The Shepherd Who Set Sail Without Knowing Where He Was Going

It was the summer of 1492, though on those Atlantic islands summer never really ended. A Guanche goatherd — that was what the natives of those lands were called — tended his flock in absolute solitude. Gonzalo, as he was known, was not yet twenty and had barely spoken a word to any human being other than his mother.

His companions were the goats. He cared for them with a devotion that bordered on tenderness, and the few times he had felt another warm body against his own had been with one of them on the cold mountain nights. He knew no woman at all. Perhaps that was why he did not miss them: you do not long for what you have never had.

Each afternoon he would come down from the cliffs to bathe in a small pool at the foot of a narrow waterfall. The water was cold and clear, and the roar of the fall drowned out every other sound in the world. Then he would return with the flock and, at dusk, go back to the hut where he lived with his mother. His father had died of a fever when he was still a boy, and since then the routine had never changed: the goats, the milk, the mother who went down to the harbor to sell it.

He had never set foot in the harbor. Nothing beyond his mountains stirred the slightest curiosity in him.

Until that afternoon.

When he went down to his usual bathing place, he saw a figure in the water. At first he hid on instinct. Then, with the stealth of someone stalking something without knowing why, he moved through the brush until he was close enough to look without being seen.

He could make out only a back and a long soaked mane. The body stood motionless, and only the arms moved, lifting and lowering as water was poured over the head. It was the first time he had ever seen anyone at that pool. More than that, it was the first time he had seen anyone in those mountains who was not of his own blood.

Then the figure turned to come out.

Before his eyes appeared a beautiful face, the most beautiful he could remember ever having seen. And as the woman came toward the shore, he discovered more: two firm breasts, with dark, erect nipples pointing forward as if they meant to indicate a direction. Then the belly, smooth and perfect. And finally, the cunt, covered in thick black hair, hypnotic, which he could not stop staring at. He licked his lips without realizing it, imagining the smell of that wet flesh.

The woman finished climbing out of the water and lay down on the grass beside a bundle of cloth that must have been her clothes. She opened her legs slightly so the sun would dry her skin, and Gonzalo caught sight, between her thighs, of the lips of her cunt shining with water, parted, pink within.

Gonzalo realized that, without having decided to, his cock was not hard but rock hard. It throbbed inside his rough drawers, so swollen it hurt. No night with his goats had ever given him such an erection, and that scared him as much as it excited him. He took hold of the bulge and squeezed it through the cloth, and with that alone he nearly came right there.

He stayed hidden and trembling until the girl dressed and left the way she had come.

What had just happened was bewildering. What’s happened to me? he wondered, and had no one to ask. Only the goats, and from them he expected no answer.

***

The following afternoon he returned to the pool with the naïve hope of seeing her again. He hid in the same place and waited. The hours passed and no one appeared. He went back the next afternoon, and the next, always with the same result. He began to doubt whether it had really happened or if he had dreamed it during some siesta under the sun.

He had almost forgotten the whole thing when, one afternoon, while he was swimming naked in the center of the pool, he heard footsteps on the path.

It was her.

He had no time to get out of the water and hide, so he remained still, the water up to his chest. The girl approached the shore and looked at him without shame. She was fascinated by the boy’s wet blond hair and those shoulders carved by years of climbing cliffs after the goats.

Rather than leave, she began to undress slowly, never taking her eyes off him. When she was completely naked, she stepped into the water and came closer.

“Hello. My name is Catalina. And you?”

“Uh… Gonzalo.”

“And what are you doing here? I’d never seen anyone at this pool before.”

“I’m a shepherd. I come here almost every afternoon to bathe. And you?”

“I think it’s obvious,” she laughed. “I’m bathing.”

“I can see that. But no one ever comes here.”

“I arrived on the island two weeks ago. I’m the daughter of the Count of Almenara, lord of these lands. I found the pool one day when I went out for a walk and slipped away from the ladies.”

“I don’t know that count,” he said, shrugging. “I didn’t even know this island had an owner.”

Catalina laughed again and threw a handful of water in his face. Gonzalo went from surprise to counterattack, and so, almost without realizing it, a game began that brought them closer with every splash. They grabbed each other, tried to dunk one another, and amid the laughter their bodies ended up ever closer, slippery and cold on the surface, burning within. She felt, against her hip, something hard and thick moving of its own accord, and her eyes flew wide open. She lowered her hand beneath the water, curious, and closed it around the boy’s cock. Gonzalo jerked and moaned before he could stop himself.

“My God…” she murmured. “Get out of the water. I want to see you.”

After a while, she got out and lay down on the grass again.

“Gonzalo, come. Lie down beside me.”

The boy emerged from the water with an erection he could no longer hide. His cock pointed at his navel, thick, the glans swollen and purple, the veins standing out along the shaft. The girl’s mouth fell open when she saw the shepherd’s member. She had not seen too many naked men, but this far surpassed anything she had imagined.

He lay down. She never looked away.

“Why do you keep looking at me like that?”

“I’ve never seen anything like it. It’s enormous.”

“I suppose all men have it the same,” he replied, truly knowing nothing else.

“The same? Not even close. Can I touch it?”

“If you want, I don’t mind.”

Catalina closed her hand around that member and began to move it slowly, up and down. She had to spread her fingers wide to fit around it, and even then she could not close all the way around it. In a few seconds it was hard as the stone of the waterfall. With her other hand she stroked his balls, weighing them, tugging them gently, and felt how they tightened and pulled up against his body. From the hole in the glans oozed a thick drop that she smeared with her thumb across the crown, and thus slick and wet, her hand moved up and down more and more easily, making a damp sound that thundered in Gonzalo’s temples.

He felt his own cunt grow wet, and he did not care: all his senses were concentrated on what he held between his fingers. He was surprised to find himself squeezing his thighs, seeking friction against his own clit.

“It’s incredible,” she murmured. “It’s hot. And it’s beating.”

Gonzalo closed his eyes. His legs tensed, his belly clenched, and a thick jet shot out in a long arc over the grass. Then came a second, and a third, and another, landing on Catalina’s wrist, forearm, and one breast. Her eyes widened, but she did not stop her hand. And far from softening, the member remained as firm as before, still hard, still hungry, throbbing between her fingers slick with semen.

“It doesn’t go down…” she whispered, incredulous, a new smile on her lips.

She brought her semen-stained fingers to her mouth and slowly sucked them, watching him. She liked the taste: salty, dense, with a warm undertone that went straight down to her belly. Then she leaned in and took his cock into her mouth. The boy thought he had touched heaven. He felt a hot tongue tracing the whole glans, tight lips slowly sliding down over him, swallowing what they could. Catalina tried to take in as much as possible, but she barely managed a third of it; what would not fit in her mouth she worked with her hand, up and down in the same rhythm, leaving the cock shining with saliva. She moaned around him, and those vibrations made Gonzalo’s skin break out in gooseflesh from the nape of his neck to his heels.

She licked his balls one by one, carefully taking them into her mouth, and then went back up the shaft with her flat tongue, leaving no space untouched. She sucked hungrily, saliva dripping from her chin, looking up at him with wet eyes. A couple of minutes later he came again, this time into her mouth. He felt the spurts strike her palate one after another, hot and thick, and she swallowed every drop without letting a single one fall. Without stopping swallowing, she brought two fingers to her own cunt, pushed them in to the knuckle and, as she did so, had an orgasm she did not even try to hide: her back arched, she moaned with his cock still in her mouth, and clamped her thighs tight against her hand and her sex.

When she caught her breath, she sat up and began to dress. Her cheeks were red and her hair mussed.

“I have to go. My father will be missing me. Tomorrow?”

“I’ll be here, Catalina.”

***

The following afternoon they met again. First the bath, then the rest. This time there was not a trace of shyness. They came out of the water embracing, and he laid her on the grass. He kissed her mouth clumsily, learning, and then went down her neck to her breasts, which he sucked one by one, tugging at the nipples with his lips until she writhed. He kept going down her belly and did not stop until he buried his face between her legs. He had never done such a thing, but the smell of Catalina’s cunt drove him mad and he needed no teacher: he licked the way he licked salt from stones when he was thirsty, with brutish hunger, his whole tongue, from bottom to top, searching for the bulge of the clit she kept pushing against his mouth. He opened her with his thumbs, pushed his tongue in as far as he could, drew it back out and went up again to the hood. Catalina grabbed his blond mane and pressed his face against her sex until she came out shouting, her heels dug into the earth and her hips trembling.

Still panting, she shoved him by the shoulders to lay him on his back and climbed on top. She took his cock, placed it against the lips of her cunt, still throbbing, and lowered herself slowly, holding her breath. The head entered, stretching her flesh, and she closed her eyes and lowered another finger, and another, until she was impaled to the hilt. She felt completely full, so full she could hardly breathe. No part of her was left unoccupied; she could feel him inside her, striking a place she had never known existed.

“Holy God… you’re splitting me apart…” she gasped, and began to move.

At first slowly, rising only a handspan and lowering herself again, learning how to settle around that enormous cock. Then with more eagerness: she braced her hands on the boy’s chest and began to ride him, her breasts bouncing in front of his face, her ass slapping against his thighs with a wet sound. Gonzalo gripped her hips and helped her up and down, watching as his whole cock disappeared inside her again and again, shining with her juices each time it came out. Her orgasms came one after another without respite; she came moaning, and barely had one passed before the next began to mount.

He turned her over and put her on all fours on the grass. He spread her buttocks with both hands and thrust into her again in one hard push. Catalina gave a hoarse cry and arched her back. He started fucking her like that, hands on her waist, pulling her back as he drove forward. The sharp blows of his hips against her ass could be heard above the roar of the waterfall. Gonzalo seemed tireless; added to his size was a hardness that never once gave way. He grabbed her wet mane, tugged gently, and the girl came again, spilling down her thighs, squeezing her cunt around his cock until she milked it dry.

Even so he did not come. He laid her back on her spine, put her legs over his shoulders and penetrated her to the hilt, folding her in half, looking into her eyes as he split her open. He drove deep, unhurried, with the full weight of his body, and Catalina watched her own belly bulge with every thrust. She scratched his back, bit his neck, begged for more between moans:

“More… like that… don’t stop, come inside me, I want to feel it…”

Gonzalo held on as long as he could, and when he could bear it no more he unloaded in the depths of her cunt with a roar, shot after shot, pressing her hips against his so not a drop could escape. She felt the heat flooding her from within and came again, one last time, clinging to his back.

They sought each other out without rest and only stopped when it was time to return. Day after day they went back to the pool, and day after day they gave themselves to each other as if the world were going to end at dusk. They fucked in the water, against the stone of the waterfall, on the grass, with her sucking him until he was empty and he eating her cunt until she was voiceless. The shepherd’s cock never rested: as soon as he came once, it was hard again, ready to go back in.

A couple of weeks later, the Count of Almenara began to grow uneasy. His daughter went out every afternoon without explanation, and her appearance had changed: her cheeks were flushed, her eyes bright, and there was a new thinness about her he did not know how to interpret. He ordered one of his knights to follow her unseen and report everything.

At dusk, the knight returned with his head bowed.

“My lord, young Catalina meets every afternoon with an islander at a pool not far away. They bathe naked and then… fuck like beasts, with no shame at all. The savage mounts her in every possible way and she screams with pleasure, my lord.”

The count flew into a rage. He ordered that the next day they go out hunting for the shepherd and bring him to his presence in chains.

***

That afternoon, Gonzalo sensed that something was wrong. Catalina did not appear, and instead he noticed strange movement in the brush. The instinct of someone raised among cliffs put him on alert before he understood why.

The soldiers burst out suddenly, running toward him with swords raised and shouting for him to surrender. The boy had enough reflexes to leap twice and scramble onto a large rock behind him.

“Quick, seize him!”

But Gonzalo knew every stone in those mountains. With the agility of a mountain goat he slipped uphill and vanished among the rocks before anyone could reach him.

When they reported his escape, the count clenched his fists.

“Damn it. Tomorrow you take more men. And if you have to search this whole island inch by inch, you do it. I want him alive or dead.”

They tried for days. The shepherd always saw them coming and never let himself be seen. Unable to catch him, the count made another decision: he would send Catalina back to the mainland on the first ship that sailed, far from that savage. There would be time to hunt him later.

The young woman’s protests were useless. She was going back to Castile. But she was determined to say goodbye to her beloved no matter what it cost.

***

The eve of her departure she managed to slip away. She did not know whether she would find him, but she was certain that he would see her. And so it was: Gonzalo was the one who stepped into her path around a bend in the road.

He dragged her behind some rocks and there, without a word, kissed her desperately. He lifted her skirt, tore off her underclothes in one pull and buried his fingers in her cunt. Catalina spread her legs against the stone and unfastened his drawers. She took out his hard cock and slid it inside herself. They fucked standing up, fast, biting their lips so as not to cry out, knowing it would be the last time for a long while. He lifted her from the ground, her legs tight around his waist, and drove her against the rock until he came inside her for the last time. She came with him, her mouth pressed to his neck to muffle her cry.

When they parted, her eyes were wet.

“They’re sending me back to Seville,” she told him.

“I don’t want you to go.”

“I don’t want to go either. But they won’t let me choose.”

“Then I’m going with you.”

“You can’t come on my ship. They’ll be waiting to arrest you. But you can sail on another one later and join me.”

“And how do I know which ship to take?”

“That doesn’t matter,” she said, taking his hands. “Any ship leaving here is bound for Cádiz or Huelva. This is the end of the world, Gonzalo. Once you’re on the mainland, look for the palace of the Count of Almenara, in Seville. I’ll be there.”

“Are you saying any ship will take me?”

“Any of them. There’s nowhere else to go from here. I have to leave now. I love you.”

“I love you, Catalina. I’ll see you in Seville.”

She boarded at dawn the next day. Gonzalo waited a whole week, until he believed the watch had relaxed, and then for the first time in his life he went down to the harbor.

***

The harbor was a boiling mass of sailors, bundles, and voices he did not understand. He asked for the first ship that was about to depart. They pointed out three vessels preparing to weigh anchor.

He took advantage of the back-and-forth of the men loading merchandise to slip aboard one of them. He hid beneath some tarps, in a corner of the deck, and through a hole in the canvas watched the bustle. On the pilot house he managed to read the name of the vessel: Carabela María Galante.

He thought of Catalina. He thought of Seville, of a palace he could not imagine, of a life beside her that he scarcely dared dream of. For the first time, the end of the world did not seem so terrible.

An hour later, a voice cracked across the deck like a whip.

“You still haven’t changed the name! Do it now!”

Some sailors came over with boards and tools. They ripped off the sign that said María Galante and nailed another in its place. From his hiding place, Gonzalo painstakingly spelled out the new letters: La Santa María.

Fifteen minutes later, another voice, forceful and solemn, rose above the murmur of the harbor.

“Admiral, we’re ready!”

“Good. Cast off the lines,” the man replied. “The immense ocean and the Indies await us. The Virgin and the Catholic Monarchs protect us.”

And beneath the tarps, dreaming of Seville, the shepherd who had never left his island set sail, without knowing it, for the other end of the world.