The Seal

by Adriana Koulias

  ‘Iterius,’ he said, wiping one hand with the other and raising a cold brow, ‘your Majesty wishes to know how you have been wasting your time and his patience.’

  The Egyptian’s features turned servile. ‘Experiments, sire, computations, regenerations.’

  ‘Yes . . . yes . . . but what in the devil have you achieved?’

  The man fumbled with his words and Philip turned his head and therefore his brow to one side and observed him from out of slitted eyes. ‘I have no gold. I have no bank and no property . . . It seems the Templars have outwitted me. My question is, Astrologer, why did you not see it in your stars?’

  The Egyptian’s face paused a moment before the immediacy of Philip’s gaze. ‘Sire . . . I have consulted the flames,’ he said, moving towards him, ‘and awakened the spirits of fire. I have consulted the boiling waters and the wax shapes . . . but it was the pattern created by smoke that has this day warned me of your . . . disappointment.’

  The King raised a hand and the Egyptian was instantly silent. ‘You are late. Why did you not tell me yesterday?’

  The other man looked down in deference. ‘I did not know it yesterday, sire, I only learnt of it today.’

  ‘Today? You imbecile! What good are you to me? Without the gold there is nothing! Without the bank less still, and with¬out the property . . . well . . . I have wasted my time!’

  ‘But sire, if I may . . . there are other things . . . more advantageous to your Royal Highness besides gold. But like gold, they must be mined in the exact right place.’

  ‘There is nothing more advantageous than gold, you fool!’

  ‘There are . . . secrets, sire,’ he threw in.

  The King narrowed his eyes. ‘Secrets?’

  ‘Today I have learnt . . . that you . . . must direct the inquisitors to extract from Jacques de Molay concerning . . . those.’

  The King frowned. ‘What secrets?’ He seemed to remember something – an Italian inquisitor had come to him some years before, he had spoken something of secrets, but Philip had not believed him. He turned a chill eye upon his astrologer. ‘Tell me!’

  The man cowered. ‘I only know of their existence, sire. You must direct the inquisitors to ask the questions of the Grand Master. Only he –’

  The King raised a hand and Iterius was immediately silent. ‘How may they do so, you fool?’ he thundered. ‘Clement has ruled that any Templar who is interrogated by a cardinal need not be questioned again! Jacques de Molay was interrogated at Chinon – all the Templar leaders were interrogated by cardinals at Chinon! The inquisitors cannot disobey!’

  There was silence. The King moved around Iterius now, like an animal circling its prey. ‘I do not see what you promised me on your arrival at the gates. I am not rich, I have no advantage and I am yet to see the destruction of those accursed heretics – those heinous, cowardly heretics, those bestial knights of the Temple who have deprived me of my material possessions! I am beginning to think you a creature of grand promises and little talent! I have no use for debased currency.’ He hooked a finger under the Egyptian’s cap and sent it flying from his head.

  The astrologer stood perfectly still. On his face was made plain the knowledge that this was not a good day. ‘If I may, sire,’ he pleaded, ‘I know something that shall calm your nerves . . .’

  From a crucible he secured a handful of gold dust that he allowed to escape through his fingers into the atmosphere of the dark room. The gold danced in the pale green light and this observation seemed to calm the King.

  Philip moved closer and a little quiver of excitement ran through him like a ripple in a pond. He placed his hand in the way of the falling specks, letting them run through his fingers, and this filled him with a memory, a dark memory full of blood and death. He knew this peak of bliss was destined to vanish and die, and leave him nothing but his unholy and abysmal spirit for comfort, and so he grabbed the Egyptian by the wrist. The man let go the crucible to the ground, causing gold dust to gloss the stone tiles. ‘Do not hex me!’ he cried in a low voice, his grip tightening until there was an imprint of blood where a sharply manicured nail had dug into the brown flesh.

  ‘It usually wins your esteem, sire,’ Iterius gave back, his face flushed.

  ‘This day it inflames me with an aversion!’ He let go of the hand and found a low chair on which to drop his long and angular body.

  The Egyptian wiped the blood from his wrist and reached across the various articles on the table to bring forth a blue vial, which he took to the King. The King looked at him full of boredom and irritation. ‘What do you have now?’

  Iterius fell to the ground once again before Philip; he did not look up but held the vial out above his head. ‘My King . . .

  your loyal servant has something for you . . .’

  The King looked at it. ‘What is it?’

  ‘It is a draught. But not like the others . . . something special . . . something . . . potent . . . I have been labouring on your behalf, see how I have been labouring? One swallow is all you need, sire.’

  Philip took the vial and sniffed beneath its lid. ‘What is in it?’

  ‘It is a concoction whose ingredients are the powdered tongue of a hanged man, snake oil and mushrooms.’

  ‘Powdered tongue! Mushrooms? Snakes?’ The King eyed him with suspicion. ‘Stand up! I have taken much that you have made . . . but . . . this? Why should I drink such a brew? Perhaps you are trying to poison me?’

  ‘Sire!’ Iterius took his time to stand. ‘I have no other purpose left to me but to serve you.’

  The King thought on it and could not help a laugh. ‘That is true.’

  ‘Ours has been a great association, my King,’ the Egyptian soothed, ‘since many lives before this life. Remember your dream, sire, which foretold my arrival? How it told of our brotherly bond made sure and fast through the blood of men? Such a dream is powerful and cannot be denied. You knew I would come and I did not disappoint you. Now you will trust the dream again, because without me . . . you will not learn . . . the secrets.’

  ‘What does it do, then, this concoction?’

  ‘It is an ancient brew, the mushrooms are magical and are known to induce visions. The ancient Jews used such mushrooms to bring about ecstasies and images of other worlds.’

  The King made a twist of the nose. ‘And this tongue of the hanged . . . what is it for?’

  ‘It connects you, sire, with the world of the dead from which something shall speak to you.’

  He thought of all the hunted creatures, the trophies of his soul. ‘The dead shall speak to me?’

  ‘Something more potent than the dead, sire, shall speak to you, and I shall decipher the meaning of its words. You may not be able to interrogate the Templars, but you shall know all that you desire to know.’

  The King narrowed one eye. ‘How is this astonishing deed accomplished then?’

  ‘The draught shall open your soul to a higher spirit! A terrifying, cruel and ingenious spirit!’ Iterius said. ‘A spirit known to you of old, and from whom you have learnt much. This spirit shall illuminate for you the secrets of the Templars.’

  ‘Get to the point!’ he thundered. ‘From whence comes this spirit?’

  ‘From other times, long ago, when human beings knew more concerning magic. This spirit shall tell you, sire, what has made the Templars so powerful . . . how to command the power over living . . . and . . . and . . . dying things.’

  The King was astonished. ‘They know this?’

  ‘Yes, sire, of course! How else could they become so powerful in so short a time? It is magic!’

  ‘Sorcery?’

  ‘As surely as Paris is the centre of the world, sire.’

  ‘I hit it on the nose then?’ Philip marvelled. ‘And I did not even know it!’ He grew sceptical. ‘But if they know magic, why did they not use it to save themselves?’

  ‘Because, sire, they have forgotten the secret.’

  The King paused, thinking this cont
radiction through. ‘And this draught will tell me how it is to be found, this secret?’

  ‘You must drink, sire, begin to commune. Soon there shall be a coincidence of the nodal lines of Venus and Uranus, a con-junction in the descending nodes, which shall bring about the forces that are tied to the aphelion of the earth. When these great conjunctions and oppositions, one near the descending node of Saturn, and another between the descending node of Neptune and the Perihelion of Mars, are seen in the night’s sky, it shall be a most efficacious time. All things shall be made apparent.’

  ‘I wish to kill you, Egyptian,’ the King said, breathless with pleasure.

  ‘Ahh . . .’ The astrologer kneeled before Philip. ‘Well you may, well you may, sire, for I am like a lover that arouses your hate but also your lust and so you cannot do without me. It is as if you were holding a wolf by the ears. Aribus teneo lupum ... you dare not let go, but you cannot hold on . . .’

  His voice entered the cavity of Philip’s head and he was lulled.

  ‘Drink, sire!’

  Iterius removed the stopper and brought the vial to Philip’s lips. The King drank and it was as if a violent storm of will seized him to the very bones, as though his body were being torn asunder by lightnings and thunderings.

  He was lifted up, and from above he saw himself lying before the figure of the astrologer. He saw the stretch of his limbs and the quiver of his body, and the smile on the astrologer’s face.

  THE FOURTH CARD

  STAR SOPHIA

  35

  THE WOMAN

  Eternal woman draws us upwards.

  Goethe, FAUST

  January 1309

  Etienne felt as if he’d slept a thousand years and was now awakening into a new season. His heart was a cup of love and dreams. His memory was released and he was naked with joy – like a flower whose face was turned to the sun and whose petals opened to unfurl a secret.

  My heart, my mother . . . within me! I lay between heaven and earth, between goodness and evil. I am a child. Life is brilliant, dazzling. Only God can explain such miracles.

  His eyes opened and his breath came in a rush. His hand went at once to the ring-seal upon his finger and from his half-closed eyes he saw that he was in a warm firelit room. Outside the wind whistled, and in the darkness of the hut made of stone a woman with long hair fed him gruel and ale and a dog barked at the swirling of the world.

  The woman was young.

  He felt for the wound in his side and was filled with a sensation of death, a terrible certainty more certain for its painful eloquence – then nothing but sun and darkness alternating, and the sound of a never-tiring wind.

  ‘Drink this,’ the wind said, and a cup was bent to his lips and a brew was poured into his parched mouth. The woman kneeling beside him was a Jewess. This he knew instantly by the darkness of her looks and the way of her dress. He had sensed, therefore, in her the spirit of the Madonna, with a face full of life and sorrow-filled compassion. She was, all at once, the silence and mystery of God, the flooring of all that was, is and will be. The wise Sophia reflected in earthly form whose home was in those stars that crowned her head and shone bright from out of those eyes. This brightness burnt into his heart as if it had been pierced by pieces of coal from the fire and he stretched forth his fingers to catch the apparition, but they did not seem to reach across the gulf between them – his fingers lingered in the air and touched nothing.

  He wondered if she were not his mother then, returned to take him to her heaven, emptying the very blood from his heart, drawing out the mystery from his soul, to make it a vessel for the blood of Christ.

  He held these thoughts inside his head and looked at them. Yes, he was certain he would die now from that pain which was giving birth to another more deep, making him out of breath. He felt himself drowning in a place where all things seemed white and dissolving. St Michael would have to find another finger to hold the mystery of the Order, for in a moment he would breathe out his soul to let it depart from the body that had served him all these years.

  But at that moment inside his chest there was felt a release, like the opening of a tap releases the wine from the barrel, and the blood flowed and warmed his body.

  A breath came then and with it life.

  The fire spluttered and roared and he gasped. Outside, the whooping air spoke to him, and told him that his soul was profane for desiring death before he met with the performance of his duty, and he saw the remonstration on the face of St Michael and on the brothers of his Order that were now dust and had died for the glory of Christ and the advancement of His Kingdom.

  Looking now upon the great expanse of those faces, he saw their disapproval and wanted to flee from it.

  I am not whole. A part of me is with the gold of the Order somewhere in the deeps of the ocean by now, while another part lies in France with my Grand Master. A further part has been left in Cyprus, and before that, a part was surrendered to the Holy Land. I am that part and this, this part and that, separated out, and all that is left to me are small, spare bits, like crumbs left for birds. How must such a small thing accomplish so great a task as that of killing the Order?

  The woman stood and poked the fire with a stick. The hut of stone was dark. There was the smell of goat milk and sheepskins.

  He closed his eyes and prayed that his brothers might forgive him, that God might forgive him.

  ‘My child is dead,’ the woman said to him, interrupting his meditation. ‘My man is dead and now my child.’

  Etienne laid back his head and let the spit come into his mouth. How must he think upon these earthly things when his heart was not on the earth but in the air? He looked at the woman and her face enticed from him a question. ‘Who killed your husband, Jewess?’ he said finally.

  ‘I am a baptised Christian, my name is Amiel.’

  He nodded and looked at the fire and almost fell asleep again, thinking that it was a good name, Amiel.

  ‘Those men,’ Amiel said, with a jerk of the head, ‘from the village . . . they killed my husband and my child. They came on the eve of Passover. My husband was bloodied from killing a lamb for the holiday. They accused him of killing Christians and took him to the bishop. They tortured him until he confessed to murder and named fifty others as helpers. They were all burnt in the village square. Why is a Jew worth less than a dog?’ She shot him a look, her eyes dry and distant. ‘The child died from the heartbreak. They made the poor thing watch his father burn. They baptised me, and this young one, the old man too, with a knife to our throats.’

  ‘What village is it?’

  ‘We are near the river, not far from here is the village. Do you not recall your hardships?’

  He gathered his thoughts together and looked to the woman. ‘I cannot.’ He sat up a little to clear his head, and it began to return, the house of the Order, the bodies, the gruelling journey over mountains and valleys, rivers and creeks, with little food, only what they could gather or kill, sheltering in caves. That had taken them many months, for he had made it a slow work since the wound in his side had not properly healed. He remembered the pass over the great mountains and the herbalist. The cure had taken long . . . and now he did not know how long it had been since he had taken himself from his Grand Master at Poitiers. He did not know and this made his mind go into a fog and his heart give a lurch for he remembered that Jacques de Molay and the brothers of his Order lay in the King’s prisons.

  ‘You have been sick in your travels,’ the woman said, ‘and starved nearly to death . . . You have slept for a week or more.’

  He shook his head of the fog and looked at the woman. ‘You speak French?’

  ‘My father was from Lyon.’

  He contrived to sit up further but the pain made inroads to his throat and he coughed into the fire like a tired old man – a dead man.

  ‘I have had a good piece of luck in your arrival for I have only my husband’s father with me, and he is very old. Your men are mending t
he hole in the roof of the barn and are seeing to the animals. If you stay until winter is passed I will not die in these forsaken hills. I will care for you and feed your men, you can build your strength and wait for good weather for your leave-taking.’ Then she said, as an afterthought, though it came out as if it were a knife through the throat, ‘You must know that I will not freely give my body. I will die first.’

  Etienne frowned under the weight of this and closed his eyes to dispel the vision that her words extracted from his soul. Visions of the flesh that time and again he had overcome, suppressed and defeated through fasting, penitence and prayer. He searched in his soul, where had he mislaid the Madonna, the great mother Isis? He searched the room; there was no sign of her presence, only the woman with the dark eyes staring from out of a dark face.

  The Jewess stood by the firelight, grim and determined. ‘I will live now only for the sake of the other child.’ She pointed to a corner where lay a small crib.

  The child in the crib made noises and the woman went to it. Etienne closed his eyes lest he see the apparition of the Madonna arise again to take him to God before his duty was done.

  A moment later he looked to her and saw that the child was at the pale breast, one hand at the tender skin. He closed his eyes again and reminded himself that a breast was a vision of both heaven and hell.

  ‘Rest,’ she said and began a song in the Jewish tongue, like a whisper into the child’s ear, and he looked once more and her hand was fondling the hand of that infant, and she was once more the picture of the Madonna, mother of all mothers.

  This song soothed him, and though his blood was thin, he sensed the pulse in it.

  St Michael was right, he would live longer.