title: Hallucinations: or, The Ill-Fated Peregrinations of Fray Servando
author:  Reinaldo Arenas 
description: In the brilliant tradition of <i>Don Quixote</i> and <i>Candide</i>, <i>Hallucinations</i> is a modern masterpiece of Latin American fiction. Fray Servando-priest, blasphemer, dueler of monsters, irresistible lover, misunderstood prophet, prisoner, and consummate escape artist-wanders among the vice-ridden populations of eighteenth-century Europe and the Americas, fleeing dungeons, a marriage-minded female, a slaveship captain, and the Inquisition. Whether by burro, by boat, or by the back of a whale, Fray Servando's journey is at once funny and romantic, melancholy and profound-a tale rooted in history, yet outrageously hallucinatory. <br /><br /> "An impenitent amalgam of truth and invention, historical fact and outrageous make-believe. . . . A philosophical black comedy." (<i>The New York Times</i>)
zlib_text: 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  I’ll meet you there.
  
  
  
  
  
  —Rumi
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Chapter Eight
  
  
  
  
  
  “I’d like to see him,” I said, folding my hands primly in my lap.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Why?” The magus gave me a hard stare. He’d aged in the four years I’d known
  him. His brown hair was now streaked with grey and faint lines creased the
  corners of his mouth. That’s what happened when a person was no longer bonded.
  I still didn’t know why he hadn’t taken another daēva, or how the first one
  had died, and I doubted he would ever tell me.
  
  
  
  
  
  “Because I have a block, and the only way I can break through it is by
  practicing with Darius,” I said. “I told you about it, remember?”
  
  
  
  
  
  He grunted. “One hour a day. After evening chores.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Thank you.” I jumped to my feet and was almost at the door when the magus
  spoke.
  
  
  
  
  
  “You feel his emotions very strongly, don’t you?”
  
  
  
  
  
  I froze. “Sometimes.”
  
  
  
  
  
  “Not all do. Some feel nothing at all, only the power. It’s