Birthing Ella Bandita (2 page)

“That way,” the Cook always concluded at the story’s end. “He keeps two steps ahead of the Devil and two leagues out of Hell.”

The Ancient Grove and Abandoned Valley had been forbidden ever since he came here. Even her father was powerless against him, just like the Patrons were before him.

His eyes terrified her the most. When the Sorcerer beckoned, the girl screamed. She pulled away and fell. The freeze knocked the wind out of her when she hit. Then the river buried her. She flailed in the churning depths, the water choking her when she tried to draw breath. The last image in her mind before all went black was the Sorcerer of the Caverns, and those colorless eyes that could endure the unblinking stare of the dead.

****

At least it was over. The girl found comfort in that. But she could still feel the crash of water against her back and smell the river. But now, the odor was dank and her clammy gown hugged her body. The girl shivered and tried to ignore her senses. She ached for the black soothe of death. But velvet pulled her to waking. She recognized the plush dryness teasing her fingertips, and stroked the pillow. The girl sighed, and finally admitted she was alive.

“Your face is so ugly, it’s beautiful.”

She stiffened when she heard that voice. The baritone rang even deeper and those words echoed around her. Then she remembered the last moment before she fell into the river and opened her eyes. The Sorcerer sat on a massive chair, a throne carved from gold and cushioned with blood red velvet. He was watching her with a shadow of a smile on his face.

The girl shuddered and looked away, but all she saw was stone and fire. The walls were black and gleaming from the light of torches. Her flesh prickled and her stomach was in knots when she realized the Sorcerer had her. She must be in the Caverns.

She pulled herself up. She rested on a sofa made of gold and velvet pillows the color of blood. The sofa matched the Sorcerer’s throne. The girl closed her eyes and forced herself to breathe slowly, trying to quell the panic rising inside her. There had to be a way out. The Sorcerer couldn’t force her to stay. She knew that from the stories she had heard. She opened her eyes and searched among the walls for hidden corridors, darker spaces that would take her back to the world outside. When her gaze brushed over the Sorcerer, one finger pointed over her head. The girl followed his lead and gasped when she saw what rose above her.

She was at the bottom of a tunnel carved deep in the earth. The descent of black stone glistened from the fire torches spiraling with the staircase falling down into the Caverns. But it was the colors that riveted her attention. Thousands of crystals were embedded in the tunnel walls, and the light from the torches bounced off the facets and set their essence free. The colors made the most of their captive freedom. The crystal essence swirled in an orgy of coupling and rebirth, a vivid provocation dancing and whirling in the empty space. Every shade of the spectrum came together and apart, transforming into other hues, and the progeny bounced off the walls before rising to disappear in the bright blue afternoon sky. The girl stared into the cyclone of color. Her terror on waking lifted and was gone.

“Go on, Miss,” the Sorcerer said. “Go on up the stairs until you find one you like. You can take it as a gift.”

Without looking at him, she drifted from the sofa to climb the staircase. She’d never felt so light in her life. Her feet almost hovered above the steps. She caressed the wall with the hand trailing behind her, scarcely touching the cool stone, fingertips gliding over the mounds of crystals. Then her fingers clung. At first, she struggled to go on. She was halfway up the spiral, her gaze fixed on the circle of blue above her. She would be free if she could get to where the sky was infinite. She pulled harder and the stone surrendered. The girl stared into her hand at a crystal shaped like a star with eight tiers stretching around her palm. Then she waved it before the nearest torch and exploded a whirlwind of color. The maelstrom took her breath away, surrounding her with a disconnected rainbow.

“Excellent choice! Nobody has ever taken a stargaze before.”

The girl started when she heard the voice. She couldn’t remember where she was. Looking down, she saw a kindly old man smiling at her from the bottom of the steps.

“You must be hungry,” he called. “Why don’t you come down, get something to eat?”

The girl blinked slowly, tempted to let her eyes rest from the heaviness of her lids. She must be immersed in a beautiful dream. She heard a faint voice inside imploring her to beware and to keep going up the stairs. But she hadn’t the desire to obey. She rubbed her hand over her belly. She was more than hungry; she was empty. And the old man seemed so gentle.

“I would love something to eat,” she answered. “Thank you.”

Her host snapped his fingers. Of course this was a dream. It was impossible that shadows could pour from the walls, carrying heavy golden platters and piling them on the round table. The wood was dark and the girl suspected the table was carved from the trees in the Ancient Grove. She floated down the spiral like a specter while a feast fit for a banquet of kings was readied just for her. Her nostrils fluttered from the aromas rising to meet her: savory, pungent, bitter, sweet, and spice, hints of the flavors to come. The girl took her seat, eyes wide, looking upon the mountain of platters towering over her. Closest to her were the desserts: fragile cake layers held together with ribbons of silken frosting, steam rising from souffl_s, while berries of blue, black and red bulged from the delicate confection of mousse, making a perfect marriage of sweet and tart. This wasn’t a supper, but a festival of the senses.

“Go on,” the old man said. “You can have as much as you want.”

The girl weaved in her seat, almost intoxicated at the realm of choices before her. She hesitated before reaching for a crab culled from its shell, a modest pile of roasted peppers and squash, a small bunch of grapes, and a creamy slice of the mildest cheese. Then the girl tasted of the banquet and awakened her hunger.

Once she swallowed the first bite, her blood was suffused with endless craving. She dropped her fork and knife and ate the crab from her hands and licked her fingers when it was gone. The succulence of the naked flesh started a gnawing that made her ravenous. She snarled, sweeping her plate and utensils off the table and threw herself into the feast. All thought disappeared as the girl became animal. The meats of land and sea were the richest she ever tasted. The cheeses were bitter, mild, and pungent, some creamy, others hard. The fruits were plump, bursting with juice; the vegetables held the smoke of the fire over which they had roasted. The more she ate, the more her hunger grew. The gnawing opened an abyss that could never be satisfied. The girl shred meat from bone with her thick teeth, suckled souffl_ from her fingers. She relished the textures while flavors exploded in her mouth and moaned in an agony of pleasure. Hours passed and she devoured the tower until it became the rubble of leftover bits.

The girl collapsed when she was done, falling into the cushions. Her gown was covered in stains and her face was smeared with juices from meat and fruit. She breathed heavily, and placed her hands on her belly, the haze of madness drifting away. She glanced at her host and realized she must have been under some kind of spell. The illusion of a kind old man disappeared and she recognized the Sorcerer. But the girl wasn’t at all afraid when she looked into the colorless eyes gazing at her with that shadowy smile.

“So how did a wench with such a lusty appetite come to the point of throwing herself into the river?”

“If you’re such a mighty Sorcerer, then you should already know the answer to that question.”

“I can see the feasting has made you rather bold,” he chuckled. “Really. You could be fascinating.”

“What do you want?”

“I already have what I want, Girl. Question is…what do you want?”

The girl chortled, the bark cut short from an upsurge of bile burning the back of her throat. The pain of eating too much came upon her in that moment. She curled into a ball and wondered if she would burst from gluttony until her silent memories swept in. The image of empty faces and condemning eyes seared through and emptied her again. But the ache remained in her belly and the Sorcerer looming over her made her uneasy. Yet she also remembered this was the first conversation she’d had in almost seven years.

“What do you think?” she muttered, sitting up. “I want to not be so alone. I want people to care. What else could I possibly want?”

The Sorcerer raised his brows and the hairless arches deepened the grooves in his forehead.

“Come on, Girl. Don’t be so paltry in what you wish for. You can do better than that.”

The heat rushed to her cheeks, but she said nothing. The Sorcerer rested his chin on interlaced fists and waited. That squeeze clenched inside her breast. But this time she wasn’t so foolish to hope her heart beat again. Staring into the colorless eyes of the Sorcerer, who gazed back at her with a bland expression, the girl couldn’t move.

“I want anybody I choose to fall in love with me,” she finally said. “Can you really make that happen?”

The Sorcerer of the Caverns smiled, his teeth the longest she’d ever seen, the dark yellow gleaming against his matted dusty beard. He nodded.

“And what do you want of me?”

“I want to lay with you,” he said. “And I want you to give me your heart.”

The girl froze. Although her heart had been dead for years, she clasped her hands over her breast to protect what rested underneath. The thought of giving it to the Sorcerer made her stomach churn. She shook her head before she spoke.

“No.”

“Not so hasty, Girl. I think you may like what I have in mind for you.”

“I said no.”

She stood and looked up the staircase spiraling out of the Caverns. Then the snap of fingers made her flinch, and the sound bounced off the stone and reverberated up the tunnel. A boulder slid across the top and the girl watched the nighttime stars disappear. She couldn’t quite believe this was happening to her, but she still wasn’t afraid. A calm descended on the girl as she watched the Gateway to the world above close off to her. She looked at the Sorcerer. His robes cascaded around his throne; his hair and beard were dull against the opulence of gold and velvet.

“I’ve heard stories about you all my life,” she said. “But never once did I hear that you could force me to stay. Not even once.”

“That’s true,” he replied. “However, I can insist that you listen to what I have to say before you refuse me.”

The Sorcerer waved his hand to the sofa. The girl saw the table was clear, the ruins of the banquet gone as if the feast had never happened. Instead, a bronze triad of candles stood in the center of the table beside the crystal she pulled from the tunnel walls.

“Have a seat,” he continued. “You may find my offer enticing.”

She sat down. Her back was straight as a rod, her hands in a tight clasp, her limbs rigid, a silent prayer repeating through her that she had to get out of the Caverns. For a moment, she panicked at the thought that the Sorcerer might read her mind. But he gave no indication he could as he took the crystal stargaze and held it to the candles. Its essence came free, and the colors whirled around them. The girl grew light-headed, but dropped her lids. She refused to look up until she’d made herself blind to everything but the Sorcerer. Then she opened her eyes and focused only on him until the essence was brought home to the crystal and the colors fell.

“You have a strong command over yourself,” he said. “That’s very good.”

“Just tell me what you want and be done with it.”

He set the crystal down and pushed it across the table, its tiers spinning before her.

“If you lay with me just once, I will bless this stargaze with the power to steal the heart of any man you desire. But…”

The Sorcerer paused.

“If you lay with me many times, I will teach you the arts of seduction.”

The Sorcerer slowed his speech to the lulling cadence of persuasion. The girl listened. She couldn’t stop her limbs from softening nor could she hold the tight grip of hands.

“To master the secrets, you must surpass the ancient knowledge. If you can do this and pleasure me more than any woman ever has, I will give you a dust you can use for protection.”

“What does such a dust do?”

“Blow a pinch when faced with an enemy,” he said. “Say the first thing that comes to your mind and thus, your enemy is changed.”

“So far, this sounds…” the girl trailed off. “Why not just make this your offer?”

The right side of the Sorcerer’s brow crinkled deeper. She scowled, hesitating before she continued.

“My heart’s been dead for years anyway. Why would you want it?”

“All or nothing.”

The girl tensed. She thought an agitated serpent might have invaded her belly. The longer she looked into the Sorcerer’s eyes, the tighter the coil around her innards became.

“No,” she said. “I won’t do it. Just let me go.”

“I’m not done yet,” he retorted. “If you give me your dead heart, I will make you immortal.”

The girl opened her mouth to speak, but the words wouldn’t come.

“You could die,” he continued. “Bullet, blade, rope, fire, or water would kill you. But you can never fall sick, so plagues and poison will have no effect on you.”

The Sorcerer uncurled his long fingers and held his palms open in readiness to receive.

“Just think of it,” he murmured. “You’re only twenty years old. You will never grow old. You’ll remain a maiden alive forever in the bloom of youth. The world would belong to you.”

The Sorcerer’s temptation was as powerful as legend told. A chaos of fascination and disgust rioted inside the girl. She stared at the thin papery flesh and the thought of touching him made her recoil. Then she remembered the silence, the backs turning on her, and the eyes averting whenever she turned to face the accusing glares. The possibility that she would never have to suffer that ever again made her tremble, the tingling along her flesh more than she could stand.