History's Great Queens 2-Book Bundle: The Last Queen and The Confessions of Catherine de Medici

by Gortner, C. W.

  A physician in a black robe bent over the bed. When he heard my approach, he turned to me. The resignation in his eyes made my heart pause. “What is wrong with him?” I asked in a thread of a voice, and I realized that despite my lack of volume I sounded perfectly calm.

  He sighed. “I was told His Highness complained of some stomach pain in the afternoon and retired to his rooms to rest. He later sent word that he would attend the banquet tonight, where he collapsed. At first I thought he had drunk too much wine or that his roast had gone bad, but now that I’ve examined him I’m inclined to think whatever it is he’s been fighting it for some time.”

  I looked at Philip. He was moaning in his delirium. “He’s been healthy all of his life,” I heard myself say. “I’ve never known him to have so much as a cold.”

  The physician motioned, “Your Highness, if you would?” I jerked forward. I smelled human waste as he parted Philip’s chemise. The linen was plastered to his skin; as the physician peeled back the cloth, I covered my mouth. Philip’s neck was swollen, the skin tinged with a blistery, virulent rash that seemed to spread to his chest even as I watched. Even the palms of his hands bore the blisters. He had also soiled himself, and his breeches had been removed.

  “Is it…?” I couldn’t speak the word aloud.

  He shook his head. “If it is the plague, I’ve never seen it manifest like this before. This swelling and discoloration are more consistent with some type of water fever.”

  Water fever. Besançon had contracted a water fever.

  “Your Highness, I believe we should send for an expert. Such ailments are beyond my limited wisdom. I know of one in Salamanca, versed in such maladies: Dr. de Santillana.”

  “Yes,” I whispered. “Do it. And before you go, tell them I’ll need warm water and cloths.”

  I DID NOT LEAVE HIS SIDE.

  Some no doubt said I was a fool for love, a woman so far gone I surrendered even the last shreds of my pride, for never was my madness more apparent than in that hour when I agreed to tend my mortal enemy, when any sane person would have walked away and let him die.

  But they had never known love. They had never felt its wildfire and brimstone. Philip was my enemy, but I had loved him once. I would not let him suffer alone like a beast. I would not have it said one day to our children that I denied their father in his hour of need.

  I was a queen. I knew the meaning of honor.

  I removed his soiled clothing and bathed his feverish body with my own hands. It was no longer the body I remembered, taut with youth and vigor. That gorgeous sculpture of white muscle had turned flaccid, corrupted by vice and wine and his own relentless demons; but at the touch of my fingers his skin seemed to remember me and respond.

  I then called for Doña Josefa and Beatriz. Together, we dressed him in a fresh linen bed gown and eased him under the covers. No one else made an appearance. Only Don Manuel expressed concern, albeit via a courier who stayed only long enough to hand me his missive. Word had gotten out of Philip’s collapse and fear of the plague ran through Burgos, with many fleeing with whatever they could carry. I found it telling that even my half sister, Joanna, forsook her preoccupation with my state, promptly leaving for her country home outside the city, where the constable no doubt joined her. In less than twenty-four hours, Philip went from aspiring king to abandoned victim.

  Within the casa, the silence was broken only by his whimpers as he fought the fever. The physician’s name was Dr. Parra, a simple medic with no experience treating royalty. His pale face showed his overriding anxiety that his exalted patient might die in his care.

  Beatriz kept me fed and Doña Josefa tended to the washing of linens and the fire. I often found myself alone in that room, seated on a stool by the bed, swabbing Philip’s brow with rose water. It was as though a wall of glass enclosed me. I was not afraid, not even for the unborn child in my womb. I knew with a curious certainty that whatever afflicted my husband would not harm me.

  On the fourth day, Dr. de Santillana arrived.

  A corpulent man with fleshy jowls, he hummed over Philip. After poking and prodding his swollen glands, scrutinizing his white-coated tongue and the rings of his bloodshot irises, Santillana made an uncomfortable moue and turned away to discourse with Dr. Parra. I went across the chamber to where the doctors stood.

  “Well? What is it?”

  Santillana glanced past me to the bed. Philip reclined on mounded pillows, his eyes closed, his face so white it blended with the linen.

  “Your Highness,” said Santillana, “might we step outside?”

  I wondered at the need for privacy, seeing as Philip had not regained consciousness. Still, I led the doctors into the indoor patio. Sunlight flashed off the colored paving stones and center fountain, where water trickled from the mossy spout. I blinked, adjusting my vision, which had grown accustomed to the gloom of the sick chamber.

  It was a lovely day, I thought faintly.

  I sat on a nearby stone bench, folding my hands in my lap, utterly serene. I must have looked it, as well, for Santillana and Parra exchanged a puzzled glance before the portly expert blew out his breath in a worried puff. “Your Highness, I don’t quite know how to begin.”

  “Just say it. Whatever it is, I want to know.”

  “Well, it is not a water fever as we first thought.”

  “Then, what? The plague?” Water fever or plague, it didn’t matter. I just needed to know if he would survive. Everything depended on it.

  “No, not the plague.” Santillana let out a troubled sigh. “Your Highness, I believe your husband has the pox.”

  “The pox?” I stared, completely taken aback. “Are you saying he has the French malady?”

  “Unfortunately, I am. It is rarely seen in Spain. I myself have never treated a case of it. However, His Highness’s symptoms match those described by colleagues who have.”

  “But you’ve not treated it yourself, so you can’t be certain.” I collected myself in the ensuing silence. For a moment, the world had spun out of control. I recalled that Philip had consorted with that French harlot, whom I assaulted in Flanders. She’d had a sore on her mouth. Had she infected him? And if so, had he given it to me? I thought he mustn’t have, for surely I would have fallen ill by now or at the very least failed to conceive.

  Santillana sighed. “If it is the pox, he will recover. The disease produces terrible symptoms at first and then it disappears. I’d say this is the first stage. The infection can hide for years afterward.” He raised somber eyes. “Your Highness must know that I’ve not heard of any man, or woman, who escaped the disease’s ravages. Though they may appear to completely recover and regain their strength, in the end they all go insane, though of course His Highness may have many years ahead of him, with the proper care.”

  A rushing sound filled my ears. Philip had the French pox. He would recover, in time. He would regain his strength. He would continue to wreak havoc for years before he went completely mad; and if I didn’t appreciate the irony in this it was because I envisioned something even more horrific—a future in which I’d be disposed of and a mad king ruled Castile, rousing the grandes to bring chaos and ruin to the kingdom my parents had built; a future in which there would be nothing left to bequeath our sons but ashes and death.

  I flashed back on a haunted room in Arévalo, heard again my mother’s voice as she faced an angry, uncomprehending fifteen-year-old girl: I couldn’t risk it. My duty was to protect Castile, above all else. Castile had to come first.

  Of all the wrongs Philip had inflicted on me, none moved my hand as this one.

  “Years?” I repeated, and I was surprised I sounded as calm as I had a moment ago.

  “Indeed. If my diagnosis is correct, he should soon show improvement. His Highness has been sick for, how many days now?” Santillana turned to Parra; as the doctor opened his mouth to reply, a bloodcurdling call came from the bedchamber.

  “Where is everyone?”

  I turned, m
oved in a nightmarish haze back into the room. I came to a halt. The doctors nearly collided into me from behind. Philip sat upright, looking like a resurrected cadaver.

  He fixed burning eyes on me. “I’m hungry. Get me something to eat. Now.”

  I HAD SOME OXTAIL BROTH brought and spooned it into his mouth as he scowled. He muttered he would never eat anything at a banquet again. At one point, his eyes caught mine and I saw his suspicious disbelief that I’d been with him throughout his ordeal. The doctors pronounced him on the mend. Santillana hastily took his leave, refusing any payment, relieved he’d diagnosed a prolonged death and not one he need attend.

  I was left with Parra and an empty house that would soon fill up again once word got out that Philip was recovering. I had very little time.

  I wiped the residue of broth from his lips and took the empty bowl to the tray. “There, now,” I said. “If you like, I’ll bring more soup later. But for now, you should rest a while, yes?”

  He eyed me. “Why would you care?”

  I paused, the tray in my hands. “I am your wife. Is there anything else you need?” I heard myself say as if from far away, “A warm claret, perhaps, to help you sleep?”

  The moment hung between us. I was shocked by my steady grip on the tray, the impassive way I met his stare, as though I were behaving in the most normal manner imaginable. If nothing else, my very ability to project the demeanor of an efficient wife at her husband’s sickbed proved how monstrously he had warped my heart.

  “No? Very well. I’ll be in the next room. Please do try and get some sleep.”

  I started for the door, my steps leaden, my heart capsizing in my chest. Then, just as I set the tray on the sideboard and reached for the latch to open it, I heard him grumble, “If that doctor you brought in doesn’t forbid it, I suppose a bit of wine couldn’t hurt.”

  I did not glance over my shoulder as I left the room.

  THE RATTLE WAS AUDIBLE NOW, HIS BREATHING SO SHALLOW IT scarcely lifted his chest. For the past two days, he had shouted out inchoate words before slipping into a silence so profound it was like finality itself. The fever raged again. This time, nothing could vanquish it.

  “Your Highness must rest,” Parra said. I could see he too was exhausted, baffled by the abrupt turn in Philip’s condition, by this new assault that churned my husband’s bowels to bloody water and raised evil pustules on his flesh, as though he festered from within.

  “No.” I gave him a weary smile. “But I would welcome a glass of water.”

  He bowed his head and left me.

  Philip’s mouth was ajar, that awful gurgle deep in his throat reminding me of the sound stone-filled udders made when children played ball on the plaza cobblestones. I took his hand in mine. When my fingers grazed his skin, I felt the heat emanating from his pores, though the skin itself was cold, unexpectedly hard to the touch. Though he had taught me the meaning of loneliness and betrayal, I wanted him to feel he was not alone.

  I would show him a compassion he had never shown me.

  His forehead creased at my touch. I set the goblet I’d prepared in his hand, in which the last of the herbs melted in the warm wine. A shadow darkened his face.

  “Drink,” I whispered.

  I forced the lethal mixture through his broken mouth. Some of it seeped down his chin. I wiped it with my sleeve. “It’s almost over,” I said, and I took his hand once more. “Almost over.”

  A few seconds later, he gasped. I felt his fingers tighten in mine, then go limp.

  Everything came to a creaking halt. We were frozen in time, painted figures on a facade. The quiet pressed in around me. With the illusory weightlessness of a dream, I experienced the scarce warmth fleeing his flesh. I stared at his face. Had it not been for his stony pallor, he might have been asleep. He looked young again. Death had restored to him the lost beauty of our halcyon days: a tangle of gilded hair on his brow and his long, fair eyelashes—the envy of many women at court—resting like poised butterflies. Looking at him, I lost all sense of the past. I lost awareness of my self, of the child in me, of my heavy aching body.

  And of what I had done to save my kingdom.

  All I had was this moment beside my husband’s corpse and, in my mind, the words of a prophecy uttered only five months ago: You may come as a proud prince today, young Habsburg. But you shall travel many more roads in Castile in death than you ever will in life.

  THIRTY

  My husband, the man I’d wed for politics; whom I loved for four years and hated for five; bedded countless times and wept countless tears over; borne five children and conceived a sixth; battled, plotted, and fought against: my husband was dead.

  Did I mourn him? The answer is simple, and private. I had done what was required to save my realm, and his death did not turn me into a deranged, bereft widow. Our love was a ravaged memory; his corpse only confirmed it. Now I faced a choice that could free me or condemn me forever, a means of escape that could seem to prove I was indeed as mad as he had claimed.

  But I had my reason, incomprehensible as it may have seemed.

  SO I WAITED. IT DIDN’T TAKE LONG. A MERE HOUR AFTER PHILIP died, the Flemish, Cisneros and his band of clerics, and the nobles descended on the Casa de Cordón like locusts. Beatriz, Doña Josefa, and I had barely finished bathing and dressing the corpse when the lords came stampeding into the room to assume charge of the situation.

  I swayed on my feet with exhaustion and didn’t try to fight them. I allowed myself to be taken back to my rooms, while the Flemish wailed and Cisneros let the embalmers in, after which the body was wrapped in linen for conveyance to the monastery of Miraflores outside Burgos, where the monks would hold vigil for Philip’s immortal soul. Proclamations were posted throughout Castile announcing the untimely death of Philip of Habsburg, posthumously titled “prince consort of our heiress apparent Queen Juana”—which, I suppose, glossed over the political incertitude.

  As for me, I was a twenty-seven-year-old widow and six months pregnant. Outwardly, I showed no signs of distress. I donned black out of respect but otherwise was content to take my meals with my women and remain in my rooms, pondering my next move, as I knew the grandes did.

  Overnight, the world had changed. With Philip dead, I was most definitely their queen, but I did not delude myself that I held any more power than I had when Philip was alive. Indeed, it was barely a month after his death that my half sister, Joanna, returned to the casa swathed head to toe in black. She immediately set herself to infiltrating my household, despite Beatriz’s overt scowl. To my disgust, other noble wives followed—a veritable legion determined to barricade me behind a wall of feminine solicitude. I knew this was Cisneros’s doing, part of his plot to keep me estranged. He did not want me running loose while he cajoled the nobility to the negotiating table. I tolerated the invasion for the moment because faithful Lopez, whom Philip had tortured in Flanders, had also come in haste to join my household, and Soraya showed up one day without warning, haggard and thin and bearing the marks of the whips and violations Philip’s men had subjected her to, yet resolute as ever to be at my side.

  As I embraced her, I wept my first tears since Philip’s death.

  With Soraya back in my service and Beatriz at my side night and day, I bided my time, until one afternoon when Archbishop Cisneros and the Marquis of Villena barged into my rooms.

  “It is imperative we act before the situation worsens,” Cisneros declaimed. He’d surged into startling life, with even a hint of sparse color to punctuate his hollow cheeks. “Castile has lacked guidance for too long. If Your Highness would read this list”—he set a paper on the crowded table before me—“you will see every appointment is in order and the lords cited therein most eager to serve as your councillors.”

  I faced them impassively. I’d been expecting something of this nature from him. Indeed, with Philip dead, I’d assumed it would only be a matter of time before some new alliance was forged with the grandes. The admiral believed C
isneros was my father’s supporter and had worked secretly to undermine Philip, but I suspected I’d been right about him all along. He was no better than any noble in his lust for power. I’d made an enemy of him during my last trip, when I confronted him at La Mota. He would not be a friend to me now, not until my father showed up and put him in his proper place.

  “This talk of a council is premature, my lords. I will address this, and other matters pertaining to my estate, at a more appropriate time.” I couldn’t resist a small smile. “Are we not, after all, still in mourning for my late husband?”

  “The thirty days are past,” Villena said with his suave air. “This matter concerns the very future of Castile. Surely Your Highness doesn’t wish to deprive her people of proper governance at a time like this?”

  “This realm has lacked for proper governance since my mother died,” I said dryly. “I hardly think a few more weeks will make any difference.”

  His mouth worked. I could see he was doing his best to control his temper, to try and divine my reasons for delaying. When he next spoke, it was with a deceptive softness that chilled me to the bone. “My lord archbishop, the lords, and I believe Burgos is no longer an appropriate place for Your Highness. After having suffered such tragedy here, we humbly suggest you honor our offer of assistance and move your household to—”

  I held up my hand, hiding with that peremptory gesture the stab of alarm that went through me. “You forget with whom you speak, my lord. I am your queen. I alone will decide when and where I shall move my household.”

  I watched his face turn scarlet and let the seconds pass, one by one, until I felt the air curdle like sour milk. “I must be invested and crowned,” I said. “The decision of the Cortes to recognize me in Valladolid was delayed by the plague, but with my husband the archduke gone there can be no further debate as to my rightful claim. My mother willed this realm to me, and I will rule it. In the meantime, I have some requests of my own.”