Chapter Seventeen: FORTES FORTUNA ADIUVAT

The Jade Steps:
Chapter Seventeen:  Fortes Fortuna Adiuvat

When they arrived at the city of Tlaxcala[1], there was an enormous welcoming party to greet the Spaniards. Different clans of Tlaxcalans dressed in differing colors, their maguey or henniquen cloaks all painted and embroidered. A contingent of priests with their burning copal performed fumigations, wearing long white hooded robes, their hair long and blood-encrusted, blood oozing from their ears, and with fingernails several inches long. The streets and rooftops were thronging with smiling Indians who showered the Spaniards with roses of varying hues.

When they reached the central plaza, King Xicotencatl took Cortez by the hand and led him to a palace, explaining, “This shall be your home in Tlaxcala for as long as you wish.” He assured Cortez that all his men, all the Totonacs and Xocotlans, and even the Mesheeka nobles, would be well housed. Upon his signal, hundreds of servants began streaming into the plaza bearing cooked turkeys, maize cakes, fruits and vegetables for all. The soldiers all agreed it was the best they had eaten since leaving Cuba.

With everyone so joyously happy, Cortez and Malinali retired to their quarters. They had not had any time together since Zautla – so they did not waste any time now, making love fiercely and quickly. Afterwards, noticing Malinali was staring into space, Cortez asked her what she was thinking about.

“Mixtli….” was her whispered reply. “Clouds… a bright blue sky filled with small puffy clouds, with the two of us jumping from one to the other like stepping stones, playing and laughing.” She looked at him. “I am so happy with you, my Captain.”

“And I with you, my Doña Marina.”

She nestled into his arms. “Tell me about your land of Spain. Señor Bernal says you come from a city called Medellin.”

Cortez smiled with raised eyebrows. “Just what else has Bernal been telling you?” He tickled her and she squealed with laughter. “Ah, my España – it is a very old land. The people of Spain have been there for thousands of years. Many centuries ago – over fifteen – Spain became part of the Empire of Rome. My city was founded by the Romans[2]. They called it Metellium, after their general, Metellius. We have many Roman ruins there – a theatre, a bridge, villas. A small river runs by the town, the Ortigas, where my family had a mill for grinding grain. My father, Martin, had been a soldier, and we would walk along the stream where he would teach me how to swordfight.”

“My father did just the same with me, by the stream that ran by our palace!” Malinali exclaimed.

“Well, we did not have a palace,” was Cortez’s response. “My father was a hidalgo, which is the lowest rank of Spanish nobility. We had a small house in the central square of Medellin, where I was born. My father was the town regidor and procurador, councilor and representative. There was a palace, actually a castle, in Medellin. The closest I ever got to it was with my mother, Catalina. Her father, Don Diego Altamirano, worked for the Count and Countess of Medellin, and she would take me to see my grandfather in the castle when I was a young boy.

“I left when I was twelve[3] to go to school in Salamanca. There was a very famous and very old school there[4] where I studied Latin and the law. You must learn Latin to be a lawyer, because our law comes from Roman law. But I spent more time reading Roman literature and history. A favorite of mine was Terrence[5]. There is a line in one of his plays, Phormio, that I decided would be my life’s motto: Fortes fortuna adiuvat. Fortune favors the brave.

“There was one Roman lawyer, though, who wrote something I will never forget. He was Ulpian of Tyre[6], the most famous legal mind in Roman history. We had to study this huge book of Roman legal writings compiled by an Emperor named Justinian[7]. At least a third of it was by Ulpian. What I will always remember of his was: Omnes homines natura aequales sunt: All men by nature are equal.[8]

“When I read this, I said to myself, ‘This is something our Lord Jesus would say.’ But Ulpian was a pagan Roman, He was not a Christian! It was then that I understood that Jesus was speaking truths to all mankind, that were true for everyone, Christian and non-Christian, and that everyone can recognize them as true.

“Omnes homines natura aequales sunt: All men by nature are equal. You, Doña Marina, me, Hernando Cortez, His Majesty Don Carlos, the Mesheeka King Montezuma, and everyone else are all equal in the eyes of God. As His Son would say, we are all God’s children. That is why… that is why…” Cortez closed his eyes and breathed deeply. “That is why I know that our Lord Jesus has sent me here to end this evil eating of man by man, this slaughter of men in sacrifice to Satan…”

He closed his eyes again. When he opened them, Malinali was silently looking intently into them. He shook his head. “I am sorry. I did not mean to mention such things at a time like this with you.” He kissed her gently and held her tightly.

They held each other for a long time. Then Malinali asked, “So, why aren’t you a lawyer back in Spain?”

Cortez smiled. “I tried… but not for long. I returned to Medellin as a “bachelor of law,” with my family having high hopes of my becoming a letrado, a legal councilor at the court of the King. But what kind of life was that? A life more boring and dull it is impossible to imagine. I could not get Terrence out of my mind: Fortes fortuna adiuvat. Fortune favors the brave.

“So to the great displeasure of my mother and father, I left for Seville, the greatest city in all Spain. It was the seat of the royal court of the great Queen of Castile, Isabella, and the great King of Aragon, Ferdinand V, the great heroes who had defeated the hated Moors in their last stronghold of Grenada and sent the great Admiral Colon[9] to discover this New World, both in the same year[10]. The joining of their kingdoms[11], plus the expulsion of the Moors, created and united our one land of Spain.

“But I had not come to Seville to be at the royal court. I had come to see my cousin, Nicolas de Ovando, and join his expedition to the island of Hispaniola in the New World. But I had an, ah… accident. I hurt my leg from a, ah… fall, and couldn’t go.”

Malinali couldn’t help notice Cortez’s hesitation of embarrassment. Something told her… “It wasn’t a fall from a balcony, was it? A balcony like one in Cuba?” Her eyebrows were arched halfway up her forehead.

“Ahhhh – now I know you have been talking to Bernal too much! It was a window, if you must know.”

“The window of a Señorita’s room?”

Cortez blushed. “Well, her father was very angry, and I had to jump. Actually her father was very wealthy, and I had to leave Seville very quickly. That was in the Year of Our Lord 1502 and I was age 18. So I spent four years traveling to the great cities of Spain – Grenada, Cordoba, Valencia, Segovia, and Valladolid – working in various law offices, finally returning to Seville when it was safe for me. I learned that a ship, La Trinidad, was sailing for Hispaniola and the captain, Antonio Quintero, agreed to take me. That was our year 1506 and I was age 22. I have not been back to Spain since.”

“You talk of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, but never of your King Don Carlos. When did you meet him?” Malinali wanted to know.

Cortez laughed and shook his head. “I have never met the man. He doesn’t know I exist.”

* * * * *

Malinali’s head snapped back in amazement. “What??!! Then how… then why….” Her stammering dwindled into speechlessness.

Cortez was still laughing. “I should say I never met the boy. He was only six years old when I left Spain[12]. Besides, he was born in Flanders[13] — that’s over 300 leagues[14] on a horse to Spain’s northern border. He speaks French, not Spanish. He never set foot in Spain until two years ago – and that was over a year after he became King of Spain! At least his mother is Spanish, but she is insane.”

All Malinali could do was mutely, uncomprehendingly stare at him.

Cortez sighed. “All right, I will explain. Ferdinand and Isabella had one son, Juan, who was to be king, but he died young before he had any children. They had four daughters. Ysabel married King Manuel of Portugal. She died in childbirth, so Manuel married her sister, Maria, and now she’s Queen of Portugal. Catherine married King Henry VIII of England, so she’s Queen of England[15]. Joanna married Philip, the son of the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian…”

“The Holy what…?” Malinali managed to interject.

“There’s a giant confederation of princedoms and kingdoms of all Central Europe that the Holy Father in Rome calls the Holy Roman Empire. It’s a way the Church tries to keep peace between them. The famous king Carolus Magnus[16] was declared the first Holy Roman Emperor many centuries ago. The Hapsburg family now leads it. Maximilian is a Hapsburg.

“Flanders is part of this confederation, and that’s where Philip is from. Joanna and Philip had a son, Carlos, Charles. Queen Isabella died in the year 1504. By now Joanna has become known as La Loca, Joanna the Mad. She poisons Philip and kills him in 1506. Thus when I left Spain, this crazy woman and her six year-old son were the only heirs to the Spanish monarchy. When King Ferdinand died three years ago in 1516, his 16 year-old grandson, Carlos, ordered that his crazy mother – who technically was now Queen of Castile – be locked in a dark room without windows in the Black Castle of Tordesillas[17], so that he could rule unchallenged as the King of all Spain.”

Malinali still had a look of bewilderment. Before she could say anything, Cortez gently put a finger to her lips.

“Yes, my Doña Marina, it is all a ruse, my pretending to speak for Don Carlos, my telling the Mesheeka that he knows about them, that he knows of ‘the Great Lord Montezuma.’ How could that be true? We, this little band of Spaniards here in Tlaxcala right now, are the first to ever hear of him. Thousands of leagues from here across the Great Ocean, this now 19 year-old boy is desperately trying to keep a country from coming apart that was just put together by his grandparents. A country vastly larger than this land here of the Mesheeka and their neighbors.

“Does Pontochan seem a long way from your Paynala? It’s about 40 leagues. We have gone maybe 50 leagues from Cempoala to Tlaxcala. It is at least four times that from one end of Spain to the other: 200 leagues. Plus this: before I left Cuba, we heard that Maximilian was in poor health. Don Carlos is a Hapsburg through his father. He may be the next Holy Roman Emperor[18], trying to rule hundreds of kings and princes in a land larger than you can imagine, over a thousand leagues from one end to the other. So he does not know about or care about us. But he soon will.”

Before Malinali had a chance to blurt “How?”, Cortez answered her.

“My Doña Marina, there is another way of saying Fortes fortuna adiuvat, fortune favors the brave. If you really believe that, it means that a man can create his own destiny. I am the son of a fine man that no one ever heard of beyond the town of Medellin. I arrived in Hispaniola with only a desire to make a nice comfortable life for myself. And I did. I saw the best chance for me was in the new colony of Cuba. I worked hard raising cattle and mining for gold, I had a beautiful hacienda, and I was elected alcalde, mayor of the capital city, Santiago de Cuba.

“I had achieved what I wanted, I was successful and respected – and I was no longer a young man. When I first heard the stories of another world from the men who came back from Cordoba’s and Grijalva’s expeditions, I ignored them. What did this other world have to do with me? Yet it was me whom Diego Velazquez asked to organize a third expedition after the failure of the first two. I was prepared to refuse, but when Andres de Duero, Velasquez’s secretary, showed me the instructions for the expedition, I hesitated.

“I remember the day[19] so well. It began by saying the principal purpose of the expedition was to serve God. We were to bring the Word of the One True God and of the salvation offered by His Son to those whom we encountered. All Indians we met were to be well treated, especially women, whom we were forbidden to tease or molest in any way. We were to place all lands we discovered under the protection of the King of Spain, Don Carlos. It was a capitulacion, a formal contract giving us legal authority from His Majesty himself through his agent, Governor Velazquez. Which meant, we were acting in the King’s name, by his authority, and he must by law be informed of what we accomplished.

“I signed the contract without any more hesitation. For the words carpe diem, seize the day, thundered in my brain. I knew at that moment that this was my chance to create my destiny, to do what my God meant for me to do, to accomplish a great work of which my God and my King would be proud. Now do you see, my beautiful Doña Marina?”

“Yes,” she whispered into his ear. They lay quietly, not saying a word. Then Malinali’s forehead crinkled with a question. “But why now is Diego Velazquez your enemy?”

A rueful grin crept across Cortez’s face. “That is another story,” was his reply. “Let us just enjoy this time we have together.”

[1] September 18, 1519.
[2] 75 B.C.
[3] 1496. Cortez was born in 1484. In 1519, Cortez was 35, Malinali was 19.
[4] The University of Salamanca, founded by Alfonso IX of Leon in 1218, is the oldest university in Spain and one of the oldest in Europe.
[5] Publius Terentius Afer, 190-159 B.C.
[6] Domitius Ulpianus, fl. 222 A.D.
[7] 483-565 A.D.
[8] Digest of Justinian, 17.32.
[9] Christopher Columbus, 1451-1506.
[10] 1492.
[11] Ferdinand (1452-1516) and Isabella (1451-1504) were married in 1469.
[12] Charles – Don Carlos I of Spain, Holy Roman Emperor Charles V – was born February 25, 1500 and died September 21, 1558.
[13] In the Flemish town of Ghent, now in western Belgium.
[14] Close to a thousand miles.
[15] Catherine of Aragon (1485-1536) married King Henry VIII on June 11, 1509. After 23 years of marriage producing no male heir, Henry secretly married his mistress Anne Boleyn in January, 1533 and ordered Thomas Cranmer Archbishop of Canterbury to annul his marriage to Catherine in May. Excommunicated by Pope Clement VII, Henry created the Church of England.
[16] Charlemagne, 747-814.
[17] Joanna La Loca remained incarcerated there until her death, April 12, 1555.
[18] See note 23.
[19] October 23, 1518. A copy is in the Archivo General de Indias (AGI) in Seville, Patronato legajo 15.