Page 8 of Do Not Awaken Love (The Moroccan Empire #3)

The woman returns with two pails of water and some small rags and indicates that we should wash, which I do gladly, for I am still spattered with vomit and mud, seawater and urine.

When I am clean, I use what is left of the water to wash my shift, placing it back on my body dripping wet but at least cleaner than it was.

Catalina follows my example, her still half-formed body hunched and miserable.

Afterwards, we are led back a different way and shown into a different room, this one far larger and already filled.

Later I count more than sixty people, men, women and children.

Most are dark skinned, the odd few here and there are lighter skinned.

There are women weeping, clutching their children to them, knowing, no doubt, that they are to be separated.

The women whisper to their older children, tears running down their faces, no doubt aware these are their last words to them.

Beside them stand or squat their menfolk, faces closed up, one hand on their women’s shoulders, their fingers digging deep into the flesh for one last touch, one last chance to make their feelings known.

A few men and women stand or sit alone, friendless and without even the comfort of a desperate familiar touch. Their faces are closed in bitterness.

A young, light-skinned woman gestures to an empty space beside her. I nod to her with as much dignity and courtesy as I can manage, and she manages a small smile and a nod in return. Catalina and I lower ourselves to the floor by her. She says something that I do not understand. I shake my head.

“I do not speak your language,” I say in Latin.

“My name is Rachel,” she replies, her Latin passable.

“I am Sister Juliana,” I tell her, relief at speaking flooding my voice. “This is Catalina.”

“‘Sister’?”

“I am a nun,” I say. “Catalina was to be a novice in our convent.”

“Where was your convent?”

“In Galicia.”

Her eyes widen. “What are you doing here?”

“Where is here?” I ask, suddenly aware I still do not know.

“Tangier,” she says.

I feel the heaviness in my belly from the confirmation that I was right. We are in the Maghreb. “We were kidnapped. Brought here by Norsemen,” I say. “You?”

“The same, but from Al-Andalus,” she says. “I lived by the sea on the Southern coast. I could see the shores of the Maghreb from my home. I never thought I would cross the sea to come here.”

I move closer and kneel by her, untie her hands from the tight leather strips that have been used to bind her. I chafe at her wrists which are badly marked from the ties and she smiles at me.

“Thank you,” she says. “You are very kind.”

I look her over. Her colouring is similar to mine, she has a Biblical name. “Are you a Christian?” I ask.

She shakes her head, hesitates for a moment. “I am a Jew.”

I sit back. I had thought I was speaking with a woman of my own faith.

I am among heathens twice over. I see that she understands my disapproval and reluctance to converse with her further, for she does not speak to me again that night.

Sleep is impossible, it is a night of weeping in the darkness, one sob leading to another echoing around the stifling room, the stench of bodily waste growing stronger.

When morning comes the merchant and his servant return, accompanied by the Norseman. Judging by his colourful robes and the thick gold bracelet he wears, the merchant is well-off. No doubt trading in slaves has made him good money over the years.

The slave merchant looks the three of us over. He speaks with the Norseman.

“What language are they speaking? Do you understand them?” Catalina asks Rachel, who is paying attention to them.

She nods. “Arabic, although the accents are hard to follow. I know it from my own land, from Al-Andalus. It sounds different here.”

“What is he saying?” Catalina asks Rachel. I frown at Catalina to hold her tongue, but she does not look at me and I, too, wish to know what is said, although I do not wish to speak with the Jewess.

She looks uncomfortable but speaks in a whisper. “He says your hair is very fine and that you are very beautiful.”

I feel a cold shudder go through me. I can already sense Catalina’s fate and it is one of such depravity that I do not know how to erase it from my mind.

The merchant is looking at me and shaking his head. He jabbers at the Norseman and the Norseman replies with something that makes the merchant laugh.

“What did he say?” asks Catalina again.

Rachel shakes her head.

“Tell me,” she insists.

“He said Sister Juliana is… not beautiful. Or young,” she says, looking away.

He said I am ugly and old , I think to myself, guessing from her awkwardness that the merchant did not mince his words.

“Why did he laugh?”

“I would rather not say,” she whispers.

“Please,” says Catalina. “Perhaps it will help us.”

“He asked why she had no hair, he said it makes her ugly. The Norseman said she is a holy woman, that she must be an untouched virgin even if she is old. He said her hair will grow soon enough and that virginity is worth a better price than hair.” Rachel’s cheeks are scarlet.

I look away, gaze at the painful blue sky.

Catalina yelps with pain. I look to see that the merchant has pulled her to her feet by her hair, she twists in his clutches so she can look to me.

“Help me!” she screams.

“Our Lady will protect you,” I say loudly, as she struggles with the merchant.

“Our Lady has forgotten me!” she cries.

I do not reprimand her in her hour of need, it is natural that she should have doubts, even Our Lady’s holy son doubted His father in His own hour of need.

Instead, I pray out loud, so that she will hear holy words even as she is taken from us.

“Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee; blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb.”

“Help me!” she screams again as they reach the door, but the merchant’s servant has lifted her bodily and she cannot escape him, he carries her from the room and out of our sight.

He returns swiftly for a girl so dark-skinned her skin seems to have glints of blue and another with pink-white skin and hair the colour of saffron.

My heart sinks, for it is clear the three girls have been specially selected, being young and beautiful, perhaps for a harem, for I have heard of such places.

Beside me, Rachel is weeping. “Poor child,” she says, turning to me and trying to embrace me. “To be violated…”

“What is done to her body will not dishonour her soul as long as she stays true to her faith,” I say, extracting myself from her arms. “She will be a martyr to our faith. These heathens will go to hell for what they have done.”

Rachel stares at me as though I am mad, but I ignore her.

I cannot expect a Jewess to understand. Instead, I pray for Catalina’s soul, that it will rise above the treatment her body may receive.

I pray for my own sin in failing to bring her home safely to the convent, this girl-child entrusted to my care whom I have failed to protect.

The slave merchant’s servant returns after a little while and this time he takes Rachel.

“I will pray for you,” she says to me as she is dragged from the room. I do not answer her. I am not sure I want the prayers of a Jewess, nor whether it would be right for me to pray for her.

There is a delay of perhaps some hours, but then the door opens, revealing the merchant’s assistant with several armed men.

There are commands given. Although I have no-one to tell me what is happening, it soon becomes clear that we are all to leave this room, to follow the assistant and his guards.

The women begin to wail, their voices chiming and clashing together.

One woman crawls on her knees to the merchant’s assistant and clutches at his feet, speaking quickly.

She opens her robe to show him her breasts, perhaps promising him the use of her body if he will not take away her children, but he only pushes her away with his foot and gestures to the armed men to accompany us.

A few of the men are bound, but we women and the children are not.

Where would we run to? We would be caught and beaten in moments, for we do not know the city, nor any people here, there would be no door to hide behind, no protection we might seek.

The children cling to their mothers and fathers in desperate fear; they would not run even if their parents urged them to.

We pass through the narrow streets, this sorry trail of men, women and children, bound to meet our fate.

Our walk is brief, we come to an open area, a large public square. There are stalls around the edges, many dozens of them. We are led to an empty space, facing the centre of the square, behind a small wooden platform.

The heat is like nothing I have ever felt before.

I have grown used to the cool stone corridors of the convent, the shaded corners of the garden even in summer.

Although it is autumn, still the sun rages down on us.

I can feel my pale skin prickle and burn in the heat and see even the dark-skinned children shrink under its rays, their mothers trying to shield them from the worst of the heat by holding out their own arms to cover their children’s heads, taking the burning into their own skins rather than let it hurt their offspring.