Trembling With Fear 04/11/21

The Penitent Line by Aristo Couvaras

All the townsfolk stood in the line. 

One behind the other. 

Taller heads stood out from those shorter than them and obscured the view of those behind them. 

The eyes he could see, the stares he could meet, were all hard; hard and uncaring as stones, fixed and focused as the harsh glare of the sun. These were the eyes of parents who know they must punish their children, they knew it the same way an infant knows the face of their mother. None of the faces were smiling, they were not permitted to show joy or glee, but if one looked closely at the bared teeth and snarling lips, there at the corners of a mouth – yes, some would enjoy this. Some had been waiting for this.

All the townsfolk stood in the line. Except for the Magister and him. He was chained to an old plinth, his hands and feet manacled and their links driven into the stony platform. He could’ve stood, though it was not permitted. So, he knelt in supplication, waiting for the person at the head of the line to approach him.

At the base of the small set of stairs cut into the plinth was the Magister. “Today we are gathered,” the Magister’s voice boomed over the silent mass. “Gathered so that we may affirm our communal commitment to fraternity, to justice, to peace and to love for our neighbors. To consecrate, before one another, the ideals by which we abide. To sacrifice our own humanity so that this one creature, undeserving of our love and care, might be saved.”

The Magister held a tool aloft. “This is the hammer my father used to build the home of my family.” He raised his other hand. “And this is the nail first driven into the wood he crafted so we might have a door to shield and protect us from the evilness of the outside world. I have pried it from its place and bedding and weakened my home so that my sacrifice will hold personal resonance, personal loss. I give these to the Penitent, with regret for having to do so, but with love for him, so that he too may be saved as I have been!”

He kept his head bowed as the Magister took the stairs. His body quaked, his teeth chattered, sweat poured from his brow and mingled with the tears in his eyes.

He stared down at the Magister’s boots. The Magister cried out, “I absolve you, Penitent! With love and forgiveness I give of myself to you, so that you may be made whole at my expense. I ask only that when the time comes for you to do the same for me, you do not baulk as I have not baulked.”

With that, the Magister pressed the point of the nail against the trembling, sweat-slicked skin of his brow and began hammering it into his flesh. He screamed. He bled. True to his words, the Magister did not baulk.

When the Magister stepped down, the man first in line stepped up. “This is the switch with which my father made me into a loving man, with which he hardened me so that the teeth of this dark world would not rend my flesh! Would that I might make the Penitent hard and good too! I give this to the Penitent, with regret for having to do so, but with love for him, so that he too may be saved as I have been!” 

The man stood behind him and shouted, “I absolve you, Penitent! With love and forgiveness I give of myself to you, so that you may be made whole at my expense. I ask only that when the time comes for you to do the same for me, you do not baulk as I have not baulked.”

The man whipped the flesh of his back. He felt no love or care in the strikes, only pain and rebuke and disdain. The man dropped the bloody switch before him as he left.

A woman stepped forward next, as the blood beaded and ran down the open sores of his back. “This is the knife which carves the feast day meals for my family, which cuts the flesh of beasts so it may be consumed and nourish my children. I relinquish my possession in hope it might too cut the wickedness from the Penitent. I give this to the Penitent, with regret for having to do so, but with love for him, so that he too may be saved as I have been! I absolve you, Penitent! With love and forgiveness I give of myself to you, so that you may be made whole at my expense. I ask only that when the time comes for you to do the same for me, you do not baulk as I have not baulked.”

She plunged the blade into his thigh and he trembled and screamed. She left it there, deep in his flesh, the handle standing tall like a man observing his crops with pride.

“This is a stone from the riverbed where me and my brother play…” The boy threw it at his head and left it where it landed.

“I give this to the Penitent, with regret for having to do so, but with love for him, so that he too may be saved…” And the newlywed kicked him with the polished boots he’d worn on his wedding day. Taking them off and leaving them on the plinth when he was done.

“I absolve you, Penitent! With love and forgiveness I give of myself to you…” The winemaker broke a bottle over his head, letting the claret drink obscure the blood.

“So that you may be made whole at my expense.” The tanner’s belt buckle ripped into the skin of his chest.

“I ask only that when the time comes for you to do the same…” The knife the young man had been given for his name day was thrust into his other leg.

“For me, you do not baulk as I have not baulked.” The blacksmith held his tongs and pressed the red-hot ingot from the forge against his cheek.

“When my tooth had festered…” His lips were forced open and one tooth pried out, then two, then three.

“That lanced the boil…” The hot needle was driven in.

“Do not baulk as I have not baulked.” The words were repeated again and again. The punishment of his salvation enacted with hateful eagerness. Again and again.

Some had to come and hold him under the arms for those still in line, so that he did not collapse. “These are the hands with which I plant.” Knuckles drove into his nose. “The shoes which protect my horse.” More nails broke his flesh. “The manure which sustains my crops.” He was pelted with hot slop and feces. “The tallow which makes the candles that light our houses from the dark.” Hot wax scalded his flesh and his wounds. “The hatchet with hews the wood that warms my family.” Three of his fingers were cut clean off. 

They held his head up by the hair so he might face the next person, though his eyes were swollen and his vision full of blood and wine and spit and sweat and shit. A young girl was standing before him. The hem of her dress and her feet was all he could see. They pulled his head higher, wrenching his neck, so he would face her. He was silent. She held nothing in her hands. No, no, no, no, he thought. No, no, no, no, he tried to say.

“This is the kiss my father gives me when I am afraid.” She kissed him on the forehead. She held him tight. He baulked. He wept. His daughter. He had told her to do as the others. She had said she would, she had promised. Over her shoulder he saw his wife next in line. Her hands were over her mouth and she wept too. The man was broken now. They let him fall and he cried out. 

If she did not punish him, she would be in his place next.

His daughter looked to the Magister, to the crowd, to those still waiting in line and said, “I ask only that when the time comes for you to head the Penitent Line you do not baulk as I have not baulked!”