The Immortal Collection (A Saga of the Ancient Family Book 1)

by Eva García Sáenz

  “Well, I insist, Adriana. You were on the verge of dying today, and yet we’d never been so far apart. If this is what’s keeping us apart, if it’s because my pride wouldn’t allow me to show you the proof, then that’s over and done with as of this very afternoon. Let me try to convince you before something irreparable happens.”

  “And I insist that I don’t want to see any proof.”

  “Then I don’t understand you,” I said, sitting down beside her, all my arguments exhausted.

  “What I’m trying to tell you is that you no longer have to prove anything to me. Today, for the first time, I saw the man who was born ten thousand years ago. I’m looking at you right now, and I’m recalling each and every one of the details of the last six months, and I’m trying to put the puzzle together again and finally, all the pieces fit. All of them, Iago, down to the last tiny piece. All your replies, your arguments, your irritation whenever I dug my heels in over your theories.”

  Then she opened her bag and handed me a folded piece of paper. “Here.”

  “What is it?”

  “ ‘The Mea Culpa of a Skeptic.’ Not the original, naturally. It’s a photocopy of the one you yourself acquired a century ago. You’ve earned it.”

  As I was listening to what she was saying, the knot that was strangling every fiber in my body loosened and I felt myself relaxing, just like a puppet when they cut the strings that keep it upright. I rearranged myself on the couch, and the intolerable pressure in my head eased, too, in the same way that a boiling pot stops being potentially harmful when it’s removed from the heat. I held back the urge to speak and forced myself to listen to everything that Dana had prepared, though I couldn’t stop thinking about the wonderful time we’d already lost.

  Cowards. During all those months, Dana and I had been magnificent cowards.

  “It was in the Prehistory Hall, you know?” she went on—and she’d gone back to looking me in the eye again. “The day of the Cantabrian Peoples exhibition, when we met for the first time. I had my back to you, and I heard your voice. I recognized it. That’s why I turned around so slowly. I was allowing myself a few seconds to say farewell to the ‘prerecognition’ me and cross over into the ‘postrecognition’ me. From that moment nothing was innocent. Before I’d turned around, I was conscious that I’d lost the battle, that it didn’t matter who owned that voice. And it wasn’t an adolescent crush; it wasn’t a physical attraction. I didn’t choose. It was simply that I knew you, and resistance wasn’t an option. From that day until this very morning I’ve been fighting against that lack of control. It’s never happened to me before, not like this. You’ve got to understand me. I’ve been in love before; I’ve experienced very intense affairs, just like you, I imagine. But never this, Iago. Never anything like this.”

  And then, yes, then I allowed myself to believe that it was finally happening.

  I carefully lifted her up by her waist and sat her down on my lap facing me, with my back resting against the sofa and her legs on either side of mine. That position finally gave us the intimacy we deserved and that we’d put off for so long.

  I remember that embrace as if she were still between my arms today. It had the power of the supernatural, an alchemy that few are selected to enjoy. And I wanted to invent a machine that would stop time so that we could remain there, suspended in the dark of that night in which nothing else mattered.

  Thousands of kisses later, I forced myself to speak. “Do you have any idea how long I’ve had to wait to meet you? I’ve been searching for you for three hundred generations. I’ve known all your forebears. I’ve watched them change over time. I’ve pretended to adapt myself to them, so that I could finally meet my companion, the one who will leave me indelibly marked . . .” Grabbing her chin, I said, “Because it’s so. Because you’re the one who was reserved for me. But nothing really prepared me for this. We’ve made all the errors we could have made and, despite this, here we are. This link we share must be strong if it hasn’t broken yet.”

  “That’s true. I can’t stop thinking about how close we’ve been to ending it, even before anything really started,” she murmured, her voice sounding as if she was falling into a semisleep.

  Dana had leaned against my torso, her head resting on my chest, and when I looked at her face, I realized the effort she was making to stay awake.

  “Come on,” I whispered, “I’ll carry you to our bed.”

  “I can walk under my own steam to my own house. Don’t worry about me,” she said, half-asleep.

  “There’s no reason why you should go through this on your own.”

  “I don’t mind. I’ve always been on my own when I’ve been sick,” she replied, trying to infuse her voice with something like defiance.

  “Well, there’s no need for it now, Adriana.”

  “By the way, you can call me Dana.”

  As I just said, that night was one to frame. I hid a smile as big as the cosmos.

  Then she looked at me with a frown. “What’s the matter with your hand?”

  “Nothing really.”

  “Well, it looks as if it’s been burned,” she insisted with a note of concern in her voice that delighted me.

  “The fact is that it doesn’t hurt at all. I somatize really well.”

  “And what the devil does that mean?”

  I smiled. That was my Dana; she was back.

  “That I’m so happy that I don’t feel any part of my body complaining. Honestly, it doesn’t hurt. Come on. Let’s go, my love.”

  She smiled at me with the misty look of someone who isn’t aware of anything. So I picked her up in my arms and carried her to my bedroom. I left her lying facedown on the bed wearing the top half of my pajamas. If she woke up during the night, she would find the wound very painful. I went out onto the balcony, forcing myself to carry out my tasks even though the only thing I wanted was to lie down on the bed beside her and spend the night looking at her.

  First, I pulled the oldest leaf from my aloe plant and peeled it, extracting all the pulp into a bowl. Then I turned off all the lights in the apartment, put on the bottoms of the pajamas I was sharing with Dana, and lit a candle next to my bedside table. I lay down on my side and spent some time watching her. I brushed the caramel-colored hair back from her face. She had collapsed, totally exhausted, and my body was begging for sleep, but there was still something I had to do.

  I took off her pajama top as carefully as I could so as not to disturb her and concentrated on removing the dressing that was covering the claw mark. When her back was exposed, I examined it closely. There would be a scar, a sign of her battle. More than one person had risked their life to gain something similar. There had been no need for her to look for one. I removed the Betadine with a piece of gauze soaked in water and then conscientiously applied the aloe pulp along the length of the wound. I also applied some to my hand, not because it was bothering me, but so that it would recover its normal appearance as quickly as possible and Dana could stop worrying about it. I took my time. My priority was that Dana not suffer, and that the mark which would accompany her for the rest of her days would heal quickly. Would I ever be capable of matching her achievement?

  Hours later the candle went out, putting an end to the lengthened shadows my fingers had been casting onto the wall as they ran up and down her back. The aloe had been completely absorbed, and when her back had dried, I bandaged it again and put the pajama top back on her. I watched over her sleep for as long as I could, storing away every word we’d said that night so I wouldn’t forget them for the next ten thousand years. I knew I’d need to remember them, that they would light up the bad times.

  With that thought I lifted Dana’s body on top of mine so that she could rest her head on my chest, and finally gave myself up to sleep.

  PART 3

  44

  IAGO

  Saturn Day, the
fourteenth day of the month of Duir

  Saturday, June 23, 2012

  To be honest, I wasn’t conscious of when the night died and our first morning together was born. I know that in my dreams Dana wasn’t wearing any clothing that would tie her to, or identify her with, any particular era, but her name and her face never changed. I know that we rolled on top of each other in our semislumber, half-awake, half-asleep in the clean dawn light, embracing each other so we wouldn’t fall off the bed. I, ever mindful of the wound on her back; she, piercing me with her gaze, without disturbing me. We were both looking forward to the next step. And it was as it should be, because we owed it to each other.

  First came the kisses at the corners of the mouth, kisses with our eyes open. Her thighs were soft and trembled just as I remembered. My hands navigated her narrow waist, and Dana again explored the nape of my neck and my shoulders, retracing the route she initiated during our very first night. This time, however, she wasn’t sad. This time, she was warm. She had all the time in the world, although there was an urgency, too.

  But I owed my lady a tribute, so I sat her on the edge of the bed so that her back wouldn’t be resting on the mattress. Then I kissed the taut, smooth belly of one who has never been a mother and made my way down to the inside of her thighs. I moistened the tip of my tongue in her mouth and, using it like a brush, painted pictograms with the saliva and then blew them dry with my breath while she held her breath as my kisses brought her tsunami ever closer.

  Then she whispered, “Imagine we are both virgins again.”

  I obeyed, and that new reality ended up heightening my passion.

  I know I spoke to her in a thousand tongues, because I swore I would never again raise any barriers between us, and I know she understood them all. I know that a short time later neither of us could hold back, the pajama top and bottom had disappeared, and I had no memory of the sequence in which that happened. All I know is that two battle-scarred warriors, both on the same side, were fighting on that battlefield.

  Dana moaned in my ear, making me forget everything prior to her existence in my life. I entered her, holding on to her hips as our bodies created their own rhythm, as if they were casting aside those parts of us that belonged to the past and anything we might have done back then. And as we were seated on our throne, with Dana on my lap, she finally revealed herself as the goddess she’d always been, and I as the immortal I’d always been.

  As such we reached orgasm, and it took away our consciousness. For a moment I became disorientated again and sensed the vertigo that came with not knowing who I was. But she saw it in my eyes and held my face and whispered my most recent name to me over and over again. Then we cried out in unison, not the least bit concerned about the neighbors in the other buildings, or the walls, or the passersby twisting their heads to look upward one Saturday morning on the Paseo de Pereda.

  45

  ADRIANA

  Saturday, June 23, 2012

  A burst of endorphins such as I’d never experienced before ensured I was anesthetized from the wound on my back for a while. After that it hurt; of course it hurt. It left me quite breathless. The wound forced me to hold my back completely upright, with my shoulder blades pulled right back. Despite all this it was one of the best days of my life, and that’s exactly how I remember it. Allowing myself to see Iago for who he really was took so much weight off my shoulders that for the first time in months I felt worry-free.

  The previous afternoon, when Héctor and I had got out of Iago’s car and were left on our own, we took a short walk before we got to the front entrance of my building. Entire legions of Santander residents had thronged onto the streets for fear of losing even a minute’s sunshine.

  “You’re starting to believe us, aren’t you?” Héctor said as he walked beside me with his hands in his pockets.

  “You’ve noticed, then?”

  “Yes, I’ve seen that way of looking at us before. That said, not many times. But now it’s as if you are seeing us for the first time, right?” he asked, even though we both knew it was a rhetorical question. It had already been answered.

  The only thing I could do was nod in silence. I was trying very hard not to limp or show how much the wound really was burning.

  “Look, Adriana, if someone tells you he’s never before seen his son like that, he might be talking about ten or twenty years, thirty at the most. But if that same person is talking about ten thousand years, that’s an entirely different matter. Iago has all the time in the world—literally, I believe—but I have a feeling that you don’t.”

  I slowed my pace because we’d reached the section under the arches and were getting close to my front entrance.

  “What I want to say to you,” he continued, “is that I don’t understand how you can be losing what little time you have at your disposal.”

  I brought our walk to a halt and put my hand on his shoulder. “Héctor, don’t pressure me anymore. Not today, please. I’ll do whatever I have to do. I’m grateful to you, too, for saving my life. I might well have been an item on the news if it hadn’t been for the two of you. As your son put it, I have a blood debt outstanding to you, and one day, if it’s in my power, I’ll return the favor. But please understand that right now I need to be alone.”

  “Whatever you prefer.”

  He kissed me on the forehead and went off smiling, maybe because he’d picked up on the fact that I’d referred to Iago as his son.

  I made it to my apartment and prepared myself some warm soup. I needed to put something into my body that would make me feel better. I was dying of hunger, so I kept filling my bowl until there was nothing left in the pot. I thought about lying down for a sleep, but the wound was on fire and kept me pacing back and forth like the lioness Iago had taken down. I took off my clothes and got into the shower to try to wash away all the bad things that had taken place that day. But they wouldn’t go away.

  I had to talk to Iago. I had to thank him. He’d placed himself under a wounded lioness to save me. How long would I have to live in order to return that favor? My throat went dry again, and it felt as if I had swallowed a cactus when I closed my eyes and the image of Iago under the animal came back to me. I had thought for a moment that the animal would destroy him, that I’d have to watch it clawing and dismembering him. That was when I’d decided that I wouldn’t run away again, that I wouldn’t protect myself, but that I would yield to the evidence. I remember thinking, I’ll never overcome this. If it’s because of me that Iago dies, there’ll be no five phases of mourning or anything else.

  Then they had taken me away to the infirmary before they’d removed the lioness’s body from Iago, but I knew from the calm appearance and aplomb of his father that he’d survived. In Iago’s car, on the way back to Santander, I’d understood: Héctor was right. I’d never seen Iago like this before either, totally beside himself, with almost no self-control, so unlike Iago. Even when he’d lost his memory and his self-confidence after returning from the US, he’d still been Iago; he’d still maintained his composure. This time it was different.

  Then I recognized that it was because of me. That we were both the same, both equally stubborn in our attitude. And, like a blind person recovering his or her sight, I could also see that I was tired of giving myself excuses, and that I didn’t feel like running away anymore. I did want to run, no question, but toward his house four streets away rather than away from it, as was usually the case. And I wanted to find out if it could be true that a ten-thousand-year-old man was trembling because of me.

  Iago’s voice brought me back to the present. “Is your back hurting right now?”

  “Just a little”—Quite a lot to be honest—“but I’ll take another painkiller.”

  He looked at me with a smile, because he hadn’t believed a word I’d said. “Next time ask me to get you one first.”

  “I will. You can count on it,�
�� I said, my face very close to his.

  And it was such a delight to spend the morning lazing in his bedroom, naked under the sheets, with nothing else to do. I thought about all the questions I’d like to ask and realized that we could probably dedicate a good decade to my unwholesome archaeological curiosity, doing nothing else but me asking questions and him responding, so I decided to postpone my interrogation for a few more hours. If science could wait, so could I.

  There were other pressing needs calling for attention. Needs like kissing every inch of his wonderful face nonstop, or telling him incessantly that he was the one, he and nobody else. Needs like allowing him to delicately follow the scar on my forehead with his tongue, and the new one, the one on my back; the one that had united us in this way—permanently, no matter what might happen.

  Hours later the Waterboys sounded on his phone, shaking us out of the lethargy we’d sunk into. Iago jumped up and ran to the other end of the bedroom to get it out of his trouser pocket.

  “No, I hadn’t forgotten that it’s tonight . . .” he said, looking down and running his fingers through his hair. “When have I ever forgotten the salmon? . . . Of course it’s already being marinated. In any event, I’ll see if I . . .”—he corrected himself—“if we . . . Yes, I said ‘if we.’ ”

  Someone on the other end said something, but it came across as nothing more than a whisper to me.

  “Well, prepare your younger son. I don’t want him making a scene. I’ll call you later once I decide what we’re going to do,” he said and hung up.

  “Was that Héctor?”

  “Yes, he was demanding my presence at the family celebration of St. John’s Eve, the summer solstice.”