Isle of Glass (23 page)

“The stable,” Reynaud said. “Their speech—”

“Devilish mockery, you said yourself,” she broke in. “You
can’t have it both ways, jackal. If our little Brother, our beardless boy, is
the greatest of your theologians, then surely he must be of our blood, for the
book he wrote is twice as old as his face. But that can’t be possible, can it?
You didn’t hear what you thought you heard, what you wanted to hear in your
lust for his death.”

“Witch!” he hissed.

“I madden you. You can’t bear it that I should want him and
not you. If I promised to take you, you would do everything in your power to
have me set free. You’d even promise to free him—but that would be a lie.”

Beneath the livid marks of her nails, his face was a mask of
fury. “Demon! Tempter!”

“But not a liar,” she said. “It’s you who lie. You want him
to die, for your own glory and for the King’s grief. You haven't deigned to
mention all the accomplices who must have known what our Brother was, raised
him and trained him and made a monk of him—they’re too many and too far away,
and much too powerful. You haven’t even called Master Jehan to account for his
guilt, though in your tale he’s as much at fault as the rest of us, for he
doesn’t matter to you and he has kin who could avenge him. The King’s kin are
his enemies and urge you on, and the little Brother has none.”

Adam stepped between them. “We do not act at the bidding of
any temporal power. Our part is to search out and destroy the enemies of the
Church; here in this court we judge by that Law which commands, ‘There shall
not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass
through the fire, or that useth divination, or is an observer of times, or an
enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a consulter of familiar spirits, or a
wizard, or a necromancer. For all that do these things are an abomination unto
the Lord.’ And in speaking of punishment, the Law is most simple and most
strict: ‘Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.’ ”

There was a silence. Thea seemed at last to have understood
what she had confessed. A tremor ran through her body; she drew back a step,
shying as her guard raised his knife. She stopped and stood very still.
“Brother Alfred is not a sorcerer. If anyone is to die, it must be I, though
life on this earth is very sweet, and since they tell me I have no soul, Heaven
is barred to me.”

“Hell will take you gladly,” Reynaud muttered.

She hissed at him. “The Dark Lord is my bitter enemy, as he
is of all my people. We’ve thwarted him too often and too thoroughly. But you
he would welcome with open arms.”

She turned to the Bishop. “This is not a trial. This is a
gathering of the King’s enemies to destroy the one thing he cares for. That
one”—she indicated Adam with a toss of her head- “believes in what he does,
which is all the worse for him. But the rest of you would kneel to a crucifix,
and then spit on it.” Through gasps of horror and cries to seize her and cast
her down, she laughed without mirth. “Ah, you mortal men! The truth sears you like
cold iron. Shall I strike you again? You’ll burn the little Brother. The stake
is ready; you have only to tie him to it and light the fire. And then the King
will come. What then, Lord Bishop? While you kept to the abbey and plotted in
secret, he suffered you. But now you declare open enmity.”

“He will not touch a man of God,” Adam said. “He dares not.”

Again she laughed, freely now, almost joyously. “Don’t be a
fool. He’ll tear down this abbey stone by stone and drive you Hounds into the
sea, and rend yon puppet of a Bishop limb from limb and cast him to the dogs.”

“Interdict—anathema—”

“You’re babbling, pious Brother. Ask Bishop Aylmer if Anglia
or its King will suffer for vengeance taken upon traitors.”

“
Silence!”
Bishop Foulques was on his feet, quivering
with passion. “The trial will resume. And I will hear no further word from you,
witch; or as God is my witness, I will cast you out.”

“My lord Bishop,” Adam said soothingly, “she will not speak
again. We, for our part, have presented our case. We contend that the prisoner
is guilty as charged, and we submit him to your judgment.”

For a long while, Bishop Foulques did not respond. He had
mastered himself; his face had returned from livid wrath to its former pallor.
He seemed deep in thought, frowning, shooting swift glances at Alf, at Thea, at
Aylmer: glances compounded of hatred and cold terror. Slowly, repeatedly, his
thumb traced the intricate carving of his crozier.

When at last he spoke, it was to no one and to everyone, in
a firm voice. “I have heard both attack and defense. I have reached a
conclusion.”

He paused. Jehan found that he could not breathe. Alf was
absolutely still, death-pale; Thea had turned toward him, holding him fast with
her burning gaze.

The Bishop resumed. “No one has denied that witchcraft has
been practiced in and about this city and the King. The doubt seems to lie in
the identity of its practitioner. Either it is a woman of unknown origins and
overweening arrogance and a flagrant disregard of the dignity of the Church, its
court, and its Scriptures; or it is a monk in the habit of the holy Order of
St. Jerome, an ordained priest and an acknowledged favorite of His Majesty the
King.” Again he paused. Most of those there listened in puzzlement. But Adam’s
face had paled and Reynaud’s gone livid. “The charges are grave. The penalty,
as Brother Adam has informed us, is death.”

Alf tore his gaze from Thea’s and turned toward the Bishop.

Foulques raised his voice slightly. “It is my belief that
both the accused and the woman are guilty of witchcraft, of sorcery, and of
black enchantment. Yet in view of the evidence, it is also my belief that the
guilt is not evenly apportioned. The prisoner has not confessed to his crimes,
but has denied them; the woman...” He steadied himself with a visible effort.
“The woman has admitted her guilt freely, insolently, and most unrepentantly.
She also denies that the other shares that guilt; of this I am not convinced.
In my judgment, she was the instigator, he the accomplice; she the cause, he
the sharer of their sorceries.

“Therefore,” Foulques proclaimed, “I sentence them both.
You,” he said to Alf, avoiding the pale stare, “as a priest of God, have sinned
most grievously. Yet you are young, of an age when the beauty of a woman may
overcome the strength of your vows; the passion of your blood has tempted you
to do what is most direly forbidden. You have not fallen wholly, as this woman
has testified; yet for your transgressions you must pay the due and proper
penalty. Here before the court of Holy Church, by her authority vested in me, I
suspend you from your sacred vows. You shall not go up to the altar of God, nor
perform the functions of a priest, nor admit yourself into the company of
priests or of monks, until such time as you may have proven by the purity of
your life and actions that you have atoned fully for your sin. Furthermore, to
remind you that you are but dust and ashes in the face of the Lord, I command
that you submit to the punishment of twenty lashes upon your bare back; and
that with each stroke, you cry to Him for His mercy.”

Alf stood rigid. His face was terrible, wholly inhuman. The
Bishop turned to Thea, his eyes glittering. “And you,” he said. “You have cast
your mockery in the face of Holy Church. You have given voice to lies born of
the Devil your sire. And yet, in coming to this place, in crying your defiance,
you have submitted yourself to our power. That power I invoke to its fullest
extent. Woman of the hills, nameless one, corrupter of priests, you shall die
by sacred and cleansing fire, and your bones shall be cast into a pit, and the
curse of God’s wrath shall lie upon them.”

Alone of all those who listened, she seemed unmoved. Alf
broke away from his guards. “No!” he shouted. “
No!
Let her live. I lied;
I deceived you all. It is I who am the sorcerer.
I
worked the spells; I
pretended innocence to confound you.
I
should go to the fire. Let me die
in her place!”

“So completely has she corrupted him,” the Bishop said, half
in pity, half in satisfaction, "that he will defend her unto death. It
grieves me to see such virtue turned to evil.” He raised his hand. “I have
spoken. So be it.
Fiat. Fiat. Fiat
.”

Early in the morning of the Feast of St. Nicholas, the
townsfolk of Carlisle began to gather near the east gate. In the space before
St. Benedict’s Abbey, a new growth had appeared in the night, a tall stake hung
with chains. Heaps of brushwood stood beside it.

By full day, a sizable crowd had taken shape. A newcomer,
ignorant of the cause, might have thought that they kept festival under the
rare cloudless sky and despite the winter chill. They laughed and jested; among
them moved peddlers and pickpockets, a traveling singer and a troupe of
jugglers. On the fringes a huddled circle, a chorus of shouts and jeers,
proclaimed a cockfight.

Only the space about the stake remained clear. Pauline monks
guarded it, interspersed with men-at-arms who wore the blazon of the Bishop of
Carlisle.

Beyond the throng in the lee of the abbey’s wall, workmen
had erected a canopied platform. Figures began to take their places there as
the hour approached terce: Benedictines, Paulines, a layman or two. Earl Hugo
appeared with his lady and half a dozen attendants, settling on the right of
the vacant high seat. Not long after, Bishop Foulques swept in to take the
chair of honor, escorted by the Abbot of St. Benedict’s. Servants saw them
settled and wrapped in warm robes against the cold.

The crowd boiled. Bishop Aylmer strode through it on foot
and simply dressed, with a troop of monks at his back.

Eyes widened and grew wise. Not one of the escort was armed
or armored, and none wore spurs on his sandaled feet, but the smallest
overtopped the burly Bishop by half a head.

Aylmer bowed curtly to the dignitaries on the dais, and
paused a moment. The high ones exchanged glances; one or two half rose as if to
make room for him. The King’s Chancellor turned on his heel and took his place
close to the stake, with his monks in a half-circle behind him.

o0o

At the stroke of terce, the great gate of the abbey swung
open. A hush fell; eyes stared, necks craned, fathers swung children onto their
shoulders.

It was a small procession for so great a matter. A tall thin
Pauline monk carrying a book and a scroll; a pair of novices, thurifer and
crucifer; monks chanting a psalm. And behind, guarded by mailed men with drawn
swords, the prisoners.

The first stood taller than his guards, a familiar pale face
ravaged now with fasting and with sleeplessness, and beneath it a thin white
tunic which afforded little protection from the biting wind. Chains bound his
wrists, but he walked with his head up, seeing nothing and no one.

But the second made the crowd jostle and crane, straining to
see. She was harder to catch a glimpse of, tall but not as tall as the other,
her long tangled hair half-hiding her face. Her tunic was much like his, but
her chains were far heavier, of black iron, weighing down her slender body.

A growl rumbled in a hundred throats, swelling swiftly to a
roar. A stone arced over her head; others followed it. Men-at-arms surged
forward, striking with fists and flattened blades.

Thea paid them no heed. Nor did she heed Alf, who continued
his nightlong mental barrage. For each shield he had battered down, she had
erected another; he could not reach her mind.
Thea!
he cried.
Thea,
for the love of God, answer me!

Her shield held fast. And he had nearly exhausted his mind’s
strength. A last desperate shaft struck not at her mind but at her chains.

It rebounded to pierce his own bruised brain. He staggered;
a hard hand held him up.

Out of madness and frustration and sheer perversity, Alf let
fall the illusion that shielded his eyes. The guard gasped and crossed himself.

With a small tight smile, Alf walked on. He had not restored
the seeming. If enough people saw soon enough, he would go to the stake with
Thea.

It loomed before him now, half again his own height, a great
lopped tree-trunk. Beside it stood a hooded man, in his hand a long whip.

He wore lay garb, but Reynaud’s mind laughed within the
hood. Adam had not let him touch the precious prisoners, but Bishop Foulques
had been more amenable, had let him take the executioner’s place. In that much,
he would have his revenge on them all.

The procession arrayed itself around the empty circle. Adam
performed obeisance to the high ones, and at Bishop Foulques’s nod, mounted the
dais. In a clear voice he began to read the charges.

Alf did not listen. The stake held his gaze and his mind.

They were economical, these people. He would be flogged
first at that stake, and afterward they would bind Thea to it, heaping high the
fuel. And then—

They were dragging him forward. Adam had come down from the
dais; he met the monk’s eyes. The mind behind them mingled regret, compassion,
a touch of genuine liking; and a fire of zeal for his calling, that leaped high
as the truth struck his consciousness.

Denounce me,
Alf willed him.
Make them burn me.
Make them!

Adam’s deep eyes hooded. He stood aside as the men-at-arms
chained Alf to the stake, back to the air, face to the rough bark. It was sweet-scented,
seasoned pine; it would burn well and swiftly.

Hands tore at his tunic, baring his back. Vulgar jests rang
in his ears. He pressed his cheek to the wood, aware of Morwin’s cross caught
between breast and stake. Adam had let him keep it. Gentle, cruel Brother Adam.

There was no gentleness in Reynaud. The whip whistled as he
whirled it about, teasing, taunting him with the anticipation of pain that
never came.