The Mapmaker's Daughter (28 page)

I don’t mean it. At least, most of me does not. He offered me the place Noor holds now, and I chose my future. Still my heart is bleeding so badly I’m surprised my clothing is not soaked red. For a moment, I pity the young woman, so unable to meet him as an equal. How hard he must be working to be as happy as he was with me.

Is Jamil standing in his courtyard now, looking up at the Alhambra and wondering where I am? He knows which window is mine. “You made your choice too,” I say, sending the thought to him as I shut the lattice screen.

GRANADA 1459

Noor brings her infant son, Ahmad, to the palace a month after his birth. I am afraid to look at him, for fear I will recognize Jamil’s eyes or his thick, golden-brown hair. But Ahmad looks no more like one of them than the other, and I murmur along with the rest of the women, that with such parents, it’s no surprise he is a beautiful baby.

I watch with odd detachment Ahmad’s progress in the first months of his life. I’m as excited as the rest of the women when he recognizes me, and I smile back with sincere pleasure. I am happy for Noor, because I know what it means to be a mother, and from time to time I even forget the miserable truth behind this delightful child’s existence.

By summer, another pall hangs over my life. The caliph is gravely ill. Muhammad has no son to succeed him, and in the Caliphate of Granada, the outcome would be unclear even if he did. The only certainty is that a new family and a new chief wife will take over the Alhambra, just as Mushtaq had done years before.

No one will pack anything now, so Death will not think it has been invited, but eventually Jawhara and her children will go with Mushtaq to their ancestral home in Almería. There they will live inside the Alcazaba, a fortress overlooking the sea.

“You’re welcome to come,” Jawhara tells me almost every day. “Zubiya will be bereft without you and Eliana. Please say yes!”

I am not tempted by the offer. Zubiya’s marriage has been contracted, and in a few years, she will leave for her husband’s domain near Málaga. Eliana, now thirteen, will eventually marry as well, and if she moves away, I will be alone here in Granada. But if I accept Mushtaq’s and Jawhara’s offer, I will serve for their amusement once Zubiya is gone, and nothing more. That’s not enough of a life for me.

I could go back to Queluz. The idea tempts me, but an inner voice tells me to go first to some place where I can establish who I am on my own before I decide on a more permanent home. But where? Simona told me not to stay in Queluz just because I couldn’t decide what to do with my life, and I’m feeling the same confusion now. In time, will I feel as Simona does, saying to myself, “look where I ended up,” without remembering exactly when, and how, my destiny was set?

I go to the palace one morning and know from the minute I arrive that something is wrong. No one is outside tending the gardens, and the shops are empty. “Is he—?” I ask a guard.

“No, but they’re saying he won’t last the day.” I rush to the women’s quarters, but only Rayyan is there. We wait together the rest of the morning, and eventually we see Mushtaq being carried in a chair. Jawhara and Zubiya are holding onto each other, crying.

“My husband is gone,” Mushtaq says as the servants lower her chair. Grief buckles her legs under her as she stands up.

“I’m so sorry,” I say, my eyes welling with tears for this woman I have grown to love so deeply.

“He’s better now. He is with Allah and the Prophet, sall Allahu ëalayhi wa sallam.” She tries to smile.

The servants help her to her favorite chair, and she glances at the table next to her. “It looks as if you have received a letter.” She examines the wax seal. “From Elizabeth of Castile.”

She hands it to me, then turns to a wet-faced eunuch standing quietly nearby. “Please tell the servants our time here is over. We’ll bury my husband and leave for Almería as soon as we can pack.”

Mushtaq excuses me so I may read my letter in private. The former Queen of Castile is my childhood friend Elizabeth, whom I haven’t heard from in years. She is already a widow, her elderly husband, King Juan II, having died five years ago, when she was only twenty-five.

There are rumors that her removal with her two children to the small town of Arévalo was not voluntary, but a banishment carried out by the new king, Enrique IV, who is Elizabeth’s stepson by King Juan’s first marriage. Elizabeth has two children of her own, an eight-year-old daughter Isabella and a son Alfonso, two years younger. The boy is second in line for the throne because Enrique is childless.

“El Impotente” people call him behind his back. After thirteen years of marriage to his first wife, Blanca of Navarre, the pope granted an annulment, based on proof that Blanca was still a virgin. When prostitutes came forward saying he had been quite the lover with them, he claimed Blanca had used witchcraft to keep him from her bed. The poor woman was sent in disgrace back to her home in Navarre.

Since his second marriage, the rumors have increased that Enrique’s member is withered, because he and Juana have not produced a child to secure the throne of Castile. Witchcraft indeed. I’m glad Diogo never heard that excuse.

What can Elizabeth want from me? Closing the door to my quarters, I break the seal.

My dearest Amalia,

Although it’s been years since we have seen or written to each other, I think of you often and hold you in my heart. I understand you have been in service as a tutor in Granada, and if you are ever looking for another assignment, I hope you will consider coming to Arévalo to be the tutor for my daughter, Isabella.

My dear Amalia, I remember our childhood together and hope the recollection brings you the same tears of joy. Life has brought both of us much sorrow, but there is no friend like one from that time of youthful innocence, and I pray we will make each other smile again.

Your friend,

Elizabeth of Portugal and Castile

19

ARÉVALO, 1459

My first reaction upon seeing Elizabeth is to wonder whether I could possibly look that old. I am thirty-three and she is two years younger, but the sad details of her life since she left Portugal to be King Juan’s second wife weigh heavily on her. Elizabeth had been plump and rosy-skinned back in Portugal, but now her collarbone juts out behind a necklace of pearls, and even the careful ministrations of servants cannot disguise her lank, thin hair and sagging jaw.

She senses my alarm and gives me a wan smile. “It’s the poison,” she says. “My husband’s mayordomo tried to kill me with what he said was a cure for melancholy. I never recovered.” She shrugs too enigmatically for comfort. “It’s part of life in Castile. I guess they don’t realize God sees all of the court for the fraudulent little weasels they are.”

Eliana is sitting next to me, trying not to squirm in the style of dress we must now wear. The maids assigned to our quarters had to scurry to find suitable clothing for us this morning, since we’d come with nothing but our loose Andalusian robes. Later today, the tailors will arrive to begin our transition into uncomfortable Castilian wardrobes of our own.

The views from the palace are of the same glorious countryside we traveled through. Scattered among the undulating fields of golden wheat are patches of saffron flowers and orderly vineyard rows. Trees line the banks of rivers and streams like dark-green ribbons dropped from the hand of a giant. Cows and horses graze in pastures set against violet hills in the distance. The sky is blue most of the time, although massive clouds form quickly, sending shadows racing across the landscape.

Just outside the walls that enclose the town, two rivers meet. Near their juncture, a round fortress juts up to the sky, and from our window we can see small figures of guards walking the parapets. Above them, the flag of Castile waves in the breeze, next to the personal banner of Elizabeth, to mark the fact that she is in residence.

Life in the palace is turned inward, though, and the windows lining the corridors aren’t open to let in light, much less a hint of the world outside. It feels like a prison here compared to the expansiveness of Granada. Is anything in this room where we now sit truly her own? Is Elizabeth her own anymore? Was she ever?

She sighs. “Do you remember I used to think being married off to an old man was the worst thing that could happen? My troubles were nothing compared to what they’ve been since my husband died.” Her eyes cloud and she looks away, just as she used to when one of her dark moods was setting in.

I try to introduce a note of cheer. “We’ve been looking forward to meeting Isabella and Alfonso,” I say, giving my daughter a forced smile.

Eliana doesn’t smile back.

She doesn’t smile much these days. At thirteen, she’s not happy about coming to a place where her only company will be an eight-year-old princess. She was crushed when Jamil married Noor and devastated again at Zubiya’s departure from the Alhambra. She sulked much of the way to Arévalo, insinuating that her unhappiness was, if not completely, at least largely my fault.

I’ve tried to reassure her this move will be for the best, even if we can’t see how at the moment. I’ve tried to tell her my heart is breaking too, and we will both get over the pain, but there’s a hole in my heart so large I feel as if my entire being will be sucked in and vanish altogether. I’ve lost Jamil and Granada too. I don’t know where I am going, or why, and the sullen child with me, for all her desire to take her own path, still depends on me to choose well for both of us.

I haven’t told Eliana how wounded I am, don’t want her to know how little confidence I feel. On the journey here, I waited with such anticipation for her to fall asleep at night. Only then could I let myself go and cry for all I have lost, surrendering to the bleakness ahead, for that is all I can see.

A sound in the doorway startles me back to the present. A young girl is waiting just inside the room. The silhouette of a nun takes up most of the light, but the girl is standing in the glow from a wall torch that illuminates her blond hair like a crown around her face.

“Isabella!” Elizabeth says. “You may enter.”

The little girl comes into the room followed by her brother Alfonso, who has to be urged forward by the nun. “We’ve come from mass, your highness,” the nun says. “I hope we haven’t kept you waiting.” She looks at Eliana and me, and though the light is low, I see a flicker of disdain. I’m a Jew. I’m in her country. I don’t expect she needs to know any more than that.

Another sour soul like Tarab. Being a nun, at least this one won’t have a daughter she’s trying to marry off, although the stories I’ve heard about some convents make me think it’s best to be prepared even for that possibility.

I informed Elizabeth I was now living as a Jew, so she could rescind her invitation if she wished. “I can’t say I like what you’ve done, but it is up to God to judge, and no one here need know you were ever anything else.”

“I would get much comfort from being with someone I know to be a privada, a true friend, who cared for me when there was nothing to gain by it,” the letter went on. “Such a friend can only come from the years before I became a ball to be tossed around in games others play.”

“Isabella, Alfonso, I’d like you to meet Doña Cresques and her daughter, Eliana,” Elizabeth says, using the Jewish family name I have now adopted. “Doña Cresques will be teaching you geography and literature.” A scowl flits across Isabella’s face, and I realize the nun has probably been telling her how wrong it is for a Jew to teach a princess anything. From the stubborn set of her mouth and shoulders, I can see that Isabella agrees with the nun. “And if you would like,” her mother continues, “Doña Cresques can teach you Arabic as well. She speaks and writes many languages perfectly.”

“Arabic?” Isabella had been examining me with her smoky eyes, but now her head turns sharply toward her mother. “Why do we need to know Arabic when there will soon be no Moors in Spain?” She looks at the nun. “I gave my favorite bracelet for the cause when we went to church today.” The black-robed woman gives her a dour, approving nod.

Why learn Arabic indeed? Isabella’s value lies in a strategic marriage. Whatever foreign country she goes to, one thing the little girl can count on is that they will not speak Arabic there.

I meet Isabella’s stare with one of my own, tempered with a smile to show I am not unnerved by her. But I am. Something about that child is different from anyone her age I have ever met. Forget Arabic, I tell myself. Teaching her geography is going to be challenging enough.

VALENCIA 1492

I remember Isabella’s face when she announced that she had given her own jewelry to fight the Moors. The intensity in her manner and expression was unlike what I expected in a princess. All the ones I had known were pampered, vacant little dolls.

God had spoken. That was how Isabella felt. The triumph of right over wrong might take time but it was inevitable. How could God be almighty otherwise?

Those raised with a modest sense of themselves acknowledge that God loves their neighbors too and may favor causes other than their own. But Isabella did not grow up modestly. Certainly, when King Enrique didn’t like something his stepmother said or did, he was not above cutting off the allowance that let Elizabeth and her children live in comfort, but Isabella’s lack of modesty had nothing to do with the food she ate or clothes she wore.

The girl I tutored in Arévalo listened to what others said, but she kept her own counsel. Isabella never doubted that the Moors would be pushed from Spain, because she was sure she knew God’s will. Would Isabella have turned out differently if Elizabeth had been stronger? If just one thing is altered, does a string of changes inevitably follow, or are some forces so great they plow down whatever is in their path?

I soon realized that my presence in Arévalo had little to do with Isabella needing a tutor. I can’t think of anything I taught her that couldn’t have been handled by someone else. Elizabeth needed a friend she’d chosen herself, and she needed to set her foot down at least occasionally, as a reminder of the person she had once been.