The Brilliance of Cowards

If I had been a carpenter or stone mason’s daughter, my earthly life would probably be behind me, snuffed out most inelegantly by the noxious fumes of the monthly witch’s pyre held every Friday night after midnight Mass in the town square. Because my father was a notoriously rich and well connected pervert, I was spared death and disgrace by way of a wedding. 

When I was caught “fornicating with the devil,” my father gave me an ultimatum: burn in hell (literally and figuratively, as it turned out), or become a wife. When I asked if I could have some time to think about it, he struck me so hard I lost a tooth (it was the abscessed molar in the back, which I took as a sign that maybe God did have a sense of humor). 

I knew I should be grateful, but the only thing I hated more than being my father’s hostage was the thought of being a husband’s hostage.

After an agonizing night of prayer and nightmares of demons, hell fire, and childbirth, I woke up with what felt like a divine solution that could only have come from God Himself. I’d offer to repent and devote myself to God and the family’s moral honor by entering a convent and becoming a nun. 

Unfortunately, nuns were just about worthless as a commodity for trade and material gain in the worldly realm that my father aspired to. (“What good are you to me as a fucking nun?” were his exact words.)

And so I found myself engaged to a strapping young knight and hero of the kingdom, ordained by God to save Christianity and the Vatican’s land interests from Martin Luther's heretics. Despite my apprehension over marrying anyone, let alone a complete stranger, I did my best to hide my relief when my father announced his choice for my husband. Betray any sign of relief or excitement, and he might just change his mind and betroth me to one of his peers - a fate worse than the fire itself.

And so the night of our engagement finally arrived, and our families arranged a lavish banquet to celebrate and gloat before the faithful. Still wary of my future husband’s casual haughtiness and disturbingly fine and handsome features, I tried to make light of the situation and see if we could at least be friends and find some common ground.

“You must be very courageous and steadfast in your faith to risk your life to fight the heretics,” I said earnestly. 

“Save it Lady Fingers. I know you’re damaged goods. It’s the only reason your greedy little bastard of a father would choose to sell you to me instead of to the Bishop’s hit man, that old scaly pig the Marquis de Porcine. He knows that even a whiff of scandal or deceit on his part and your entire family would roast like a crate of pigs at Easter. You’re welcome, by the way.” 

He took a long, gulping sip of wine from his ruby encrusted goblet without so much as turning his head or casting a sideways glance at me as he spoke. 

My face burned so hot I thought I might actually be in hell. 

“You’re disgusting.”

“Hey, I’m not the one who got caught plucking my own harp.” Laughter, followed by more gulping.

Seriously, did the whole country know?

I couldn’t tell if I hated him more for being so arrogant and artless, or for being right. I was also struck by the humiliating realization that the only thing worse than having to choose between being incinerated alive or sold to this infuriatingly beautiful arrogant bastard, was being incinerated alive or sold off to the aforementioned scaly old bastard. 

One of the advantages of being betrothed to a “hero” about to ride off to war to save Christendom from their heretical neighbors was that we barely saw each other in the run up to the wedding. He spent most of his time in prayer, politicking, raising money, and the indulging in the type of shameless gluttony that made angry villagers pick up the torches and pitchforks in the first place.

Our wedding night was the first time we were ever truly alone together, but had I been nervous about being alone and moving in with him, I needn’t have worried. When I walked into the parlor, he was sprawled out in front of the fire draped in layers of velvet robes like an ersatz Henry VIII.

“Your chambers are down the hall and off to the right,” he said, barely looking up from his book and dismissing me with a bored flick of his bejeweled hand. “Oh and don’t worry, the doors lock from the inside, so you’ll have all the privacy you need Lady Fingers.”

While I knew that I should be grateful for the secret freedom I’d enjoy married to a man that had no interest in me, I also found myself fighting an overwhelming urge to stab him with one of his swords. 

His servants were no better. They had an odd sense of haughtiness and didn’t even pretend to hide their disdain for me, and confusion over their master and hero’s choice of bride. In the weeks and months after the wedding and leading up to his eventual departure to claim his glorious and bloody destiny, I spent most of my time blissfully reading and writing in the library and walking with the dogs (my only friends) across the massive grounds of his estate.

There were the obligatory banquets and grotesque displays of ego of course, some of which were more unbearable than others. But the Church’s coffers weren’t going to fill themselves, so his displays of prowess became more and more preposterous and embarrassing the closer the battle came. 

On one occasion, he knocked his jousting partner off his horse, jumped up onto the back of his own, and proceeded to take control of both horses, riding with one long and lean leg on the back of each, to the delighted wails and screams of his adoring fans. I found myself panicking that he might fall and break his neck - would I be able to hide my relief and convincingly play the role of the hysterical widow?

This went on for what seemed like forty lifetimes in the midst of the hell fire, but the night of his farewell banquet finally arrived. I remembered our engagement party, and made no attempt to engage him whatsoever. I just tried to keep my eyes open and feign excitement at the speeches and toasts aimed at our beloved hero.

Lost in my thoughts, I was shocked to feel his face within inches of my own.

“I’m getting the fuck out of here.”

“What?”

“You heard me.”

“I know. It’s why we’re here. Obviously.” Now I was apparently also an idiot who couldn’t take a hint.

“No, I mean I’m taking the money and running.”

“What are you talking about?” 

People were noticing our heated whispers, but were thankfully stupid enough to attribute it to the dashing knight comforting his inconsolable bride on the eve of his heroic departure. 

“You can’t be serious. Why would you joke about something like that?”

“I’m not joking,” he said without breaking eye contact or easing the psychotically perfect smile he had learned to weaponize against his adoring, meat and wine soaked minions.

“I’m taking the Church’s blood money for myself and fleeing to Italy. You should come with me.” He threw the last sentence out as casually as if he’d suggested I try the goose liver.

“This is crazy. And heresy, by the way. And I don’t understand. I thought you wanted to go and fight. The glory and the kingdom and the rivers of blood and manhood or whatever.”

“Fuck it,” he said, clapping and nodding along solemnly with the sniveling speech giver. “Have you seen what happens to some of the poor bastards who actually manage to make it back alive? Mattias lost an eye, and Rafael came back a eunuch.”

“What are you talking about? They died in battle!”

“They were maimed and deemed too freakish to parade around the town square like stuffed peacocks, so they got a shovel to the back of the head and an eternal resting place under the rose bushes behind the cathedral. The Bishop and Vatican council rightly figured out that nobody would want to see that shit.” 

He was still clapping and nodding along to the speeches perfectly on cue.

“But what about the heretics?” I said dully, truly at a loss.

“Fuck them too. Listen, you can come with me to Italy, where you’ll be safe from the scandal, and free to fornicate with the devil - or me - to your heart’s delight. Your choice.” 

Again, as casual as if he’d simply asked me to pass a bowl of grapes.

I tried to lie and convince myself that the sudden flush in my cheeks and under my skirt was from the shock of his words and the wine I’d started to down with hearty abandon. I could tell from the slight twitch at the corner of his mouth and the way his eyes danced as he pretended to watch the crowd that he’d noticed it too.

“What’s in Italy?” I asked, trying to keep my voice as casual and steady as his.

“A bunch of corrupt, gutless, old assholes mostly, just like here. But we'll be safer and have more fun.”

I hated how my heart and pelvis pulsed with electricity when he said “we,” as if I’d already agreed. 

This couldn’t be happening. 

Then it occurred to me with a sudden thud of alarm (and disappointment) that it was a trap. He could be setting me up for a charge of heresy or treason, in order to get rid of me for good. Or just for a laugh. Who could tell with a man this beautiful and crazy?

“Why should I believe you? For all I know, you’re just trying to get rid of me so you can run off and be free with some tavern wench.”

“I hate to be indelicate Lady Fingers, but if all I wanted was a tavern wench, I wouldn’t need to get rid of you for that.” 

“OK you really have to stop calling me that.”

“I’ll call you anything you want. So what do you say?”

“Well I never figured you for a coward, for starters.”

“Why not?” he asked earnestly. “Cowards are the happiest and most free people you will ever meet. And most importantly, they’re alive and in one piece.”

“OK fine, but we’ve been married for months, and you haven’t so much as thrown a desirous glance my way. We’ve been living like brother and sister, but suddenly you want me to go to Italy as your…what exactly?”

“Well I couldn’t run the risk of you falling in love with me before we left,” he deadpanned. “I wanted you to make the choice freely, and with a clear head.”

“How generous of you,” I said dryly. “But as you’ve pointed out before, I don’t really have the best of options available to me do I? At best, they’ll know you escaped and suspect that I was your accomplice and burn me at the stake. At worst, they’ll assume you died in battle and your family will just sell me off to some old pig, leaving me right back where I started.”

“So you have nothing to lose by leaving with me, and everything to lose by staying,” he said triumphantly. “Look, the way I see it your dirty little self love habit set us both free. If you hadn’t been caught, you’d most likely have been married off to Porcine or worse, and most likely have thrown yourself in the river by now. I would have been pressured to marry and impregnate someone infinitely less interesting and liberated than you, making my own escape that much more complicated. You’ve saved us both Lady Fingers.”

We were obviously past propriety, so I got to the point. “And speaking of duties and burdens, what makes you think I want to be impregnated by you or anyone?”

“I don’t,” he replied with a triumphant smile. “There are solutions to that little problem, and without the watchful eye of the Church and your creepy father, we’re free to live like Adam and Eve in the Garden, before the unfortunate fall.”

“Well. Speaking of the Church, how exactly will we hide from the Church in Italy of all places?”

“You can’t seriously think I’m the only soldier to wake up to the war racket? There’s an underground network with resources. We’ll be hiding right under the Vatican’s nose.”

“Seriously? Does every knight feel this way?”

“Not the stupid ones.”

“And you’ve made up your mind then?”

“I have. This was the plan all along my lady. There are only two questions remaining: are you coming with me, or can I trust you to keep my secret if you make the wrong choice and opt to stay behind?”

“OK, suppose I agree. What will happen to me when we get to Italy? What will I do?”

“What do you mean? You’re my woman.”

“Oh please I am not your woman.”

“OK look, I didn’t expect you to trust me blindly. So I’m prepared to split the purse with you whether you decide to stay with me when we get to Italy or not. I’ll even give you the money before we leave as a measure of good faith.”

“Well had you opened with that, this would have been a much shorter conversation. So how, and more importantly when, do we leave?”

*