I want to skip ahead by a day in order to share the explanation I received regarding the abduction of Beautoix and his men before I narrate the fantastic events that occurred the night of Samhain.

Therese, who was soon to become the Order of the Sacred Hearts newest member, and I met during the previous nights revelries. Out of my mind, so to speak, with enthusiasm for our Goddess I failed to see her for who she really was. But I am getting ahead of myself.

By the time she found me it was nearly twilight. I had slept most of the day and was wandering the grounds deep in thought when a strange and pretty young lady approached me and told me of our encounter on the Night of the Dead. I had been sorting through my somewhat unclear memories of the previous night and what she related struck something in me. Memories came to me. We were both anxious to speak at length, both desperate for some clarity. I offered to share my supper and she accepted.

After our meal we sat in my cell, a lone candle between us lighting our faces from below, which always gives the teller of a tale a peculiarly frightening aura, or so I have found.

Therese had the kind of brown hair that lightens considerably with exposure to sunlight so that in the winter they are quite brunette and in the summer often regarded as naturally blonde. It was abundant and thick. Her eyes were smallish and penetrating, of an ocean green, and they widened in amazement as she embellished on her strange and perilous journey to our convent and her febrile impressions of the night before. Her skin was a swarthy peasant tan but quite becoming to her as she bloomed in the springtime of youth. Her jaw was rather square which pleased me somehow. Her cheeks would hollow as her lips pursed into little o’s. Small freckles dotted her face. We formed a bond very quickly.

We shared a bottle of wine. Our spirits heightened and our inhibitions lifted. We wanted to confide and allowed ourselves this prelude, talking of very little: life in a small village as a girl and the like. It can be guessed how interested I was when she told me of her abduction by my husband and his cronies. She spoke so elegantly as she told her story that she reminded me more of a princess than a peasant girl. There would be time to discover her secrets, I reflected. At my urging she seemed to slip dreamily into the already remote land of yesterday and began.

Therese’s Tale Part 1

I questioned every sister I could get to listen today as I walked the grounds, to find out what I could, but everyone turned from me. You are the only friendly person I have met Sister Agnes. Your Abbess still has not told me why I am here. You were the one I was hoping to meet. I am glad to have found you.” She clenched my hand and offered a pained smile. “I was so frightened last night I thought I would perish. But when I encountered you I sensed a deep humanity and suffering and loss. It made me rethink what I had witnessed and now I yearn to know more. But let me go back to near the beginning.

I’ll tell you one day why I found myself on foot, friendless, walking a lonely road away from my native village of X when Beautoix and his henchmen came upon me. Suffice to say I incurred a shame that the godly folk of our humble village could not countenance. Ostracized and without hope or prospects I faced the wide, grim world utterly alone. It is hardly surprising that the Devil sent these men to prey upon me so soon. I must have seemed a delicious and easy morsel to the Fiend.

I was tired and hungry. It was still early morning and I had gone without breakfast. I had taken a path going north perhaps an hour previously. The sky was not quite lit but beginning to stain with pink. Church bells tolled in the distance. The birds sang canticles to their Creator as I walked through the dim forest, occasionally emerging onto open moors and fields. I am a solitary soul and such peaceful impressions soothed my troubled heart. I tried, with the aid of those bells, to find the village whence they came so as to find some benefactor, some good person for whom I could work who would not take advantage of me, at least not unduly.

The quiet peace of that morning was broken by the sound of trampling hooves and the rough voices of five large rugged men plus the rather sad figure of your husband, their leader, horrendously ugly with pigsty breath, Beautoix. His men called him by his Christian name Gaston. They were all brutish and filthy. I tried not to look at them.

I was summoning my courage to ask these men for a ride to the village or perhaps a crust or a bit of cheese to assuage my appetite when they surrounded me. Their cocky smirks and jeering remarks put an end to my hope that these might be godly and charitable men. I trembled since for the protection of the Almighty I was as vulnerable as a wounded fledgling. They asked in rude tones my name, the name of my village and where I was going. I was frightened to the point of speechlessness. In reply to their queries I only succeeded in whimpering like an imbecile. I ran but was caught by the one whom Beautoix particularly favors, Grimaldus, whose face is covered in scars. They bound me and loaded me onto a mule like baggage. They talked of me as if I was not there, giving frank appraisals of my body and face. They admired my looks but it hardly pleased me. In their arrogance they mistook my paralyzing fear for idiocy. They assumed that I was mute and devoid of understanding. The lowly state in which they’d found me doubtless contributed to that impression. This was a grace from God and was to work to my advantage.

I listened to them carefully and as they did not attempt to censor their speech I soon learned the object of their voyage.

What I learned was more horrible than I could have imagined. I was not the only girl they had taken nor would I be the last. These men were professional abductors of girls. They had associates who worked the southern coasts, who knew traders from Africa and the East, where ships came and went constantly; I was to be sold into concubinage along with several other women from this very convent whom they had made a deal with your Abbess Clarissa to purchase. This is why they traveled to your nearby village of R. A meeting was arranged at the local inn where they would inspect the women and arrange a price with her. If this was not nefarious enough a project for these brigands many were inclined to not only break the deal and abduct the women without payment but to kidnap Clarissa herself, having heard of her legendary beauty.

Beautoix however would have none of this plan although his objections were pragmatic rather than moral. Not being an adventurer like his men but a businessman, he reminded them that an eminent Abbess’ departure would surely be noticed whereas the girls whom she enrolled in her convent were usually poor and insignificant creatures like myself, abandoned by society and family alike, whom no one would miss.

Around mid-afternoon as we were riding along M. Beautoix suddenly doubled over in pain. He quickly dismounted and propped himself against a tree. We all stopped and the men attended to him, I watching bound from my mule. They were all subsisting on the same diet so there could be no question of tainted food. Grimaldus suggested witchcraft was to blame, having heard stories of a coven in this area. M. claimed his stomach had always been made of iron yet he felt he was being jabbed there, as if with a knitting needle. He groaned in pain. After a few moments this pain subsided as quickly as it had come. M. brushed himself off with some embarrassment, remounted, and we continued. Very shortly after however he started to convulse and foam at the mouth. His neck twisted in an unnatural way that was disturbing to see. He fell from his horse, flailed on the ground and emitted horrible noises. His beady eyes exuded fear. We could all see that demons were possessing him. And then it stopped as if it never happened leaving everyone, myself included, very unsettled. They crossed themselves and uttered prayers. We were near the village and the inn by now and rode there in silence, I ever alert to a possibility to make my escape.

Soon the inn of the appointed rendezvous came into view. The innkeeper and his wife came out to greet us, issuing instructions to the grooms with regard to the horses and mule. They seemed ill at ease. He eyed the men and I with trepidation while his wife, whose eyes I desperately sought to link with mine, stubbornly kept them fixed groundward.

It was one of those inns one finds everywhere scattered about the French countryside: thatched roof, grazing poultry, the smell of manure, elderly caretakers, bedbugs no doubt, but the Inn Sauvois as you may or may not know possesses a spacious dining hall. To this hall we were led to be met by your Abbess Clarissa who sat serenely in an oak chair outside the heavy doors, wearing the accoutrements of her calling, hands primly folded in her lap, as if she had all the time in the world.

I don’t know what sort of first impression Clarissa, the Abbess I mean, made on you Sister Agnes but as for me…(and here she sighed deeply) I must say I have never met anyone like her. Grimaldus whistled under his breath when he saw her. Her plain nuns habit never manages to suppress what Nature has so lavishly endowed her with, don’t you agree?” Here we both giggled like old friends. I was glad to note her naughty sense of humor.

She noticed me right away and I quailed shyly under her appraisal. She hadn’t expected me and I could see an impromptu calculation taking place in the depths of her smoldering eyes. I know I blushed. I sensed that she approved of me somehow. The men said little in response to her inquiries about me, simply saying they’d picked up an extra whore on the way.

She commanded the Sauvois’ in a voice smooth as velvet yet harsh as the cry of an owl.

The couple met all of her little demands, and a whole host of them there were, with the utmost celerity, as if she were the true owner of the Inn! They fairly quaked in her presence.

Clarissa led us into the great hall, the couple looking very anxious and unhappy but nonetheless servile. We entered and a shout of approval went up from Beautoix, who was feeling better now, and his ruffians. Entering last I saw five enchanting women, generously built and alluring, holding salvers on which were choice wines and jeweled goblets. They wore nothing but nuns coifs and crucifixes round the neck. I was shocked that they would blaspheme so merely for erotic savour.

They were undeniably beautiful; I had never seen a womans nudity apart from my own.

But I no longer felt sorry for the fate of these who, along with me, were to be slaves to some Mongol or Moghul or Sultan, seeing clearly now that they were simply harlots and the so-called Abbess nothing but a procuress, albeit a truly charismatic one.

Under the Abbess’ supervision M. Sauvois spread a great feast. The whore nuns were to be our servants. I could hardly believe my eyes or my nose as dish upon succulent dish appeared at table: roasted capons, pickled duck eggs, suckling pig with thyme and mushrooms, leeks with almond milk, cinnamon and roses, a fried chicken dressed with capers and oysters. Bottle upon bottle of fine wine.

Even at Christmas I never knew such a bounty. My stomach growled. If there was any lingering reserve with these men, any slight pique at having to deal with a powerful assertive woman, it vanished at the enticements of the table and the flesh. They fell to greedily. The women poured the wine and submitted coquettishly, squealing and giggling, to being roughly handled, smacked and pinched.

Clarissa laughed as if in camaraderie with these boors, a laugh as limpid and cold as a mountain stream. Her confidence, nay her total superiority, was never in doubt. Could it ever be? Even these men were disarmed by her and, despite the perfidy in their hearts, they were never a match for her.

The Abbess made sure I had a large share of food. I noticed my wine was not poured from the same decanter as the mens but from the Abbess’ personal one. I locked eyes with her once. Their inner flame smoldered still and I knew I was safe. I drank the sweet wine.

I would blush to think of myself as present at such a scene although it almost pales compared to last night. As the men drank they grew more demanding of the depraved nuns, who, the Abbess assured them, were among the most pious and exemplary members of the Order of the Sacred Heart. This provoked a great burst of laughter. I had to smile myself. Grimaldus noticed this and attempted with a mouth full of grouse to call attention to me. But the atmosphere had grown boisterous and the women were putting on a show.

An ornate couch plush with purple upholstery, with delicately carved legs and arms of lions heads, quite out of keeping with the unostentatious setting, stood at the head of the dining hall. The women at a signal from the Abbess made their way there. Three of them removed their coifs, letting their luxuriant hair flow. With coquettish smiles they engaged one another, physically, you understand? kissing and touching, fondling and caressing in the most intimate places? The men and I moved forward in our seats. The homely innkeepers were outside in the hallway keeping watch. Did they know what was happening? The shouts and revelry died away as the orgy reduced us to awed silence. The coos and moans of the ladies echoed through the great hall.

I admit I was bewitched by this spectacle, so unlike anything I had ever expected to see, the wine heating my senses further as I watched. Yet I continued to accept when Clarissa poured for me, leaning over so that her heavy breasts pressed my shoulder, rather unnecessarily, and I could smell her exotic perfume.

The women, one blonde, one brunette and one redhead, pawed each other, pressing their bodies together, fondling each others curves. The brunette lay down. The blonde opened her legs and lowered herself directly over her face. The reclined sister flickered her tongue like a snakes at the proffered delicacy, the blonde sighing with delight as she moved her hips back and forth. The blondes large breasts, the aureoles like heavy pink coins, heaved as she rode, her long hair matting with sweat that clung to her back and shoulders. The third nun, the redhead, kissed her, crushing breasts as small and firm as underripe apples to her heavy and full ones. She straddled the supine nun at the center, pushing her red hairy sex to the brunettes. We heard a hard moan and saw the brunettes body jolt as their sexes slid together, the redhead rolling her hips. All three made delicate sensuous sounds that pierced me and made my heart flutter. I could smell the incense of their combined musk.

The other two nuns wielded great fronds with which they fanned the participants as they sweated from their exertions; despite the coolness of the season the room was rather stuffy. One of the fanners stood very close to me. She shifted her weight from time to time causing her ample buttocks to shift as well. Why did my heart beat so as I watched? There was, simply, so much flesh.

I imagined myself in this scenario, my body naked and pressed and coiled in depraved concupiscence with these women, who obviously were enjoying the choicest pleasures. I particularly envied the one on bottom who was receiving the twofold pleasure of licking and having her own quim rubbed by that of the enchanting redhead, who glided in a hot rhythm over her. Even now when I think of it…” Here she trailed off and gulped down some wine, her face red; her stare became fixed as she concentrated on some indefinite point in space and I could see her thoughts gather themselves before she went on. When she did her tone was harsher.

I never knew this was allowed although I suppose in fact that it is not. But upon further thought who has disallowed it and why? The idea that the Almighty Fount of Creation would be interested at all, let alone so adamantly opposed, seems a bit ridiculous, don’t you agree Agnes? Should He not have better things on His Mind?

I once stood at the crest of a high cliff and looked down at the dots on the beach below, which I knew were humans like me, scurrying like ants, all so self-important, all so sure that Creation Itself should be intimately invested in them and all their personal opinions and proclivities. How much loftier still must be the perspective of the Almighty, if It exists.

You see thoughts like these which occur to me naturally and often, they must occur to others as well, a person can’t help but think them, yet we are taught to hold it against ourselves, as if we are broken and worthless in comparison to this chimerical Father of hot air that the priests have made up. As if thinking and feeling are proof of guilt, proof we must submit to an Absolute Judge Who is, of course, interpreted for us. Planting this shame into a young soul and nurturing it is the surest means of control: a cunning sort of slavery don’t you agree Agnes? I mean, what chance do we have? Hell was invented because mankind, in subtle and refined cruelty, wants it to exist.

I would never have dared avow any form of free thought when I lived a peaceful life in my village or even as I walked that lonely road away from my past, into the frightening vastness of the unknown. Yet now my mind feels like a bird whose cage has been left ajar. It hops onto the rim of that little gate and stares up at the sky, the blue immensity that lives in its very blood, of which it has done nothing but dream as it sang its lonely song to dull human ears. Soon, even though it perish that very day, it will have spread its wings and known the joy of living its own tiny precious life in freedom. But I digress.

The emotions I felt as I watched the orgy so worried and confused me that I longed to excuse myself to the loo. There, in private, I could soothe my overwrought body and then return with a level head, which I sorely needed. Perhaps I could even find a way to escape. I wondered how to do this without betraying that I could speak.

The Abbess watched dispassionately for a while but mainly observed the men. She muttered something under her breath, repetitively. It sounded like a different language, Latin perhaps, I was the only one sitting close enough to hear. She seemed to be concentrating hard, waiting for something that it turned out was not long in arriving.

“Stop!” the Abbess demanded in her despotic voice of silk. The sisters, rather reluctantly, ceased their amorous explorations. I turned to look. The men were unconscious. Her victorious gaze turned to me.

“You can thank me later. What is your name? You are obviously neither mute nor stupid.”

“Therese madame.”

“Madame? You are to address me as Abbess.” So saying she walked calmly to me, smiled and slapped my face, without rancour. “You are one of us now. Help us with these men.”

The tone changed and the sisters worked with a different sort of discipline, rapidly dressing in simple clothes at hand. We all went to work on the slumped criminals, binding and trussing them. The Sauvois man helped as well, his wife still keeping watch. Upon her signal we dragged their heavy bodies, the Abbess supervising us, into a covered hayrick waiting outside.

“You can keep the couch!” the Abbess shouted back as she whipped the horses herself and we drove off. The innkeepers dour faces seemed to brighten somewhat.

“And so my fate twists in the wind Sister Agnes. Of course the Abbess in her way has been kind to me. She saved me from the clutches of slave-traders but then why abduct them and what has she done with them? Can you tell me?

At any rate, I became aware of the easy and loose mores of the courtesan on the ride to your monastery. The women teased me, sizing me up even more brazenly than our new prisoners had. The one called Thorgerd, the buxom blonde, was the worst. The one whose sweaty golden hair clung to her supple back as she rode the brunette’s face. She kept pinching me and tickling me and trying to grope my breasts. I was vexed to tears by the time Clarissa told them to leave me be. We sat atop the men during the ride who snored under us.

I may seem loquacious now but only because we are already friends Agnes. I am normally very shy especially when dealing with new and stressful situations.

I still find myself unable to understand how a convent like this can exist but I am beginning to feel grateful for it. When the walls of the Order came in to view I felt, wrongly it seems now, that I would simply be a different sort of prisoner from the slave that the Beautoix gang intended me to be.

At any rate, to be as brief as possible, this is how I found myself in a cell in this nunnery, living I gather directly above your Abbess. She still has not seen fit to instruct me in what I am to do here and I am unsure if I am a captive or free to go. Of course, I have nowhere to go.

You understand, about last night, that I was bored and restless. I saw the smoke rising from the bonfire in the distance beyond the walls and heard mad, joyous sounds. Of course my curiosity overcame me. I saw so many strange things yesterday, things that have changed my life completely, things that make my blood run either hot or cold to think of. But when you appeared, seeing, as it were, through me, into another dimension, that was at once the most terrifying and the most heart-breaking of the days impressions. Before I continue and tell you what I saw last night tell me what happened to you, how you were brought to such a state. Explain it to me. You saw someone else when you looked at me; you heard a voice that was not mine.

“You and the other sisters, you looked so strange, your eyes wild and hair matted. And was that...blood? Staining your mouth and your teeth? You seemed at once abject and degraded, transcendent and sanctified. I don’t know how else to describe it.”

She looked at me expectantly. The night had worn on. It was black outside and wolves howled. Our candle had shrunk by half, leaving a waxen mass resembling white claws. Her eyes were lit but opaque, like cats in the dark. I summoned my thoughts and began to sift through the haze of memory to determine, for myself and for her, what had actually happened the previous night, when the dead had lived again.

Copyright 2015. All stories on lush written by Audrey Xavier. Do not copy, reprint or repost.

The Passion of Agnes series@2015 copyrighted and the exclusive intellectual property of Audrey Xavier.