Chapter Text
Luisa was relieved when Anatoly Popov and the rest of the Vladkan delegation finally finished their visit and departed. It was stressful having ordinary out-of-town visitors, and the chief advisor to the king of one of the most powerful kingdoms in the world was not at all ordinary. All of the meetings had taken place behind locked doors, guarded by stony-faced Vladkan soldiers who were neither fooled nor amused by any of Camilo’s attempts to sneak in disguised as various people. Dolores was no help, either. She and Mariano had left for their honeymoon out of the Encanto a day before the Vladkans arrived. Luisa was only invited to one of the meetings, and the experience was more than enough for her. Popov was pleasant enough, if a bit smarmy, and he asked Luisa a lot of questions about herself, but she felt too intimidated to relax around him. She didn’t really see the point of having a meeting just to make idle chit chat, anyway.
Luisa’s nerves were on high alert the moment Abuela asked to speak with her privately after her final meeting with Popov, but none of the outlandish scenarios she concocted in her head came close to what her grandmother said when they finally met in Luisa’s room. “You want me to do what ?” Luisa said incredulously, sure she must have misheard Abuela.
“Consider marrying the Crown Princess of Vladka,” Abuela repeated, looking at her granddaughter expectantly.
“The Crown Princess… Abuela…why? And why me?” Luisa was stunned that she had heard her grandmother right the first time, since the words didn’t make any sense.
Abuela gave her a small smile before she started explaining. “Mr. Popov made a very interesting proposition at the end of his visit. Magic is hated and feared there. King Vasily’s sister has a wonderful gift, but she almost never gets to use it. If she weren’t royalty, it’s likely she would have been forced to flee the country. The Vladkans barely tolerate her as the king’s sister, and they would never accept her as their queen if he died without another heir. The king is even having trouble finding a suitable marriage for her. No respectable Vladkan wants their child to marry a witch. King Vasily heard about our Encanto, and he wants to form an alliance. If Princess Svetlana marries a Madrigal, Vladka will offer us military protection from the king’s own guard if we ever need it. You know how strong they are. No one would dare try to attack our home ever again. We could also start a trading partnership. Think of it, Vladkan textiles in our market!”
Abuela’s eyes shone. Although elaborately embroidered Vladkan fabric was legendary, Luisa suspected that the added safety of the Vladkan army was the most appealing part of the arrangement to Abuela. There was still a piece of the puzzle missing from Abuela’s explanation, though. “But why me ?” she asked.
“Mr. Popov says the princess prefers women, so that rules out Bruno. Dolores is married now, and Isabela isn’t ready to settle down yet. You’re the logical choice. And besides,” Abuela said, giving Luisa a searching look, “your mother and I have had the impression for a long time that you might…well, share the princess’s preferences.”
Luisa could feel her face flushing as her stomach dropped. She thought she had hidden it so well, never letting her gaze linger on a beautiful woman, or talking about her crushes with anyone. Sure, she had never expressed any interest in having a boyfriend, but the whole family knew how busy she was. But now she realized that not only did Abuela suspect, but she and Julieta had been talking about it behind Luisa’s back, which meant that Dolores probably knew, which meant that everyone in town probably knew… Luisa groaned. How would she ever face the villagers again? There were a few gay couples in town, and they were treated with politeness and respect, but she was one of the Amazing Madrigals. She couldn’t afford to be anything less than perfect.
“Hey, mi vida , it’s alright,” Abuela said, startling Luisa as she put her arms as far as they would go around her granddaughter. “I know that in the past I haven’t made you feel like you could be open with the family, but I want to change that. You don’t have to give me an answer - about any of this - right away,” and Luisa knew she meant the whole “actually, I’m a lesbian” thing. “Just think about it. It would be a wonderful thing for the family and the Encanto, and also possibly a wonderful thing for you too. Mr. Popov tells me that Princess Svetlana is a charming young woman, only a year older than you. He thinks the two of you would get along very well. But whatever you decide, I’ll support you.” Abuela gave her a pat on the shoulder and then left the room, leaving Luisa to the fallout of the bomb Abuela had just dropped.
Luisa’s head was spinning. She couldn’t even wrap her head around her grandmother knowing about her sexuality, let alone this whole arranged marriage business. This was too big a burden to keep to herself; she needed someone else’s input, or she’d go crazy. She swallowed hard, and came to a decision.
~ ~ ~
Mirabel answered the door to her room a split second after Luisa knocked on it. “Luisa!” she cried excitedly. “Come in, come in! What did Abuela want to talk to you about? We’ve all been dying to know!”
Luisa tentatively stepped inside and looked around the room. Formerly the nursery, it was now customized to Mirabel’s taste. The walls were a riot of color, covered in beautiful murals depicting various Madrigals and townspeople, hand painted by Mirabel and Tío Félix. There was a sewing corner, with the brand-new sewing machine that her sisters and cousins had all chipped in to buy Mirabel for her last birthday. A colorful patchwork quilt covered the bed, and a ratty old red armchair sat in another corner. The effect was overwhelming, but somehow comforting at the same time.
Mirabel ushered her sister to the armchair and looked surprised as Luisa dropped into it with a huge sigh. “Was it that bad? Do you have to go to Vladka and train their soldiers? Are Vladkan soldiers coming here to train? Does the king want you to help build him a new palace? Did-” She cut herself off after glancing at her sister’s stunned face. Luisa looked like she’d been kicked in the face by an entire herd of donkeys, one after another. “Talk to me,” she said gently, flopping down on the bed and looking at Luisa expectantly.
Luisa laced her fingers and fidgeted in her seat. She wasn’t sure how to even begin putting her racing thoughts into words. “Did you know that I’m gay?” Luisa said abruptly.
Mirabel’s eyebrows rose above her glasses. “Um, well, not in so many words, but I guess it’s not exactly a huge shock to hear you say that. Well, it is in a way, because you’re normally all ‘I’m strong and stoic and I don’t need anyone’ and I guess I never thought about you really wanting to date anyone. Was that what Abuela was talking to you about? Was she mean about it? I swear, if she was, I don’t care if she’s our grandmother, I will kick her ass.” At this, Mirabel curled a hand into a fist and looked ready to run out of the room immediately.
“No, no,” Luisa rushed to interject. “She was cool about it. More than I would have expected. I guess we’ve all grown a lot this past year, though. But the real point is that she wants me to marry King Vasily’s sister. The…I think her title is Crown Princess? Svetlana.”
Mirabel gaped at Luisa, then let out a low whistle. “You’re going to be a princess?”
“I might be marrying a princess,” Luisa corrected her. “I don’t think the title would carry over to me. Anyway, Abuela says it’s totally up to me, but it would be good for the family and good for the town, and I don’t know what to do. I honestly never even thought I would come out, let alone get married. Romance has always seemed like something for the Isabelas of the world, not for me. I never thought there was a way I could marry a girl and help the family at the same time.”
Mirabel pushed herself up to a sitting position. “Let’s do pros and cons. Pro, I don’t care what you say, if you marry a princess, you’re a princess too in my book. What else?”
Luisa filled Mirabel in on the rest of her conversation with Abuela, conveniently leaving out that their mother and grandmother had apparently been gossiping about her love life for years. She wondered if Mirabel had known about those conversations, but pushed that thought aside. Although Mirabel was a classic annoying little sister in some ways, she’d never been prone to talking about people behind their backs.
Mirabel grabbed a notepad from her desk and started scribbling away as Luisa spoke. “Okay, so pros, we have: you’d be a princess, we’d have more protection from outside threats, I could get one of those awesome Vladkan shawls, you might end up falling in love with her and it would be super romantic, you’d make Abuela happy, and we’d have a new gift in the family. What’s her gift, by the way?”
“I don’t actually know,” Luisa said, realizing she’d completely forgotten to ask. It seemed like a very basic thing to know about her potential wife, and yet she didn’t have the slightest clue.
“Well, whatever. Now for cons. You don’t know this girl and you might not like her, you’re not necessarily ready to come out to the whole town, and if I can editorialize a bit here, it’s kind of a classic old school Abuela move to try to arrange our lives to suit her needs. Plus,” Mirabel said as she handed Luisa the completed list, “Princess Svetlana’s gift might turn out to be something totally lame like turning into a sea cucumber or something.”
Luisa chuckled at the image, and Mirabel’s heart swelled at the sound. Ever since they’d all moved back into the rebuilt Casita, she’d been making a point to try to spend more time talking with both of her sisters. After Isabela’s confession about not wanting to marry Mariano, it was like a dam had broken and the conversation flowed between them effortlessly. Surprisingly, it had been harder going with Luisa. Apparently it was difficult to set aside a lifetime of trying to carry the entire family’s burdens single-handedly, but Mirabel never stopped trying to get her sister to open up to her. Any time Luisa sought her out for moral support, Mirabel felt a spark of pride that her sister trusted her.
Luisa scanned the list clutched in her hand, still feeling unsure. This was all happening so fast. This morning, her biggest concern had been how to reroute the river to best serve both the Ramirezes’ farm and the Montoyas’ mill. She’d certainly had no intention of dwelling on her love life at all, let alone discussing it with her grandmother. She groaned aloud. “This is hopeless. I’m never going to figure it out this way.”
MIrabel gazed dreamily into space. “An arranged marriage to a princess. This is such a good telenovela storyline…wait! Why don’t we ask Tío Bruno?” Her eyes lit up at the flash of inspiration.
Luisa frowned at her. “He’s not taking vision requests anymore, remember?” It seemed odd to her that Mirabel would have forgotten this. After all, she spent more time with their reclusive uncle than anyone else.
“No, no, not a vision,” Mirabel said impatiently. “He’s seen basically every telenovela in history and he wrote, like, six of his own while he was gone. He’ll know what to do. Come on, let’s go ask him.” She leapt off the bed and chivvied Luisa out of the room before Luisa even knew what was happening.
~~~
Bruno studied his two younger nieces over the rim of his coffee mug. They’d tracked him down in the dining room, but Mirabel had insisted they go up to his tower for maximum privacy. The three of them were now settled on comfortable cushions, soaking in the sunlight outside of his rebuilt vision cave. Truth be told, he found himself retreating up here more than he’d care to admit. As happy as he was to be back among his family, after ten years with only the rats for company, the Madrigals en masse could quickly become overwhelming.
Still, it was nice to have visitors every now and then, and Mirabel was secretly his favorite. He hadn’t gotten the chance to spend that much time with Luisa since his return. Even though she was taking more breaks, she was still by far the busiest of the family; only Julieta’s schedule came close to being as packed. Luisa had certainly never come up to his tower of her own volition, and he suspected that her younger sister was the instigator of this particular visit.
Sure enough, Mirabel quickly launched into an explanation of Abuela’s shocking request and Luisa’s mixed emotions about it. Bruno nodded, immediately picking up on the melodrama of the proposition, just as Mirabel knew he would. “This is kind of like Mi pecado . And a little like Abrázame muy fuerte . Plus a dash of Muerte del deseo . The prequel miniseries, not the main series, of course,” he mused.
“What’s Muerte del deseo ? I’ve never heard of that one,” Luisa said.
“That’s one of his,” Mirabel explained with enthusiasm. “See, the Duke of Greenwich is going to lose his inheritance if he doesn’t marry the bastard son of the Prince of the Netherlands, but-”
“Okay, but how does this help? What should I do?” Luisa hardly ever interrupted anyone, ever, so Bruno knew she must be feeling particularly agitated.
Bruno looked pensive as he spoke. “Look, kiddo, I wish I could give you a clear answer. If you go for it, my experience tells me that you’ll either be deliriously happy until you realize you’ve accidentally married your wife’s grandmother’s clone, or she’ll turn out to be an assassin hired by your enemy and try to kill you on your wedding night.”
Luisa huffed. “You know, this would be a lot easier if you would just have a vision and tell me if it’s the right thing to do or not.”
Bruno took a sip of coffee to avoid responding. He very rarely had visions these days. Even the most seemingly harmless ones tended to cause resentment and mistrust from those pictured. As a rule, he never made predictions for people’s personal lives anymore.
Luisa seemed to sense that she had touched a nerve. “I’m sorry, Tío Bruno. That wasn’t fair of me. You don’t have to do anything that makes you uncomfortable. I’m sure I’ll figure this out somehow.” Mirabel patted her sister’s arm supportively as she slumped back in her seat, looking dejected.
“That’s okay, kid,” Bruno said with a small smile. “What I’ll tell you from my own life is that I never regretted anything I did for the family. It may not have been the best choice in the end, but I still believe I did the best I could with what I knew at the time. How are you leaning at the moment?”
Luisa took a moment to gather her thoughts. “I don’t know,” she said at last. She struggled to put her feelings into words. “I’m starting to come to terms with potentially everyone knowing that I’m gay. And in a way, this might be kind of the best possible way to do that, right? If I’m doing something that’s also so beneficial to the Encanto?”
Mirabel shrugged. “Ideally you’d get to actually pick your own wife yourself. But at the same time, I know how important it is to you to feel like you’re helping the family, and if this is the best way for you to be able to get married while still doing that, then I think it’s a totally valid choice. Just as long as you don’t feel like you’re being forced into it. And whatever you end up doing, we’ll support you no matter what.”
“Thanks, Mirabel,” Luisa said, gently bumping her shoulder against her sister’s. “I really do think Abuela’s changed. The way she talked about it, she made it totally clear that it’s okay if I say no. I don’t really feel pressured by her.”
“It’s true, she’s much more relaxed now,” Bruno added. “She’s even letting me use the courtyard as a community theater space. Can I interest either of you in roles in next month’s production of Cats ?”
“Will you look at the time!” Mirabel said loudly.
“We really ought to go help get ready for dinner,” Luisa added hurriedly. “Bye, Tío Bruno. Thanks for all of your help!”
~~~
Dinner was supposed to be particularly festive that night. Dolores and Mariano were due to return from their honeymoon in the late afternoon, and Julieta had prepared an especially lavish meal to welcome them back. But as one hour after their expected arrival time passed, and then two, all of the Madrigals became increasingly nervous. By the time they were three hours late, even Félix couldn’t coax the dark cloud away from Pepa’s head.
“This isn’t like them at all,” Abuela fretted. “Dolores is such a responsible girl. She must know how worried we are. I can’t imagine what’s delaying them. Perhaps it’s time someone searched for them.”
“I’ll go!” Luisa was the first to leap out of her seat. She hated sitting around doing nothing when she could be out taking action instead. The mood in the dining room was somber, and although the food looked delicious, no one was eating anything. She had to get out of there.
Mirabel offered to come with her, and the two sisters set out, heading toward the river. Before long, they heard the thunder of hoofbeats, and to their enormous relief, Dolores and Mariano soon emerged from the forest. Luisa smiled and waved, but as they drew closer and she saw the expressions on their faces, the smile slid off her face.
“We need to get to Julieta!” Dolores cried. Luisa noticed that Mariano’s left arm was bandaged to his side, utterly immobile.
“What happened?” Mirabel rushed to ask.
“Soldiers,” Mariano gasped, pain crossing his handsome face. “From the same type of militia that drove our grandparents here in the first place.”
“We’ll see you back at the Casita,” Dolores said. “He needs to see your mom right away,” and she urged their horse back into a gallop.
Luisa and Mirabel stared at the clouds of dust the horse’s hooves left, and listened until the sound of its footfalls faded away. They slowly began walking back home, neither wanting to broach the frightening subject of Mariano and Dolores’s unpleasant news. Luisa’s mind was whirring. She remembered Abuela’s stories of her flight with Abuelo Pedro, the terror and chaos of those days. The Encanto had always felt like such a different world that it was easy for her to forget that such things had happened right on the other side of the mountains, but she knew Abuela had never forgotten. Tragedy and horror could find them, even here. As they approached the Casita, she broke the silence at last. “I’m going to do it. I’m going to marry the princess,” she said. It was no longer a question of her own personal wishes. The safety of her family, of the entire Encanto, was now threatened. She had no other choice.