Chapter 1
Esteban POV
The stone of the balcony is hot enough to burn his palms. It is a brutal reminder of the relentless Spanish sun that ruled the sky. He stood like a monument of dark iron against the white heat of the afternoon. His broad shoulders blocked the light and cast a long shadow across the marble floor. Below him the citadel is a sprawling maze of sun baked stone and red clay tiles. It is a city he was sworn to bleed for but would never be permitted to rule.
At twenty-seven years of age he bore the map of a life lived in the margins. His hair is the color of a starless night and unruly in the dry wind. It matched the thick dark stubble that shadowed a jawline forged by years of clenching his teeth against royal insults. To the court he is a living blasphemy. They saw his obsidian eyes and the high sharp blades of his cheekbones and whispered of the Moorish whore who had supposedly tainted the bloodline.
While his younger brother was raised in the cool shade of silk tapestries and choral music he had been tempered by the sting of salt air and the weight of a breastplate. His skin is the color of burnished cedar. It is a deep bronze that refused to reflect the sun and absorbed it instead. A jagged silver scar tracked vertically through his right eyebrow and down his cheek. It was a souvenir from the siege of Oran where he had traded his blood to hold back the Ottoman tide while his brother is sheltered within the scented halls of the inner palace.
He is the shadow in the sanctuary and the moon to his brother’s sun. He is a master of the ply which was the brutal and intricate folding of steel and strategy. His hand moved instinctively to the pommel of his sword as a soft rustle disturbed the silence behind him.
As he turned to see who it is, he found a woman standing in the doorway. She is his own age or perhaps a few years younger with a wild spill of red curls that defied her modest head covering. Freckles speckled her pale skin like sun-drenched sand and her green eyes were as bright and sharp as a spring apple. She was the Queen’s embroiderer. She wore a heavy dress of pomegranate linen with a dull golden trim that marked her as a member of the royal household. At her throat hung a silver cross which was a loud and shining devotion to the Church.
As he looked at her he realized he had never truly seen her before. Perhaps she was a new addition to the palace staff or perhaps he had simply never taken the time to look at the servants who moved like ghosts through the halls. Before him she stood out like a flame in a stone cellar. She possessed the soft curves of a woman well fed and well kept with a bosom that strained against the laces of her bodice and a waist that tapered into the elegant shape of a lute. She stood with a grace that suggested she could be a princess rather than a mere handmaiden.
She did not look away as she reached the threshold. Instead she clutched a bundle of fine linens to her chest as if they were a shield. There is a secret strength in the way she held her chin even as she performed a shallow curtsy that is required by his rank.
Esteban turned his full attention to her. She looked up at him with a startling amount of grace.
“My Lord,” she said. Her voice is steady but soft. “Their Majesties are requesting your presence in the throne room.”
Esteban nodded. He did not realize he was staring at her until the silence between them stretched too thin. He traced the line of her throat and the way her red curls caught the afternoon light. He had seen thousands of women in the markets of Seville and the ports of Oran but none of them had ever made the air in his lungs feel quite this heavy.
Her face started to redden under the weight of his gaze. She adjusted the bundle of linen in her arms and spoke again to break the tension.
“They wish to see you as soon as possible.”
Esteban coughed to clear the sudden tightness in his chest. He gestured for her to lead the way and she began to escort him through the winding stone corridors toward the heart of the palace. As they walked he watched the sway of her pomegranate skirts and the way she clutched the white fabric to her chest.
They walked past the guards who stood like statues in their heavy crimson tabards. Each man wore the royal gold trim and the crest of the yoke and arrows embroidered across his chest. Dozens of servants hurried back and forth in a frantic dance of duty but the air felt different as they passed.
A man of his trade lived by the details and he noticed the way the knights in the hall began to turn their heads. They looked at the woman with a certain kind of hunger. And my dear reader it is not the same type of hunger one feels for a meal. It is a dark and predatory appetite that turned her into a prize rather than a person.
He saw the way the stares weighed on her. She clutched the bundle of linen tighter to her chest as they approached the heavy oak doors of the throne room. Her shoulders were tense but she kept her chin high and her eyes fixed forward as if the filth in their expressions could not touch her.
Inside of him a sudden heat flared. He wanted to place himself between her and their prying eyes. He wanted to shield her from the sickness of their gaze. He silently shook his head to clear the thought. What is he doing? He did not even know this woman. She is a servant of the Queen and he is a man who lived on the edge of a blade. He had no business feeling protective over a girl whose name he had yet to hear.
They arrived at the towering oak doors of the throne room where two guards stood as rigid as stone. Their halberds caught the light and their crimson tabards remained perfectly still.
“Please announce to their Majesties that we have arrived,” the woman said.
Her voice is steady but he could see the slight tremor in her hands. One of the guards bowed his head slightly and slipped inside. Esteban took notice of the man’s face. There is a peculiar dark mole on the side of his nose that looks like a drop of dried ink. It is a detail a soldier never forgot.
Moments later the guard returned and pulled the heavy doors wide. Esteban and the woman stepped into a room that breathed extravagance and power. The ceiling is a high canopy of carved cedar and gold leaf which formed a geometric heaven above their heads. The air smelled of expensive beeswax and the faint sharp scent of old parchment. Huge tapestries depicting Christian victories hung on the walls and muffled the sound of their footsteps on the polished marble floors.
At the far end of the hall atop a dais of stone sat the Catholic Monarchs. Queen Isabella sat with a spine as straight as a spear. She is a woman of pale complexion and strawberry blonde hair that peeked from beneath her silken veil. Her blue eyes were famously sharp and observant. She wore a heavy gown of deep Tyrian purple which is a color so expensive it is reserved for the soul of the state. Beside her sat King Ferdinand. He is a man of shorter stature but possessed a sturdy and athletic build. His hair is dark and thinning at the crown and his face is bronzed from his time on the battlefield. He wore a doublet of rich sapphire blue with a collar of heavy gold links that clinked as he shifted.
They looked like gods carved from the very history of Spain. Esteban felt the familiar weight of his own “tainted” blood as he prepared to bow before the two people who held the power to either grant him a life or sign his death warrant.
“Your Majesties,” he began as he dropped to one knee. “You wish to see me?”
He kept his head bowed and did not notice the woman move quietly toward the Queen. She flowed like a shadow to Isabella’s side and leaned in to whisper a few soft words into the royal ear. The Queen gave a single and sharp nod of approval. Without a word the woman turned and slipped out of the throne room while clutching the linen sheets to her chest. The heavy doors thudded shut behind her and left Esteban alone with the power of Spain.
Ferdinand looked down at him with an unreadable expression. His dark eyes searched Esteban’s face for any sign of the “Moorish” defiance the court so often gossiped about.
“Rise my son,” Ferdinand said. His voice is deep and lacked the warmth usually found in a father’s tone. “There is no need for such formalities here.”
Esteban rose and clasped his hands behind his back. He forced himself to look his father in the eye. He stood taller than the King and the height difference always seemed to make the room feel smaller.
Ferdinand leaned back in his throne and adjusted the sapphire sleeve of his doublet. “I hear your envoy to the Sublime Porte in Constantinople went well. I presume the Sultan was as difficult as the rumors suggest?”
It had been four years since he had last spoken to the King in person. During those long seasons in the East their only connection had been through letters written in code. Those papers discussed the delicate trade relations between the cross and the crescent. Esteban had only returned to his homeland the previous day to deliver the Sultan’s final terms in person.
“The Sultan wishes for a greater share of our silver and mercury mines,” Esteban said. He kept his voice steady and showed neither agreement nor disapproval. “In return he offers us a monopoly on the silk and spice routes passing through his ports.”
Ferdinand gripped the arms of his throne until his knuckles turned as white as the marble floor. Before the Queen could even breathe a word of caution he snatched his golden goblet from the side table and hurled it against the stone. The ring of the metal echoed like a gunshot through the silent hall.
“The Sultan is getting greedy,” Ferdinand spat. His face is twisted in the cold and jagged temper that had made him the most feared man in Europe. He looked like a wolf who had been told he could not eat.
Isabella placed a steadying hand on Ferdinand’s arm. Her touch is light but it carried the weight of a command. The King’s breathing slowed as he felt the pressure of her fingers.
“We are the defenders of the Faith,” Isabella said. Her voice is like velvet over a blade. “We do not let infidels dictate the price of our own earth. But perhaps there is a middle path.”
She looked at Esteban. Her blue eyes were piercing and felt as though they were stripping away his skin to see the Moorish blood beneath.
“Tell me,” she said. “Did you find the Sultan’s court to be as decadent as they say or were you too busy admiring the architecture of their mosques?”
Esteban clenched his jaw at the Queen’s insult. It is a familiar sting. Despite being raised in the shadow of the crucifix and the Catholic faith she still expected him to betray God and Country at the first sight of a minaret. He knew the Queen did not hate him simply because he is a bastard. She hated him because he is a reminder that the King’s blood could be mingled with something she considered unholy. If his mother had been a Catholic Spaniard she might have looked at him with pity. Because his mother was a Moor she looked at him with suspicion.
He kept his expression as cold as a mountain stream.
“Your Majesty,” he responded in a measured tone. “Despite the differences between our nations the Sultan’s court still holds a graceful manner much like our own. They value strength and the word of a man who does not flinch.”
The Queen did not offer a comeback. He could see the flash of cold fire in her eyes that told him his answer had struck a nerve. He had dared to compare the “infidel” court to her own and she would not forget the slight.
Isabella forced a thin and bloodless smile that did not reach her sharp blue eyes.
“Perhaps your time in the East has colored your judgment,” she said. Her voice is as soft as silk and just as dangerous. “Maybe we should send someone else to finish the negotiations with the Sultan. Someone whose loyalties are not quite so complicated by the ghosts of their ancestry.”
Ferdinand shifted in his throne. He looked between his wife and his son and realized the room had become a powder keg. He knew that removing Esteban would weaken the deal but he also knew better than to openly cross Isabella when she is in a defensive mood about the Faith.
“We shall consider it,” Ferdinand muttered. He looked toward the side of the room where the shadows gathered near a heavy velvet curtain. “What say you to this matter? Do you think the commander has spent too much time admiring the architecture of Constantinople?”
From the gloom stepped a man dressed in the stark black and white robes of the Dominican order. He is the King’s closest advisor and a high ranking official within the Holy Office of the Inquisition. His face is as pale and narrow as a prayer candle and his eyes were sunken deep into a skull that seemed too small for his skin. He did not walk so much as he glided across the marble floor.
“Architecture is a gateway to the soul,” the advisor said. His voice is a dry raspy whisper that sounded like parchment rubbing together. “To admire the beauty of a mosque is to entertain the logic of the infidel. I have often wondered if the commander finds the call to prayer more musical than the ringing of our own cathedral bells.”
The man stopped beside the Queen’s throne and placed a thin hand on the back of her chair. He gave Esteban a look of feigned pity.
“Loyalty is not a garment one puts on and takes off,” the advisor continued. “It is in the marrow of the bone. If the Queen feels that a more devout representative is needed to secure the interests of the Cross then it is our duty to provide one.”
Esteban felt the muscles in his back tighten. He knew this man. He is the type of predator who searched for heresy in the way a man breathed or the way he trimmed his beard. To have the Inquisition questioning his diplomatic successes is a death sentence draped in the language of concern.
Ferdinand looked at his advisor and then back at Esteban. The King is caught between the practical need for his son’s skill and the religious pressure of his court.
“Is that what you believe?” Ferdinand asked. “That my son has forgotten who he serves?”
The advisor gave a slow and thin smile that did not show his teeth.
“No sire,” Hernán said. “I do not believe he has forgotten. But perhaps if the commander stays within these castle walls he will in time relearn his place. He has spent so many years in the wild lands that he has forgotten the rhythm of the chapel and the requirements of a faithful heart.”
Ferdinand looked at Esteban. There was a flicker of something like regret in the King’s eyes but it was quickly snuffed out by the political necessity of pleasing the Church. He gave a sharp and final nod.
“Fine Hernán,” Ferdinand said. “I want you to make sure that he is welcomed home properly. He is to remain within the citadel until further notice. He will be stripped of his traveling duties and assigned to the local guard until we decide if his judgment has cleared.”
The Queen looked satisfied. She leaned back in her throne and her purple skirts rustled like the wings of a predatory bird. Esteban felt the trap snap shut around his ankles. Being “welcomed home” by a man like Hernán meant being watched at every meal and followed to every prayer. It meant his every word would be weighed for heresy.
“Go now,” Ferdinand said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “Go and find your brother. He has been asking after you since the sun rose.”
Esteban bowed low. He did not trust his voice to speak. He turned and walked toward the heavy oak doors and his boots clicked against the marble with the rhythm of a funeral march. As he stepped out into the hallway he saw the two guards again. The one with the dark mole on his nose was watching him with a new and bolder intensity.
