Chapter 13
My heart felt like it was torn out and bleeding beneath me on the floor. The hand who tore it out had walked away. Debra held me, but I could not stop screaming. The arrangements were already made to leave for Holland, but I could not pack. I no longer cared if Spanish power was on the decline. My sister said the money now flowed through Amsterdam, but it did not matter to me. I only wanted my Rafael, but he did not want me.
For over a century Rafael had shared my thoughts, my hopes, my bed, but it was always with a manipulative heart. He had always loved another. When Debra announced we were leaving Spain, he realized he would never have her, and saw no more reason to keep up the facade. He used simple language without a hint of an apology to me. When summoned before the Queen, he confessed his love for her, and swore to never love another. I listened with new found emptiness from the doorway as he used words he once used with me.
When Rafael had finished speaking, Debra ordered he should be punished. She asked him to willingly enter a coffin for thirty nights. This was retribution for the pain he had caused her sister. Although the suffering would be great, and the lack of blood would cause certain madness, he agreed. Debra said this would also give her time to consider his words, and he replied he would do anything to prove his love.
For twenty nine days Rafael lied in a coffin bound shut by heavy, nearly unbreakable chains. In the predawn hours before thirtieth day, Angie helped me pull the coffin into an open field. My sister handed me an ax. I chopped three slits into the topside of the coffin, which were sufficient to let in a decent amount of sunlight. As the three of us walked away, I heard for the last time Rafael's voice as he begged for forgiveness. Less than a month later we left Spain for a new life in Holland.
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