The Kingdom of the Damned

by Mario Garrido Espinosa

  "Tell me your name," Irene ordered, trying to buy some time.

  “Pelayo. Pelayo Castro Ortega.

  “How old are you Pelayo?”

  “Seventeen. Almost eighteen.”

  “At that age you should have done it a lot of times already.”

  “I have not said I'm a virgin!” He shouted indignantly.

  “Lower your voice, I beg you!”

  "Well, measure your words," Pelayo said, assuming that everything he had heard, except for the last, had some measure.

  “Well, forgive me if I have offended you.”

  “You are forgiven, Sister, but I do not understand you. I do not know what you want from me... Why do you want me to go to your cell?”

  “Okay, I'll tell you more clearly. First, I have to warn you that it is something that is going to seem very strange to you.”

  "All this seems strange to me from the beginning," Pelayo admitted.

  “I only ask you not to run away like a scared child when I tell you.”

  “And why would you scare me?”

  “Other people were scared... But you seem to me a very brave man.”

  Pelayo was amazed that he called him a man, moreover, brave.

  "Of course I'm brave," he said with a hint of pride.

  “I hope so. Listen out. If you enter my in cell, I will make you feel something impossible to imagine. Unexplained sensations. You will howl with pleasure and you will never regret having come.”

  “But what are you talking about?” Pelayo asked, who seemed to have to be told everything with the greatest clarity. Without subtleties. The last and only time that Irene had tried something similar was too direct and for that reason she failed. Today, she had no choice but to say things by its name, even at the risk of failing again.

  “I want you to come up and make me love.”

  “But, by God! You are religious!” The boy exclaimed who seemed to have the word "sacrilegious" come to mind.

  "Yes, I am," Irene admitted. “But under this habit there is a person who cannot repress her feelings and needs. You cannot imagine how difficult it is not being a woman at all," she said, repeating the words she had engineered during the previous months.

  “But I... A nun is a nun and...”

  “You look like from the previous century. The nuns are people like the others and, in this world, they have their human needs...”

  “You want to cheat me. You’re from the Holy and intends to lose me...”

  “Me? From the Holy Inquisition!” Irene laughed softly. “Since when a woman can go so far in the Church.”

  “You’re a Holy spy. That is what you are. I've heard about them. Well, know that I am a good Christian. I go to mass every day that I can and I receive communion. I confess once a week..." Pelayo finished the review of his partly invented religious activities and making an intention to leave said, “Goodbye, have a nice day!”

  “Listen, Pelayo! All that spies are scary stories for children like you, who are willing to believe them.”

  Pelayo stopped walking away and shouted:

  “I'm not a child anymore! I'm a man.”

  “Well, prove it and come up here with me.”

  “The clergy do not do those things.”

  “You're naive, Pelayo. The people of the clergy, with the Grand Inquisitor at the head, are the first to enjoy the pleasures of the flesh," Irene said, perhaps saying one of the few truths of the entire conversation.

  “But the Holy Office burns people for things like that...”

  “No, man. It burns witches and heretics... And as for the flesh, ask for restraint.”

  “You’re telling me that fornication is not sin!”

  “Of course it's not a sin. What world do you live in?”

  “Not even in a nun?”

  “If it is done with moderation and enjoying the minimum, it is not a sin in God’s servants. I, for example, do it only once a year. This time, it’s your turn. The year before another came with this luck.”

  “All the nuns are like you?”

  “Not all. There are a lot less caste than me. But the good God knows how to forgive his servants, and also those who make love to them.”

  “I do not know if I should.”

  “Don't be a coward. Sometimes they have entered into my cell Counts and Marquises. Why would you be less?”

  "Well, because I'm poor," the kid said without thinking, in a show of realism.

  “The cloistered nuns are also poor.”

  “But...”

  “For me you are just as valid as the richest of men.”

  To Pelayo something smelled again and, after taking a look at the cloudy sky, he said:

  “I'm sorry, Sister, but it's late and, besides, it's going to rain. I have to go.”

  “Do not go. Wait a minute. Do you think I'm ugly and fat? I will show you the woman that these clothes hide. Do not move!”

  Irene climbed off the slope. She took off her habit and the spotless nightgown she had underneath, staying practically naked. Then she moved the cot under the window. She removed the threadbare woolen mattress full of knots and put the stool on the board underneath, climbing on top. That moved and Irene Lopezosa was afraid of falling —though she feared that Pelayo would have run away— so she clutched the wall with her nails, rubbing her naked body over the rough, moldy, dirty wall. At last, she looked out at the small window and was relieved that the boy was still there.

  “Watch this.”

  The fake nun, very afraid of ending up on the floor, stood on tiptoe and leaned her torso through the window, letting out her huge and appetizing breasts through the rusted bars. The red-haired boy was about to fall on his back after contemplating that pair of tits that had not yet fed any baby and that remained intact and turgid, despite being as big as the thighs of a fat matron. Irene moved her body with great care and her breasts danced insinuatingly between the bars.

  “You thought that for being a nun there would not be anything nice in my body?”

  Pelayo was still with his mouth open. About to drool. Maybe he thought he was dreaming.

  “All this will be yours if you have the audacity and the courage to climb up here.”

  Irene Lopezosa rescued her breasts from the bars, helping herself with one hand. Then she covered them with one arm.

  “Show me more!” The amazed boy said.

  “For that, you will have to enter into my cell.”

  “But the bars...”

  “I'll cut them if you bring the necessary tool. I've done it before. Remember that you are not the first.”

  “And how is it that they are not serrated anymore?”

  “Well, because I have not always been in this convent. I only had eight months here.”

  Irene Lopezosa, during the last few months, had raised any kind of question that could arise from this situation and, of course, had all the answers made up. Even several answers for the same question, which would apply depending on the person to cheat.

  “The cloistered nuns are always in the same convent. Shut up!” The boy said.

  “How ignorant you are! They have also made you believe that. How much you still need to learn! Come and I will teach you...”

  The boy again had the frightening feeling that she was cheating on him. Irene insisted on showing her gifted tits.

  "You're really going to give this up," she said, stroking her breasts too temptingly.

  That turned the balance again in favor of the false nun.

  "Okay, I'll bring the tool now," the boy said at last.

  Pelayo turned around in the direction of the trough. He was beginning to convince himself that if there had been others before, which meant that this was normal. Moreover, if that were not enough, then Almighty God was willing to forgive you. What more could you ask for?

  “Do not! Wait. I do not have much time now," Irene informed. Come tomorrow a little before today's time.

  “It’s O.k. I'll be here.”

&nbs
p; Irene had about twenty minutes left to go to the tabernacle and then to the choir, but her body was full of dirt and a large part of her breasts with traces of rust. She felt euphoric and full of happiness. Able to do anything. Soon, she would be free and put into operation her bloody and expected revenge. Besides, she was sure that Pelayo would not betray her. He seemed as innocent or as stupid as was necessary. What luck she had! Pelayo seemed to have swallowed all the lies she had told him and surely, there would be nothing in his head but Irene's formidable breasts moving provocatively. Tonight, if his conscience left him, the memory of the tits would serve the boy to relieve his body.

  Sister Irene decided to go quickly to get some water. She brought it to her cell in a chamber pot. There she cleaned herself with the sheet of her bed, the best and fastest she could.

  She was so happy that, for the first time since she arrived at the convent, she participated in the sixth prayer, which was always officiated before the meal. This time she really, and not pretended, repeated the mechanical prayers she had in her head, for having listened to them for more than a year.

  5

  Pelayo arrived at the convent wall very punctually. It was loaded with a rough, jagged saw, with a hand-made pine handle. He was accompanied by a pair of pliers, a worn punch and a straight iron, something rusted and finished in a point. All these tools were completed with a very heavy mallet. He carried the material in a large, very flexible basket. He threw the end of a rope several times and on the fifth attempt, Irene Lopezosa took it.

  “Very good, Pelayo. Tight the basket to the rope.”

  “Do not. Tie the rope to a bar first. I want to go up and see you more closely.”

  "We do not have time," Irene protested with a face of resignation. “I have to go to the refectory to set the table for lunch.”

  "Then there is no deal," said the scowling boy.

  The rope, logically, was tied to one of the bars. Specifically the one that was more to the right. Pelayo Castro climbed with the basket on his back, with the handles stuck in one of his arms, and resting his feet on the wall. When he could see the austere and ghostly interior of the cell he could only make out Irene's figure wrapped in his habit and nothing else.

  "Well, you've seen me," Irene said angrily. Now give me what's in the basket!”

  “First let me touch one of your breasts.”

  “What do you say?”

  “That I want to caress one of...”

  "It's okay, it's okay," Irene protested. She would have gladly punched him, but instead, she climbed on the slope, lifted her habit to her shoulders, and directed the boy’s left arm, who had not grasped the rope, to one of her appetizing breasts.

  “My God!” The boy exclaimed, touching it awkwardly due to his position. He tried to feel more woman’s areas imprisoning his shoulder against the bars, but Sister Irene took about five seconds to get rid of that young and inexperienced hand, which at the moment of being removed, caressed one of her big brown nipples, like the yolk of an ostrich egg. The woman experienced with pleasure that delicate sensation —almost forgotten by time— that she always noticed that her bust was caressed by someone else's hand; even the nipple hardened excited, but did not want to give too much confidence to the kid, who on the other hand, was already taking enough.

  The boy passed the tools, one by one, through the bars.

  “How long will it take?” Pelayo asked, already stepping on the ground. “My father would suspect if the tools are out of place for a long time.”

  “Come in three days in the afternoon and we will do everything that I have promised you.”

  “Could I caress again your...?

  “Of course. Everything will be allowed," Irene replied, realizing how naive Pelayo was.

  “And how do I know that in three days you will be here?” He asked, laying aside his naivety.

  Sister Irene thought quickly.

  "Take this," she said, showing outside the cell the sacred miniature image of the Blessed Virgin Mary of all the Faithful Dead, which all the nuns wore in one of the pockets of their habit.

  “Is it made of gold?”

  "Yes," Irene lied, because of gold it only had the color. “It's old gold. Very valuable. It's what I love most in this world. It is our Holy Virgin. I would not give it to you but I think about recovering it. I trust you, Pelayo. You'll have to return it to me when you come back.”

  Irene threw the image through the window.

  "It seems fair to me," Pelayo said, catching the virgin's flight. “Do not doubt that on Thursday I will be here.”

  “Ah! Bring weapons as I told you. Do not forget.”

  “Weapons? You did not talk to me about bringing arms," the boy protested, who remembered word by word the conversations held with that strange nun.

  “Yes, I told you. Soon, things are going in your head," the false nun reproached him, although she knew it was the first time she had referred to this subject.

  “What are you talking about now?”

  “So? You agreed yesterday to come armed to the appointment.”

  “What weapons?” Pelayo asked who was making a mess.

  “Well, normal weapons. In that, we were yesterday. If they are of fire much better. Remember that I confessed you that I only did it with armed men and I do not know how to do it with others," Irene said, imploring Pelayo to be the most naive or foolish among all the naive and foolish.

  “But...”

  “I know it's strange, although yesterday, it seemed normal. I like to see a man disarm. See him shed his weapons to end up falling into my arms. I go crazy. You will see.”

  Pelayo was silent without trust and finally asked:

  “What do weapons have to do with what you promised me? You are telling very strange things.” He paused. “I will come as I want! With or without weapons!”

  “Oh I see!” Said Irene finally. “Do you fear for your life? You are very suspicious. You do not see that I'm a nun. Something vicious, God forgive me; but after all, He made me like that. I cannot help wishing men. But I do not kill them. Holy God! The Almighty teaches us that we should not kill our neighbor. You, yourself, can leave the weapons where you want. As far as you can. Please, trust me, Pelayo. What happened to you? Yesterday all this seemed good to you...”

  Pelayo was sure he had not spoken about the weapons. He quickly rolled the rope and went thoughtfully to his house, with the Blessed Virgin in his hand, the rope on his shoulder and dragging the empty basket through the sand.

  Irene Lopezosa watched as he left until she lost sight of him. She was not sure she convinced him. At this point, it did not matter. If he did not bring weapons, he would manage with some of the tools. The hammer, although it was unwieldy, could be an option.

  6

  First, she wanted to use the sharp lever and the mallet, but the dry and loud noise of that procedure immediately discarded it. In addition, the mallet became very difficult to handle due to its weight and volume, and Irene was not used to its handling, running the risk of hurting herself on a wrist, which would ruin her entire plan. With the punch, she tried to scrape the mortar that held the bars, and then remove them, but the tool broke on the second attempt. She had no choice but to use the nicked saw and arm herself with patience.

  Having already chosen the method, Sister Irene used all her available time, including sleep, to break the bars. After praying full by ten o'clock at night, she went to her cell to work until the body fell down. The first night she stayed awake until six o'clock in the morning, time at which she must be ready for Morning Prayer and Eucharist. Two days later, in addition to dragging a huge fatigue, his hands were destroyed —filled with blisters and wounds—, sawing and holding the rusted iron with force.

  To avoid suspicion, she hid her hands in the sleeves of her habit and showed them just what was necessary, but never by the palm. During the kitchen hours, she suffered real tortures with the various manual works. She had to make sweets, cakes and cookies. Peel and chop
fruit. Knead, fry and bake. Handling sugar, flour, eggs, butter, milk... Moreover, always something of all this managed to get in her wounds and open blisters. In fact, a small cavity of the little finger was filled with hot wax, and that crack was not closed again in all her life, leaving an awful dark brown color.

  Sometimes the tears of pure pain skipped but she wiped them with the sleeve of her habit, pretending to dry her sweat, always thinking about the revenge of Thursday; and in her murderous delirium, she deliberately put salt instead of sugar in the sweet Holy Katherine’s donuts and filled some buns of the Dead with cayenne powder instead of honey. She also took advantage of Sister Cyprian’s some brief absence to make almonds from Mother Anna from Holy Ines with bitter or rotten almonds, from which she was discarded between the good and sweet. She made a raisin bread from Holy Barbara that contained five cockroaches and a horrible and huge spider. In another kitchen chef’s absence, she urinated in a glass without taking off her habit and distributed her urine for all bottles of sweet liquor of Fray John of Misery... And Sister Cyprian was beginning to be happy and pleased with the unexpected and feverish activity of her kitchen assistant, who, to continue at that rate, would increase the production of sweets in a much higher amount than Barnaby could carry on only one of his business trips to the convent.

  On Thursday of the massacre, almost before dawn, Barnaby arrived, and Sister Irene, knowing that he was coming, did not work in her cell. It did not occur to the merchant to look into the space of Sister Irene's room at any time, although it passed right in front of the trough. A simple twist of his head would have sufficed to see that two bars were missing and the other was almost torn off.

  After twenty-five minutes, Barnaby left with the worst products that had ever been conceived for human consumption. Half an hour later, there were no bars in the little window.

  7

  At nine in the morning of the massacre’s day, the nuns in full gathered in the choir to read the Psalter, as they had always been doing every Thursday of the year. Each religious read ten or twelve verses, while the others listened absorbed in their meditations. The ones gave way to the others in the reading in a completely orderly manner.