Night Pilgrims

by Chelsea Quinn Yarbro

  “No,” Sandjer’min answered directly. “From what I have learned, there are volcanos.”

  “Some say that they are windows into Hell,” Sieur Horembaud persisted. “Perpetual fire in the earth: what else can they be?”

  This time Sandjer’min spoke to Pendibe. “Do you know if there are fire-mountains near the port the other guides spoke of?”

  “I have not seen them for myself, but I have been told by many who know these things, and have seen them, that there are a good number of fire-mountains between the sea and the high mountain lakes. If the port they speak of is real, it may well be near a volcano.” Pendibe stopped to let Sandjer’min explain this to Sieur Horembaud. “I have been talking to their head guide, Tsega is his name, and we are thinking that with a little planning, we will reach the Church and Monastery of the Redeemer by sunrise the day after tomorrow, assuming we stay here for the night and the day ahead. We have”—he thought a long moment, then said—“a bit more than six leagues to go. The climb is moderate and the road should be in good repair if the heavy rains haven’t brought landslides. We will have to use the Inundation bridge over the Atbara, and it will allow only one beast or three men to cross at one time.”

  “Why not use boats?” Sieur Horembaud asked.

  “Because the water is too high and wild. In the spring, that would be a good choice, but not now.” Pendibe looked directly at Sandjer’min. “Make him understand: crossing the river in a boat is too dangerous.”

  “Three men or one beast? Does that mean the beast is unburdened or unridden? Or will the bridge take a beast if someone is riding it? I have seen horses balk crossing bridges, and that can lose the bridge and the horse together.” Sieur Horembaud returned Pendibe’s stare. “Or does the other guide have a better idea for getting over the Atbara? Another crossing, perhaps?”

  “I have not asked him,” Pendibe said stiffly. “I know of no such crossing. In the winter, you can step over the Atbara in the bottom of the canyon, no bridge is needed. But now? It is the bridge we must use, or we must find a way to cling to the walls of the canyon that the Atbara makes; the path we have been following stops at the bridge. We must cross there, whether we are traveling up the Atbara or the Nile.”

  “A bridge,” Sieur Horembaud said, tossing his head with scorn. “But I suppose if we must use it, we must. God tests us in all things.”

  “Do you want to press on tonight, then, or wait until tomorrow afternoon?” Pendibe asked. “It is almost midnight, and the tents have just gone up.”

  Sieur Horembaud swung round to confront him. “Were it my choice, I would press on, but the rest of the company is eager for guests and an easy night. I pray they have not given the others our trust too quickly.”

  “They are your fellow Roman Christians. Why should you not trust them?” Pendibe added to Sandjer’min, “In the winter, we would have seen many more pilgrims than we have on this journey.”

  Sandjer’min translated, telling Sieur Horembaud, “You seem to think there’s trouble ahead.”

  “One must always be alert to trouble; in such a strange land, we might easily be deceived by those who appear familiar but are not,” Sieur Horembaud said. “Many a rogue has hidden his sins in a monk’s habit or a pilgrim’s blue cotehardie.”

  “There could be trouble, I suppose; there can always be trouble if you look for it,” said Pendibe when Sandjer’min finished his translation. “But I find it hard to … to hold other Christians in such low opinion.”

  Sieur Horembaud audibly ground his teeth, then said, “There are reasons some of us do not embrace other Christians without hesitation; we have witnessed a few of those for ourselves already.” He gave a vindictive little snort. “Many say they are Christians but in truth are sent of the Devil to lure us from our faith.”

  Sandjer’min translated this reluctantly, not wanting to give Pendibe or the other Copts any reason to resent the presence of Sieur Horembaud’s company.

  Pendibe sighed. “So you Romans say.”

  “And who is to blame us?” Sieur Horembaud asked truculently.

  Before Sandjer’min could translate this, there was a wail that came from the edge of the camp, where tents had just been erected; it was underscored by a single bark of laughter and the sudden sounds of a scuffle. This was followed by a deluge of shouted prayers and more keening; a few of the other company of pilgrims looked about in consternation.

  “Sorer Imogen,” said Sieur Horembaud, turning to Sandjer’min. “You’d better attend to her before she frightens Pater Venformir’s pilgrims away. I’ll try to explain what I can to Pater Venformir.”

  “I will speak with the other pilgrims when Sorer Imogen is calmer, so that they can comprehend her circumstances; the sound of her outburst may distress all of us,” Sandjer’min said as he waved to Baccomeo to take Melech’s reins. “Brush him well, and note any rubbed places on his coat; give him a small amount of water now, and more after you have fed him,” he said in the northern Italian dialect, then hurried off toward the disturbance.

  Margrethe met him at the door-flap. “She is overwrought, which you must know. These strangers frighten her,” she said, ushering him inside, her eyes shining at the sight of him. “Lalagia is with her.”

  “Very good.” He hesitated long enough to make note of her condition; he saw the dark circles around her eyes. “You haven’t been sleeping well, have you?”

  “No,” she admitted. “I have used the medicaments to keep Sorer Imogen more at ease during our travels.” She held the sheet aside and allowed Sandjer’min to step into the side of the tent that was Sorer Imogen’s.

  The nun shrieked and resumed praying swiftly and loudly.

  “If you’ll remain beside her, Lalagia? I have some calmatives I can provide for now, and another soporific, as well, for after she eats.” He felt more than saw Lalagia’s glare as he took off his sack of medicaments and set it next to Sorer Imogen. Quickly he removed a small bottle containing a bluish tincture. “This will restore her composure for now.” He unstopped the bottle and held it out, pressing it to her lower lip. “Good Sorer Imogen,” he said quietly. “This drink will quieten your fears. Drink half the bottle and you will shortly be less anxious, and will be able to pray with more dignity.”

  As he hoped, his choice of words met with some approval. Obediently Sorer Imogen drank, then resumed her hectic prayers; Sandjer’min nodded to Lalagia. “Thank you. You did well.”

  Lalagia pushed up on her elbow. “You’re going to need more of that drink before many days are out.”

  “I agree,” he said, his worry revealed by the fine vertical line between his brows; he would have to find an herb-woman or someone well-versed in the lore of plants in order to make more of the calmative. As it was, he was nearly out of this medicament.

  “What about water? Shall I get her some?” Lalagia asked; she was getting to her feet, her features pale, her face damp.

  “Are you feeling unwell, Lalagia?” Sandjer’min asked as he took stock of her condition.

  “Not unwell, just pregnant,” she said in Byzantine Greek.

  “Pregnant?” Sandjer’min echoed her.

  “Only just. It may not catch. No use in being in a state because of it until it’s certain.” She watched him rise. “The cuts still bothering you? You’re straining.”

  “Yes, they are, and they will for a while longer.” He returned to the more pressing matter. “Who is the father.”

  “Methodus Temi, of course. Whoelse could it be?” She gave him a defiant stare. “I am not a whore, I’m a camp-follower, and loyal to the man who supports me. Methodus has been kind to me, and although he may not dote upon me as the Bondame does on you, he is truly fond of me, and minded to keep me with him.”

  “If your pregnancy is discovered, you will not be allowed to remain with the company,” Sandjer’min warned, paying no attention to her remark about Margrethe’s attraction to him.

  “I have time, and they won’t stone me, as they wo
uld the Bondame in a similar situation,” she said sharply.

  Sandjer’min moved a few steps away from Sorer Imogen, who was now completely caught up in her recitation of prayers. “Are you not seeking Sieur Arnoul?”

  “I am; for the sake of his children. But I have looked for him a long time—more than two years—and I know I may not find him. I went up the Nile, as I was told he had done, and I made inquiries where I could, but after Edfu, any mention of him ceased. One of the priests I spoke to said there was nothing he could tell me.” She wiped her face with the flat of her hand, but whether to be rid of sweat or tears, even she did not know. “I was not meant to be alone. Methodus has been with the Crusaders: he understands, and he wants me.” She paused. “We may not go much farther with the company. We’ve been talking about waiting out the end of the Inundation, and then joining with travelers going down-river toward Alexandria. Sieur Horembaud will not want me to remain once he sees my state, which he will do in two months, when we will be at the limits of our travels.”

  “Just you, or you and Methodus?”

  “Methodus and I, of course,” she answered with a little more heat. “If he comes with me, I can make a report to the Bishop who sent me on this pilgrimage, and deliver a claim so that my children may have their father’s protection. Methodus is my witness. The Church cannot refuse me. I have followed all I have learned about Sieur Arnoul to the edges of the Christian world and God has not brought us together.” She pressed her lips together, and when she was certain she could go on, she said, “Methodus is a good man. More than that, as a blacksmith, he has a fine skill, one that will gain him employment anywhere, and he treats me well. I am not young, but I will not be old for a while yet, and he and I can have good years together. He says he will raise my children if the Church will release them to me.”

  “Have you said anything of this to Bondame Margrethe?” The question hung between them like an invisible web.

  “No. That is one thing that gives me pause. Telling her is bound to upset her, and I am reluctant to do that. I like the Bondame; she has been good to me. She treats me better than the rest of the company. I don’t want to leave the Bondame without any help. Sorer Imogen might well have another fit, no matter what medicaments you give her, and if she does, the Bondame will be hard-put to contain her, with your help or without it.” She glanced at Sorer Imogen, who was now praying less frantically.

  “I understand you,” said Sandjer’min, and added, “I will do what I can to ease as many of Bondame Margrethe’s burdens as I am able, so long as I do not compromise her, or Sorer Imogen,” he said.

  Lalagia smiled. “Good. I knew you wouldn’t make me explain. The Bondame will be pleased to know that you will guard her.” She went back to Sorer Imogen and said, “You should rest, Sorer,” in her best Anglo-French. “You do yourself no good exhausting yourself this way. Ask God to bring you some peace, for all our sakes.”

  Lalagia said nothing more; she went to the other side of the sheet, had a few words with Margrethe, and left the tent.

  Margrethe came to the end of the sheet and looked at Sorer Imogen lying on her side, her knees drawn up to her joined hands. “How is she?”

  “Much less excited,” said Sandjer’min, feeling her attraction as if it were the sun’s full mid-day intensity.

  “God hasn’t sent this upon her, has He? as a punishment or a test?” she asked in a rush, frightened by her own thoughts.

  “I am not a Christian, Bondame, but I would say no, your God has not visited the Falling Sickness upon her, any more than the desert has singled you out for suffering.” He waited for her to speak, and when she blushed and looked away, he said, “She may be asleep before midnight supper is ready. In which case, I think you should have a handful of raisins for her, and one or two oil-cakes for when she wakes. She’ll be famished by morning.”

  “I will arrange it with Lalagia.” She watched him for a long moment. “The new company of pilgrims—there are no women with them, I’m told.”

  “I haven’t seen any,” Sandjer’min said quietly.

  “Then it may be best that Lalagia and I stay in the tent while we are camped with them.” She took a step toward him.

  “I believe Sieur Horembaud would approve,” said Sandjer’min. “He is wary of these pilgrims.”

  “He is wary of everyone.” She yawned deeply. “I’m sorry,” she told him. “I’m tired, though the night is only half over.” Her face grew somber. “It seems so … strange to have other pilgrims with us. I hadn’t realized how much the world has shrunk, as if we are the only people in it.”

  “I think that is a great fear in Sorer Imogen, though she dreads being alone.” He said it gently, feeling her isolation as keenly as he felt her desire.

  “Then, of course, I shall not go out unless I must.” She studied Sorer Imogen. “What am I to do with her, to get her back to her convent? Heneri has gone, and I know of no man of our family who would come into Egypt to fetch us home, not even if Guillaume des Grossierterres should send them on my husband’s behalf.”

  “The Hospitallers will send you with an escort, since you and your husband come from noble Houses,” said Sandjer’min. “You will not be stranded here.”

  “That takes time, arranging an escort and securing passage. I will have been gone more than a year in a few days; who knows what waits, either for me or Sorer Imogen, in the Aquitaine? After so long, there could be many changes. The war between England and France may have finally ended, or it might have become much worse; the markets may be busy, or there could be no markets worth attending; illness or other suffering among the people could have spread, or ended. Frater Anteus says we must all trust in God, and pray to the Virgin to still our doubts.” She gazed at him, forlorn and filled with barely understood longings, then moved away from him. “If Sorer Imogen has the Falling Sickness, might not Sieur Dagoberht have it, as well? Might that be the cause of his condition? The physician who treated him said that males have it more often than females, who have the pains of childbirth in its place. Yet there may be a curse on all Goslands.”

  Sandjer’min spoke with gentle certainty. “Sieur Dagoberht might have the Falling Sickness, but I doubt it.”

  “Why?” She touched his hand, let go, then took it again. “You have never seen him.”

  “Because nothing you have told me suggests he had any of his troubles before his injury. From what I’ve been told, Sieur Dagoberht took a severe blow to his head, and that can cause many problems,” Sandjer’min said. “I once treated a man who had been hale and strong until the beam of a lifting-rig struck him on the side of the head, after which he was without any sense of those around him, friend or foe. He jumbled words and could not remember the faces and names of his own children.” He did not tell her that this had happened at dockside in Hippo Regia almost six hundred years ago.

  “Then perhaps God gave us no children out of kindness, so the affliction would leave the House.” Margrethe turned away from him. “I never did anything to harm him, and I did nothing to cause him to regret our marriage, and yet he treated me as if I were a servant of the Devil, sent to torment him.” She broke away from him. “I’ll stay with Sorer Imogen; she will not be alone while we are in the company of other pilgrims.”

  At another time, Sandjer’min might have tried to explain what he thought happened to those who received severe injuries to the head, but now, he knew, such theorizing would not be welcome, and might add to Margrethe’s distress. “You and Lalagia can divide your time with her, so that each of you has a chance to rest. You cannot afford to let yourself be fatigued, not while she is so unpredictable in her reactions.” He was about to go on when Lalagia called out, “Sidi, Sieur Horembaud wants you to join him and Pater Venformir at the cooking-fire.”

  Margrethe gave him a gesture of release. “Go. We will speak again before we break camp tomorrow evening.”

  “If you need my help, I will come,” he said as he left her with the softly praying So
rer Imogen. He went through the cluster of tents to the center of the camp, where a number of Pater Venformir’s pilgrims were already lining up to receive the simple stew of onions, herbs, and salted pork that was beginning to boil in the largest cauldron in the camp; pilgrims from Sieur Horembaud’s company stood in ones and twos around the camp center, keeping careful watch on the others.

  “Over here, Sandjer’min,” Sieur Horembaud called, waving Sandjer’min toward him; he was sitting on a stack of chests, trying to appear at ease. Beside him stood Pater Venformir, and for the first time, Sandjer’min took stock of him; he was a forty-two-year-old man of remarkable ugliness: his face was sagging like an old hound’s, with deep grooves in the cheeks, a lantern jaw that hung like flews, and heavy furrows across his forehead. His nose was large and lumpy, and his mouth turned down at the corners. But his clear blue-green eyes were bright as a youngster’s and his voice was rich and sonorous as a pedal-note on an organ. His pilgrim’s cotehardie had faded to a grayish-white, and the brass chain that held his pectoral cross was so dulled by long exposure to blowing sand that it looked as if it had been made of glazed ceramic links instead of metal. Frater Anteus stood with them, recounting their crossing of the Nubian Desert in Church Latin for Pater Venformir’s benefit.

  Sandjer’min made his way through the cluster of pilgrims, hearing a buzz of talk about him in the Moravian dialect; he wondered if they would say the same things if they knew he could understand them. “Sieur Horembaud,” he said as he came up to the three men. “Frater Anteus. Pater Venformir.”

  “You are needed, I’m afraid,” said Sieur Horembaud.

  “For what tongue?” Sandjer’min asked with a half-smile.

  “It is not that: these two manage well enough with Church Latin.” Sieur Horembaud indicated the two clerics. “You are widely traveled. Can you tell us something of this Jenghiz Khan? in Church Latin.”

  Pater Venformir answered him. “When we left Venezia, we were told that his forces had conquered Persia and would be likely to stay there. Now I hear that it is believed that his troops are in the Russias.”