The Sisterhood

Chapter 7


Las Golondrinas Convent, Summer 1505





The next day the mules panted and strained to haul the carriage up the last steep gradient before finally pulling to a stop. Nauseous from the twisting road, Isabella leaned out the window and took great desperate gulps of air that was clean and cool after the scorching heat of the plains. Gold and ruby earrings flashed in the sun as she turned her head for the view of Alejandro’s childhood home. Below her spread well-tended terraces of olive trees and vegetable gardens and she could hear goats’ bells and the distant calls of shepherd boys. In the distance, small white villages clung to the mountains.

Relief at reaching her destination and the scent of sun-warmed herbs and pine soothed her nerves and stomach. She craned her neck to look up at the convent gates and walls with their barred windows and flocks of swallows whirling and dipping around the bell tower. She squinted against the bright sunlight. Save for the cross on top of the bell tower it could have been another empty Moorish fortress standing with its back to the rock face of the mountain. They had passed many such fortresses and castles the Moors had built, then abandoned in the Reconquista. Yes, there, just as the book had described, the statue with her hand out to the stone swallows carved around her feet, carved so realistically they looked about to take flight. Isabella closed her eyes, and for a moment it was not the mountain breeze but Alejandro’s breath on her cheek, and she was comforted.

Only for a moment. There were new trials ahead. The pain gripped again, harder and more insistently. She clutched her handkerchief tighter and her breath came shallowly. Small beads of sweat appeared on her upper lip. She glanced at her father who was discussing something with the groom who waited to take his reins. She bit down on her handkerchief. Trying to think of anything but the pain, she distracted herself recalling what the acolyte had said of this place.

Before the convent, heathen goddesses had been worshipped by women who had somehow found their way to this remote spot. The Phoenicians had left shards of votive pottery and amulets and a small stone with Punic writing claiming it as the shrine of the goddess Astarte. According to Pliny, Carthaginian women were abandoned here when Hannibal led their men over the mountains on elephants to attack Rome, and rededicated Astarte’s altar to their goddess Tanit. In Hadrian’s time adventurous young soldiers would undertake expeditions to search for a legendary colony of beautiful Carthaginian girls in the mountains. But the Christian God and the intercession of the Virgin had vanquished pagan associations…

The pain gripping Isabella receded and she abandoned her recital to wonder what was keeping her father talking to one of the grooms for so long. A few minutes later the hand resting on the carriage window tightened again on her wadded handkerchief. She must get inside. Soon.

Then the coachman was opening the carriage door and placing a block in front of the steps. “Come daughter,” said the count sternly. She needed his help to descend, and, gathering her skirts bulkily in one hand, she gave him the other and tried not to grimace. Perspiration broke out on her brow. The baby’s life depended on her giving no sign. She willed the pain to wait, just a little farther now…another step…another.

They reached the gate, and the count knocked loudly. A grilled window slid open and a woman’s voice demanded to know who was there. The count gave their names and titles and after a moment the gate creaked open wide enough for a girl to enter. As the pain came again Isabella caught her breath and the smallest moan escaped her lips. The count was grimly pleased by her seeming reluctance to enter. But her hesitation was because something hot and wet gushed down her thigh. She bent her head and kissed her father’s hand, seizing her opportunity for the only revenge available to her. “Farewell. From this moment on I leave the name of sinful Isabella in the dust at my feet. In your prayers remember me as Sor Beatriz, the name I will take when I am professed.”

She let go of his hand, turned her back, and as she entered the gate, a pale hand in a nun’s sleeve reached out to pull her inside. The portress bowed silently to the count and swung the great gate closed with a thud as Isabella clutched the portress hard by the arm and sank to her knees with a cry she could no longer suppress—because of the pain and because she was trapped. Her plan had failed. She would never reach the Abenzucars now!