Paradise & More (Torres Family Saga) (26 page)

      
Unlike the heavy-boned, solid Bartolome, his elder brother was slim and almost frail looking but for his piercing pale blue eyes and a firm expression about his generous mouth. The crippling sickness had gnarled his hands and caused his tall, straight back to stoop a bit, but he was yet one of the most imposing men Magdalena had ever met. “Good afternoon, Admiral,” she said as he smiled and gestured for her to enter.

      
Cristobal noted the way her eyes scanned the large room and locked for an instant with those of her champion, Bartolome. “Good day to you, Doña Magdalena. You look much improved since first we met this morning. I trust you have recovered from that, ah...encounter?”

      
Magdalena felt her cheeks heat with a blush.
Such a way to meet the man who holds my fate in his hands!
“I am well, thank you, Admiral Colon.”

      
“You will find Doña Magdalena a most resourceful young woman, Cristobal,” Bartolome said drily.

      
“I would that she not risk her life among the rough and dangerous soldiers and other even more unsavory residents of Ysabel,” he replied with a gently reproving look at Magdalena.

      
“I was attempting to go to Dr. Chanca's hospital across the plaza. I understand there is much illness here and I have some skills caring for the sick.”

      
Cristobal looked at her with frank puzzlement and a bit of distress mirrored on his face. “Surely, Doña Magdalena, as a lady of the court, you cannot wish to do such menial and dangerous work? Bartolome has spent the better part of the past hour avoiding an explanation of precisely why you are here. This is scarcely Seville.”

      
“It is preferable to the convent of the Dominican sisters in Madrid, Admiral,” Magdalena replied forthrightly. “I am much in debt to your brother for his kindness and now I must beg your indulgence, too.” She began the tale of her disastrous sojourn with the court, ending with her father's agreement to seal her up in that heinous convent, but she omitted any mention of her betrothal to the admiral's marshal. “I never wish to return to Castile or to see my father again as long as I live,” she finished.

      
As she had unfolded the story of immorality and jealousy, Magdalena had paced back and forth by the long open windows facing the plaza. When she finished speaking, Bartolome offered her a goblet of wine and pulled a heavy wooden chair out for her to have a seat. She accepted both with thanks, her eyes quickly moving back to the tall, thin man staring intently at her with a troubled expression on his face.

      
“I can see why you wished to leave Valladolid, even to flee the Spains, but surely there was some refuge better than this wildly improbable venture. Have you no kinsman who could arrange a marriage for you?”

      
Magdalena let her eyes drop, her mind racing.
Please, Bartolome, do not tell him!
Then she met the admiral's earnest gaze and said, “I have no other family—at least, none who would dare defy Bernardo Valdés. You see, my father is a Crossbearer for the Holy Office in Seville.”

      
Colon's fingers tapped on the rough wooden table. “A most dangerous foe to antagonize,” he murmured with a meaningful look at Bartolome, who had the good grace to redden.

      
“There is a simple remedy for all our problems,” Bartolome began very carefully.

      
“Yes, there is,” Magdalena interjected. “I will cause no trouble. I grew up on my parents' country estates outside Seville. I am used to hard work. I can tend sick people, sick animals. I will be a good colonist for Ysabel, Admiral.” Her eyes were huge and entreating.

      
“You are a beautiful young woman of the nobility—your very presence in a place such as this is trouble, Doña Magdalena,” Colon rebuked gently. “You had a bitter taste of the problem already this morning, and you have been in Ysabel only three days. I am given to understand from my youngest brother that every gentleman at table last even was exceedingly smitten— including Diego himself. There will be fighting among my men. I cannot allow this. You must choose to wed one of them, or I will be forced to send you back to Seville, no matter how painful the decision is for me,” the admiral said quietly.

      
Magdalena looked at his careworn but stern face and knew he meant his words. “But I do not love...that is none...oh, forgive me, for I am most flattered by all the gentlemen who have shown me such kindness, but I do not wish to wed any of them, not even your brother Diego.”

      
“Perhaps you should follow your heart, Magdalena,” Bartolome prompted. “In spite of his mule-headed stubbornness, you love him still, do you not?”

      
Magdalena's eyes darkened with pain. She shook her head as a lump tightened in her throat so that she could not speak.

      
Cristobal looked from the distressed young woman seated before him to Bartolome. “Who is this man whom the lady would wed?” he asked his brother in a tone of voice that demanded an end to the earlier evasion.

      
“Magdalena was betrothed to your marshal, Diego Torres. She carries the crest ring of his father's house. I brought her here to wed Torres, but when we summoned the young fool, he refused.” Bartolome paused for a moment, hating to hurt Magdalena further, but knowing he must speak. “Torres lives among the Taino.”

      
“I know. I sent him with them when first we made landfall on San Salvador nearly two years ago.” Then understanding struck the admiral. He looked to Bartolome for confirmation. “Surely he cannot hold to a Taino female and deny his obligation to a Castilian noblewoman after all she has risked—”

      
“After all she has risked, he denies even the betrothal!” Bartolome interrupted angrily. “Did those Indians of his work some necromancy on him to cause him to behave so?”

      
Cristobal rubbed his temple with his palm, then said, “This is not what I would expect of Diego Torres.” He looked down at Magdalena uncertainly. “In all the time I spent with him aboard ship, never did he mention this betrothal.”

      
Magdalena's shoulders slumped as she admitted in a quiet voice. “The pledge was made by his father Benjamin on Diego's behalf, just before he sailed with you on your first voyage here.” She blushed in complete humiliation, recalling the painful scene with Benjamin and the even more hateful way his son had repudiated her in front of Bartolome and Diego Colon.

      
“The young whelp seduced her in his father's home. When Benjamin Torres found out the truth, he would have ridden with Magdalena to Palos and had them wed before the voyage, but the lady refused to force him. The elder Torres made the pledge. Show the Admiral the ring, Magdalena,” Bartolome commanded softly.

      
Magdalena stood up and looked from Bartolome to Cristobal, then said calmly, “I cannot do so. Last even when I returned to my room, he lay waiting for me and took it from me.”

      
Bartolome's hand clenched on his sword hilt and he swore.

      
“Twas his ring. He has refused to believe that Benjamin pledged him. I would not force him to wed me,” she said, turning to stare out the window, her back rigidly straight.

      
“And I would not have him dishonor you. How dare he invade the governor's residence and your room!” Bartolome said in outrage.

      
“You have verified that this ring belonged to the House of Torres?” Cristobal asked Bartolome.

      
“Yes. I examined it well enough. Why else would he come to reclaim it at such risk? He would have taken it when first the lady showed it to him, but I made him return it at sword's point,” Bartolome added grimly.

      
A hint of a smile tugged at Cristobal's lips as he considered his arrogant young marshal being forced to return the ring. Diego Torres would mislike being forced to do anything. Then his expression became grave. “You say your father is a Crossbearer in Seville?”

      
She turned and the absolute coldness of her eyes stunned both men. “Yes, Bernardo Valdés betrayed Benjamin Torres to the Inquisition. He has sold his soul for wealth and power. I would that he were dead.”

      
“And Diego blames you for the sins of your father. I begin to understand,” the Admiral said, nodding slowly as he decided on a course of action.

* * * *

      
Three days later Aaron paced across the floor, uncomfortable in the hot, tight clothing he had donned to meet with the admiral. Resting his hand lightly on the hilt of his sword, he looked down at the sapphire ring on his finger, then his eyes met Colon's, blue on blue, both gazes intense. “I will not wed her,” he stated flatly.

      
“Nor I him!” Magdalena said, standing up with a furious swish of her skirts.

      
Colon looked from Aaron to Magdalena. “Then, Dona Magdalena, choose another. Any man of gentle birth and good breeding among the residents of Ysabel. I know many would be honored to wed you. You have but to select one and I will see to the rest.” He waited, feeling the tension crackling between the two young people before him. Whatever his feelings for Magdalena Valdés, Diego Torres did desire her and she him. By the Blessed Virgin, the fire fair leaped between them, like the sparks that swept a ship's rigging before the lightning came!

      
Magdalena felt the admiral's eyes on her. The man was compassionate but convinced of his course. Aaron's hard, dark gaze scorched her with his fury. What was she to do? Wed poor, weak Diego Colon? Or Mosen Margarite? Or Alonzo Hojeda? Better to return and accept the cold cell of the convent! She walked a few steps and then stopped short. Her fists clenched, hidden in the folds of her skirts. She whirled and faced the admiral and his arrogant marshal.

      
“I have chosen. I will have Diego...Torres! I will swear any oath you care to devise that Benjamin gave that ring to me in pledge of betrothal to his son,” she said, pointing to the sapphire crest on Aaron's finger. She faced his steely glare levelly and did not flinch beneath his withering contempt.

      
“You may have bewitched my father, but I warn you, Magdalena, I am not so gentle a man as he was,” Aaron said, biting off each word.

      
Aaron paced like a caged lion before Cristobal and Bartolome after Magdalena had been asked to leave the room. “What you ask, in addition to what you have already ordered, is too much,” he said tightly.

      
“Such onerous duty—to be wed to a beautiful and wealthy noblewoman who adores you. You are much put upon, Torres,” Bartolome said angrily.

      
Cristobal waved his brother aside, motioning him to take a seat and cool his ire. “I understand your concern for the
cacique
's sister and her child, but you yourself have said there is no dishonor among these people if a woman bears a child without a husband. Guacanagari will not blame you for wedding one of your own kind. If you are concerned for the Taino, then you can best serve them by taking the post just vacated by Margarite.”

      
“Margarite has set sail to Castile with Fray Buil and a host of other troublemakers. They will report ill to the Majesties about how the Colon family misgoverns Española,'' Bartolome interjected.

      
“Mosen Margarite has the king's ear, and Fray Buil will doubtless report to the queen that the Taino refuse conversion and are warlike,” Cristobal said wearily.

      
“That is absurd. We are better off without Margarite and Buil. Fray Pane is truly interested in learning Taino ways and will do more good without that pious ass Buil,” Aaron replied.

      
“Yet that pious ass, as you so aptly describe him, has powerful friends at court. Both he and Margarite are my bitter enemies. I have received some troubling dispatches from the Majesties already, questioning how I keep order on Española. The king asks why we have sent so little gold back.” The Admiral looked at Aaron with earnest entreaty. “I always favored you to be my commandant.”

      
Bartolome stood up and leveled his most intimidating glare on Aaron. “We fully expect a royal investigator to set sail from Cadiz any time.”

      
“I would have us at peace, prosperously trading with the Taino, when the next caravels arrive. Those
cacique
s who will not accept the governance of the king and queen must be vanquished and Guacanagari's people must be protected. You are the man both Taino and colonists most respect, Aaron. I ask you to become commandant and to marry the Lady Magdalena.” The admiral waited, piercing Aaron with his pale blue eyes.

      
Aaron scowled as he turned and met the stare. “As in all matters, you leave me little choice. I assume my bride and I are to reside here in Ysabel. When is the marriage to take place?”

      
“You will take my quarters,” Bartolome said. “It is a small building with a stout mahogany frame and cane walls which will afford comfort through the warmer season. By the time the rains come, if we have the colonists in hand doing their tasks, a stone house should be completed for each of us,” Bartolome said with a challenge in his voice. “In the meantime, I can reside here with my brothers.

      
“As to the marriage,” Cristobal added, more delicately, “I think it best to summon Fray Pane and have him perform it quickly, to ally possible conflicts with other of the lady's suitors.”

      
A chilly smile slashed Aaron's mouth. “You have considered all options. We will wed and bed ere this night is done. Then I am bound to Magdalena for life, but still I must see Guacanagari and Aliyah, Cristobal. You needs must trust me outside Ysabel if I am to be your commandant.”