Mira's Way Read online

  “How do things at Belarac fare?” Arnaud asked. “The flock looks sound.”

  “Sound, yes, but smaller than it was. We had to slaughter some of our merinos for meat.”

  “Why?”

  “One disaster after the next. The barn sprang a leak and the fodder got moldy, so there wasn’t enough to last the flock all winter. Then two of the weaving looms broke—and no one knows how to fix ’em. To top it off, the dye came out strange this year. The cloth we brought to the Nay market wasn’t black at all, more a grayish-brown. If it weren’t for Carlo Sacazar, we wouldn’t have sold a single length of the stuff.”

  Mira swallowed hard. “What do you mean?”

  The shepherd looked at her for the first time. “He bought it all. For half the usual price.”

  She tried to put Carlo Sacazar out of her mind. “Surely the new abbess will address these problems.”

  “The new abbess?” His expression tightened. “She never sets foot in the washing station or the weaving room. Too busy praying, or whatever it is she does inside those gates.”

  “But none of the problems you speak of are beyond remedy.” Mira glanced at Arnaud. “We can help right things there, Arnaud and me. He built some of those looms, and I know the proper way to dye wool.”

  Arnaud nodded. “We’ve got to pass by Belarac on our way to Bayonne. We’d be foolish not to step in and do what we can, for it benefits us all in the end.”

  “Bayonne?” the shepherd asked. “What’s there?”

  “Work, we hope,” Arnaud replied. “And maybe a way to help Ronzal. Some of the villages in valleys to the west are hauling oak downriver from Pau to Bayonne, then shipping it north.”

  “I’ve a cousin who does it,” the man said, nodding. “For great profit I’m told.”

  “It won’t be easy,” Arnaud allowed. “But the rewards will be worth the trouble.”

  “I’ll pray to the gods that you succeed. I for one would much rather fell oaks than watch our flocks dwindle to nothing.”

  The shepherd embraced Arnaud, then hurried across the meadow. The hail had subsided, replaced by a driving rain.

  “We should join them and help get the flock safely back.” Mira watched the sheep plodding away, the men with their staffs, the dogs with their spiked iron collars.

  Arnaud shook his head. “We stayed too long in Ronzal as it is. The safest thing for you is to be as far from Oto as possible when your father and brother return from war.”

  “Perhaps the order to kill me did not come from my father.” She turned to face him. “Perhaps the steward was just possessed of an addled mind. He was a violent man prone to rages, by all accounts.”

  Arnaud put his arms around her. “Mira, as long as your father lives, I’ll do whatever I can to keep you away from him. He wanted you dead. And for that matter, your brother may, too.”

  She stared at him bleakly. “The only thing I could not bear is you getting entangled in my family’s troubles. If something were to happen—”

  “I can handle myself in these forests. I’ve faced wolves, bears, lynx. But I’m no warrior,” he said flatly. “I’m not schooled in swordplay, I’ve never held a pike. So the wise course for us is to leave these mountains before anyone from the house of Oto comes looking for you.”

  In her heart, she knew he was right.

  Arnaud helped her back up into the saddle. She reached back and rested a hand on the canvas-wrapped oak panel behind her, imagining its layers of oil and pigment, its finely-etched underdrawings, its hidden words scrawled in charcoal—words no one would ever see.

  All winter she had been fixated on the idea of a future in Bayonne. She and Arnaud would work side by side, artist and artisan, nestled in some respectable lodging near the harbor. She would collect wealthy patrons like so many shining pearls on a string. And he would craft furniture of such exquisite quality that foreign merchants would clamor for it, load it on their vessels, sail it north. But at this moment, shivering under a dripping beech tree high in the mountains, countless leagues from the sea, Mira felt a tendril of doubt unfurl in her belly.

  The journey to Bayonne would be long and full of dangers. Once they arrived, they would have to cobble together a future piece by piece. They had no family there, no friends. If some crisis befell them, no one would come to their aid.

  She squeezed her hands together until her knuckles ached. The flock and the shepherds had disappeared from sight, the jangle of iron bells had faded into silence.

  For the first time, Mira wondered uneasily if the future she dreamed of would even come to pass.

  3

  Summer, 1504

  Pyrenees Mountains, Aragón

  Mira

  The sun was beginning its descent in the west when Mira and Arnaud arrived at the King’s Road and the passage to Béarn.

  A group of monks and a long mule train were assembled at the pass of Somport near a stone cabin occupied by a guard and a tariff collector. Behind them massed a group of muleteers, their animals weighed down by goods. Mira and Arnaud dismounted and led their mules to the back of the queue.

  When it was their turn, the tariff collector searched the contents of the mules’ panniers. His red leather armor was emblazoned with the herald of Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand. Meanwhile, the guard busied himself attempting to create order out of the shifting crowd of people and animals. He rattled his sword, shushing two muleteers who were arguing loudly in the mountain dialect.

  “What’s in there?” The tariff collector pointed at the canvas-wrapped parcel strapped behind Mira’s saddle.

  “A painting,” Mira said.

  “Let’s see it.”

  “It’s not worth your trouble,” Arnaud said, stepping between them. “It’s damaged. Has no value.”

  “I’ll decide for myself what its value is,” the man snapped.

  Arnaud carefully detached the parcel from its tethers and unwrapped it.

  The tariff collector eyed the portrait, let out a low whistle. “A fine enough likeness of you, but what a mess.”

  “Of me?” Mira said. “No, I—”

  Arnaud flicked her a warning look.

  “Why haul something over the mountains when it’s been destroyed?” The man examined the raw gouge in the center of the painting, shaking his head. “Someone dropped it on a pike, from the looks of it.”

  Mira draped the canvas over the painting again, annoyed to see a tremor in her hand. She wanted to tell him exactly how she planned to repair her mother’s portrait: a plug of wool for the hole, layers of gesso and glue, then careful application of linseed oil mixed with pigment. In the end, the damage would be nearly invisible.

  But she kept silent, her head bowed.

  The man gestured at the bundle of parcels on the flanks of Arnaud’s mule. “What about those? More ruined paintings?”

  “Wood,” Arnaud replied. “I like to whittle.”

  The tariff collector rapped on the parcels with his knuckles and seemed satisfied with the result.

  “What business do you have in Béarn?” he asked, hand outstretched.

  “Same as any other couple.” Arnaud dropped several coins into the man’s palm. “We go where the work is.”

  “Are you an artisan, then?”

  “I work with wood, like I said. Cabinetmaker.”

  His response seemed to satisfy the tariff collector, who waved them on with a warning.

  “Mind you be wary on your way down. The road north crawls with bandits and Cagots.” He pointed to the necklace around Mira’s throat. “If I was you, I’d hide that.”

  They proceeded down the wide, rutted road, keeping the monks’ mule train in sight.

  The pine trees here on the exposed ridge were spindly, their branches sparsely clothed with silver-green needles. The hillsides were covered in rocks and loose sha
le. A cold wind snaked down from the snow-covered peaks above them.

  Mira glanced back over her shoulder at the gates, watched the tariff collector wave the next group of travelers forward. She put a hand to her throat.

  “There are no rubies or pearls in my necklace. Just a bit of ivory on a thin chain.”

  “Anything shiny is attractive to a bandit,” Arnaud said. “And the chain may be thin, but it’s gold. Better to do as he says.”

  Mira sighed, fumbled with the clasp of her necklace and slipped it off. She held it in her hand a moment, pressed the carved ivory scallop shell into her palm. Then she pulled out her dagger and deposited the necklace in the bottom of the sheath. Anyone who wanted her mother’s necklace would see the sharp end of her blade first. As an additional precaution she pulled up her skirts and strapped the sheath around her thigh. If they were ambushed, at least she would have a hidden weapon.

  “What did he mean, ‘Cagot’?” She folded her arms underneath her cloak, shivering. The air smelled of winter.

  “They’re a strange race of people. There are many in Béarn. You never encountered them, truly?” He sounded skeptical.

  “When would I? My entire life was spent behind the gates of Belarac.”

  “You lived in Nay a time,” he reminded her.

  “In Nay, my world was the home of Carlo Sacazar, the convent of his sister Amadina, and the marketplace. I suppose I might have seen a Cagot there, though I did not know it.”

  “No. They wouldn’t have mingled with the townsfolk. They keep to themselves, and others think of them as little more than beasts.”

  “Why?”

  He shrugged. “Fate hasn’t been kind to them, that’s all I know.”

  The mules shambled along at their usual pace, searching in vain for tufts of grass to nibble. These hills were barren of life, Mira thought, save for those pines—and even they looked half-dead. Just ahead, the rocks on the slopes that bordered the road were stained the color of blood. As they got closer, she saw the rocks were covered with creeping red moss. Somehow it survived up here where no other plant would.

  Wings churned the air overhead and a crow settled into a stunted pine, fixing its bright black eyes upon her. She thought of Elena and her hatred of the creatures. Mira closed her eyes a moment and whispered a prayer, overcome with a sudden wave of longing.

  Please, God. Keep my Elena safe, wherever she is.

  4

  Summer, 1504

  Basque Country

  Elena

  Elena had never been this far west before. They had traveled on foot through the mountains for nearly a fortnight, following the shepherds’ trails through meadows and forests that grew wetter and denser the closer they got to the sea. Each day beginning at dawn, she strode a short distance behind Xabi, breathing in the earthy, rich scents of the forest, half-listening to the trills and whistles of songbirds high in the canopy above them, charting the progress of the sun across the wide blue sky. If it were up to her, they would continue on this way until they reached the ends of the earth, where the rivers poured into the sea. But they were nearing their destination now. The quiet companionship of these days with Xabi was drawing to an end.

  Afternoon was turning into evening when they came to the crest of a low hill that overlooked a grassy meadow. On the opposite end of the clearing, a broad-shouldered, bearded figure emerged from the woods and tramped across the grass. Two large white dogs wearing spiked iron collars padded alongside him.

  He hurried toward them, waving both arms enthusiastically. Xabi and Elena descended into the meadow to meet him. The dogs settled back on their haunches, regarding their master with solemn eyes as he greeted Xabi and Elena in the mountain dialect. Elena realized this was for her benefit, since she could not understand a word of Basque.

  As soon as the niceties were dispensed with the man placed his hands on Xabi’s shoulders and said solemnly, “Your sister’s dead, cousin. It happened last night, just after sunset.”

  Xabi lowered his gaze. “At least she’s not suffering anymore.”

  Elena slid her hand into Xabi’s, feeling a rush of sympathy for him. His mother had died when Xabi was a boy and his elder sister had been thrust into the role of motherhood long before she was ready. She never married, claiming the rewards of marriage were already hers: a brood of children and a whitewashed home with a peaked red-tiled roof that was every inch her domain.

  But now it would all be Xabi’s.

  Xabi’s cousin led them along the trail. A bear had been sighted near here not too long ago, he told them. That was why he had brought the dogs. It was odd, he said, a bear in summer. Usually bears stayed higher in the mountains until autumn, when they grew cranky and voracious, desperate to fill their bellies before winter silenced the land with its deep crust of snow.

  “I suppose you’ll be happy to live in one place,” Xabi’s cousin said over his shoulder. “The shepherd’s life is no good when you have a woman.”

  Elena pressed her lips together and lengthened her stride, put out at the assumption that she belonged to Xabi. He turned, saw her expression, smiled. She felt her heart soften. The fact was, she did belong to Xabi—and he to her. They had wintered together too many times to count in their secret valley with its steaming pools, ensconced in a snug stone cabin.

  Last autumn she started her journey to their secret valley too late. She’d had no choice but to stay at Castle Oto as long as Mira remained there, to watch over the girl. On the day when the steward Beltrán had unspooled Ramón de Oto’s murderous plan and the arrow he launched at Elena hit wood instead of flesh, she fled to Ronzal. When Mira and Arnaud returned safely from the cave, she saw her opportunity to leave. But when they surprised everyone by announcing their intent to wed, she delayed her plans.

  Mira and Arnaud were married on an autumn day that felt like midsummer. The Ronzal villagers slept under the stars around a bonfire that night, marveling at the sultry air. The next day began sunny and ended with snow flurries. Though Elena departed in haste, snow chased her west through the mountains all the way to the valley.

  By the time she got there, Xabi had already resigned himself to a winter without Elena by his side. She smiled at the memory of their reunion, the quiet joy in his dark eyes at the sight of her.

  Mira and Arnaud, for their part, must have been snowed in at Ronzal for the winter. If the gods were willing, they would soon make their way over the mountains. Before long they would be in Bayonne, settled into a new life by the sea.

  Elena could never think of Mira now without thinking of her mother, Marguerite. From the beginning, Elena was convinced she could never love a noblewoman, especially not a member of the house of Oto. But she had grown to respect Marguerite. More than that, she had become fiercely protective of her. Despite the enormous gulf between them—a mountain woman and a high-born lady—they understood one another in the end. And the knowledge that Marguerite had sacrificed her own life so that Mira could live elevated the noblewoman even higher in Elena’s estimation.

  Walking along the quiet forest trail with Xabi’s warm hand in hers, Elena wished for one more chance to talk to Marguerite, to tell her that Mira was safe, married to a good man, with a future full of promise. Just as she’d always hoped.

  They rounded a curve and the whitewashed house came into view. Nestled in the crook of two sloping hills, the house was surrounded by fruit trees, a summer garden, and close-cropped grass. A flock of goats stood in a pen just outside the barn a short distance from the house. One of them began rasping excitedly at the sight of the dogs.

  The broad, battered wooden door opened as they approached.

  “Xabi,” a woman cried. She ran to him and threw her arms around him, sobbing and talking a wild streak of Basque.

  Soon Elena was longing for the quiet of their hidden valley. Xabi’s family was loud and argumentative. They spent ev
ery evening picking apart discrepancies in stories, trundling out the same bits of family lore again and again, unravelling it all before the fire along with copious helpings of wine until everyone began to nod off under the weight of so many words.

  Elena often found Xabi’s eyes in the midst of these smoky, ear-splitting soirées, and he would shrug slightly, or raise and lower one eyebrow so fast that she wondered if that was really what she saw, or draw down half his mouth in a lopsided smile. She would take a deep breath and let it out, feeling herself grow calm under his gaze.

  They were together, that was the important thing. These people roaring and screeching in their mysterious language—she would grow to accept their ways. Perhaps she would one day understand them, although there was a small comfort in her foreignness. It gave her the freedom to lose herself in her own thoughts while the rest of them were caught up in their stories.

  “We’ll have to marry,” Xabi told Elena one night in bed.

  She ran a finger up and down his forearm, tracing the slight furrow between two lines of muscle.

  “What if I don’t want to?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “I’ll be forced to wed with a dagger at my neck, is that it?” She rolled away from him.

  He snorted, folding his arms under his head.

  “I’d never force you to do anything.”

  She couldn’t argue with that, but she felt like arguing anyway. The prickly side of her was outraged that his family would assume they could ram their traditions down her throat. The practical side of her knew that for all intents and purposes, she and Xabi were married. Formalizing things would not change their feelings for each other. But the idea that outsiders would press a union upon them—it didn’t sit right with her.

  “Do you truly want to live trapped in this house for the rest of your life? After all of your wanderings?”