Fall 1521

The effervescent green of the valleys beamed in the morning sun. A soft wind breathed. A stillness fell upon the granite walls surrounding the shoulders of the valley. The peaks triumphed yet pressed down upon them in the Cirque de Gavarnie as the red deer creaked his knees, slowly turning his head and tiptoeing into the open of the sun-kissed valley of God’s great greenery.

The unusual warmth of this particular fall had kept the herds in the higher regions of the Pyrenees. Forty meters away, a Spanish arrow peaked through the mountain pine trees. 

Then came a whispering in the wind . . . a memory . . .

“If you’re going to kill son, do it right and do it quick."

The thoughts creaked through the archer’s mind in the fragile morning air.

“Do I have a clean shot?” “What about the wind?” “How much longer should I wait to let it idle?” “How much longer till it subsides?”

“The taking of a life, son, of one of God’s creatures is not a light endeavor.”

His father’s voice still teaching from far-off memories in the back of his mind and the granite of this valley.

“Be sure you know the shot, watch the arrow, picture it in your mind, then let it glide, then take your strike.”

Boyhood thoughts from a grizzled yet steady father who was ever present in Lucas’s life till this foreign campaign. It’s been a while since he’s seen his family. It’s been a while since he wrote home. Shots like these he had taken over and over again in the infantile days of his youth. The Spanish weren’t known for the use of the bow and arrow, but his father insisted he learned its use.

The bow was meant to be given respect and honor, just like the blade. If it was used properly, it would far outshoot the crossbows of the Spanish infantry. With practice and discipline, he learned from his father’s guidance how to shoot. It had been some time since Lucas had been out hunting, but still, he preferred the use of a bow over a sword. It always felt more familiar, more practical, less brutal, more merciful and concise.

He had followed his father’s youthful course in the fighting, taking the oath of a knight. Defending the homeland from the infidel was the original objective, to live a caballero’s life, a knight following the Christian code. Yet, here he was in the County of Bigorre of all places, in the far reaches of southern France, far from the lines of the Reconquista of the Iberian Peninsula. And for what? For his garrison to defend a castle in a seemingly unknown town here in the Pyrenees mountains while Navarre to their north was being laid siege and Spain and France were at war.

It was a notable risk for Aragon and Castilla to entrust to young Spanish men the defense of a French village in enemy territory, but a risk which was going quite handily. The locals in town seemed to not care so much about boundaries or borders, kingdoms or fiefs, but rather more so about security from another Hundred Years War.

However, the men in his company with him on the hunt ached for battle. They grew up like Lucas hearing about the ages past when grand crusades were fought for their God and their country, a time when the knights’ Templar and the Christian military orders seemed to defend the land and reclaim faraway lost kingdoms. But by the time they had reached the age to go off on such grand adventures, much of the Iberian Peninsula had been taken back from the Moors, and the crowns of Aragon and Castilla were now united. War for Iberia seemed on the men’s hopes and dreams, yet, in doing the simple routine of a knight, they were easily bored.

All seemed to be fine the first month of their late summer commission. Spain had seemed to gain the upper hand, until word had sprung up that French forces early this fall had mounted a counterattack just to their north in the towns of Roncal and Roncevaux. The French were moving in the opposite direction, to the north to try to retake Navarre again from the south after they had failed in their first attempt this summer. The men upon hearing the news grew anxious for a fight.

“We could surprise them from behind, hit them from the south on their own territory, they don’t even know we’re here!”

"I’m ready for some sort of blood, especially after that Count tried to claim a land which is rightfully owed to Iberia!”

“We need to continue to avenge the men they killed in Pamplona this summer!”

“We can’t let them take Navarre again!”

These were some of the conversations Lucas overheard on his daily runs around the village.

There was no mistaking it, men here wanted a battle, and Lucas knew they were anxious for some action. Most of them had never traveled a distance more than eighty or so kilometers from their homes in Castilla and Aragon, but now, after the King summoned more reinforcements, they found themselves hundreds of kilometers from anywhere they had ever known. They had left with the promise of glory for the grand Iberian initiative, to fight for the unification of their kingdoms and lands on the peninsula. Now they were bored being cooped up in the old Roman garrison overlooking this small French village.

Knowing their uneasiness, Lucas thought, “What could be better than the adventure of a hunt?” “It’d take the edge off their appetite.” “Give them something to learn, watch, and to do.” “It’d only be a few days in the mountains.” “A few from their company.” “But what stories they could tell!” “And bringing back some wild game would be more than enough to convince his superiors, as long as the reasoning to steady the men was shared with them, and of course a chance to give them any first pickings at the feast . . .”

Then came again the whispers in the wind.

“Breathe.”

“Pull back the arrow to your cheek.”

“Check your form.”

“Remember to watch the shot in your mind.”

“Steady your heart.”

“Eye on your mark.”

“Release.”

“Remember now to keep your form until . . .”

Thump! 

“. . . the arrow hits home.”

“I got him!”

Lucas turned to his fellow knights behind him.

Stepping out from the underbrush in his father’s old umber brown wool cloak. Any passerby walking in the valley would have a hard time picking Lucas out amongst the trees. His cloak seemed to match the depth of the forest. But so also did Lucas. Days like these out in the wilderness were what he seemed to be made for. His steady posture almost appearing like the trunks of the trees. He knew how to move with the forest, how to sway with the leaves. Even now as he got up he seemed almost to be on pace with the morning breeze.

“That’ll feed us for weeks!”

“Just wait till we get back to the castle and they see that buck brought in by one of our horses.”

The men chatted behind him as Lucas nimbly got up to his feet.

Luckily, they had left most of their armor behind in Lourdes, so they could travel light on their feet and not be picked off by any passerby as Spanish soldiers in the mountains. Lucas had gotten the hunt passed by his superiors as long they promised to do reconnaissance and be on the lookout for any French encampments. They had traveled for two full days to get here, leaving in the morning, riding the horses steadily most of the fifty kilometers, making camp about halfway over the course of the two days, careful to respect the rough terrain of the mountains.

Last night they had made camp again just on the far northern ridgeline, under the cover of trees, to prepare themselves to wake up early before dawn.

“The hunting is best in the morning,” Lucas told the men.

“Don’t worry, I’ve learned enough to survive in these mountains for weeks on end.”

Strangely enough, Lucas was grateful for the summer trainings of his youth. His mother’s family had lived in these mountains on the Aragon side of the border for generations. He had spent many summers learning to navigate similar rocks and valleys through many days and nights with his uncles. His father always came for a week. Perhaps to relive the adventure of his soldiering days before returning back to Castilla to the vineyard preparations. “Veraison,” was what he called it. The time in summer when the grapes change colors and predict the time of harvest come fall. A moment which he had worked the vines hard for, and which couldn’t be missed.

Even if it was only for a week, Lucas was always grateful for his father’s summer lessons, and the men this day were grateful to have Lucas, it made them sure of this weekend’s wilderness endeavor. Lucas was always foreseeing, much older and seasoned than his age. Lucas was always sure on his feet. He still had much to learn, but he wasn’t quick to get caught up in any failure or defeat.

Now on his actual feet, Lucas had known he wasn’t going to bring much for the hunt. He only needed two weapons. First, the bow, hewn from English yew, which was a family heirloom, gifted to his mother’s brother as a child, and now to him. Second, his dagger, given to him on the day of his knighting. The bow for the kill, the dagger for mercy to be given to an animal so deserving of life.

“The animals embody the creativity in our Makerr’s mind. That son, is what deserves our respect.”

“While man gave up his original design, the animals suffered from our decision, in a departure from theirs. They then took the brunt of our punishment for us. You must remember the value of the kind of life you are taking.”

As Lucas walked up to the red buck deer, what was to be expected lay before him. His arrow struck true to the lungs, possibly piercing the heart. But the animal still held on for the last bit of its life.

Then, with his dagger at hand, Lucas’s breath whispered a final word to the buck:

“Thank you.”

He said, as he began the thrust and looked into the creature’s eyes.

“The deer, badger, and horse are not made for eternity son, but rather solely for this life. Be sure you look them in the eye at their end . . . In the order of God’s creation, they may be lower than you, but they still echo life’s goodness and God’s gift of life to me and you.”

Then in pulling out his dagger from the animal, he handed it to one of the men in his contingent, Alonso, the son of a butcher in Leon.

“Let’s do the field dressing here. While you are working, I’ll move the men to the lower valleys, hopefully we’ll catch a herd working its way up the valley.”

As Lucas led the men down out of the upper valley, he couldn’t help but to see the blood trail left by the deer. They followed it backward the moment his shot struck the animal.

As he walked back to the original place of his shot, tracking backward by blood smeared valley grass. The inevitable hinge between impending death and the normalcy of life flashed before Lucas’s mind.

For Lucas, amidst the shared dreams of fighting and adventure, he held within himself a fondness for home. He still yearned for Aranda de Duero, his home in Castilla south of León. For time with his family amongst the vineyard estate and cobblestone streets. Make no mistake, he was content doing his duty here in Bigorre, protecting the small village. But he knew it was inevitable that when the time came one day, he would return home, perhaps settle down, and spend most of his days working the family’s vineyard. There wasn’t much for a knight to do here but hold the Roman garrison and wait while the battles in towns to their north waged onward. Here at the threshold of his arrow’s strike, Lucas knew, the life in the endless pursuit of battles and glory promised him inevitable death, but what lay behind him, locked in his past, was still a hope for life. He had to be wise though to avoid deaths arrow strike.

As they traveled back to the garrison with three red deer in tow, the grand buck Lucas had shot the kill of them all, the men had many stories to tell. All seemed to be right, being here in these mountains. These days had staved off the hunger for a bigger fight. For a bit longer they were looking forward to their drills and rounds in the village, in this unusually warm fall of 1521.

After two more days on the trail, the granite tower of Lourdes’ old Roman Chateau, hewn over a millennia ago by Roman soldiers, peered out beyond the slopes of beech trees in the distance. Those men, alive over a thousand years ago, were much more akin to their own party than these Spaniards probably realized. They too were men for battle, stretched out upon the far reaches of their country's empire, caught up by these mountains to fortify a town in a nation not their own. They too probably looked at the great expanse of the Pyrenees, caught up in the landscape’s beauty, but also its unsurety. They too were surely caught up in the endeavor of the great continent of Europe, facing their own time in its history and left in wonder with many great unknowns.

As they finally arrived at the garrison’s entrance, they were met with a welcome applause from the men on guard. After reporting that there were no sightings of french soldiers in the mountains, Lucas made a quick run to drop the three red deer off at the local butcher. After finally arriving back at the castle’s quarters, he unpacked his belongings, unstrung his bow, and folded his father’s cloak, placing it beside the straw heap of his bed. A soldier walking past Lucas‘s quarters, upon noticing his return, peered in.

“Diego de León, a letter for you was sent!”

“Whose it from?” Lucas asked.

“Your father!” The sentry replied.

“Where can I fetch it?”

“Check the tower overlooking the western countryside.”

Lucas got up to retrieve the letter sent from his father, and walked up the granite rock walls and wooden beam quarters into the outer square of the fortress, crossing the walkways under the clouded night to the tower which overlooked the town on the hill to east and the river and caves along the western countryside.

Inside the lookout, a solid granite beam stood in the middle to serve as support for the wooden beams of the roof above. The old Roman Chateau fort was a muddled concoction of the bones of old Roman-hauled granite and of more recent plastered repairs and medieval support beams. The tower glistened with lantern light, the only warmth in the mountains except for the light of some townhouses below. Next to the central beam was a small table with a traveler’s wooden box on top containing the incoming and outgoing mail of the soldiers defending the garrison.

“Why would my father be writing?”

Lucas thought, sifting through the few envelopes the box contained. Finally, he found the one addressed to him;

“Lucas Diego de León de Aranda”

Then came his father’s name, “Diego Álvares de León de Aranda,” which was inscribed next to the crimson red wax seal of their family’s wine crest on the envelope.

He opened the letter. His father was always one for silent words and wisdom. However, Lucas could only later guess that this one time his father didn’t know exactly what to say. He must had still been processing the reality. He must have scribbled the note right away and expected Lucas to know what preparations he would have to make.

On this clouded quiet night in the tower, the five words of the letter thumped louder than the arrow hitting its mark just a few days prior in the Cirque de Gavarnie. They rang out not as a whisper in a valley, but rather as a thundering lighting strike in the darkness of the night. 

“Son, your mother has died.”