The last sheet from the Stella's diary.
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They took off my shoes and dress and walked away a few steps to look at and divide the loot. The others took a hammer and nails and my heart froze. I couldn't say a word with terror.
The soldiers and executioners stood behind me and talked about something as if I wasn't there at all, and I stood facing the crowd and didn't know where to hide. Because there was no way or place to hide. Tied up and naked, and guarded by armed legionnaires, I had no way to escape nor to shield my shame from the eyes of the crowd.
Finally they approached me, cut the bonds and threw me on the cross, immediately began to nail my right hand. I thought I would go mad with pain, I screamed desperately, kicking my legs and grabbed my right wrist with my left hand, wet with blood, clenching my fingers. As soon as they finished, they pulled my hand away and drove a nail into the other wrist. Pain shot through me, from one wound to the other, through the entire length of my arms and chest, taking my breath away. Even my nipples ached. I arched my back, spreading my legs unconsciously. And when I regained my self control, I felt that the cross was lifted up and I was hanging on the wounds of my arms. Soon I was again torn apart by pain, unable to even scream, I was only crying like a little girl.
*
Because in reality I was a little girl. I was already an adult in my year, but I was still a maiden and a virgin. Still living with my parents in the cottage and helping around the farm as before, I did not feel this adulthood at all, and above my bed in the room there were still two rag dolls sitting on a shelf, which I sometimes still liked to cuddle secretly in the evening. It is true that I was soon to start cuddling my husband, because two boys my age started to come to my parents to court, one from our village, the other from a neighboring hamlet. I liked them both and they fought for my hand in advance, but nothing had been decided yet.
But the day my father's cart, driven carelessly, ran over the daughter of the salt mine owner, everything ended. Despite the doctors' help, the girl died soon after, and the salt mine owner demanded compensation. My father wanted to sell and liquidate all his property to pay compensation for the involuntary wrong, but the rich man demanded that the ancient law of "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth" be fulfilled. And that my father could only pay for the death of his daughter with the death of his daughter.
That is, my death.
Our last hope was the judge. Although the judge usually sided with the rich and made sure that the verdicts were in their interest, I hoped that he might take pity on me.
But the judge agreed with him and without batting an eye, sentenced me to death, even though I had done nothing wrong.
And to the most terrible and monstrous death penalty - by crucifixion...!
*
The executioners drove nails into my ankles, nailing my feet to either side of the pole, and stepped back so the crowd of onlookers could get closer.
Through my watery eyes I couldn't see clearly at first, but then I realized that in the first row, right in front of me were Marcus and Valerius, the boys who had been trying to win my hand. Both of them had their brows furrowed, but while Marcus lowered his gaze, gnashing his teeth, angry that such a girl had been stolen from under his nose, Valerius, already reconciled with it, stared narrowly at my nakedness, taking advantage of what he was allowed. Seeing this, I tried to squeeze my knees together to hide my vulva from his sight, but my feet nailed to both sides of the pole made this task very painful and impossible to maintain for more than a minute or so.
The boys were silent, but from behind them I could hear laughter and loud whispers. In the second row, right behind them, stood my friends and colleagues. My peers, with whom I had played with my dolls a few years ago. Some of them looked at me with horror and disgust, others with indifference and amusement, and Marcus's older sister, our neighbor, with contempt and hatred. Seeing me looking at her, she spat at my feet and showed me the middle finger. Seeing this, Anna and Diana, my best friends and playmates, laughed and repeated the insulting gesture, sticking out their tongues at me. I burst into tears and turned my head away, and then many more people in the further rows laughed, including my aunt Lunulla, who had never liked me, and her daughter Altea, as well as our neighbors.
I felt a hand touch my buttock - the legionnaire guarding me approached me and, leaning out from behind my knees, looked up, moving his gaze over my vulva and belly, to my breasts and face.
"You're already bawling? Wait, it'll really start hurting in a few hours!" he said contemptuously. "And enjoy the attention, because by evening there's not much to see of you!"
He grinned and patted my butt before returning to his seat.
The soldier was right, now sweaty and snotty, with disheveled hair and caked with blood flowing from wounds, around which swarms of flies were starting to circle, I stopped looking like a teenager and more like carrion hanging from a tree.
I opened my eyes and noticed that my suitors and my friends had already left. Most of the other villagers had also returned to their daily work in the fields. They couldn't spend the whole day on the show, with cows lowing hungry and thirsty. Now, the main crowd at the foot of the cross was the townspeople from nearby Antium, who had more free time, and at their front stood the priests from the temples of Apollo and Minerva and the city officials. The mayor nodded and said loudly: "There must be justice!"
Hanging on my hands, I began to choke. I also didn't have the strength to squeeze my thighs any longer. I lifted myself up, and my knees spread. I heard shouts of encouragement and applause from the crowd, as if I were a stripper performing her show. The mayor exclaimed: "What a whore!" after which he too spat at my feet.
"When she dies, throw her into the river as food for the eels!" he added, and turned towards the descent from the hill to the city.
I fell down helplessly, hanging on my hands, aching, suffering and humiliated, not even having the strength to look at who was coming up to my cross next and what they were saying. I could only hear their laughter and mockery, and once again I felt terribly sad that I had to die and I started crying again. But after a moment, more jolts of pain shot through my body, and with a cry I lifted myself up, thrusting my hips. A stone, thrown by one of the women, hit me in the crotch. There was applause and a few more stones hit me in the lower abdomen, but I didn't care anymore.
Cursed by people and gods, I had only an ocean of suffering and no future before me. Not even a funeral awaited me. I slid down again, scraping my back and buttocks against the rough wood of the post, and hung helplessly, tilting my head to the side. Another stone, smaller but angular, hit me in the face, cutting my lips. I groaned quietly, not having the strength to move. But that was only until the pain in my wrists became so excruciating that I could not bear it in any way.
And then there was only pain, then terrible pain, then indescribable pain, and then suffering so terrifying that I thought I should die from it on the spot. But I could not die, so the suffering went from terrifying to monstrous, and then I thought nothing, and only suffered and suffered for many long, slowly passing hours, until I stopped thinking and feeling, and finally breathing.
And then there was nothing, only a feast for eels.