The Falcons of Fire and Ice

CHAPTER Six



Henry II of England cast his falcon at a heron. The heron seemed to be on the point of escaping the falcon, when Henry swore aloud, ‘By God’s gorge, that heron shall not escape, even if God Himself wills it.’

No sooner were these words uttered than the heron rounded upon the falcon and, as if by a miracle, struck the falcon’s head with its beak, killing the bird instantly. Thereupon the heron cast the dead falcon at the feet of his master King Henry, to prove to all those who witnessed it that God’s will must always prevail even above that of a king, though it turns the natural order upside down, and causes the prey to become the hunter.





Belém Isabela



Eyas – a young hawk taken from its nest in the wild before it can fly and reared in captivity.



‘You’ll all sleep here,’ the ship’s master said gruffly. We were standing in a low compartment beneath the forecastle in the bow of the ship. Two narrow openings in the wooden walls on either side showed tiny glimpses of water and of the quayside. The sun blazed down through the hatch above our heads, illuminating a space that contained little except for a line of small wooden chests and bulkheads hung with wooden and metal tools and coils of rope as thick as my arm. I glanced up at the square of blue sky above us and wondered how dark it would be in here if the hatch was shut. I swallowed the lump that rose up in my throat as I thought of my father sitting there in the damp, stinking darkness of that dungeon, unable to stand or even lie down. How long could a man live like that before sickness took hold of his body, or despair seized his mind?

The master continued, ‘There’s a chest apiece to stow your belongings in, and see that your bedding is rolled and hung on the sides at first light. Seamen need to get to their tackle and they don’t want to be falling over your blankets, especially not in rough seas.’

A plump, middle-aged woman squawked in a mixture of alarm and disgust as she surveyed the bare boards, on which white lines marked out the sleeping space allotted for each passenger. ‘But where are my husband and I to sleep? My husband is a wealthy and distinguished silk merchant, you know.’

‘I told you,’ the master said wearily. ‘All passengers sleep here.’ He glanced at me and then back to her, for we were the only women in the party of eight passengers. ‘Some ladies like to hang a blanket in the corner to screen themselves when they’re dressing.’

‘A blanket!’ the woman echoed, her voice shrill with disbelief. ‘When we were on the pilgrimage last year the better class of passenger all had private cabins with locks on the doors and beds suspended on chains from the ceiling. The cabins were hardly bigger than my linen press at home, and the beds were far too hard and small, but they were at least proper beds. And I put up with all that discomfort and inconvenience without a single word of complaint, isn’t that so, husband? For one expects to suffer on a pilgrimage. But this … this dog kennel isn’t even fit for slaves to sleep in.’

‘This, Senhora, is a cargo ship, not a pleasure trip,’ the master said tersely. ‘But my men would be glad to swap places with you if you don’t fancy sleeping here. Perhaps you’d rather bed down with them in the hold among the grain and spices.’

‘Now see here,’ the small, stout merchant said, indignantly puffing out his chest. ‘I won’t have you talking that way to my wife.’

‘Then you’d best disembark now while you still have a chance, for as master on this ship I talk to passengers and crew alike any way I please. All that matters to me is getting this ship safe to Iceland and back again and I’ll not let any passenger endanger that.’

‘Iceland?’ the merchant said sharply. ‘What business has a cargo ship to do with Iceland? You cannot trade there. They’ll not permit traffic with any Portuguese merchants, not even with the English now. I’m reliably informed that any halfway decent harbours on that island that are able to accommodate a ship have been leased by the German merchants, mostly from Hamburg, and what remain are in Danish hands. I can assure you I have investigated the matter very thoroughly, for if trade were possible, I myself would be taking my business to that island.’

The master gave a twisted smile, displaying a mouthful of crooked, yellow teeth. ‘And who says we’re going to land any goods? There’s no law against landing people, and if a few barrels should happen to fall over the side whilst we’re helping the passengers off …’ He winked. ‘My lads are sharp enough at sea, but put them anywhere near land and they’re as clumsy as ducks on ice.’

The merchant’s wife positively trembled with outrage, her double chin wobbling like a chicken’s wattle. ‘The agent gave us to understand this was a lawful voyage. My husband is a respectable merchant. He has a reputation to uphold and I will not have his name linked to any nefarious dealings. I have no intention of sailing aboard a … a … pirate ship.’

‘Pirates seize goods, Senhora, they don’t land them, as you’ll soon find out if we have the misfortune to encounter any. Besides, you’re bound for England, what do you care where we go after that?’ The master glared around at the rest of us.

‘Now mark me well. You’ll get two hot meals a day. When you hear the trumpet sound, make haste to the table and eat. When it sounds again, finished or not, you’ve to rise and make way for the captain and his officers. So you’d best eat quick, for the captain doesn’t like to be kept waiting. If you want more food or drink, you’ll have to use your own provisions, so I suggest you stock up well at any inhabited port we call at, for it is getting late in the season now, and we will more than likely run into the first of the autumn gales as we sail. And if we’re forced to spend more weeks at sea than we reckoned on, then be sure of one thing, the captain will not allow his men’s rations of food or water to be shared with passengers, for if the sailors become too weak to work, then we’ll all perish.’

At these words the matron swayed alarmingly as if she was about to swoon, and some of the other passengers looked equally frightened. I also felt an icy shiver. It was not fear of running out of food but of time that frightened me. I could not afford to be delayed at sea, for with every day that passed the shadow of my father’s death crept closer.

With final instructions not to distract the sailors when they were working, not to touch any rope, chain, pulley or windlass, in fact not to do anything at all except eat, sleep and stay out of the seamen’s way, the master grunted that we’d best get what luggage we had brought with us safely stored aboard, for we would be sailing with the next tide.

As soon as he had climbed the steps and disappeared back up through the hatch to the deck, the merchant’s wife immediately claimed a strip in the far back corner, which she deemed to be the most sheltered from draughts, and ordered her husband to stow the towering stack of her bundles and boxes into what seemed by comparison to be a pathetically inadequate ship’s chest.

One of the male passengers bent towards me and whispered, ‘She won’t find that spot so cosy when all of the passengers are vomiting and gasping for air. Take my advice and sleep near one of the anchor holes. It’ll be cold, but the air will be fresher.’

I was about to do as he suggested when the merchant’s wife seized me by the arm. ‘No, no, my dear, you must sleep next to me.’ She lowered her voice. ‘Sailors are little better than savages. The sight of a woman after weeks at sea drives them mad with lust. We must place ourselves as far as possible from the hatchway in case one of them should try to creep down in the night. I tell you, I’ll not be able to shut my eyes all night for fear that they might try to molest me. I begged my husband to allow me to bring my tiring maid, but he refused to pay her passage. Says it will be cheaper to hire new servants when we arrive. But how he expects me to manage without servants on the voyage, I’m sure I don’t know.’ She glared balefully at her husband who was anxiously examining some cargo tallies, oblivious to his wife’s distress.

The young man who had spoken to me before squeezed past me again. ‘Careful you don’t find yourself pressed into service as her slave.’ He smiled at me and his hand brushed mine so lightly that I could not be sure if he intended it or not.

A trumpet sounded, and the matron looked up eagerly. ‘Food? Make haste, husband.’

She waded through the chaos of bundles and bedding towards the steps that led up through the hatch, elbowing the other passengers aside in her haste to be first to set her foot upon them. But when we followed her up the creaking steps, we found that the trumpet blast had not been sounded to summon us to a meal.

All the sailors were assembled on the deck and a priest stood up on the poop deck in the stern, the highest deck on the ship, a young altar boy at his side dangling a censer of burning incense from its chain in one hand and clutching a silver bowl with hyssop in the other. The sailors one by one removed their caps, and the priest began his blessing of the ship. He was mumbling away in Latin, his voice drowned by the clamour of the voices on the quayside. The boy swung the censer vigorously back and forth, but the incense smoke blew away before it could reach our nostrils. The priest dipped the hyssop twigs in the silver bowl and flung the drops of holy water over the ship, but they too were snatched by the salt breeze before they could touch the timbers.

The altar boy began to sing the hymn to the Virgin Mary in a clear sharp treble, Salve Regina, Hail Queen of Heaven. The ship’s boys joined in and the men’s deep voices plodded after them. Each of the weatherbeaten faces relaxed for a few moments into expressions of certainty and devotion.

I felt suddenly afraid. All my life I had known what I believed. Known that the Holy Virgin and her saints were watching over me, as my mother had always told me they were. I had looked up at that shrine in the corner of the kitchen and seen them smiling serenely down at me. When the thunder echoed round the valley so deafeningly that I was sure the great boulders in the mountains were rolling down to crush me, I would run to the shrine and pray with all the fervency of a nun, in the knowledge that the Virgin would protect me.

But whenever I was naughty as a child, I had guiltily avoided the unblinking stares of the statues, knowing that they had seen me steal a fingerful of honeycomb from the jar or watched me as I tried to hide the plate I had broken. I was always convinced they would tell my mother what I’d done. Yet even then, I had known beyond any doubt that when I lay down to sleep in my little cot, if I did not wake I would be carried by the angels up to heaven.

Now, for the first time in my life, I did not know where I would go when I died. If there was a storm and the ship foundered, would any saint bear me up in the waves, knowing what I was, who I was? Would the Virgin Mary Misericordia open wide her cloak and shelter me beneath it? The Holy Church and my own mother had declared the Marranos heretics, and Mary did not spread her cloak to comfort those who were to burn in hell. I was alone, cast out from all the protection that once had surrounded me. My own God had rejected me as a heretic. Yet if there was a God of the Marranos, I did not know him or where to find him.

The agent who had accepted my money and negotiated my passage had asked no questions of me save one – ‘Are you an Old Christian?’ I assured him I was. The lie came as easily to my lips as it had to my mother’s. Indeed, like her, I had for a moment found myself still believing it was true, until I remembered. He had insisted on hearing me recite the Creed and the Ave in Latin. But though I had known the words all my life, I suddenly began to stumble over them, as if my tongue was swelling up as I tried to say them. The agent seemed satisfied, however, and had held up his hand halfway through to stop me.

‘That’ll do for me,’ he said. He winked. ‘I have to check. They don’t want those Marranos escaping, but I say, what if they do? Good riddance to them, we don’t want their sort here. In fact I reckon we should get together the oldest and leakiest hulks we can find, pack the lot of them on to them and send them all off to the New World. And if the ships founder before they get there, who’s to care, that’s what I say. But no one listens to ordinary folk like us, do they?’

My blood instantly turned to iced water. I had been so afraid I would not be able to find a ship that it simply hadn’t occurred to me that I might be arrested for trying to leave the country. Of course, I knew that the Marranos weren’t permitted to leave Portugal. I had grown up knowing that, but then I had also grown up knowing that I wasn’t a Marrano, so the decree had no meaning for me. As an Old Christian I was free to come and go as I pleased. But now suddenly I realized that I was one of those forbidden to leave.

The agent must have seen my stricken expression, for he reached across his table and grasped my hand unpleasantly tightly, his mouth twisted into a leer. ‘Now, don’t you be fretting, my darling. There’s no danger of your ship sinking. Smartest and most seaworthy ship on the seas she is. You’ll be sailing in luxury. Course, if you’d have gone to anyone else, it would have cost you three times as much, but I’m a friend of the captain, so he gives me special rates.’

Along the quayside a small group of black slaves shuffled past from one of the ships newly put into port. They were naked save for filthy loincloths, their feet weighed down by iron shackles, their necks chained together. A few stared wildly around, their bloodshot eyes darting from side to side in fear at the strange sights and sounds that assailed them on every side. But most gazed sightless at the ground, moving listlessly as if they were already dead. I winced as I remembered the heavy fetters biting into my father’s limbs and neck. My guts felt as if they had been twisted into a knot so tight it would never be loosed.

I retreated to our sleeping chamber the moment the blessing was over and peered out of the anchor hole, holding my breath each time a soldier approached the gangplank. Once, when two soldiers paused to chat to the seaman on watch, I thought I would be sick with fear. Eventually they strolled away, but still I remained terrified that any moment they might discover who I was and drag me from the ship. When finally I watched sailors casting off the mooring ropes and I heard the gangplank rasping up over the side, I breathed easily for the first time in days.

We sailed on the evening tide and ate our supper – mutton and a pudding of bruised wheat – by the light of the swaying lanterns. The merchant’s wife, who announced that she was to be addressed as ‘Dona Flávia’, complained that the mutton was tough, the pudding not sweetened enough, the wine watered, and the boat rolling so much she’d never be able to eat a bite, but such shortcomings did not prevent her from devouring every dish with such haste that I was sure she would be ill.

The other passengers seemed anxious to obtain as many fragments of information about one another as could be snatched between mouthfuls of food. I listened, but I didn’t attempt to join in. Up to the time of my father’s arrest, I had rarely spoken to anyone who was not a friend or neighbour of my parents. We seldom had visitors at home, and even if my father and I chanced to encounter servants and courtiers at the summer palace on our way to the mews, I was expected to do little more than curtsy, smile and listen without interrupting the conversation of my elders.

But with Dona Flávia presiding over the table, I didn’t need to talk. She immediately informed us that she and her husband were travelling only as far as England, if, she added with disdain, ‘this wretched hulk manages to get us that far’. There her husband was to do business with only the finest shops to which he planned to sell a large quantity of silks and other rare fabrics. She, meanwhile, would decide if there was anything at all worth buying for her daughter’s trousseau, though she very much doubted that England would have anything half as fine as could be purchased in Lisbon. She proceeded to launch full-sail into a detailed description of her daughter’s forthcoming lavish wedding, while her husband sat morosely tearing his bread to pieces and muttering to anyone who’d listen that he hoped the English shopkeepers were feeling generous since he’d have to sell three full warehouses of silk to pay for what his wife had planned.

Finally, he interrupted her and addressed himself to the elderly gentleman sitting next to a lumpish, baby-faced boy who, though he looked no more than twelve, was already twice the size of his tiny wizened father in girth, as if the boy had been feeding on his father like some great leech and had sucked all the juices from the old man. The lad, it seemed, was the youngest of the man’s many children. The father was taking his son to France where he was to be enrolled as a student in Paris and would, his father anxiously assured us, become a scholar.

The lad didn’t look very scholarly and, judging by his scowl, he didn’t seem to want to be. But it appeared his father was in despair to know what to do with his son. He wasn’t suited to the life of a craftsman, for several apprenticeships had been obtained for him and none had lasted more than a few weeks. So it was either the life of a scholar or the lad would be obliged to take holy orders and become a priest or monk. At which pronouncement the boy’s scowl deepened, and he savagely kicked the bench on which he was seated.

Attention now turned to the three other men at the table. All three looked to be of a similar age, in their late twenties, but that didn’t seem to make them friends, for they eyed one another warily, like strange dogs circling as if to test one another’s willingness for a fight.

The one sitting next to me was a gaunt-looking man, with eyes as blue as the deep of the sea. His head was wrapped in a turban of black velvet cloth trimmed with a silver thread. It so completely enveloped his pate that I suspected underneath it he might be bald. He leaned across the rough wooden table to help himself to more of the mutton and the over-long sleeves of his doublet trailed in the juices on his plate.

Dona Flávia gestured imperiously at the cook, who was bending over the two great pots bubbling in the cookbox, half-hidden in a great cloud of smoke and steam.

‘Where is the man who serves the food?’ Dona Flávia asked in a voice that must have carried from stern to bow. ‘He should be waiting on us. This poor gentleman’s clothes are quite ruined.’

The cook gave no sign that he heard her.

‘I fear we have to fend for ourselves, Dona Flávia,’ the man said, dabbing ineffectually at his sleeve with a handkerchief. ‘Like you I am, of course, used to a manservant, but I dare say we shall learn to make shift for ourselves.’ He gave up trying to clean his sleeve and attacked the mutton again with almost as much gusto as Dona Flávia.

‘It’s not good enough, not good enough at all,’ Dona Flávia grumbled, then, raising her voice so that any of the seamen could hear her, she said, ‘Husband, I insist you complain to the agent who booked our passage, the moment we return. Tell him we did not expect to be treated like common peasants on this voyage. I’m sure you agree, Senhor … ?’

‘Marcos,’ the man helpfully supplied through a mouthful of food.

‘And are you also a merchant, like my husband, Senhor Marcos?’

‘Alas, no. I am but a humble physician.’

Dona Flávia beamed and clapped her hands with delight. ‘How fortuitous! Did you hear that, husband? This gentleman is a renowned physician! I am a martyr to a sick stomach, as my husband will tell you. And to know I shall have you to call upon is a great weight off my mind.’

Marcos looked thoroughly alarmed. ‘I am merely travelling to Iceland in search of new remedies that might be concocted from undiscovered herbs and lichens. I hadn’t intended to treat … there must be a ship’s surgeon on board. He will have much more experience than I in dealing with maladies at sea.’

But Dona Flávia waved a dismissive hand. ‘I don’t doubt he is perfectly able to provide crude remedies for these rough sailors, but a lady of my sensibilities needs the gentle touch of a learned man who understands complex cases such as my own. My husband will gladly pay any fee you command. We always buy the best of everything.’

The merchant winced. Then he patted his wife’s arm. ‘Now then, my dear, let’s not tempt providence by speaking of illness. I’m sure you will remain perfectly well on this voyage, so there will be no need to trouble Senhor Marcos.’

And, as if desperate to divert his wife’s attention from her illness, he said almost without drawing breath, ‘I have heard, Senhor Marcos, that there are ancient bodies preserved in the mud in Iceland. They tell me all the skin and flesh remain intact, though every bone has mysteriously vanished from the corpse, but not a cut is to be seen on the skin. And such corpses when rendered down provide much more powerful medicine for every kind of ailment than even the dried mummies brought from Egypt. Although I understand they are so rarely found that even a king’s ransom would not buy a whole corpse.’

Marcos offered that kind of faint, polite smile which people make when they have no idea of what is being discussed and fear to reply in case their remarks appear foolish. I wondered if he was actually listening, or was still cowering in fear from Dona Flávia’s attention.

The merchant waited politely, but seeing Marcos was not inclined to add anything, he turned to the man sitting to Marcos’s right. ‘And you, Senhor, what is your profession?’

The man he addressed was the one who had so kindly advised me to sleep near an anchor hole. Now he smiled pleasantly, as if he had been waiting to be asked this question.

‘Please call me Vítor, and I am by profession a maker of maps and a collector of curios.’

Dona Flávia’s head swivelled round to face him, her pursuit of the physician quite forgotten.

‘How thrilling! Do tell us, what curios are you searching for on this voyage?’ she asked, apparently dismissing maps as quite unimportant.

Vítor paused to consider the matter for a moment. His gaze travelled towards me. For a long moment he seemed to be studying me, his eyes veiled by long, dark lashes that would be the envy of many a girl. He wore such an intense, hungry expression that I found myself blushing. Then, just as swiftly, he looked away and smiled again at the merchant’s wife.

‘There are two curiosities I long to possess, Dona Flávia – a sea monk and a sea bishop – both are to be found in the icy Northern waters. These creatures are described most admirably by Guilielmus Rondeletius in his book Libri de Piscibus Marinis. The sea monk is a fish the size of a man with a human head like that of a tonsured monk, long scaly robes and two fins which resemble human arms. But its superior is the sea bishop, which has two legs, two hands and the head of a bishop complete with mitre and a covering upon its back resembling a cloak.’

The merchant’s wife stared at him with a spoonful of pudding suspended halfway to her mouth. ‘And have any such creatures been found?’

‘Indeed they have, Dona Flávia. For Rondeletius has made fine drawings of them from his observations. And furthermore, a sea bishop was captured and taken as a gift to the king of Poland, though it did not remain in the palace for long, despite being shown every honour and courtesy due to a personage of the rank of bishop. The creature made it plain by signs that it disapproved of the impiety of the Court and wished to be returned to its life of contemplation beneath the waves, and so it was.’

Dona Flávia glanced out at the foaming black water, as if she expected to see the sea bishop floating towards us, praying.

‘Are such creatures … dangerous?’ the elderly man asked nervously, and even his son stopped kicking the bench.

Vítor looked uncomfortable, as if he suddenly regretted mentioning the fish at all. ‘It’s thought they are mostly harmless. They don’t attack ships or eat those who fall into the sea, but they are inclined to a little – how can I put it? – mischief. I believe the sea monk has on occasion whipped up a violent storm, when it is displeased.’

Dona Flávia clutched at her chest. ‘Then I absolutely forbid you to capture one, Senhor Vítor. Tell him, husband. Tell him he must not attempt such a thing. We have no wish to anger this monster.’

‘My dear, have you forgotten, we are disembarking in England, and Senhor Vítor has explained these fishes are found in the cold seas to the North. We shall be safe on land long before the ship reaches the dwelling places of these creatures.’

But his wife seemed far from reassured and glared furiously at poor Vítor as if he was the cursed Jonah and should at once be thrown overboard to save the ship.

‘And what of you, Senhor?’ Dona Flávia said, pointedly turning her back on Vítor and addressing the last man at the table. ‘I hope you are not intending to drown us all by recklessly antagonizing ferocious sea monsters.’

He pressed his hand to his heart and, half-rising from the bench, made a gracious bow, beaming first at Dona Flávia and then at me. ‘Senhor Fausto, at your service, ladies.’

The man had a pinched, drawn look as if he had recently suffered an illness, but that only served to emphasize the fineness of his features.

‘I assure you, gentle ladies, you need have no fear. I will not attempt to arouse the wrath of any dragons or monsters. Mine is a far more civilized quest and one of which I’m sure you will approve, for I am bound for Iceland to seek diamonds and gold to adorn the necks of lovely women like you.’

The merchant frowned. ‘I didn’t know such things were to be found there.’

‘Ah, there speaks a man with knowledge of the world’s wealth,’ Fausto said. ‘It is true that none have so far been discovered there, but few men have looked, for the natives of that isle care only for their sheep. But in a land where mountains spew forth fire and rivers run hot from the heart of the earth, who knows what treasures may be found? And if I find none, why then, I’ll take the next ship on to the vast lands of Canada and try my luck there.’

The merchant snorted. ‘Then you are a fool, Senhor. Have you not heard, some Frenchman by the name of Cartier went on an expedition to Canada and returned to France claiming he brought back a fortune? Seven barrels of silver he reckoned to have, eleven barrels of gold and a whole basket filled to overflowing with uncut diamonds and other precious gems. None of it was what he thought it was, and the only use there was for those stones was to fill in potholes in the road. He’d have got a better price if he’d fetched back eleven barrels of dog dung – at least he could have sold that to the tanners, isn’t that right?’ He nudged Vítor sitting next to him and laughed heartily.

But Fausto’s smile did not waver, though his eyes were cold and hard as jade. He was not a man who could laugh at a joke made at his own expense.

‘This Cartier clearly knows nothing about the diamond trade and is unable to distinguish a diamond in the rough from a common pebble. I, on the other hand, have learned my trade from the best.’

He leaned forward across the table. ‘When I was travelling in India, I came across a merchant who had the biggest and most perfect diamonds for sale. I asked him where they came from, and for a long time he refused to tell me. Then one day this merchant was attacked by a band of thieves, who tried to strangle and rob him. I saw the attack and galloped in to assist him, fighting furiously until I had helped him beat them off.

‘In his profound gratitude he offered to give me any diamond of my choice from his stock. But I asked instead to be taken to the source of these diamonds. At first he refused, but since he owed a debt of honour to me, he finally agreed to take me to the place, on condition that I allowed myself to be conveyed there and back blindfolded and hooded, so that I could not disclose the route to anyone.

‘I allowed myself to be hooded and was led through the mountains on a mule. It was a terrifying journey since I could feel the steepness of the mountainside as the beast struggled up. I could hear the stones dislodged by the mules’ feet crashing down hundreds of feet below, so I knew the track must be wild and dangerous, but I could do nothing except trust the man in front to lead me safely. Then finally the merchant called for us to stop and my blindfold to be removed. We were standing on the edge of a huge ravine, so deep that great trees below looked like tiny blades of grass, and clouds hung below the cliff edge. The merchant explained that once a mighty river had run through the ravine, carrying with it such a quantity of diamonds that now they lay on the dry bottom in great heaps.’

Dona Flávia’s jaw had dropped open and she had even forgotten to eat. ‘Even the peasants who live there must be as rich as emperors. Imagine such wealth,’ she breathed in awe. ‘It must be paradise.’

‘Ah, but there is always a serpent in paradise, dear lady. The sides of this ravine are sheer rock, much of it overhanging such that no man may gain a foothold, and it is so deep that it would be impossible for anyone to be lowered down by a rope. Many have tried in vain to breach the defences of that ravine, as their skeletons bear witness.’

‘Then forgive me, Senhor Fausto,’ the old man said, ‘but I thought you said this merchant took his diamonds from this place. How is such a thing possible, unless you are telling us the man could fly? Now, that would be a fine tale, Senhor.’

Everyone laughed at this, but Fausto simply smiled. ‘In a manner of speaking, you are correct, Senhor, the merchant did use wings, but not his own. He commanded his servants to take from the panniers pieces of raw meat, sticky with blood, and throw them down into the ravine. Then he whistled. Almost at once, four or five eagles appeared and flew down into the ravine to snatch up the gory feast. The birds were trained to carry the meat up to the cliff top where the servants would take it from them. And there, sticking to the meat, were the diamonds. When the men had gathered sufficient diamonds they rewarded the eagles with their supper.

‘I saw this done with my own eyes and I was determined that I would return alone and try the same trick myself, but as I said, I had been blindfolded and when I did return I could not find my way back to that ravine again. I searched for many weeks, till I was half-dead from exhaustion, but in those mountains I could have searched for a hundred years and not found it. But I assure you, Senhor, unlike this Frenchman, Cartier, I will know the real diamonds when I find them.’

‘The merchant had trained these wild eagles himself? But how did he man them?’ The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them.

‘The people of India are much skilled in the art of falconry. But your words tell me you know something of falconry yourself. Are you interested in the art, Meniña? Which hawk do you favour?’

I could have slapped myself for my stupidity. How could I have given myself away so carelessly and the voyage only just begun?

‘I’m afraid I know nothing about hawks,’ I said hastily. ‘I was just fascinated by your story. I’ve never heard of such a wondrous thing before.’

‘I agree, my dear,’ the merchant said. ‘I too have never heard such an incredible tale. But you must be careful not to believe everything travellers tell you. Young girls inexperienced in the ways of the world may easily be dazzled by fine words.’

Fausto glared furiously at him and half-rose as if he meant to be revenged for such an insult, but however he intended to retaliate, he was forestalled by Dona Flávia who suddenly seemed to remember that she knew nothing about me.

‘And what brings you aboard this ship, my dear? You are very young to be travelling alone. Have you no parents or kin? Is there no chaperone with you? Was Senhor Fausto correct to address you as Meniña? Are you unmarried?’

‘Yes … no, I mean, I am married.’ If my face was as red as it felt, I was sure I was lighting up half the ship like the flames in the cookbox.

‘And your husband is allowing you to make a long sea journey alone?’ Dona Flávia looked scandalized. ‘Whatever –’

But at that moment the trumpet sounded again and two bare-footed boys came scampering across the deck as if they had been waiting for the signal. They began to gather up the wooden bowls and plates with such haste that some of the passengers were left holding their spoons suspended in mid-air as the bowls they were eating from were whisked off the table.

The cook, having ignored us up to now, strode up to the table, wiping his greasy hands down the front of his breeches. ‘Come along, let’s be having you. Lads have to lay up the table for the captain. Shift your arses. The lads are scrawny but they’re not ghosts, they can’t work through you.’

‘This is an outrage,’ Dona Flávia spluttered, attempting to wrest her bowl back from the hands of one lad who was equally determined to keep hold of it. ‘We haven’t finished eating yet.’

‘Then you’ll know to eat faster next time, won’t you?’ said the cook with complete indifference. ‘There’ll be plenty of time for you to gab on this voyage. Nothing else for you to do, is there? So what you want to remember is mealtimes is for eating and the rest of the time for talking. You’ll soon get the hang of it.’

One of the young lads sniggered, and the cook cuffed him across the back of his head, causing him to lose his grip on the dish he was attempting to wrest from Dona Flávia. The dish jerked upwards and the remains of the wheat pudding, her third helping, landed with a wet plop on her neck. For a moment no one seemed able to do anything except stare as the mess slowly began to ooze down into her ample cleavage.

Then Dona Flávia gave an ear-piercing shriek. The boy fled and the cook reached out his hand as if he was going to attempt to grab the mess before it disappeared down inside her gown. This only seemed to alarm the poor woman more, and clutching her dress to her as if she feared he was going to rip it off, she fled, howling, to the passengers’ quarters as fast as her bulk would allow, pursued by gales of laughter from those seamen who had witnessed her misfortune.

The cook wiped his perspiring face with his sleeve. ‘Senhor, your wife …’ He seemed to be struggling to control his face. ‘Rest assured I will thrash that boy till his back’s as black as a tar barrel. Not that it will do the slightest good. Captain bought young Hinrik there from his father in Iceland when he was seven, that was nigh on five years ago, but you’d think he only came aboard yesterday, he’s that clumsy. No amount of beating him seems to knock any sense into the lad. Reckon his father didn’t sell him ’cause he needed the money, but just to get shot of the useless blockhead.’

‘I would not have the lad beaten,’ the merchant said. ‘On this occasion he was not entirely to blame. But I believe it would be wise to allow my dear wife a little privacy just now … so that she can change her gown, you understand.’

He glanced anxiously towards the passengers’ quarters. He evidently wanted to avoid returning there for as long as possible. I didn’t blame him and I certainly had no intention of going back there either, at least until Dona Flávia was safely asleep.

Fausto and Marcos were engrossed in discovering which seaman had the best wine for sale on board, and the merchant and Vítor had wandered over to join a small group of sailors who were sitting on coils of rope eating their meals and listening to a young lad singing about the women left behind in every port.

I found a dark corner in the stern of the boat and stood there, watching the lights of the ship’s lanterns trailing across the black water. The flames separated into a thousand tiny reflections as if a shoal of bright yellow fish was following the ship. The waves foamed white in the darkness and the wind, though still warm, tugged at my clothes. Closer inshore tiny fishing boats dipped up and down on the waves, and occasionally the outline of a man would appear, stripped to the waist and silhouetted against the boat’s lanterns, as he pulled in his nets. Yellow and red lights dotted the distant shoreline, like jewels on a black velvet gown. And above them, a great arc of white stars hung in the sky. For a moment, staring up at them, I could feel blessedly alone.

But a raucous gale of laughter from the sailors quickly reminded me I was very far from alone. I was trapped with a score of others, any one of whom might discover who I really was and inform the captain he had a heretic on board. I had seen the way those seamen blessed their ship. Sailing with a heretic on board would, in their eyes, be worse than if someone had hidden a curse-doll on the ship. I had to think of a plausible story to protect myself. Dona Flávia would not be diverted for long and, as the cook had reminded me, we would be many weeks aboard this ship, and what else would there be to do but talk? I couldn’t hide from her for ever.

The ship juddered as a large wave rammed it and the huge square sails snapped as a sudden gust of wind filled them, making it leap forward like a startled horse. I shivered in the wind. Then I felt something heavy envelop me. Vítor was standing behind me. He had swung his short cloak from his shoulders and wrapped it about mine.

‘I hope you have some warmer clothes for when we get further north, else you’ll freeze.’

In truth I hadn’t even considered that. I had brought a few clothes from my closet at home which I wore through the chilly days of winter on the hilltop of Sintra. Would it be colder than that? Would I be able to buy warm clothes there? I gnawed at my lip, thinking of how much I had paid for the voyage, and I had yet to find a ship to bring me home. I dared not spend too much on other things.

Vítor put his head on one side. ‘Trying to avoid Dona Flávia?’

‘No, of course not,’ I said too quickly, then, seeing the exaggerated rise of his eyebrows, I smiled. ‘Are you avoiding her too? Afraid she might lecture you again about the folly of provoking sea monsters?’

He laughed. His breath was sweet, but not from wine. ‘I shouldn’t have mentioned that. Though I don’t think Senhora Flávia has anything to fear from sea monsters, it is they who would take fright at the sight of her.’

‘Are you really intending to capture such beasts?’

‘Capture, perhaps not. If I brought such a fish aboard this ship, bishop or not, the cook would soon have it broiling on his fire.’

‘Then why are you travelling to Iceland?’

His smile vanished abruptly. ‘Must a man have only one reason for going on a journey? I might ask you the same, Senhora, or is it really Meniña?’

‘I am married,’ I snapped with the kind of indignation that flares up when a lie is questioned. ‘My husband’s in Iceland. He promised he would send for me when he was settled and now he is.’ I was glad that it was too dark for him to see my face.

‘A Portuguese settled in Iceland. That is unusual – a Catholic in a Protestant land.’

‘He’s a Dane. I … met him when he came here to trade. We fell in love.’

‘So you are married to a Protestant. Is that why you travel alone? Have your family disowned you?’

I nodded. That much at least did not feel like a lie. My mother and I had parted on the worst of terms. She was going to stay with her sister, and I knew they would take her in. But when I told her where I was going, my mother had torn open the bodice of her dress telling me to cut out her heart and eat it in front of her. Why not, she said, that was what I was already doing to her – ripping out her heart. For an only child, a daughter no less, to abandon her mother at a time like this, was a crime more wicked than murder.

As I stood there on the rolling deck, her face swam before me again, white and pinched, her eyes wet with tears, but not softened by them, her voice as harsh as a seagull’s screaming at me that we were not Marranos. How could I even suggest such a thing? It was all a lie, a wicked lie, and how could I be so cruel as to taunt her with this, hadn’t she already suffered enough by losing her husband? She spoke as if he had already been taken by the angel of death, as if she was now a grieving widow. Maybe that is what she would tell her sister – that her husband was dead. And she would say it as if it was the truth, for in her head, like so much else in her life, she had already convinced herself it was.

I was so preoccupied with my mother’s words that I didn’t realize that Vítor was still talking.

‘… when we reach Iceland. But in the meantime, Isabela, allow me to offer myself as your protector, if only from the dragon, Dona Flávia.’

I didn’t register what he had said at first, the name was slipped in so smoothly among the words.

‘It is Isabela, isn’t it?’ he asked softly. ‘A beautiful name for a beautiful woman and one you can be sure I will remember.’





Iceland Eydis



Pelt – the dead body of the hawk’s prey or quarry.



I keep the man alive because I have to do it. Like Ari, I ask myself a thousand times a day if I should let him die and I know beyond any doubt that I should. But I also realize now that he will not simply cease to live, for in truth I am doing little to keep him alive. I have bound his wounds and covered them in herb poultices so that they do not fester. Five times a day I wash his mouth with water and put honey beneath his tongue. But these ministrations are not enough to help him recover. He is injured in ways I can never heal. Any other man would have died within hours of being brought to the cave, but he lives. Not waking, not stirring, but still he lives.

Jónas carries little Frída into the cave in a sack tipped over his shoulder, with only her head visible and not much of that, for her face is wrapped tightly around with a shawl. Frída is nearly seven years old and lives up to the name that we revealed to her mother, for she is both beautiful and fair. Her mother gave birth to her in this cave and Valdis and I brought the child into the world and bit through the cord to loose her from the womb.

‘Is the child sick, Jónas?’

He does not answer, but lays her tenderly on the floor. She begins writhing like a maggot, trying to free herself from the sack, and her eyes are blazing with fury.

Jónas glances over at the man lying motionless in the corner.

‘He still lives then,’ he says without curiosity. ‘I heard what happened.’ He spits to show his disgust. ‘He was a fool to come inland. A shark-sucker does not leave the shark, why should a sailor leave the shore?’

‘Why have you bound your daughter?’ I ask, not wanting to talk about the man.

Jónas grunts and turns his attention back to his thrashing daughter. ‘She tried to throw herself into a boiling mud pool.’

‘But she’s a sensible child, old enough to know that the pools are so hot they would kill her instantly.’

‘She knows. We’ve taught her since she could crawl that it is dangerous even to walk on the ground around the boiling mud pools in case the crust of the earth gives way. But she ran at the pool and tried to jump in. Her playmates caught her and dragged her away, but she fought them and kept trying to reach the scalding mud again. In the end three of them had to sit on her to hold her down while one of them came running for me.’

It is not unknown for men and women to throw themselves into these pools of boiling mud, when a great melancholy comes upon them. I have heard of women killing themselves in this way in grief over a lost lover or a dead child, but for one so young to be in such despair … Whatever could have brought about this change in her?

‘Loosen the shawl. Let me speak to her.’

Jónas fumbles with the knot and pulls the shawl from her face.

The moment her face is uncovered, Frída screams that it hurts and then she utters such obscenities that I never thought to hear fall from a child’s lips. Her father makes to cover her mouth again, but I stop him.

‘Where does it hurt, Frída? Tell me where you feel the pain.’

But she stares at me, her eyes wild. ‘The whales are singing on the land. The birds are flying in the water. And flowers, I saw flowers in the snow.’

She thrashes her head violently from side to side, her pale hair flailing about her face. It is only now that I notice the thick black line down the side of her face, but the mark is not swollen. I have seen enough bruises on the man in recent days to know that this mark was not caused by a blow or a fall.

Jónas hastily ties the thick shawl about his daughter’s head and face again, plainly worried that she will dash her brains out on the rocks. ‘You see how she is? Her mother and I can do nothing to bring her to her senses.’

‘That mark on her face. How did she come by it?’

‘In the same hour that she lost her wits,’ Jónas says sadly. ‘Her mother thought it was soot and tried to wash it off, but it will not budge.’

‘You said that she was playing when the madness came upon her. Did her friends tell you what happened?’

Jónas frowns. ‘They did, but what they say makes no sense. They were scattered about the pasture, throwing a ball one to another, when one of the children said she heard a hissing in the air. She looked up to see a cloud, a small black cloud, approaching them. It was so low and coming towards them with such speed that at first she thought it must be a big black bird of some kind. It seemed to her that this cloud brushed past Frída’s face and at once my daughter fell to the ground, screaming and holding her head. As they clustered round her trying to find out what ailed her, she leapt up and ran towards the mud pools, screaming and babbling so wildly, they had to run after her to grab her.’

‘Your neighbour has done this. A Sending has been conjured to harm the child.’ The voice which suddenly booms out in the cave might have been my own and yet I did not speak. There is a harshness to it which I do not recognize.

Jónas turns to look at my veiled sister. ‘My neighbour?’ he asks, as if he expects her to answer him, and I cannot understand why, until I remember he does not know she is dead.

‘Is there anyone who has a grudge against you?’ the voice says.

I stare at the body of the man lying in the corner of the cave, even though I know it is my sister’s voice I can hear. But he remains motionless, his eyes closed, his lips cracked and still.

‘Pétur, it has to be that bastard Pétur,’ Jónas says vehemently. ‘I sold him a stallion to cover his mares, but he said the beast died. Claimed it was sick when I sold it to him. He’s come to my farm several times demanding the return of the money, but I wouldn’t give it to him. It’s been more than three months since I sold him the stallion. If the horse had been sick when I sold it to him it would have died long before this, but he wouldn’t listen to reason. Now he’s taken his revenge on my poor innocent daughter. What can I do to help her?’ Jónas is still addressing my sister as if he expects her to answer him.

‘If you do exactly what I say, the child’s wits shall return,’ she says.

My hands are trembling. I slowly turn my head towards Valdis’s body, not wanting to look but knowing I must. There beneath the flimsy cloth of her veil, I can see her lips moving.

‘Go to the graveyard,’ she says, ‘and open a grave of one newly buried. Take from it the coin that is placed on the man’s tongue. Carry the coin to Pétur’s farm and there hide it in the bed of the stream at the place where his mares come to drink. But make sure you do this during the daylight hours. At night, the ghost of the corpse will follow his coin to the farm to take back what has been stolen from him, but ghosts cannot enter running water, so he will not be able to retrieve the coin. In his frustration, he will take his vengeance out on the nearest living creatures, Pétur’s mares, and kill them. Then the child’s wits shall be restored.’

Jónas shudders. ‘The wretch deserves to lose his mares and more besides after what he’s done to my beautiful daughter, but I would sooner kill his horses with my own hand than rob the dead.’

‘Dark magic harmed your child, only vengeance from the spirit world can undo the curse. It must be done as I have told you,’ Valdis tells him.

I am so horrified at hearing the voice come from my dead sister’s lips that I have barely taken in what is being said, but the words finally penetrate through the veil of fear and revulsion in my head. I know what she is telling him to do is wrong, terribly wrong.

‘No! No, that is not what ails the child.’

Jónas turns to me, puzzled, as well he might be, for my sister and I have always before uttered the same thought.

‘The cloud was not a Sending. There was no malice in it, no life in it, no spirit.’

‘Just look at the child,’ Valdis jeers. ‘How can you say there is no malice in this?’

‘The child is sick, but I sense that no human hand lies behind this. The cloud came from the mountain, not from your neighbour Pétur. Frída will –’

But Jónas interrupts me. ‘Your sister Valdis is right, whoever heard of a cloud moving so fast and why did it make straight for my daughter? Her friend said it was as if an arrow had been fired at her.’

He scoops the child up and slings her again over his shoulder, his face grim with resolve.

‘What Valdis says about the Sending is the only explanation that makes sense. I’ll do as she says. I’ll take a dead man’s coin to Pétur’s farm. Even if I have to dig up a hundred corpses before I find such a coin, I will do it to cure my child. What father wouldn’t be prepared to risk the wrath of a thousand ghosts if it was the only way to save his daughter?’

‘No, please listen, Jónas,’ I beg, but he strides away, determined not to hear me.

As soon as I hear him scrambling out of the crack in the rock above, I steel myself, then slowly pull the veil from my sister’s face. Beneath the cloth, her skin is yellowed like old parchment, the features wizened and sunken as if every drop of moisture has been sucked from her body by the heat of the cave. Her lips have shrunk back from her teeth. Her arms swing limp, the fingernails blackened, the skin cold as the grave.

But though I closed her eyes tenderly when she died, now suddenly they are wide open and looking straight at me. But it is not my sister’s soft blue eyes that stare up at me. I have known and loved her eyes all my life. I could not mistake them now. The blue is gone, the whites of the eyes have vanished, only two huge black pupils remain like great gaping holes. I am staring into twin open graves. I gasp in horror and the eyelids slowly blink.