is Giuliano? Lorenzo said, where is my brother? Is my brother safe? Where is Giuliano? No one answered. The people had stampeded out of the cathedral. The room was silent. One member of Lorenzo's group of friends was able to climb the organ loft so that he could look down at the scene to make sure that more enemies weren't waiting outside the bronze doors. He saw Giuliano's body covered in blood, lying on the floor. Lorenzo's friends surrounded him, a human shield on their way out of the cathedral, not to protect him from assassins, but so that Lorenzo wouldn't have to see the mangled body of his little brother. Meanwhile, Archbishop Salviati and Jakapotipazzi were trying their best to uphold their side of the revolution, attempting to take control of the Palazzo Vecchio and rally the people. On a horse, Jakapotipazzi rode through the streets trying to rally the people. People and liberty, he shouted. People and liberty. He tried to start a chant, but the people of Florence were silent. And then their answer came softly, a murmur from the crowd that became a shout. Pali, they said, Pali, they repeated it and it became louder. Pali, Pali, it drowned out Jakapotipazzi's words. Pali,
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is ball, the symbol on the Medici sigil. In almost no time, Lorenzo's men had the upper hand at the Palazzo Vecchio. The assassination attempt had succeeded in killing one out of two of its targets, but this was an all or nothing game. They had failed and there would be hell to pay. What the conspirators hadn't quite grasped was how unpopular they were and how terribly their message would be received. Lorenzo Dimadici didn't even really need to do anything. The people of Florence were outraged at these foreign invaders, these traitors who came in with thugs from foreign territories into their city who killed their golden prince, Juliano. There was outrage at Lorenzo and the Medici family at the time. There were people in Florence who saw them as tyrants, but as historian Miles Unger wrote, quote, no matter how compelling the message, the Potsy were the wrong messengers. These conspirators were mad at the Medici for their own selfish petty reasons. They were the wrong harbingers of revolution. They weren't there to free Florence from oppression. They were there to get rid of a guy who had been thwarting their own personal political ambitions.
