by P K Adams
The corners of Helena’s lips lifted in a small smile, but her eyes remained lightless. “You should have. Maybe then Dantyszek would not have missed two days having his beard trimmed and perfumed, and the two deaths would have gone unsolved due to the ineptitude of the chancellor’s men.”
I could not help but admire her wit, and on a day like that. A purr of laughter curled in her throat, white and exposed in the square neckline of her gown. “Your suspicions about me sneaking out to see a lover would seem to have been confirmed,” she went on in a slightly mocking tone, “and you would have chastised me about it again, but then you would have forgotten about it because, like our king, deep down you don’t like confrontation.”
She was correct in that too, but still I was disheartened to find myself so transparent. Yet this was not about me. “Why did you not tell anyone back in June that Zamborski had violated you?”
“Because—as he himself said—nobody would have believed me.” She was still speaking in that cool, detached tone, so different from the passion and vehemence of two months before. She had lost her gambit, but she had taken her revenge and regained her peace of mind. Nothing else seemed to matter.
I wanted to deny her words, but I found myself unable to do so. Not after my meeting with the queen in the infirmary, and not after I had seen the judges conduct her trial. And how would I have reacted without the trail of death left in the wake of Helena’s rage? Would I have offered a sympathetic ear or dismissed it as a misunderstanding, or, even worse, her own fault? I could not answer that in good conscience.
“You see?” She smiled again, seeing the uncertainty in my face. Was I truly not able to hide anything from the eyes of the world? “But even if they had believed me, they would not have cared. They would have said that I had flirted with him and enticed him because they see the maids of honor like Lucrezia or Magdalena, the sweet eyes they make at the courtiers, and what is a man to do?”
I was struck by the similarity between her words, even if spoken mockingly, and what the queen had said, and again I could not deny it. But there was something else I wanted to know. “Even if that had happened and you were dealt with unjustly and sent home with your reputation ruined, surely that would have been better than what is awaiting you today?”
She tilted her head, the gesture almost teasing. “Would it?” she asked, narrowing her eyes. Then she straightened up again. “No, it would not.” Her voice hardened. “And I regret nothing.”
I opened my mouth to say something about her soul, but I thought better of it. It was a matter between her and her confessor if she chose to avail herself of one.
“But I am glad that it ended with just Zamborski and Mantovano,” she added unexpectedly. “You were right, Dantyszek was innocent. And who knows”—she paused, and something sinister in those three words made my skin prickle—“if I hadn’t ended up in this cell, if I had returned to the court in a few months—which is what I planned to do after killing Dantyszek and leaving the city secretly—I might not have resisted killing again.”
I felt the blood in my veins turn to ice. “What do you mean?” I asked, my throat so dry the sound was barely audible.
“I mean that I am not sure I could have stomached Lucrezia or Magdalena’s thoughtless, reckless behavior,” she replied with a hardness in her voice that told me she was not jesting. “But as it is, your curiosity has sealed my fate,” she added with a hint of amusement. “And saved them.”
I could find no words to respond to that. There was nothing left to say between us, and the sooner this sad story was behind us the better. Then I could start trying to put my life back together from the pieces into which it had shattered, and she . . . well, I did not know what awaited her afterward. Perhaps nothing at all.
I turned to leave, but her words reached me again. “Thank you, Caterina.”
I paused with my hand on the door’s rusty iron handle. Her voice was quiet and sad, the kind of sadness that envelops you like a heavy, wet cloak, making it hard to breathe. I was not able to look at her.
“For speaking up for me, even though my case was hopeless, and even though I would have killed you had things gone differently. There aren’t many people out there—especially at the court—who would do that.” Her voice caught at the end.
Still staring at the rushes on the floor, I said, “I hope you find peace, Helena. I will pray for it.”
And I have, every day since then.
I left the cell. But before I descended the narrow staircase, I leaned against the cold stones of the wall and let my tears flow for the last time.
Executions were carried out across the road from the tower, on a low hill that sloped gently toward the meadows on the riverbank. It was the same riverbank where, on a summer night nine months earlier, the first act of this tragedy had taken place against the background of dancing flames, laughter, and singing. The day was cool, and patchy clouds scuttled across the sky, now flooding the world with sunshine, now plunging it into a somber shade. But there was an unmistakable scent of spring in the air, sweet and moist, a spring Helena would never see again.
A block had been set up where the scaffold normally stood—noble executions were rare and tended not to draw as many spectators from the town and surrounding villages unless the condemned was well known. Neither Helena nor her victims had been, and the crowd was small and quiet. It consisted mainly of a gaggle of older women, some just curious, but a few looking grim as they stood shaking their heads and whispering to one another in low voices. I had feared the hostility that I had seen in the court, but those people had stayed away or found another distraction to keep them occupied, or perhaps they were there but had discovered some sympathy in their hearts. Whatever the reason, I was thankful.
I came with Lucrezia, the only maid of honor who had expressed the wish to attend. I had advised her against it, but she insisted. In the past few weeks, she had taken to dressing more plainly and had abandoned most of her jewelry, especially the strings of pearls she had once loved. She had also completely ignored Dantyszek when he had come to testify at the trial. I doubted that the queen’s newfound strictness accounted for it, for although Her Majesty had given the girls a speech, none of the others had taken such drastic steps, and gradually things were returning to the way they used to be. No, Lucrezia’s had been a more profound transformation, whose nature I had not yet fully grasped.
A little apart from us stood Piotr Gamrat, the queen’s Polish advisor, dressed somberly in black but wearing, as usual, one of his elaborate caps to hide his growing baldness. Next to him was Chancellor Stempowski, his arthritic fingers clasped over his stomach and his lips set in a grim line. I wanted to be angry at him, but I could not. Perhaps I had no emotions left in me, or perhaps it was because he had ultimately only done his job, efficiently and dispassionately, just like the judges had, in the only way they all knew how.
The only other members of the court in attendance were the Princess of Montefusco and Doctor Baldazzi. Rather than wearing a typical garish gown and dripping with diamonds, the princess looked very different in black lace that enveloped her from head to toe. There was no rouge on her face, and she kept dabbing her eyes with a silk handkerchief, although from where I stood, they looked dry enough to me. I had a strong suspicion that she was there mainly to have something to talk about for the next six months, but perhaps I am too harsh. After all, it was her inexhaustible curiosity and the desire to be at the center of events that may well have saved my life.
Doctor Baldazzi, on the other hand, looked genuinely stricken. I had run into him at the entrance to the tower earlier that morning, after I came down from my last meeting with Helena. He was on his way up to see her and offer her a vial of valerian oil to dissolve in wine, which would calm her and dull her senses. I had waited downstairs, and he returned not ten minutes later saying that she had refused any help. She would not go to her death dumb like a beast to slaughter, she had said, but she would be her own mistress and fac
e it on her own terms. Now he looked pale, there were beads of sweat on his forehead, and he could not hide the shaking of his hands.
I looked around to see if Helena’s father was anywhere, but he was not, and who could blame him? Dantyszek was absent too—after the trial he had gone home to continue his recovery, but I suspected that he would be back in Kraków once the dust settled. He was not one to stay away from the glamour of the royal court for long. In that, too, I would be proven right.
The cathedral clock struck midday, and all eyes turned to the tower, looming cold and rusty red at the southern foot of the castle hill. How many had suffered and died in there, and would Helena’s ghost join them today? Unlike the unfortunate town councilors of the previous century, she was not innocent. But was she truly guilty if she had been forced so violently onto the path that had brought her to this place? Again, I hoped that there was nothing for her afterward—if no joy, then also no more pain. I knew that was what she wanted too.
Shortly after the bell fell silent, the side gate opened, and the first person to emerge was the executioner. He was a bull of a man and was dressed in a black leather jerkin whose seams appeared on the verge of snapping over his thick arms. His thighs were like the trunks of an old oak, the powerful muscles knotted underneath the tight hose, and his brown leather boots had dark stains on them that could only have come from one source. His head was covered with a fitted cap with holes cut out for the eyes and mouth, and he carried an axe that looked almost like a toy in his meaty hands, although it was sharp and deadly.
I shivered when I saw him, and Lucrezia clung to my side with a low whimper. I think in that moment, both of us regretted having come. Then Helena stepped out, flanked by two guards with halberds, and I was glad I was there, even though my heart hammered against my ribs as if it would crack them. If Lucrezia and I had not been there, Helena would have died with only those impassive servants of the state and a coterie of curious crones around her. I hoped that seeing our familiar faces, faces of those who bore her no ill will and were not indifferent, would make it easier for her, less frightening.
I could see that she was frightened. Her lips were white, they moved as if in a silent prayer or some other exhortation, and she could not tear her wide eyes away from the wood block, stained dark like the executioner’s boots. But she continued walking, never stopping or even slowing her pace, her legs never buckling under her, and I was glad of that too. I would have hated to see her manhandled by those guards or by the executioner in her last moments.
She stood in front of the block. Her hair had already been gathered up into a tight bun, and her neck stood exposed. She wore the same plain black dress with a low neckline in which I had seen her that morning, and no cloak. A gust of wind swept from the east, carrying the fresh scent of pine from across the river where the forest was awakening to a new life after the winter’s slumber. Helena’s dress fluttered, clinging to her hips and legs. With her pallor and her slim figure, she looked dignified and soulful, like a martyr from an old painting or a stained-glass window I had seen in a church somewhere. But unlike a painted martyr, she was a woman of flesh and blood, and just then it seemed like such a waste of a young life and a good mind, and for what? Already she was known as the unnatural female killer, that transgression far graver than the cause of her crimes.
Looking at her in those last moments, I doubted that she thought of herself as a martyr—a martyr died to prove the world’s injustice or to affect a change with her sacrifice. But there had been no talk of a new code of conduct for the courtiers, no attempt to help women find redress if they had been wronged. The only time I had mentioned it to the queen, she said that given the number of short-lived affairs that occurred at the court, it would be difficult to tell real cases from those motivated by jealousy or revenge. Then she repeated that if we kept a close eye on the girls and ensured that they behaved properly, such a thing would never happen again. If Helena’s death had a deeper meaning, I could not see it.
The executioner motioned for her to kneel. She locked eyes with me then, and I would remember their look—both resigned and defiant—for the rest of my life. I admired her in that moment. I do not think I would have had the strength to remain so poised, not to scream, or struggle, or faint. I knew that she saw that admiration in my face, for her lips were touched by a ghost of a smile. Then, after a small hesitation, which, no doubt from long habit, the executioner patiently observed with the axe crossed at his chest, she laid her head on the block so that her chin rested in the little indentation, just above a wicker basket that had been placed below. It, too, had rusty smudges all over it. That whole cursed ground, the very earth beneath our feet, was soaked in blood. My chest felt as if it were encased in tight armor. I could not draw a breath.
It was then that I heard footsteps behind me, rustling on the remnants of last year’s grass. They were familiar footsteps; I could already pick them out from among hundreds of others. That alone allowed me to take a breath again, albeit a shallow and painful one. The executioner planted himself on Helena’s side, his heavy legs wide apart, and raised the axe over his head. I could not have moved if I wanted to. I felt a hand on my arm, the same way he had held it that night we walked back from visiting Maciek in the tower. But this time his grip was stronger. He knew before I did.
The executioner froze for a brief moment with the axe in position. I closed my eyes, shutting them tight as if it could somehow also block my ears against the sound. But it could not. The blade cut the air with a swish that ended in a dull thud, and I gasped, staggering to one side. If Konarski had not been there, pulling me into him, I would have gone down. He held me so that my back was to the block, but he could do nothing about the awful sounds of the men moving about, lifting things, moving them, and then the squeaky noise of the cart being pulled away down toward the tower. Next to us, Lucrezia sobbed loudly, and I could hear wailing from where the women were gathered.
I did not cry, but for a while I could not control my breathing, which came fast and shallow as if I had run a great distance. My fingers dug into the leather of Konarski’s doublet so hard I was afraid I would tear it. We remained like that for a long time, until the women’s cries subsided and their footsteps retreated and died in the distance, until the princess and Baldazzi, Stempowski and Gamrat, and even Lucrezia left to return to the castle.
Then we, too, made our way back slowly as the bell struck the half hour, a mournful and solitary sound. Clouds had come and blotted out the sun, and an increasingly angry wind tugged at our cloaks. I was glad of the wind; there was something purifying about it. A few weeks before, in the infirmary, I had wondered if I would ever be able to find peace again. Now I knew I would, one day. There was time to grieve and time to be comforted. Tragedies passed, lives ended, but nature—whether in a storm, sunshine, cloud, or a gust of wind—was eternal, impervious to the evil perpetrated by us who are but brief guests here.
Behind us, the low hill stood empty, absorbing the fresh blood and quietly waiting for more, patient but never satisfied.
Epilogue
Bari, Kingdom of Naples
March 1560
I stayed in the queen’s service until Prince Zygmunt—now King Zygmunt August—was born the following summer; then I took my leave and returned home. By then the queen understood how miserable I was in my position, and I think she also knew the reason for it. But we never spoke of it, for, in truth, it would have made no difference. When it came to women and their role within families, Bona—that most rebellious and independent of Polish queens—was very traditional. It was her upbringing, and her role as a monarch intent on preserving the power and securing the future of a kingdom that had always functioned in certain ways, that made her that way. Perhaps that is understandable. But I had no such obligations; despite my own precarious situation, I could choose whether to be a part of it or to retreat from the court and make another life. I chose the latter and she released me, and on the first day of September of
the year 1520, I left for Bari.
The Teutonic war was never the kind of success that Poland had achieved a hundred years earlier. The early offensive stalled due to bouts of bad weather, but artillery was eventually sent from Kraków in the spring, and it assisted Marshal Firlej’s troops in capturing several northern strongholds. But instead of insisting on the Order’s immediate surrender, the king accepted a ceasefire, which Grand Master Albrecht von Hohenzollern promptly broke once Danish and German mercenaries arrived to help him. And so the fighting continued until a truce was signed in April of 1521, even though Poland was in a position to demand a full peace treaty. It was none other than Chancellor Stempowski who managed to persuade the king not to push for it, and the truce was widely criticized. Who knows how many more times that ages-long conflict would have flared up had it not been for the Reformation? It was that, more than the military efforts of Poland and Lithuania, that finally weakened the Order sufficiently to lead to its secularization and disbandment in the year 1525.
Helena’s father died within a month of his daughter’s execution, and so ended that ancient and proud line that traced its origins to the previous ruling dynasty. The estate at Lipiny passed to some minor relative, and then was sold off at auction with part of it acquired by Konarski’s other uncle—Konstanty’s father—who lived in Baranów.
Lucrezia Alifio, as I have already said, changed in a way that made her hardly recognizable. The queen soon forgot about her new strict rules of behavior, paying no more attention to them than she had before. But it was as if Lucrezia had donned a garment of perpetual mourning. She sold off her colorful silk and brocade gowns and all of her jewelry, and with the proceeds, she paid for an antependium depicting the scene of Christ’s Resurrection for an altar in one of the cathedral’s chapels. She never spoke about her transformation, at least not to me, but she was the only one of the queen’s maids of honor to never marry. She remained in Bona’s service until she died in 1547.