The Priest by Monica La Porta Read Free Book Online Page A

lost memory of his father telling him to be
cautious when speaking their language around women resurfaced.
    “It’s… beautiful.” Her voice broke a little.
“What does the word pax mean? You said it several
times.”
    “Peace; the father wants his kid to live in
peace,” he answered without thinking, despite what he had just
remembered.
    “I would like to hear some more,” she said
softly.
    Mauricio couldn’t believe the girl had asked
him to sing for her. She was talking to him as if he were another
woman. Although he couldn’t be sure of how women talked among
themselves. He knew that she wasn’t talking to him as a man, in any
case. The realization was so shocking that he lost the use of his
tongue for several minutes.
    “I already told you; I am not going to call
the guards if you talk to me.”
    “But you did last time!” Mauricio couldn’t
help to retort and then regretted it immediately.
    “What?” The girl sounded confused by his
outburst. “No! I can’t believe it… you are the slave who was found
in my room three months ago?” She was genuinely surprised, but not
angry. “It’s okay, as I already said, twice, I am not calling for
help. The last time I saw you, I screamed because I was coming out
of the anesthesia. You have to admit that your presence in my room
was rather upsetting.” Her tone was calm.
    “I'm sorry if I scared you. It wasn’t my
intention,” he said defensively.
    “I know. I saw the recording of what
happened that day. You were very… gentle.”
    “I only wanted to see you.”
    “Why?”
    “I have heard you sing before, and I wanted
to see what you looked like.” Mauricio felt a strange urge of
telling the truth, even if he knew he was playing with fire.
    “You heard me before?”
    “I was left in a depository room next to
yours. Sound traveled through the wall.”
    “What’s a depository room?”
    Mauricio was taken aback by this question.
How was it possible that she didn’t know?
    “You can’t say?” she pressed.
    “No, it’s not that. I thought you knew. It’s
a place the guards bring me to fill my quota of semen for the day,”
he said slowly.
    “What do you mean?” The girl seemed
interested.
    “I am a semental.” Mauricio thought that the
name itself was enough explanation without having to be any more
detailed.
    “What does a semental do?” she asked
instead.
    Mauricio groaned. He really didn’t want to
say anything else about the topic. The other men had always treated
him like the plague for being a semental. He didn’t think that she
was going to regard him any better. Maybe that explained why she
was talking to him. She didn’t know who he was and what he did for
the guards.
    “Guards use my semen to create fathered
women,” he said and his voice was angry. Happy now? he
thought.
    “Oh! I didn’t know.” The girl’s voice came
as a barely audible whisper.
    “It’s not that I like doing it. I have no
choice,” Mauricio said defensively and hurt.
    “I studied physiology at school, but they
didn't explain to us how things work in detail. I didn’t know that
there were particular slaves who… do only that,” she said in a
conciliatory tone.
    He was astonished by her ignorance and, most
of all, by the fact that she hadn’t run away by now.
    “You seem different from the other slaves,”
she said, surprising him even more.
    Mauricio didn’t know what to say after that.
He didn’t even know if she had meant it as a compliment. Probably
not. Women didn’t compliment slaves.
    “In the recording, you stood there, watching
me sleep. It felt like you were protecting me,” she continued.
    He was completely at loss for words.
    “I must go now.” The girl concluded her
soliloquy without adding anything else.
    Mauricio heard her steps moving away and
wondered what had just happened. I just had a conversation with
a woman. He kept thinking about that all night, playing the
exchange over and over again. When the tall guard came