A Place in the World

by Amy Maroney

  Elena nodded. “Let’s go upstairs, my love.”

  Mira followed Elena obediently up the staircase and through a bedchamber’s door. She perched gingerly on an elegant leather-backed chair near the window, looking around in wonder.

  “What on earth are you doing in this place?” she asked.

  “Alejandro and me, we came to find you. We arrived last night.”

  “What? My brother?” Mira sprang up. “Where is he?”

  “Calm yourself,” Elena ordered, putting a finger to her lips. “All the travel took a toll on him. He’ll be fine—a bit of a chest cold, but I’ve given him some herbs and honey. He’s sleeping off the hardships of our journey in the chamber next door.”

  “You and Alejandro traveled here alone?”

  “No, we were with your brother Pelegrín’s men,” Elena explained. “I thought it was ridiculous to have escorts on the journey. After all, how many times have I crossed those mountains alone? But Pelegrín convinced me that for Alejandro’s sake, we must bring guards.”

  Mira stared at her, stunned, and sank back into her chair.

  “I stayed at Castle Oto with Alejandro for nearly a year,” Elena went on. “I went there directly after Brother Arros told me the truth about it all. How I’m Ramón de Oto’s sister, and aunt to the three of you.”

  Mira folded her hands together in an attempt to stop them from shaking.

  Elena knelt before her. “It’s true,” she said. “Maria found me in Arazas. My family was dead of the plague. Around my neck was this.”

  She pulled a golden medallion from her bodice, strung on a thin gold chain. It was identical to the one Marguerite de Oto had worn on her belt when she sat for her portrait with Mira.

  “The muleteer’s tale,” Mira said faintly. She reached out and touched the medallion with a fingertip. “The gossip was true all along. You were the Baron of Oto’s child cast out to die, rescued by a guard.”

  “I’ve been keeping this for you.” Elena tore the necklace off and thrust it at Mira. “Go on. Take it.”

  Mira shrank back. “I cannot. It rightly belongs to you.”

  “Well, I don’t want the thing,” Elena snapped. “Pelegrín insisted I keep it, but it’s yours now. I’ve hauled this bauble across mountains for you, girl. And as your aunt, I’m due some respect. Heed my wishes.”

  She dropped it in Mira’s lap.

  Mira slowly drew the chain over her head and cupped the medallion in her palm.

  “Pelegrín.” She whispered the words, feeling a tiny stab of fear at the thought of her twin brother.

  “He’s not like your father.” Elena’s gaze burned into Mira. “He’s got a good heart. I saw it when he was a boy. I worried he’d turn hard like his father when he went off to war. I’ve seen what he’s made of now that he’s a man, though, and you’ve nothing to fear from him. I vow it.”

  Blood pounded in Mira’s ears. She tried to imagine what Pelegrín looked like. What her father had looked like. These men who were her flesh and blood, one of them dead now, the other born alongside Mira from the womb of a frightened young woman. The audacious plan Marguerite launched that terrible night had succeeded—she had saved her baby girl. She must have always known she would be found out. And the price would be her own life. Now that Mira was a mother, she understood. She, too, would take any risk to protect her child, no matter the consequences.

  “Alejandro,” she murmured. “He knows?”

  “Well, not all of it,” Elena allowed. “He knows you’re his sister and I’m his aunt. And he wants to meet his cousin. Arnaud told me all about Tristan at the summer meeting of the mountain people. How is your boy? How is Arnaud?”

  Mira shook her head. “You’ve seen Arnaud more recently than I. He was due to arrive by now. He should return any day, by the grace of God. As for the baby, Tristan is well. He is with—” She clapped a hand over her mouth.

  “We must go,” she said firmly, standing up. “There is someone who very much wishes to see you.”

  72

  February, 2017

  London, England

  Zari

  Zari ducked into the gallery and deposited her dripping umbrella in an oversized copper urn next to the door. Several wet umbrellas already huddled there in a sodden mass. She pulled back her hood and unzipped her jacket, grateful to be out of the rain.

  The gallery was high-ceilinged and rectangular, its walls painted a vivid blue. At discreet intervals, gilt-framed paintings seemed weightlessly suspended, supported by invisible hooks and wires. Each work was lit from above with beams of intense light.

  A few dozen other people wandered the space. Two burly men dressed in navy blazers and black slacks, clearly security, stood at either end of the room.

  Zari put her hands in her jacket pockets and began to stroll, affecting an aimless air. Inside, she was pulsating with nerves. She paused in front of a full-length portrait of a man whose luxuriant brown hair cascaded over his shoulders. He was dressed in a foppish ensemble of black velvet pantaloons and a white linen blouse edged with lace. Tilting her head first to one side, then the other, she pretended to give the painting serious thought. Then she moved on to a still life of an arrangement of flowers in a silver vase, and frowned as if in deep concentration.

  One of the security guards cleared his throat. Zari jumped, her eyes darting his way. He was staring at another visitor, a man in an orange down coat and scuffed black boots who had a mobile phone jammed against his ear.

  Trying to shake off her nervous energy, Zari moved through the room, giving each painting her utmost attention. Finally, she stopped before the only painting in the gallery that she cared about, titled Portrait of a Merchant’s Wife. Lady de Vernier of Toulouse stared back at her, dressed in rich blue that was a few shades lighter than the cobalt of the walls.

  Yes, Zari thought, it was painful to be here at the dealer’s auction preview, and it would be an exercise in misery to sit through the auction itself. But she could at least bear witness to the sale of Mira’s work. And she was curious—Zari had never been to an art auction before.

  She consulted the auction catalog again. Everything was labeled with a ‘lot’ number. The portrait before her, lot number thirty-six, had been in a private collection since the late nineteenth century, and went to auction as part of an estate sale in Toulouse last year. Dotie had purchased the portrait and retained a team of conservators to clean the work and conduct a series of imaging tests upon it.

  Zari read the few snippets of evidence shared in the auction catalog from the team’s analysis. According to the notes, the panel dated to about 1500 and was made of Pyreneen oak. The artist used extensive underdrawings fashioned with a metal stylus. And the word ‘Bermejo’ was written in charcoal beneath the layers of paint. Though Zari had identified Lady de Vernier as the subject of the portrait during her own research last year, no mention of that was made.

  Great, Zari thought sourly. Another woman erased from history just as she’s made her debut on the world stage.

  She returned her gaze to the painting. Lady de Vernier’s brown eyes glimmered with intelligence and cool confidence. The background was, on first glance, quite stark. The rose-pink of the brick tower visible through the open window was a vivid contrast to the luminous folds of the woman’s dress, to the pale silvery blue of the sky.

  Then Zari stepped closer. She could see plants growing through cracks in the bricks, a pair of doves nestled on a ledge in the tower wall, even a ladybug scuttling along the windowsill. Once she started really looking, she saw endless details. And that, she could not deny, was Bermejo’s hallmark, his claim to fame: he was the king of obsessively detailed backgrounds.

  Zari felt her anxiety start to rise again. She took a series of long breaths, held them for counts of four, and let them out slowly. With steady hands, she pulled her mobile from her pocket an
d took several photographs of the portrait, zooming in on each section of the panel in hopes of capturing details her eyes might have missed.

  The world fell away as she examined every inch of the painting. The other people in the gallery disappeared, the rise and fall of their voices a distant hum, the clatter of their heels on the wooden floor barely penetrating her consciousness.

  Nothing existed in that moment but Zari and the painting.

  “Wait,” she whispered, her eyes caught on a circular whorl in the windowsill behind the merchant’s wife.

  She retrieved her magnifying headlamp from her handbag and slipped it on, leaning closer still. Marguerite de Oto wore a medallion around her waist in the portrait at Fontbroke College—a circle intercut with a cross, overlaid by a smaller circle. In the self-portrait at the house in Getaria, Mira wore an identical medallion around her own waist.

  Scarcely breathing now, craning her neck forward, Zari was sure of it.

  The very same mark was carved into the windowsill behind Lady de Vernier.

  Zari’s entire body tingled with adrenalin. It took all of her self-control to stay quiet. Swiftly she flipped up her visor and raised her mobile to take a photo. She adjusted the zoom button, making sure the image was perfectly focused.

  A deep voice made her flinch.

  “Madam, what are you doing?” The guard’s tone indicated his annoyance.

  Zari stepped back, pocketing her mobile.

  Damn, she thought. I didn’t capture the shot.

  She removed the headlamp and stuffed it back in her bag.

  “I’m an art historian,” she offered lamely. “I study portraits of this period.”

  “We ask our visitors to keep well back of the paintings.” His voice was polite, but he surveyed her with suspicion.

  Grateful that he said nothing about the photographs she took, Zari moved on, murmuring an apology. Snatching her umbrella from the stand by the door, she exited the building and let the full force of the wind and rain slap her in the face. She walked rapidly, weaving around other pedestrians, ducking to avoid the sharp points of umbrellas, oblivious to the cold, the wet.

  Zari stopped under the awning of an upscale jewelry store, tucking her umbrella handle over one arm. She got out her mobile and clicked through the photos. Though the security guard thwarted her attempt to take a close-up photograph of the medallion image itself, she was relieved to see it in one of the photos she’d taken earlier. She sent the image and a note about the medallion to John Drake. Of course, if the last several months were any indication, he was not going to respond. He was not going to help her expose the truth about this painting.

  Who else could she tell? How fast could she spread the news? A voice of caution, of reason, seeped into her mind. It was Andreas’s voice. If she showed him this evidence, he would say the Oto mark was meaningful only to her and a handful of others. The painting had been attributed to Bermejo by an expert, after all. Even if she went on a rampage of publicity alerting every art historian and media contact in her network to this discovery, it would only serve to make her an object of ridicule.

  There was nothing to be done. Dotie had won. Bartolomé Bermejo would get the credit for this painting. And Mira would continue to languish in the shadows of history.

  After a moment, Zari composed a text to Wil describing the thrill of vindication she’d experienced, discovering Mira’s monogram hidden in plain sight. And then the utter dejection of realizing her discovery didn’t matter.

  His response came swiftly. As long as you’re Mira’s advocate, she will not disappear.

  Zari raised her umbrella, turned, and bent her head against the wind.

  73

  Autumn, 1506

  Bayonne, Gascony

  Mira

  Elena went through the connecting door into Alejandro’s room to rouse him.

  “Here’s a bit of light, my boy,” Mira heard her say as she flung open the shutters. “Get your clothes on. I’ve a surprise waiting for you.”

  She returned to Mira and they stood side by side, listening to the boy stumble around as he shed his nightshirt and dressed himself in haste. Finally he burst through the door, his curly brown hair standing straight up from his head. His eyes grew wide at the sight of Mira.

  “Alejandro,” Elena said. “Your sister, Miramonde, is here.”

  Folding her brother in her arms, Mira was overcome by a feeling of disbelief. The lightheadedness that had assailed her in the bookmaker’s shop rushed back. She fought to steady her mind, to delight in her reunion with the younger brother she thought she would never see again.

  Elena and Mira walked briskly through the busy streets, arm in arm. A sleepy Alejandro followed at a short distance. They had not gotten far when three men wearing leather armor and longswords turned into the lane ahead of them. Alejandro raced ahead, trying to get the trio’s attention.

  Mira clutched Elena’s elbow, paralyzed by fear. “What is he doing?” she breathed.

  To her astonishment, Elena chuckled.

  “Those are Pelegrín’s knights,” Elena explained. “They served us well on the journey here. How’s your lodging?” she asked the men when they reached the group.

  “It beats sleeping outside,” one of the knights said. “We’re heading to the harbor. They say a cod-fishing ship is back. At any rate, sailors home from a journey across the sea. A sight to see, by all accounts.”

  The three men nodded at Mira, curiosity evident in their eyes. But Elena did not make introductions.

  “Can I go with them?” Alejandro asked Elena eagerly.

  She shook her head. “I want you to meet your cousin.”

  He nodded, clearly a bit disappointed, but did not protest.

  “Were those men with Pelegrín at the battle for Naples?” Mira asked, setting off again toward home with her arm looped through Elena’s. Alejandro trailed a few steps behind them.

  “Yes. They’re his best men, his most loyal comrades. And yet he sent them with us just when he needed them most.”

  “What do you mean?” Mira asked.

  “Pelegrín’s been ordered by the king to journey to Barcelona and pay tribute in the spring,” Elena explained. “He must carry gold with him on the roads, and he has few guards left that he trusts.”

  Mira looked at her, troubled. “What is the tribute payment for?”

  “Something about war booty, and the Great Captain, who led your father and brother in battle.”

  “I still do not understand why Pelegrín let Alejandro leave Castle Oto with you,” Mira confessed. “Why would he send his brother all this way, even with guards for protection? The mountains are full of dangers.”

  Elena’s face grew sober. “A sweating sickness struck the castle. Pelegrín was afraid the boy’d be taken by it.”

  “I see,” Mira said, her mind leaping instantly to Rose. But before she could tell Elena about the dreadful events in the Valley of Maury, they turned into the lane that led to the lodging house.

  Ahead of them, standing by the fountain in the small square, was a tall man with a baby on his hip. He bent and dipped a ceramic pitcher into the fountain, then tipped the water out in a thin, silvery stream. The baby clapped his hands and squealed at the sight.

  At their approach, the man stood and squinted against the sun. “Mira?” he said in surprise. “Thought you wouldn’t be back until—”

  Then he noticed the woman at Mira’s side. The pitcher slipped from his hand and shattered on the cobblestones.

  The baby began to wail.

  Elena’s pace flagged. She halted, staring at the man before her in confusion.

  “Xabi?” she whispered, in a tone so hopeful and eager that Mira nearly wept.

  “Your eyes do not deceive you,” Mira said softly. “It is Xabi. Your Xabi.”

  Elena dashed over
the cobblestones in a blur of skirts. Mira followed. She held out her arms for Tristan and looked on, laughing through tears, as Xabi gathered Elena close to him. Alejandro hesitantly edged forward, a look of sheer bewilderment on his face.

  Tristan quieted in Mira’s arms, his sobs replaced by wide-eyed wonder.

  74

  Autumn, 1506

  Near Bayonne, Gascony

  Amadina

  Amadina sighed, drumming her fingertips on the mule cart’s bench. A mantle of fog obscured her view of the sea. Ahead of them on the road rumbled the priests’ carriage, an enormous converted oxcart draped with lustrous red cloth that shielded its passengers from the outside world. For safety’s sake, she had followed the priests and their entourage to and from the tribute feast in St. Jean de Luz.

  Before leaving Bayonne, she had scooped a handful of gold coins from her wood-and-iron box and tucked them into a small purse she hid in the depths of her bosom. Later, she tithed so generously at the feast that the priests in St. Jean de Luz lavished her with attention all evening. Not just the priests, Amadina reminded herself, smiling a little at the thought. Merchants had flocked to her as well. She’d felt like a young woman being courted by multiple suitors, all vying for access to her glittering fortune.

  Amadina shifted her weight on the hard bench in an unsuccessful bid to find a more comfortable position. She distracted herself by spinning a tale in which she was the heroine, a selfless widow who traveled endlessly from city to city doling out gold to influential men, blooming like a wine-red rose under their flattery and attentions.

  Her thoughts were interrupted by a brisk wind rushing in from the west, skimmed from the surface of the sea. It tore at the trees lining the roadside. A few scraggly leaves sailed overhead, swirling in a current. She closed her eyes and pretended she was the one in the elaborate oxcart, sitting on a velvet cushion.