Alhambra/The Constant Princess (3)

This is the third installment of my Alhambra-The Constant Princess mash-up. In the second installment, I deliberately did not include pictures of the Courtyard of the Myrtles because further in the novel, when they are in Wales together, Catalina describes this particular spot to Arthur.

“I shall tell you about my home,” she offered.
“All right.” He gathered the purple blanket around them both and waited… “And then where shall we go today?”
“Today we shall turn right and go into the Court of the Myrtles.”
He closed his eyes, trying to remember her descriptions. “A courtyard in the shape of a rectangle, surrounded by high buildings of gold.”
“With a huge, dark wooden doorway framed with beautiful tiles at the far end.”
“And a lake, a lake of a simple rectangle shape, and on either side of the water, a hedge of sweet-scented myrtle trees.”
“Not a hedge like you have,” she demurred, thinking of the ragged edges of the Welsh fields in their struggle of thorn and weed.
“Like what, then?” he asked, opening his eyes.
“A hedge like a wall,” she said. “Cut straight and square, like a block of green marble, like a living green sweet-scented statue. And the gateway at the end is reflected back in the water, and the arch around it, and the building that it is set in. So that the whole thing is mirrored in ripples at your feet. And the walls are pierced with light screens of stucco, as airy as paper, like white-on-white embroidery. And the birds—”
“The birds?” he asked, surprised, for she had not told him of them before.
She paused while she thought of the word. “Apodes?” she said in Latin.
“Apodes? Swifts?”

One end of the Courtyard of Myrtles. No swifts today though.

The other end of the Courtyard of Myrtles, with the pool reflecting the door and arches.

A lot of the surrounding text are hard to read—cringe-worthy declarations of passion which I suppose are there since this is a historical romance afterall. But when Philippa Gregory is describing the Moorish palace, Catalina's longing for home is believable and one feels sorry for the young girl who has to make a new life in a foreign country.

(To be continued.)