History's Great Queens 2-Book Bundle: The Last Queen and The Confessions of Catherine de Medici (34 page)

I anxiously searched the barren flat below me. I had deviated from my original course toward the river, but my swerve must have dissuaded Villena, for he was gone. Either he’d ceased his pursuit in favor of going back for reinforcements or he sought a way to intercept me as I emerged from the forest. By now, word would be out; it would only be a matter of time before they guessed my destination. Fortunately, I had decided on a circuitous route.

I slid to the ground and led the mare into the thicket of trees, pushing down a surge of doubt. This was my land: I had been born and raised here. I would find the way.

I only knew the sun had started to fall when after having picked my way through a labyrinth of deer paths for what seemed like hours, I stumbled upon a clearing.

Below the scarlet streaked sky was an old hut, fenced by an enclosure with a few skinny goats. A stooped woman in a ragged dress hung bunches of herbs on her threshold to dry; at the sight of me, she froze. Her ageless face was carved by life, her skin brown and creased, like the leather cover of a book. My entire body throbbed. As the woman set aside her herbs and moved toward me, I had to grope at the mare’s reins to keep myself from sinking to the ground. God help me, I could go no further.

“Doña? Doña, está bien?”
The woman was thin to the point of emaciation, her eyes a watery black. She dropped her gaze to my stomach.
“Está embarazada,”
she said. “You are pregnant. Come. I’ll give you a cup of goat’s milk,
sí
?”

“You don’t understand,” I whispered. “I must reach the road that leads to the river.”

Her puzzled gaze lightened. “The road. Yes, I know where it is. But it’s too far. It’ll be dark soon. I’ll show you tomorrow. Come now. You are tired. You must rest.”

She was a poor gypsy who lived in the forest, isolated from the world, deemed as heathen as the Moor. Yet she offered all she had to a passing stranger large with child, a fellow woman and outcast: shelter and a cup of milk.

With a grateful nod, I allowed her to lead me into the hut.

THE NEXT MORNING I AWOKE TO BIRDSONG, AN ACHING BACK AND
buttocks, and the unfamiliar sense of peace. I reveled in it as I lay in my rumpled clothing on a pile of straw in the crude hut. I had not felt free in so long I had forgotten what it was like. Rising from the mat, running a hand through my tangled hair, I saw the woman was gone. On the table were strewn her dried herb cuttings, which she’d painstakingly shown and named for me. Mandrake, chamomile, belladonna, and rosemary, and a strange dried red berry she called
el sueño del moro,
the Moor’s Sleep—the lethal and benign gathered together by an herbalist’s expert hand.

“A few pinches of the Sleep in a cup of wine will vanquish all your enemies,” she had said, and her dark hooded eyes glittered in the tallow light, as though she knew why I fled.

Beside the herbs, I saw she had left another cup of milk, still cool from the clay jars she set in the hut’s earth floor. There was also country bread slathered with honey and some stringy ham. I devoured the fare. My mare had spent the night in the enclosure with the goats. I found her there alone. The woman must have taken her goats to graze while I slept. I must soon be on my way, but I took a moment to enjoy the sunbeams coming through the treetops, festooning the clearing in patterned gold. It seemed to me at that moment so uncomplicated an existence that I felt a pang of envy for this anonymous life.

Then the world tore apart. One moment, the birds were chattering and my face was raised to the sky; the next I heard a wail of terror cut short with lethal suddenness, and men on horses came pounding into the clearing—a troop of my husband’s mercenaries, herding the frantic cluster of goats. One of the men tossed a lump at my feet as I backed away. I looked down at the bloodied mess of the gypsy woman’s head and let out a horrified scream.

“There you are! God in heaven, must you ruin everything?”

Philip came cantering toward me. I spun about to race back into the hut, hearing the men dismount, laughing, and the whicker of my mare, unnerved by the smell of fresh blood. I was panting, cursing aloud, searching for a knife, an ax, anything to defend myself with, caught up in a maelstrom of terror and disbelief when I felt his gauntlet on my arm.

I yanked away. “Murderer! Monster! Don’t touch me!”

He chuckled, seeming enormous in that closed space, defiling the peace that had once dwelled here. “Enough. You’ve had your fun, now come with me. I’ve no time for games.”

“Games? You’ve killed an innocent woman!”

“She means nothing. Now come with me before I drag you out by your hair.”

“You are a coward,” I said. “A miserable coward who hides behind a dwarf ’s skirts.”

“Don’t call me a coward, you—you madwoman!”

He took a menacing step toward me. I paused, my fear evaporating, leaving me cold. “Would you prefer I address you as Your Majesty, like that pack of traitors you’ve surrounded yourself with? They hate you, you know. The moment you turn your back, they’ll betray you. They’ll hang you and Don Manuel from the nearest gibbet.”

“
SILENCE
!
You are the one who betrays me, time and time again. Do you think I don’t know your ploys, your pathetic attempts to set your father on me?” He thrust his face at me. “I let your handmaiden go because I knew she’d never make it to Segovia, as she did not. She barely made it halfway before my men found her and let her know in no uncertain terms she had caused far more trouble than she’s worth.”

I gasped. Not Soraya. Not my loyal Soraya.

“I’m told she put up quite a fight,” he added, with a chuckle, “but in the end she learned a lesson she’ll not soon forget.”

I whispered, “What—what did they do to her?”

“What she deserved. But they were merciful. She still lives. You, however, will never see her again. Nor will you ever see the son you left here to usurp my place.”

“He is our son!” I screamed. “How can you speak of him as if he means nothing to you?”

His face twisted. “Because he was never mine! You made sure of that when you left him here with your mother. All he is to me now is a threat.” He paused. A terrible smile fractured his face. “And now, after everything you’ve done to me, you think I’d let you ride off to join them? You think they’ll protect you? Idiot. Your father has forsaken you. Even if your Moor had reached him, it would have done you no good. He fled from my army without so much as a fight.”

“Liar.” My hand stretched out behind me, to the table. “Whatever my father has done, you forced him to it. He did it to protect me!”

Philip guffawed. “You always did like to pretend the world is better than it is. But I know the truth. And I’ll tell you one more thing: your father isn’t in Segovia. He sent a messenger even as you hatched your plan. He’s on his way to Aragón and from there will go to Naples. So this silly escapade was for nothing, unless you planned to ride all the way to Italy on that nag of yours.”

My fingers closed over the herbs; as I drew my hand toward my cloak pocket, he laughed.

“Tomorrow you
will
go with me to Valladolid and show the Cortes how you honor your husband. You can go like a lady or you can resist. Only I warn you, if you choose the latter”—he grasped my wrist, yanking me close, and his savage kiss cut my mouth—“I’ll bring you into the city in chains.”

He let me go. I did not lift a hand to my bruised mouth. I met his eyes and said in a voice that issued from the very core of my being, “I will see you dead.”

I swept past him outside and the guards awaiting me.

TWENTY-EIGHT

V
eiled and dressed in black, I made my state entry into Valladolid, the same city that had witnessed my betrothal by proxy. The people had gathered to cheer me then; now their silence was palpable as I rode past, a woman in mourning among a thousand men, a mother without her children, a queen without her crown.

For six days I was shut in a chamber in Valladolid’s
casa real,
my windows boarded up even as the city officials hung banners in preparation for the Cortes. I was forbidden the services of women, my meals brought by sentries. Every morning Philip came to me, accompanied by Don Manuel and none other than Archbishop Cisneros, who’d grown so thin he resembled a petrified tree. This powerful Castilian prelate who had known me since my childhood, who had no doubt sworn to uphold my mother’s will, watched impassively as Philip harangued and threatened, demanding I sign a warrant of voluntary abdication.

“Nunca,”
I said. “Never!” I tore the document to shreds before his eyes, indifferent to his dire threats.

On the seventh day, my door opened. I looked up through burning sleepless eyes to find Admiral Fadriqué on the threshold. Cisneros hovered close behind, a lurid specter; I wondered how the admiral had gotten in, even as my heart leapt painfully at the sight of him.

“I told you, Her Highness is ill,” I heard the archbishop say. “Your Excellency, it would be best if you let us assist you in your requests. She cannot—”

The admiral held up his long hand. Though in his late forties, he was still very lean, almost rigid in his signature unadorned black velvet, which he had worn for as long as I could remember. His features had retained the handsome angularity of his youth but wisps of silver now threaded his black mane and his thin mouth was framed by deep lines, sorrow etched in the skin around his eyes. His tender gaze gave me a burst of almost painful hope.

“It is against the law to forbid a senior member of the Cortes access to our sovereign,” he said, without glancing at Cisneros. “Please, leave us. I will speak with Her Highness in private.”

He closed the door on Cisneros’s astounded face.

“Don Fadriqué.” I came to my feet, my belly protruding. I held out my hand. “I thank God you are here. I—” My voice caught. “I feared they would never let me go this time.”

He bowed low. “
Su Majestad,
I beg your forgiveness. I retired to my estates in Valencia following Her Majesty your mother’s death. I was one of those who conveyed her body to Granada for entombment in the cathedral. I did not hear until recently of your predicament.”

“I am glad you came,” I said softly. He brought me back to my chair, his hand on my sleeve. When I sat, he said quietly, “Do you know what they say? They claim you are unfit to rule and that you wish to bestow your crown on your husband.” He paused. “Is this true?”

Anger sparked in me. “My lord, you’ve known me all my life; you saw me as a child in my parents’ court and welcomed me home when I first returned from Flanders. What do you think?”

He did not look away from me. “I believe they would impose a cruel fate on you,
princesa.
”

Tears pricked the corners of my eyes. “Yes,” I said haltingly. “They would lock me away like my grandmother before me. But I swear to you,
I am not mad.
”

He went still. I held my breath. Did he detect a flicker of the wild, inchoate fear that fed on isolation? Did he understand how such a seed, with enough despair and enforced darkness, can turn into lunacy? I was fighting against its seductive embrace with every breath in my body, with every nerve and sinew; and still I knew the desperate portrait I must present, far too thin for a woman with child, unwashed and alone, as anguished as my grandmother must ever have been.

Then he said, “I believe you. And I promise you that while I am here, they’ll not harm you anymore. You must trust in me. I am your servant.”

I nodded, my tears brimming now, spilling down my cheeks.

“Will you tell me everything that has happened?” he said.

I whispered, “Yes.”

HE STAYED WITH ME
until midnight, ordering a meal brought up to us and removing the nailed shutters from the window with his own hands. After we dined, we talked again, until I had related everything that had befallen me. When he finally quit the chamber, he left me curled on my bed, knees pulled to my chest, fast asleep after weeks of torment.

I awoke ten hours later to find I’d been released. There were still guards and sentries about, but I had new clothing brought and women to attend me, though none could hold a candle to my beloved Beatriz, who had fled when I did and whom I had not seen since.

The admiral proved in those days why he had been one of my mother’s most stalwart supporters. Of impeccable noble lineage, a respected peer and defender of the Crown’s rights, he had risked himself by coming into the viper’s lair, where the other
grandes
no doubt viewed his presence with mistrust and fear. But neither Philip nor Don Manuel dared say a word against him and he scarcely left my side, sleeping in the room next to mine with his retainers taking turns standing vigil at night in the corridors, so no one could approach without him knowing.

Every morning we met. He told me of Philip’s growing penury and his frantic need to win the permission of the Cortes to take over the treasury, which was currently held in Segovia by my mother’s lifetime friend the Marquise de Moya.

“He needs that coin,” the admiral said. “Without it, his mercenaries and most of the nobility will abandon him. Don Manuel has exhausted their reserves in bribes and extravagances, but the old marquise, God bless her soul, has vowed to burn down the treasury itself if your husband dares set foot within ten kilometers of her city.”

I smiled. “No wonder my mother loved her well. And I believe my lady Beatriz de Talavera is with her. We’d agreed to meet in Segovia when I tried to escape Benavente. The marquise will have heard from Beatriz everything my husband and Don Manuel have done.”

“Indeed. The marquise will die defending that treasury, Your Highness. That is how we shall force Don Manuel and your husband into a corner. Without the treasury, they cannot proceed.”

“But what about Cisneros? I do not trust him.”

“Cisneros knows what we plan.” He lowered his voice. “He came to me last night, after Your Highness retired. He showed me letters he’s been exchanging with your father in Naples.”

I started. “My—my father?”

“Yes. Cisneros is his informant. Everything that transpires here, our archbishop records in coded dispatches. He’ll not impede us. He wants your husband to fail. He’s ambitious and far too canny for an old churchman but to surrender Castile into Habsburg hands would be unthinkable.”

The mention of my father roused sharp doubt in my heart. I looked away.

“Many a night I have pondered his reasons for leaving me when I most had need of him,” I said, my voice catching. “I have tried to accept that he is no longer the invincible king of my childhood, that my mother’s passing has left him vulnerable to my husband and the nobles.”

“It is true,” said the admiral, and I thought I heard a guarded note in his voice. “Your father has borne the hatred of Castile’s nobility all his life; had he stayed and fought he would have risked not only his safety but also that of your son the infante and Aragón’s as well. Without your mother to defend him anymore, he is but a minor king.”

“And yet I cannot help but feel he has deserted me.” I brought a hand to my throat. My voice hardened. “I’ve no doubt Cisneros is capable of playing a double hand, but why does he not speak out against my husband if he serves my father? He is still Castile’s premier prelate.”

“According to him, because His Majesty your father asked that he not disclose their plans under any circumstances, save for a direct threat on your life.”

I stared at him. “What plans?”

“All he said is that His Majesty wants your husband to make an open bid for the throne.”

“An open bid!” My voice rose despite myself. I paused, took a deep breath. “Why?”

“I do not know. But have no fear. Cisneros or not, Lucifer be damned, we
will
stop your husband. I swear that to you on my honor.”

On the day the Cortes was to convene, he came to me before dawn. “They don’t suspect a thing. They anticipate protest from me but not from you. I leave my body servant Cardoza outside to escort you.” He bowed over my hand. “I must go now to take my seat in the Cortes.”

“My lord,” I said softly. He paused, raised his sad, beautiful eyes to mine. “I thank you with all my heart. Were it not for you, I do not know where I might be.”

His sudden smile illumined weathered crinkles at the corners of his eyes, the gleam of his strong white teeth and proud line of his jaw. “You are my queen. To serve you is all I require.”

I felt the touch of his lips on my hand, the rough caress of his beard on my skin. “I will await you,” he murmured, so quietly I almost didn’t hear him. Then he turned and left, as though he could not bear to deny the communion between us.

I rose and went to the window.

Far below, the Duero crawled past the city walls, its arid banks cracked by the sun’s wrath. Only ten years ago I had stood in this same palace, a virgin bride awaiting the arrival of the admiral, who’d escorted me to my betrothal. Now I waited again, this time to declare open war on the man I had wed.

I was a queen. I could not look back. I would fight until I had nothing left to fight with.

A knock came at the door. I smoothed the folds of my stiff new gown, adjusting the extra panel at my waist. As I went to the door, my heel clacked on the floorboard under which I’d hidden the herbs taken from the gypsy’s house, those herbs I had grabbed in desperation and wildly considered using on myself should Philip succeed in imprisoning me for good.

The admiral’s body servant Cardoza, a burly Castilian with arms the size of beef haunches, stood on my threshold. “Is Your Highness ready?”

I smiled. “I have waited all my life for this moment.”

He took me through a narrow passage connecting the
casa real
to the Alcázar and up a spiral staircase into an empty room. He clicked open a star-shaped aperture on a wood and mother-of-pearl screen partition and motioned me to it. When I peered through this peephole, I saw that the screen looked out onto the Cortes’ hall, where procurators gathered on their tiers.

The speaker of the Cortes banged his staff of office three times. Silence descended. I discerned Don Manuel as he stood before the dais to read aloud Philip’s declaration. The procurators murmured. Then, as my hands knotted my skirts, Philip stood, clad in violet silk, his voice reverberating against the walls:

“Noble lords, it is a dolorous burden I bring before you, one I would gladly forsake my entire fortune to remedy. But the sad fact is that my wife, Doña Juana, infanta and heir to this realm, has fallen prey to that malady that claimed her maternal grandmother. She worsens with each day, and cannot, even by all the love we bear her, possibly recover. She mustn’t be made to suffer the burden of governance in her state. Rather, we must send her to dwell in a safe place, where malcontents cannot disturb her. I humbly ask that we resolve this terrible matter and then embark on the task of enthroning me as king, so I can assume the treasury of Castile and begin to guide us past the dangerous uncertainty my wife’s dementia has created.”

I whirled about; Cardoza detained me with a gentle hand. His eyes glimmered. “Your Highness, please. Your time will come.”

In the
sala,
the admiral stood like a pillar of marble and velvet. “By the saints, never have I heard the like! Where is Her Highness to defend herself against these claims? Are we, the members of these Cortes, not to be graced by her presence this day?”

He swerved to the procurators, all of whom sat staring at the figure before them as though he were an avenging archangel. “I have met with Her Highness,” he continued. “I have spoken with her at length and seen with my own eyes this alleged malady she suffers. And I tell you she is as fit as any one of us. I’ll not consent to the farce proposed here today.”

“We sympathize with your misgivings, my lord,” drawled Philip, though I could detect the fury underscoring his feigned indifference. “But the fact remains that these very Cortes invested me as prince consort two years ago. I ask only that you recognize my claim as king apparent, given the circumstances. You needn’t do anything that goes against your conscience.”

The admiral retorted, “All of it goes against my conscience, by your leave. Our late queen Isabel left this realm to her daughter. No one save Doña Juana can bestow it on another person. I say no to your request, no to the disinheritance of our sovereign queen Juana of Castile!”

I wanted to applaud. The Cortes erupted, members’ voices clashing, fists banging on tables, caps swept from brows and thrown to the floor, while the admiral beheld the result of our insurrection.

Cardoza murmured, “It is time.” I straightened my shoulders, hearing the speaker cry out for silence as Cardoza led me to a small door that opened onto a narrow flight of steps. As I quickly descended these steps to the hall, the speaker said, “We, the members of the Cortes, have heard His Highness the archduke’s and my lord admiral’s requests. We will honor our past oaths to His Highness as prince consort, but”—he lifted his voice over another surge of shouting—“we must also abide by the statues that uphold Her Highness the infanta as our rightful queen. We therefore ask that she be brought before us to answer these claims, and—”