Sister Doroteia's Fist

November 1, 2025. Lisbon.

Rodrigo Pereira was coughing. Why was his throat so tight? He sat in a corner of the bookstore cafe speaking to his girlfriend.

“Are you okay?” She asked. “Your face looks puffy and red.”

“Of course I’m okay. Did you hear me?”

“You think we should see other people.”

“I have come to that realization, yes.” He gulped air. It didn’t help.

“Why? Have you found somebody else?”

“I may have. My life is my own.” The room felt stuffy. The air stale.

“Does this have to do with your `project`?”

“You say it with such disdain. Yes, I want to open a museum across the street, at the site of Dom Afonso de Almeida Pereira’s home. My ancestor.” He couldn’t give the proud words their proper gravitas, his throat felt too much friction to go beyond a reedy whisper.

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine enough,” he rasped and smiled the way he did when he said he liked her cooking.

His girlfriend held up the book she had been flipping through. “I wouldn’t be too sure about glorifying this guy. Do you know what the nobility were up to back in the 1700s? They were pretty corrupt.”

He sucked in a deep breath. “There is nothing bad written about Dom Afonso. He was — “ He paused to cough. What happened to the air? “—he was a beloved patron of the convent that used to be half kilometer down the road. He was practically a saint.”

She ignored him. “According to this, some 18th century `patrons’ of convents received more than moral edification.”

“What are you talking about?” he rasped.

She read, with melodrama: “`The monks and nuns live in the most scandalous libertinism. The nuns’ parlors are always full. They have an air of indecency and a backstage tone like that of the actresses in France.’”

His vision felt constricted. He blinked a few times.

She pointed to a painted image of a richly dressed woman who looked like a cross between the Virgin and 18th century Portuguese royalty. “The most famous nun was Paula of Ovidela. She caught the eye of King João V, and then soon after she was pregnant. Then she was promoted to Mother Superior.”

Rodrigo wasn’t listening. He got up. His lungs felt fire. Each breath sparked points of light in his vision. He got up and paced with one hand in front of his mouth, the other running through his wavy black hair.

Then he collapsed.

After the crowd, the police. And the questions.

Was it a fatal disease? No, he didn’t have a virus. He didn’t have the plague.

Cardiac arrest? No, his heart was in good condition.

Poison? That was closer to what the final medical diagnosis was.

Apparently there was mold in the foundation of the building, which before the Great Earthquake formed the estate of Duke Lucas de Carvalho. Specific individuals could be susceptible to the mold and in some cases suffer anaphylactic shock and die.

Later, the bookstore owners broke the floor to clear out the mold and found two skeletons. A man with the back of his skull crushed. A woman.

November 1. 1755. Lisbon

Just after midnight on the morning of the Feast of All Saints, Mother Superior Abbess Beatriz knocked on the door of Afonso de Almeida Pereira, a landowner and patron of her convent.

She was shown into his sitting room, a book-lined sanctuary with a lush animal-skin rug and a crackling hearth. Two comfortable chairs were half-facing the fire. Dom Afonso was sitting in one of them sipping port wine. He rose when she entered and bowed.

She said, “Dom Afonso, it pleases me to find you still awake. I suppose I am lucky that you dine so late.”

He smiled warmly, his lustrous black hair and beard dancing in the firelight. “Mother Beatriz, you are always welcome here. Yes, I conduct research that often takes me past normal waking hours. Come, sit. How can I help you?”

He poured her a glass of port.

She was loathe to begin. “I come to you with a most disturbing matter.”

He looked in her eyes and took a slow deep breath. She felt herself doing the same. “Please, you are safe here,” he said. “Unburden yourself.”

She suppressed a shiver. “My heart stops when I imagine it. A body hanging by a rope from one of Dom Lucas’s olive trees.”

The lands of Dom Afonso and Dom Lucas abutted the walls of the convent.

“A body? Whose?”

“Poor young Sister Doroteia. Only days ago she had taken her novitiate vows.”

Afonso swallowed some port. “On Dom Lucas’s land, you say? What connection could she have with him?”

“You can guess.” They had spoken before of Dom Lucas’s appetites. Mother Beatriz was forced to tolerate him because of the lavish gifts he bestowed on the convent, but he had on more than one occasion violated the sanctity and chastity of her nuns.

Dom Afonso smoothed his long black hair. “Take me to the body.”

Dom Afonso enjoyed a reputation as a man who could see through appearances to the truth beyond. People still spoke in wonder of how he had once recovered the King’s Brazilian gold when the coach carrying it mysteriously disappeared. He was also quite handsome. For these reasons he was always welcome at the convent.

On news of his arrival, a small crowd of nuns gathered in the cloister. He strode across the courtyard in leather boots, black beard thrust forward, led by the Mother Superior.

Sister Doroteia’s body lay on a stone table in the cold kitchen. The fire had been doused hours before. The cook was folding bread for the upcoming Feast of All Saints, but Mother Beatriz dismissed her.

Afonso examined the body. The novice’s veil was torn off, and her dark hair had loosened, falling around her shoulders. He checked the skirts of her habit, noting that her undergarments had been removed. The skirts were splashed with clay, of the sort found on the moors that border the convent and the lands of Dom Lucas and Dom Afonso. One of the girl’s fists was tightly clenched. Three strands of black hair, which Dom Afonso said were likely her own, were locked in her grip.

“Often when victimized, a woman will tear out her hair,” he said.

“She was assaulted by Dom Lucas?” Mother Beatriz asked.

“That is how it appears.”

The day’s monastic prayers began with Matins at 3 am, followed by Lauds at dawn and six more prayer sessions over the course of the day. Mother Beatriz would get no sleep.

She arrived at Dom Lucas’s property at 9 am and waited for Dom Afonso. The olive trees along the path to the front door had not been cared for. They twisted uncomfortably away from his extensive palácio, as if shunning the horrors within. Sister Doroteia had been found hanging from a tree like one of these in the orchards to the West, bordering Dom Afonso’s land.

The crescent moon watched Beatriz’ shadow shorten as the sun rose. Her patience shrunk with her shadow. She would enter the bear’s den alone and let Dom Afonso follow when he was able.

Dom Lucas was at breakfast. He sat alone at one end of a long table with a platter of food in front of him. Boiled eggs, breads, meats, cheeses. And pastries of all sorts. Beatriz glimpsed swirled cinnamon rolls and lightly caramelized custard, both originating from the kitchens of her convent. A bottle of Madeira sat uncorked next to his cup.

Where Dom Afonso was a sleek wolf with aquiline nose and high cheeks, Dom Lucas was a round-faced lumbering bear. Where Dom Afonso had thick black hair that rippled smoothly like the Tagus at midnight, Dom Lucas’s light brown wisps had forsaken his freckled crown and fell in grungy strands from his temples.

The room was long and cold. The fireplace behind Dom Lucas may have warmed his back, but the heat failed to reach Mother Beatriz as she entered. The fiery flicker traced his bulk with a satanic light. A walking stick was hanging by a hook on the wall next to the mantel. She recalled news of a riding accident a few days before.

“Mother Beatriz. Welcome. Sit.” He smiled blandly and tilted his head back in a partial nod, but did not get up.

He instructed a servant to bring water.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” he asked.

She moved to a seat halfway along the table, but remained standing. “We found Sister Doroteia,” she said, unable to contain a hint of venom.

“You found her? Had she been lost?”

“She was hanging from one of your olive trees. Violated and murdered,” she said acidly.

“This is sad news,” he said while chewing, with a voice he might have used to lament the loss of a shoe.

“She was found on your land.”

“Yes, I heard you say that. What would you have me do?”

“This is a crime.”

“Certainly.”

“I have come to accuse you.” She held her breath.

The skin of his face turned pink. He snorted. Filled his mouth with a pastel de nata. “I am incapable of such a deed.”

“Incapable? You have on more than one occasion…used my nuns.” Only now, faced with his gluttonous degeneracy, did she fathom how appalling that experience must have been for them.

“And you allowed it. You have been my lieutenant in these pursuits.” He smiled smugly.

Was the villain correct? His corruption was on the surface for all to see. But that did not mean her nun’s habit did not also hide a stain on her own soul.

“For the good of the order, I have…sacrificed.” She raised her head, defying him to disagree.

He smirked through crumbs. “I thank you for your sacrifice. I have had a most delectable time.”

“You are a monster!”

“Quite certainly. And you have fed me,” he said before poking a lump of bread between his lips. “But I don’t believe I have had the pleasure of Sister Doroteia’s company. Was she quite beautiful? Before she was killed, that is.” He laughed and rinsed his mouth with wine.

Beatriz had begun to finger the handle of a meat cleaver she had hidden in her vestments. Her face became hot. Her arms trembled. “You will burn,” she said.

He showed teeth. “Indeed. As will you.”

Before she knew what she was doing she had crossed the room and was standing beside him, clenching the knife tightly beneath the fabric.

He pushed his chair back with his arms and turned to her. There was something not right with his legs. They hung limp and his breeches appeared damp.

“Are you coming to seek absolution? If I were a priest you would need to get on your knees.” He grinned.

She dove onto him, knife in hand.

But he pulled her towards him laughing, as if welcoming a lover. She felt his stubbled face smash hers and was trapped by the strength of his limbs against his pillowed bulk. Her arms splayed out. His hug was too powerful to get leverage to swing the knife. Smelling wine and cheese and something rotten, she struggled to pull away.

Her feet slipped on something wet coating the floor beneath his chair. A putrid smell assaulted her nostrils and she gagged. Dom Lucas continued to hold her, chuckling, steaming breath onto her face, a rabid dog enjoying deranged entertainment.

At that moment, the floor began to shake. She thought perhaps a parade of coaches was passing, but there was no road close to the house. It was an unnatural feeling, as if the Lord himself were expressing anger with his sinful flock. The entire house vibrated. Windows rattled, the door to the room swung, the heavy chandelier hanging over the table danced in frightening jerks.

Dom Lucas seemed not to notice. He was Satan incarnate, welcoming the end of the world.

Beatriz didn’t have the strength to persist against him. The horror of Doroteia’s violated body, Beatriz’ sleepless night, the self-disgust at her crime against her innocent charges, all weighed her soul. Perhaps this was the penance she deserved. She leaned forward, as if accepting his embrace.

“Yes. Receive my… blessing.” He laughed at his own jest. He raised his hand to her head, pulling her lips towards his cavernous mouth. This deprived the hug of its force on that side. It also exposed his flank.

She bent her arm and jerked the knife into his side. He shouted in pain and released her.

The shuddering earth became more vehement. A portion of the floor behind him cracked and tore open, creating a hole as large as a person.

Before he could again reach for her, Beatriz backed away uncertainly on the trembling floor . She grabbed his walking stick from its hook.

Dom Lucas now was aware of the world. For the first time he seemed frightened. He pushed his arms against the chair, trying to stand, but couldn’t.

The putrid smell. His riding accident.

He reached towards Beatriz. “Give me the stick!” he commanded.

“You want this?” she asked. She felt a sudden disinterest in the collapsing world around her. Only the gnarled wooden shaft made any sense.

“Yes, quickly!”

She held the walking stick out to his supplicating hand. He reached greedily.

Then she aimed it higher. Running towards him, she thrust the staff into his sternum. She pressed forwards until he and his chair toppled into the newly formed chasm.

Looking down into the hole, she saw Dom Lucas’s face. Dark liquid pooled around his stringy hair. The world’s shaking animated his head, but his bulging eyes held no life.

He needed a stick to walk. He must have damaged his legs irreparably.

I am incapable of such a deed.

Dom Lucas was not Sister Doroteia’s attacker.

This was armageddon, but instead of preparing to meet her final judgement Beatriz thought of the black hairs in Sister Doroteia’s fist. Why would the girl pull out her own hair?

And why had Dom Afonso never arrived?

A portion of the ceiling fell on top of Beatriz and she lost consciousness.

Some time later she was awakened by a rush of water. She thought of Dom Afonso’s black wavy hair, like the Tagus at midnight. The Tagus, whose overflowing banks now flooded her lungs and brought realization of Sister Doroteia’s actual tormentor. With her last awareness, she cursed him and his descendants.