Chapter 17 #2
For the next few days, Anne helped Luisa rest, using some of the spells her sister Mary had favored to weave peaceful, happy dreams so Luisa could have a break from the pain she carried.
On the third day after Anne began her ministrations, Luisa agreed to some bread and broth, and after a week, she began to speak. Her first word was to Anne: “Gracias.”
That success had been wonderful and exhausting, and now, even months later, it kept Anne afloat.
Blending magick and science was painstaking work, Dr. Al-Bashar and Anne reviewing spells a dozen times over before putting them to use.
Sometimes the spells made no difference.
But every now and again, Anne’s words could brighten a clouded mind or calm a troubled thought, and there was a singular type of joy found in healing that Anne had never known before, knitting together a part of her heart that had cracked when she left her former life behind.
As the weeks went by, she and Dr. Al-Bashar had gotten into a rhythm of working together every morning, then sharing a mealtime.
The early March weather was cool, bordering on cold, but Anne and the doctor found a sunny patch in the hospital courtyard tucked away from the wind, Anne thinking smugly of how England would be swamped by rain this time of year while Madrid enjoyed milder days.
Students and teachers and witches called out greetings as they passed, and Anne smiled and waved around her meal of bread and cheese.
She hadn’t been among so many people since she had lived in the palace, and sometimes it still felt strange to be treated like any other woman rather than a queen.
Though Gisa knew the truth, Anne and Lina had been careful not to bring up their pasts around anyone else, not even Dr. Al-Bashar, but Anne often wondered just how much the woman knew.
After all, neither Anne nor Lina hid their education, and there were precious few women who were afforded such opportunities in Europe, their number almost exclusively noble or royal born.
“How did you come to be a physician?” Anne asked, curious what Dr. Al-Bashar’s own upbringing had been like.
Dr. Al-Bashar was eating from a tin of almonds and dried dates, and she chewed thoughtfully for a moment before answering.
“My father was a physician, and my mother his assistant. For centuries, my family lived in Granada, at least until the Inquisition began. We were once Muslim, but became Moriscos to avoid exile. For a while, it worked, and we were safe.”
Anne’s jaw went tight. Why was it that the world insisted upon tearing itself to pieces over religion? She would never understand being so convinced your god was better than someone else’s that you’d fear or hate or kill those who didn’t believe.
“When my cousins were suspected of having lapsed in their new Christian faith, they were expelled from Granada. Their reputation tainted ours. My father lost patients and income, my mother succumbed to fever, and my father died a broken man not long after.”
Anne dropped her eyes, knowing that despite all she had been through, she could never understand that kind of persecution and trauma. “I am very sorry.”
The physician paused to take a breath. “By then I had learned my father’s trade and was treating anyone who needed help, regardless of whether they could pay.
One day, I helped a woman take care of a pregnancy she did not want.
She was a noblewoman in the Spanish court, and her husband was abusive, prone to fits of violence even against his pregnant wife.
She feared for her life and the child’s and decided not to bring a baby into such a dangerous world.
The woman told me about the Sisterhood—or, at least, the rumors she had heard—and put me in touch with a contact in the north.
Eventually I made my way to Madrid and the hospital, where I met Lady Marguerite.
She was perhaps the first person, besides my parents, to truly see me for who I was and what I had to offer. ”
Anne knew that feeling. Her younger days in France had given Anne a similar sense of coming into her own, encouraged by Marguerite’s unwavering vision for the future of womankind.
And now here she was, being reborn again.
Just look at her: The sleeves of her dress, a simple linen thing she wouldn’t have imagined wearing two years ago, were rolled to her elbows, and her hands were dry, cracked, and scarred.
(The doctor had her washing her hands constantly, explaining that every time Anne used her blood magick, she risked infection if the cuts weren’t properly cleaned.
Anne had argued that bloodletting knives were always bespelled against disease, but Dr. Al-Bashar said science won out over magick every time.) Gone were the hands of a noblewoman, of a queen, and in their place were the hands of a—dare she say it—healer.
Scars, calluses, and even her missing pinkie made Anne feel she had re-earned her place among the Sisterhood.
Anne brought herself back to the present moment, realizing she’d been asked a question.
“I’m sorry?”
“I asked whether you are still feeling any pains from your wound,” Dr. Al-Bashar said, pointing to Anne’s hand. She must have noticed Anne looking. “Do you feel it has improved?”
Anne’s attention went back to her missing finger, where she traced the mass of scars from a life that now seemed little more than a dream.
“Yes and no,” she replied. “Some days, I don’t notice it at all.
On others, it still burns like someone has put a smoldering ember underneath my skin.
But even on the painful days, I am reminded that my freedom was well worth the price. ”
She had told Dr. Al-Bashar that she had cast the curse that cost her finger to escape her ex-husband, but she had not mentioned that husband happened to be the king of England, may he rot in the deepest, hottest depths of hell.
They were quiet for a few moments, watching the last of the leaves on the courtyard trees flutter and cling to their branches in the early-spring breeze. Soon, those leaves would be growing again.
“Do you think about it often? The life you left behind?” The physician seemed focused on her own meal, but Anne knew she was listening closely for an answer.
So she answered honestly. “Every single day.”
But ever since that conversation with Lina when they’d learned of Jane Seymour’s death, she hadn’t let the fury back in.
And now, after long months of practice, Anne found she could think of Elizabeth without wanting to cry.
And she could think of Henry without wanting to scream. Or, at least, not so loudly.
“Don’t get stuck living in the past,” Dr. Al-Bashar advised, standing up and brushing off the apron she wore while working in the hospital. She extended a hand to Anne and helped her to her feet.
Anne took a deep breath, pulling a last bit of fresh air and sunlight into her lungs before they returned to work. “I am doing my best,” she replied. And in her heart, the words rang true.