The Devil's Concubine Read online

“Shallem, guided by some supernatural sense, began to fly with me in his arms and avoided the gapes that had appeared in the ground. The house was free of the mist since the doors and windows were shut tightly and it was too thick to penetrate any cracks. He lay me down on the bed and lit the candelabra next to it. In the flickering light, I saw Shallem’s terrified expression as he looked at me. My body was burning and felt bloated, as though it had swollen several centimeters. A red veil seemed to cover my eyes and kept me from seeing him clearly. Our hair and clothes were dripping with that sticky slime.

  “I wanted to speak, to say goodbye to him, but I couldn’t. My life was fading by the seconds. I must have looked monstrous. He, by contrast, looked as healthy as ever in spite of his dirty clothes, body, and hair that fell dripping and loose upon his shoulders. The mist, which had covered his face, turned into a crystal clear film that glistened with a thousand colors, illuminated by the flames from the candles. His skin remained taught, creaseless, due to that mask. His expression was fierce and savage, an expression of someone ready to valiantly fight till the end to save the one he loves. He squeezed my hand in his as mortals usually do when consoling loved ones during an illness. Very slowly and with his eyes closed, he leaned toward me.

  “I felt his breath on my lips and then the short, forceful word that came from his.

  “ ‘Live,’ he whispered. What a sweet imperative, an undeniable command that wouldn’t accept denial. Then came a spell in the form of a deep, long kiss, an empyreal, metaphysical kiss unlike any human kiss. A kiss that filled me with the breath of life.

  “I felt no pain as something entered me as forcefully and violently as the vortex of a hurricane. A jump into nothingness and then, in a fraction of a second, a vertiginous fall that made my departing soul return, just like it did in Alexandria. Life came back to me in all of its splendor and with all of its energy.

  “The swelling, the blisters, the pain..., all of it was gone. I knew I wasn’t going to die. I knew Shallem’s powers had healed all of my wounds. I could see clearly, my hands were once again soft and smooth. I looked at him in the only way God or an angel could be looked at: with adoration.

  “Suddenly I saw Bronco, my favorite dog, watching us from the center of the room, motionless like an ebony statue. He had his tail between his legs and stood there with an air of absorbed stupefaction as if he had suddenly become... empty.

  “He started to whimper and his whimper grew louder and louder, like he was in horrible pain. Then he immediately stopped. His eyes shined like coal and he stared at me while growling ferociously and bearing his threatening fangs. His growl turned into something unexpectedly savage. A type of furious roar completely inappropriate for a dog.

  “ ‘Don’t move!’ Shallem shouted keeping his eyes on the dog. ‘He’s possessed!’

  “Bronco burst into flames the instant he leapt to jump onto my bed. He didn’t burn slowly, as you would expect, he combusted so quickly that in a fraction of a second, he was reduced to ashes. I couldn’t believe what I had just seen. For some moments, I was breathless with amazement. I felt a mixture of reverence and astonishment as I looked at Shallem, never had I imagined he possessed that type of power.

  “Suddenly an indescribable stench began to permeate the air. It was a foul nauseating odor, that seemed almost solid, palpable. It was like, perhaps, an odor you might smell coming from a decaying corpse. A stench that made you retch and which had turned my face into a grimace of repugnance.

  “ ‘What is that?’ I asked.

  “ ‘They’re here!’ Shallem shouted.

  “Through the window I saw a horrifying spectacle of bright lights and frozen shadows. Inside the bedroom, there was a new horror. A sound. A deathly screeching like nails being dragged across a chalkboard. The sound penetrated my brain, turning it into pulp. It was incessant, loud, very loud, and grew even louder...

  “Shallem grabbed my head in his hands and pressed so hard it hurt. I covered my ears with my hands and squeezed my eyes shut as if that useless gesture would help block the sound. He wanted me to open them. And as I opened them, he stood there grave, pale, strong, supernatural and looked at me with an astounding expression of severity in his eyes.

  “That powerful expression is the last thing I remember from that era of my life. This is how the prologue to my life ends. Everything that happened before that moment was just my childhood. My brief and painful experience among mortals that will always affect me. Then my discovery of love and of celestial beings. All of this was just a prelude to my long existence, a beginning which presages the incredible events for which I was inevitably destined.”

  PART TWO

  –I–

  “I awoke when I felt the sun’s rays on my eyelids. I had slept in an unfamiliar bed and Shallem was not with me. I became worried.

  “I looked around the room, the ceiling, the floor and the wooden walls. A washbasin, a mirror, the bed and an end table were the only furnishings. An inn, no doubt.

  “Shallem walked in just as I was getting up and I relaxed when I saw him.

  “His hair was washed and he wore it the same as usual, loose and lustrous. His eyes sparkled, he smiled and kept smiling as he drew near, then, he took my hand. He seemed happy.

  “ ‘Shallem, where are we?’

  “ ‘Oh, we’re still in Sorgues,’ he answered nonchalantly.

  “ ‘But, what place are we in? Rooms in inns don’t look like this. I should know. It’s just that... have we travelled in time? Is that it?’

  “Shallem nodded and kept smiling.

  “ ‘So, what’s the date?’ I asked.

  “ ‘Does it matter?’

  “ ‘Not really, but I’d like to know...’

  “ ‘We’re in the year 1440.’

  “I let out a loud cry. ‘Two hundred years! Why so many? I’m not going to recognize the world!’

  “Shallem laughed and kissed me. ‘It hasn’t changed at all. I promise you,’ he reassured me.

  “We stayed in Sorgues two more nights and then decided to go to Paris. Shallem told me Eonar would never stop looking for me to avenge his son’s death. Paris was the largest city closest to Orleans where we could go undetected for some time. Shallem bought two slow and lazy nags from the innkeeper and we started our trip.

  “Two hundred years later, Orleans was as beautiful as ever. Bellflowers, hidden among thickets, spied on travelers as they passed by; oleanders and foxgloves adorned the edges of the road. Daises, tansies, pansies and parsnips shared the trails in perfect harmony, sprinkling the way with their velvet shapes and beautiful colors. Blackbirds twittered from their branches and coal tits and blue tits sweetened the air with their songs. The sky was so immense and transparent blue, so different from what it is today... In short, an extreme delight for travelers who pass by.

  “I remember one day, after we had travelled for a couple of days, Shallem abruptly reined in his mount. He looked toward the thick forest as if he could sense something I couldn’t. I strained my five senses while asking myself what it could be but I didn’t hear anything or see anything out of the ordinary. Whatever it was, it was completely hidden.

  “I followed Shallem into the forest and after eight or ten minutes we dismounted our horses and continued on foot. He walked with determination, pushing aside branches that got in our way. And soon, among a thicket of brambles, we saw a dying doe.

  “In agony, she lay there with both of her rear legs completely destroyed buy a hunter’s cruel trap. One of her fawns lay next to her, sadly supporting his head against his mother’s stomach. The other was standing, with difficulty, on his young legs and was trying to walk toward Shallem. I wanted to throw myself at the fawn, take him in my arms, kiss him, and share the tremendous pain that was coming from his big black eyes. I took a step toward him and felt Shallem’s hand grip my arm like a talon. He let out a yell. A yell that seemed to come from deep within, a harsh malicious yell that left me speechless.

  “ ‘No!�
�

  “I looked at him and saw someone I didn’t recognize. I tried to make him let go by childishly lifting his fingers one by one.

  “ ‘Shallem, you’re hurting me!’ I protested.

  “ ‘You’ll contaminate him with your human stench and his mother will never nurse him again!’ he screamed at me; it felt as if he had stabbed me.

  “I don’t know how to explain the aggressive hatred that I felt coming from him, the expression on his face, how his hand held me, purposely causing me pain... At that moment, I was a pestilence, a representative of a hateful species he would have liked to erase from the face of the earth. If destroying me would have meant the extermination of humans, he may have tightened his hands around my neck instead of my arm. I was about to say I was sorry and I would have done so if I had known what I was sorry about. I felt as miserable as if I myself had set that steel, oval clamp with its sharp spikes that lay hidden in the thicket; as though I myself had broken her legs with my own hands and thus condemned her little ones to death.

  “ ‘I didn’t choose to be this Shallem!’ I yelled. ‘Are you going to make me suffer for the sins of those I hate as much as you do? I hate my species. You know that, don’t you? I never needed to tell you. Don’t you know that and love me for it? Why do you torment me? Why do you humiliate me if the only thing I have common with them is my flesh? I have about as much in common with them as you do.’

  “Shallem let go of my arm. He seemed sorry and was about to answer me when the doe let out a painful cry. He approached her, opened the murderous clamp and freed her bleeding legs. She was already too weak to move. Shallem knelt beside her and the fawns began nudging him with their snouts, as though they were desperately trying to ask for help, as though they really knew he could save her. They searched for his hands and placed their little heads between them, trying to lift them, urging him to do something.

  “His face crumpled, unable to bear the suffering of those creatures he loved so much. He took one of her hurt legs and began gliding his hands over it up and down, up and down. The doe didn’t seem to be in pain. Silent and calm, her fawns watched, attentive to the firm and slow movement of his hands on their mother’s delicate limb. I, dumbfounded, watched as a blue trail of energy emanated from his caress and rose until it faded away into the air.

  “When he carefully placed her leg on the ground, it was no longer a mass of splintered bones. For a second it lay there, healthy and strong, next to the one that was still broken. He took this one into his hands and caressed it just as he had done with the first.

  “An aura had formed around Shallem’s body, it was purple at its origin but its tone brightened until it became a faint yellow bordered by an evanescent blue. Even I was immersed in the energy waves. They extended behind me, spreading to a radius of at least around 10 meters and everything was under its influence. It was now a bright indigo at its source and faded away in the distance by melting, disappearing into the sun’s rays.

  “Shallem caressed the doe’s back. She first raised her head to look at him and then, little by little, stood up and used her long tongue to lick the face of the one, she knew, wasn’t a mortal being; the one who no one should fear.

  “The doe stood, full of life and leaping with happiness, just like her children. They frolicked like four puppies and kept away from me. Finally and although I was afraid I would interrupt a sacred ritual, I decided to approach them so I could also pet the doe. Why shouldn’t I? I loved animals almost as much as Shallem. I had suffered because of her agony and had rejoiced at her salvation. Couldn’t they sense that I also loved them, that I wouldn’t cause them any harm? I wanted to be one of them; an omnipotent and magical spirit just like Shallem. Someone whose love would never be rejected, someone whose love for them made it impossible for them not to love in return.

  “But it wasn’t so. As soon as the doe realized what I wanted to do, she ran away from me. Shallem turned around to look at me. I was afraid he would stare at me with that detestable look of hostility, but he didn’t. The expression on his face was one of innocent and saintly happiness. His aura had faded little by little and had invigorated all life that it had touched. I myself felt stronger, more vital, as if I were surrounded by a protective shield that no evil could penetrate. And he... I had never seen him so happy. ‘There must come a day’, I thought, ‘that he will always look this happy, like a newborn weeping with bliss at all the beauties of the world. Yes. That is the face of an angel.’

  “He held out his hand and I took it. With his other hand, he stroked the doe’s back and urged me to do the same. When I did, the doe came closer, the fawns played around our legs, and I felt Shallem’s magnetic energy flowing through my body.”

  –II–

  “We rented a small apartment in downtown Paris. A Paris where forty or fifty thousand souls roamed, most of which were ragged and starving. Souls whose days were spent dozing beneath the Seine’s bridges or walking the malodorous streets, searching through rubbish for something to eat. The English had been driven out four years earlier and had left Paris in a hopeless state. They had left families robbed of their few possessions, orphan children begging in the streets, homes burnt to ashes, and the ill people sick... This was the vengeful goodbye of the English whose position in France had been maintained simply due to support from Duke Phillip of Burgundy and to the military occupation of Guyenne, Normandy, Paris and some territories north of the Loire region. Once the Duke was overthrown, the French army, still empowered by Joan of Arc’s courage, had managed to drive the English out of Paris, although the occupation would still go on for many more years.

  “For me it was like landing in a chaotic, unfamiliar, and broken world. A world where it was necessary to understand the state of affairs and the emotions that impregnated the environment in a very short time although it took history years to devise. I felt lost in that unforeseen France, a freedom-fighting and destitute France that used the word “English” as the worst insult.

  “At first, I liked to mingle with people in the market, speak to them as I shopped..., try to unravel and, perhaps, bridge the distance between us. Maybe I wanted to behave like a common housewife, naively trying to give my life the normality I hadn’t enjoyed since I was fifteen years-old. It wasn’t long before I realized I would never find a place during that era in which even the language hadn’t changed. Because of this, and because we couldn’t bear the sight of so much misery and pain, we decided to only go out at night, when there was less stench and fewer ragged beggars in the streets.

  “My impotence, feeling as if there weren’t a way to stop humans from their wicked ways, ate away at my soul. Wherever I looked, all I saw was greed, selfishness, lust for power, resentment, vengefulness, and hate. I saw it as much in the children who begged outside of the Notre Dame, who would have killed me to steal my jewelry if I were alone, as in the unhappy pimps who pummeled prostitutes in nearby streets. I saw it in the innkeepers who took advantage of their client’s frenzied drinking sprees to clean out their wallets, and in the Seine’s boatmen who at night ambushed and robbed the beggars that sheltered themselves beneath bridges. I saw it in the petty thieves who would usually get killed by friends who wanted to steal their day’s profits. I hated Paris with all my heart, it was a prison from which I couldn’t escape.

  “Shallem found great pleasure in breaking into the Notre Dame at night. Melancholic and quiet, he would enter the church and travel its nave while discreetly contemplating every sculpture, every statue, every scene on its portentous stained glass windows, always as if he were doing this for the first time. At times, he would just stay outside and curiously look at the gargoyles that rounded off the balusters as if he were expecting to see his own image. He would gaze at their stone wings, their ridiculous horns and then the tongue that insultingly appeared between one of their snouts. He would then look at me, place his hands on his cheeks, pretend to perch on an imaginary baluster and comically stick out his tongue and imitate the mons
ter’s sneer. We would both burst out laughing.

  “However, most of the time, our visits didn’t end in laughter but rather with him seated and even at times lying on one of the cold benches for hours. He would ignore my requests, my pleas to leave, my complaints of hunger, of cold or weariness. He would even ignore my most simple questions that, until I became accustomed to seeing him in that state, came nervously and convulsively from my lips.

  “ ‘What’s going on Shallem? What’s wrong?’ I would ask him. However, due to the absence of a response and his own obvious absence, my questioning stopped and I just patiently sat next to him and kissed him once in a while. He wouldn’t even look at me. When the smallest gesture on his face let me know he had returned to me and without giving him an opportunity to escape again, I would ask him:

  “ ‘Shallem, can we go?’

  “ ‘Yes, my darling, yes. Let’s go now. You must be cold.’ Then his gaze would make me warm.

  “Nevertheless, not Notre Dame nor any other temple held any special religious significance for him. God was not inside them more than he was in any other place. However, those enormous chambers made from massive stone blocks became magnificent observatories from where he could look easily and safely into space, searching for the presence of enemies.

  “We were walking beneath Paris’s cloudless sky, admiring how the cathedral’s buttress reflected in the waters of the Seine. There were hundreds of stars, thousands of stars in the sky. We sat on a bench beside the river and batted away clouds of mosquitoes that flew around us. The night was warm. It was four in the morning and there was no one wandering around on the streets that could approach and bother us.

  “We looked into each other’s eyes, lost ourselves in each other’s gaze. I never tired of looking at him. He was so alive and sensitive that the expression on his face constantly changed. No matter whether it was sad or happy, angry or loving, underneath it all was an expression that was eternally melancholic and rebellious. What experiences he must have had to accumulate such rancor!