Temple of The Grail (22 page)

I
was in the midst of a storm, alone within elements that
burst forth in the most violent manner. Thunder shook the world, and out of a
bolt of lightning, these are the things that I saw.

Behold a door was opened in heaven
and emerging, a throne, surrounded by four creatures. I saw four and twenty
seats upon which sat four and twenty elders, dressed in white raiment.

‘Give Glory and honour and thanks to
Him that sitteth upon the throne who liveth forever and ever!’ a voice cried. ‘Woe
be unto him that followeth the foulness that is spewed from the belly of the
underworld.’

Suddenly I heard a grumbling coming
from below, and from out of the penumbral night, a crack in the earth thrust out
lava whose sulphurous light illuminated the firmament, revealing waves of mud,
smoke, scum, and dung. Creatures of every kind in bursts of liquid fell upon
mankind, the multitude who, like little ants at first congregated, dispersed as
the progeny of demons sought them out. Vipers, minotaurs, salamanders,
serpents, hydras, lizards and vultures, gryphons, crocodiles and scorpions,
became one boiling convulsing substance – a thick oily matter that,
ignited by the first rays of a black sun, descended upon a convention of
discord, an assembly of abominations, a cohort of transgressors. They tore eyes
from their sockets, ripped souls from out of mouths, stripped the flesh from
naked bodies with sharp, jagged teeth.

At this point, I could see a giant
eagle, ablaze with stars, so that in its luminous wake other beings followed,
lured like drunken moths. The creature whose brilliance was an offspring of the
celestial bodies that clot the sky, descended through the dark area of
mountains possessed of such fury and determination that I felt a sudden rush of
air escape my lungs. He began by darting at the loathsome creature with seven
heads, whose form only now emanated from the schism. The battle had begun.

The beast curled in fury, winding its
body around itself, each profane mouth emitting whole chromatic scales,
shrieks, and whimpers. Craftily it dodged the eagle, but the great bird aimed
at his mark with care, and in one swift slash of a long, sharp talon, he tore
out the heart of the creature, whose cry of agony rose to the great heights of
heaven. The dismembered parts were then flung to the four corners of the earth,
and thereupon four temples appeared. From the beast’s heart, a red blood, thick
with life – as though in it convulsed a multitude of reptiles, abundant
in the power of transmuted creation – surged, forming a river. And I saw
this river divide into two, then the two became four, each branch finding its
way to one tabernacle. Along its banks, where gleaming sandy beaches wound
around peninsulas, canyons, and valleys, there appeared blood-red roses whose
upturned petals praised the great primordial power of the universe. Stars fell
then, from the great galactic desert, burning holes through the mantle of the
night, uniting with each temple. And a voice said:

‘Glory be to Manes for he has seen
the power of good and evil. Glory be to Zarathustra for he has seen the sun in
its divinity. Glory be to Buddha for he has experienced the starry light. Glory
be to Scythianos for he raiseth the Temple to the highest summit.’

The eagle transformed itself into the
countenance of a man, and brandishing a blade, with one swift move, he pierced
the dismembered belly, out of which spewed forth seven books, bound in red.
These he placed at my feet and with a voice like that of thunder he spoke these
words:

Take these seven books,
for they are the gifts of cosmic Intelligences.

For all time these books have belonged to me,

Now I must forsake them for the
sake
of humanity.

Be ye their guardian, that whosoever,

Out of a purity of thinking, feeling and willing

Can tread the long steady path to intelligence,

Let him eat of these books and be saved.

Suddenly I found myself
falling into an abyss. Devoid of self, suffused with a sense of selfless union,
I plunged into the synthesis of the universe; expanding, growing into all that
was around me, until within me I beheld unintelligible constellations,
celestial deities, whole worlds residing. I was a cosmos, and all around me
concealed nature became exterior form; organs were as macrocosmic satellites
mapping out their course through the microcosm of my planetary being. I saw
with awed reverence, a liver circumnavigate a spleen, whose own revolutions
around a heart whispered astrological philosophies, profound harmonies. It was
a rhythmic oscillation and vacillation, a universal school, where cosmic
secrets murmured to the sweeping orbits of distant suns.

‘That which is here spread out and
around thee, thou art that!’ I said to the orbs at the perimeter of my
existence.

‘I am a god, and thou art my people,’
I said to the internal cosmos that I now embraced.

What was intrinsic was also
extrinsic, within, and without, form became formless, and the formless
embodied. Soon, Christian de St Armand would cease to exist, his sun eclipsed
by the light of a moon whose effulgence was far greater than his own. Then the
twelve became seven, and the seven stars appeared.

A
t this point I awoke, and yet I knew that I was still asleep,
for before me stood the figure of Plato. You may find this curious, but far
more curious was the fact that I did not find it curious at all, but quite the
most natural thing.

‘Herein lies the difficulty,’ Plato
said, ‘that I may never solve to my satisfaction.’

‘What is it, Plato?’ I asked.

‘I ask myself what is the meaning of
this dream?’ he said, pacing my cell, long Grecian robes rustling in the still,
dead of night, one slender hand cupping his chin in a remarkable manner, a
little reminiscent of my master. ‘Are we to say, then, that you have dreamt a
vision?’

‘A vision,’ I considered, ‘a vision
of what?’

‘The battle between good and evil?’

‘Indeed, that may be so,’ I nodded my
approval.

‘A vision also of a kind of knowledge
. . . whose guardian you shall become . . .’

‘It stands to reason, Plato,’ said I,
‘but what knowledge is this? And why have I been chosen?’

‘My art is in examining your thoughts
– as my tutor, Socrates, would have said – and not in promulgating
my own. You must not see me as an originator of ideas, for I am like a midwife
who in her barren wisdom, can never bring forth. It is you who must give birth,
you must labour, and I will see to the delivery . . . Come . . . what could
this knowledge be? If it were known to all men it would not be vouchsafed to
you, am I right?’

‘I should think not,’ I affirmed.

‘So it is a secret thing . . . and so
not easily learnt or attained?’

‘Following this line of reasoning,’ I
replied, ‘quite rightly.’

‘It is not of a practical nature, for
it would not be called an intelligence, it would be called wisdom.’

‘But wisdom is the same as
intelligence. Is it not?’

‘You forget my friend that I am
ignorant, you are the person who is in labour.’

‘But I am in pain!’

‘And so, I will comfort you. Do we
call a man wise, whose nature is prudent?’

‘Of course.’

‘And from whence does the fount of
prudence spring?’

‘From practical experience.’

‘Excellent! And what of intelligence?’

‘From understanding?’

‘Yes! It is the understanding that
enables you and I to grasp the first principles – as my pupil Aristotle
has said. And, as an outpouring of the gods, it is therefore divine. Prudence,
on the other hand, is merely the result of the practical use of this
understanding, and therefore human. So we may say that the knowledge vouchsafed
to you is of divine origin?’

I nodded.

‘Then we are in agreement,’ he said.

‘But what does this have to do with
the monastery?’ I asked.

‘It is clear from our discussion that
this intelligence is mysterious, and now we also know that it is divine. Am I
right in saying that opposite natures and substances attract?’

‘I suppose so.’

‘Then nothing attracts a great evil
more than a great good. If this knowledge is a great good, it shall attract a
great evil, and so the battle will ensue. The monastery is merely the
battleground.’

‘But how to find these books and
therefore unlock the secret?’

‘Like the act of birth, all
understanding is preceded by a little pain. This you must undergo with courage,
but it is only the beginning, for when one learns a thing, it leads one to
desire to know other things, and questions give birth to other questions, and
so one conceives afresh. I, Plato, on the other hand, am dead.’ He sighed, ‘Having
delivered too many men when I was alive . . .’

‘Alive . . . Come alive, boy!’ I
heard these words echo through a darkened consciousness, and I found that my
body was being shaken violently . . .

A
t first I could see nothing, but I then realised that my
master was standing over me, a black shadow that I recognised instantly.

‘Master?’

‘For the love of God! If I were a
Saracen you would now be singing discordantly in the great choirs of heaven.’

Half asleep, and a little hurt by the
word ‘discordantly’, I fell into a broody silence, but as I readied myself I
told him because I could not hold it in any longer. ‘I had a dream, master,’ I
said very quickly. ‘First there was a dragon and an eagle . . . Plato said it
was the battle between good and evil.’ I held the little gem, given to me by
the abbot, hotly in my hands.

‘I say it was too much mackerel at dinner.
Now up with you! Tonight we search for a mystery. Come along, look alive!’

‘But master –’ I began to argue
with him, but seeing his mood, thought better of it, for he was rubbing his
knee.

‘Curses to all ignorant Frenchmen!’
he mumbled. ‘Damn the Count of Artois. Are you ready? Do not forget the lamp,
boy, we are not bats!’

I nodded, and taking the lamp in one
hand and tapers in the other, joined him outside.

It was snowing lightly. I pouted,
feeling a great frustration. My master sniffed the air, pausing, and for a
moment stood very still. ‘Tomorrow it will storm,’ he said emphatically.

Who would have argued differently?

We entered the church, and hid in the
shadows behind the rood, waiting long moments. I thought of Eisik, who was
usually praying at this time, and I wondered how curious it must be to be a Jew
believing in only one God, and awaiting a Saviour who had already come. I hoped
that he was praying for our safety, for I was afraid. Not of what we might see,
crouched as we were like thieves, but rather of what we might not see, for it
was my impression that the evil one in his infernal wisdom works invisibly, and
therefore unknowingly. My master seemed unperturbed, even excited and in a very
good mood. I must say that this worried me more than anything.

When Andre deemed it safe, we moved
past the choir stalls and to our right, in the direction of the north transept.
Moments later we were in the Lady Chapel, at the altar of the Virgin of our
sorrows. My master motioned for me to light the two lamps from our rooms on the
perpetual flame of the bronze tripod. This I did, and on my return we began to
inspect the area behind the great red curtains, near the exit to the graveyard,
for this was where brother Daniel had pointed saying Virgil’s words, ‘
Procul
este, profani!
’ Here there were stone panels around three or four paces
square, and my master determined that there must be a device hidden somewhere.
In the dim light we could see very little, but we continued looking for
anything. Soon, however, I found that I was assailed by a desperate desire to
sneeze, and it was as I attempted to emerge from behind the dusty curtains that
I became entangled and fell. Luckily I held the lamp firmly, otherwise it would
surely have set the curtains alight. It did, however, cast the lamp’s
brilliance upon the lowest panel that, from my position near the stone floor,
became visible to me. I could see something, at first only vaguely. My master
was about to help me to my feet when he saw it also. He dropped painfully to
his knees then, bringing the lamp closer, exclaiming perhaps a little louder
than he should have, ‘Oh defender of the holy sepulchre!’ He must have hurt his
knee, and in a strangled whisper said, ‘Hush!’ as though
I
and not
he
had uttered these words.

Producing a parchment and quill, from
the little repository inside his scapular, he copied the inscription quickly,
but then we heard something that we later realised were footsteps headed in our
direction. My master with presence of mind pushed me out from under the
curtains, saying, ‘Quickly, through the door!’ and I was suddenly dragged to my
feet and thrust out of the north transept door and into the cold night.

‘Master –’ I began in a
bewildered whisper but was forestalled by the smell of damp and death that
pervaded the graveyard.

‘Hush! Follow me, and don’t ask
stupid questions!’ he said, putting out our lamps, and pushing me around the
body of the church, past the crosses and to the east door, whose aperture
remained open until midnight.

‘What are we doing, master?’ I asked,
put out.

‘We are spying on the Devil,’ he
said, and I thought I could see a devilish grin on his face, but it was too
dark, my imagination was having its way with me. Even so, I had never seen my
master so excited, and I feared he was fast becoming Aristotle’s model of an
intemperate man whose desire for what gives him pleasure is insatiable, and
draws its gratification from every quarter. What pleasure, though, could a
normal person derive from scampering in the dark in graveyards? I shuddered to
think and admonished him for his terrible curiosity.

Presently we found ourselves moving down
the nave with the instinctive movements of a fox training its nose to the hunt,
and it was only a matter of moments before we were once again on the other side
of the screen, dashing quickly in the shadows, to a place behind the choir
enclosures. That was when we saw the figure of a monk moving silently past the
great bronze tripod, not too quickly, for he was carrying something. He was
headed in the direction of the Lady Chapel. I surmised that he must have
stopped to pray before the great altar, otherwise we would not have caught up
with him. A devil that prays? We followed him, coming upon the arch that
separated us from the transept. My breath pulsated before me in time with my
racing heart.

‘For God’s sake! Breathe quietly,’ my
master whispered harshly into my ears and moments later the figure disappeared
behind the curtains.

‘He is going down into the catacombs!’

‘Who, master?’

‘How should I know?’

After a brief moment the monk’s
shadow came out into the pale light, but we did not see his face, covered as it
was by a cowl, and he disappeared into the inky gloom of the ambulatory.

‘By God’s bonnet!’ my master cursed,
and moved hurriedly to the chapel, lifting the curtains. ‘By my hilt! Nothing!’
Pausing a moment, he said, ‘Stay here, wait for the bells. I shall soon return.’

He left hurriedly, and I, fearing the
Devil himself around every corner, huddled in the shadows of the ambulatory,
praying many paternosters, thinking that my master must return at any moment.
But matins came and went. There were whispers.

‘Where is the preceptor?’ they asked
in fearful tones, glancing at his empty seat. I waited as the last of the
brothers filed out. What could have happened? I was becoming exceedingly
worried, but being very weary, and not wishing to disobey my master, I huddled
in a corner, anticipating his return like a dutiful child, and in this way I fell
into an uncomfortable sleep.