Night Blooming (17 page)

“Only three more steps,” said the first. “Hold tight.”

“What do you think I’m doing?” the second demanded. “You have to turn a little to the left.”

“I remember,” said the first, and his wooden shoes scraped on the stairs. “To the left.”

The first man appeared, moving backward, the larger end of the athanor in his hands. He swayed as if his back hurt, and his arms were trembling with strain. “You have three more steps to go,” he said, and nearly dropped the athanor as he caught sight of Rakoczy. “Magnatus!” He ducked his head without being able to reverence him.

“Put it in the center of the room, if you will,” Rakoczy said evenly.

“If that is what you want,” said the mansionarius. He continued to back up, doing his best to look as if this were easy.

The second mansionarius came into sight and looked toward Rakoczy as if expecting a rebuke. “The middle of the room?”

“If you would,” said Rakoczy. He indicated the place. “Here.”

The two mansionarii made a last struggle and brought the athanor to where Rakoczy wanted it, and set it down with a thump. They turned toward Rakoczy uneasily, expecting a blow for their clumsiness.

“You have done well,” said Rakoczy, and motioned to them to leave.

“We have two more chests to bring up, Magnatus,” said the mansionarius who had backed up the stairs; he was ruddy-haired, perhaps thirty years old, and was missing two fingers on his right hand.

“Then do it,” said Rakoczy. “When you are done, go to the kitchen and have a cup of beer. You may tell the cook you have my permission.” No one in the household would make such a claim if it were not true, for that could result in expulsion from the household with a brand for treason on the shoulder.

“That is generous of you, Magnatus,” said the red-haired mansionarius, and glanced at his younger companion. “Let’s get back down.”

“You are in a hurry,” said the second.

“For a cup of beer? Yes, I am,” said the first He reverenced Rakoczy, then hurried off down the stairs.

The second ducked his head, then reverenced the Magnatus. “What do you want us to do here?” As soon as he said it, he fled.

Rakoczy watched the youngster go, and he wondered what the mansionarii would say to their fellows when they went to dine at sunset. He went to open his red lacquer chest and removed two vials of tincture of willow; he would offer them to the mansionarii, and hoped that the lessening of their hurts it would provide would be enough to incline the men to be less apprehensive about his foreignness than they were now. Determined not to be discouraged, he assumed all his household servants would eventually accept him, but though he argued inwardly at his most cogent, he could not convince himself this would ever be the case, especially once he began to work in the smithy, doing work no man of rank should do.

T
EXT OF A REPORT FROM
F
RATRE
A
NGELOMUS, WITH
O
TFRID, MISSI DOMINICI TO
K
ARL-LO-
M
AGNE.

To the most excellent ruler, Karl-lo-Magne, Otfrid and Fratre Angelomus tender their account of their recent escort of the Magnatus Hiernom Rakoczy, of Sanct’ Germainius, from his fiscs to Paderborn, according to your stated Will.

The Magnatus received us at his villa, serving us fine meals and having our horses stabled as well as his own, and they were groomed as if for a procession. This attention is evident in all his holdings. His fiscs are in good heart and many of the buildings are being rebuilt and repaired from the damage of the former tenant to whom you were magnanimous enough to present the fiscs now held by Rakoczy.

We were presented to the two fully armed and mounted men Rakoczy has provided as part of his vassalage to you. One is a former Guard from Aachen who is grateful to the advancement Rakoczy has afforded him: a fellow named Usuard, son of Ansgar. The other is a local fighting man, Theubert of Sant’ Cyricus; he has been a Watchman at the monastery of that name and was trained by the Abbott himself, who was once a famous Comes and retired from the world when he lost his arm to the perfidious Moors in Hispania.

We brought him as directly as we could to your Court as you commanded we do. It took us just under two weeks, riding from dawn until dusk, and with the lengthening days, this has let us make good speed on the road. There was hardly any mud encountered, and, as we have ridden horses rather than been paced by oxen, we have been able to progress rapidly.

The Magnatus has been installed at the house of Maurus the merchant, where he has been given a good reception by the men of the household and provided the largest bedchamber and two large basins made of copper for his use in token of his favored position with the King. The Magnatus has returned this kindness to Maurus by presenting him with a cask of new wine and a cup of gold ornamented by fine stones he claims are rubies from the East. This has pleased Maurus, and he has said that his entire household is in the debt of the Magnatus, and it may be that the Magnatus will sponsor a journey for Maurus, who has of late wanted to enter Wendish lands to purchase amber and furs.

The armed men who accompanied us in their duty to Great Karl have said that they have been treated well by Rakoczy, who, they say, tempered the weapons he provided them himself. While I do not entirely believe this, I did hear his mansionarii say that the Magnatus works his own forge in the smithy, so it may be true. It is also said of him that he has provided tinctures and unguents to treat the ills of the household, and these treatments have helped to end their pains and fevers. If this is a genuine skill, it could be of use in the King’s service when next Great Karl campaigns.

It is useful to know that the Magnatus has been able to learn the tongue of his peasants well enough to listen to their complaints without the aid of a clerk, and this may become to his advantage if he is to remain at the fiscs Optime has granted him.

By my own hand on the Pope’s Feast of Sant’ Epiphanius of Salamis, on the Mass of Mid-May, the Church’s Year 797.

Fratre Angelomus

Chapter Seven

O
NLY THOSE KEEPING
V
IGIL
were in the chapel at Sant’ Audoemus; most of the monks were asleep in their dormitories, dreading the sound of the Matins-bell that would ring well before dawn. In the two other dormitories of the monastery, the maimed, the crippled, and the mad kept their own watches, some of them chained to the walls, others on cots, still others in places of their own choosing.

“I don’t belong here,” said Gynethe Mehaut to Priora Iditha as they walked in the night garden of the monastery, making the most of the warm June night; it was unusual for the two of them to have much time together, and Gynethe Mehaut wanted to make the most of it.

“I know,” said Priora Iditha kindly. “But I believe there is little I can do to change your situation. Do not repine. Your welfare is being considered by Sublime Iso, or it will be as soon as he comes and I am permitted to speak to him on your behalf.”

Gynethe Mehaut sighed. “I realize that. And I understand that I must accept what is provided me.” She gestured toward the infirmary and the confinement cells, at either end of a stark building set against the highest part of the wall. “I am not like the others: I am not mad, and I am sound of body, although my body is strange. My bleeding is not like other sorts of wounds. It isn’t like women’s bleeding. What these monks offer can avail me nothing. They might as well send me to the remotest island in the Western Sea.” She stopped to bend down to an open, white blossom that released a sweet fragrance onto the night air. “Sometimes I think I am like these flowers—of my own nature, as God made me.”

“I agree,” said Priora Iditha. “But Bishop Iso has said you must remain here until he can decide about your case. You know he is to come here soon, and at that time he will learn that there is more to your condition than white skin and red eyes. If only your hands didn’t bleed. More than your skin and your eyes, that is what troubles everyone. That is what the Sublimi must decide about, on Bishop Iso’s advice. Be obedient to the wishes of the Sublimi, and the time will pass quickly.”

“They expected the Bishop yesterday, and still he isn’t here,” said Gynethe Mehaut, doing her best not to fret. “What if he has met with trouble?”

“We will hear of it if he has. He may come tomorrow, or the day after,” Priora Iditha offered, sharing her apprehension. In the silence that followed, Priora Iditha watched her charge carefully.

“They say the Saxons have submitted to Great Karl,” said Gynethe Mehaut, making it clear she wished to speak of other things.

“So they do,” said Priora Iditha. “It is a great victory for the King.”

“Truly it is,” said Gynethe Mehaut. “Then the Wends will fall, and the Emperor in Constantinople will tremble. The Golden City of the Greeks will not shine so brightly.” She shoved her bandaged hands into the capacious sleeves of her gonella and stared up at the waxing moon. “I wish I could see these wonders: Constantinople, the castles of the Saxons, Roma.”

“Perhaps one day you will,” said Priora Iditha, not believing it for an instant.

“It all rests with Bishop Iso and his fellows; if they decide I must become cloistered, then I will see nothing but nunnery walls until I die,” said Gynethe Mehaut, reminding them both of the obvious.

“And, because you are faithful to the Church and the King, you will abide by the Sublimi’s decision, even if it means you’re to remain here the rest of your days,” said Priora Iditha, a bit more sternly than before.

“I must,” said Gynethe Mehaut simply. “My father gave me to the Church and I am bound to obey its strictures. I accept my place as my father’s bond, though it is more his desire than mine. I pray for a true vocation, but I haven’t received it.” She sighed again. “Sometimes I wish I could leave here, and live like everyone else.”

“You?” Priora Iditha looked shocked, and spoke sharply. “You cannot live as others do, not as you are, and well you know it.”

Gynethe Mehaut took a long, slow breath. “Perhaps not. Yet I would be glad of it, if I could. It would be pleasant, not to have to be regarded with dread wherever I go, and to be confined with the infirm and mad. It would be sweet to walk in the sun without fearing burns and worse.”

“Your domicile may change,” said Priora Iditha, doing her best to shore up her charge’s flagging confidence. She made her voice more heartening. “Have faith in the Bishop. He will decide where it is best for you to live.”

“In another prison, perhaps more comfortable, perhaps less, but still a confinement, hemmed in by monks and nuns as good as armed guards. I fear I will not be in the world again now I am gone from it.” Gynethe Mehaut looked up at the moon. “You entered Orders willingly; I have been given no opportunity to go about in the world before entering the care of the Church, though I wish I could. I cannot even become a nun, not while the Bishops are uncertain about me. So I am between the world and the Church, and neither will have me.”

“The world is not such a place as you should wish to enter,” said Priora Iditha. “Here, at least, the Saints and God protect us.”

“Must protection be all? Isn’t there more to the world than danger?” Silent tears slid from Gynethe Mehaut’s ruby-dark eyes down her white cheeks. She did not bother to wipe them away; she pressed her lips together to keep from sobbing.

Priora Iditha shook her head. “For you, danger is your lot in life. You are not alone in your travail. In the world, aren’t women prey to every dangerous or foolish man? Aren’t women valued because they give birth to sons, and make alliances possible? Is that what you want for yourself? You cannot hope to marry—no one would have you as anything but a mistress, or a whore.”

“With these hands?” Gynethe Mehaut laughed miserably. “They would fear damnation or they would be afraid to offend the honor of God.”

At this, Priora Iditha relented. “Yes. Your hands are as much a problem as your skin. And your eyes,” she added, glad the moonlight turned the red to an unearthly shade of violet.

“If God would only inspire the Bishop with an understanding of what I am, I should be thankful beyond all reckoning.” Gynethe Mehaut pulled her hands from her sleeves and looked at the bandages that were already showing patches of blood on the palms. “I have prayed and prayed and prayed. God does not hear me, nor Virgine Maria, nor any Saint. I have no answer.”

“God and the Hosts of Heaven don’t often speak to women,” Priora Iditha reminded her. “You must hope that the Bishop will be given an answer.” She regarded Gynethe Mehaut with sympathy. “It is a burden to be patient, but it is also the lot of women. We are here to wait upon the wants of others, whether father or husband or God.”

“So I am told, very often.” She walked away from the night-blooming plants into the beds of herbs. “I wish I could do something useful. I would feel less at the mercy of…” She could find no word to describe her vulnerability. “I would like to prepare medicaments and medicinal pomanders. I have studied the art, and I know I could do it. But because of this”—she held up her hands—“I am ordered to touch nothing that might take malign influences from the blood.”

“Then you must abide by what you have been told, or be thrown on the world to beg. This would be your fate, to have to stand at the side of the road and implore charity from those who pass,” said Priora Iditha, who had plucked a spray of fragrant blossoms to tuck into her long braid, then thought better of it and dropped the flowers.

“Where I should die quickly,” said Gynethe Mehaut with utter conviction. “Who would give food to me, or shelter, but the Church?” There was no trace of pity for herself in her tone, only a stark expression of what she knew.

Priora Iditha said nothing; she continued along with her pale-skinned charge for a short way, then stopped. “You should be at prayers soon. Vigil is almost over.”

“Yes,” said Gynethe Mehaut.