The Falcons of Fire and Ice

by Karen Maitland

  All the sailors were assembled on the deck and a priest stood up on the poop deck in the stern, the highest deck on the ship, a young altar boy at his side dangling a censer of burning incense from its chain in one hand and clutching a silver bowl with hyssop in the other. The sailors one by one removed their caps, and the priest began his blessing of the ship. He was mumbling away in Latin, his voice drowned by the clamour of the voices on the quayside. The boy swung the censer vigorously back and forth, but the incense smoke blew away before it could reach our nostrils. The priest dipped the hyssop twigs in the silver bowl and flung the drops of holy water over the ship, but they too were snatched by the salt breeze before they could touch the timbers.

  The altar boy began to sing the hymn to the Virgin Mary in a clear sharp treble, Salve Regina, Hail Queen of Heaven. The ship’s boys joined in and the men’s deep voices plodded after them. Each of the weatherbeaten faces relaxed for a few moments into expressions of certainty and devotion.

  I felt suddenly afraid. All my life I had known what I believed. Known that the Holy Virgin and her saints were watching over me, as my mother had always told me they were. I had looked up at that shrine in the corner of the kitchen and seen them smiling serenely down at me. When the thunder echoed round the valley so deafeningly that I was sure the great boulders in the mountains were rolling down to crush me, I would run to the shrine and pray with all the fervency of a nun, in the knowledge that the Virgin would protect me.

  But whenever I was naughty as a child, I had guiltily avoided the unblinking stares of the statues, knowing that they had seen me steal a fingerful of honeycomb from the jar or watched me as I tried to hide the plate I had broken. I was always convinced they would tell my mother what I’d done. Yet even then, I had known beyond any doubt that when I lay down to sleep in my little cot, if I did not wake I would be carried by the angels up to heaven.

  Now, for the first time in my life, I did not know where I would go when I died. If there was a storm and the ship foundered, would any saint bear me up in the waves, knowing what I was, who I was? Would the Virgin Mary Misericordia open wide her cloak and shelter me beneath it? The Holy Church and my own mother had declared the Marranos heretics, and Mary did not spread her cloak to comfort those who were to burn in hell. I was alone, cast out from all the protection that once had surrounded me. My own God had rejected me as a heretic. Yet if there was a God of the Marranos, I did not know him or where to find him.

  The agent who had accepted my money and negotiated my passage had asked no questions of me save one – ‘Are you an Old Christian?’ I assured him I was. The lie came as easily to my lips as it had to my mother’s. Indeed, like her, I had for a moment found myself still believing it was true, until I remembered. He had insisted on hearing me recite the Creed and the Ave in Latin. But though I had known the words all my life, I suddenly began to stumble over them, as if my tongue was swelling up as I tried to say them. The agent seemed satisfied, however, and had held up his hand halfway through to stop me.

  ‘That’ll do for me,’ he said. He winked. ‘I have to check. They don’t want those Marranos escaping, but I say, what if they do? Good riddance to them, we don’t want their sort here. In fact I reckon we should get together the oldest and leakiest hulks we can find, pack the lot of them on to them and send them all off to the New World. And if the ships founder before they get there, who’s to care, that’s what I say. But no one listens to ordinary folk like us, do they?’

  My blood instantly turned to iced water. I had been so afraid I would not be able to find a ship that it simply hadn’t occurred to me that I might be arrested for trying to leave the country. Of course, I knew that the Marranos weren’t permitted to leave Portugal. I had grown up knowing that, but then I had also grown up knowing that I wasn’t a Marrano, so the decree had no meaning for me. As an Old Christian I was free to come and go as I pleased. But now suddenly I realized that I was one of those forbidden to leave.

  The agent must have seen my stricken expression, for he reached across his table and grasped my hand unpleasantly tightly, his mouth twisted into a leer. ‘Now, don’t you be fretting, my darling. There’s no danger of your ship sinking. Smartest and most seaworthy ship on the seas she is. You’ll be sailing in luxury. Course, if you’d have gone to anyone else, it would have cost you three times as much, but I’m a friend of the captain, so he gives me special rates.’

  Along the quayside a small group of black slaves shuffled past from one of the ships newly put into port. They were naked save for filthy loincloths, their feet weighed down by iron shackles, their necks chained together. A few stared wildly around, their bloodshot eyes darting from side to side in fear at the strange sights and sounds that assailed them on every side. But most gazed sightless at the ground, moving listlessly as if they were already dead. I winced as I remembered the heavy fetters biting into my father’s limbs and neck. My guts felt as if they had been twisted into a knot so tight it would never be loosed.

  I retreated to our sleeping chamber the moment the blessing was over and peered out of the anchor hole, holding my breath each time a soldier approached the gangplank. Once, when two soldiers paused to chat to the seaman on watch, I thought I would be sick with fear. Eventually they strolled away, but still I remained terrified that any moment they might discover who I was and drag me from the ship. When finally I watched sailors casting off the mooring ropes and I heard the gangplank rasping up over the side, I breathed easily for the first time in days.

  We sailed on the evening tide and ate our supper – mutton and a pudding of bruised wheat – by the light of the swaying lanterns. The merchant’s wife, who announced that she was to be addressed as ‘Dona Flávia’, complained that the mutton was tough, the pudding not sweetened enough, the wine watered, and the boat rolling so much she’d never be able to eat a bite, but such shortcomings did not prevent her from devouring every dish with such haste that I was sure she would be ill.

  The other passengers seemed anxious to obtain as many fragments of information about one another as could be snatched between mouthfuls of food. I listened, but I didn’t attempt to join in. Up to the time of my father’s arrest, I had rarely spoken to anyone who was not a friend or neighbour of my parents. We seldom had visitors at home, and even if my father and I chanced to encounter servants and courtiers at the summer palace on our way to the mews, I was expected to do little more than curtsy, smile and listen without interrupting the conversation of my elders.

  But with Dona Flávia presiding over the table, I didn’t need to talk. She immediately informed us that she and her husband were travelling only as far as England, if, she added with disdain, ‘this wretched hulk manages to get us that far’. There her husband was to do business with only the finest shops to which he planned to sell a large quantity of silks and other rare fabrics. She, meanwhile, would decide if there was anything at all worth buying for her daughter’s trousseau, though she very much doubted that England would have anything half as fine as could be purchased in Lisbon. She proceeded to launch full-sail into a detailed description of her daughter’s forthcoming lavish wedding, while her husband sat morosely tearing his bread to pieces and muttering to anyone who’d listen that he hoped the English shopkeepers were feeling generous since he’d have to sell three full warehouses of silk to pay for what his wife had planned.

  Finally, he interrupted her and addressed himself to the elderly gentleman sitting next to a lumpish, baby-faced boy who, though he looked no more than twelve, was already twice the size of his tiny wizened father in girth, as if the boy had been feeding on his father like some great leech and had sucked all the juices from the old man. The lad, it seemed, was the youngest of the man’s many children. The father was taking his son to France where he was to be enrolled as a student in Paris and would, his father anxiously assured us, become a scholar.

  The lad didn’t look very scholarly and, judging by his scowl, he didn’t seem to want to be. But it appeared his
father was in despair to know what to do with his son. He wasn’t suited to the life of a craftsman, for several apprenticeships had been obtained for him and none had lasted more than a few weeks. So it was either the life of a scholar or the lad would be obliged to take holy orders and become a priest or monk. At which pronouncement the boy’s scowl deepened, and he savagely kicked the bench on which he was seated.

  Attention now turned to the three other men at the table. All three looked to be of a similar age, in their late twenties, but that didn’t seem to make them friends, for they eyed one another warily, like strange dogs circling as if to test one another’s willingness for a fight.

  The one sitting next to me was a gaunt-looking man, with eyes as blue as the deep of the sea. His head was wrapped in a turban of black velvet cloth trimmed with a silver thread. It so completely enveloped his pate that I suspected underneath it he might be bald. He leaned across the rough wooden table to help himself to more of the mutton and the over-long sleeves of his doublet trailed in the juices on his plate.

  Dona Flávia gestured imperiously at the cook, who was bending over the two great pots bubbling in the cookbox, half-hidden in a great cloud of smoke and steam.

  ‘Where is the man who serves the food?’ Dona Flávia asked in a voice that must have carried from stern to bow. ‘He should be waiting on us. This poor gentleman’s clothes are quite ruined.’

  The cook gave no sign that he heard her.

  ‘I fear we have to fend for ourselves, Dona Flávia,’ the man said, dabbing ineffectually at his sleeve with a handkerchief. ‘Like you I am, of course, used to a manservant, but I dare say we shall learn to make shift for ourselves.’ He gave up trying to clean his sleeve and attacked the mutton again with almost as much gusto as Dona Flávia.

  ‘It’s not good enough, not good enough at all,’ Dona Flávia grumbled, then, raising her voice so that any of the seamen could hear her, she said, ‘Husband, I insist you complain to the agent who booked our passage, the moment we return. Tell him we did not expect to be treated like common peasants on this voyage. I’m sure you agree, Senhor … ?’

  ‘Marcos,’ the man helpfully supplied through a mouthful of food.

  ‘And are you also a merchant, like my husband, Senhor Marcos?’

  ‘Alas, no. I am but a humble physician.’

  Dona Flávia beamed and clapped her hands with delight. ‘How fortuitous! Did you hear that, husband? This gentleman is a renowned physician! I am a martyr to a sick stomach, as my husband will tell you. And to know I shall have you to call upon is a great weight off my mind.’

  Marcos looked thoroughly alarmed. ‘I am merely travelling to Iceland in search of new remedies that might be concocted from undiscovered herbs and lichens. I hadn’t intended to treat … there must be a ship’s surgeon on board. He will have much more experience than I in dealing with maladies at sea.’

  But Dona Flávia waved a dismissive hand. ‘I don’t doubt he is perfectly able to provide crude remedies for these rough sailors, but a lady of my sensibilities needs the gentle touch of a learned man who understands complex cases such as my own. My husband will gladly pay any fee you command. We always buy the best of everything.’

  The merchant winced. Then he patted his wife’s arm. ‘Now then, my dear, let’s not tempt providence by speaking of illness. I’m sure you will remain perfectly well on this voyage, so there will be no need to trouble Senhor Marcos.’

  And, as if desperate to divert his wife’s attention from her illness, he said almost without drawing breath, ‘I have heard, Senhor Marcos, that there are ancient bodies preserved in the mud in Iceland. They tell me all the skin and flesh remain intact, though every bone has mysteriously vanished from the corpse, but not a cut is to be seen on the skin. And such corpses when rendered down provide much more powerful medicine for every kind of ailment than even the dried mummies brought from Egypt. Although I understand they are so rarely found that even a king’s ransom would not buy a whole corpse.’

  Marcos offered that kind of faint, polite smile which people make when they have no idea of what is being discussed and fear to reply in case their remarks appear foolish. I wondered if he was actually listening, or was still cowering in fear from Dona Flávia’s attention.

  The merchant waited politely, but seeing Marcos was not inclined to add anything, he turned to the man sitting to Marcos’s right. ‘And you, Senhor, what is your profession?’

  The man he addressed was the one who had so kindly advised me to sleep near an anchor hole. Now he smiled pleasantly, as if he had been waiting to be asked this question.

  ‘Please call me Vítor, and I am by profession a maker of maps and a collector of curios.’

  Dona Flávia’s head swivelled round to face him, her pursuit of the physician quite forgotten.

  ‘How thrilling! Do tell us, what curios are you searching for on this voyage?’ she asked, apparently dismissing maps as quite unimportant.

  Vítor paused to consider the matter for a moment. His gaze travelled towards me. For a long moment he seemed to be studying me, his eyes veiled by long, dark lashes that would be the envy of many a girl. He wore such an intense, hungry expression that I found myself blushing. Then, just as swiftly, he looked away and smiled again at the merchant’s wife.

  ‘There are two curiosities I long to possess, Dona Flávia – a sea monk and a sea bishop – both are to be found in the icy Northern waters. These creatures are described most admirably by Guilielmus Rondeletius in his book Libri de Piscibus Marinis. The sea monk is a fish the size of a man with a human head like that of a tonsured monk, long scaly robes and two fins which resemble human arms. But its superior is the sea bishop, which has two legs, two hands and the head of a bishop complete with mitre and a covering upon its back resembling a cloak.’

  The merchant’s wife stared at him with a spoonful of pudding suspended halfway to her mouth. ‘And have any such creatures been found?’

  ‘Indeed they have, Dona Flávia. For Rondeletius has made fine drawings of them from his observations. And furthermore, a sea bishop was captured and taken as a gift to the king of Poland, though it did not remain in the palace for long, despite being shown every honour and courtesy due to a personage of the rank of bishop. The creature made it plain by signs that it disapproved of the impiety of the Court and wished to be returned to its life of contemplation beneath the waves, and so it was.’

  Dona Flávia glanced out at the foaming black water, as if she expected to see the sea bishop floating towards us, praying.

  ‘Are such creatures … dangerous?’ the elderly man asked nervously, and even his son stopped kicking the bench.

  Vítor looked uncomfortable, as if he suddenly regretted mentioning the fish at all. ‘It’s thought they are mostly harmless. They don’t attack ships or eat those who fall into the sea, but they are inclined to a little – how can I put it? – mischief. I believe the sea monk has on occasion whipped up a violent storm, when it is displeased.’

  Dona Flávia clutched at her chest. ‘Then I absolutely forbid you to capture one, Senhor Vítor. Tell him, husband. Tell him he must not attempt such a thing. We have no wish to anger this monster.’

  ‘My dear, have you forgotten, we are disembarking in England, and Senhor Vítor has explained these fishes are found in the cold seas to the North. We shall be safe on land long before the ship reaches the dwelling places of these creatures.’

  But his wife seemed far from reassured and glared furiously at poor Vítor as if he was the cursed Jonah and should at once be thrown overboard to save the ship.

  ‘And what of you, Senhor?’ Dona Flávia said, pointedly turning her back on Vítor and addressing the last man at the table. ‘I hope you are not intending to drown us all by recklessly antagonizing ferocious sea monsters.’

  He pressed his hand to his heart and, half-rising from the bench, made a gracious bow, beaming first at Dona Flávia and then at me. ‘Senhor Fausto, at your service, ladies.’

&nb
sp; The man had a pinched, drawn look as if he had recently suffered an illness, but that only served to emphasize the fineness of his features.

  ‘I assure you, gentle ladies, you need have no fear. I will not attempt to arouse the wrath of any dragons or monsters. Mine is a far more civilized quest and one of which I’m sure you will approve, for I am bound for Iceland to seek diamonds and gold to adorn the necks of lovely women like you.’

  The merchant frowned. ‘I didn’t know such things were to be found there.’

  ‘Ah, there speaks a man with knowledge of the world’s wealth,’ Fausto said. ‘It is true that none have so far been discovered there, but few men have looked, for the natives of that isle care only for their sheep. But in a land where mountains spew forth fire and rivers run hot from the heart of the earth, who knows what treasures may be found? And if I find none, why then, I’ll take the next ship on to the vast lands of Canada and try my luck there.’

  The merchant snorted. ‘Then you are a fool, Senhor. Have you not heard, some Frenchman by the name of Cartier went on an expedition to Canada and returned to France claiming he brought back a fortune? Seven barrels of silver he reckoned to have, eleven barrels of gold and a whole basket filled to overflowing with uncut diamonds and other precious gems. None of it was what he thought it was, and the only use there was for those stones was to fill in potholes in the road. He’d have got a better price if he’d fetched back eleven barrels of dog dung – at least he could have sold that to the tanners, isn’t that right?’ He nudged Vítor sitting next to him and laughed heartily.

  But Fausto’s smile did not waver, though his eyes were cold and hard as jade. He was not a man who could laugh at a joke made at his own expense.

  ‘This Cartier clearly knows nothing about the diamond trade and is unable to distinguish a diamond in the rough from a common pebble. I, on the other hand, have learned my trade from the best.’