Novela de Mi Id

“In Fear and Trembling”

Chapter Seven

The hairy one proved to be a gentler lover than she had imagined. The first night had not been one of pain like her mother had warned and as succeeding nights wore on, she began to realize that her husband was quite gentle for a man who looked like a beast.

Nevertheless, there came a night when she awoke to find him staring out their bedroom window, his face focused on the distant moon.

“Come to bed, my heaven,” she said.

“I can't.”

“What is it?” She pushed away the blankets and walked over to him.

He was murmuring something. “I was conceived in darkness and raised in darkness. Now I conceive yet another in darkness and so on forever and amen.”

“What is it?” she said again.

He turned to look at her, and suddenly, despite her long white robe, she felt quite exposed. His attention seemed focused on the small triangular slit that had been made in her robe below the waist. It was a conception dress, to put it quite bluntly, and yet the way her husband looked at her now made it quite clear that conception was not quite on his mind.

“You are quite beautiful,” he said.

“Thank you.”

“Too beautiful.”

“I don't understand.”

“They will separate us in the end. The beauty and the beast only live happily ever after in fairy tales.”

He stared at the night sky again. “Someday I will burn and so will all my children. But you -- you will be spared.”

“Why are you talking like this?”

“I have decided to go to the New World, away from the eyes of the Mother Church.”

He grasped her hand. “I want you to come with me.”

“Why?”

“Because you are my wife.”

“No,” she said. “I mean, why are you fleeing the kingdom?”

He looked away from her. “You would not understand.”

“Yes, I would. Just tell me.”

He turned toward her again.

“I am cursed.”

“Why do you say that? Because you're hairy?”

He shook his head and then fell silent.

Then he pointed.

On a path in the garden below their bedroom window, the bones of a small animal shone in the moonlight.

“I did that,” Don Felipe said. He looked at her again. “And God help me, someday I may do it again.”

Novela de Mi Id

“In Fear and Trembling”

Chapter Six

The next morning a sexless one appeared at the door. “Come with me,” it said.

He was escorted down a long black corridor to a solitary stone chamber. The furnishings were much simpler in this chamber than in the one in which he had slept the night before. For one thing, there were no windows or wall coverings and the floor was bare stone. The only piece of furniture was a wooden chair; its only source of heat was a modest fire. A brown-robed man sat in the chair. Besides him was a yellowing human skull. The man's head seemed almost as hairless as the skull. His hood was down and around his neck could be seen a crucifix and a rosary.

“Good evening,” the man said. “I am Father Jerónimo.”

The man patted the skull beside him and waited for an answer. When none was forthcoming, he continued. “I have heard that you have some objection to the Mother Church.”

Father Jerónimo patted the skull again. “Why is that?”

He replied, “For years, I have been a prisoner in the royal dungeon. Did the Mother Church lift a finger to help me? No. Why then should I be especially grateful to it for anything?”

Father Jerónimo frowned. “You owe the Mother Church more than you know. It was we who fed you and educated you. It was we who gave you clothes and arranged your marriage. Your own father cared little whether you lived or died. You saw that for yourself at the ceremony.”

“You mean that old man was my father?”

“Of course,” said Father Jerónimo. “But then I suspect that you had already guessed as much.”

He said nothing.

Father Jerónimo continued. “Anyway, the one reason you are here today is because of the Mother Church. Otherwise, you would have been exposed at birth.”

The hairless old man smiled and noted his visitor's reaction.

“What of my mother?” he asked.

“She died while giving birth to you, her only child,” said Father Jerónimo. “Why else do you think your father resents you so?”

He stared at Father Jerónimo, his assurance suddenly shaken. He took a step forward. “Why do you tell me this?"

“Just a warning,” said Father Jerónimo. “You are a good man in spite of your unalterable handicaps. Our kingdom needs good men like you to rule it. Especially since we are on the verge of becoming an empire. However, what she does not need is would-be heretics spitting in the face of her supporters and dragging the kingdom down to ruin. After all, we are first and foremost a Christian country. Our ways are Christian ways. Take care not to mock them for even you are not indispensable.”

Father Jerónimo patted the skull again. “Heed the lesson of the memento mori. We are all mortal. Never forget that.”

He just stared at the old man again.

“You are dismissed,” said the priest.

He just stood there.

“I said you are dismissed.”

He still did not move. “My name,” he said.

“What?”

“Say my name.”

“Very well,” said the priest. “You are dismissed, Don Felipe. But take care never to darken my door again.”

He smiled again. “You seem to forget that it was you who had invited me to come here.”

And with that, he left.

Novela de Mi Id

“In Fear and Trembling”

Chapter Five

That night they were left alone in a large bedchamber. The carpet and the drapes were all in bright red; the ceiling was inscribed with angels. On the wall beside the bed was a tapestry depicting the Annunciation and the Wedding at Cana. He remembered learning about these events from the sexless ones when he was a child but he was not sure why they were deemed appropriate for a tapestry in this room. Behind the bed and above the headboard was a wooden cross upon which a hook-nosed figure clad in a loincloth was nailed. This figure, too, was familiar to him from his childhood teachings but it still made him uneasy to look at it -- perhaps because no such figure had ever been used to decorate his cell when he was growing up.

He and his bride were silent as they entered the room. The sexless one who had escorted them inside leered as it departed and made a gesture of farewell.

His bride was the first to sit upon the bed, her white dress clashing with the red blankets and bed curtains. She pulled aside the blankets; the sheets beneath were pure white. But of course, she thought. Then she gazed upward at the eyeless angels.

Behind her, she heard the sound of shuffling feet. Her groom cleared his throat. “I suppose it's time,” he said.

He started to undress.

“No, not here,” she said. “Turn your back first.”

“But we are man and wife,” he said.

“The angels are watching,” she said and then she pointed upward.

“But those are only painted figures.”

“But they have human eyes.”

She turned toward him. “You still don't understand, do you?”

He shook his head.

“The Church, your father -- they will have men and maids watching us. To see that we conform to the Holy Law.”

“Why is that a matter for them?” he said. “I was taught that it was a matter between us and God.”

She winced. “It is. But God does not always punish the ungodly; that is the Holy Church's role. And if the Holy Church did not do its part, we might soon fall into...” She paused. “...bestiality,” she weakly finished.

“I still don't understand.”

“The servants are watching us to see that we couple in the approved manner. For if we do not, we imperil our very souls and they will feel obliged to report us to men who will save us from ourselves -- at the cost of our very lives." She paused again. “Do you understand?”

He smiled. “No, I don't. What harm can the two of us do to the Mother Church in our marriage bed? Surely the ceremony has already proved us to be good Christians.”

“Perhaps. Perhaps not. Many a nonbeliever has called himself a Christian after the Reconquest yet still eschewed ham and pork. Some such folk even retained a separate set of dishes for Sabbath days. No, a good Christian must be Christian in all parts of his life -- and not just in public.”

“And the servants are here to see to that?”

“Yes, of course.”

He walked over to the wall, bowed to the crucifix, gently removed it from the wall and kissed it. Then he drove it upward into one of the angel's eyes. He heard a shriek of pain for his trouble.

“Bless this room and all in it,” he said, repeating words he had heard in his childhood, “For who knows what evil things lurk without?”

His bride's face contorted in fury. “You fool. You risk not only your life but mine with such blasphemy.”

“On the contrary, I am the Heir. You said so yourself. The one who shall someday rule this great kingdom. For me, there is no such thing as blasphemy.”

“You fool. Even a Prince of the Blood is not exempt from the stake.”

He smiled. “Tell me this. Did these men who watch us so closely care so much for my immortal soul all those years I was imprisoned?”

“That was different. You were born quite ill, or so the old folks said. Your father was not sure that you would survive.”

“So he locked me away from all mortal men and treated me like an animal -- just in case.” He smiled again.

He dropped the crucifix and walked toward the bed.

“What are you going to do to me?”

“That which a man usually does to his lawfully wedded wife.”

“But the servants...”

“Should get their own women.”

He started to undress her.

“No. Wait. I can do it. Please. Stand back.”

“You seem most frightened, my dear.”

“The tales I have heard the servants telling about you. About the encounter you had with the village girl. She said you were a sodomite.”

He laughed. “I'm afraid I don't know that word.”

“That you were a boy-lover. An eunuch. One who is incapable of physically making love to a woman like me.”

He smiled. “I know not what those first two parts mean, but I assure you that the third part is not true. And you will soon find out just how untrue it is.”

“Will I?”

He stared at her, his shirt half-unbuttoned.

“Certainly.”

Novela de Mi Id

“In Fear and Trembling”

Chapter Four

At dawn, they awoke him for the ceremony. He was brought to the great stone baths where the sexless ones unceasingly scoured and scrubbed him until he was achingly clean. Then they dressed him in fine silken underdrawers and lavender trousers. A hairshirt -- so redundant in his case -- and a silken shirt of purest white were chosen to cover the bit above his waist. Around his waist they tied a black sash and upon his head they placed a gold crown. They also gave him a cape -- a simple one made of red silk.

Then they looked at him and they saw that it was good.

On the way to the chapel, he felt nervous. His head was pounding as if it resonated with the beat of a giant pendulum. His mouth felt dry and feverish and his palms sweated as if he was in the midst of a great desert.

When he reached the door of the chapel, he noticed his bride standing at the far end by the altar. She was clad in a white dress and a wreath of flowers was around her neck.

A sacrifice, he thought.

And he wondered what had made him think of that.

The sexless ones prodded him forward. Reluctantly, with the air of a vain yet cowardly actor, he walked forward, trying to keep his feet and face pointed straight forward. As he neared the altar, he looked away from the black-clad sexless one standing there and gazed more at his bride standing on the right.

He walked right up beside her and the sexless one gestured for him to stop. He did so.

A black-clad old man whom he had not seen before came forward out of the shadows and stood beside him. In his hand was a gold ring with a red stone embedded in it.

The old man gestured and from out of a darkened alcove, music played. An invisible choir sang words he could not recognize.

Then the old man gestured again.

And the sexless one spoke.

Once again he did not understand the words being spoken yet every so often, the old man prodded him and whispered in his ear the words he was to say.

Then at last, the sexless one asked him in normal language to join hands with his bride and he did so. Her hand felt hot and sweaty but she did not draw away. However, her eyes kept looking at the old man with an expression of fear.

He wanted to say something to reassure her but he knew not what to say.

Then the sexless one uttered some more incomprehensible words and gestured. The old man handed him the ring.

The sexless one said a few more words and then gestured for silence. No one spoke. Then it continued and at the end of its speech, it pantomimed placing a circle on its ring finger.

The old man prodded him again. He looked down at the ring and realized what the pantomime had meant. He placed it gently upon his bride's finger. He tried to reassure her with his eyes but she kept evading his gaze.

He thought he heard her whispering words to herself but the words she said made no sense. I am not here, she said. This is all unreal. I am far away, dreaming in my bed, and I am not here.

The sexless one spoke again and then stopped and clapped its hands. It smiled and pantomimed a kiss.

He bent forward to kiss his bride and felt only hot, sweaty skin.

It should have been better than this, he thought.

The sad look in his bride's eyes told him that she felt likewise.

Then the old man slapped him on the back. “Congratulations, my son,” he said.

The old man shook his hand and retired into the darkness. It was only the sight of the sexless ones bowing in the old man's direction that told him that the old man had been someone of importance. And it was only the sight of his bride that told him that he had not dreamed this.

Novela de Mi Id

“In Fear and Trembling”

Chapter Three

That night they sent a servant into his cell to anoint him for the ceremony. She was a dark-haired girl dressed in a long red skirt and a white blouse and her breath stank of garlic and fermented fruit. At the entrance to his cell, she hesitated, swaying as if caught by a sudden breeze. Then she took a swig from the small green bottle she carried and entered, making the same strange gesture with her hands that the sexless ones did.

She knelt before him and uncapped one of the small flasks she had tied to her waist. Pouring its contents into an open palm, she looked up at him.

“Kneel," she said, and beneath her words, he detected a bit of nervous laughter.

Nevertheless, he knelt and stared at the woman as she in turn stared at him.

“I bet you're a very big man,” she said.

He blinked.

“Please undress,” she said.

“But, señora, I --”

“Don't worry,” she said, averting her eyes. “I have seen men undressed before.”

Slowly and nervously, he divested himself of his clothing, keeping one eye on the woman all the while. Once he was fully naked, he knelt down once more and saw the woman turn to look at him.

“So big,” she said. “So very big.”

“What do you mean?”

“Never mind. It matters not. Come closer. I must anoint you.”

“Very well.”

He moved forward. Now he was almost touching her. The woman reached out with the palmful of oil and began rubbing it upon his chest.

He flinched.

“Haven't you ever been touched by a woman before?” she asked.

“No. That is -- I don't think so.”

The woman smiled. “By tomorrow night, all that will be changed.”

She rubbed harder, rubbing the oil over his arms and shoulders and down toward his back and buttocks. "So very big, she kept saying. It was almost a chant.

When she touched his sex, she almost laughed.

Then she looked at him and smiled

“Quite the little innocent, aren't you?”

“I know not what you mean.”

She smiled. Then she bent down and kissed him upon a most private place.

“Señora!” he cried.

“Hush, my hairy one,” she said. “I am not a señora. I am a señorita.”

She kissed him again in the same location.

“But this -- this is wrong.”

“This is the way it has to be.”

She took another swig from the green bottle by her side.

“Come to me, my darling.”

“But --”

“Kiss me.”

“But I am to be married tomorrow.”

“I know. That's why they sent me. As a test.”

Her breasts were half out of her blouse, shimmering like great white moons. Her skirt had been detached and kicked away. Beneath it, she wore nothing save a patch of short black hair.

So that is what a woman looks like, he thought.

Then she kissed him and her tongue invaded his mouth and her hands grabbed hold of his sex and she engulfed him with her hairy legs until --

He pushed her away.

At first, she stared at him in disbelief.

Then she frowned. “So they left behind a few eunuchs, after all,” she murmured.

She crawled forward again.

“Don't touch me,” he said.

The woman smiled slyly at his warning gestures. “You needn't bother. This was all for your convenience, not mine. Tomorrow on your wedding night, you'll face a similar challenge. I could have helped you with that but ---”

She shrugged. Then she reached for her skirt. Her white buttocks, turned toward him, looked like two giant half-moons.

He reached for them. “So beautiful,” he said.

She looked behind her and smiled. “A boy-lover, huh?” she said.

She pulled away from him. “I thought as much.”

“I know not these words you keep using,” he said.

She smiled again. “You should. I get the feeling that you will be hearing them a lot.”

She stood up and refastened her skirt, leaving the empty green bottle behind on the floor of the cell.

As she readjusted her blouse, he crawled toward her. “Please, don't go,” he said.

He grasped her knees.

She looked down at him. “Let go.”

He did so. And watched silently as she left the cell.

An hour later, the sexless one grinned as it brought him his supper. “Pretty nice, huh?”

He only looked at the black-clad figure, not seeing it, not seeing the tray, not seeing the door or the walls or the bars or anything. Save darkness.

Novela de Mi Id

“In Fear and Trembling”

Chapter Two

“My wife,” he stammered. “But I have no wife.”

“I am the one our elders have chosen for you. Not that you could not have chosen for yourself, but... Anyway, I'm the one who has been chosen for you.”

“I see.”

“No, you don't. You are the heir to a powerful empire. It is your duty to produce an heir as well so that there will be someone to carry on in your place after your death. I am to be the mother of that heir. Do you understand?”

There was something about her crisp, clear enunciation which disturbed him. He felt as if she was talking to a child.

“And you agreed to this?” he asked.

She lowered her gaze. “No, I did not. Not at first.”

She looked at him again.

“Not that you are not attractive in your own way but --”

She looked down again.

“I had always hoped to be able to choose my own lovers. But my father never gave me that privilege.”

She looked upwards again.

“Instead he gave me to you.”

“I see,” he said. “And who is your father?”

She looked downward again.

“You don't want to know.”

Novela de Mi Id

“In Fear and Trembling”

Chapter One

His first memory was of advanced age -- of large, white, wrinkled hands holding and kneading his body like a loaf of dough.

Then there were the faces -- large, pale, moonlike things that peered at him from out of the darkness.

Then came the tutors. Tall, thin, sexless things hidden in black robes who made funny gestures with their hands every time he grew frustrated with them.

For an embarrassingly long time, they gibbered at him in an unknown tongue, communicating all the while with their hands until he was able to echo the syllables which issued from their mouths. After that came reading and writing and sums.

Then came the next step. They took him out of his darkened chamber and took him into a room filled with light. They gave him clothes that were finely woven and helped him put them on.

Then they took him into another golden room where a girl awaited. At least, that is what he thought it was, judging from the pictures in the books they had shown him. The girl was tall and slim and no doubt they considered her beautiful. Having never seen such a being before, he really could not say.

She had long blonde hair and around the crown of her head was a wreath of white flowers. She was clad in a white linen dress and he could not help wondering what lay beneath it. Did she have two legs like him or was she solid from the waist down?

As he observed her, his guardians pushed him forward and he struggled to keep his balance. Then he walked toward her.

The girl's blue eyes opened wider as he approached her. Was she frightened of something? And if so, of what? He looked over his shoulder but saw nothing there that he thought to be especially frightening or even unusual. No doubt, it was one of those feminine mysteries the sexless ones had talked about.

He knelt down to talk to her. The girl drew away. His face contorted in surprise. Surely she was not frightened of him? Was she?

He came closer. She drew back more. She was frightened -- of that, there was no doubt.

He tried to echo the words his tutors had taught him. They came out in a low, guttural tone.

“I will not harm you.”

The girl still trembled but now she seemed more puzzled than scared. Hadn't she ever heard a man speak before?

She looked down at the floor in front of her.

“But you're so big.”

“Big things are not necessarily dangerous,” he said. He stuttered, wanting to say more but not knowing the proper words.

He decided to ask her the obvious question.

“Who are you?”

The girl looked at him again. "Did they not tell you?”

“No,” he said.

Her face had a strange expression. Not quite fright, not quite anger, but something... sad.

“I am your wife.”