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Submitted by Yazmin
Something lingered in the air this night. Something luring to his senses. The theatre brought back an overwhelming feeling within him…and he felt at home once more.
One foot pressed upon the red carpet beneath him and then the other. A slow and claiming presence took over the hall of the historic building…the mortals around him could not help but stop to stare at him and it caused a devilish grin to stir upon his lips.
Although there was no set occasion, he had found himself smartly dressed. Naturally. It was custom to him to look and feel good whenever and wherever he was…and tonight…was no exception.
A black tuxedo sharpened his features in stern lines. He appeared smart and sexy…and with his bow tie loosened, the tassels fell gently either side of his neck, which added a casual and comfortable appearance.
This man walked in like he owned the place. And had the mortals before him known better they would have continued to make such an assumption. Fools.
His fingers gently laced around the bottom of the tux and tweaked at it somewhat, smartening himself up before taking a few more steps within the theatre. What would he watch tonight? Pondered the question throughout his thoughts…He wasn’t entirely pleased with the plays casting currently…but then again, when was he ever fully pleased?
No, tonight…there would be no play…instead…perhaps a good hunt…one with class.
His eyes rolled over the passing mortals. Their steps hurried against the ground, their bodies weighed down with expense of jewellery and clothes…mmm yes, this evening he would indulge on the luxury of status…
His fingers slowly curled around the black beaded buttons of his tuxedo jacket and slowly began to undo them…each of his hands shifting it off of his shoulders in a somewhat…seductive action. The fabric rolled down his arms, his eyes closed momentarily as he took in the soft feeling of it doing so…. my, how his senses were heightened currently. Everything was projected and amplified in a sensual manner and it drove him wild in hunger…a silent purr fell from him…
Sounds, smells, sights…everything. It was all eye candy to him, all an opportunity of the night…If only they knew how much of a threat they were in…it made him grin endlessly at the thought of disruption…but no, the theatre was a place of civility and he had a great respect for that.
What his mind was set on for the moment…was the loud blonde strutting her glorious Hollywood figure down the hall. Decorated in the most elaborate and revealing red velvet dresses. Hands lifting in the air in exaggerated movements, beckoning to her “people” as though she were a queen.
His mind sunk deep within her own and he read everything about her in a speed that was unrecognisable. She was the one…how he’d love to silence those red lips of hers…that is…silence them after a loud shrill…drink up; sweet lady…tonight will be your last.
Submitted by Jared - WINNER!
En la Compañía de Santos
The tabalet pounded emphatically and the dolçaina lifted the atmosphere, bolstered by the clapping in time to the tabalet from the surrounding balconies. A red and purple anthropogenic mulberry tree swayed just slightly as a young child ascended to its apex; the exhilarated boy cautiously steadied himself on the strong shoulders of the riser, holding out his arms as branches and looking over at a nearby enxaneta who was doing the same. Her face was calm yet austere and he found her alluring for it. Refusing to break her concentration, she ignored him, yet his elation drowned any disappointment as he lifted his arms in triumph. The ovation came to a crescendo and he soaked it in before he delicately dismounted to find a motorcade waiting for him, the tumult of the event abruptly dropping.
“Get in the carriage,” Alejandro derisively commanded, and the driver held open the door emblazoned with the crest of Xunta Suprema de Galicia. The ten-year-old climbed in and was taken to the Pazo de Raxoi for his admonishment. “It was your first time and it shall be your last.” His father reiterated his brother’s motif in the baroque palace. Propriety needed to be upheld unfailingly during this critical time for Galiza, he was told, and associating with proletarians would disgrace the local administration, even for progeny not destined for inheritance. He stared at the white marble floor with his thoughts on the enxaneta.
An infatuation coursed through his young body, not just for the rider and her deep concentration but for something else, something unidentified. With a lamp in the dusk, the tunnel-vaulted corridors were navigated and he entreated Sergi. “Take me to El Sí de las Niñas.” Sergi’s eyes were glassy in the light of the lantern. “Wait a few days,” he conceded after a moment, “then we’ll see.”
This was a dangerous time. The Xunta de Galicia had recently declaimed support of Charles IV’s disenfranchised son and thus the community was marked as traitorous. An insurrection against Joseph Bonaparte had already erupted nearly six years ago across the country and the courts had retreated to Cádiz. This the ten-year-old scarcely understood for the distortions in the glass in his windows. He yearned to be engaged with such severity that he sometimes even mused fighting with the rebellion save for his age. In the shadow of the Obradoiro façade of Saint James the Great’s resting place, he slipped away from the palace into the dimming twilight.
The theatre was engrossed in itself as Francisca was threatened by her mother to abide her arranged marriage to don Diego, and the girl’s absolute anguish struck him nearly as much as her pervasive beauty. His enticement by this thespian from his inconspicuous location gave him a slight moment of guilt for the enxaneta, as if either one would notice, but he was captivated nonetheless: Francisca’s defiant love for Félix radiated across the audience and he urgently wanted to replace Félix. A hand fell on him and he was spun to face a dark-eyed stranger with a narrow face and a somewhat prominent nose framed by a flowing mane of grey-black.
"What’s this?” the brusque man demanded with him pressed against the stone wall in the darkness. “Can you present a scene? Come with me.” He was ushered into a room and was fitted with proper yet minimal gear. “You are of the same dimensions of Rafael who conducted the part of Calamocha. Here, learn these lines quickly and, if you cannot recall them, put yourself in the mind of the character and respond.” Thrust before the spectators, he asked Simon why don Diego had come to Alcalá and Simon asked him the same of Félix, each forbidden by their masters to reveal their masters’ intensions for Francisca. He was inebriated by this avenue with which to project himself, not to mention his new proximity to Francisca, and he remained so after the performance.
“You clearly are apt at the stage,” the stranger said to him as he was returning the props.
“I should not be here,” he divulged.
“I know who you are, who your father is,” the man said, tying his hair back. “Don’t be anxious. No one else noticed due to your attire.” He was given a subjective expression for a moment. “My name is Leandro Fernández de Moratín. Come with me and perform.”
“I cannot—”
“Did you understand the play? Did you see beyond the façade of a young woman who is finally given the option of choosing for herself between a wealthy man of whom she knows nothing and love? Do you know how difficult it was to gain administrative permission to perform this tonight? Your father was upset enough that the theme appears to be the woman’s right to choose.” The man leaned toward the boy and ensured that others could not overhear. “Your father initially supported the aristocracy’s dethronement of Ferdinand and then saw Ferdinand as a puppet. As the battle continues in Vitoria, think about La Pepa. Those are not Saint James’ remains in the cathedral.”
The encounter with the playwright perplexed him. An element was missing from his being and he was opaque to its source. An attractive sunlit courtyard lined by arches was crossed and the streets were taken until he finally came upon the muixeranga preparing for another display. A weight in his chest incited his begging of the cap de colla, who had not a notion of his name during the last event, to let him participate. He glanced over at the other enxaneta, who again did not pay him interest, and then he approached, inspired by Félix: “I—I see how determined you are on the aixecador; not only during the castell, but at night as I lie and in the morning. You are very pretty.” The muixeranga music flared and saved the girl from needing to respond. A tower was constructed with him as the enxaneta and he looked around at the applauding bystanders and back to see the other enxaneta rise to the pinnacle of a pilar. A musket shot silenced the crowd and the pilar toppled.
“Attention!” Alejandro roared next to his coach and the Xunta guards. The tower was disassembled and he went toward the dense mass of pinya amongst cries to see that the girl was lying on the street, unmoving. The guards were entering the throng to apprehend him, but he fell behind the mass and lay silently, staring at eyelevel into the deep brown eyes of the girl. Her head was at an odd angle. Another shot was fired in the air and Alejandro again shouted, “Attention!” He ducked into a narrow passageway and pressed his face against the cold stone wall. “By my authority as heir to the Xunta Suprema de Galicia, I am honored to relay the declaration to you of our final victory over the French Invasions. Unfortunately Joseph Bonaparte averted our troops, but their Empire has been disposed from our nation. Before God, reaffirm your allegiance with Ferdinand VII!” He soundlessly moved away from the point and found refuge in a more secure spot behind another building, and the guards returned to the carriage unsuccessful. Despite the widespread contempt for the French, there were no sounds of celebration coming down the street.
Those brown resolute eyes were all he could see, alternating from lucid to empty, but the rest of the face remained stoic: she had merely one expression. Her cheek bluntly sat upon the stone street and then was looking at him as he confessed his attraction. Francisca encroached upon his mind, several years older and equally unfathomable. After darkness swept over the city, he wandered through the streets toward the theatre, to see Moratín. El Sí de las Niñas had been cancelled and the building was empty like the enxaneta’s eyes. He sat in the back row and, from the nothingness within, Moratín emerged.
“It might do better in other provinces,” the man considered jokingly, clad in his brown high-collared coat and dark cloak. “Suddenly the radical ideas of the revolution are not welcome among the aristocracy. Pretty convenient, wouldn’t you say?” The man watched him with the same subjective expression. “Well, you are too young.”
He honestly didn’t understand what had happened. Those brown resolute eyes were all he could see. “I want to come with you,” he uttered into the apathetic night, “and perform.”
“The new sovereignty is not going to be of the people as promised if Ferdinand reclaims the throne in a few months. Take note that he will be under the control of the church and the nobility and he will not uphold La Pepa. Alas, he is no don Diego. I will endeavor here, but may have to return to Paris.” The mane of hair was undone and those dark eyes bore into the boy’s as the man took his hand and analyzed its texture. “Hold on to your fire, young one, and remember to question that which is considered to be absolute.”
Moratín receded into the black innards of the theatre and the ten-year-old, disillusioned, sat for awhile and thought of the enxaneta.
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