by H C Turk
“What I select, then, is your contradiction, that you allege piety, yet promise evil. Therefore, the choice be yours. If a godly man, you reject rape and killing. If ye be evil, let Satan choose your topic. If God is your creator, you select me as a lady.”
Naylor then laughed with his mouth closed, his smile as meager as it was rare. As though embarrassed by his own foolish response, Sir Jacob turned from me and quit my cell.
The next man to enter brought mainly his prick. A male so accustomed to lying that his visage did not reveal his age entered in prison garb so contrasting with my fine woolen dress that further conflict was demanded. Immediately he sought me, and found disbelief, the man startled that so comely a lass would be offered for his leisure activity. Meat for the animal’s eating was I, the starving sinner staring at me with no embarrassment as he neared, as he made to join me on the stage of my bed. Despite the histrionics, the audience retained its response; for behind that temporary hole stood the magistrate, his face hidden by the corridor’s darkness, his smell penetrating that barred opening the same as shadow and sound.
As though a site selected for this lovers’ tryst, the bed saw us meet at its edge. Performing my practiced role, I sat on the cot and lifted my legs toward the second actor; and with no lady’s undergarments worn in this society, what was to interfere with his gaining my meat? Well rehearsed was this actor who knelt to consummate the scene or consume the scenery. He found, however, not the fulfillment implied first by my beauty, then by my spreading, but a composer’s climax wherein taunting was merely a segue to a sexless denouement equitable with the surrounds; for I kicked him like a crime, striking him full in the face with both feet. As the actor stumbled backwards from the energy of my orgasm, I proved myself so aesthetic as to leap up and perform a variation on my theme, stepping to the man with no overture to kick him well again, now to his sensitive, smelly crotch. In this role, I had no concern for the male, my only intent to avoid killing sex. And here was society’s evil: to foster disregard in folk by encouraging mutual attacks between members, then punishing the troupe with each other. How pleased, then, was the audience at the composition’s turn, expecting a romance yet finding tragedy? No booing ensued when the act progressed from bodies to bodily function; for noting the criminal about to rise, I met his shoulder with my chamber pot, both items damaged by the contact, but only the latter past repair. Then the sinner forgot my femininity despite gaining a great smell of my lower regions in that he was coated with my piss, a minor revision compared to that of his arm so wrenched the man could not lift it, could not modify his expression from one of unrehearsed pain.
The scene ended as though a curtain closed, two stagehands entering to change scenery, a pair of sinners who looked at me, then the man, removing this latter prop by dragging him by his side without shit, without breakage, act one, scene one, more tragedy to follow.
I had no regret for saving myself from the torture of that evil sex. Praise God, I implied, for saving that man from Eric’s mutilation, from Percival’s death. Naylor’s promise of the criminal’s forthcoming, official death had no effect on my emotion. Most significant was a new aspect of my life, for I had never before attacked a person with brutal intent. The men I had killed were Satan’s work. The boy flogged in the park was mere punition. Slapping Rathel was direct defense, but the prisoner I had devastated. What sort of person had I become to attack without so much as contemplating avoidance? True evil is evil’s self-justification, and though I felt shame from the assault, I also felt relief from averting my own injury—but was that small salvation worth the man’s damage? As though Eric in my hands, here was another man partially destroyed, this crime more morally heinous by being intended. Eric had been injured from foolishness, a criminal lack of thought avoidable if the evil witch had only rejected Rathel’s drink, rejected Rathel. But, no, in her socialness the witch allowed her husband’s destruction, which led to her causing further injury, that to her identity given by God; for never had I been more of a sinner than when damaging one in their own manner.
• • •
I waited for Naylor. Surely, he would provide a new process for the witch now that lust had failed. But only a guard came that day, replacing my split dung bucket, leaving me grease food, exchanging my water crock for one whose content was too fresh to support the greenish cast of a previous wet body, that pool where I had not failed to prove myself the witch, but failed to prove myself a killer.
I would not eat that sinners’ grease until near starvation. And though unhungered, I prepared for my future sustenance by hieing toward the nearest insect, gaining the flying beetle to bite its belly, bite the creature to find myself eating a bug as though I were an animal—but I was worse, for in being revolted by this natural consumption, I again was a sinner, folk who would likely eat one another’s heads rather than bug guts and call the feeding Continental. As punishment for being a sinner, I decided to starve, and tossed the dead insect through the window, having swallowed only the single bite, which in fact was less than tasty. As though refuting or refusing my own witchness, I proceeded to the water bucket and well cleansed my palate, further proving myself the sinner by being unable to accept the taste of God’s true food.
The magistrate returned that night, for I found him in my dreams, the type most heinous by being real. Therein he first visited another cell, one identical to the Rathel’s kitchen, to obtain a lethargic drink, but not for himself. As though more concerned with my dreams than his own reality, he had come to feed a certain ignorant prisoner, one so deluded as to believe herself a sinner, when in fact the magistrate knew her to be a common criminal. To prove her identity, he would connive her toward sleep, for therein she would dream of escape and thereby prove the justification for her incarceration in bed.
Having achieved my sleeping, the magistrate observed by sending an actor to participate in my dreams of eating raw meat. From my crystalline crotch, I decunted dreams of witchcraft that this sinner sipped, though my groin fumes were so biting he should have refrained from imbibing, his failure one of etiquette, a failure in thinking he could control the flow of sex liquor, later to wonder why he had not simply refrained, simply quit my bed, simply refused my crotch or spilled it. But too politely did he pour himself into my cuntainer that held but a small part of him, but held it completely. Then he danced on the stage of my sex an unmusical opera that turned to tragedy; and I, the unappreciative audience, suffered. Lodged in my balcony bed, I felt the same torment that this player portrayed, and what God did he seek to redeem himself? What prayer do men have when their manliness dies, their offspring deceased without being born? The sinner was a bug on me feeling its leg bitten away. This creature meat was made into a meal by devil Rathel, a family member who, according to history, was a chef so rank as to revolt the diner from the bottom up, the invert person from her stomach out disposing of the criminal consumed, the man a meal puked away as warm mush, no longer imprisoned within the witch, though not precisely free, his limb exchanged for tactile regret, limbo mush nightmare remorse for accepting the sleeper and suffering her dream.
So tormenting was this nightmare as to be in two acts. After the meal came a loss of employment. Since the spy had been too social for Naylor’s law, no pardon was forthcoming despite the actor’s tremendous outcry of bloody tears from his crotch face that lacked a nose, his response one from remorse, for he hated a dampness composed of his blood. Sentencing the actor to silence, Naylor provided peace with no action, allowing the spy to weep himself to sleep forever, his end a succession of diminishing prayers of Great God, Lord Jesus, and Blessed Mother for having his lower nose plucked away, the one to be poking my decunter, not that above sniffling bloodless tears of Great God, Lord Jesus, Blessed Mother, the man inverted because his lower nose, in its absence, wept more profusely than that above, and he did not care to be inverted, like a white witch, in that one had pulled his manly nose away, Great God, scabbed Jesus, and the witch’s bloody mother with her
pieces in a grave, in pieces like this man, but all sooty was she, dirty and not to be touched lest fingerprints be left on everything touched thereafter, throughout one’s life, her daughter’s life, fingerprints of soot left wherever Mother touched her after death, in all her daughter’s lives, darkened smears like bruises from within the flesh, welts on her spirit’s sensibilities, bruises on her love, sooty blood as dark as the devil left as clear as tears on that white skin, black body.
How saddening a composition the magistrate created, one to move me toward tears, but not near enough, for my tears were golden fish unable to pass through my eyes, remaining in my head as though a nightmare to swim round and round, rooted by the black gold of hair as though a familial source. Most vivid was this dream for the pain it brought me, as though I had been mutilated instead of the nightmare spy, as though I had lost a limb when in fact I had gained one. Though having difficulty in distinguishing this dream of pain from my tormented sleeping, I finally awoke to see my keeper cleaning a meal thrown onto the floor whose consumption I could not recall; for why would I eat such a mush made of water and bile whose only distinguishable portion appeared to be a nailless thumb? Perhaps this was the guard’s own vomit, for his entire body retched and trembled, though no part of him expressed enough revulsion to fit one beauteous of view who in her heart was a cannibal.
Chapter 37
A Misapplication Of Love
Miss Elsie looked up from the street, but could not see her lass. This was no dream. Since the window’s bezel was set deeply within the wall, I could not press forward into light; so in shadow I stood to look down upon Elsie. Her clothing was typical for a servant, not the dull greyness fit a jail, but Elsie was no longer a prisoner. Miss Elsie had been released from this home of mine, though too long after being captured by Naylor’s morality. But what force had rejected her? There she stood in the narrow street’s center, a wagon passing by, a carriage, not enough traffic to oust her as she stared upward to Montclaire’s wall. But was the woman looking up to see the cave that had held her for days, or was she looking for me? And what should my response entail? Should I scream out: Here I am, the one who loves you yet near killed your master! Or should I hide from shame and regret, do nothing, no response, mentioning naught of the history to bring us there not to be changed. But, no, some past aspect was different, some conviction or belief modified, and the potentially guilty Miss Elsie had been released. One belief, however, would never change, one of mine: that this woman I did love, should love, and no remorse had I for my conviction.
Standing in my cave to see Elsie in the world to fit her, I loved her better for the justice she had received, loved the relief I felt for her release, and was satisfied. Yet Elsie was looking, not for an object unless that object be as alive as her own emotion. So in my selfishness I called her name, no more, no pledge of love nor desire for forgiveness. I spoke her name again, more loudly, then louder yet until the sound was no longer a name but a cry, a plea. And the sinner heard me, this woman, this friend; for no longer did she cast her view along the wall, but gave all of her attention to a sound, a spot, a dark shadow that was my cave’s passage for remorse. There she looked in silence, toward silence; for having gained her attention, I gave nothing further; so we shared God’s space, a medium that was loneliness, a distance of despair.
She looked away. Sharply Elsie moved her gaze to the street’s level, for as though male sex fumes came loud orders from Montclaire’s bottom for the woman to be on her way lest she return for a greater stay, what with all her fondness. Then Elsie turned to leave, lifting her hand to produce some gesture; but with nothing left to hear and no one to be seen, the woman had no goal but a black hole that was me, Elsie departing with only her freedom, her half-raised hand returned to her side as she left my world, left me.
• • •
“As sure as God lives, He will have your soul, murderous cur, and send it to Satan where the spirit of such an immoral hypocrite belongs.”
Naylor displayed no surprise at my condemnation, a vow on the Lord’s behalf that I desired as though lust. The magistrate, however, was either accustomed to such condemnations or familiar with my rash assertions, my liberal philosophy. Or was he less surprised at my words than my special speaking, that murmuring of my lower lips having effected within him true belief, a proof to last his entire life of occult concern? And did I not discern a new attitude on his part signified by a whiff of fear? Those two males within my cell near the door: did their presence not prove the magistrate’s caution, his cowardice? What form did his fear take that he was not accompanied by a man of God, only those of crime?
“No cleric would condemn me, and surely they know Jesus better than you, being experts in God. The previous night, you finally proved your own expertise, for which I praise God. And He will accept my praise with none of the rejection you seek, for I have fulfilled my duty as one of His men by allowing the barbarous criminal to pass on to greater hands.”
“And during the night, you tortured him first. My God vilifies all torturers. Does yours, being Satan, perhaps praise them instead?”
“If true, he would be praising you, woman, for you are the person to have done the bloody deed.”
“My person was the implement, vile Naylor, dishonest in your sinister philosophy by which you and the devil destroyed one of God’s people. No willingness had I as proven by your requiring a potion to steal my body. No less than the blade wielded to kill the man was my person a tool unwillingly used for slaughter.”
“But even as the metal blade slices naturally, proven equally natural is your need to slaughter men.”
“The need be yours, heinous Naylor, and the ability is mine the same as any person with a blade has the capacity to slaughter, but only those vile have the need.”
“Enough of this pious expertise, woman, from one residing in an English prison for having mutilated her husband. I did not make your torso such a weapon. But I have verified its capacity as you previously maintained. Thus, we proceed to your true identity, that of a witch. Therefore, avail yourself in good detail to correct my misjudgments of your nature, for this be the vow made us one another. Despite your initial doubt, my integrity in keeping my word is proven. All that remains is your testimony.”
“With all of your integrity, you take pride in using me heinously?”
“Be a good blade, missus, and feign not that your edge has no dried blood from previous occult displays. Hereafter, you will deny that your own husband’s male member was separated by his wife’s body. If a satanic force overcame your pious will and caused you to slaughter, then be it part of your description, part of your vow.”
“And your vow is to allow me life. How generous when without Eric’s death you cannot legally kill me. But a magistrate of your bloody career can interpret the law according to his own integrity—and who’s to restrain him: the God he praises or the devil he manipulates?”
“Your own lax philosophy will not change the honesty of our mutual pledge. Your life I have promised to spare not as due to be taken for your husband’s assault, but for those other sheer murders last night proven true. For those deaths, you receive no punition from England. At your life’s end, Lord God will have His own interpretation, but His justice is not for magistrates to question. My place with you now is to receive your own expert and most thorough knowledge of your race and all their occult secrets.”
“My own, accurate recollection provides for further achievement on your part. Or has your memory vanished with your integrity?”
“All my requirements regarding our vow I have realized. Your ‘saint,’ this Elsie Rowell, was released today with no harm done. Proof might be offered you as to her living freely in London.”
“No verification is required in that I saw her depart, and pray God that she receives from life what her pious heart deserves.”
“From further observation, did you note this prison’s latest guest arrive? Did you observe my remaining vow’s fulfillmen
t?”
“I did not.”
“As Elsie Rowell vacated her cell, the woman was replaced by one now considered less expert than before. A formal English trial awaits Amanda Rathel, who is charged with conspiracy to murder, and additionally, with harboring a murderess and dealing with occult forces at the cost of human life.”
“How might this trial damage me since often there I’ll be discussed?”
“Well accepted legally will be that your dealings with Lady Amanda are separate and fulfilled with justice in the eyes of Queen Anne and her law.”
“This Rathel, then, will not manipulate you as often she has during your career of integrity?”
“Lady Amanda shall receive a justice due her that you will not, for only your testament saves you. But Amanda…. No words shall I accept from her, no expertise. As you wished for Rowell, Rathel will receive her deserved results in life. To prove my expertise in arraignment, shall I display the prisoner and have you understand my contractual completion?”
“You may.”
The magistrate stepped away, moving to his guards with whom he had quiet speaking. I discerned no words, but Naylor’s voice sought me, his deep tone projecting an unsegmented sound. Then the door was opened, one guard leaving, the second remaining with Sir Jacob.
“You will accompany us, missus,” he offered, and held forth his hand as though for a lady. This prisoner, however, his hand would not touch, only direct.
Guards infiltrated the prison’s halls like rats, internal constables observing at cells, and I wondered how often they had stared into mine. Now they gained good viewing, looking closely not to their superior, but to his most beauteous charge. And what had they heard of this prisoner to set them to wonder? Though that unpadded, half-flat bosom was readily seen, did they also stare at my pelvis as I passed to wonder of pricks contained therein, like sweetmeat in a crockery jar, cockery jar? Did they look behind me for sexual members dribbled from my bottom, jostled loose by the movement of my legs, the swaying of my hips they well desired to imprison with their senses? And what was the source of Naylor’s pride I smelled: from accompanying a blatant beauty, or controlling a proven witch?