The Horse Healer

by Gonzalo Giner

  He went to the window and felt the cool of the night on his burning face. Then he looked for his Koran, the most beautiful of all books of poetry. He wrote something on a leaf of parchment, folded it, and slipped it between the pages. He always did this when something important occurred.

  “Wait!” the caliph exclaimed when they were already leaving his chambers.

  Al-Nasir approached Estela and looked into her eyes.

  “If now you ask me for forgiveness, you can avoid this martyrdom. This is your last opportunity. What is your answer?”

  “You may wound my body, stain my skin with blood, but you will never have my heart,” she answered without fear.

  When he heard that, al-Nasir felt a wound tear open in his heart, worse than if she had stabbed him with the daggers. He had never loved another woman so much, and now nothing could avoid his wrath.

  “Get her out of here!”

  The next morning, after the first prayers, Estela was dragged to the base of the minaret and tied to a wooden pillar. Five imposing Imesebelen protected her from the public that had begun to gather around her.

  One of them was Tijmud. He saw how her legs shook and he was saddened. They bent on their own, beyond the girl’s will, and then, when she was about to fall, they would straighten and hold her up a bit longer. Her elbows, arms, all her body was shivering from the terror she seemed to feel.

  Estela had decided not to scream and to bear any blow, however hard. She thought of her sisters and decided to sacrifice herself willingly.

  “Don’t hurt her. She’s good. …” A sweet and childlike voice attracted her attention.

  She raised her head and saw a girl of around eight years old with a clear, sincere gaze. The girl extended her small hand offering her little strength, her support, as if she could help. Her father, seeing the gesture, reprimanded her, saying that Estela was a heretic, a filthy Christian. The girl’s eyes welled with tears. Her innocence moved Estela before she lost sight of her, just when the vizier appeared.

  “Are you Estela de Malagón?” he shouted.

  “I am,” her thin voice responded.

  “Very well, then we will get started as soon as we can.” She heard a murmur of satisfaction from the public. The man turned to the soldiers and signaled Tijmud.

  “You shall begin.” He passed him the whip.

  The guard took the leather and looked at the woman in her tribulation. They had trained him to kill in defense of the caliph, and his pulse had never quickened when he had been given the opportunity, but this was different. The girl was defenseless, and besides, he knew her.

  Nonetheless, he understood his obligation and readied to obey the order.

  “Begin, and be firm.” The vizier tore Estela’s tunic in half. “This is the wish of your caliph, whom you owe everything to, even your very life.”

  Tijmud breathed deep and flicked the whip twice through the air before bringing it down on the girl. A tense silence accompanied the first blow. As the leather cracked over the girl, there was heard a light murmur of pain. The people applauded his action, anxious to see blood. The second lash tore her skin, opening a wound from the base of her neck to the middle of her back.

  The vizier ordered him to stop and turned to the prisoner. He grabbed her hair and twisted it, making her look at her observers.

  “Look at their faces, whore. See how they enjoy it?”

  She didn’t answer. She felt the wound in her back and the ache of exposed flesh, but she still felt she could bear it.

  “Go on,” he said again to Tijmud, “and show no mercy. Find her ribs, and give it all your might.”

  Tijmud tensed the muscles in his arm and gave her a series of ten lashes without any rest in between. As if it was a knife, the whip opened her flesh, lacerating her, violating the silky texture of her skin. She screamed during the last few, incapable of resisting that terrible pain further. Her back was on fire.

  Tijmud cleaned the blood from his hands and approached her to see how she was. Secretly, he spoke into her ear.

  “I hate doing this,” he whispered. “Forgive me.”

  Estela looked into his eyes and forgave him between her cries of anguish. There was no need to say it; he saw it, he knew it, and he felt an unknown and unrecognizable feeling. It was like a strange impulse that seemed to push him to protect her from more pain. He still had thirteen lashes left to give. He had never felt anything like it. He thought it must be what others called pity, a feeling he didn’t know. He cleaned the tip of the leather, somewhat confused, before he went on. His hands failed him. … The vizier shouted in his ear to continue, insulted him, even grabbed one of his hands, cocking it back so he would strike the girl.

  Estela filled her lungs with air and squeezed the muscles in her back to receive the final lashes. As the number went up, the public began to get nervous. Some women protested that the penalty was too harsh, others shouted for them to stop the butchery, but the vizier paid attention to none of them. He had precise orders from the caliph and he was determined to carry them out.

  Estela, frightened, awaited the whistling sound that preceded the stinging of the whip, but she began to think of other things. She remembered her life in Malagón and her thoughts fled in pursuit of the family’s inn. There she saw her siblings, back when they were still happy, and she thought of Diego. What would have happened to him?

  A terrible pain shook her thoughts when the whip came around her ribs, and its tip, hard and cutting, scratched one of her breasts.

  She clenched her jaws and awaited the arrival of the next lash, looking at Tijmud. She saw compassion toward her in his eyes, and she began to think of him.

  Ever since the wicked execution of Blanca, that Imesebelen, guardian of Princess Najla, had approached her a number of times. Though they had hardly spoken, she saw something special in him from the beginning, different from the rest of those wicked guards. And then she saw herself fleeing again, with Blanca, through the streets of the city, in that same square. She remembered a man with a flute, and at his side a basket of serpents, he was playing a beautiful melody when she was captured.

  Then she suddenly felt very tired, and only wanted to sleep.

  She stopped hearing the blows on her skin and began to feel her head, heavy, very heavy, and let it fall.

  The vizier, clearly angered, tried to see if she was just faking, and approached to observe her. He ordered Tijmud to stop once he was sure. He waited a moment for her to regain awareness and then sent for a bucket of water to revive her. He himself threw it over her head, but to no effect.

  “Who cares?” he decided. “Finish with the lashes she has coming to her, and then leave her there; maybe the sun will heal her wounds.”

  Unable to go on, Tijmud passed the whip to another Imesebelen. The new man gave Estela a blow that resounded through the whole of the plaza. Immediately it aroused cries of protest among the people. Some began to insult the guards; others threw fruit and stones, accusing them of being cowards.

  That soldier, impervious to what was happening around him, continued hurling the leather once, twice, five more times, until suddenly Estela awoke and opened her eyes in fright. When he saw her, the vizier stopped the whip with his own hands and watched what she was doing.

  She clenched her fists, shouted in pain, stood up from the floor with great difficulty, and screamed. She did it with such desperation that it penetrated the consciences of all who were there. Najla heard her from inside the palace. She was with her brother. Both looked at each other horrified, aware of who it was coming from.

  “One day you killed my best friend, Blanca. Are you going to let them do the same to her?”

  Al-Nasir covered his ears to flee from his own torment, but Estela screamed again, much stronger than before, until the entire city could hear her.

  From the place of punishment, Estela looked p
roudly at the vizier, and far from begging him for clemency, she spit on the floor with contempt, having heard the multitude clamoring for him to take pity on her.

  Some of the women who screeched, now emboldened, picked up stones and began to hurl them at the torturers. The vizier took charge and raised his voice so that he could be heard.

  “In the name of Allah, the benevolent, the merciful, listen to me …” He raised his hands in the air and repeated the same thing three times until he managed to get complete silence. “As you know, our law commands that we publicly flog those who fornicate, who commit adultery, and accuse others of lying.” He walked around Estela and placed his hands on her back, staining them with blood. Then he showed it to everyone. “I assure you the blood of this woman was not spilled in vain. You must know that you have here an infidel, a Christian, a deviant who has dared to offend our glorious caliph. Her sin must be punished, and that is what has been done. But I have just seen you pray to Allah for her, begging for mercy, perhaps. And I want you to know Allah has heard you. And in obedience to his will”—he raised his voice higher—“the beating will be suspended.”

  A clamor of approval coursed through the crowd.

  “Free her, then,” a boy shouted.

  “Free her, free her,” a chorus started up.

  “I cannot. …” the vizier concluded. “She must finish paying for her crime. She will go on tied to this wood for three days, as our caliph has demanded.”

  The people, murmuring their disapproval, began to scatter through the square known to all of them as Jemaa el Fna, to the stalls where they sold their wares. The vizier, too, after giving his final orders, left the square.

  All that remained was a guard of two Imesebelen to prevent the curious from meddling. One of them was Tijmud.

  After a while, Estela turned her gaze to him and saw his eyes, as dark as his skin, with scarcely enough strength to bear the pain running through her body.

  “Tijmud, I need to drink. …”

  “My lady, I cannot. … You must understand.”

  “Please, I beg you. I’m dying of thirst.”

  Tijmud studied his companion’s face and understood that he wouldn’t approve. He went over to him and whispered into his ear in their language. Then he called a young girl and sent her to bring a pitcher of water. Tijmud himself helped her to drink.

  “Thank you again.”

  “Now rest, and don’t speak more. Try to sleep so the pain doesn’t sap your energy.”

  “You’re right. … I feel very tired and it’s hard to speak. …”

  “I’ll try to help you.”

  “Why are you doing this?”

  “I don’t know. … When I see you suffering, I feel something moving inside me, but I don’t know what it is.”

  Estela gripped the wood and closed her exhausted eyes. Her torment was so great that she didn’t know what it was or where it came from. After a while she was defeated by weariness and fell asleep.

  When the sun began to rise the next day, a warm light touched her cheeks and stirred her awake. When she opened her eyes, she looked for Tijmud without seeing him. He had been replaced by another soldier who refused to answer her questions. But Tijmud came back that afternoon, and then they were able to talk.

  “My back feels like something is tearing at it from all sides,” Estela confessed. A hard crust of blood covered it entirely. “There are moments when I can hardly breathe from so much pain. …”

  In midafternoon, a punishing sun fell like lead over the square, emptying it out. Tijmud took advantage of the circumstances to cool the wounds on her back with fresh water. Using a cotton cloth, he carefully dried them.

  “Tell me about your family,” Estela said.

  “An Imesebelen does not have a family.”

  “That is impossible.”

  “No, señora, it isn’t. In case you didn’t know, as soon as we are born, we are separated from our parents and taken to a special school. There they prepare us so that one day, we will be the faithful guardians of the caliph. In my case, I learned that as a newborn, they left me in a stable where there was only a camel. I will never know how I made it, but it seems the animal raised me on its milk. That is usually the first trial they submit us to so that we become good Imesebelen. He who shows he has sufficient instincts goes for the camel when hunger strikes him. Those who don’t, die. Some are not even capable of absorbing the camel’s dense milk, and some get stepped on and killed. That is how we are selected. From the first day, there begins a cruel triage that follows an infinitude of harsh tests where those who are too weak are exposed and only the strongest are chosen to finally protect the caliph.”

  “And the love of a mother, the protection of a father? How can someone live without that?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve never known what those things meant. Believe me. We Imesebelen live only for the caliph. He feeds us and we protect him; it is a simple and practical arrangement. During our preparation, those who show the most weakness, try to escape, or do not manage to get through the harsh circumstances of our training meet a harsh destiny.”

  “I can’t imagine.”

  “They become targets for our exercises.”

  “What kind of exercises?”

  “We learn how to kill in ways you couldn’t imagine.”

  Estela curled up from fright.

  “Then you have never known love, or the effect of a caress …”

  “I was taught in another language, the language of duty, of loyalty, of total sacrifice. I belong to a unique breed, an elect group, and I am proud of it.”

  “You aren’t, believe me. You have missed out on the very best in life. One day I hope to explain it to you.”

  That night, when he returned to the palace, Tijmud pondered what they had discussed. It had never occurred to him that his parents had been real, and the mere thought of it was causing him a strange disquiet. Might they still be alive?

  Once he crossed through the gates of the Alcazaba, he found the ambassador Pedro de Mora. He was walking in the company of the vizier. Though he hadn’t seen him for some time, there was something in his face that called his attention, blurring the outlines of his smile.

  They looked at each other. The two men were talking.

  Tijmud thought he heard something that piqued his interest even more. He hid behind a wall, with his back to it, and inched along it until he could hear them clearly.

  “It was a little bastard who did it to me; he said he was the brother of that redheaded whore you just punished, Estela.”

  “Be careful what you say about her, and to whom …” the vizier explained. “I will tell you in confidence, but before, you must swear not to repeat it to anyone.”

  “You have my word.”

  “Good. It is about our caliph. He is madly in love with the girl. There is no other woman in the harem who can make him happy, none. He loves her so much, in fact, that no one can understand what happened today.”

  “Thank you for warning me. What you tell me doesn’t surprise me especially, though it’s been some time since I’ve seen them together, nor have I spoken with him of this matter. I will be more careful, but I will also tell you, I will exact my revenge on that woman for the evil her brother has committed. I will take it out on her one day.”

  IX.

  Doña Teresa Ibáñez entered quickly into the music room where Mencía was playing a psalm.

  “Run, run. Leave that, and go to the ballroom. A great surprise is waiting for you.”

  Mencía left her instrument on the bench and got up mistrustfully. The rushing about, the change in her mother’s tone of voice, her nervous stomping, all that made her suspect she was covering up something.

  “What’s it about?”

  “Better if you see for yourself, darling. Come, quick.”

  Mencí
a crossed the courtyard full of blossoming camellias and turned to the other wing of the castle. Her mother was following her, almost touching her. When she arrived at the sitting room, Mencía found a man with his back to her looking out from one of the balconies. She coughed delicately to make her presence known, and he turned.

  “My beloved Mencía …” She was petrified when she saw it was Fabián Pardo, especially when he turned to her with an attitude that seemed so at odds with the contents of the letter she had mailed a few weeks back.

  The man took her belt and pulled her to him, intending to kiss her on the lips. She avoided him as best she could.

  “But why are you here?” Mencía put her hands between them to push away. “You are at war, you should be with your king, Pedro.”

  “My calling is the law and not arms, and I wanted so much to see you …”

  Doña Teresa interrupted their conversation.

  “You can’t imagine the joy your visit has brought us.” She moved around them like a sandstorm.

  She offered him her hand to receive his greeting and returned the courtesy, kissing him on both cheeks. “Forgive me these confidences, but I almost consider you part of the family already.”

  Mencía looked at her with horror.

  Doña Teresa was receiving the Aragonese as if he were her son-in-law. Though this struck her as already audacious, the worst thing was that Fabián seemed enchanted with the idea.

  “You are perfect,” he affirmed without warning, turning again to Mencía. “The greatest wife a man could ever dream of.”

  She was paralyzed. She had rejected him in writing and yet his reactions seemed to indicate the contrary. In her letter, she had left things sufficiently clear, and for that reason, his presence was incomprehensible. She armed herself with her courage and decided to broach the issue, looking for some logical explanation.

  “Did you get my letter?”