The Falcons of Fire and Ice

CHAPTER Two





Anno Domini 1564



According to Norse legend, at the birth of the world an ash tree was created, Yggdrasil, the tree of life, of time and of the universe. On the topmost branch sits an eagle, and perched between the eyes of the eagle is Vedfolnir the falcon, whose piercing gaze sees up into the heavens and down to the earth, and below the earth into the dark caverns of the underworld.

All the good and evil this falcon sees he reports to Odin, the father of gods and men. For the falcon and the winds are one, and the winds blow across every blade of grass on the earth and every wave that foams on the sea. There is no escaping the wind.





Lisbon, Portugal Isabela



Stoop – the rapid descent of a falcon from a height on to its quarry.



‘You must not avert your gaze, Isabela. Whatever you see, whatever you hear, don’t let your face betray you. You must look as if you approve of everything that is done.’

My father had given me the same instructions at least a dozen times, and every time he said it, it made me more nervous, certain that I would not be able to control my expression. For the only thing he and my mother could agree upon was that I always wore my feelings on my face.

Though dawn was only just breaking over the rooftops of Lisbon, my hands were already sticky with sweat. The bread and olives I had eaten sat in a hard lump in my stomach. I’d felt too nauseous to face breakfast, but my father had stood over me, forcing me to eat for fear I might later draw attention to myself by fainting. It wasn’t lack of food that was likely to make me faint, but being laced into the rib-crushing corset and farthingale petticoat, with its many whale-bone hoops. Together with heavy, voluminous skirts, the whole contraption swayed so alarmingly whenever I moved, I was sure I was going to tip over. Simply crossing the room was like trying to take half a dozen over-excited puppies for a walk.

Back home in Sintra, I never wore such things, but my father was determined that today at least I must look like a lady. My mother had snorted at the very idea, and for once I was forced to agree with her. Nothing could have induced me to dress up in this cage had I not seen the desperate anxiety in my father’s eyes. Whatever was troubling him – and it had been for weeks – it was far more serious than me not disgracing him by dressing, as my mother so kindly put it, like a dung collector’s brat.

Father peered into the mirror, adjusting the scarlet cap on his head, so that the three white falcon feathers were plainly visible from the front, his badge of office as the Royal Falconer. He turned and studied me, his head on one side, frowning in concentration as if I were one of his hawks and he was deciding whether or not I should be flown.

Conscious of his critical gaze, I smoothed my new skirts. Father had selected the colour of my gown himself. It was emerald green, much to my mother’s disgust. She always complained that my skin was too dark for a well-bred Portuguese lady and the green, she said, only emphasized it. But for once my father overruled her. Green was the colour of the Holy Order of the Inquisition and we had to be seen to show our loyalty.

Father shook his head. ‘Where do the years go? It seems only yesterday, you were a wild-haired little chick. I blinked and here you are now, sixteen years old, a woman already. How did I miss that?’

‘If I’d had feathers you’d have noticed,’ I teased.

He smiled, but it didn’t soften the lines of anxiety permanently etched around his eyes. He was only in his forties, but lately he had begun to look like an old man. He reached out, grasping my shoulders gently.

‘You are truly a beautiful young woman, and yet to me you are still only a child, my child. I hate myself for making you do this. But we must all act our parts in this play today, even the young king, him most of all.’

I knew little King Sebastian well, for he spent as much time as he could at the summer palace in Sintra with my father and the falcons. He was only ten years old, yet he had more riches than any boy in the world could dream of possessing. But the only thing he seemed to care about was his falcons. He loved those birds even more than my father did. If ever their sovereign was missing, the servants always knew where to find him. There he’d be with the falcons, but most especially with the pair of royal gyrfalcons, those exquisite white falcons with their great dark, liquid eyes. Sometimes the way Sebastian looked at them reminded me of that rapt expression of adoration on my mother’s face whenever she knelt before the altar of the Holy Virgin.

He’d spend hours with my father exercising the birds and, unlike the other nobles who were only interested in hunting with them, he was eager to learn every aspect of their care. He and my father had high hopes that the pair of gyrfalcons would breed next season. They’d been excitedly planning how the chicks might be hatched beneath a bantam hen and then hacked to teach them to return, a method my father had not often had cause to try, since most falcons and hawks, except the royal gyrfalcon, could be so easily replaced by trapping wild adult birds in migration.

Motherless and fatherless, all the lonely little boy’s affection was poured into those white falcons, and I believe also into my father whom he treated like a wise grandparent. I confess to feeling a pang of jealousy sometimes when I saw the two of them together. Little Sebastian so absorbed in helping my father to mend a broken feather. My father smiling down at him in the way I could imagine he might have smiled at his own son had he been blessed with one. My father would have denied it vehemently, but I knew I could never make amends for not being a boy.

‘But Father, surely little Sebastian won’t be there today? He’s only a child.’

My father grimaced. ‘His great-uncle, the Regent, insists he witness the auto-da-fé. He says Sebastian must learn to recognize and hate the enemies of the Church and of Portugal. I only hope for the boy’s sake he will be able to do what is required of him. It is something no human being should have to see, let alone a child. And you …’ He stroked my hair sadly. ‘Isabela, please believe me, if I could have brought your mother instead of you, I would have done so, but we both know …’ He trailed off miserably.

I tried to smile. ‘I know. Mother is too …’ It was my turn to grope for the word. ‘Sensitive,’ I finished lamely.

There was a whole bible of words you could use to describe my mother – beautiful, volatile, caustic, bitter – but sensitive certainly wasn’t one of them. What my father meant, what we both meant, was that she couldn’t be trusted not to open her mouth. Whatever thought slithered through her mind seemed to wiggle its way out between her lips without any attempt at censor. And most of her thoughts were vicious ones. Not that I blamed her, not really. Her husband, me and her whole life had been a constant disappointment to her. We’d all let her down, as she was forever reminding us in her sighs, her clenched-teeth humming and the crashing of pots and pans.

When she had married a man newly taken into royal service, she had expected a life of luxury at Court, of dancing and entertainment, of pearl-encrusted gowns and jewelled necklaces. Everyone said she was certain to be chosen as one of the ladies-in-waiting to the queen herself, for my mother had been strikingly handsome in her youth. But instead she was dealt a life scarcely better than a peasant’s, exiled to Sintra and married to a man who, she said, cared nothing for his family or for bettering himself, but only for his lousy stinking birds.

My father, faced with one of my mother’s furious tirades, would always gently reply that he was simply more content to spend his years peacefully among his falcons instead of having to tiptoe his way through the spiteful intrigue and rivalry of the Royal Court. And I didn’t blame him, though, of course, I never dared say so in front of my mother.

Father took both my hands in his. ‘Isabela, listen to me carefully. You must not look at any individual in the procession for too long or it will appear to others as if you are taking an interest in them. These things will be noticed. Try to let your gaze wander indifferently over the penitents as if they were a flock of sheep being driven to market. If among the penitents you should see anyone you know, a neighbour, a friend even … don’t let your eyes meet theirs. No one must see the slightest flicker of recognition in you, not for any of them.’

I gaped at him. ‘But we don’t know anyone who is a heretic.’

I could just imagine my mother’s outrage at the very suggestion. We were Old Christians from good Catholic stock and proud of it, as she never ceased to remind me.

Father gnawed at his lip. ‘No one knows who will be brought out of the dungeons until the procession begins. But what I do know is that they will have planted spies everywhere amongst the crowd. They will be watching everyone who comes to witness the spectacle, looking for any sign of sympathy or pity, and if they see it they will report it to the Inquisition. The auto-da-fé takes many hours, but no matter how tired and hungry you become, you must not relax your guard for an instant.’

‘Do try to keep up, child. We must hurry if we want the best seats.’

Senhora Dona Ofelia peered anxiously behind her to ensure I was still with her. But much as I would have liked to lose her, it would have been impossible, for that vast billowing scarlet gown was surely visible even to ships far out at sea. Dona Ofelia was the wife of a Court official and my father had persuaded her to act as my chaperone, for he was required to attend upon the young king’s pleasure.

I stared glumly at her massive backside as she deftly squeezed her hoops between the benches on the raised platform. I was still struggling to force my skirts to walk in a straight line in the street without knocking over small children or dragging stray dogs and startled pigeons in their wake.

Dona Ofelia sat down, then immediately stood up again, moving along the bench before sitting and at once bouncing up again, trying half a dozen positions until she had assured herself she had secured the best possible view not only of the square, but of the royal dais to the side of us. Opposite us a great altar had been erected, on which stood huge fat yellow candles and what I guessed must be a cross, though it was covered with a heavy black cloth.

The benches around us were filling up fast with families of Court officials, town dignitaries and wealthy merchants. The ordinary populace of Lisbon was gathering along the other two sides of the square and lining the streets beyond. The air throbbed with chattering and laughter, and with the bellows of the street vendors offering wine or cooling sherbet drinks; and for those who were hungry there were oranges, olives, cheese, almonds, custard pastries, roasted sardines and hot spiced bread fresh from the ovens. Friars and priests were trying to drive them away, for the auto-da-fé was supposed to be witnessed while fasting, but the standing crowd had come determined to enjoy themselves and no disapproving priest was going to stop them.

Dona Ofelia snapped her fingers, attracting the attention of one of the vendors who was renting out well-stuffed cushions. She rejected the one he proffered and insisted on pinching and poking almost a dozen until she found two that she considered worthy of our posteriors.

‘Some of these cushions have more lumps than a cobbled yard,’ she said. ‘You don’t want to get one that’s been sat on by a great fat sow like her, ruins them,’ she added, nudging me and gesturing to a woman two benches down from us, who looked as thin as a whippet compared to Dona Ofelia.

Finally settling herself with a sigh of contentment, she drew out a long fan and flapped it vigorously, though the morning sun had barely risen above the great buildings.

The banners of the Holy Office of the Inquisition fluttered from the roofs and balconies around the square. On each flag was painted a bright green cross flanked by an olive branch and a sword, to reassure everyone that the Inquisition dealt equally in forgiveness and justice, mercy and punishment.

I peered around, trying to see my father, and glimpsed him standing among the throng of courtiers behind the royal dais. His head was bowed slightly as he listened to the chatter of the man beside him. He wouldn’t say much, he never did. Mother said he was a fool for not pushing himself forward. She complained that he made no attempt to ingratiate himself and win friends who could help him rise.

Dona Ofelia nudged me and gestured towards the royal dais itself. A line of soldiers stood guard in front of it, their breastplates polished until their own nostril hair was reflected in them. At the slightest movement of their chests, dazzling bursts of sunlight bounced off the metal and darted about the square like dragonflies.

‘There’s King Sebastian himself.’ Dona Ofelia levered herself up for a better look. ‘See how regally he holds his little head. Bless him. Poor little mite, he’s the whole weight of the kingdom on his tiny shoulders. But he’s going to be a heartbreaker, that one. When he was born, the astrologers said that every noblewoman in the world would throw themselves in his path. Not that you need the stars to tell you that – who wouldn’t want to be his queen?’

I craned around the head of the man in front. A small blond child sat on a great gilded throne that would have dwarfed even a fully grown man. His tiny feet, clad in red leather boots, rested on an embroidered footstool. I had never seen him in his royal robes before or looking so clean. It was hard to believe it was the same little boy who would emerge from the mews covered in bird muck and blood after feeding the falcons with scraps of raw meat.

But there was no look of rapt attention on the young king’s face today. He was fidgeting and leaning over the arms of his throne, peering down at the soldiers below him as if he’d much prefer to be standing guard with a sword in his hand than sitting on a throne. Two priests dressed in severe black cassocks stood just behind him. One of them bent down to whisper something to the king and the boy jerked upright, evidently obeying an order to sit still. It was the first time I had seen these two men among the young king’s retinue and they certainly did not seem to behave with the deference most of his other courtiers showed towards Sebastian.

‘Those two priests,’ I whispered to Dona Ofelia, ‘who are they?’

‘The king’s new tutors. Jesuits, very devout men. They fight against the heresy of the evil Protestants. I hear they keep a strict hand on the young king, as they should.’ She pursed her red lips and nodded approvingly. ‘Boys, even kings, must be taught to –’

But what boys must be taught I never learned, for Dona Ofelia was interrupted by a fanfare of trumpets, and she struggled to her feet, pulling me up with her. Everyone rose, except the boy-king, as another figure mounted the royal dais. He was a tall, gaunt-faced man dressed in the scarlet robes of a cardinal. He turned to face the crowd lining the square, repeatedly making the sign of the cross in blessing over them, as his imperious gaze swept over the throng. As the raised hand moved in their direction, the people bowed their heads, hastily crossing themselves as if his blessing was more like a curse to be warded off. Only when the robed figure took his seat on the empty throne next to the boy did those of us lucky enough to have benches sink back down on to them again.

‘Ah,’ Dona Ofelia sighed with satisfaction. ‘That’s who we were waiting for. Now the procession will begin, you’ll see. That’s Cardinal Henry of Évora, the King’s great-uncle. He used to be the Grand Inquisitor.’ Dona Ofelia suddenly raised her voice so that her words must have been audible at least three rows in front and behind us. ‘We’re fortunate to have such a godly man as Cardinal Henry for Regent.’ Then, in case there should be any doubt where her loyalties lay, she declaimed, ‘There is none more dedicated to purging Portugal of evil than the Regent.’

A cry of Viva la fé, Long live the faith, rose from the crowd as the first glimpses of the procession were visible, approaching the square.

‘What kind of monks are those?’ I whispered, as a phalanx of hooded men in black bowed low to the royal thrones. They each carried a wooden rod.

‘Monks!’ Dona Ofelia echoed indignantly. She looked at me through narrowed eyes as if she wasn’t sure if I was mocking the procession or was just extremely ignorant. She evidently decided on the latter. ‘They’re not monks, child. They’re the Guild of Charcoal Burners. They provide the wood for the fires, so the cardinals have given them the honour of leading the procession. Has your father not described the procession to you?’

I was spared the necessity for a reply, as Dona Ofelia was distracted by the entrance into the square of a man bearing the red and gold standard of the Inquisitor-General. The Inquisitor-General himself strutted behind his flag bearer, flanked by two lines of his own soldiers and followed by a long procession of priests and monks from many different orders, all anxious to prove their support for the Inquisition.

Some of them staggered under the weight of the crosses, icons and reliquaries they carried reverently in their hands. The remainder shouldered biers on which rested life-sized statues of saints. A bejewelled statue of the Holy Virgin followed them, smiling distantly at the crowd below her as if she wished herself anywhere but here. Sunlight flashed from the gold and silver crosses and from the many precious stones that encrusted the reliquaries and the robes of the wooden saints. Many of the crowd sank to their knees, stretching out their hands in supplication, and wailing out their prayers as the holy objects were whisked past them.

But they rose just as quickly to their feet as the Dominican friars entered, and the pious prayers of the crowd turned to hisses and shouts of rage, for the friars carried ten life-sized wooden figures into the square. These were not hung with jewels or crowned with halos. The monks stood them in a neat straight row before the altar, like children lining up toy soldiers. Each crudely carved wooden figure had what looked like words inscribed on its chest. I leaned forward trying to read the letters, until I realized Dona Ofelia was watching me.

‘You recognize one of the names, child?’

I snapped upright. ‘No, I was … I just … the statues, they’re not saints, are they?’

Dona Ofelia closed her eyes and crossed herself. ‘Those are the likenesses of the wicked men and women who escaped before the Inquisition could bring them to mercy,’ she whispered in awed tones, as though running away to avoid arrest was too heinous a crime even to be spoken aloud.

I could see her lips moving, but whatever she was saying now was drowned out by the renewed hissing and shouted obscenities of the crowd as several more friars appeared bearing small coffin-shaped boxes.

Dona Ofelia thrust her face so close to me I could smell what she’d eaten for breakfast – spicy morcela blood-sausage, judging by the stink of her breath. ‘Those coffins contain the bones of the wicked heretics who died in the Inquisition’s dungeons,’ she bellowed down my ear, ‘and those who’ve been found guilty of heresy after their death. Their bodies have been dug up, so they can be punished. They needn’t think that dying will let them escape,’ she added with grim satisfaction.

As the tiny coffins were borne past, people began spitting and throwing clods of excrement and rotten vegetables at them. But they seemed to be exceedingly bad marksmen, for most of the missiles hit the friars instead of the coffins, much to the amusement of many young lads in the crowd, who whooped with delight and slapped one another on the back. The friars glared furiously, but could do nothing.

A sullen silence now descended as forty or fifty men and women limped and shuffled into the square, each one flanked on either side by two black-hooded familiaries, the lay agents of the Inquisition, who in some cases were virtually carrying the prisoner between them, for these emaciated figures could hardly stand, never mind walk. I felt my heart begin to race. This was the moment my father had warned me about. I dug my fingers into the palms of my hands and fought to keep my expression blank.

The prisoners were all dressed in the sanbenito, the uniform of the heretic. It was a broad yellow tabard reaching below their knees on which was painted the cross of St Andrew, with single, double or half cross-pieces according to the severity of their crime. On their heads they wore a tall hat, like a bishop’s mitre, painted with flames and grinning devils. Nooses of thick rope hung from their necks and in their hands they carried unlit candles. Some of these cowering creatures were aged, their hair grey, their faces the colour of a blade of grass that has been kept too long from the light. Others were as young as the boy-king himself, their cheeks sunken and wizened like tiny goblins who dwelled deep in the earth.

I told myself that I mustn’t look at the faces, but I couldn’t help it. They stood in a miserable huddle, some gazing around them at the other prisoners or at the crowd, desperately searching for a glimpse of their family members who had been arrested with them. I watched their eyes dart to the little coffins. I knew they were heretics and I should be glad they’d been caught. But I just felt so sorry for them, and then I felt guilty for feeling sorry.

The hissing in the crowd began again, like a fire racing across a field of grain. The final little group was dragged in. A dozen or so men and women, they too wore the yellow sanbenito, but their tabards as well as their hats were painted with leaping flames and devils. All of them had leather gags tied tightly over their mouths.

Dona Ofelia was on her feet, shouting along with the crowd – Heretics, blasphemers, Jewish pigs, sons of the Devil!

She turned to me, her eyes glittering with excitement. ‘They’re the ones who are to be burned. There’ll be no escape for them. They’ll burn in this world as their souls will burn in hell.’

I glanced over at my father. He was staring anxiously at me. Our eyes met and he gave the briefest jerk of his head. I knew he wanted me to stand and join in the jeering. But I wouldn’t. The crowd opposite were howling and throwing every piece of dung and filth they could lay hands on at these broken, terrified wretches. And for the first time in my life, I felt my mother’s anger at Father’s timidity – Behave like everyone else, don’t draw attention to yourself. Why should I? The Inquisition couldn’t arrest you if you hadn’t committed a crime, and certainly not for refusing to behave like a savage ape.

The crowd were trying to surge forward now and vent their fury on the prisoners. The guards fought to hold them back. Then suddenly a young boy in the first group of penitents seemed to recognize one of the condemned. Before his two familiaries could stop him, he had dropped his unlit candle and stumbled towards the group, his arms held out. ‘Mother! Mother!’

For an instant a woman lifted her head and her arms jerked forward as if she was reaching out to him, then they dropped back by her side, and she turned away. The familiaries grabbed the child and led him back to his own group. I thought he would cry, but he didn’t. He didn’t even look at the woman again. He hung between the two men like a frayed rag, as if the last spark of life in him had suddenly been snuffed out.

The crowd fell silent once more as the Inquisitor-General donned his bishop’s mitre and climbed up to the altar. He was a thin, lean man with a long, straight nose, made longer and sharper by the upward tilt of his chin.

In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti, Amen.

When the High Mass was ended the Inquisitor-General took up his staff of office and, descending the altar steps, solemnly strode across the square towards the diminutive figure of the king, closely followed by a young altar boy staggering under the weight of a huge leather-bound and jewel-encrusted copy of the Holy Gospels.

As the Inquisitor-General approached, little Sebastian edged so far back into his throne I half-expected him to crawl out of the back of it. The Inquisitor-General took the massive book and held it out towards the king. At the urging of the two Jesuits behind the throne, the boy placed his right hand on the book and in a shrill, quavering voice, promised to ‘support the faith and the Inquisition and do all in my power to extirpate heresy’. He stumbled over this last phrase and it took three attempts to get it right. Sebastian glanced fearfully up at his great-uncle, Cardinal Henry, but he received only a stern frown by way of reassurance.

Dona Ofelia produced a finely embroidered handkerchief and dabbed her eyes. ‘Ah, bless him, the little lamb. Such a pure, innocent child, he has no notion what wickedness there is in this world.’

One by one those penitents to be spared death were dragged forward to have the name of their sin proclaimed to the crowd. As each crime was announced, Dona Ofelia, fervently clutching at the silver and ebony rosary that hung about her neck, gave an exaggerated gasp of horror as though she was about to swoon at the wickedness of it all. Some of the penitents had confessed to being Lutherans, witches or adulterers, or had broken the law by neglecting to display an image of the Virgin Mary on the walls of their houses. But Dona Ofelia reserved her greatest shrieks of outrage for those who were accused of Judaizing – relapsing back into the Jewish faith.

‘I knew it,’ she said, as each was dragged forward. ‘You can tell he’s a Jew just by looking at him.’

If Mother had been with us, her horror would have been even greater than Dona Ofelia’s, for according to my mother and our parish priest, Judaizing was the most unforgivable crime you could ever commit against Christ. Father Tomàs reminded us of the list of thirty-seven signs of Judaizing almost every Sunday at Mass. He said that if you saw a friend or neighbour showing any one of these signs it was your duty as a faithful Christian to report it at once. Did your neighbour wear a clean shirt on a Saturday? Was he seen giving fruit to a friend in September near the time of the festival the Jews called the Feast of the Tabernacles? Was there no smell of pork fat in the smoke from his cooking fire? Had the fishmonger remembered that they had never bought eels from him? Did you see a mother wash her infant too soon after it had been christened? Even a person cutting their fingernails on a Friday might be a sign that they were practising their Jewish faith in secret.

Father Tomàs assured us that the accused would never learn who had reported them, so no one need fear retaliation from the accused’s family or have cause to worry about being cursed by these heretics. On the contrary, whoever denounced their masters or their servants, their neighbours or even their own parents, would be blessed by the Church and God for their piety and devotion in helping to rid Portugal of this evil. My mother would nod emphatically in agreement each time Father Tomàs reminded us of this. For our family could trace our Catholic lineage back almost to St Peter himself, even counting abbesses and bishops among our forebears, so she was constantly vigilant for any suspicious signs among our neighbours, proud and eager to play her part in purifying Portugal.

It was late in the afternoon now, my mouth was dry and my stomach was growling with hunger. Sitting in the full glare of the merciless sun, the penitents must have been crazed with thirst, but they were herded to kneel before the great altar to repeat after the Inquisitor-General phrase by painful phrase the lengthy public abjuration of their sin.

The sentence for most was to be seated upon a donkey, the women bare-breasted, and flogged with two hundred lashes through the town. The shame, they called it. Children were taken from their parents to be re-educated in the Catholic faith. Then, after the shame, most of the penitents would be taken to the secular prison, there to remain for the rest of their lives. Those lucky few who, after their ride of shame, were set at liberty would have to appear in public in the sanbenito for the rest of their lives, so that all decent Christians would know what they were and shun them.

‘What a pity your mother could not attend today,’ Dona Ofelia said suddenly.

She vigorously fanned her deep puckered cleavage, down which rivulets of sweat ran from the great mounds of her breasts like melting snow from mountain peaks.

‘She’s ill,’ I told her. It was the excuse Father and I had agreed upon.

‘But witnessing the auto-da-fé is a pious act. Why, I have known people brought here on their deathbed to witness the procession who have leapt up and walked home on their two feet, cured by God for their faith.’

‘She has a contagion.’

Dona Ofelia looked at me suspiciously as if I was one of her maids she had caught out in a lie. ‘Do convey my sympathies to her. She must suffer a good deal from poor health. I seem to recall your father saying she was unwell on the last occasion too. But perhaps she does not understand how important it is to witness the auto-da-fé, for you seem to know so little of what occurs. Has your father not shared with his family the mercy of the Inquisition? Perhaps he does not altogether approve?’

‘Of course he does,’ I protested hotly. ‘My father doesn’t talk much, but there is no one who is more loyal to the Inquisition than he is, and my mother is constantly –’

She reached across and patted my hand. ‘Don’t get upset, child. I’m sure you’re right. It is just that there has been some talk. You know how gossip spreads through the Court, not that I ever listen to it myself, naturally.’

‘What have they been saying?’ I demanded, furious that anyone should question the loyalty of my parents. We came from one of the oldest Catholic families in Portugal, probably a great deal older than hers. How dare she?

Dona Ofelia’s eyes flashed. She was not accustomed to being addressed in such a tone. I knew it was dangerous to offend a woman with her husband’s influence.

I tried to swallow my temper. ‘Forgive me, Dona Ofelia, I was worried that people were saying things that were untrue.’

‘I’m sure I must have misheard and they were talking of someone else. It is nothing for you to worry about, child. Forget I even mentioned it.’

She smiled soothingly, but I knew I had ruined any chance I had of finding out more. She turned her head firmly in the direction of the altar as if she was riveted by the stumbling words of the penitents. But I couldn’t forget. She knew they had been talking about my father, but what could a man as quiet and self-effacing as he ever have done to provoke gossip? I glanced uneasily over at him, but his gaze too was fixed on the Inquisitor-General.

The public abjuration had at last drawn to a close and thick shadows stretched out their dark fingers towards the centre of the square where the penitents knelt. Over the rooftops, the sky blazed gold and purple and blood-red as the fierce sun sank from view. The notes of the choir rose into the evening air. The castrati’s high-pitched voices rang out like angel song over the square and stilled the restless crowd, sending shivers of awe up my spine. Even a few of the penitents raised their haggard faces as if they thought the light of heaven was descending upon the town.

A priest stepped forward to light the candles in the penitents’ hands as a token that they had been brought back to the light of Christ. The penitents gazed in wonder at the tiny, fragile flames which sprang up in their hands. The Inquisitor-General raised his arms, his deep voice booming out in exaltation and triumph through the unearthly soaring of the castrati’s song as he pronounced the Absolution.

Then, with a conjuror’s flourish, the Inquisitor-General swept away the black cloth, which all this while had covered the altar, to reveal the rugged green cross of the Holy Order of the Inquisition, the sign of God’s mercy, love and forgiveness. The Church had triumphed over heresy and God once more would turn the smile of His countenance upon Portugal. The crowd roared and cheered and stamped their feet as if a vision of Christ himself had appeared over the altar.

Dona Ofelia hugged me, beaming through her tears. ‘I swear even a stone would be moved by that dear man’s mercy. Isn’t he magnificent?’ she said, reaching out a trembling hand towards the Inquisitor-General as if she longed to caress his face. Then she suddenly blushed like a love-sick girl.

But the day was not yet over. There was still the little group of condemned prisoners to deal with. The king, the Regent, the Inquisitor-General and all the monks and priests processed out of the square and eventually, when the royal procession was far enough ahead, the rest of us were permitted by the soldiers to follow them in solemn procession to the huge square of Terreiro do Paço, in front of the royal palace. Dona Ofelia clung tightly to my hand lest she should lose me in the crush.

A second dais had been erected for the king and his great-uncle, but in front of it was no altar. Instead, on the far side of the square, furthest away from the palace walls, was a huge platform made from dried faggots of wood with a dozen or more posts rising up out of them.

It was dark now. Only the blazing torches on the palace walls illuminated the scene, sending snakes of red and orange flame writhing up into the indigo sky. Midges swarmed around the flames in great misty clouds and over our heads bats, drunk on moth blood, lurched in and out of the pools of light.

A twisting rope of candle flames wound down the street towards us. The candles were held in the hands of monks and the castrati who were singing a Miserere. The voices of these beautiful beardless men rose and wheeled like the flight of a merlin climbing higher into the heavens, until the very stars themselves seemed to vibrate with notes.

The crowd, restless and hungry after the interminable day, were prowling around like caged animals, and when they saw the condemned enter the square, they surged forward in a great wave, howling and shrieking in anger and disgust. It was all the soldiers could do to beat them back and stop them tearing the heretics limb from limb before they could even reach the pyre.

The condemned were hauled up one by one on top of the faggots of wood and dragged to a post, where they were chained facing the screaming mob. One of the black-hooded familiaries held up a flaming torch beside each man and woman so that those binding them could see clearly enough to fasten the locks. The Judaizers were still gagged for fear that they might cry out that they were innocent, or worse still, shout some desperate prayer to their Hebrew God.

Next to them on the pyre, the friars positioned the effigies of those who had fled rather than face capture. The wooden statues would help to burn the relatives and friends they had left behind. It was an irony not lost on the crowd, who repeated the joke loudly to one another.

Finally the boxes of bones were placed into the hands of some of the penitents spared the flames, who were driven forward to the edge of the pyre. Most carried the boxes without giving any sign that they knew what they held, either numb to any emotion now or so relieved to have escaped death they would gladly have kissed the feet of their jailers.

But one young girl began to sob so hard the sound rose even above the chattering people. Tears streamed down her face, and she clutched the box in her stick-thin arms so fiercely that the friars had to strike her with canes several times before she would set it down on top of the unlit pyre. Even then it seemed she could not pull her hands away from the box, as if her fingers were frozen to it. She clutched at it until she was dragged away.

‘That’ll be the bones of her lover or one of her family in that box,’ Dona Ofelia said with glee. ‘Now she’ll watch them burned to ashes so there can be no hope of resurrection for them, which is what all heretics deserve, don’t you agree, child?’

I smiled and nodded as vigorously as I could. Trying to look as if I couldn’t wait to see them blazing.

When all was prepared the crowd fell silent. A hush of expectation fell across the darkened square. Slowly and solemnly the Inquisitor-General stalked across the square towards his sovereign, his footsteps suddenly echoing hollowly in the darkness. The torches flickered, lengthening his shadow and sending it slithering towards the gaping crowd. As it crept close to them people stepped back, as if the mere touch of his black ghost would send the chill of death through their bones.

He bowed before King Sebastian, handing him a scroll of parchment on which were written the names of the prisoners, now released by the Inquisition into the hands of the king. For the Church could not execute anyone. The ultimate sentence of justice must be carried out by the State. The boy-king gingerly took the parchment in his hands, holding it as if he thought it would burst into flames.

A Moor with a chest as broad as an ox took up his place behind a condemned woman chained to the first post on the pyre. His features, like those of the familiaries, were concealed beneath a black hood. He was stripped to the waist and the thick corded muscles of his ebony arms gleamed with a sheen of sweat in the torchlight.

The prisoner cringed away as far as her chains would allow. She was a small, hollow-cheeked woman with long grey hair that hung in tattered shreds from beneath her hat. One of the familiaries loosened her leather gag. As soon as the gag was removed, she began to sob and scream. She was crying so hard that her words could hardly be distinguished, only the odd phrase torn from her parched throat filtered through her tears – repent … abjure … abjure … I abjure.

It was enough. Before I even realized what he was doing, the Moor had placed an iron chain around her fragile neck. Fear contorted the woman’s face as he pulled the chain tight in his great fists. She struggled desperately for breath as the chain bit deeper and deeper into her throat, then finally her head lolled sideways and her body sagged limply from the wooden post, a look of abject terror frozen for ever in her bulging eyes.

The crowd screamed and howled, half-excited by the death, but at the same time frustrated that in repenting she had cheated them of the spectacle of her writhing in the flames. The executioner removed the iron chain and moved to stand behind the next prisoner. And so they worked down the line of the condemned. As one by one their gags were removed, a few shouted their repentance so there could be no mistake they wanted the mercy of the garrotte. But through fear or pain or raging thirst, most could do no more than whisper their confessions to the friars, who declaimed them theatrically to the square. As the garrotte crept agonizingly slowly down the line towards them, the waiting prisoners trembled and tried desperately to pull themselves out of their chains. One lad pissed himself in fear, and the crowd jeered and whooped with delight.

When they came to the sixth man, they once more untied the leather gag. He was old, his hair white, his cheeks caved in as if all his teeth had gone, eyes sunk so deep into their sockets they looked like two black holes in his skull. The soldier lifted the blazing torch higher over his head, ready for the executioner to do his work. Up to then I hadn’t seen the old man’s face clearly because of the gag. But as the light fell full upon him, I realized with a jolt there was something familiar about the way he held his head, something about the mouth … the eyes … but why? Why did I think I’d seen him before? Then horror shuddered through my frame as I finally realized who the old man was.

‘Senhor Jorge! No, not him!’ The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them.

Dona Ofelia turned a startled face to me. ‘Did you say something, child?’

I tried to smile, even though I was trembling so much I was certain I was going to vomit.

‘I thought … I … I saw a friend in the crowd.’

She smiled. ‘I expect you did, dear, half of Lisbon is here. But you said, “No, not him.” ’

‘Did I?’

Mercifully, before I was forced to think of an explanation, Dona Ofelia’s attention was captured once again by what was happening on the pyre. Unlike the other prisoners, Senhor Jorge had said nothing when his gag was removed. The familiaries and friars jostled around him, urging him even now to recant and be spared the agony of the flames. But as if he’d heard me cry out, he ignored them and, turning his head, stared directly at the spot where I stood. He opened his mouth and in a hoarse, cracked voice, proclaimed, ‘You Christians are all idolaters; you bow down before idols and worship a man instead of God … Shema Yisrael …’

It was all he could get out before they forced the gag back into his mouth. With a single bellow of fury, the enraged mob rushed towards the pyre, determined to tear him apart with their bare hands, and the soldiers had to beat them back. Several people fell to the ground, bleeding and senseless, before the soldiers could regain control of the crowd.

When they were satisfied that the gag was tied so tightly around his mouth again that not a single word could escape, the friars and the executioner moved on down the line. But Senhor Jorge stood quite still with his chin lifted, his eyes staring up at the starry sky above, as if he was back in his own flower-filled courtyard in Sintra. And just for a moment I was sitting there with him again, crouching on a stool at his feet, a wide-eyed little five-year-old, listening entranced to his stories, stories his Spanish grandmother had once told him when he was a small boy long, long ago. Jorge would sip his wine and lean back in his battered old chair, peacefully contemplating the heavens.

‘That is Lilith’s star, Isabela. You watch, over the next few nights she will grow dim and then bright again, like a great eye winking in the sky. Lilith … now, did I ever tell you of her? She was the most beautiful creature who ever lived and she used to boast that she could make any man in the world fall so hopelessly in love with her that he’d give all he owned for one night in her arms. But the angels said there is one man on earth who is too wise ever to fall in love with you, and that is the great King Solomon.

‘Lilith was determined to prove them wrong. So she disguised herself as the queen of Sheba and went to visit the wise old king. And he did find himself falling in love with her, just as she said he would, but he decided to test that she really was who she claimed to be. So he built for himself a floor of glass, sat down on the other side of it, and sent for Lilith to come to him. When she drew near, she saw the glass shining in the sun and thought it was a pool of water, so she raised her skirts to wade through it and then King Solomon saw to his horror that instead of human legs she had the hairy legs of a goat. And he knew then that she was no mortal woman at all, but a wicked demon sent to tempt him.’

Seeing my mouth open wide with amazement, Jorge popped a sugared almond into it and laughed.

Gentle, wise old Jorge, how could he be here in this vile place, chained on that pyre? All his life he had been a physician and had done nothing but help and heal both neighbour and stranger alike. What had he done to make the Inquisitors think he was a Judaizer? Who could have reported him? Which of our neighbours would have done that? I wanted to scream out they had arrested an innocent man. But he wasn’t. Those words he shouted out before they gagged him again meant he wasn’t innocent at all. He was a heretic. But even though I knew that, I still couldn’t bear to see him punished. I tried to look somewhere else as my father had warned me to do, but I couldn’t tear my eyes from him. I felt as long as I kept looking at him, I could keep him alive. I could will him to live.

By the time the Moor reached the end of the line of prisoners, three of them remained alive – Jorge, a woman and a young lad. All had refused to confess their guilt and renounce the faith of Abraham. The friars were still standing beside them, urging them to repent in the hope that their courage would fail them and in their terror of the flames they would finally throw themselves on the mercy of the Church and its swift garrotte. The Church wanted no martyrs for another faith.

All heads now turned to the royal dais. The two Jesuits standing behind the king’s throne prodded little Sebastian to rise. The crowd drew in their breath as he descended the steps. They watched the slow progress of their tiny king as he marched alone across the dark square, his cape trailing after him in the breeze. The gold coronet about his brow turned to blood-red in the light of the torches.

When Sebastian drew level with the Inquisitor-General, the commander of the soldiers stepped forward and with a low bow handed him a blazing torch almost as long as the boy was high. The officer respectfully pointed to the place on the edge of the pyre where Sebastian must light the pyre. The sticks at that spot glistened in the dancing flames. They had been coated with tar so that they would catch fire at once. The Inquisitor-General stood to one side, his head bowed. It was up to the king, not the Church, to light the fire that would burn the living and dead to ashes.

The child held the burning torch awkwardly, recoiling from the heat of it. He stared wide-eyed at the flames, holding the torch as far away from himself as he could, as if he feared that the flames would set light to his hair. But he was not tall enough to balance the heavy weight at arm’s length. He advanced a couple of steps, then he lifted his head and looked up at the figures above him on the pyre. His gaze seemed to rest upon the young lad, who stared directly into the little king’s face. The leather gag masked his mouth, but his eyes were as large and liquid as those of a fawn.

For a moment the boy-king and the young prisoner just stared at each other. Then the officer, perhaps fearing that Sebastian had forgotten where he was to light the pyre, bent down to whisper to him. Sebastian whipped round, his chin jerking up defiantly, his brow creased in anger. Then he turned and hurled the torch as far away from the pyre as his strength would allow. It crashed on to the flagstones and continued to burn there, as Sebastian stalked back to the dais.

The crowd gasped. For a moment no one moved. Finally the officer retrieved the torch and looked helplessly at the Inquisitor-General, plainly uncertain what to do next. The Inquisitor’s face was a portrait of undisguised rage. For a moment he looked as if he was going to wrench the torch out of the officer’s hands and light the pyre himself. You could see he was itching to burn these heretics, but that was the one thing he did not have the power to do.

The crowd started up a rhythmic mocking chant – Burn them! Burn them! – stamping their feet and clapping their hands. The king’s great-uncle rose from his throne and almost leapt from the royal dais. His red robes flying out behind him, he strode rapidly across the square. He seized the torch with one hand, whilst with the other he struck such a blow with his leather-gloved fist that he lifted the officer off his feet and sent him sprawling on the ground a yard or more away. The Regent lifted the torch high above his head, then thrust it into the tarred sticks, as viciously as if he was thrusting a dagger into a man’s body. The wood caught at once, and flames clawed up into the black sky. The crowd roared and cheered.

The fire surrounded the box of bones that the young girl had placed on the pyre. For several minutes the box sat in the centre of the blaze, unscathed, like a phoenix in its nest, then it burst into flames and was consumed.

It seemed a lifetime before the flames reached the back of the pyre, where the living prisoners were tied. They writhed in the scorching heat, watching the flames creep closer to them, waiting for the orange tongues to dart out towards the hems of their robes and lick up around their bodies.

I had never in my life prayed for someone’s death, but I did so now. I prayed that Jorge and the woman and the young man would be suffocated by the smoke before the flames touched them. Was it blasphemy to pray that heretics should be spared pain? I never knew if my prayers were answered, for by then the flames at the front were too high, the smoke too dense for me to see when they died. If they could have screamed through the leather gags, no one would have heard them for the cheering and insane bellows of laughter from the crowd.

I pretended it was smoke that made the tears run down my face, but I don’t think Dona Ofelia believed me.





Belém, Portugal Ricardo



Lure – a piece of padded wood, to which meat and feathers have been bound, which is swung on a line to attract the hawk to the falconer.



‘Senhor Ricardo da Moniz, at your service,’ I announced.

I swept off my green feathered cap and bowed low, kissing Dona Lúcia’s plump jewelled hand. Pio, my diminutive pet monkey, standing on my shoulder, doffed his miniature cap and bowed in imitation of me. Dona Lúcia simpered at us both.

Sweet Jesu, that ruby in her ring was the size of a pigeon’s egg! I could hardly bear to tear my lips away from it. All right, so maybe it was not quite that large, but where’s the harm in embellishing a little? The point is that it was as plain as a nipple on a whore that Dona Lúcia was elderly, wealthy and best of all a widow, with no one to lavish her money on except herself and her overstuffed lapdog.

‘Won’t you sit with me, Senhor Ricardo?’ she cooed, patting the silk cushion next to her on her seat under the arbour.

Ricardo – it has a debonair ring to it, don’t you think? I’m quite proud of that one. The name came to me on the spur of the moment in the fish market when I first encountered Dona Lúcia’s adorable little maid, with breasts like a couple of soft ripe peaches and such a fetching little dimple in her right cheek. Senhor Ricardo, she repeated when I told her, and the syllables purred delightfully in her slim white throat.

Anyway, it’s a damn sight better than Cruz, which my benighted parents thrust upon me. What on earth possessed them to name their youngest son after the Holy Cross? If they hoped that it would turn me into a priest, they were sadly mistaken. Now, if they had christened me with an elegant saint’s name like Teodósio or Valerio, who knows, I might have tried to live up to that, but not Cruz. It’s the kind of name that’s bound to bring out the Devil in you from the very first time your mother sets you on your infant feet and says, ‘Now, be a good boy, Cruz.’ I ask you – wouldn’t that make you determined to rebel?

At Dona Lúcia’s invitation I settled myself on the long bench beside her under the canopy of ancient twisted vines in the small courtyard. It was the most delightful spot; enclosed by the high walls of her house, the floor of the courtyard was tiled with an intricate Moorish design of twisted blue and yellow flowers. The scents of jasmine, orange and lemon hung in the air, and from a small fountain in the centre jets of water tinkled into a marble pool, making the air feel cool and refreshingly moist after the scorching heat and dust of the narrow streets beyond.

Dona Lúcia’s black slave boy brought us glasses of hot mint tea. I produced a tiny cup for Pio, my little monkey. He crouched between us on the bench, sipping like a gentleman and graciously accepting fragments of almond cake from Dona Lúcia’s own fingers, much to the insane jealousy of her own yapping lapdog. Pio ignored it. Even a monkey could see the dog was so plump it could do little except sit there panting. It so much resembled a frying sausage I had an urge to prick its rump, sure that if I did so, it would burst wide open.

There is nothing like an animal to attract the ladies of any age. I used to have a little lapdog myself, but I realized women only really have affection for their own dog which, however revolting it is, they believe far outshines any other dog in intelligence, affection and cuteness. The monkey proved far more effective. I had dressed him in a miniature version of my own clothes, a cream doublet with gold trim and padded breeches slashed with scarlet. Together we looked quite striking.

Once the slave had withdrawn to the far side of the courtyard and Dona Lúcia’s interest in feeding Pio was beginning to wane, I worked the conversation round to the reason for my visit. I told her I needed funds to equip a ship to sail to Goa, and I launched into a glowing description of all the riches she might garner for herself if she were to invest a modest amount in such a venture, which, I assured her, could not possibly fail.

‘Unless you have seen this wondrous isle with your own eyes as I have, Dona Lúcia, you would never believe the half of its treasures. It is with good reason that it is called Golden Goa. All the riches of the world are traded there – costly spices, precious stones from Burma, jewels from the crowns of princes, the finest silks, delicate plates from China, the very best glass from Venice, horses from Arabia, elephants from India. All of it just waiting to be loaded on to ships and brought back to Portugal to be sold here for four, five, even ten times what was paid for them. That is, of course, anything you did not want to keep for yourself.’

‘Do you really think I should keep an elephant?’ Dona Lúcia asked.

She gazed round the courtyard as if contemplating whether such a beast might be installed in here to frolic in the fountain and nibble at the clipped balls of orange trees in their tall, elegant urns. I tried not to let my exasperation show on my face. Why do women have to latch on to your most inconsequential remarks and ignore the important things?

‘I was merely explaining the variety of goods that are traded on this isle, Dona Lúcia. Naturally I would not be bringing back elephants. I would purchase rare spices, fine silks, delicate ornaments from China and beautiful jewels. The kinds of things that any wealthy Portuguese man would want to adorn his home and his charming wife.’

Her large bug eyes grew misty with tears. She looked down at the numerous rings glittering on her wrinkled fingers. ‘My late husband, God rest his sweet soul, often brought me jewels. He was such a fine man, Senhor Ricardo.’ She glanced up at me from under her heavy lids outlined with black kohl. ‘He looked just as handsome as you when we were first courting. But then, I was considered a great beauty in my time.’

‘Was, Dona Lúcia? No, no, you must never say was. You are a beauty. Why, there isn’t a jewel in all the royal palaces in India that wouldn’t be eclipsed by the diamonds that sparkle in your eyes.’

She frowned. For a moment I thought I had gone too far and she thought I was mocking her. But then she favoured me with the kind of coquettish glance that must once have had men throwing themselves in front of charging bulls for her.

‘Do you really think so, Senhor Ricardo?’

We talked on about the venture, the length of the voyage, the equipping of such an expedition. I told her about the sturdy ship I had found, the Santa Dorothea – such a pious and blessed name – and described with fulsome praise the vast experience of her captain. Then finally I drew the conversation to its purpose – the considerable sum of money I would need to embark on such a voyage. Money that I assured her she could not invest in any venture more secure or profitable.

‘Why, on the last occasion I returned from Goa I made six times what I had put into the expedition and my only regret is that I was unable to invest more at that time, but now …’

Dona Lúcia frowned until the two strips of black mouse skin that she had stuck on over her own shaved eyebrows bumped noses in the middle of her forehead.

‘But what I don’t understand, Senhor Ricardo, is if you made such a good profit on your last expedition, why could you not use that money to fund another voyage?’

I hung my head in shame. ‘I regret it is almost all gone. My friends said I was a fool, but alas, it is too late.’

I glanced fleetingly up at Dona Lúcia and saw her bridle.

‘Your friends would appear to have more sense than you do. A young man who wantonly squanders his fortune is certainly a fool. I wager that women, drinking and gambling were your ruin. That’s usually how a man and his money are parted.’

I let her scold. The more harshly she judged me now, the more guilty she would feel later. And when a man or woman feels guilty they always assuage their conscience by giving far more money than they would otherwise do.

‘What, no fine words, Senhor Ricardo?’ she said. ‘You were eloquent enough just now. Are you ashamed to admit the truth?’

‘I confess that I am, Dona Lúcia. You see before you an abject wretch who has failed his duty as a son. For the truth of it is, my poor dear father became sick. I took him to all the best physicians and bought whatever treatments they prescribed in a desperate attempt to save his life – rare herbs, pearls crushed in wine, tonics and purges. One physician recommended pure cold air, so I paid porters to carry my father into the mountains. Then another physician said the mountain air was harmful, instead we should bathe him in sea water, so I rented the best rooms I could find at the sea, but it was all to no avail. He sadly died. He was relying on me and I failed to find the cure for him in time.’

I bowed my head to hide my tears and it was several moments before I was able to continue.

‘My sweet, gentle mother was heartbroken and terrified for the future, for I had five unwed sisters all needing dowries so that they might catch respectable husbands. I could not let the poor woman fret over such a burden. So all the money I had left from paying for my father’s treatments I gave to my mother to provide for her and my little sisters. I am a fool, as my friends so rightly say, for I left myself almost penniless, but what else could I do?’

I sighed heavily, and Pio, who has been well trained, reached out his tiny paw and stroked my cheek, laying his little head on my shoulder in a most affecting manner.

Dona Lúcia sighed almost as deeply as I had and, taking her cue from Pio, stroked my hand. ‘That such a thing should happen is tragic, tragic! But you mustn’t blame yourself. You did everything you could. You have been a jewel of a son to your parents and your sisters. A saint! No mother on earth could ask for better.’

I almost wished my mother had been there to hear me called a saint. Then she would realize that there are some people in this world who do appreciate my talents. But it was just as well she wasn’t for she might have disputed a few of the trivial details of my story. It was entirely true that I was half an orphan. You didn’t think I’d lie about something like that, did you? But my mother would tell you it was shame over my wicked and dissolute behaviour that killed the old man. Rather an unfair accusation, if you ask me. But then she had thought me a sad disappointment ever since I said my first word, which apparently was a word no mother would ever want to hear her son utter. She could be a harsh woman at times.

Dona Lúcia, on the other hand, was a charming if blessedly gullible creature, who was perfectly content that I was whatever a mother could wish for in a son. And that kind of touching faith is bound to bring out the best in any fellow. I swear by the time I left that perfumed courtyard she was almost on the verge of adopting me as her own kin.

I was to return in five days’ time when she would have my money … her money … ready for me to collect. She had originally proposed two weeks to gather the finances, but I had persuaded her that the ship needed to sail within the week in order to catch the trade winds. A few days, I told her, could make all the difference between a journey lasting mere weeks and a voyage of many months, as I knew from my own experience, having seen ships becalmed for days on end.

I explained to her that men grew so sick from lack of food and water as their supplies dwindled that by the time they found the wind again, the crew were too weak to man the sails. I told her how I’d seen innocent young boys plunge to their deaths from the rigging, too faint to hold on, and men, driven mad by thirst, leaping into the waves thinking the water was a meadow and they could see their own wives and children running across it. She dabbed her eyes most touchingly at that.

Finally, after we agreed that the money had to be found as quickly as possible if she didn’t want their deaths on her conscience, I left her house, clutching a basket of grapes and peaches ‘for dear little Pio’.

Tomorrow I would pay a call on a friend of mine, a clerk, and get a document drawn up. Dona Lúcia would expect a written contract before she parted with a single crusado. My friend could produce the most impressive documents ornamented with great flourishes and couched in such obscure legal phrases that the Devil himself would sign away his own soul and not realize he was doing so. This clerk would draw up whatever I required for nothing. He owed me. He’d managed to pocket some nice little sums from his employer over the years, but he’d become greedy and careless, and was perilously close to getting himself arrested. I’d helped him point the finger of blame at another employee who even now was languishing in prison, but my friend knew that one word from me and he could find himself in that dungeon instead.

‘Just think, Pio,’ I said, as we feasted on the fruit in the stifling heat of my lodgings, ‘in five days’ time that bastard of an innkeeper will be bowing and scraping and begging us to accept the best wine his poxy tavern can offer. But I’ve a good mind never to set foot in there again. He can whistle for his money. Throwing me out as if I was a beggar instead of a gentleman. By rights he should be paying me to drink that muck he serves just to get rid of it. And I should sue him for giving me a bellyache every time I sup it.’

Pio snatched another grape from my plate, and leapt up on top of the battered old cupboard to eat it, spitting the seeds at me. I popped a grape into my own mouth and, as if he thought I was stealing his food, Pio screamed at me in indignant fury, before finally turning his back on me and refusing to look at me at all.

When he was in this mood, he was nearly as bad as Silvia. The sulky little witch was always flouncing and throwing tantrums. I didn’t have enough fingers on my hands to count the number of times she’d threatened to leave me. Now she had finally done it, but I knew she wouldn’t stay away for long, not once she got a whiff of the money.

‘How long do you reckon it’ll be before that whore comes crawling to me? Want to place a wager, Pio? A month, you say. I’ll bet you a whole barrel of figs it’ll be a week at most, you’ll see. Then she’ll be twisting her pretty little arms round my neck and begging me to take her back.’

I lay back on the narrow stained straw pallet and stared up at the sagging beams above the bed. God, but I missed her. Silvia drove me mad when she was here with her whining and nagging, but when she was gone I was crazy with longing for her. I tried not to think about whose bed she was lying in now. And she would be lying with someone; she was not the kind of woman to spend even a single night alone. With that wild mane of raven hair, lithe brown limbs and full soft lips, not even a Jesuit could have remained true to his vows in her company.

Even when we lived together I could only be sure that Silvia was faithful to me when she was actually in the room with me. Not even then sometimes, for she often had that melting look in her wide indigo eyes that told you she was thinking of someone else. I frequently became insanely jealous. But when I shouted at her or implored her to give the other men up, she only laughed at me. Jealousy made no sense to her, for she was easily bored and would wander from lover to lover like a fly aimlessly buzzing around a butcher’s stall. She couldn’t ever understand that a man wants to believe he is a woman’s only lover.

What had made her stalk out this time, I couldn’t remember. We’d had a fight. But that was nothing new. Silvia loved to whip up a storm, to rage and scream and hurl her shoes at my head, and once even a full chamber pot. But if our fights were wild, our lovemaking afterwards was wilder still. All that fury in her exploded into passion and she rode me like a marauding Tatar until we both collapsed into sleep from sheer exhaustion.

But there’d been no intoxicating gallop this time, that much I do remember through the brandy fumes fogging my head. When I’d finally awoken the next morning, with a tongue as furred as a donkey’s arse, she was gone. I was sure she’d return that night but she didn’t, and no one at the inn had seen her since.

‘But it’s only been four days, Pio. As soon as she hears I’ve got money to buy her dresses and jewels, she’ll slither back in here. Just you wait and see, Pio. All the soldiers in the king’s army couldn’t keep her away.’

A bright green lizard scuttled across a patch of rotting wood above my head. Sweet Jesu, but it was hot. The sweat was trickling down my face and stinging my eyes. The stench of putrid fish guts, tar and dried seaweed wafted in through the broken shutters, but there was scarcely a whisper of breeze to cool the tiny room. I slapped at a bedbug crawling into my armpit and tried to settle myself more comfortably between the lumps in the straw mattress.

Below my window, I could hear the rustling and squealing of the rats fighting among the rubbish, too insolent even to bother to wait for the cover of darkness. But for the first time in weeks I didn’t resent any of these daily torments. Only five more days and then I’d be out of here for good, with money jangling in my pocket and a belly full of rich food. Life was a tree laden with sweet ripe peaches for those who knew how to pick them, and I was about to pluck one of the juiciest.





Iceland Eydis



Mews – the building where hawks are kept, especially while they moult, or mew.



My sister died today. I felt the life go out of her as I cradled her tightly to me. I had always thought the spirit took wing from the body like a beetle flying upwards to the light. First would come the shiver of death in the slow opening of the wings, testing, balancing, and then a sudden upward thrust and the soul would be gone.

But it was not like that at all. It was water dripping slowly out of a cracked beaker. It was an icicle melting drop by drop. There was no moment of death, only a slow haemorrhaging of life, the heartbeat growing softer, a drum fading into the distance as the drummer walks away.

Valdis didn’t speak, but I knew what she was thinking, I always knew. She was thinking of the mountain and of the river of blue ice that creeps from it so imperceptibly you cannot see it move, although you know it does. She and I used to watch it for hours when we were small children in the hope of seeing it change, but we never did. At night, tucked up together in the little bed we shared, we’d hold hands and listen to the ice-river singing to us under the bright cold stars. But some nights it did not soothe us with its lullabies. It crackled and cracked so loudly the boom of it would echo around us as if the mountains themselves were crashing into the valley. Then we clung to each other, afraid.

That’s what Valdis was thinking of when she died, the nights of the blue ice. We always promised ourselves we would see that river again one day. One day we would leave this cave and climb up again to the light. We would run across the grassy plains, and slide across the frozen lake, and scramble over the sharp black rocks to reach the mountain where we were born. One day, we said … one day. We promised each other.

Our mother brought us to this cave when we were both seven years old. That is the age at which the gift of second sight awakens in a child. I remember thinking how vast it was. First the descent through the slit in the rock, narrow as a woman’s crack, hidden from any mortal view unless you knew it was there. Then we climbed down and down over ledges and boulders into the darkness below and all the time the sound of rushing water grew louder, and the heat more intense.

Finally we stood on the wide flat floor of the cave, bigger even than our cottage above the river of ice. The rocks were warm against our bare feet. At the far end of the cave a deep, clear pool of hot water bubbled up from an underground river far below. It streamed out into a second cave where narrow tunnels crushed and squeezed the water until somewhere far off, or so we were told, it finally thundered out of the rock and into the light.

Valdis and I were terrified of that pool of steaming water when first our mother brought us here. We feared that some great beast lay at the bottom of it, a dragon or monster, which would rise out of it while we slept and devour us. We tried to take it in turns to sleep, but in the end we both slept. The cave was too warm, the sound of the water too intoxicating to resist sleep for long. But now I am alone with that pool. Now there is no one to keep watch over me, sleeping or waking.

For fifty years there has always been the two us. We were twins, constant companions, day and night, sleeping and waking. Not even lovers could know the closeness we felt. I used to look at people who were alone and wonder what it must be like to have only your thoughts for company, hear only your own heartbeat in the night, feel only your own breath in the darkness. My sister was as close to me as my soul is to my body, and I can’t conceive of life without her.

I knew we would die one day, every mortal dies, but I had thought we would die together. It didn’t seem possible that one of us could go on living when the other was gone. In truth I can’t even be certain that I do live. I feel numb inside as if my thoughts are frozen, my tears petrified as ice, and yet my body can still feel the heat of the water gushing through this cave. My eyes can still see the flames of the pitch torch burning on the rock wall and the glowing ruby embers of my little cooking fire. My ears can still hear the wind whistling over the slit in the rock high above, far out of my sight, playing the hole like a child plays the pipes. How can these things be when Valdis is dead?

When she first brought us to this cave, our mother gave us little pallets stuffed with eiderdown to rest on, baskets of dried fish and whale meat, smoked mutton and sweet dried berries. She gave us lamps filled with fish oil and torches dipped in pitch. We had water aplenty in our underground lake.

The blacksmith who bolted the chains deep into the rock wall was kind to us. He took great care to ensure that when he fastened the chains to the iron hoops about our waists they were long enough to let us walk to the water, even to allow us to bathe if we wished, but we were too afraid to enter that pool. He returned several times over those first few years to fit us with new hoops as we grew to womanhood, but we were never to see our mother again, not after that day she brought us here. And that was the last time we ever saw the sun or the moon.

Others came, of course, bringing food and oil for our lamps, gifts of clothes or spring flowers. Everyone who comes brings an offering to us. They lay them out for our inspection and then they ask us their questions.

‘My red mare is missing, where should I look for her?’

‘My daughter has two suitors, which should she take as a husband?’

‘My husband has not returned from the sea, has he drowned or has he left me?’

‘Shall I buy my neighbour’s farmstead, will it prosper?’

‘My son has been murdered, who is his killer?’

They want curses to punish their mothers-in-law, spells to defeat their rivals, blessings to protect their infants and cures for their ailing cows. We hear all life as it passes through here in their quarrels and triumphs, their griefs and their joys, but we do not see life, except in our visions. We do not live it.

They are afraid of us, afraid of what we might do if the iron rings are removed from our bodies. They know it is only those rings that keep our spirits in this cave. If that iron ever broke, we could transform ourselves into falcons. We could fly into the blinding sunlight, or soar among the frosted stars, and like our mother who brought us to the cave, they are terrified of what we might do then.

But in here we are tamed, their captives, and they need us, now more than ever, for a long shadow of evil creeps across the land. The Lutherans have destroyed the abbeys and monasteries, driven out the Catholic priests and executed the bishops. They raid homesteads and cottages, searching for the images of saints and the charms and amulets of the wizards and wise women that have protected the Icelanders since the old gods ruled this land. All the old certainties, the faith, the hope that people clung to down through the centuries, have been torn away from them. They are frightened. They are lost. They are defenceless. They need us. And I need Valdis.

One day, my sister, one day we shall return to the blue ice. I will find a way back to the light. I will take you back. I swear to you on your corpse, I will not fail you.