by Shirl Henke
Aaron met her eyes steadily, standing with his legs braced wide apart in the center of the room. His long hair and nearly naked body made him appear savage, larger than life, menacing. His expression was tight and grim.
“I have been considering what we should do about this marriage. We are bound to it. Your father cannot set it aside. The specter of the convent—if ever such did loom—can no longer menace you. You may return to Seville with the protection of my name, if you wish. As of now I have little of worldly wealth, but soon—”
“No!” she interrupted, then stopped before she utterly humiliated herself by telling him she did not wish to leave him, that she loved him. “You merely wish to be quit of me so you can return to your savage. As you said, my husband, we are both of us bound by this marriage. I will not meekly leave you to your pleasures.”
His eyebrows rose sardonically. “You would be free to find pleasures of your own in Castile. Perhaps the king would take you back?” He could see the blow struck home as she flinched at his cruelty. No matter how he felt about Magdalena, he knew well the reputation Fernando Trastamara had as a coarse and brutal lover. Sighing, he walked to the bed and sat down beside her. “I am sorry. It seems I am either saying evil things to wound you, or I am lustfully attacking you. We have no middle ground in this marriage. The best way to deal with it is to live separately.”
“We cannot do that unless I conveniently return home, or you break your word to the admiral and return to the Tainos to live. She, not I, is the witch, Aaron, who holds such sway over you. You return to her to see if she has borne your child. Do not deny it!”
“That, among other things, does concern me, but our marriage has ended any means of giving the child my name.”
“Then you are in love with her and want her babe, even if it is not yours. She has a hold on you that the admiral, the king, no one can break,” she said bitterly.
He shook his head at her willful misunderstanding. “Do not underestimate yourself, wife,” he said softly, then rose and turned to the door.
“Aaron, come back! How dare you leave me humiliated on the morn after our wedding!”
“Sob on Bartolome's shoulder. He is ever good at consoling your spoiled child's tears,” he said as he walked out the door.
She felt the sting of those tears burn her eyes and blinked them back with an oath. Then a slow, catlike smile tilted the corners of her lips. “Ah, yes, husband, I will tell Bartolome.”
* * * *
Aliyah lay exhausted, yet utterly replete, as the women attending her bathed her body and anointed her with fragrant oils. She could hear the lusty cry of her son. Aaron's son!
“He is splendid, your glory,” her young cousin said as she watched Aliyah's older sister bathe the newborn.
“He shares his father's magical eyes. He will grow to be a great chief,” Mahia added as she handed the babe back to her sister.
Aliyah smiled beneath her elder sister's praise, putting the infant to her breast. “He is as hungry as his sire.” She felt the sweet fierce pull on her nipple and thought of Aaron. How proud he would be! She studied the babe's sculpted European features. His hair was inky black but there was no doubt at all that he was Aaron Torres' child.
“You endured the birthing well,” Mahia said. “That is always a good sign. You will be able to bear many fine healthy children. Now Guacanagari can arrange a profitable marriage for you with a great chieftain. Perhaps Behechio.”
“No!” Aliyah's eyes flashed defiantly at Mahia. “I will wed only Aaron. He will become a powerful chieftain among our people. With the fearful weapons he brought with him from across the sea he can defeat all our enemies.”
Mahia shrugged at her spoiled younger sister. “Always Guacanagari has given you your way, but he cannot force the Golden One to wed you.”
“He will not have to force Aaron.” Aliyah's voice was petulant, but she was too pleased with herself to entertain anger with her foolish sister. “I have learned much about how the men from across the sea think. Aaron, like the rest of them, will prize a male as firstborn. He can plainly see this is his son.” She touched the babe's face as if to prove her point.
“The men from across the sea have many strange notions. They also prize virginity in a bride.” Mania's voice was laced with scorn for such a ridiculous idea. How could a man know if his wife would be barren or not if she bore no children before he wed her? “I do not understand why you want the Golden One. His planting stick must be much like any other's, no matter what color his skin.”
A sensuous smile curved Aliyah's lips. “Ah, but you have never seen his planting stick...and I have.”
Mahia snorted in disgust, but said nothing.
Aliyah handed her the babe, who had fallen soundly asleep. “Take and show him to our brother while I rest.”
“Will you name him now?”
“Aaron's people have their own custom. The father names his children. I will wait until he returns.”
When Mahia had departed, Aliyah reclined on the huge raised bed. She was sore and tired and her breasts ached as they filled with milk for the child, but she was triumphant. The birth had not been difficult, but she would tell Aaron differently. He had expressed grave concern about her pregnancy and the impending birth ordeal. She smiled. Mahia was right about some foolish notions of white men. But if he thought birthing a great danger, then all the better. She would convince him his son had nearly killed her coming into the world! “Ah, yes, Aaron, you will wed me and you will become a great war chief. You will crush all the other chieftains between Marien and Xaragua—and I shall stand by your side as your queen!”
Late that evening, as several slaves served Aliyah an elaborate meal, Guacanagari arrived at her bohio. At once she knew he brought bad news. Dismissing the slaves, she turned to him and asked, “What has happened?” His grave expression, so at variance with his joy earlier in the day, frightened her. “Aaron is well, is he not?”
“Aaron is well. He is here. I have shown him his son and he is well pleased by the babe.”
His reticence baffled her. “If he is returned, why has he not come to me?”
Guacanagari felt a great wave of anguish for his young sister. She had so hoped to wed Aaron, and he, too, had wished the match which now was fated not to be. “He felt it better if I spoke with you first. The admiral has returned and commanded Aaron to wed a white woman from his homeland. She awaits him in their village by the sea.”
All color drained from Aliyah's face as she stared in disbelief at her brother. Then a killing rage infused her. “How dare he do this to me! Who is this woman that he scorns a royal princess to wed her?”
“He told me he did not wish the marriage, but his admiral commanded it, just as I can command my nobles to wed where it suits me. Under his law he may have only one wife.”
She forced her fury under control and said, “He is happy with the child and knows it is his.”
“He wishes to keep the boy.” Guacanagari looked at her uncertainly. Such was not unusual once a babe was weaned.
“I will think on it, but for now the child is mine. I will name him Navaro.”
Guacanagari considered this. “Navaro was a fierce war chief who defeated our enemies many generations ago. The boy must be a great warrior to live up to such a name. We do not fight now but have learned to live in peace. Perhaps—”
“Peace!” Aliyah saw the surprise her outburst caused her brother and quickly let the rest of her words die on her lips. Peace is for weaklings such as you! “I have the right to name my child, do I not, Guacanagari?”
He nodded. “I will tell Aaron of the name. Do you wish to speak with him now?”
“I grow weary tonight. Bid him come to me in the morning.” After her brother had departed, Aliyah considered her plans, allowing her anger to cool and her mind to calculate. So, he did not like the white wife he was forced to wed. And he did want his splendid son. She clapped her hands, summoning a slave from outside her bohio. �
�Bring the child to me. My milk is come and I would feed him.”
As she nursed Navaro, Aliyah made a vow, crooning low in his tiny ear. “You will be a great warrior. And the means by which I rid Aaron of his pale-skinned wife and claim him for myself!”
* * * *
“This is madness. We do not even speak their language, and we know nothing of their customs. Some outlying sentry will probably kill me with his poison-tipped spear and carry you off as his slave. You should have remained in Ysabel,” Bartolome complained as he ducked a low-hanging vine.
The trail they followed into the hills beyond the coast was narrow and twisting, slippery from a sudden rain squall that had just blown inland. The jungle trees loomed high above them. Tall palms interlaced with dense stands of mahogany, silk-cotton, and ebony. Brilliantly colored parrots screeched when the small party of riders disturbed them and a bird that sounded for all the world like a Spanish nightingale sang sweetly in the distance.
“Nonsense,” Magdalena chided Colon patiently. “Luis is with us and he is fluent in their tongue. More probably a poisonous snake may prove our undoing,” she said with a shiver as she looked at the lushly beautiful jungle.
“The Tainos do not use poison as the Caribes do,” Luis said, overhearing their conversation. “I would not fear snakes overmuch, but do beware these.” He pointed to a small tree of considerable beauty with waxy green leaves shimmering with fresh rain. “Even the rainwater off the leaves causes a painful rash and the fruit if eaten is always fatal. The natives call it the manchineel.”
Bartolome grunted in distaste. “For all its beauty this place is treacherous.”
“Yet look at the flowers, Bartolome,” Magdalena said in awe. “They grow in the trees, climbing on vines thick as ropes. Every color, shape, fragrance. It is truly paradise.”
“I pray then for the angel with his flaming sword to bar us from traveling further into paradise,” Colon replied in mock piety.
“Soon we shall be at the village,” Luis said, looking at Magdalena's rapt expression. At once her face lost its pleasure-filled awe and sobered.
“We crest a hill soon. Is it beyond that?” she asked warily. Her throat constricted, and the furious anger and stricken pride that had goaded her into following Aaron now began to desert her. How would he accept her latest defiance of his will?
Luis Torres nodded. “You can see the village and fields from the top of the ridge. It is a magnificent sight.”
When Magdalena beheld the orderly rows of large cane houses, with wide clean streets stretching between them and a huge plaza in the center of the settlement, she said in amazement, “It is truly a city. Thousands must reside here.”
“Look at the fields beyond,” Bartolome said in wonder. “Would that our meager crops thrived so well as those below us. The soil is as black and rich as that about Ysabel is rocky and poor.”
“Any settlement of colonists must first possess the will to work,” Luis reminded the admiral's adelantado.
“Nevertheless, I have been considering asking my brother to search out a new site for our principal settlement, a location with a better harbor and richer land.”
As the men discussed the possible relocation of the colony, Magdalena rehearsed in her mind how she would face Aaron and his mistress. She had stormed into the governor's house yesterday, beseeching Bartolome's assistance. She told him that Aaron had gone to make peace with Guacanagari and with Aliyah in light of his marriage, but that she feared the woman's hold on him. Together they had faced the dubious admiral with a scheme to follow Aaron, bringing gifts and assurances that Magdalena's marriage with their adopted friend did not pose any threat to the friendship between Colon and Guacanagari.
“She will but slip away and risk the jungle alone if I do not accompany her,” Bartolome had said with a sigh to Cristobal, who had agreed to the diplomatic mission with grave reservations.
While they rode through the hot, steamy forest, they were bitten by insects and baked by the sun, but Magdalena had held to her resolve. Now as the small party of a dozen riders entered the fertile valley and approached the impressive village, she was overcome with doubt. Do I really want to see if she is as beautiful as I have heard?
Momentarily, she was distracted as she saw the Tainos gathering apprehensively to watch their advance. The Indians had never seen horses before the colonists of the second voyage had brought them, and they greatly feared the beasts. For her part, Magdalena was as appalled at the savages as they at her astride her big gray mount. Unlike the natives who lived and worked in Ysabel, those of the interior were as naked as their mothers bore them!
The admiral had insisted on simple cotton tunics for the Taino women in Ysabel. Even the men wore at least a scandalous breechclout, if not a cloak or some other decent covering. But these brown-skinned people, men and women as well as children, were completely nude. Some of them were painted with brilliant red and black dyes in odd markings. Many of the women seemed to favor white paints. All wore brilliant parrot feathers in their hair and a wide variety of jewelry made of fish bones, shells, various metals and, now, the trading beads and hawk's bells brought from Castile.
Magdalena eyed them uneasily as they spoke rapidly and pointed at her, singling her out from her male escorts. They seemed curious but were too terrified of the horse to approach. Luis dismounted, leaving his horse with Bartolome, and engaged in conversation with several young boys who then raced into the village.
“Are we welcome or not?” Magdalena asked nervously.
Luis smiled in reassurance. “These people have always been friendly and honest. They will be our staunchest allies against any Indians who would refuse allegiance to the monarchs. All we need do in return is keep faith and not abuse them.”
“You mean slit their noses and cut off their ears if they do not bring sufficient gold to satisfy us?” Bartolome asked, knowing of the gold quotas Hojeda and Margarite had tried to impose earlier.
Magdalena gasped in horror. “That has been done?”
“Yes, and it earns us more enemies daily,” Luis replied. “As yet Aaron has kept Guacanagari's people from feeling any more Toledo steel, but I know not how long the peace can last if we do not mend our ways.”
“That is why he is to resume his duties for my brother. He is a trained soldier and can hold the avaricious ‘gentlemen’ goldseekers in check,” Bartolome replied.
“We must dismount now. 'Twould be poor return for their hospitality to terrify them by riding our horses into the village. See the enclosure of canes Aaron has built yonder? We will leave them in there with his horses until we are ready to depart. I am afraid we must act as our own grooms,” he added ruefully as they reined in beside a fenced area outside the village. Several horses, including the bay Aaron had ridden, grazed peacefully in its confines.
After the horses were tended, the numbers of Tainos swelled around the visitors as they walked into the village. On foot, Magdalena felt far more vulnerable. The natives stared in wonder at her hair and her clothing. How strange it was to feel uncomfortable because she was dressed while those who were naked gawked in casual curiosity!
“‘Tis fearful hot. Go slowly, Magdalena, lest you overtax yourself,” Bartolome cautioned, observing her flushed face and shortness of breath.
“She is not faint from heat but faint at the prospect of confronting her husband, whom she has disobeyed,” Aaron said, moving into their path. He had materialized suddenly from behind a large building, dressed in the minimal scrap of cotton that some of the armed men wore. He scowled at his wife. “By all the saints, why have you come here?”
“The adelantado and I have come with the admiral's gifts to present them to his friend Guacanagari,” she said with feigned sweetness, ignoring his black frown. “Will you present me as your wife—or have you even told him of our marriage?”
His eyes were dark as seawater, “Oh, I have told Guacanagari of you, my lady. He was a bit disappointed at my rash act—considering that
his sister has presented me with a son in my brief absence.”
Magdalena felt as if she would never breathe again. Only the numbing pain kept her from running across the jungle trails back to Ysabel.
“Who has come from the admiral?” a tall handsome young man asked as he approached Aaron.
From the way the people parted for him, Magdalena knew at once he must be Guacanagari, the cacique.
Luis presented Bartolome, the admiral's brother and Magdalena, Aaron's new wife. The young cacique bowed to Bartolome and then assessed her with keen black eyes and spoke in his soft melodious tongue to Aaron.
Grimacing, Aaron translated for her. “Guacanagari is most gracious. He says you are very beautiful, a fit mate for me,” he replied in a tone heavy with irony.
Luis, Bartolome, and Guacanagari walked apart, engaging in a conversation, discreetly leaving Aaron and Magdalena to settle their differences alone.
“You are mad! With Aliyah just delivered of her first child, I do not wish to parade my fine lady wife in front of her or Guacanagari.”
“Yes, 'tis a pity that ‘your fine lady wife’ did not choose to meekly sit and repine in Ysabel, while you strutted about here receiving the plaudits of these savages for your virility. And you dare call Fernando Trastamara a lecher!” She lashed out with all her humiliation and suppressed pain transmuted into sheer rage.
His face, taut with anger before, now became rigid. “I will give you a good taste of how savages live! You have come after me, now you will live with me—and I choose to live here.”
“The admiral commanded you live in Ysabel,” she said, stamping her foot furiously.
“The admiral commanded me to strengthen the ties between him and Guacanagari's people. I will do so in my own way. But now, I will escort you to your new abode.” He reached for her wrist and took it in a steel-hard grip, yanking her behind him as he strode toward the center of the huge village.
Magdalena stumbled after him, grateful for her leather riding boots. Even though they were miserably hot and itchy, they offered more protection from the rocky earth than her cloth slippers would have.