“Because Gemma is your sister,” she finally said. She spoke the truth with perfect clarity. It was unambiguous.
“What?”
“Your father got her mother pregnant after he and I were already married. You were six years old. She and her boyfriend had a shotgun wedding. But everyone in Ugarte knew the truth. They could see that the baby wasn’t premature. Gemma is your father’s daughter. You’re half siblings. The idea of you having a child together is madness.”
“I fell in love with my own sister?”
“Yes, I’m afraid so.”
“I slept with my own sister?”
“Yes.”
“And no one in Ugarte told us?”
“Why should they have? You’ve followed in your father’s footsteps and slept with every girl in Ugarte and in the nearby villages. I suppose they didn’t think the affair would last more than a few weeks. Why destroy two families a second time by digging up an old scandal?”
“What about Gemma and me? Did anybody consider the fact that this might destroy our lives?”
“That’s why I’m doing what I’m doing. Putting an end to this.”
Alvar took a while to take in what his mother had said, to believe what he was hearing. Raising his head, he glanced around the forge, the place he had conducted his romantic trysts for years. He felt like he was cavorting onstage while the whole village watched in silence, the whole time knowing how it would end.
I thought that today I would become an adult, a married man, he thought bitterly.
He sighed and acquiesced.
“So you spoke to Gemma. What did you tell her?” he asked. His voice was different, older, deeper. It was the voice he used to seduce, to appear more mature.
“Everything.”
“Everything?”
“Yesterday she found out that she was pregnant with her half brother’s child. She wept for a long time. I offered her money to go away, to pursue the studies she’d always dreamed about. I offered her a life.”
A life without me. And she accepted.
“How much?” he asked.
“Enough.”
“How much?”
“I offered her fifty million pesetas to start.”
“Are you crazy? Won’t Papa find out?”
“Your father has no idea how much money he has; he hasn’t known for a long time. Even when he’s himself, he doesn’t even pretend to care. Our lawyers know what they’re doing, and they keep us informed,” she said.
She was tired. Tired of playacting, tired of hiding her husband away, making sure nobody found out that the lord of the tower was mentally unbalanced, a lunatic who could be hospitalized. If he were declared insane, they would lose everything.
All that tension. All that control, was it worth it?
I do it to protect them, Inés reminded herself, contemplating the gold rings on her fingers. To protect Alvar and Ram.
“You said to start. How much did she accept?”
“She negotiated. In the end, she agreed to leave for eighty million.”
“She bargained away the life of our child? She agreed to never see her family again, to never say goodbye to me?”
“Don’t hate her for what she did. She was as shocked as you when she found out you were her half brother.”
“But she haggled over the money…” muttered Alvar. He was no longer talking to his mother; he was talking to himself. He was repeating the words he would tell himself every night until the day he died.
And he wanted to know everything.
“How did you know I was getting married today?”
“Agustín,” she replied simply.
¿Et tu, Brute? My best friend. You too.
And then he felt it.
A weight falling at his feet, like a heavy sack.
An almost-physical sensation.
Three masks cracked that day: his mother’s, Gemma’s, and Agustín’s.
His respect for all of them disappeared.
For his mother especially—the woman who gave birth to him, who raised him, who always listened to him, and who had been his ally, someone he could trust.
“Very well then,” he said finally, standing. “I won’t get married. Not to her, or to anyone. Who knows how many sisters I have scattered across the country. Tomorrow I’m joining the priesthood. And you will not deny me that. It’s a family custom. I can do it. Ramiro Alvar will inherit the title. I don’t want it. I want nothing to do with you. Goodbye, Mother. Thank you for putting a price on me. Now I know how much I’m worth.”
And with that, he left.
Ramiro, now Ramiro Alvar, had to crouch in the wheat field so his brother wouldn’t see him when he stormed out of the forge, slamming the door behind him. The wooden door, barely held together with old, rusty nails, couldn’t withstand it and burst apart from the impact. No one would be able to fix it.
Ramiro, officially crowned Ramiro Alvar, fell to the ground in shock. His glasses flew off, hitting a stone at the field’s edge. A crack like a spider’s web formed in one of the lenses.
And he did not see his brother again that day. He was told by their bewildered father that Alvar had decided to enter the seminary in Vitoria. He had felt a calling from God.
That evening they dined in silence. The three of them. His father, devastated, was dressed sloppily, like a servant. Ramiro’s mother didn’t even notice the crack in his glasses. Dinner was a silent affair, full of vacant stares. The only sound was the clink of silver cutlery on their plates, dishes that belonged to their ancestors. They barely touched the meal, crestas de gallo, Alvar’s favorite; it felt sacrilegious.
The absence of the impetuous Alvar burst the fragile bubble of daily life in the tower. His mother—who likely already lacked the strength to pretend each day was as perfect as the last, or who perhaps was unable to bear the weight of her guilt—stopped smiling.
Whenever Alvar returned from the seminary, he flipped the household ecosystem upside down. Arrogant, frivolous, and charming with outsiders; cold and distant with his family. He seduced every girl in Ugarte. A worthy successor to his father, Alvar returned frequently to the forge, and never alone. Only now he wore his cassock.
Ramiro Alvar just watched things unfold. He wondered where his older brother, his role model, his best friend had gone, and why he hadn’t come back. No one could answer that question.
Just as no one knew why Inés was at the wheel the day his parents’ car dove off the Vitoria bypass.
Seeing his father’s inert body on the steel gurney, wearing clothing taken from the servants, shook Ramiro Alvar profoundly.
“If your alter is dead, then where are you, Papa? Why don’t you come find me?” he whispered into a cold ear that could no longer hear anything.
Alvar wasn’t listening, either. The two gazed in disbelief at the bodies that had made them orphans. Ramiro Alvar hadn’t seen his brother for several years. Alvar had stopped visiting the tower. His mother invented feeble excuses, smoke screens that insulted Ramiro’s intelligence.
He finally understood, or at least thought he did, when he saw Alvar enter the morgue. His brother was an old man who walked with a cane. His face was pale and haggard from anemia and chronic pain, and none of his proud vigor remained beneath his cassock. Only bitterness was left. But what he still couldn’t figure out was Alvar’s new and violent hostility toward him.
“This is what our mother did. And she did it well, don’t you think?” said Alvar, finally addressing his brother.
“I don’t understand. What did she do?”
“She steered the family’s destiny, and we didn’t even see it happening. That’s what she did.”
42
REINFORCEMENTS
DIAGO VELA
Summer, the Year of Our Lord 1199
Alix crouched down, drawing the torch near, and nodded.
“Three yards should suffice. All the townsfolk must quit whatever they’re doing and come to the workshop to sew. They mustn’t stop until it’s finished.”
“Do you believe this will stop their monstrous devices?”
“No, but we’re desperate.”
I made my way to the butcher’s house and rapped hard with the door knocker. He came down in a nightshirt that barely covered his hirsute legs.
“Slaughter half a dozen suckling pigs. The fattest you have.”
My words woke him from his slumber.
“Should we not save them for later?”
“They’ll never be plumper than they are now, and I need every ounce of animal fat you can give me. We have plenty of salt from the Añana flats, so you can cure the remaining meat.”
Back at the main square, I found half the village on the ramparts, peering over the wall. I climbed the wooden steps to the tower.
The light from the enemy’s torches showed their progress. A large army was approaching.
I found Chipia by the North Gate, giving orders to his archers, who were filling the baskets at their feet with arrows. I ran up to him.
“How many do you think?”
“Three thousand, at least,” he said. His sardonic smile had vanished; he was worried. “But none of them are ours, God be damned. I’ve seen pennants belonging to the orders of Calatrava and Santiago, powerful allies of Alfonso. And they have three robust siege towers in addition to their siege engines. They’re bound to attack soon, before our reinforcements arrive. These walls have been well reinforced and will withstand them, at least. By the way, I’ve been meaning to congratulate you for using hot sand instead of boiling oil.”
“Oil is expensive, and our reserves are low. I was reluctant to waste such a precious resource, although it might come to that given what we’re facing.”
“A novice would have used oil to repel the first attack.”
“I’m not thinking about what might happen today, or even in a month’s time. I’m preparing for the worst possible scenario. If there’s a lengthy siege, we will need oil more than sand. As long as we have walls and cobblestones, they can be ground into sand and heated in the furnaces. But I’ll leave you here, I need to speak to my brother and sister.”
I hastened to the forge where I found Lyra and Nagorno distributing weapons. Nagorno was about to take several baskets of bolts to the crossbowmen in Nova Victoria.
“Lyra, I need you to make arrows that are sturdier and longer than these. They need to bear weight. We don’t have time to make hoops, so send one of your men to the rope makers for rope.”
I briefly explained my plan, and they nodded.
“We need good marksmen. Only you and I have the nerve to fire straight,” murmured Nagorno.
“I know,” I replied. “We’ll do it. I’m not even going to share the plan with Chipia in case he tries to stop us. He’s still waiting for help that isn’t coming, and his false hope will destroy the town if we let it.”
I had scarcely finished speaking when the first volley of rocks fell onto the rooftops. The wood splintered from the force of the missiles, and I could hear shouting.
We ran outside.
“They’re armed with catapults and trebuchets!” I cried. “Lyra, make those arrows quickly!”
In addition to the huge rocks they were firing from their onagers, balls of burning straw soon began to rain down upon us, setting fire to rooftops.
The streets filled with black smoke and debris from the damaged houses.
“Run for cover!” The cry went up. “To Santa María Cathedral!”
Then the arrows came, only this time no one hurried to collect them. I saw a little girl no more than five summers old, one of Milia the layer-out’s children. I ran after her and had almost caught up to her when an arrow shot past me and pierced her back. By the time I threw myself on top of her, she was no longer moving. I carried her limp body to the nearest courtyard and vowed to return after the attack to give her a Christian burial.
But will there be an after? I wondered.
I knew they could obliterate us. They could continue to bombard us with fire, rocks, and arrows until nothing was left, not even the town’s foundations. They would repopulate the area, and in two generations, no one would remember the people who had originally built Victoria and had made their lives there.
I ran to the weavers’ workshop.
“Did they bring you animal fat?”
“They’re still slaughtering the pigs, but they’ve started bringing us all the fresh lard they already had in store, just as you ordered.”
“Then spread the canvas sheets on the floor and smear them with the lard. I’ll be back shortly. I doubt we can hold out for long.”
I heard several loud thuds. Onagers were launching rocks at the town wall. They weren’t precise engines, but a trained solider knew where to aim them to inflict the most damage: opposite a gate tower or to cover an assault.
I looked up at the guard walk and saw that Chipia’s archers and crossbowmen were doing a good job of protecting the ramparts. Then I went into every burning building I could see to make sure that nobody was trapped.
After I had gone through several, burning my arm on a beam that caught me unaware, I heard my name being called.
“Count Don Vela, your brother and sister are looking for you! They’re waiting for you at the forge, and they ask you to bring the canvas sheets.”
* * *
—
Some time later, Nagorno and I climbed the battlement west of the North Gate. We could see one of the three siege towers advancing toward us. It was several stories high, and the oxen had dragged it as far as the first moat. Soldiers were placing bundles of branches lashed with rope across the breach, then putting planks of wood on top to allow the tower to move closer to the wall.
If the soldiers stormed the battlements and entered the town, there was nothing we could do. We would be helpless against so many.
My brother and I each carried a longbow made of yew, the kind used by English archers, and a thick arrow that was fastened by a rope to the corner of an immense canvas.
Nagorno sniffed the air like a wild boar.
“The wind is coming from the south. This promises to be a magnificent spectacle,” he murmured gruffly.
We stood several feet apart. The enormous cloth was smeared with lard, making it a deadweight. I drew back my bowstring with my burned arm and took aim.
“Ready. Take aim! Fire!” I cried to my brother, tilting back and holding my breath as I released the bowstring.
The two arrows sped through the air simultaneously, striking the wooden platform at the top of the siege tower. The canvas draped itself around the edifice.
Lyra handed me an arrow with a lit tip. Her men did the same for the four archers who accompanied us.
“Ready! Aim! Fire!” I shouted.
All our burning arrows landed on the cloth and set fire to the pork drippings. Red and blue flames engulfed the siege tower, and the soldiers hidden in the upper platforms leaped to the ground, their clothes alight. The wind appeared to be on our side. Its gusts fanned the blaze until the charred wooden structure eventually collapsed at the base of the wall.
Some of our men let out cries of joy and embraced one another. But Lyra, Nagorno, and I ran down the stairs. A second siege tower was approaching the outskirts where the cutlers lived.
Once again, we climbed to the guard walk. I saw dead bodies on the way, but we were going too fast for me to recognize them: I could make out burned wimples, legs covered in soot,
motionless amid the rubble. The weavers were coming up Rúa de la Astería, bearing another huge canvas patchwork on their shoulders. Arrows were flying everywhere, and they were using it as a shield.
The second siege tower didn’t collapse completely. The soldiers had been warned, and as soon as we fired the canvas sheet, they began to pull at it from below. We only managed to set fire to the base of the tower.
“That’s enough!” Nagorno cried. “We’ve stopped it for now—they won’t be able to use it to breach the east wall. Let’s take the third one!”
“All right, but we haven’t destroyed it; they’ll just repair it!” I said.
The third siege tower was threatening the walls of Nova Victoria, next to Portal Oscuro. Ortiz de Zárate cleared the rubble blocking our way to the Angevín district.
This time the tower had all but breached the wall. Some soldiers were pushing bound planks onto the crenellations, preparing to cross.
Mendoza and his men fired their crossbows repeatedly, and the planks plummeted to the ground.
“Ready! Take aim! Fire!” I ordered, even though we were only a few yards from our target.
The third canvas wrapped itself around the last tower, and a fresh volley of flaming arrows set the huge siege engine ablaze, swiftly reducing it to cinders.
Old Mendoza carried his family shield—a red stripe on a green background—and gave me a solemn nod. I took it as a gesture of gratitude and responded in kind.
We were ready to set the onagers aflame as well, and then burn the soldiers attacking our walls, but once more we heard the cry.
“Retreat!”
To our astonishment, the cry was repeated all around the town.
“Retreat!” we heard along Camino de la Cruz Blanca.
“Retreat! King’s orders!” on Campillo de los Chopos.
The arrows stopped flying and the rocks stopped pounding our walls. Soon the only sounds left were the crackle of the flames consuming the rooftops and the cries of people searching for their mothers, husbands, daughters, grandmothers.
The Lords of Time Page 32