Night in the Baztan Valley was dark and sinister. The walls of the houses continued to mark the outer edges of safety just as they had done in yesteryear, while beyond them everything was uncertain. It was hardly surprising that barely one hundred years ago ninety per cent of the population in the Baztan Valley had believed in witches, the presence of evil roaming abroad at night and the use of magic charms to keep them at bay. Life in the valley had been hard for her ancestors; men and women as brave as they were stubborn, determined to establish themselves in that damp, green land in the face of all logic, despite the fact that it had shown them its most hostile and inhospitable face, swooping down on them, rotting their crops, making their children ill and decimating the few families who stood their ground.
Landslides, whooping cough and tuberculosis, flash-floods and deluges, crops that rotted where they were planted, without even making it above ground … But the Elizondarras had stood firm next to their church, fighting back in that bend of the River Baztan which had given them everything and then taken everything away as it pleased, as if warning them that this was not a place for men, that this land in the middle of a valley belonged to the spirits of the mountains, the daemons of the springs, to the lamias and the basajaun. However, nothing had managed to break the will of those men and women who had surely also looked at that grey sky, just as she did, dreaming of another clearer, friendlier one. That valley was known as the land of the wealthy hidalgos and the voyagers who left for the Indies but who always returned from overseas, bringing with them the great wealth that was sung about in Maitetxu mía. They invested in remodelling the town, showing off to their neighbours the gold that they had earned and filling it with luxurious palaces and mansions with huge balconies, monasteries dedicated to giving thanks for their luck and with bridges over rivers that had previously been impassable.
True to her word, Aunt Engrasi declined their invitation to join them on the walk, preferring to stay and cook and using the deplorable state of her knees as an excuse, but Ros and James insisted on going on the expedition in spite of Amaia’s many protestations and attempts to convince them that it would rain before midday. They drove along the edge of the river and then upwards until they came out in a huge meadow that stretched as far as the beech wood that grew at the edge of the river and the foot of the mountain. As they drove through the open meadows she understood why people came from far away to visit Elizondo and sighed, overwhelmed by the outstanding beauty of that idyllic world hidden among low mountains interspersed with valleys and impossibly lovely meadows, punctuated only by woods of oak and chestnut trees and small rural hamlets. Its damp climate made for long autumns, so that the meadows were still green even in the middle of February, in spite of the fact it had snowed. Only the sound of the Baztan broke the silence of the countryside.
This was the most mysterious and magical forest ever. The huge oak, beech and chestnut trees covered the slopes of the mountains and mixed with other species to adorn them with different shades, shapes and contrasts.
A forest that offered such a multitude of sensations: the ancient interaction with nature, the wild sound of water among the beech trees and the firs, the freshness of the River Baztan, the occasional sound of the animals and the leaves that had fallen in autumn and still blanketed the floor like a silky carpet which the wind rearranged at will to form mounds like fairy dens and paths along which the lamias walked, the aroma of forest fruits and the smooth cloth of grass that covered the meadows, glowing like a magnificent emerald that a jentil giant had buried in the woods. They walked between the trees until the sound of the river showed them the way to the fabled place. Ros led the way and turned round from time to time to make sure her fellow walkers were not too tired. She needn’t have feared for James, who didn’t stop talking, enchanted with the beauty of the winter woods. They crossed an area thick with ferns before starting to move upwards.
‘It’s not far now,’ announced Ros, pointing to a clearly visible crack in the rock. ‘It’s just there.’
The path was quite a bit narrower than they had expected. Angular rocks formed a natural and irregular staircase which they ascended as the path turned again and again, going back on itself like a snake as it went up the mountain. At each turn, the brambles and scrub made the path even narrower, making their progress more difficult. One more turn and they arrived at a flat platform covered in sparse grass and completely carpeted in yellow lichen.
Ros sat down on a rock and frowned.
‘The cave is twenty-five metres further up,’ she said, pointing towards a path almost completely hidden by gorse bushes, ‘but I’m afraid this is as far as I can go. I twisted my ankle on the way up.’
James squatted down at her side.
‘It’s not serious,’ she smiled, ‘my boot saved me, but it would be best if we go back soon, before it starts swelling and I can’t walk on it.’
‘Let’s go, then,’ said Amaia.
‘Don’t even think of it, you can’t go without seeing the rock after coming this far; off you go.’
‘No, let’s go: your ankle will start swelling and you won’t be able to walk, you said it yourself.’
‘Just as soon as you come back, Amaia. I’m not moving from this spot unless you go and see it.’
‘I’ll stay with her and wait for you here,’ James encouraged her.
Amaia pushed her way amongst the gorse bushes, cursing their spines, which made a noise like nails scratching against fabric when they brushed her anorak. The path stopped abruptly in front of a cave with a low but very wide mouth that looked like a grim smile on the face of the mountain. There were two large rocks to the right of the entrance which were also very strange. The first, standing on end, resembled a female figure with large breasts and pronounced thighs looking out over the valley; the second was magnificent in both size and shape, perfectly rectangular, like an altar for sacrifices, its huge surface cleaned by the rain and the wind. On it were a dozen small stones of different colours and types arranged like the pieces on an incomplete chess board. A woman in her thirties was holding one of the stones in her hand and looking towards the valley, admiring the view. She smiled as she saw Amaia coming and gave a friendly greeting as she placed the stone next to the others.
‘Hello.’
Amaia suddenly felt like an intruder in a private place.
‘Hello.’
The woman smiled again, as if she were reading her mind and could see her discomfort.
‘Get a stone,’ she said, pointing towards the path.
‘What?’
‘A stone,’ insisted the other woman, pointing at the ones on the table. ‘Women ought to bring a stone with them.’
‘Ah, yes, my sister told me, but I thought they were supposed to bring one from their home.’
‘That’s true, but if you’ve forgotten you can take one from the path; when all is said and done it’s a stone from the path to your home.’
Amaia leant down and picked up a pebble from the path, went over to the table and put it next to the others, surprised by how many there were.
‘Wow, were all these stones brought by women who’ve come up here?’
‘It looks like it,’ replied the beautiful woman.
‘It’s incredible.’
‘We’re living through uncertain times in the valley, and when the new solutions fail, people fall back on the old ones.’
Amaia was left open-mouthed at hearing the woman repeat almost the same words her aunt had spoken a few nights earlier.
‘Are you from around here?’ she asked, studying the woman’s appearance. She was wearing a moss green shawl over what looked like a silk dress in shades of green and brown and her mane of golden hair, which was as long as Amaia’s, was held back from her face by a golden diadem.
‘Oh, not exactly, but I’ve been coming here for many years because I have a house here. I never stay long, though, I’m always moving from place to place.’
‘My name’s Amaia,’
she said, holding out her hand.
‘I’m Maya,’ said the woman, taking it in her smooth hand, covered in rings and bracelets that jingled like bells. ‘You’re from around here, though, aren’t you?’
‘I live in Pamplona, I’m here for work,’ she answered evasively.
Maya looked at her, giving her one of those strange, almost seductive smiles.
‘I think you are from here.’
‘Is it that obvious?’
The woman looked at the valley again.
‘This is one of my favourite places, one of the places I most like to visit, but things haven’t been going well here recently.’
‘Do you mean the murders?’
The woman continued without directly replying; she was no longer smiling.
‘I often pass through this area and I’ve seen strange things.’
Amaia’s interest suddenly increased dramatically.
‘What sort of things?’
‘Well, while I was here yesterday, I saw a man going into one of those small caves down on the river bank and come out again a while later,’ she said, pointing towards the thick undergrowth. ‘He was carrying a bundle when he arrived but he didn’t have it when he came out.’
‘Did his behaviour strike you as suspicious?’
‘He seemed satisfied.’
A curious adjective, thought Amaia.
‘What did he look like?’
‘I couldn’t tell from up here.’
‘But did he look like a young man to you? Could you see his face?’
‘He moved like a young man, but he was wearing a hood that completely covered his head. When he came out he looked back, but I could only see one of his eyes.’
Amaia looked at her perplexed.
‘You saw part of his face?’
Maya remained silent and smiled again.
‘Afterwards he went down the path and left in a car.’
‘You couldn’t have seen the car from here.’
‘No, but I clearly heard the motor start and move away.’
Amaia went over to the path.
‘Can you get to the cave from here?’
‘Oh, no, it’s quite well hidden to be honest. You have to go up from the road, first through the trees, up to there, see,’ she said pointing, ‘and then you have to walk through the undergrowth, because the old path is hidden … The cave is about four hundred metres further on, behind some rocks.’
‘You seem to know this area very well.’
‘Of course; as I said, I come here a lot.’
‘To leave offerings?’
‘No,’ she said, smiling again.
The wind blew in strong gusts that caught the woman’s hair, revealing some long earrings that looked like they were made of gold. Amaia thought it was an unusual choice of outfit for coming up onto the mountain, and even more so when she spotted the woman’s feet poking from under the bottom of her silken dress, encased in some roman-style sandals. The woman seemed so absorbed in studying the pebbles on the rock they could have been precious stones; her expression remained enigmatic.
Amaia suddenly felt uncomfortable, as if somehow aware that her time was up and she should no longer be there.
‘Well, I’m going to go down … are you coming?’
‘No,’ the woman replied without looking at Amaia, ‘I’ll stay a bit longer.’
Amaia turned towards the path and took a few steps before turning to say goodbye. But the woman was no longer there. She stopped, looking at the spot where the woman had been standing just a second earlier.
‘Hello?’ she called.
It was impossible for the woman to have gone in any direction; she couldn’t have gone to the mouth of the cave or passed Amaia without her seeing her, even without the jingling sound of her bracelets.
‘Maya?’ she called again. She took a step towards the cave, determined to find her, but stopped short as the gusts of wind became stronger and a vague fear stirred within her. She turned back to the path and almost ran down to the platform where Ros and James were waiting for her.
‘Wow, you’re really pale … Have you seen a ghost?’ joked Ros.
‘Come with me, James,’ she demanded, ignoring her sister’s teasing.
He got up, alarmed.
‘What’s up?’
‘There was a woman but she disappeared.’
She pushed back into the bushes on the path without explaining further or answering James’s questions, scratching herself on the undergrowth and thinking that it was impossible that Maya could have come down here.
When they arrived, Amaia went over to the huge lumps of stone to check that the woman had not thrown herself over the edge. There was a sloping path at her feet, thickly overgrown with gorse and covered in sharp rocks. It was obvious that she had not fallen down there. She went to the entrance of the cave and bent down to look inside. It smelled strongly of earth and something that made her think of metal. There was no sign that anybody had been in there in years.
‘There’s nobody here, Amaia.’
‘Well, there was a woman, I spoke to her for a while and suddenly I turned round and she’d disappeared.’
‘There aren’t any other paths,’ said James, looking around. ‘If she’s gone down she’ll have had to go down this one.’
The stones that had been on the rock table, including the one she had put there, had disappeared.
They went back to the path and back down to where Ros was waiting.
‘Amaia, Ros and I would have seen her if she had come down this way.
‘What did she look like?’ her sister wanted to know.
‘Blonde, pretty, about thirty, she was wearing a green wool scarf over a long dress and she was wearing lots of gold jewellery.’
‘All you need to tell me now is that she was barefoot.’
‘Almost, she was wearing roman sandals.’
James looked at her in surprise.
‘But it’s about eight degrees, how could anybody wear sandals.’
‘I know, her whole appearance was strange, but elegant at the same time.’
‘Was she wearing green?’ enquired Ros.
‘Yes.’
‘And she was wearing gold jewellery. Did she tell you her name?’
‘She said she was called Maya and that she came here often because she had a house nearby.’
Ros covered her mouth with her hand and stared at her sister.
‘What?’ Amaia urged her.
‘The cave in those cracks is one of the places where, according to legend, Mari used to live, and she would move around by flying through the air from Aia to Elizondo, from Elizondo to Amboto in the middle of a storm.’
Amaia turned towards the path down with an expression of contempt.
‘I’ve already heard enough nonsense … Or have I really been speaking with the goddess Mari on her doorstep.’
‘Maya is the other name for Mari, clever clogs.’
A flash of lightning split the sky, which had continued to darken until it was the colour of old tin. There was a crash of thunder nearby and then it started to rain.
40
Dense curtains of rain doused the street from one end to the other, as if someone was randomly wielding a gigantic watering can, in the hope of washing away evil, or memory. The surface of the river was choppy, as if thousands of small fish had all decided to come to the surface at once. And the stones of both the bridge and the facades of the houses were soaked, water was bouncing off them and forming small pools that emptied themselves back into the river, pouring down the artificial walls along its edge.
Flora’s Mercedes was parked opposite their aunt’s house.
‘Your sister’s already arrived,’ announced James, parking behind it.
‘So has Víctor,’ added Ros, looking towards the archway at the entrance to the house where her brother-in-law was busy drying a grey and silver motorbike with a yellow chamois towel.
‘I don’t believe it,’ mu
rmured Amaia. Ros looked at her in surprise but said nothing.
They got out of the car and ran through the rain to the porch where Víctor had parked his motorbike and exchanged hugs and kisses.
‘What a surprise, Víctor, our aunt didn’t tell us you were coming,’ explained Amaia.
‘That’s because she didn’t know. Your sister called me this morning to invite me, and, as you’ll have guessed, I was delighted to come.’
‘And we’re delighted you’ve come, Víctor,’ said Ros, giving him a hug while she looked at Amaia, still confused by the comment she’d made in the car.
‘It’s beautiful,’ said James, admiring the motorbike, ‘I haven’t seen one of these before.’
‘It’s a Lube, an LBM, named using its creator’s initials, with a two stroke 99cc engine and three speeds,’ explained Víctor, only too happy to talk about his motorbike. ‘I’ve just finished it; it took me quite a long time to restore it because some of the parts were missing and finding them has been a bit of an odyssey.’
‘Lube motorbikes are made in Biscay, aren’t they?’
‘Yes, the factory opened in Lutxana in Barakaldo in the Forties, and closed in ’67. It’s a shame because they were really lovely bikes.’
‘It is lovely,’ admitted Amaia, ‘it reminds me a bit of the German motorbikes from the Second World War.’
‘Well, I suppose they were all quite influenced by that design during that period, but don’t be surprised when I tell you it was in fact the other way round. The creator of the Lube already had prototypes designed years earlier, and he’s known to have had contacts with German factories before the war …’
‘Wow, Víctor, you’re a real expert, you could give classes or write about this.’
‘That would be a possibility if anyone was actually interested.’
‘I’m sure there would be …’
‘Shall we go in?’ said Ros, unlocking the door.
‘That’s probably a good idea; your sister will be getting impatient already. You know she thinks all this motorbike stuff is nonsense.’
The Invisible Guardian Page 32