West Africa, 1752.
A colonial governor, a man of power and order, feels his legacy crumble within his own walls. It is not war, rebellion, or politics that shatters him, but his own daughter and a black man he was taught to see as beneath him. Their story unfolds through forbidden letters and whispered confessions, each word peeling away the illusion of his authority. Night by night, moan by moan, they ruin him--tearing down not just his family, but the very foundations of the world he once believed unshakable.
Gold Coast Colony, May 7, 1752
Most Esteemed and Honoured Mother,
From this wretched colony on the Gold Coast, where the jungle breathes hot and heavy and the very earth hums with voices not our own, I write with hands that tremble--not from fever, nor toil, but from the weight of what I have done. Papa's house stands high above the slave pens, the air thick with spice and sweat, with the scent of molasses and something darker, something forbidden.
I have crossed the line no woman must cross. I have lain where I should not, with one whose very existence makes my sin unthinkable. The weight of it crushes me, yet even now, my heart betrays me, for though I drown in disgrace, I cannot say I regret the drowning.
Papa has always spoken of them in hushed tones, with disdain curling his lip, with warnings that hung heavy in the air like the scent of burning tallow. Beasts, he called them. Savages. Creatures not meant to stand among us, but to serve, to labour, to be driven by command and whip. And yet, Mother--oh, how cruel a jest Heaven plays upon me--I have learned the truth of the beast, and it was not in chains that I found him, but in the shadows of my own desire.
He came in the dead hush of midnight, when virtue sleeps and sin prowls. Papa lay but a wall away, oblivious, safe in his slumber, while the very thing he feared, the very thing he named beast, slipped into my chamber--silent, certain, unstoppable. And, oh, Mother, I let him in. I did not stop him. I did not even breathe a word to send him away.
Was it fear that paralyzed me? Was it wickedness that warmed my skin before he even touched me? I do not know, and I am terrified to ask. When he reached me, I did not resist. My body had already betrayed me before his hands even found their place. They were rough, calloused, shaped by labour unknown to men of our kind. His skin, dark as the midnight sky, burned against mine, and I, in my folly, burned for more. I should have fought. I should have wept. Instead, I opened myself as if I had never known virtue, as if I had been born for this singular moment of wicked rapture.
He took me--took all that was left of my innocence, if innocence was ever truly mine to claim. Not as the fumbling boys of our rank would, with hesitation and apology, but as one who knew his right, who knew his power, who knew that, in that moment, I was his and his alone. There was no gentleness, no soft murmurings of love. Only heat, only hunger, only the breaking of a girl who thought herself untouchable.
Is it not the blackest sin of all, Mother? To find not suffering, not disgrace, but something deeper--something primal, something that trembles even now beneath my very skin? When his weight pressed me down, when his heat consumed me, when his breath--hot and slow--brushed against my ear, I did not think of heaven. I did not think of shame. I thought only of the beast and of the ruin he wrought upon me.
And, God help me, I wanted it.
I should have felt defiled. I should have recoiled, wept, begged for mercy. But I did not. When it was over, when my body lay spent and trembling beneath his, I did not feel broken. I felt alive. As if I had been blind all my life and now, in my disgrace, I could finally see.
But see what, Mother? That I am wicked? That I have fallen so low that no priest's words can cleanse me? That Papa's beast has left his mark upon me, not just upon my body, but upon my very soul?
Do not tell me that I was helpless. For the truest sin is not that he took me. It is that, even now, I wish he would take me again.
Thy most wretched and ruined daughter,
Geneviève
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Gold Coast Colony, May 26, 1752
Most Esteemed and Honoured Mother,
I do not know how to write these words, nor do I know if thou canst bear to read them. My hands shake, my breath is shallow, and yet the weight in my belly is heavier than any sin I have ever known. I write not to beg for forgiveness, for what use is pardon when the stain cannot be washed away? I write because I am afraid--afraid of what stirs within me, afraid of what I have become.
Mother, I feel it. I know it. It is inside me. It moves, it works, it grows. I do not know how, but I know. His seed did not simply flood me--it took. It has rooted. My own flesh, my own cursed womb, has betrayed me.
I should not know so soon, and yet--how could I not? My body is not my own. My veins burn with something foreign, something monstrous. I wake in the night slick with sweat, my skin fevered, my limbs trembling, and I know it is not from shame alone. My belly is not yet round, but I feel it. It pulses within me like a second heartbeat, a rhythm that is not mine, that never should have been mine.
Mother, I am unclean. I am ruined. And worse still--I have damned Papa's bloodline. His lineage, his proud, noble name, the years upon years of purity he so jealously guarded--all for nothing. For I have taken his greatest fear into my flesh and made it my own. And should this thing be born--should I bear it forth into the world--then Papa's own grandchild shall be nothing more than the very thing he despises. One of them. A wretched, cursed creature whose very existence is a mockery of everything he holds dear.
What shall I do, Mother? What can I do? I have prayed, but God does not listen. How could he, when I have sunk so low? I have pleaded with the heavens to undo what has been done, to take this horror from my womb before it is too late--but the nights pass, and still, it remains.
I am afraid, Mother. I am afraid of what is to come, afraid of what I will become, afraid of the thing that stirs inside me. But most of all--God have mercy on my soul--I am afraid of how much I want it. How, even now, my body does not fight it. How, deep beneath my terror, there is something else, something darker, something that whispers that this was meant to be, that it is right.
Tell me, Mother, what must I do? Tell me that thou wilt not forsake me, even when I have forsaken myself.
Thy most wretched and trembling daughter,
Geneviève
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Paris, the 8th of June, 1752
My Dearest Geneviève,
So the beast has taken you. Has filled you, pumped his seed deep into your belly, left you writhing and trembling with something you dare not name.
Tell me, Geneviève, how many times did he empty himself into you? Did he stop at once? Twice? Or did he not stop at all, using you until you were too weak to resist, too ruined to be anything but his? Did he claim you like an animal--grunting, ruthless, unstoppable? Or did he make you want it, make you need it? Did you hold him to you, legs locked, hips lifting, taking every drop of what he gave?
And Papa. He heard nothing? Not the sound of you gasping, moaning, opening for him? Not the bed creaking, not your breath breaking, not the wet, sinful sounds of your ruin? How deep did he have to be before you lost yourself? Before your voice failed you? Before shame melted into hunger?
God help me, but I need to know. Every detail, every breath, every moment where you knew you had crossed into the abyss and still begged for more.
