The Hand of Fatima Page 23

  During the siege, the Prince also gave the order to kill women and children regardless of age or condition. In spite of this slaughter, the Christian army left with 4,500 women and children as slaves. They also made off with gold, seed pearls and silk, and riches of all kinds, as well as enough wheat and barley to keep the army supplied for a year.

  Aben Aboo did not come to the defence of Galera and the thousands of Moriscos who had sought refuge there. Following the surrender of Órgiva, he attacked Almuñécar and Salobreña, where he was routed. He then scattered his forces throughout the Alpujarra, with orders only to engage the enemy in skirmishes until the promised help from the Sublime Porte arrived. This never materialized, and his miscalculation allowed the Duke of Sesa to enter the Alpujarra and take control of all the land between El Padul and Ugíjar. For his part, Don John of Austria continued putting entire villages to the sword.

  Death, the hunger resulting from the Christians’ scorched earth tactics, and the cold (the mountains were already covered in snow) all began to take their toll on the spirits of the Moriscos and their allies from across the strait.

  Hernando alone took any satisfaction from the rout at Salobreña. When the commander of the fortress, Don Diego Ramírez de Haro, repelled the attack, the Moriscos fled towards the mountains. The women, children and old people who accompanied the army with the baggage trains struggled as best they could to escape, while Aben Aboo, Barrax, Brahim and the rest of the officers and infantry rushed ahead of them, concerned only for their own lives.

  Helped by Yusuf, and even though his feet were shackled, Hernando took advantage of the confusion to hop over to La Vieja. Next to the mule he came across another one laden with the clothes, perfumes and other luxuries that Barrax’s ‘sons’ always took with them. People were shouting and scurrying about; no one was looking or showed any interest in him. He could try it. Why not? He saw Aisha and Fátima fleeing from the camp. He also saw the boys in their shimmering tunics running bewildered through the crush in search of their mule. They loved their possessions; he had watched them perfume and adorn themselves the way women did – perhaps even more so. What would they do if they saw all their treasures were at risk?

  He signalled Yusuf to keep watch. Just before the boys came running angrily up to them, he untied the straps and saddlebags and loosened the harness on the mule’s chest. Ubaid gave the order to depart and the string of mules set off. Almost at once the saddlebags slipped sideways. All the boys’ treasures came cascading out, and they were forced to run after the mule and gather them up from the ground. Ubaid saw what was going on but did not stop; the Morisco army was scattering in front of them. Yusuf was smiling to himself, turning his head this way and that, first towards the boys, then to Hernando.

  The commander’s lovers struggled to pick up the trail of clothes, scent bottles and ornaments that were scattered all along the trail. They managed to grab some things, but lost many others. Standing like bright lanterns in their highly coloured garments, they screamed at Ubaid to wait.

  Nobody came to their aid.

  Mounted on La Vieja, Hernando took in the scene: an older woman gave one of the boys a shove when she saw him crouching down to gather up a tunic, and the boy fell flat on his face, dropping everything he was carrying. When his friend rushed to help him, shrieking curses, another woman tripped him up. The next woman spat at him and the one behind her kicked him. In the commotion both boys lost their precious slippers, which some youngsters grabbed hold of to play with. As the column advanced, children and women picked up more things from the road. The last time Hernando caught sight of the two boys, they had been left a long way behind, and were standing, barefoot and filthy, crying in the no-man’s-land between the rearguard of the Morisco army and the Christian vanguard.

  They had run away. At least that was the explanation Ubaid offered Barrax when they arrived at Ugíjar. Hernando and Yusuf listened to the conversation from a few steps away. The corsair captain grasped the muleteer by his tunic and hoisted him up with one arm, bellowing, his face and open mouth dangerously close to the latter’s nose.

  ‘They fled,’ Hernando confirmed from where he stood. Barrax turned towards him, still keeping hold of the muleteer. ‘Does that surprise you?’ Hernando added cheekily.

  Barrax looked from one to the other several times, before throwing Ubaid into the dirt several yards from him.

  Aben Aboo pitched camp near Ugíjar, where he left those he thought would be a hindrance in his new strategy of guerrilla warfare. From there he worked strenuously to bring all the troops scattered throughout the Alpujarra under his control. Barrax and his men returned to the Morisco stronghold after clashing with Don John of Austria at Serón. Initially, the battle favoured the Moriscos; the Christian soldiers were so hungry for plunder that they attacked the town without waiting for orders. Don John disciplined his troops, attacked a second time, and captured the village.

  Hernando found himself urgently summoned to Barrax’s quarters.

  ‘Heal him,’ Barrax ordered as soon as he came into the tent. ‘Ubaid tells me you know about potions.’

  Hernando looked at the man lying at Barrax’s feet: there was a large bloodstain on one side of his grey sweat-soaked undergarment. His breathing was irregular; his body was twisted in pain and his face, framed by a neat black beard, seemed strained. Hernando guessed he must be about twenty-five years old. His eyes strayed to the finely wrought suit of armour piled next to him.

  ‘It’s from Milan,’ Barrax announced, picking up the helmet and examining it closely. ‘Made not far from his birthplace, most likely in the Negroli workshop. A knight like him, who is close to that bastard Christian prince,’ he said, throwing the helmet to the floor, ‘will bring us a ransom worth more than all the booty we have seized so far. There is no inscription on the armour; find out his name and who this nobleman is.’

  ‘I’ve only healed mules,’ Hernando said by way of excuse.

  ‘In that case, healing a dog will be easy. You have made your decision, Nazarene. I warned you. You have chosen not to renounce your faith. If he dies, you will go with him to the grave; if he lives, you will row as a galley slave in my ship. You have Barrax’s word for that.’

  With these words he left him alone with the Christian.

  The knight had been wounded by Barrax himself on the approach to Serón as he tried to protect the Christian soldiers who were fleeing in all directions. The bodies of hundreds of dead were left on the roads and in the ravines until Don John was able bury them some days later, but the noble prisoner had been thrown on to a horse like a sack and brought to the Morisco camp.

  Hernando knelt close to the knight to examine the extent of his wound. What was he going to do? With great care he tried to remove the knight’s undershirt; it was padded with layers of cotton to protect him from the rubbing of the armour. He had never before treated a man . . .

  ‘He called you Nazarene.’

  The words, spoken with difficulty, startled Hernando as he held the fabric in his hands.

  ‘Do you understand Arabic?’ Hernando asked him in Spanish.

  ‘He also said you have not . . . that you haven’t renounced your faith.’

  The knight was struggling to breathe. He tried to sit up and blood spurted from his wound, soaking Hernando’s fingers.

  ‘Be quiet now. Don’t move. You have to live,’ Hernando said. ‘Barrax keeps his word,’ he muttered to himself.

  ‘In the name of God and the Blessed Virgin . . .’ mouthed the knight, ‘by the nails of Jesus Christ, if you are a Christian, get me out of here.’

  Was he a Christian?

  ‘You wouldn’t be able to take two steps,’ said Hernando, dismissing the question he had asked himself. ‘Besides, there are thousands of Morisco soldiers camped here. Where would you go? Stay quiet while I take a look at you.’

  The wound seemed deep. Could it have affected his lungs? What did he know? Hernando examined the wound again; then did the same
with the knight’s face. He wasn’t spitting blood. So what? What possible significance did it have that he wasn’t spitting blood? The only thing he knew with any certainty was that if the knight died, he died too. He had noticed a change in Barrax’s attitude; it was very different now from when he had been trying to win him over. Now he spoke to him in exactly the same way he addressed Ubaid or any of his men. Like most of the Berbers and janissaries, the corsair captain was worried about the course the war was taking. And if Hernando didn’t die, he would row as a galley slave on the Flying Horse for the rest of his life. Who would pay a single maravedí of ransom for a Christian who was really a Muslim? He touched the knight’s forehead: it was very hot; the wound must have become infected. Hernando knew this from treating his mules. He had to get rid of the infection and staunch the bleeding. As for any internal wounds . . .

  He needed horns. He called Yusuf.

  ‘Tell the commander I need two or three horns, preferably stag horns, a pestle, a bowl and whatever it takes to light a fire—’

  ‘Where are we going to find horns?’ the boy interrupted him.

  ‘From the harquebusiers. Many of them keep their gunpowder in them. I’ll also need a strip of copper, bandages, fresh water and cloths. Run!’

  When Yusuf returned, Hernando started to grind down the end of one of the horns in the pestle.

  ‘Barrax told me to stay with you and help,’ said the boy when Hernando turned to him.

  ‘In that case, you see to the horns. You need to grind the tips.’

  Yusuf began his work. Hernando undressed the knight, who by now seemed to be only semi-conscious, then cleaned the wound with fresh water. Once Yusuf had finished grinding the ends of the horns, he heated the powder in the pestle and smeared the ashes on the wound. The knight groaned. Hernando covered the wound with the copper strip and wound a bandage round it.

  Which God should he entrust himself to from now on?

  Fátima had driven Brahim crazy. He did not allow her to leave the hut that he had ordered built for the two of them in the camp. He even neglected his duties to the King in order to be with her. Aisha, her children and Humam took refuge under some branches beside the hut. Fátima showed complete indifference when Brahim went anywhere near her. Enraged by her contempt, the muleteer would beat her until she submitted to him. He forced her to caress him and she did so until Brahim was in ecstasy, but he found only scorn in her big dark almond eyes. She obeyed his commands. She gave herself to him, yet each time the muleteer found only her passive body, the girl won a small revenge, but this was a satisfaction that always faded during the endless days she spent cooped up in the hut.

  One night, Brahim appeared with a terrified Humam dangling from his right hand like a heavy sack.

  ‘I will kill him if you don’t change the way you behave,’ Brahim threatened her.

  From that night on, with Humam always near them to remind her what would happen to him should she fail to satisfy her new husband, Fátima was forced to recreate everything she had learnt from her mother and the other Morisco women about the art of love. She tried to remember what had pleased her first husband, and to recall all the chat between the women about how they fulfilled their menfolk’s needs. Time and again she feigned the pleasure she had denied Brahim until now. Afterwards, Brahim left her on her own, taking Humam with him. Alone in the hut, she spent most of her time praying and watching Aisha and her son through the cracks in the wall. She wept and stroked the hand of Fátima still hanging round her neck, waiting for the moment when she could suckle her child. This was the only time her husband allowed her to be with him, as he sought to isolate her from everyone, including her son.

  Meanwhile, on the opposite side of Aben Aboo’s camp from where the Moriscos came and went to skirmish with the Duke of Sesa’s soldiers, Hernando was trying to save the Christian’s life . . . and his own. For some days, the knight remained semi-conscious, fighting the infection. When he was awake he prayed, commending himself to Jesus Christ and the Virgin while Hernando took the chance to give him some broth to drink. On one occasion, he asked Hernando to pray with him, refusing to take any food until he did so. Hernando yielded, and prayed while trying to force some of the broth into the knight’s mouth, although most of it ended up trickling through his beard. Another time, when he was completely lucid, the man fixed his gaze on Hernando’s blue eyes.

  ‘Those are the eyes of a Christian,’ he said, peering down at his tattered clothes. ‘Set me free. I will pay you back.’

  If I were to do that, where would he go? thought Hernando, glancing at the shadow of the Berber on permanent guard outside the tent.

  ‘What is your name?’ he asked.

  The nobleman again peered into Hernando’s blue eyes. ‘I will not bring the dishonour of dying in the tent of a renegade corsair down on my family, nor will I have my Prince worry about my captivity.’

  ‘If you don’t say who you are, they will not be able to ransom you.’

  ‘There will be time enough for that if I survive. I am aware I am worth a great deal of money, but if I am to die here I would prefer to do so without my people knowing.’

  Hernando read the inscription on one side of the flat hexagonal blade of the noble’s hand-and-a-half sword hanging with Hamid’s scimitar from the post at the tent entrance. Ever since Barrax had brought in the wounded Christian Hernando had had to sleep in the commander’s tent, with a guard outside night and day. On the first evening, the corsair had caught him stealing a glance at the scimitar on the floor in the corner. He had gone across, picked it up, and hung it from the wooden post next to the knight’s sword. The Berber on guard watched him in silence.

  ‘If you wish to die,’ Barrax warned Hernando, ‘all you need do is brandish one of these.’

  From that moment on, whenever he came into the tent Barrax would glance across at the post and the guard nearby.

  ‘Do not unsheathe me without reason or sheathe me without honour’, read the inscription on the nobleman’s sword. Hernando peered at the face of the sleeping knight. What reason did the Spanish have to unsheathe their weapons? They were violating the peace treaty signed by their monarchs at the surrender of Granada. The Moriscos too were subjects of the Christian kings. They had been for years, paying more tithes to their majesties than any Christian did; ridiculed and hated, they had dedicated themselves to working peacefully for the good of their families on harsh, inhospitable land that had been theirs since time immemorial. They were Muslims, plain and simple, but Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand knew that on the day they had pledged peace. What kind of peace was it that they were offering? Following the Alpujarra uprising, Philip II’s territory was swamped with Morisco slaves. Merchants bought and sold them for next to nothing all over Spain. Thousands of subjects of the King, forced to become Christians, found themselves enslaved. The same King! It was said that in the Indies, a place also ruled by that King, the natives who were baptized by force could not be made slaves. Why should the Moriscos be any different? Why did the Church not defend both peoples equally, when they were both vassals of the same King? It was said that the natives of the Indies ate human flesh, worshipped idols and believed in their witch doctors, and yet the Spanish monarchs had exempted them from slavery. Muslims on the other hand believed in the same God of Abraham as the Christians, they did not eat human flesh, nor did they worship idols, yet, despite having been baptized and forced to share the same faith. they could be enslaved!

  Hernando too was a slave – for being a Christian! What sort of madness was that? To some, he was just a Morisco whom they would kill as they did all those over twelve years of age; to others he was a Christian who would row for the rest of his life in a corsair galley – if they didn’t kill him first. And if he swore to uphold the Muslim faith, his own faith, he would become the plaything of a renegade. He, who had been born a Muslim! Or did the Christian blood running through his veins count for something? The knight would be ransomed for a sack of gold coins
that would make the corsair wealthy. Barrax would return to Algiers a rich man while the nobleman would go back to the lands he owned to take up the fight against the Moriscos once more, and go on making slaves of them.

  21

  DECREE IN FAVOUR OF ALL WHO SURRENDER

  My Lord the King, aware that the majority of the Moriscos from this kingdom of Granada who rebelled against his laws did so moved not by their own will but were cajoled and compelled, duped and persuaded into the revolt by agitators and troublemakers, chiefs and leaders who moved among them and continue to do so; which said persons enticed them to rise up for their own ends, so that they might enjoy and help themselves to the property of the common people, and not in order to bestow any benefit on them; and having despatched men of war to punish them as befitted their sins and crimes, who retook the places they had seized on the Almanzora River, in the Filabres hills and in the Alpujarra, when many of them were killed or taken prisoner, forcing them to wander lost and astray in the mountains, living like savage beasts in the caverns and caves and in the forests, suffering extreme hardship; moved by all this to pity, a virtue befitting his royal status, and wishing to show mercy towards them, considering that they are his subjects and vassals, and moved by his knowledge of the acts of violence, violations of the womenfolk, spillage of blood, robberies and the other great evils that the men of war have committed without excuse, His Majesty has delegated us in his name to treat them with royal clemency and to admit them once more under his royal authority in the following manner:

  Assure all those Moriscos who have rebelled against the due obedience and grace of His Majesty, men and women of whatever status, rank or condition, that if within twenty days from the date of this decree they lay down their arms and place themselves in the hands of His Majesty and Don John of Austria in the King’s name, he will spare their lives, and will listen and dispense justice to all those who can prove that acts of violence and oppression forced them to rebel, dealing with them in accordance with his customary mercy; and further promises similar consideration towards all those who besides giving themselves up and surrendering carry out a particular service, such as slitting the throats of or capturing Turks or Moors from Barbary who have joined forces with the rebels, or doing the same with those others of his kingdom who have been captains and generals in the rebellion and who persist in their sedition, refusing to accept the grace and mercy His Majesty sees fit to bestow on them.