To the Edge of the World (7 page)

IX

December 22-27, 1519

“I love her,” I told Rodrigo that night as we lay on our bedding aboard ship.

“It is what we all think with the first one. Do not worry. It will pass.”

“But I am serious. I truly love her.”

“I believe you. You truly love her until you meet the next pretty native.”

“Pah! Why did I even think you would understand?”

“Believe me, Mateo, I do understand. It is you who are brainless.”

“If you understood, you would not speak to me so. If you understood, you would agree that I am really in love.”

“Truly, Mateo, sometimes I think you are the stupidest person alive. What good is love on a voyage like this? You will only have to leave her.”

“You are a liar, Rodrigo, and I will never talk to you again.”

“God be praised.”

I rolled over, pulling the blanket over my head, hating Rodrigo for always speaking the truth.

We sat beneath the full white moon, the fire blazing beside us. I had played my guitar and sang so much, I despised hearing myself. But Aysó, dearest Aysó, whenever I stopped, she motioned for me to play again. So I played again. How could I say no?

She sat beside the fire on a bed of leaves, cross-legged, weaving a chain of flowers. Already she had woven one chain into a circlet, which she had placed atop her head. “Mateo,” she whispered, smiling to herself, her brown eyes peeping shyly from beneath the delicate crown. “Mateo.”

I sang her a love song. Already I had sung it, what? Eight times? Nine? I had composed it myself and thought it very good.

Eyes like water,
Lips like wine,
I drink your love,
Sweet love divine. . . .

Then her hand clasped over mine, stopping my strumming. “Mateo,” she whispered again. My breath caught in my throat as she quietly, slowly, placed the circlet upon my head. I could smell her sweet warm breath. Then she gazed at me, and I swore I saw love in her eyes.

But when I reached out to caress her, she gently took my hand and placed it on the strings of my guitar. She pointed at my guitar and at me. “You want me to play? Again?” In answer, she rubbed my hand across the strings. I smiled at the sound it made.

And so I played and sang while she made circlet after circlet, draping them on her, on me, on my guitar. I grew weary, the scent of so many flowers intoxicating. I imagined myself as a bee, drunk on nectar. The night became a dream, hazy, as if I watched myself from far away as I sang and played and sang and played, dizzy with love. Finally, my eyelids drooped. I stopped playing, laying aside my guitar, expecting Aysó to protest. But she was not even listening.

Instead, she lay curled beside the now smoldering embers, asleep on her bed of leaves, surrounded by flowers. Embers snapped and the orange of firelight flickered across her face, etching her in softness. She looked like a painting, motionless on a canvas. I watched her for a long time, unwilling to end this moment. Then, quietly, I removed my dagger, took off my shoes, and lay down beside her, wrapping my arm around her waist, imagining us together forever.

She moved closer to me as the sweet scent of crushed flowers twined through my senses. Sleep pressed upon me. The last thing I remember was the whisper of her name on my lips, painted across my heart.
Aysó . . .

There was a distant shouting in the jungle that night, but I pulled Aysó closer and heard her sigh before I fell back to sleep.

Waterfalls. Dreams of flowers. Lips like wine. Shy eyes beneath a
crown of petals. . . .
I rolled over, dimly aware that the jungle darkness receded, that the fire was cold. Birds chorused overhead. Then a squawking, louder, louder . . . a rustling. The birds flew away.

Suddenly, I was yanked to my feet by my hair. My scalp screamed with pain. My blood surged with shock. Aysó shrieked and clung to me before she was torn away.
My God, what is happening?

Then a marine shoved his face into mine, his features vague and distorted in the early morning light.

My heart leaped into my throat. Sleep vanished in an instant. I saw the deep shadows of pockmarks and knew I was in trouble again.

“You, Dog-Boy, are in violation of a direct command from the captain-general!” Spittle showered my face, my eyes.

“Command? But—but—I—”

“We have been searching for you through the night! I have lost sleep because of you, Dog-Boy. Shore leave is hereby canceled. Report to the ships immediately to prepare for departure. We leave in a few days.”

Another marine stood beside Pock-Face. He was black-haired, black-eyed, and hook-nosed, reminding me of a crow. I did not like the glint in his eyes as his gaze swept over Aysó. A chill ran through me.

“I—I—must gather my things,” I said quickly, wanting to end this, to lead them away from Aysó, back to the waiting ships.

Pock-Face shoved me toward my shoes. “Hurry. The captain-general is waiting. You sore try his patience.”

I sat to pull on my shoes, meanwhile watching the other marine out of the corner of my eye. From the moment they had found me, the crow-faced marine had not stopped staring at Aysó. Aysó seemed to sense his gaze, for she hung back now, her eyes saucers of fright, confused. Beside me on the ground, partially concealed with leaves, lay my dagger. Making no sudden moves, I grasped the hilt, shielding the blade under my arm. “I’m ready. Let us go.” I stood and casually fetched my guitar, turning from Aysó as if she were only a thing to be forgotten, my heart crashing against my ribs for fear.

Then it happened. What I had been dreading.

“Take him back to the ship, Segrado,” said Crow-Face. “I’ll only be a few minutes.”

Pock-Face, or Segrado, as he was called, loosened his grip from my arm, and I sensed his hesitation. That was my moment.

I dropped my guitar, whirled, dagger in hand, and attacked Crow-Face. “Run, Aysó!” I screamed as my dagger bit flesh.

The marine cursed. Surprise splashed across his face.

“Run, Aysó!” With one look at me, panicked and terrified, Aysó turned and disappeared into the jungle. I heard nothing of her escape. I knew only that she was gone.

An arm locked about my neck from behind. “Drop the dagger, Dog-Boy!”

When I did not, the arm tightened. A veil of blackness began to fall over my eyes, and the dagger slipped from my hand. Run, Aysó, I thought. Keep running and don’t stop.

A fist slammed into my gut.

Again, and again . . .

I stood facing Espinosa.

His ice-blue eyes studied me.

Just a few paces away, Magallanes gazed out the stern windows, his hands clasped behind his back. I saw the tightness of his jaw, heard the deepness of his breath.

Motionless and suffocating, the captain-general’s cabin was as feverish as Spain on a windless summer’s day. Sweat soaked my shirt, clinging to my bruises, my aching ribs. My bloodstained hands were shackled behind me, and on each side of me stood the two marines. My accusers.

Failure to return to the ship when ordered, they said. Resisting arrest. Attacking a marine with a deadly weapon. A flesh wound only, but one blade’s width to the left, and Minchaca would be dead. I was a boy gone wild, they said, uncontrollable.

When the accusations dwindled under the punishing silence, Magallanes turned. His dark eyes gazed at me, his brow furrowed. And although his eyelids drooped and the flesh beneath his eyes sagged, his stare pierced me like an arrow. For you, Aysó, I thought, my heart fluttering even now with the memory of her.

Under their scrutiny—Espinosa’s and Magallanes’s—I lowered my head. Shame covered me like a heated shadow, even though I had done nothing for which to be ashamed.

“Well?” asked Magallanes finally, waiting for me to answer.

I said nothing. Fearing to speak, fearing not to speak. From outside I heard the cry of a parrot. A dog barking. Laughter.

Then Espinosa said, “Leave us.”

I looked up, surprised.
Leave us?

“Segrado, Minchaca, both of you, leave us. Wait outside the door. The captain-general and I wish to speak to the boy alone.”

I sensed their reluctance. But, like well-trained soldiers, they obeyed the master-at-arms, latching the door behind them.

Now I was alone with Magallanes and Espinosa. And even though I again looked at nothing but the boards in the floor, sanded and polished, I knew they regarded me. That they wondered what to do with me. That for the second time I faced the captain-general accused of a crime. That for the second time I shamed him. That he still believed me a liar and a spy. Perhaps Espinosa was regretting the day he’d stopped at the inn. That he’d shared his rabbit stew with me. . . .

“Well?” Magallanes asked again.

I sighed, miserable. “I had no choice,” I finally mumbled.

“I can’t hear you. Speak up.”

“I had no choice.”

“Every man has a choice, Mateo.”

“Not me.”

“I see. Tell me what happened.”

“That marine, Minchaca. He was going to hurt Aysó.”

“Aysó? Who is Aysó?” asked Espinosa.

“She is a girl. A woman, I mean.” I felt myself flush.

“This Aysó, you were with her?” asked Magallanes.

“Aye, Captain-General.”

“I see. And Minchaca?”

“The two of them came to take me back to the ship. But Minchaca wanted to stay behind. I knew he was going to hurt her.” Now I looked at both of them. “I saw it in his eyes. Please believe me.”

“Did he touch her?” asked Magallanes.

“No, but he was going to.”

“Did he harm her in any way?”

Again I lowered my head, shaking it. It is useless, I realized. They will never believe me. For I am a liar and a spy and they no longer trust me.

“So you attacked him,” asked Magallanes, “although he did not lay a hand on her?”

“Upon my word, Captain-General, he was going to. I told you, I saw it in his eyes.”

Magallanes glanced at Espinosa, then sighed heavily. “You leave us no choice, Mateo.”

“Aye.”

He limped to the door and opened it slowly. Minchaca and Segrado stood at attention, waiting. “He is to have a dozen lashes, plus five days in the stocks. Minimum rations.” Then he stepped aside as Minchaca and Segrado entered the cabin to take me away.

The next day was Christmas.

I heard the hymns. Heard the padre. Felt the movement of men around me. I endured their stares, heard their whispers.

A blackness deeper than I’d ever known suffocated me, greater even than the pain of my flogging. It was as if I were buried alive, dirt seeping into my ears, my eyes, my nostrils, my mouth. Weight crushing my chest.

Aysó was gone.

I was gone.

I knew I would never see her again, for the armada would move out to sea as soon as Christmas ended. Yet there was one bright spot I clung to, a golden lantern in a storm of blackness. Even though I would never see Aysó again, I had rescued her from Minchaca.

Aysó was safe.

I would cling to this forever, through all the storms to come, perhaps even death at the hands of monsters or cannibals, perhaps even dropping off the edge of the world. Aysó was safe.

Then, like the ocean at the change of tide, my thoughts turned again and my blackness deepened. I remembered both Espinosa and Magallanes. Their probing stares, their disappointment in me. The captain-general still thought me a liar and a spy, and yet this time I had done nothing wrong. It was not fair! Nothing was fair! I would have pounded my fist in frustration and rage, but the stocks held me tight, pinning me like a rat in a trap. And Espinosa? He had trusted me, brought me on this journey when I had nowhere to go, nothing to eat. Now I had sorely disappointed him.

I vowed to kill Minchaca. It was my right. My honor. He would be sorry for the day he laid a fist on Mateo Macías de Ávila!

Lost in my ocean of thoughts, I did not realize at first that someone was talking to me. “Mateo,” the voice repeated, “I must speak with you.” It was Espinosa. He squatted in front of me so I had no choice but to see him, then reached up with a muscular arm and brushed my hair from my eyes. I turned my face away. It was he who had flogged me the day before, afterward walking away without a word. I could not bear to look at him. What more was there to say? Were not a flogging and punishment in the stocks enough? Could he not see my shame? My rage? Did he not hate me now for disappointing him?

Then, before I could stop myself, I said, “I’m thirsty.”

He returned with a cup of water. He held my head while I drank. It was difficult to drink, to throw my head back far enough. I could not use my arms, for they were locked in the stockade along with my neck. Water dribbled down my chin. Waves of pain pulsed through my back.

“I must know,” whispered Espinosa. “Is it true? What you have said?”

I nodded. “Aye.”

“You were defending a woman?”

“Aye. They beat me when I helped her to escape.” I spoke through gritted teeth. “No matter what you think, I am not a liar.”

“Mateo, you are too quick to judgment. The truth is, I believe you. I have always believed you.”

I blinked, unsure of what I’d heard. “You believe me? Then why—”