A New Novel, Part 287 I Will Trade My Virtue to You

18 July 2011, A New Novel, Part 287 I Will Trade My Virtue to You

For those who haven’t been following this blog, let me introduce it a little. I am currently blogging my 21st novel that has the working title Daemon. The novel is about Aksinya, a sorceress, who, to save her family from the Bolsheviks, called and contracted the demon, Asmodeus. Her family was murdered anyway, and she fled with the demon from Russia to Austria.

Father Dobrushin took Aksinya to dinner.  He told her he is willing to marry her to help her be rid of the demon.  They have reached the end of their discussion--now is the time for Aksinya to decide...

Aksinya sighed, “Your words confuse me, but I am always very simple and direct.  I shall marry you.  I shall do as you ask and require.  I shall pray with you and for you.  All of this to be rid of this demon that eats away at my life and my soul.  It is a fair bargain to trade my virtue to you for all you have done for me.”

“There you are wrong, Princess.  You can desire without sin when the object of desire is appropriate.  You would not give your virtue to me and I would not give my virtue to you.  We would rather retain that virtue together in our mutual desire as husband and wife.”

Aksinya turned a gentle smile to him, “I see.  Sister Margarethe taught me you can love without lust.  Do you intend to teach me that I can love God and still possess desire?”

“I would teach you that you can still love and have desire.”  He smiled, “But you are only allowed desire for me.”

“I see.”

“We should accomplish this soon before the demon can work anymore mischief in your life.  The first step is marriage.” 

“Will Father Makar marry us?”

“I don’t know.” Father Dobrushin lowered his eyes.

“What are you not telling me?”

“It is nothing.  We will ask him tonight.  Perhaps he will do as I ask.”

They quickly finished their dinner and Father Dobrushin hired a carriage to take them to the Ecclesia.

Father Dobrushin told Aksinya that he wanted to see this whole great problem of the demon through because in it he could know the truth of spiritual things.  It made God real to him.  This is one of the subthemes of the novel.  Few patently disbelieve there is some spiritual reality.  Thoughts, emotions, the unexplained are seen to exist in the world of the spiritual.  Most of us seek the truth and reality of the spiritual world.  Because our lives are bound in thought and emotion, we recognize that inexplicable place is real, but we wish proof.  For Father Dobrushin, Aksinya is that proof.  Thus, his words confuse her--she sees them as real, he seeks their reality.  This was the metaphor in the trials.  This was the metaphor in the idea that Aksinya was not sane.  We accepted her sanity as a postulate of the novel.  We ourselves fell for the assumption of a spiritual reality based on the demon.  This is the reality Father Dobrushin wants to experience first hand through Aksinya.  He is willing to give up everything for this.

Aksinya doesn't fully understand, but she is willing to give herself to be rid of the demon.  Listen to her words, she is still in the mindset of a contract:  "It is a fair bargain to trade my virtue to you for all you have done for me.”

And here comes another subtheme explained by Father Dobrushin.  Do you remember Sister Margarethe told Aksinya she could love without desire.  Of course Ekaterina showed Aksinya about the different types of love.  Aksinya has been acting on the preface that to desire is not to really love.  Father Dobrushin is about to teach her about Greek eros.  I don't use the word in the novel because it it so misunderstood in English.  Greek eros is romantic love.  In the Christian worldview that Father Dobrushin represents, marriage is the proper place for eros, phileo, agape, and pathos (sexual love).  A husband and wife don't give up their virtue to each other, they share these loves and retain their virtue.

Father Dobrushin does love Aksinya--he is just a little embarrassed to say it.  This is cultural for the times and place.  He makes a possessive statement to her:“But you are only allowed desire for me.”

There is an element of time here.  They must hurry to see this through.  The demon still prowls the earth and he owns Aksinya through a contract.  They would enact another contract--a contract of marriage.  Of course in the old world and in ancient thought a marriage is not consummated without sex.  That is the point in Tobit.

The large question is where they will be married by contract.  This is normative for their culture and their beliefs.  They must be married in the church (it is a sacrament) before they can consummate it.  The only place they could be married is the Orthodox Church.  Remember, they are not Catholic and the Catholic Church has excluded Aksinya.  They could not excommunicate her--she was not in communion with them.

Then we begin to see there is a problem.  I foreshadowed this problem back at the secular trial.  You know there is a problem in this and Father Dobrushin has not told all.  He doesn't here either.  Soon we will see what this problem is.  Tomorrow, will Father Makar marry them?

A New Novel, Part 191 Do You Hate Me?

A New Novel, Part 191 Do You Hate Me?



For those who haven’t been following this blog, let me introduce it a little. I am currently blogging my 21st novel that has the working title Daemon. The novel is about Aksinya, a sorceress, who, to save her family from the Bolsheviks, called and contracted the demon, Asmodeus. Her family was murdered anyway, and she fled with the demon from Russia to Austria.

Aksinya confessed to the priests and Matushka at the Ecclesia in Wien.  She wakes the next morning and is greeted by Matushka Ekaterina...

Ekaterina smiled, “You may call me Ekaterina, Countess.”

Aksinya’s lips didn’t exactly smile, but they turned up a little, “I wish you would call me Aksinya.”

“You know that isn’t possible, Countess.”

“It would please me, Ekaterina. Because of what I really am.”

“We all have our own problems… and sins… even the nobility.”

“Perhaps you don’t understand…”

“I heard it all last night.”

“Oh…then you hate me.”

Ekaterina laughed, “Not anymore than anyone else. It depends on what you mean by hate… and love. You know your Greek?”

Aksinya nodded.

“I am called to love you with the love only God can have—that is agape love. I think I can love you like that. I don’t not love you like that. There is also phileo, the kind of love between people who trust each other.” She smiled to take away the sting in her words, “I don’t know you well enough to have phileo love toward you.”

Aksinya look up from the sides of her eyes, “How might you come to love me like that?”

“By sharing together in work. By companionship and pleasant conversation. By sharing thoughts and ideas.”

“I see… I told you I murdered my lady-in-waiting. I know she loved me. I’m not certain I loved her.” Aksinya shook her head, “What is wrong with my eyes? They have been damp since I woke.”

“Let me look at them.” Ekaterina inspected Aksinya’s eyes, “What do you feel, Aksinya?”

“I feel very sad, and I feel great pain.”

“Your eyes are filled with tears.”

“I don’t remembering ever crying before.”

“But you are crying now.”

Aksinya laid her head on the table top, “Natalya cried all the time. I didn’t understand it. Do you think she was always sad? I think she loved me. Do you think she was that sad because of me?”

“I don’t know. Did you make her sad?”

“No, I think I loved her, but I killed her.” Aksinya let out a sob, “Why did I make that sound? What’s wrong with me?” Her shoulders shuddered.

Ekaterina moved next to Aksinya. She put her arms around the girl.

Aksinya is a person who does not understand normal human relationships or interaction.  She was raised in a noble family to be a countess.  She had few friends.  We will find that she was ostracised in her own household.  Aksinya chose sorcery and put away all the things of the world because of that.  Now, she is coming to understand what it means to be human.

Ekaterina asks Aksinya to call her by her name.  This is familiar, but not unacceptable or wrong for the culture.  Since Ekaterina is an older woman, she could demand Aksinya call her by her title, but she doesn't.  Aksinya already gave up her title--she just wishes to be Aksinya now.  That is not possible in this culture and especially for the Matushka.  Aksinya begs Ekaterina in the only way she knows to beg--because of what she is.

Then, do you see?  The purpose of a Matushka is to take care of the women in the Ecclesia.  Ekaterina is well equipped to aid Aksinya.  Listen to her words and response.  Perhaps few will ever have the opportunity to look after a person as broken as Aksinya, but Ekaterina knows what to do and how to respond.  She reminds Aksinya that she knows all Aksinya's confession--everything Aksinya told the priests.

Aksinya's response: “…then you hate me.”  Aksinya spent a while being rejected physically by the church--she expects to be rejected by those in the church.  Ekaterina's answer is classic.  It depends on what you mean by love and hate.  Love comes in many flavors--this is a new lesson for Aksinya.  Agape vs. phileo the love of God compared to the love of man.  Aksinya wishes to be loved, but we knew that.  She has been seeking love since the beginning of this novel.  She sought it from her family who unfortunately died and could not know the benefit she tried to purchase for them nor the cost of that benefit.  She sought comfort within herself.  She sought love through luxuria, sorcery, and lust.  It all comes down to the same thing.  Aksinya wishes to be appreciated for who and what she is; therefore, she is very interested in how she might win love like that. 

Those thoughts turn Aksinya's mind to Natalya.  She believes she murdered her lady-in-waiting.  Aksinya doesn't know what love is; she only knows that Natalya told her she loved her more than once.  Aksinya wants to know what is wrong with her eyes.  Aksinya has been crying.  We realize, with Ekaterina's words, Aksinya has been crying since she woke.  Her eyes are filled with tears.  Natalya cried all the time, was she always sad?  Was she sad because of me?  Aksinya is really thinking for the first time about someone else and about her own effect on another person.

This is the first time Aksinya showed this kind of emotion.  She couldn't cry for her family.  She couldn't mourn them.  She couldn't cry for Ernst or for Natalya--not before.  Aksinya is so unaccustomed to emotions, she doesn't realize what is happening to her.  Notice, there is very little description in this scene.  You are experiencing almost 100% of the scene through conversation.  This piece ends with Ekaterina consoling the sad Aksinya.  Tomorrow, more of this interaction.