Nevertheless, She Persisted

by Mindy Klasky

  Then she placed it next to Tu Shr, telling him, “This is your bridal cup. Drink and be together forever.”

  Lin Han stepped back, bowed her head and closed her eyes to give the happy couple a moment of privacy.

  Exhaustion slammed down on her and she swayed. The wind played with her hair, stronger now. Maybe a storm was blowing up.

  When she opened her eyes, Tu Shr had slid down on the dirt mound so his head was now close to Dao Ming’s.

  Lin Han clapped her hands. Tu Shr had surely accepted Dao Ming as a bride! Her sister had a husband, someone who would look after her and treat her with respect.

  Lin Han bowed low to the happy couple.

  Normally, what followed would be the wedding feast. But there wasn’t anyone else to celebrate.

  “I will eat for both of you later,” Lin Han promised as she picked up the figures, holding them together in the palms of her hands.

  “The goddess will look out for you and bless you always,” she promised as she opened her hands over the edge of the grave and let the figures tumble onto the paper coffin below.

  They landed on a bit of clean paper, not where every member of the family had dropped a handful of dirt.

  Lin Han gave them the acorn cup, and the ghost money as well.

  She didn’t know what to do with the vase. It didn’t belong in the grave. She couldn’t take it home: it was just one more thing of her sister’s that her family would deny.

  Instead, she walked around to the head of the hole, where the gravestone would soon sit, and set the vase firmly in the ground. Maybe when the younger son came back to get the dirt for the ancestors’ altar, he’d see the vase and use it instead. That way, both Dao Ming and Tu Shr would be venerated.

  After one last low bow, Lin Han turned away from the grave and started down the hill. She was too tired to skip or dance, though she knew she should—she was still part of a wedding procession.

  But her feet dragged on the earth, and her tears started again. No one else would ever know what she’d done, how she’d taken care of her sister.

  Still. She’d finally managed to find her peace.

  Unmasking the Ancient Light

  Deborah J. Ross

  Shadows choked the damp and silent Antwerp street as the young widow Beatrice de Luna, moving stiffly under the weight of an edifice of gold-stitched black satin, climbed the steps of her mansion. It was very late, and she'd just returned from her audience with Queen Marie of Burgundy, Regent of the Low Countries and sister to Charles V of the Holy Roman Empire. Although she felt relieved that the interview she had postponed so many times was at last over, she already regretted having lost her temper.

  When she crossed the threshold, to be met by a bevy of servants, she drew her first easy breath of the evening. Within these walls, Beatrice de Luna, forcibly converted New Christian and court favorite in this year of 1543, no longer existed. She shed the name as easily as her fur-lined cloak and became once more Gracia Nasi, of the house of Hebrew princes.

  Gracia waved the servants off to bed, all except for the old nurse who had come with her from Portugal, barely escaping the Inquisition. Once upstairs and wrapped in a woolen dressing robe, Gracia asked Esther to bring wine. “And if Reyna and my sister are still awake, ask them to join me.”

  Candlestick in hand, Gracia paced her rooms, measuring their length and width. The outer chamber was spacious, anchored by heavy dark furniture. Shadows, like dampness made visible, clung to the corners. Esther had lit a fire in the sleeping chamber, and the embers gave off a lingering glow. To one side lay an odd little room, small and windowless, the reason Gracia had chosen these chambers for herself, rather than the larger ones her sister used. She lowered the candlestick to a table of ebony inlaid with ivory, one of the few personal treasures she'd salvaged from Lisbon. She could easily have replaced it; her late husband had left her in charge of a spice-trading empire that spanned half of Europe. But the table had belonged to Gracia's mother and to her grandmother before her.

  With a gentle tap, the door swung open. Esther entered, carrying a silver goblet. Behind her came Brianda, swathed in sable-lined wool, and Reyna. Reyna looked very young, braids tousled and cheeks still flushed with sleep, yet graceful as a willow. She took the goblet from Esther and held it chest-high, advancing with measured steps. “I bid you good Sabbath, Mother.”

  Esther's eyes glinted in her lined face, strong and brown like well-loved leather. With a fleeting smile, she closed the door behind her. She would stand guard in the hallway until Gracia released her.

  Brianda went straight to the fireplace and held out her hands. The Low Country winters troubled her more than they did Gracia; some days, she said, she could never get warm. “You're back late,” she said to Gracia. “And our nephew, João?”

  “Stayed to dice with Maximilian,” Gracia replied, accepting the goblet from Reyna. “You wouldn't have enjoyed the evening. It wasn't like the court in Brussels. As I expected, what Mary wanted was Reyna's hand for old Don Francisco.”

  “That decrepit old wastrel!” Brianda said. “I'll wager he and the Emperor have already decided how they'll carve up Reyna's estate between them!”

  “Mother…” The word came half a whisper, half a cry of pain.

  She's like sun on water, Gracia thought. One moment as solemn as a priestess, the next a mere child.

  “I put them off once again,” Gracia said with deceptive mildness. What she'd actually told the Queen Regent was that she'd rather see her daughter dead than married to Don Francisco. Harsh words but true, and in these times, bordering on perilous. The rack waited but a breath away.

  “But these troubles will not be resolved tonight,” Gracia continued, “or if they could be, others would soon arise to take their place. For now, let us welcome the Sabbath.”

  If any men had been present, Gracia, as the woman of the household, would have used the usual form of the blessing and lit ordinary candles with a taper from the fireplace. Now, though, the three women came together, each holding her cupped hands in front of her. Softly they breathed the ancient words, summoning the feminine aspect of the divine, “Brukha ya Shekhinah, elohaynu malkat ha-olam…”

  With each phrase, the air in the little room quivered. The space between Reyna's hands glowed softly, then that between Gracia's, then Brianda's. As Gracia watched, a feeling rose up in her, not any emotion she could name aloud but a stirring in her innermost heart. Her breath caught in her throat. The light kindled into flame; she could feel it streaming through her, through her daughter's child-soft fingers, from a past that no longer existed to a future she could not imagine.

  Yet this Light must remain hidden, passed from mother to daughter in an unbroken chain. Her own mother called it Miriam's Gift, after the prophetess sister of Moses. She'd spoken of other powers, too, of the balance of the ancient forces of Fire and Water, of mastery over storm and wave.

  Brightness swelled to fill the room. Of the three, Reyna's burned the clearest, molten white gold, Brianda's a delicate pink, like the petals of an exotic rose. Gracia searched the depths of her own fire and saw only layers of amber light. For a moment, she glimpsed a shape, a flickering shadow. It looked like someone in a short cloak, his face a blur as he moved toward her.

  Suddenly Reyna gasped. The image vanished and the flames died.

  “What did you see?” Gracia asked.

  “A man without a face.”

  “Perhaps your future husband,” Brianda laughed. “I saw water and rows of beautiful colored lights floating above it. It means a voyage, I expect, or some kind of merrymaking on a lake or river.”

  “Mother? What was yours?”

  “I'm not sure.” Gracia tried to picture the wavering figure, but it slipped from her mind.

  Gracia recited the blessing over the wine, sipped it, and passed it on. Reyna's vision could mean anything, she told herself, from the hand of the Inquisition to a child's uncertain fears. But no, Reyna's power was the strongest of
any of them.

  Gracia pressed her lips together, thinking. She'd thought to remain in Antwerp a while longer, while she continued liquidating the family assets and transferring them by circuitous routes, gradually moving eastward, beyond the reach of Christendom. Now her own impulsive words to the Queen had cost her precious time.

  Brianda took a second gulp of wine and wiped the back of her mouth with one hand. “Well, that's done with. Good Sabbath, both of you. It's too cold for me here; I'm going back to bed.”

  Reyna lingered after Brianda left. When Gracia held out one hand to her daughter, Reyna rushed into her arms. Gracia, enfolding her, inhaled the faint orange-blossom scent of Reyna's hair. Under the layers of lace and wool, the child's body quivered.

  “They shall not have you,” Gracia murmured. “I promise it.”

  Reyna pulled away, eyes huge in the candlelight. Tears beaded her lashes. “What will we do?”

  “What we have always done.” How could she say more? All her life had been like this, evasions and subterfuge, running, hiding from one threat after another. Yet always the Light endured, the place the outer world could not reach. She remembered asking her own mother, even as Reyna asked her now, “Why call the Light when it cannot save us?”

  “We do it to remember,” Gracia repeated the answer.

  “Sometimes I wish we could forget,” said Reyna.

  “Don't worry, preciosa,” Gracia said, putting an arm around Reyna and leading her to where Esther waited to escort her back to bed. “We will find a way.”

  The next morning, Gracia breakfasted in her sitting room, wrapped in a fur blanket. Outside, a sleeting rain fell in gusts, tapping against the thick, dimpled windows.

  Brianda joined her, still in a pique over not being invited to last night's audience. She picked at her sweet bun, her mouth drawn down and brows pulled into a straight line. The pastry was yesterday's baking.

  Gracia pushed away a dish of apple peelings. “We'll have to leave Antwerp sooner than we planned.”

  “Where will we go?” Brianda made a pretty moue. She'd hated the move from Lisbon to London and then Antwerp.

  “Venice. I've received word that our assets have arrived safely.” Gracia's stomach twisted and she caught a whiff of something salty and rotting-sweet. It was an aftermath of last night, she hoped, and not another bout of bilious indigestion.

  “Oh! Venice!” Brianda's cheeks flushed. “La Serenissima Dominante!” She clapped her hands together. “It's my vision of lights on the water! The festivals, the regattas, the gala balls! But we won't have to live in that awful Foundry area, what do they call it, il gheto, will we?”

  “Of course not.” They could not afford the slightest public lapse, for to appear to be other than devout Christians would be admitting apostasy. No place lay beyond the hand of the Inquisition. Not Spain, where their family had lived for centuries; not Portugal, where Gracia's husband was now buried. Not even here in the north.

  Before Brianda could chatter on, their nephew, João Miguez, came in. He'd stayed behind last night, drinking and gaming with the Imperial heir, and the frenzied glamour of the court still hung about him. But when Gracia called him by his Hebrew name, Joseph, a tension seemed to lift from him; his shoulders rose and then fell. He sat down facing her as he had on so many other mornings when she'd taught him the family business.

  “I shall remain here to do what I can,” he agreed. “Have you decided how you will get out of the city?”

  “I thought to go first to Aix-la-Chapelle, under the pretext of taking the waters for another bout of stomach illness which I believe will strike me soon, then to Lyons instead of Augsburg, the usual route.” She went on, ignoring Brianda's aggrieved sigh. “You must be careful, Joseph. Once Charles learns I am gone, he will almost certainly charge me with Judaizing.”

  “To give him the grounds to confiscate whatever property he can.” Joseph nodded.

  “You must argue that the prosecution is illegal because we are not subjects of the Holy Roman Empire but foreign merchants, free to travel as we wish,” Gracia said, ticking off points on her fingers, “that we are exemplary Christians, that the business belongs to Reyna and to Brianda's daughter, la Chica, while she and I have only our own small dowries.”

  “Much too small!” Brianda said pointedly. Her face reddened at this reminder that her husband had named Gracia the administrator of his half of the business, thus giving the elder sister control of the entire trading empire.

  “Some of the coffers that Charles will likely seize are in the custody of German merchants here who themselves have property in Venice, which I will petition the Doge to sequester by way of compensation,” Gracia said.

  “Perhaps the offer of a substantial loan will put Charles off for a while,” Joseph said. “We've already lent him a hundred thousand livres.”

  “Having an emperor so deeply in your debt can cut both ways.” Gracia frowned. “Such people are uncomfortable owing money they cannot repay.” In the past, powerful men had slaughtered whole communities of Jews to cancel their debts.

  Joseph's eyes flashed, reminding her of how he’d looked when jousting with young Maximilian. “Let me suggest an additional touch, a diversion. We will put about a rumor that Reyna and I have eloped to Venice, with you in pursuit.”

  Brianda clapped her hands, her mood shifting like quicksilver. “It's so romantic!”

  Gracia smiled wryly. “It will certainly give Don Francisco something to think about. But we must be careful. We'd better make sure we're seen attending Mass tomorrow.”

  Brianda excused herself, on the pretext of looking after the infant, la Chica, but actually, Gracia suspected, to inspect her wardrobe with an eye to what might be suitable for the elegance of Venice.

  Venice, La Serenissima Dominante, Queen of the Adriatic, had already passed her prime as the dominant trading power of Europe. Gracia and her household settled in a small palace in the fashionable Zeppa district. Winged cherubs, dancing nymphs, and sea creatures adorned the painted ceilings. They acquired their own gondola, with cushions embroidered with swans and hearts. They rode in it or walked, for horses were forbidden within the city.

  Gracia's rooms looked east, past the triple arched windows that reminded her of Moorish Iberia, past the lacework of canals, the arching bridges, and the iron lamp posts in the shape of dragons. East, to Turkey. Already her agents had arrived in Constantinople, preparing the way for her eventual arrival. She tried to imagine what it would be like to live openly, without this constant miasma of intrigue and subterfuge.

  The Emperor Charles had brought the predicted charges of apostasy against Gracia, charges that Joseph answered with certificates of unimpeachable Christian observance, interminable legal pleadings, and judicious gifts.

  Although Gracia's house in Venice had become a center for the community of Marranos, “hidden Jews,” she dared not associate in public with any who openly practiced the faith.

  The new year brought another round of festivals, saints' days, and Carnival, the ten days of gaiety that preceded Lent. Not even Brianda, in her wildest dreams, had anticipated the explosion of revelry. Everywhere, strolling musicians played their lutes and vihuelas, gondolas sprouted ribbons and the carved heads of griffins and bare-breasted sea maids. On the streets, people went masked, transformed by their costumes into gorgeous birds or figures out of legend, concoctions of feathers and spangled silk. The whole household was soon caught up in the festivities, with invitations to one party after another.

  The Doge's gala took place on the lagoon on a series of huge floating platforms hung with paper lanterns in fanciful shapes. The Doge himself held court in the costume of Neptune, with a trident tipped with sapphires and blue topazes. Fireworks arced through the night sky, while servants liveried in red and silver handed out goblets of fruited ice. The Doge had commissioned a piece of music in the new style called madrigale especially for the occasion.

  Gracia had chosen a mask of peacock feathers ri
mmed with golden beads. Here on the carpeted deck of the Doge's barge, as on the streets, she found the Carnival regalia bestowed an unexpected freedom, as if in hiding their faces, people felt freer to reveal themselves. In recent years, a custom had grown up of addressing a fellow reveler as “Sior Maschera,” without regard to rank or sex.

  And here we are, she thought as she tasted her lime ice, Old Christians and New, true and false, Venetian and foreigner, with only the thickness of a mask between us.

  Then, as if the water itself had turned treacherous, the barge shifted beneath Gracia's feet, sending her stumbling into the man behind her.

  His tallness caught her by surprise; she could see nothing whatever of his face or form, he was so completely swathed in black and white. Even the hands holding the precisely folded lace handkerchief were gloved. The black bautà covering his head and shoulders and the short tabarro cloak were of silk, which only nobility might wear. Behind the flaring white mask, she caught the gleam of eyes.

  He bowed to her, an exaggerated gesture as if he were a performer with the commedia dell’arte, and called her “Madonna Maschera.” His voice was deep, with a strange resonance, but that might have been due to the mask.

  Before Gracia could reply, a pair of revelers capered between them. When she looked again, the man in black had disappeared. He might have been a liquid shadow.

  “Who was that?” Brianda's voice beside her asked.

  Gracia shivered. “I don't know.”

  Brianda's mask hung by its cord around her neck, and her cheeks had gone blood dark in the light from the paper lanterns. She prattled on, talking too fast, about the ices, the French wine, the commedia performers. It seemed to Gracia that her sister, usually so confident and gay, was gasping, feverish.

  “You must not take ill from these night vapors,” Gracia said, slipping her arm through Brianda's. “Come now, we'll go home and I'll summon my physician.”

  “What do you mean, go home?” Brianda jerked free. “It's not even midnight! I for one intend to stay and enjoy myself!” She jerked her mask back over her face, slightly askew. Her voice rose in pitch. “You think you can rule everyone, just like you do the business. But the firm isn't yours, half of it belongs to la Chica, and should be mine to run!”