The Kingdom of the Damned

by Mario Garrido Espinosa

  Irene Lopezosa returned to her cell and quietly closed the door and began to undress. Slowly, she stripped off her robes, one by one, until she took off her white nightgown, which she preserved from the fine cloth itchiness of habit. These garments were going to hinder her when he went abroad, because that was her next intention. Thus, only the breeches and old warm shoes were left on, where her feet cooked in summer. In this way, with her formidable breasts in the air, she could not help but look, for the last time, at those ridiculous breeches —devoid of any sort of lace or ornament— which she hated so much and which, no doubt, considerably disrupted the beautiful ensemble that was her body. What a difference with the soft, sensual, perfumed underwear she had worn before so many men who longed for her body!.

  She tied the two sheets of her cot together. Then, she took one end of the sheets to one of the pieces of the serrated bars, protruding menacingly from the mortar and stone. Helping herself with the makeshift rope, she got very close to the hole, clutching at one of the broken irons. Her style to climb the wall was funny and ridiculous, but she managed to reach her destination. She passed the window, fearing to scrape her defenseless body with rusty barbs. She lowered the outer wall, clinging to the sheets and developing a speed of descent too fast to be able to say that she controlled the situation at all times. In spite of everything, in the end she touched the sand on the outside floor without any scratches.

  She felt, for the first and in a long time, free and she considered the possibility of leaving at the same time. Nevertheless, she was not going to do it. She had to get revenge!

  She gladly stripped herself of her only clothing, that is, the shoes and the kind of knee-length knickers that all the nuns wore as undergarments. Then, she threw herself into the drinking trough, feeling the fresh water all over her body. She had thought a thousand times about consuming this dive while she looked at the water from the pylon from the inside of her cell and the sensations perceived were identical to those she imagined.

  She came out of the pool shivering with satisfaction, emotion and cold, with the soles of her feet impregnated with the soft spongy green of the soil. She slipped on her back, and with her breeches in her hand, she went a little way into the thick pine forest that surrounded the convent. If someone had seen her walk through the forest, wet and totally in leather —excepting the horrible shoes—, they would doubtless have mistaken her for a beauty goddess. What little could be imagined, seeing her like this, that within all that beauty was concealed all the evil of this world.

  She looked for a place with the grass in good condition. She removed all the underbrush she could with her hands and lay down. She felt the warmth of the floor in contrast to her body frozen by the water. She rolled around the grass like a child. She felt every part of her body, from the neck to the feet, caressing. She stretched until the bones creaked with pure pleasure; and she curled up like a puppy. After a while, she felt so comfortable that she fell asleep amidst the moving bands of sun and shade provided by the long branches of the pines.

  She woke with her heart in her mouth at the bell sound, able to reveal a dead man, who indicated the time to go to daily tasks.

  2

  The chime of daily chores had sounded clear on Thursday of the massacre and there was no reason to be absent. Sister Cyprian, the overbearing chef, was very strict about the schedule, and she would soon be looking for Sister Irene herself in the cell if she did not appear on time. In fact, she had done it before.

  Sir Higinio's daughter ran like never before, crossing the Black Pine Forest until she reached the convent. She gripped the end of the sheets used as a rope with all the strength with which her shattered hands could. The climb started, but it was not easy. She did not go forward and was afraid to fall at any moment, so she decided to give it all up, to forget her pain in her hands, and to go up as however. Thus, she scratched the whole body, especially the knees and elbows, because all the available parts of her person made the force to get up. She went through the hole and, although she could have come down with the sheets, merely threw them into the cell. Then, she jumped, but as she hit the jump, her left leg was caught by an iron from the ancient bars, causing the flesh to tear from her thigh and a deep wound of about fourteen centimeters in length. She fell badly to the ground and stopped the blow with the knee of the other leg, deflecting her patella more than normal.

  Irene Lopezosa experienced, in a matter of seconds, horrible and distinct pain in both lower extremities; but the screams swallowed them, without even a single tear trickling down her cheek.

  She took the white nightgown and put it in her mouth, cursing her bad luck with the thought. Then, grasping the calf, she pulled her right leg with all the strength she was capable of at that moment, placing her kneecap so abruptly that it remained in her mouth with the piece of clothing she bit.

  She heard a footstep down the hall. They sounded far away.

  The torture of her right leg at that moment could have fainted, but Irene Lopezosa, far from worrying about the pain, was interested in stopping the terrible hemorrhage of her left thigh, which was already beginning to make a pool of blood in the ground. From her nightgown, she ripped off a sleeve and made a simple but effective tourniquet that partially stopped the course of blood circulation and therefore prevented further bleeding. With the other sleeve, she wrapped her thigh, pressing as much as possible the two lips of the creepy wound, while grunting like a wounded beast that resists to die.

  The steps in the hallway began to sound too close. Irene had in her mind only to Sister Cyprian entering through the door, after forcing it, and discovering her in such circumstances. That gave her the strength to do everything as quickly as possible and almost forgot the inhuman torture she was suffering. In spite of her efforts, it might not give her time. The thought of escaping and forgetting revenge crossed her mind. She dismissed the idea quickly.

  "Sister Irene!" Sister Cyprian cried authoritarian as she lightly knocked on the door of the cell.

  "Yes, sister. I’m coming," Irene replied, that at this moment the blood of her left leg was wiping with efficacious and swiftly, helping herself with the rest of her nightgown.

  "Please, go out!" The bell rang long ago!” the immense nun said, at the same time pounding the door openly.

  Irene Lopezosa put on the piglet, the bonnet and the habit, since the breeches had remained outside the convent. In her head the words that Sister Marie Second of the Psalter had read:

  “Yahweh has made himself known, has done justice, entangled the wicked in the work of his hands...”

  Without losing a second, Irene opened the door to her cell, came out and abruptly closed it, bumping into Sister Cyprian’s stone body, who, like an angry bull, was there waiting.

  "You must have been in the kitchen a while ago!" Sister Cyprian snapped.

  "I hope you can forgive me, sister. I fell asleep. I have not heard the bell.” Irene explained, looking down at the ground in a submissive manner and trying to hide the agitation of her breathing.

  "Right," was the skeptical response from the head chef, who evidently did not believe a word. Then, she glanced up and down at her assistant. That look was comparable to that of Lucifer when he seeks the death of the one who mistakenly thought that he was faithful to him, and Irene Lopezosa noticed her horrible weight.

  The two nuns returned to recover the vow of silence forced in the corridors at that hour, which was work and only allowed to speak for good cause, thus avoiding any noise that would disturb the work of the rest of the congregation. The sister turned and headed for the kitchen. Sister Irene followed her one-step. The false nun avoided the limp as she could.

  3

  During the meal, Irene Lopezosa was as natural as she knew, although they all seemed to see something strange in her. The leg, in which she had been bound with a sort of tourniquet, had not felt it for a couple of hours and had moved it by simple instinct.

  In the middle of lunch, she made the gesture that
indicated the request to be able to speak. The superior sister gave her permission, but first she had Sister Mary del Carmen silenced, who read aloud a heavy book from the little pulpit at the back of the room. The young sister interrupted her monotonous and routine reading of the Chronicles Book II, just where the account of the Covenant Ark transfer to the Temple of Yahweh is told.

  "I humbly apologize to Sister Cyprian. Today I was late to go to my duties in the kitchen," Irene said.

  "What happened to you?" Lorenza Justiniana wanted to know.

  "I do not know, Mother Reverend. I feel bad. I was asleep and unable to wake up," she explained briefly.

  Sister Cyprian had no choice but to forgive, for the superior's eyes, fixed on her face, left her no choice.

  "Your Maternity can let me go to my cell. I feel sick...,” she pleaded, without having to hide much.

  "But what do you have? Do you suffer from cramps? Does your gut hurt?”

  "I feel bad in general," Irene said without thinking, and seeing that her response was not convincing to the congregation, she added, "Besides, I have a very strong pain in my teeth.”

  Then she put a hand to her jaw and feigned the discomfort she had just invented.

  "Go in peace, sister," said the superior. “We will pray to St. Apollonian so, in the few hours possible the pain of your mouth and the rest of your ills will go away, return your calmness and be able to return to your chores as soon as possible..., —and add in a heavy way—, that so good do to your sisters in this congregation and so well considered they must be for the Most High, our Lord and guide.

  “Amen”, Irene Lopezosa thought before rising from her chair with visible annoyance. Not without difficulty managed to recompose her usual posture and walk in an apparently normal way. After she left the dining room, no one spoke, but if, they had been able to do so, it would have looked like a corral of old babbler. Most of them had in their mind a different version of Sister Irene's problems.

  She crept down the hall very slowly. Looking like a ghost. Feeling her legs numb. Sleeping with a small, but constant pain that allowed her to move but without much hurry.

  After closing the door of her cell, he removed her bonnet and habit. The latter had bloodstains inside. She quenched the uneasy itch that the garment had always caused. She did not stop scratching until her skin turned red. Then, still with the groan on her head, she untied the improvised bandage of her thigh, which was now a deep red, much like the bloodstains on the ground. At the discovery of the wound, the purple, almost black edges opened again, abruptly detaching themselves and letting blood flow from the inside again. Irene Lopezosa uttered the first cry of pain, although she tried to do it without being heard.

  Water was poured into the wound to clean it, although it was the one she had used to wash in the morning and it was rather murky. Another bandage was made with the parts of the nightgown that were not dirty. She spat on the wound, for she could not think of any other way to disinfect, and while she was bandaged, she roared with pain. This time the bandage was much better made and would last all day. Slowly and with extreme care, she wiped her body from the dried and stuck remains —vegetables and blood— that covered part of her skin. Then, she lay down in bed waiting for the red-haired boy to come.

  She felt a tingling in his belly, chest, and shoulders. It was pleasant and whenever she felt it was because of the emotion before the accomplishment of some of her evils.

  Of pure taste, she felt like a sudden dream trying to take possession of her but fought not to fall victim to that inopportune lethargy and not to lose in this way not a single second of those moments.

  4

  Pelayo Castro Ortega walked with some joy. On his shoulder, he carried a rope and his father's tanned calfskin belt, where a lumberjack's knife and an ancient sword hung, his hilt arranged at least five times, which might have belonged to his great-grandfather and who had certainly participated in more than one war and killed more than one enemy of Gurracam. He went slowly because did not want it to end. He had not slept well, and before dawn, heard from the house, with great clarity, the bells of the convent announcing the matins imminent beginning. From that moment on, he had been waiting for the present moment for the rest of the day with ill-concealed anxiety.

  He did not know very well what was going to happen, but had heard many things from the grooms on the subject, and was eager to see if all those gossip were true. In addition, that slight nun in helmets, with those huge tits, was a memory that filled him with a strange and new pleasure through all the cracks in his body.

  He reached the wall and gave a small whistle. Irene Lopezosa got up with her leg struck completely stiff and did not want to move it not to provoke the ordeal of a beginning. At least she could walk and the discomfort was bearable if compared to the pains suffered during the first moments after the fall.

  The boy had arrived soon. Two and a half hours before the pre-dinner eve prayer, which gave Irene plenty of time.

  Pelayo threw the rope into the cell. At first, he failed, but at the second attempt the rope passed through the window without touching the walls of it. The false nun tied one end to the sawed bar that had just opened her left thigh and was now, with her own dried blood, impregnated. The rope slid out. The boy came up with the agility of a monkey, avoided the irons without problems and jumped like a squirrel to the ground, cushioning with hands and feet the fall. He stood up and finally saw the exceptional landscape that Irene Lopezosa showed in her nudity, although her damaged legs were shaking the whole.

  "Are your hurt, sister?" He asked, looking at the bandage.

  "It's nothing," she said, and suddenly hug him reaching for the knife.

  "But what do you do?" Pelayo protested, pushing her away from him.

  "Nothing," she said quietly. “I told you I liked to disarm men.”

  "You said you liked to see them disarming," said the boy. “Besides, what is all this blood?”

  "Very good. Disarm yourself, then," Irene said, not answering the question.

  "I do not know whether to trust you," the boy said, who seemed to make common sense.

  "Do not be frightened by the wound on my leg. I made it with one of the irons in the window.”

  "Then you wanted to escape, didn’t you?"

  "Yes, but God has punished me justly. My life must be the closure and so before I left, I was prevented," Irene said hoping to be believed. “I understood what the Lord wanted to tell me. I have already received my just reprimand, which I also humbly accept. I've been stupid. I will not do it again.” She paused. “Now, do not make me suffer with your continued mistrust. Let's do what you came for, please.”

  Pelayo Castro felt a slight smell of singe again. Something did not work in that story... The nun was very rare, but there were times when she was too much and was no longer believable. However, he had her there. Nude. He could see everything, and although Pelayo's imagination was great, he never thought her so beautiful, so inviting. At that moment, Irene's body attracted him like a magnet, but even so, he could not help but feel suspicious.

  "I think I'm leaving. I am sorry to have given you false hopes..." Pelayo said, showing great willpower. Perhaps it came to mind that the Almighty could also punish him for thinking of doing that with such a person.

  “Stay Pelayo...”

  "Oh, by the way!" He exclaimed without listening. “You will have to forgive me, sister, for the Virgin which you gave me, I have sold it," he confessed.

  “What!”

  "I'm sorry, but I could not help it. In my house is suffering from hungry and a man offered me three silver alexandrines for it.

  "Three silver alexandrines! They have deceived you like a child.”

  Irene was well aware that Pelayo did not like being called a child. However, the boy was able to restrain himself this time and continued with his apologies:

  "I beg your forgiveness, sister.”

  "That's easy to say. You sell my Virgin, my dearest Virgin...,” she s
aid, looking desperately at the ceiling. Then she turned her eyes to Pelayo's and raised her eyebrows. "You thought the good and stupid sister would just forgive you, and end of the story. Right?”

  "Not so. I've figured out how to make it up to you.”

  "I'd like to know how," she said, between skeptical and curious. “If you do not even want to do that for what you've entered into my cell.”

  "As soon as my luck changes and I start to have some money, I'll start saving, and someday, when I gather enough, I swear, I'll have a virgin of your height or greater sculpted and donate it to the convent. I swear!”

  "You are a ruffian and a thief! You have sold what I love most in this world," Irene reproached him, acting. “You think I'm going to believe, just like that, that you're going to spend your money in this convent. You know some imager... Do you know how much they are?”

  The boy, evidently, had never seen an imager in his life.

  "I'll look for it and whatever it takes, I'll tell them to do the scapegoat. I swear!”

  "You swear too much. And you do it in false, besides. That is a sin!”

  "I'm telling you what I'm going to do. Really.”

  “Mortal sin! "You'll go straight to Hell," Irene continued, trying to terrify Pelayo.

  "I promise by the Cross that it is true what I say!” He cried for the hundredth time.

  "You swear, you promise... But everything is faked and Our Lord knows it. He will have no mercy on you! Do not be a child, Pelayo! You swear by putting God as a witness on something that you and I know to be a lie. That should never be done.”

  Irene was trying to undermine the boy's pride, but for now, he was still firm in his statements:

  "I tell you I do not swear falsely.”