by Kage Baker
But this crucifix, now, was a fine expensive modern thing, from Castile or maybe even Naples. This might have been the Bishop's very own crucifix. It was as real as they could make it. Someone had carved, someone had sanded and polished that poor gaunt body with such care that every bone and sinew shaped out perfect, anatomically precise. Someone had painted it with matte-smooth paint, the color of gray pearls or the skin of a dying man. And not to forget the details: the wounds pink and crusted with black at the edges for dried blood, just like the real thing. The wet yellow stain seeping down from the side wound. The artist who reproduced those thin red lines from the flagellum must have had a tiny brush, fine as an eyelash; yes, and he must have studied real welts, laid on live sweating backs, to show the bruising so well. The matted hair and vicious crown of thorns were reproduced with such veracity that you could see the dust caking the braids, you could see the bright blood drops.
But it was the face, of course, that was the masterwork.
An intelligent face, eyes wide and dark. You could imagine this Christ laughing, or angry, or asleep. Beyond all that, you could see the God shining through the man.
Having given you all this, this living Christ that your heart went out to, the artist put the knife in and twisted it. The mouth was opening in a gasp of pain, the teeth were bared in agony. Those live dark eyes looked out in desperation from that agony to plead, to ask a question I had no answer for. God was being murdered in front of my eyes.
So He hung before me in the gloom, illuminated by one weak beam of light. I was terrified. I couldn't get away, I couldn't.
"I'm sorry, Lord Jesus, I'm sorry, Lord Jesus, I'm sorry, Lord Jesus…"
"Why are you causing me such suffering?" cried my hallucination through bleeding lips.
"I don't know, Lord Jesus. I'm sorry, Lord Jesus. Couldn't we get you down from there and get you a barber-surgeon or something?"
"No."
"Couldn't we put bandages on you to make you better?"
"No."
"But why not?"
"Because my suffering is eternal. While men live, they must sin; and while they sin, I must bleed here. I am dying in torment for you. You are the one who pushes these thorns in my flesh by your sin."
"But when did I sin?"
"In the Garden. Because you sinned there, God sent me to be crucified."
"I'm sorry! I don't remember what I did in the garden, but I'm sorry! Can't you come down now?"
"Never." The weary eyes closed for a moment. He was so beautiful, He was in such pain, and I'd have done anything to get those nails out of His hands and feet. But I was so afraid of Him.
"It's not my fault," I wept. "I wasn't even born then."
"That doesn't matter," He explained. "As part of the human race, you are born to Sin. You're one of the daughters of Eve. You can't avoid Sin even if you want to."
"Then no matter what I do, I'll always hurt you?" I was appalled.
"Yes."
"Who made things this way?"
"I did." Sweat glittered on His brow. "I took your state upon myself to redeem you from all Sin."
"I don't think that's such a good idea," I said. "You should go back to heaven and live with the angels. How could I ever be happy again if I hurt you so much? I don't want you to suffer for me."
"You will not be saved."
I looked around at the darkened room, remembered my cell and the other room. "But I'm already damned, aren't I? And at least you won't be up on that cross anymore."
"You really mean this?" He looked intently at me.
I meant it with all my heart.
So He shrugged, and the nails came flying out of His hands and feet like bullets. The crown of thorns sprang away from His head like a lute string snapping. His stigmata closed, healed over, were gone. The weals of the scourge receded into His skin.
He stepped down from the Cross, pulled His red robe around Himself, and gave me a courteous nod before striding into the darkness and disappearing. I collapsed back into my chair, overwhelmed with relief. It was short-lived.
The door burst outward and light blinded me. My three Inquisidors stood there, dark against the light like mountains. The priest looked furious. He must have found out that I was talking to Jesus, I thought. "Are you ready to tell us the truth?" he said.
"What?" I blinked at him. He reached in and pulled me out, twisting, by the wrist.
"We have been gentle with you to this hour. We will soon be driven to force if you do not repent."
"I repent!"
"Then tell us the truth."
"I did!"
"We do not believe you. We will go down, now, to show you what will happen to you if you do not repent." And then we went that bad way again, to the bad-smelling place. There the priest set me down and said:
"Now, tell us the truth. Are you a secret Jew?"
And for the first time I wondered: Could I possibly be a Jew and not even know it? Jews were liars, everybody said so. I told lies myself, now and then. Was it possible I'd fooled even myself? Was that why I felt so guilty about poor Jesus? Had I made up a story about Christian parents to conceal my crimes? I swallowed hard and said: "I might be. I think. I don't know."
"I see," said the priest, all smooth now. "And we see. We know the truth. You're a very wicked child, to have waited so long to tell us." But I hadn't said positively. I stared at him in bewilderment.
"I'm sorry."
"You can save your mother more pain if you tell us everything."
I just stared. I couldn't think up things off the top of my head, I needed time. "But we can continue later," he said, as if reading my mind. "At another time. Until then, you can think about the things you will tell me."
How stupid I'd been, to try to hide anything from such a man.
The Biscayan led me away, back, I thought, to my cell; but halfway there he stopped and put his hand flat on a place in the wall beside us. There was no latch, no subtle engine that I could see, yet a little door clicked and swung inward. "Come with me." he said, and stepped through quickly and pulled me after him. The door closed behind us.
We went into a brilliantly lit room where there was another man. The man wore some manner of thin white surcoat over his clothes. He talked with the Biscayan in a language I did not know. He sounded nervous. When they had spoken together, the Biscayan left. I looked up at the man in the white surcoat.
He took away my rags and shaved my head. He had to put me in restraints to do that, and I thought the end had come. I screamed and screamed. I said I'd tell him everything. He never said a word in reply, but his face went very red. He put needles in my skin. He drew out a tube of my blood. He spent a long time examining my bare skull with calipers.
Writing about this now, I still can't bring myself to laugh at it much.
In time he covered me with a blanket and went away. I was left there trembling under the glaring lights. Much later, the door opened, and the Biscayan came into the room. He pulled up a chair and sat down beside me where I lay. "Well, little Mendoza," he said. "You're not doing so well, are you?"
"Are you going to burn me in the fire?" I asked him.
"No, Mendoza, not I. I am, in fact, your greatest friend in the world right now."
I looked at him in deep distrust. His black eyes were kind, he was turning on the charm, but I had seen him looking on blank while the priest deviled me. "I know who my friend is," I said. "The man in the red clothes. Not you."
"Well, unfortunately he isn't here right now. He's been recalled to the Bishop for a reprimand. And you certainly know that Fray Valdeolitas isn't your friend. He thinks you're guilty. I, on the other hand, know you're innocent."
"You mean I'm not a secret Jew?" I was dazed.
"No, of course not. You're only a little girl who has been treated badly for no reason at all. I think that's unfair. I'd like to help you, Mendoza."
"Then why didn't you stop the priest?"
"I couldn't, then. His rank in the Holy
Office is a lot higher than mine. But look, I've hidden you away here; and I am prepared to offer you even more safety."
"How?" My heart beat fast.
"Let's talk a little first." He pulled his chair closer. "You know by now what happens to people when the Holy Office finds them guilty, don't you?"
"Yes," I whispered. "They burn in a big fire."
"And you don't want that to happen to you."
"Oh, no."
"Right. But suppose I let you walk out of here right now. You've lost your mama and papa. Who will take care of you? Where will you sleep when night comes?" My eyes filled with tears, and the Biscayan patted my hand soothingly. "It's scary, isn't it? But you know what's even more scary than that? Listen to me, Mendoza.
"You'd go out of here and maybe you'd starve to death in a week or two, because you haven't got any money, have you? Wouldn't that be awful? To escape from here and die anyway."
"Yes." I was glassy-eyed: New Horizons in Fear.
"But, suppose you didn't die so soon? Suppose you lived to be twenty years old. That's good, yes? Except that it's still very hard to stay alive. You'll have to do things you don't like, bad things maybe. And what if you get killed by the plague or soldiers? Terrible, terrible.
"Maybe you'd be lucky. Maybe you'd live to be thirty. Another ten years. That's not very long, is it? But do you know what happens when you live to be thirty?" He took my hand and held it up.
"Look here, look at your nice smooth skin. Some morning you'll wake up, and it won't be smooth anymore. It'll become cracked, crumpled. It won't get better. And see, can you see the blue veins here that run up the back of your hand? One day you'll think, Why are they sticking out so much? And why are my knuckles poking out so much?
"Only little things, but more of them will come with every year you cheat death. Your teeth will begin to break and hurt. You'll keep getting sick. Maybe you'll be beautiful when you grow up, but then you'll have to watch your looks slip away, year after year. Your flesh will hang and sag. One day you'll see your reflection somewhere and see the flesh has pulled back from your bones and you'll see ghosts: your mother's face, your father's, not yours anymore. You'll be very frightened.
"Do you know what happens then, if you live ten more years, or ten more? Such a short time, but do you know what you'll be then?" He leaned close. "Did you ever see the old women with their black shawls who sit in the marketplace? Their mouths are loose and flappy because all their teeth are gone. They're all bent up like little birds, their fingers are twisted like claws. Some of them are blind. All their bones hurt, and they never have any fun. They're afraid to die, but the longer they live, the sicker and lonelier they become. But once, Mendoza, they were children like you. And some day, you'll be just like them."
"No!" I burst into tears. He loosed the restraints and lifted me up against his shoulder consolingly.
"Yes, I'm afraid so," he went on. "If you don't die young, that's all you have to look forward to. But then the day comes when you die because your body is so old. Bad things happen to the dead. Have you seen dead men on the gibbet?" I had. I shuddered against him. "And if you've been good, then you go to Purgatory, and devils torture you with fire until all the Sin is burned out of you. But if you've been bad, you go to Hell. You know what Hell is now, you've seen it. And it's so hard not to be bad.
"Now, there's a reason for my telling you this. I don't like to frighten little girls, I'm not like Fray Valdeolitas. But I had to show you what it is to be a mortal, to be trapped in the round of time. And you don't have to be trapped there, Mendoza. There is a way out, for you."
I lifted my face and stared at him to see if he was lying. But he wasn't smiling at all. "I would like to find the way out," I said, conscious for the first time of what Understatement was.
"Who wouldn't?" He sat me up on the table and arranged the blanket around my shoulders. "But you're one of the lucky ones. I'll tell you a secret, little Mendoza. I'm not really an Inquisidor. I'm a kind of spy. I go into the dungeons of the Inquisition and I rescue little children like you. Not just any little children; if they're stupid, or if their heads are the wrong shape, or if there's anything wrong with their bodies, then I can't save them. But the other ones I save, and I send them to my master, who is a very powerful magician…"
"Magician?"
"All right, so he's not a magician, he's a doctor. Such a learned doctor, he can cure you of old age and death. Mind you, you will grow up. You won't stay a little child forever."
I nodded and wiped my nose. This was all right with me; I had no desire to stay small. Children lead a miserable life. "What do I have to do, señor?"
His eyes warmed. "You'll work for the doctor. It's the best work in the world, Mendoza: you'll be saving things and people from time, just like me. What do you say?"
I swung my legs over the edge of the table and attempted to get down. "Get me out of here and I'm all for this doctor, señor."
He laughed and called in a guard. I looked at the guard fearfully, but the Biscayan said:
"This little girl unfortunately died under questioning. It will be some time before her body is discovered." The guard just nodded. The Biscayan sat down and filled out a kind of tag, which he fastened to my blanket, and he stamped my hand with a device in red ink. "It was nice meeting you, Mendoza," he said. "Now, go with this man and he'll take you to my doctor friend. See you in twenty years, eh?"
"Come on." The guard nodded to me. We went into a tiny room that jerked and shuddered and dropped. Then a door opened on a corridor that seemed to stretch away for miles. For all I know, it did. The guard was carrying me by the time we got to the other end; we came out into a great cavern, big as a ballroom, the ceiling vast and distant.
How to turn my eyes back to the eyes of that little primitive and tell the thing I saw? A silver cannon. A gleaming fish. A tin bottle that somehow had rooms and windows in it, studded with rubies that blinked steadily.
Oh, I stared. There were people walking around in silver clothes, too. Over in a corner was some furniture: big, thickly cushioned chairs and a table. Huddled around it were three tiny children like me: blankets, tags, no hair. There were toys scattered on the table, but the little kids weren't playing with them. They clung to each other, silent and owl-eyed. Two of them had been crying. With them sat a lady as beautiful as an Infanta is supposed to be. She was watching them glumly.
My guard led me to them. Turning to us, the lady switched on a bright smile and stood. "Here's the other one," growled my guard.
"Welcome, little—" She tilted her head to read my tag. "Mendoza!" she exclaimed in peculiarly accented Spanish. "Are you ready to come meet some new friends and take a lovely trip?"
"Maybe." I stared up at her. "Where am I going?"
"Terra Australis." Flash, flash went her smile. "You'll like it there. It's lots of fun. Would you like to come sit with the other children now?" So I took her hand (she smelled like flowers) and went to sit down. The children cried and cringed away from me. I eyed them in disgust, looked at the cluttered table, and asked:
"Can anybody play with these toys?"
"Please." She fairly leapt forward and swept them to me. "See, here's a dear little donkey and a horse and here's a sailing ship and these books have pretty pictures on each page. Shall we play together?"
I looked at her, appalled. "No, thank you, señora," I said. "I'll just look at the pictures, all right?"
So I sat and paged through the bright improbable books. There were pictures of children watching other children play games. Children in gardens growing flowers. Children sitting at tables passing each other abundant food. Happy, healthy, laughing children. Not a skeleton or prophet anywhere in sight.
The others sat and stared at me. After a while, one of the boys reached out timidly for the horse. He held it up to his mouth and bit down on its head. I guess he was unnerved.
The people in silver clothes ran around and did things to the ship with silver ropes, feed li
nes they must have been, and there was shouting and now green lights began to blink with the red. I put down the book and watched, fascinated.
A man came and said something to the señora. She stood up briskly. "Come on, niños y niñas! Time to go off on a wonderful adventure!" The two really little ones let themselves be scooped up like zombie babies, but the boy with the horse clung to the cushions and howled. The señora had her arms full of children and looked on helplessly.
"Shut up, you stupid piece of crap!" I hissed at him. "You want them to give us back to the Inquisidors?"
"He can't understand you," said the señora. "He's a little Mixtec."
A man came and picked up the boy and carried him with us. We all went into the ship, and we children were fastened into our seats with straps. I didn't care; at least, not until the cavern opened above our heads and we rose up through it into the night sky. Then I screamed like the rest of them. Goodbye, Spain. Goodbye, Jesus. Goodbye, human race.
CHAPTER FOUR
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There were TWO ladies on the ship, the beautiful señora and a little woman with red skin, also beautiful. She wore a pendant with a feathered serpent on it. She went and talked soothingly to the little Mixtec in (I assume) Mixtec talk. He calmed down. Afterward she and the señora leaned back on a cabinet and talked wearily, in yet some other language. They sipped something from white cups. Then the señora crunched hers in one hand and flung it into a bin. She came toward me, turning on her smile again.
"How are we doing, uh, Mendoza?"
"Fine." I looked up at her. "Have you got any food?"
"Yes, we'll be serving lovely food in just a few minutes. Are you bored?"
Not me, no, I'd been waiting for the ship to fall out of the sky and kill us all. I shook my head, and she said: "Would you like me to tell you a story?"