Pope Joan (25 page)

J
OAN
moved soundlessly through the halls until at last she reached the open air of the courtyard. She breathed deeply, feeling a bit giddy.

All was still. A single guard sat with his back to the wall near the gate, his head on his chest, snoring. Her lengthened shadow spilled across the moonlit earth, grotesquely huge. She moved her hand, and a giant gesture mocked her.

Joan whistled softly to Luke. The guard stirred and shifted in his sleep. Luke did not come. Keeping to the shadows, she started toward the corner where Luke usually slept; she would not risk waking the guard by making any further sound.

Suddenly, the ground seemed to shift beneath her. She felt a rise of nausea and dizzily held on to a post to steady herself.
Benedicite. I can’t be sick now.

Fighting the giddiness, she made her way across the courtyard. In the far corner she saw Luke. The young wolf lay on his side, his opalescent eyes staring blindly into the night, his tongue lolling limply out of his mouth. She bent to touch him and felt the coldness of his body beneath the soft white fur. She gasped and drew back. Her eyes fell on a half-eaten piece of meat on the ground. She stared at it dazedly. A fly settled on the bloody wetness surrounding the meat. It remained there, drinking, then flew upward, circling erratically before it dropped abruptly to the ground. It did not move again.

There was a loud humming in Joan’s ears. The air seemed to undulate around her. She backed away, turning to run, but again the ground lurched and shifted, then rose suddenly to meet her.

She did not feel the arms that lifted her roughly from where she lay and carried her back inside.

T
HE
creaking of the wheels kept melancholy rhythm with the clopping of horses’ hooves as the cart bumped along the road toward the cathedral, carrying Joan to her wedding mass.

She had been dragged awake this morning, too dazed to realize what had happened. She stood numbly while the servants fussed over her, putting on her wedding dress and fixing her hair.

But the effects of the drug were wearing off, and Joan began to remember.
It was the wine
, she thought.
Richild put something in the wine.
Joan thought of Luke, lying cold and alone in the night. A lump rose in her throat. He had died without comfort or companionship; Joan hoped he had not suffered long. It must have given Richild pleasure to poison his meat; she had always hated him, sensing the bond he represented between Gerold and Joan.

Richild was riding in the cart just ahead. She was magnificently dressed in a tunic of gleaming blue silk, her black hair coiled elegantly around her head and secured with a silver tiara set with emeralds. She was beautiful.

Why
, Joan wondered dully,
didn’t she just kill me too?

Sitting in the cart drawing her ever closer to the cathedral, sick in body and heart, with Gerold far away and no way of escape, Joan wished that she had.

T
HE
wheels clattered noisily onto the uneven cobblestones of the cathedral forecourt, and the horses were reined to a stop. Immediately, two of Richild’s retainers appeared alongside. With elaborate obsequiousness, they helped Joan from the cart.

An enormous crowd was gathered outside the cathedral. It was the Feast of the First Martyrs, a solemn religious holiday, as well as Joan’s wedding mass, and the entire town had turned out for the occasion.

In front of the crowd Joan caught sight of a tall, ruddy, big-boned boy standing awkwardly beside his parents. The farrier’s son. She noted his sullen expression and the dejected set of his head.
He doesn’t want me for a wife any more than I want him for a husband. Why should he?

His father prodded him; he came toward Joan and held out his
hand. She took it, and they stood side by side as Wido, Richild’s steward, read the list of items composing Joan’s dowry.

Joan looked toward the forest. She could not possibly run and hide there now. The crowd encircled them, and Richild’s men stood close beside her, eyeing her warily.

In the crowd Joan saw Odo. Gathered around him were the boys of the schola, whispering together as usual. John was not among them. She searched the crowd and found him standing off to one side, ignored by his companions. They were both alone now, except for each other. Her eyes sought his, seeking and offering comfort. Surprisingly, he did not look away but returned her gaze, his face openly registering his pain.

They had been strangers for a long time, but in that moment they were two again, brother and sister, leagued in understanding. Joan kept her eyes fixed on him, reluctant to break the fragile bond.

The steward stopped reading. The crowd waited expectantly. The farrier’s son led Joan into the cathedral. Richild and her household swept in behind them, followed by the townspeople.

Fulgentius was waiting by the altar. As Joan and the boy came toward him, he motioned them to sit. First the holy feast would be celebrated, then the wedding mass.

Omnipotens sempiterne Deus qui me peccatoris.
As usual, Fulgentius was mangling the Latin service, but Joan hardly noticed. He signaled an acolyte to prepare for the offertory and began the oblation prayer.
Suscipe sanctum Trinitas …
Beside her, the farrier’s son bent his head reverently. Joan tried to pray, too, bowing her head and mouthing the words, but there was no substance to the form; inside her there was only emptiness.

The mixing of the water with the wine began.
Deus qui humanae substantiae …

The doors of the cathedral burst open with a loud crack. Fulgentius abandoned his struggles with the Latin mass and stared incredulously at the entrance. Joan craned her neck, trying to make out the source of this unprecedented intrusion. But the people behind her blocked her view.

Then she saw it. An enormous creature, manlike but taller by a head than any man, stood outlined in the blinding light of the doorway, its shadow spilling into the dim interior. Its face was curiously
expressionless and shone with a metallic gleam, the eyes so deep in their dark sockets that Joan could not make them out.

Somewhere in the crowded assembly, a woman screamed.

Woden
, Joan thought. She had long ago ceased to believe in her mother’s gods, but here was Woden, exactly as her mother had described him, striding boldly up the aisle right toward her.

Has he come to save me?
she thought wildly.

As he drew closer, she saw that the metallic face was a mask, part of an elaborate battle helmet. The creature was a man and no god. From the back of his head, where the helmet ended, long golden hair curled down to his shoulders.

“Norsemen!” someone shouted.

The intruder continued past without breaking stride. Reaching the altar, he raised a heavy, two-sided broadsword and brought it down with savage force on the bald tonsure of one of the assisting clerics. The man dropped, blood spurting from the deep cleft where his head had been.

Everything erupted into chaos. All around Joan people were screaming and shoving to get away. Joan was dragged along with the crowd, packed so tightly between struggling bodies that her feet lost contact with the floor. The wave of terrified villagers swept toward the doors, then abruptly halted.

The exit was blocked by another intruder, dressed for battle like the first, except that he carried an ax instead of a sword.

The crowd swayed uncertainly. Joan heard shouting outside, and then more of the Norsemen—a dozen at least—piled through the doors. They came in at a run, shouting hoarsely and swinging enormous iron axes over their heads.

The villagers fought and climbed over one another to get out of the way of the murderous blades. Joan was pushed hard from behind and fell to the ground. She felt feet on her sides and back, and she threw up her arms to protect her head. Someone stepped heavily on her right hand, and she cried out in pain. “Mama! Help me! Mama!”

Struggling to extricate herself from the crush of bodies, she crawled sideways until she reached an open area. She looked toward the altar and saw Fulgentius surrounded by Norsemen. He was striking at them with the huge wooden cross that had hung behind the altar. He must have pried it from the wall, and now he swung it
around with fierce strength as his attackers darted back and forth, attempting to strike him with their swords but unable to get inside the circle of his defense. As she watched, Fulgentius dealt one Norseman a blow that sent him flying halfway across the room.

She crawled through the noise and the smoke—was there a fire?—searching for John. All around her were shrieks, war cries, and howls of pain and terror. The floor was littered with overturned chairs and sprawled bodies, wet with spilled blood.

“John!” she called. The smoke was thicker here; her eyes burned, and she could not see clearly. “John!” She hardly heard her own voice over the din.

A rush of air on the back of her neck warned her, and she reacted instinctively, hurling herself to the side. The Norseman’s blade, aimed for her head, tore a gash in her cheek instead. The blow threw her to the floor, where she rolled in agony, clutching her wounded face.

The Norseman stood above her, his blue eyes murderous through the appalling mask. She crawled backwards, trying to get away, but she could not move fast enough.

The Norseman raised his sword for the death blow. Joan shielded her head with her arms, turning her face aside.

The blow did not come. She opened her eyes to see the sword drop from her attacker’s hands. Blood trickled from the corners of his mouth as he sank slowly to the floor. Behind him stood John, grasping the reddened blade of Father’s bone-handled knife.

His eyes glittered with a strange exhilaration. “I took him right through the heart! Did you see? He would have killed you!”

The horror of it flooded her. “They will kill us all!” She clutched at John. “We must get away, we must hide!”

He shrugged her off. “I got another one. He came at me with an ax, but I got inside and took him through the throat.”

Joan looked round frantically for somewhere to hide. A few feet ahead was the reredos. It was wrought of wood, fronted with gilded panels depicting the life of St. Germanus. And it was hollow. There might just be enough room …

“Quickly,” she shouted to John. “Follow me!” She grasped the sleeve of his tunic, pulling him down beside her on the floor. Motioning him to follow, she crawled to the side of the reredos. Yes! There was an interstice, just big enough to squeeze through.

It was dark inside. Only a thin stream of light trickled in from the seam in front where the panels were inexpertly joined.

She squatted in the far corner, tucking her legs under to leave room for John. He did not appear. She crawled back to the opening and peered out.

A few feet away she saw him, bending over the body of the Norseman he had killed. He was pulling at the man’s clothes, trying to pry something loose.

“John!” she shouted. “In here! Hurry!”

He stared at her, a mad, glittering gaze, his hands still working under the Norseman’s body. She didn’t dare shout again for fear she would reveal the precious hiding place. After a moment he gave an exultant yell and stood, holding the Norseman’s sword. She gestured for him to join her. He lifted the sword in mocking salute and ran off.

Shall I go after him?
She edged toward the opening.

Someone—a child?—screamed nearby, a hideous shriek that hung in the air, then abruptly ceased. Fear overwhelmed her, and she drew back. Tremulously she put an eye to the seam between the panels and peered out, searching for John.

There was fighting directly in front of her peephole. She heard the clang of metal on metal, caught a brief glimpse of yellow cloth, the gleam of an uplifted sword. A body thumped down heavily. The fighting moved off to the side, and she was looking straight down the nave toward the cathedral entrance. The heavy doors stood ajar, propped open by a grotesque jumble of bodies.

The Norsemen were herding their victims away from the entrance toward the right side of the cathedral.

The way stood clear.

Now
, she told herself.
Run for the doors.
But she could not bring herself to move; her limbs seemed to be locked.

A man appeared at the edge of her narrow field of vision. He looked so wild and disheveled that for a moment she did not recognize him as Odo. He was lurching toward the entrance, dragging his left leg. In his arms he clutched the huge Bible from the high altar.

He was almost to the doors when two Norsemen intercepted him. He faced his attackers, holding the Bible aloft as if warding off evil spirits. A heavy sword sliced through the book and took him directly in the chest. For a moment he stood, astonished, clutching the two
halves of the book in his hands. Then he fell backwards and did not move again.

Joan shrank back into the darkness. The screams of the dying were all around her. Hunched in a ball, she buried her head in her arms. Her rapid heartbeat sounded in her ears.

T
HE
screaming had stopped.

She heard the Norsemen calling out to one another in their guttural tongue. There was a loud noise of splintering wood. At first she did not understand what was happening; then she realized they were stripping the cathedral of its treasures. The men laughed and shouted. They were in high spirits.

It did not take them long to complete their plundering. Joan heard them grunting under the weight of their loot, their voices receding into the distance.

Rigid as a post, she sat in the dark and strained to hear. Everything was quiet. She inched toward the opening of the reredos until she reached the edge of the narrow crack of light.

The cathedral lay in ruins. Benches were overturned, hangings were torn off walls, statuary lay in pieces on the floor. There was no sign of the Norsemen.

Bodies lay everywhere, piled in careless heaps. A few feet away, at the bottom of the stairs leading to the altar, Fulgentius was sprawled beside the great wooden cross. It was splintered, the gilded crosspiece broken and wet with blood. Beside him lay the bodies of two Norsemen, their skulls crushed within their shattered helmets.