Page 9 of The Familiar

“If there is even a hint of heresy in your miracles, the inquisitors will snap you up and ship you off to Toledo for trial.”

“How else am I to make my way in the world? You have remarked more than once that I am no beauty. I have no talents but this little bit of …”

Hualit seized on her hesitation. “What name will you give this, Luzia? Do you think to pretend the angels speak to you with your murky blood? Rome is already pushing for an end to the study of astrology and divination.” She glanced at the altar as if the saints themselves might be listening. “The Church owns miracles. Not scullion girls and street prophets. You are no beata doing good works.”

Luzia felt a kind of frantic anger that sat in the hollow of her throat, an ache that if she wasn’t careful would turn to hot tears and make her look like a child. She took a long breath, trying to swallow the bitter mix of panic and rage and something nameless that had the shape of a bird, lost in the rafters of a building, searching for sky.

“I can’t remain as I am,” she managed. “My back is already twisting from the weight of water and washing and baskets full of apples. I’m growing old before I’ve had the chance to be young.”

“There are worse things for us women.”

Us women. As if they were the same. It was not just a difference in stature or comforts. She and Hualit were not a pampered hound with a silky coat set next to a stray dog scrounging for scraps in the rubbish. They weren’t even the same class of creature. Luzia lived like a rat, and her only choice was to stay hidden or risk death. How many times had she complained to Hualit about the misery of her situation? But nothing had changed; there had been no pearls or offers from noble ladies until she’d dared to creep from the kitchen and let herself be seen.

“You say there are worse things, tía. But I say a quick death is better than a slow one.”

Hualit rolled her eyes. “You are not in danger of dying from hard work. You think you know hardship, but men have a gift for finding new ways to make women suffer. If they don’t charge you with witchcraft, you’ll be branded a Judaizer. You are walking onto the pyre and whistling while you do it.”

“A conversa is not the same as a Jew.”

Now Hualit’s jaw set. “It is to them. Never forget that. You think because we were dunked in water and whispered over by a priest, they consider us real Christians? We are poison to them. Something they’ve been forced to swallow that eats away at the very substance of who they are. You’ve shown off your little tricks. This must be the end of it.”

“Is it me you fear for or yourself?”

“There is room in my large heart for us both.”

“No one knows I’m your niece.”

“How many questions will it take before you tell the inquisitors who I am, where I live? Before they learn you have the taint of the Jew in your blood? Do you not see where this is headed? Where is your own fear, Luzia?”

It was still there, alive and squirming, waking her in the night like a squalling newborn. Of course she was afraid. But she wasn’t sorry. Not when she might carve some real luck from this moment. Her mother and father had vanished from the earth as if they’d been consumed, as if they’d never been here at all, uncelebrated, unsung, mourned by no one but Luzia and Hualit. Better to live in fear than in grinding discontent. Better to dare this new path than continue her slow, grim march down the road that had been chosen for her. At least the scenery would be different.

She reached into her pocket and held out Valentina’s pearl. “Can you sell it for me?”

Hualit took the earring and held it up to the light. “You really do work for paupers, don’t you? This is shit.”

“So you can’t sell it?”

“It’s shit but it’s still a pearl. You didn’t steal it, did you? I won’t sell stolen jewels. Even my friends have some standards.”

“It was a gift.”

“I think you mean a bribe.”

“I suppose it depends who you’re asking,” Luzia countered.

“What do you intend to do with the money?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“Of course you don’t.”

“I’ll buy a hat covered in ostrich feathers.”

“You might as well throw your money in the river.”

“Then the fish and I will be happy.”

“For a time.”