It was long after midday when Luzia heard a light scratch at the door.
Marius and Valentina rose. But when Luzia made to open it, Santángel stepped in front of her. In case of what? Monsters? The alguacil? Did she fear demons or the Inquisition more?
Antonio Pérez stood in the hallway, accompanied by the man with the dyed-red beard and a clutch of his liveried guards.
“I’ve come to see my scullion,” he said, looking past Santángel with a warm smile.
He stepped inside and closed the door, leaving his retinue to wait in the hall. Pérez was beautifully dressed in plum velvet, heavily embellished with silver cording, the collar and shoulders plumped with amethysts.
Luzia knew she didn’t look as she should. Her gown was rumpled and she wore nothing to cover her freckles. Her hair hadn’t been bound up properly and lay in a single damp braid. All she could do was curtsy and keep her eyes on the floor, attempting to look modest and serene.
“Last night was frightening, wasn’t it?” Luzia nodded.
Pérez glanced at the Ordoños. “And you’re all a bit frightened of me too, I think.”
“No, señor, of course not,” Marius protested. “We are grateful guests,” said Valentina. “And you, Luzia?” Pérez queried.
Luzia knew better than to lie in this moment. “Of course I’m afraid of you.”
“Luzia!” Valentina squeaked. “Do tell me why,” said Pérez.
Luzia was confused by the way he addressed her directly when he should put his questions to the Ordoños. They might not be her patrons, but they
were her employers and of far higher status.
“Forgive me, señor, but there’s no mystery to my answer. You are a man of great power and influence. I am a servant with neither. How could my answer be any different?”
“She is a diplomat, our scullion! And she makes a fair point. I would be sad indeed if people didn’t tremble just a little in my presence. Please,” he said, gesturing to the wider room. “Let us all be comfortable, if we can.
Shall I have refreshment brought? No, I see you are well provided for.
Good.” He spoke as if enjoying each word in his mouth, stacking another, then another to compound that enjoyment.
Marius took the seat closest to Pérez, while Valentina and Luzia shared a small cushioned bench. Luzia’s eyes sought Santángel, and she realized that no one was looking at him or speaking to him. It was as if they’d forgotten he was there, when to her he seemed to be glowing in the murky light of the room. Was this how he slipped past soldiers and outwitted patrols of
guards? Had he mastered a kind of invisibility even she couldn’t guess at? Pérez settled in his chair. “I have just come from speaking with Fortún
Donadei and his patroness, Doña Beatriz. In a demonstration of wisdom and courage—and I daresay foresight—they have agreed that the torneo should continue.”
Marius made a show of nodding sagely. “You feel this is the best course?”
“I fear it is the only course, my friend. The king demands a third trial, and what a king wishes is as good as done.”
Valentina glared at Marius and he cleared his throat. “Even in the wake of such violence?”
“Dreadful, I know. But that was the work of Teoda Halcón and her
heretic family. Such perfidy, such wickedness. And brought beneath my roof in the guise of holy innocence. They follow a Calvinist sect, and it was Teoda who sabotaged the second trial.”
Luzia kept her face expressionless. In Perucho’s shop, she had seen the look that Hualit exchanged with the tailor when he mentioned Teoda’s father traveling to Germany and the Netherlands. Were there whispers of her heresy even then? Luzia had been standing beside her when the
shadows began to move on the stage. The girl might have feigned her fear and surprise, but she didn’t have the ability to create such monsters. Like
Gracia, she’d prepared a magic lantern to get through the second trial. I have no talent for miracles or illusions. Maybe that was a lie too.
“What will become of her?” Luzia asked.
“Luzia,” Valentina chastised, “it is not for you to pose such questions.”
But Pérez merely leaned back and said, “We needn’t stand on protocol after such a night. She’s being taken to Toledo to face the tribunal. No doubt she will have interesting neighbors.”
He must mean Lucrecia de León. The girl who dreamed and the girl who spoke to angels, both locked away and facing torture.
“As for Gracia de Valera,” Pérez continued, “she had quite a lot to say about you.”
Marius startled as if someone had poked him with a pin. “About Luzia?” “She claims you saved her life,” said Pérez.
Luzia forced herself not to look to Santángel. This could be a trick. Had Gracia said that Luzia saved her through some strange or demonic means?
“I may have?” she ventured.
“She has left the torneo and is returning to Sevilla. She said she would keep you daily in her prayers and give alms in your name for the rest of her days. She went on like that for quite a while.”
Luzia stared at him, then sputtered, “I will do the same for her.” “We all will,” added Marius.
“Now, Luzia of the scullion’s hands, savior of beautiful maidens, are you prepared for a third trial?”
“Does it matter?” The words slipped out, her defenses eroded by a night spent blissfully without sleep and a morning whiled away in terror.
Pérez only laughed. “Not at all, child. It was a matter of courtesy.”
“Don Antonio,” said Valentina, her voice thin as broth. “Forgive me. I … I hesitate to ask, but even with the heretic under lock and key, can we be certain such a trial will be safe?”
“No,” Pérez admitted. “But the king has insisted and offered his own
guards as protection. You see, I am just the clockmaker; the king tells us the time.”
“Then we will go to El Escorial?” Marius asked.
For the first time Pérez looked uneasy. “A worthy question. And who wouldn’t wish to see its splendors? Alas, I do not yet know where the third trial will be held. That is for the king to decide.”
Luzia had understood Philip would never come to La Casilla. Not even
the prospect of a holy champion with whom to put down Dutch revolts and cow the English queen could lure him to make such a gesture. The world
came to the king, and it would be too great an honor for Pérez. But she had thought, maybe hoped, that they would visit the Alcázar or El Escorial.
What did it mean that the king would offer them no such invitation?
Marius hurried into the silence. “With Teoda and Gracia gone the king will have few champions among whom to choose.”
“Then let us say he’ll have less opportunity for distraction.” Pérez turned to Luzia and leaned forward. “You must do all you can to show the king what you are capable of, little nun. Then he will decide if you or young Donadei are to be his champion. Or no one at all.”
Now Luzia saw. If the king rejected both her and the Prince of Olives, he would be rejecting Pérez as well. Pérez would never return to his ruler’s favor or be reinstated as secretary. That was why he was in this room with them, speaking to Luzia as if she mattered. His fate lay with a scullion and a farmer’s son.
“I will do all I can,” she said, “and pray God does the rest.” “This is all any of us can ask.”
“Señor …” Luzia attempted, “is there nothing you can tell me of the final trial?”
“That will be dictated by the king’s whim. I am as much in the dark as you.”
Luzia doubted that, but there was nothing more to say.
Pérez rose and they all followed suit. Before he slipped through the door he said, “Pray tell me, Don Marius, where are Don Víctor and his wife?”
Santángel was most in a position to know, but no one asked him. No one even glanced his way.
“We haven’t seen them since before the trial began last night,” said Marius.
“I can’t say I’m surprised,” Pérez replied. “Don Víctor is like a cat. He will be seen when it suits him and not before.”
When he felt safe. When he could be certain of the torneo’s outcome.
Víctor de Paredes was widening the distance between them, creating a path of escape should this all go horribly wrong.
But none of it would matter if she could show the king a true miracle, if she could make him believe in her. The keeping of his favor might prove a
greater challenge, but Luzia would solve that riddle when she needed to. For now it was enough to hope.
Faith could be won. Curses could be broken.
