And when the guards came again that last day, we thought surely this was it. Surely this was close to the end of this insanity.

For those who were left to die and rot away in those cells, they will never know what happened next. But I was one of the unlucky ones, for when they dragged out Elena from the cell, who was now nearly lifeless, they also dragged me out. The little one they lifted up from the Cradle where she had been all night, and threw her limp body over the shoulder of one of the burlier guards. And up we went, out of the shadowy dungeon.

But where were we going? What day of the year was it even? In the dungeon, time was endless. Nobody knew when it was day or when it was night. How long was a week? A month? How long was a year? It was all relative. I had felt like I had spent an eternity in that hole, but in reality I was only there for five years. And then it hit me. Of course. Today was execution day. Once a month the Church of Santiago Marin set up festivities for the town to witness. Once a month it was execution day for the Pagans and heretics who opposed the Church. It was mandatory for the townsfolk to attend.

I remember the details very clearly. I could barely walk, I was so
weak, but I managed. They dragged me with a rope attached to my wrists. Elena was dragged on the floor by her arms, belly down. It was then that I could see the iron bars, now burnt into her flesh, a small portion of each rod, jutting obscenely out from between her legs. Alisa, on top of one of the guard's shoulder, was now freshly bleeding, the tears in her womb and elsewhere, agitated once more, now staining the backside of the guard's shirt. It was a grotesque sight.

I remember that many of us had our tongues removed that day. Maybe they didn't want us to say anything about what had happened down in the depths of that Hell. That's when they took mine. They grabbed my tongue with a pair of tongs and another with a small sickle and cut it out. They worked quickly, so in all honestly, my friend, it was painful and bloody, and every bit as terrible as you would imagine, but not anything compared to what I imagine these poor girls had experienced. Remember, this is their
story, not mine. And to prevent me from bleeding to death, they cauterized my wound with a hot iron. They did this to each of us, except the girls. I imagine they wanted them to squeal in front of everybody.

I remember that many of us were chained to wooden carts and led out onto the street. Those of us who could stand, we walked. Those who could not walk, were carried. The first few set of executions were simple and relatively mundane to the crowd. Their necks were tied with a thin metal wire, and the wire was twisted slowly behind their necks until they were strangled to death. Two others were hung. They died in a manner of minutes. But for some reason, they thought to themselves, well wouldn't it be better that day to have a little bit of fun with these poor girls. The crowd was restless anyways. Or maybe they thought that this would send a stronger warning. If you cross the Church, they may have thought, we will take your most vulnerable, and we will subject them to the most atrocious acts. Maybe they thought they were clever.

They did not kill me next. Actually, what they did next was most
puzzling. They put me in a wooden stockade, and forced me to watch, only a few feet away from the girls. Some in the crowd may have even recognized their old pastor. Then they grabbed Elena. Grabbing each of her breasts they impaled them on hooks, and pulling on a rope, they lifted her up, so that she hung in the center of town on her bosom. Still with life, she cried in anguish, and the crowd seemed to disapprove. Her silent gasps of pain were drowned by the growing murmurs in the crowd. This one was but a young girl, many of them could be heard saying. This was too much. Let her down, a woman from the crowd could be heard yelling.

But they did not stop there. Alisa was next. She was secured to a thin iron chair that the priests and guards brought from the depths of the dungeon. The iron chair had a large hole in the center of its seat, and they sat the little girl down, who was still oozing blood between her legs, down into the chair. A metal bucket was placed underneath her, and a few large shovels of red hot coals were tossed into the bucket.

It is truly too painful to describe. For the next few hours, they
cooked the poor girl from the groin up. The cries, though hoarse, felt louder than ever that day. Her eyes were wild with pain and terror. And the worst part is that she survived for most of the day. It wasn't until late evening that I was convinced she had finally died. I remember saying a prayer for her soul. Most of the crowd were finally allowed to leave, long before she expired. This wasn't what they had expected to see. They did not dare try to stop what was happening either. Like I said, my friend, we were all too scared to defy the Church of Santiago Marin.

Elena actually died a little bit after her sister. Impatient with how
long hanging the poor girl by her breasts was taking to kill her, they tied weights around her ankles, slowly adding more and more weight, until after an hour of adding weight slowly, the iron hooks finally tore through, ripping her breasts open as her body was sent to the ground in a loud thud. But she was still breathing. I could see her ribs rise up and down, still.


Wanting to kill her, because this was quickly becoming an awkward public spectacle, I could see the guards hunched over her body bickering on the fastest way to finish the deed. One of them suggesting ripping out the rods in her groin, hoping to quicken the rate at which she was bleeding. Agreeing on this, they attempted, but quickly found that those rods were stuck too tightly inside of her. Grabbing a pair of tongs, they twisted the metal rods inside her. The doomed girl, although she was almost gone, writhed slowly and groaned in pain on the floor, until finally they ripped
the rods from her flesh, bleeding her to death in a matter of minutes.

I was the only one of the prisoners left alive that day. I thought I was next to go. I wondered what horrific pain awaited me. I was
terrified. But the guards, eyes deadened with a bloodlust that was now satiated, looked at me emptily, and went about their way, disappearing from my field of vision into the evening. I was left there overnight, next to the two dead bodies of the girls and all of the other prisoners, who were piled on a heap in the center of the town square.

The very next morning, the townsfolk, in a moment of courage, and with a pair of axes, chopped me free of my wooden bondage. I remember little of what happened next. They whisked me to safety. These were my people. I had preached to them in the past, and as I had shepherded them in the past, they now protected and hid me from these evil men.

News of the atrocity in Santiago Marin spread quickly, all the way to the Vatican. This was an unacceptable amount of punishment, they quickly concluded. I write to you, though, in confidence, that what they had meant to conclude, was that this was actually an unacceptable amount of punishment performed in the public eye.

The priests and guards of the prison in Santiago Marin were rounded up by the authority of the Church of Spain, and charged with crimes against the Church. Their tongues were ripped out in similar fashion, and they were hung in the center of the town by one arm, left defenseless in the center square and alone against an angry mob who greeted them that day. That angry mob beat them to a bloody pulp, and tore them limb from limb. I was not there to witness it, thank God. I had seen enough violence for a hundred lifetimes. But this is what I had heard.

I write to you now, my friend, because I don't want our righteous
Brothers of the Church to think that what had happened was a one-time occurrence. I am sure that these dens of sin exist elsewhere in our glorious country. We must be aware of such corruption and act to end it!

We suffer so much more, hidden from the public eye. Instruments of cruel tortures are being constructed as we speak, and used on defenseless citizens, heretic or not, and we must speak up, lest they continue to be used on people in the shadows. I myself have lost the ability to speak, but thank God they did not take my hands. So I write. And I write to you now, Brother, spread the word. If we are to survive and lead the people,
these acts of atrocity must end. Godspeed, my friend.


-- Brother Adolfo