Return to Your Skin

by Luz Gabás

  In silence, the villagers waited for her answer. Brianda stared at the designs on the marble floor while carefully choosing her next words.

  “I’m not saying you shouldn’t do anything, just that you respect what actually happened.”

  “You didn’t answer my question,” insisted Alberto.

  Brianda looked for Neli and her eyes landed on the last person she expected to see there.

  Sitting in the last row, with his arms folded, Corso had his eyes fixed on her. He did not have the placid, bored look of someone listening to a speaker. Rather, his head was tilted and his eyes were half-closed, as if he were trying to decipher a secret message behind her words, her movements, and her reactions.

  Brianda wondered how long he had been there.

  Then, she saw a woman lean in and whisper something to him. He nodded curtly without taking his eyes off Brianda. She recognized his wife, who had interrupted them that afternoon in the tower at Lubich. Seeing her now made Brianda suddenly and painfully jealous. She felt like shouting that Corso belonged only to her, that nobody else had any right to whisper in his ear, look at him in adoration, kiss him, and stroke his skin.

  “By your silence, it’s clear you must think like Neli,” Alberto said. “How dare you come here from outside to tell us what we should or shouldn’t do in our own affairs.”

  In your own affairs? Brianda thought with irritation. Did she not have a right to an opinion about Tiles? If there was anything that was completely hers in this world, it was her ties to the place for which she had suffered for centuries. Without taking her eyes off Corso, she replied in a loud, clear voice.

  “I completely agree with Neli that we should use this discovery as a model of historic justice. I think we should begin by getting the case of these women recognized as a terrible miscarriage of justice and request the exoneration of all who were subjected to illegal trials. We must erase this stain from our history.”

  “That is ridiculous!” said Zacarias. “I don’t feel responsible for something that happened centuries ago!”

  The majority of those present voiced their support of Zacarias’s opinion.

  Brianda remembered what had happened to Anna Göldi in her Swiss village, and it brought an ironic smile to her face. The world could feel very small sometimes. Hundreds of miles away, the same words were spoken.

  “I do feel responsible, because it was my ancestors, with whom we share our blood, who acted wrongly. I’m only asking you to read what I have written and judge for yourselves. If you later decide to continue with these projects, it will be your own concern, but I can personally assure you that the name of my ancestor Brianda of Lubich will be restored.” She noticed that Corso frowned slightly on hearing the emphasis she’d put on the word “Lubich.”

  The bar filled with noisy arguments, and the mayor waited a few minutes for tempers to cool a little. He noticed that someone had raised a hand at the back and asked for silence.

  Corso stood up and said, “I would like to know the story of Brianda. Maybe it’s not a bad idea for us to read it and reschedule this meeting for another day.”

  Martin spoke quietly to the two others at the table and said, “That’s what we’ll do. Thank you all for coming. We’ll let you know when the next meeting is to be held.”

  Taking advantage of the commotion and people moving toward the bar, Corso came over to Brianda.

  “May I have a copy?”

  Brianda handed him one with hope fluttering in her heart.

  “It is also your story,” she whispered.

  Corso leaned closer.

  “What did you say?”

  “When you read it, don’t be surprised to see your name. There really was another Corso. I didn’t make it up.”

  “That foreign soldier who ended up becoming master of Anels?”

  Brianda nodded, touched that he remembered the explanation about a role-playing game that she’d given him the night he discovered her and Neli taking the diary from the writing desk. Instinctively, she raised her hand to the pendant.

  “It suits you,” he said. “And do you know what relationship that Corso had with that Brianda?”

  Brianda nodded again, absorbing his gaze anxiously, as if each second that passed was a second that could never be recovered.

  “He was the master of her soul,” she said. “Of her immortal soul—”

  A woman’s impatient voice called Corso from a few steps away. He turned and spoke to her in Italian. He then looked back to Brianda. He opened his mouth to say something, but he changed his mind and left with his wife.

  The following morning, Brianda got up early. She opened the windows and saw that the new day would not be sunny either, as if the valley had permanently succumbed to gray monotony. How strange nature was, she thought. How calm it could seem, and yet hide such fury, fire, and life. Her own apparent calm hid a cauldron of emotions, from the deepest grief at having to live without Corso to a powerful drive to find a whole new life for herself.

  This thought made her recognize that something had profoundly changed in her in just a couple of days. The anxiety and fear that had crippled her had disappeared. A small voice inside assured her she would survive, with the persistence of a blade of grass making its way through rugged terrain, with the courage of a soft breeze that dared to stroke the sharp needles of the firs, with the devotion of tiny raindrops dampening a seed and accompanying it in its growth. She felt her strength returning, bit by bit, and knew she could carry her centuries-old memories into the future.

  She got dressed and went down for breakfast. Isolina was already in the kitchen, sitting at the table with one of the copies of the story that Brianda had handed out at the bar.

  “Good morning, Brianda. I couldn’t go to sleep last night until I finished reading what you had written.” Her face was serene even though her eyes were tight. “I have to ask you something. Do you think Colau knew?”

  Brianda had been afraid Isolina would be upset about Jayme of Cuyls. She did not know what had happened to him after Brianda’s hanging, but without a doubt, Colau’s ancestor was the most detestable character in the story. Because of him, his descendants had been marked by misfortune and rejected by their neighbors. In any case, in her writings she had made no mention of the curse of the Cuyls or of anything esoteric or mysterious. The story of the women condemned as witches in Tiles had to be totally believable if she wanted to get them exonerated.

  “Yes. He knew that Jayme signed the executions, and I think he was ashamed of it.”

  Isolina stood up and poured herself more coffee.

  “It wasn’t Colau’s fault he got so strange and untrusting over the years. He was consumed with finding out what could have happened to make his family so detested,” said Isolina. “How is it possible that you were able to figure out in months what he couldn’t achieve in years?”

  “It was those papers Neli found; they cracked things open. It’s such a shame that Colau died when he did. All I really did was put his notes in order.”

  Isolina sat down again. “Do you know what surprised me? That Jayme of Cuyls took revenge for love. Everything he did was for Elvira. If their parents had just accepted their marriage when they were young, maybe none of it would have happened.”

  Brianda’s stomach turned. It was impossible for her to justify Jayme’s perverse machinations, his mass murder, in the name of love. However, a sudden stab of alarm in her chest reminded her that great passions always had unsuspected consequences. Had that Brianda not condemned all the Cuyls to centuries of suffering? Had Colau’s siblings not died, and many more before them? How was someone like Colau or his family responsible for what their ancestor had done?

  As if reading her mind, Isolina let out a pained sigh. “Life is full of mysteries. I’ve been mulling over something. Remember I told you that Colau was acting stranger than usual before he died? Like he suddenly knew something was coming?”

  Brianda’s cheeks burned. There was somethi
ng she still had to do. She thought about it every day.

  “I’ll be back in a second,” she said.

  She went up to her room, opened the wardrobe, found the emerald ring, and went back to the kitchen. She sat beside Isolina and handed it to her.

  “It has the inscription of Lubich. The same as the stone in the secret graveyard.”

  Isolina gasped.

  “Brianda’s ring! To think it’s been here all these years! It’s gorgeous—I didn’t know he had it. Did Colau give it to you?”

  “I found it among his things.” Brianda hoped with all her heart that Isolina wouldn’t ask when she had found it. How could she explain that her attraction to it had been stronger than her common sense?

  Isolina frowned and remained silent for a few moments. Then she took her niece’s right hand and placed the ring on her ring finger.

  “Keep it. Colau hid it because it was proof of the evil that Jayme inflicted. Maybe you can give it a new meaning.”

  Brianda hugged her in thanks. She wanted to tell her how important it was for her to be able to wear the ring on her finger, see it at all hours, know it was hers again. She got up to pour herself some coffee so Isolina wouldn’t see the tears in her eyes.

  Both remained silent until Isolina, as if she had been waiting for the right moment, said, “When Neli brought you out of that trance or whatever it was, I did a little research on the Internet. It took me a while to understand that business about karma and reincarnation, which apparently millions of people in the world believe in. You know, of course, we Catholics do believe in the resurrection of our own flesh—” She waved a hand in the air. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter. The thing is that everybody, no matter their religion, needs to believe that death isn’t the end. We can’t just be bodies that rot in graves. We can’t accept that we’ll never see our loved ones again—”

  Isolina laughed nervously. “Last night, before going to sleep, I had a ridiculous thought. I pictured Brianda in the story with your face, and I couldn’t imagine Corso as anyone but that strange man who you look at with such devotion.”

  43.

  Brianda went out to the yard and took a deep breath. At long last, the gray was lifting. A light mist covered Beles Peak, but a gentle breeze was blowing it away. The sun shone, not too strong, and the air was warm.

  She knew exactly where to go.

  She needed to go to Lubich one more time before leaving Tiles. It would not be a final good-bye now that she felt attached forever to that place, but it was time to go back to Madrid. She had to get her things from the apartment she and Esteban had shared, find another place to live, and start looking for a job for when her unemployment benefit ran out.

  Although her heart was still wounded by her separation from Corso, whom she had not seen since giving him a copy of the story in the bar two weeks ago, she was physically well and mentally strong. And she had a new goal in life. She had gotten in contact with a member of parliament about starting the process of absolving the murdered women. Regardless of what tourist traps the villagers of Tiles built, she would not stop until Brianda of Lubich was exonerated.

  As for Corso, Neli had strangely insisted that Brianda leave him in peace, as if her friend was aware of how hard it was for her not to go in search of him every morning. She desperately wanted to find in the gaze and gestures of her beloved some hint or sign that it was real for him too. She did not know whether Neli just wanted to save her from being disappointed, or if she needed time to prepare one of her spells to help her. Brianda smiled as she remembered the day she had discovered Neli’s Wiccan altar. Back then, she had branded her as an eccentric, and yet she now had to admit that her own perception of reality had completely changed.

  Immersed in these thoughts, she walked up the same path she had finally managed to follow that fateful November day. Then, dead leaves had carpeted the ground, but today, timid new buds burst forth from the branches. The freshness of the land flooded her soul like a salve.

  She came to the gates of the house, where Luzer had tried to stop her back then, but this time she did not go through them. She continued walking until she reached the top of a small hill from where she could view Lubich in all its glory. She sat down on a rock and followed the lines made by the walls and roofs, stopping wherever she was hit by a memory, an image, a sensation. A plume of trembling and enigmatic smoke came from a chimney, connecting the life inside that house to the sky. She wanted to hear the voices of Johan and Elvira … No. She wanted to be the woman sitting in an armchair in front of the impressive fireplace, beside Corso.

  A long sigh escaped her lips. Was there anything that she could or should do to convince him? An impertinent little voice inside kept accusing her of having given in too easily. But feelings could not be explained. True love did not take convincing. Corso had not reacted to her story. He had just disappeared. The message was clear.

  She shook her head, got up, and continued along the edge of a big field of wheat in varying shades of green and then toward the highest woods.

  She had never been there, yet she recognized the place instantly.

  As she ascended, the year’s first wildflowers appeared in the meadows at the edge of the forest. She bent down and stroked some of them. She envied their strength, their persistence, their tenacity to grow year after year in that cold land. She raised her eyes and looked toward Beles Peak, impassive witness to everything that lived, moved, and breathed in the valley. After endless cycles of life and death, it remained, unchanged, certain of its own infinity.

  She reached an overgrown path. She had to bend down several times so that the dry branches did not scratch her face or get caught in her hair, and she twice had to stop to disentangle her long skirt from thorns. The path reached a dead end in a small clearing overlooking a gully of scarred rocks. The remnants of a small bridge jutted out at each side of the precipice. In the middle, nothing.

  She climbed down, careful not to trip, and sat on a rock near the rushing stream, full from the weeks of rain. She picked up a branch and began to play with it, her mind drifting languidly with the murmur of the water.

  Just then, she heard someone call her name softly, first once and then again. She turned and saw that it was not her imagination. Up in the clearing, one foot resting on a rock, was Corso. Behind him, Santo was tied to a tree.

  “Is this where Brianda killed the wolf?” he asked.

  Brianda nodded with a shy smile. So, he had read her story.

  He came down and sat beside her. Brianda rubbed her forearms to control the slight trembling brought on by feeling him so close. Corso met her eyes; his look was intensely familiar, penetrating, inquisitive.

  “I saw you in the distance and I followed.”

  “I’m glad you did. Now we can say good-bye. I’m going back to Madrid tomorrow.”

  A shadow fell over Corso’s face.

  “I read what you wrote, but the story isn’t finished,” he blurted out. “Do you know what happened afterward?”

  Brianda shook her head.

  “I have my own theory,” he said. “Would you like to hear it?”

  She nodded, intrigued.

  “Corso of Anels went mad,” he began. “He only lived and breathed for his son, Johan. If it were not for him, he would have ended his life and gone off in search of Brianda. He saw her in every corner of the house. He heard the wind rustling the branches of the trees and thought it was her. He cursed her for making him promise to look after Johan. Nobody spoke to him and he spoke to nobody. When he was not muttering about vengeance, his throat made not words but moans. The fields and roads felt too short because of the speed at which he galloped, the pitch-black night too bright, the wolf-plagued forest too peaceful for his rage, the silent summit of Beles Peak too loud for his shaken spirit.

  “All he wanted was to die, to free himself from that punishment.

  “The guilt was suffocating. He had not been able to save her. He, who had fought in dozens of battles, who h
ad slain so many enemies, had not been able to prevent the death of his wife. Her face as the hangman put the noose around her neck, her last gaze, the touch of her hand, her vacant eyes, her cold, stiff body—the memories blazed in his mind, burning away his sanity, wilting his being, consuming his good judgment.

  “After the hanging, it took him three weeks to get the lawyer to agree to be present at the exhumation of his wife’s body and take note of what he saw. Corso, Marquo, and Arpayon gathered around the grave one cold evening at the beginning of April. With them was the old woman from Darquas who had not been able to tell whether Brianda was pregnant at the trial. She was there to check, in exchange for a generous sum of money, whether Brianda actually had been expecting a child.

  “Corso wouldn’t allow anyone to help him. He used a shovel at first, but then he knelt down and used his hands. The pain of her absence endowed his movements with an unhealthy urgency. What if he could show that she was pregnant? Would that bring her back to life? No, it would not, he thought in the midst of his madness, but at least it was making it possible to see her again.

  “His fingers trembled as he lifted her body into view. There was his Brianda, her hands crossed over her bosom and holding a blue flower as soft as her skin, with a peaceful expression on her face, as if the worms had not dared sully her body, as if the earth had not managed to dampen and soften her features, so perfect, so beautiful …

  “‘In God’s name, let’s get on with it,’ he heard Arpayon say as the man brought a handkerchief to his nose.

  “Corso climbed out of the grave and helped the old woman down to take his place. With a sharp knife, she cut into the left side of Brianda’s rib cage, put her hands inside, carefully felt around for a while under Corso’s watchful gaze, and finally took out a small piece of flesh about three inches long and shaped like a human. She laid it on a small flagstone, which she handed to Corso.

  “No one said a word while Corso wrapped the tiny body with a handkerchief, his jaws so clenched and his neck so tense that they seemed about to snap. He then helped the old woman from the hole, got in again, and kissed his wife’s lips, as if saying good night, as if her sleep was not already eternal.