The Oblate's Confession

by William Peak

  terror he has suppressed all day unleashed, set loose, a terror so big he cannot contain it, a terror so big it spills from him like something alive, something crazed and alive that bounds about the room, howls and shrieks at him from the rafters, from beneath the bed, over the door, till it seems it must explode, the room, the house, must explode with the exigency of it all, the holy man yelling No! out there like that, and he has to get out of here, escape from this place, this room, these women, this living and uncontainable terror.

  And the next thing he remembered was stars. A collision, someone’s legs, the sound someone makes when their back strikes the ground, the wind driven from their lungs, and then he was out, free, the sky overhead dark and full of stars. And for a moment it was wonderful. When he told me about it all those years later that was one thing he remembered well, how good it had felt to be outside, how really fine, as if one actually could escape such terror, leave it behind, blind and shut-up in a room.

  And then he saw the holy man.

  The open area before the houses had at first seemed almost empty, surprisingly empty for all the noise it had generated, one or two old men beating on a drum, someone playing a pipe, but, otherwise, apparently, no one. Then he saw the priest, the one he had been taught to address as “Father.” He hadn’t noticed him at first because he hadn’t expected to see him (anyone really) in such a position, the two of them, the priest and old man Baldred, not arguing with one another by the fire as might be expected after that No!, but lying on the ground, both of them dirty and disheveled, entangled in one another’s arms like little boys tussling, like two little boys caught tussling. And they were looking at him. He remembered that well, Father did, the two faces almost comic in the firelight, open-mouthed, staring at him as if embarrassed to have been found in such a position, no one moving, no one saying a thing. And he almost laughed, the two grownups on the ground like that, their faces, his unexpected freedom, he almost laughed, but he didn’t, because there was something about the faces he didn’t like, something about the way they looked at him,

  the way they looked at him and then turned in unison, turned in unison as if part of the same pantomime, turned and looked from him up and out into the darkness over the fields.

  And Gwynedd (the fear creeping back into him now, the fear seeping from between the legs of the women in the doorway to creep across the ground and back into him like something alive, something alive and full of worms) looked that way as well. And saw lights. A confusion of lights really. Torches. Most of them up on the rocky place, Dacca’s crag, but another, a single torch, down below the others, below the others and off to the left, above the fields. And for a moment the little boy is very much afraid, terrified, his mind unable to make the necessary connections, the lone torch seeming to float ghost-like above the fields, a will o’ the wisp, a fiery demon. But then, thankfully, it all comes clear, his mind showing him the scene as it would appear in daylight, the position of the light suddenly evident, reasonable. Someone was up on the ridge. Someone was standing up on the ridge (the one that rode the fields like a boat and sometimes figured in his dreams), someone was standing up there and waving a torch at the people up on the crag. Who, in turn, seemed to be waving back. Or something.

  But it was then that he heard the movement, all that had happened since his escape taking but an instant—the collision, the firelight, the priest and old Baldred, their look, the torches, his resolution of their respective locations—all of this having taken but a moment, and then the women were upon him and he was up and running, hands thrown over his head, running out into the peas, the chard, hiding himself among the plants of the field.

  But it was here, as I remember it, that Father stopped for a moment in the telling of his story, hesitated, cocked his head as if looking at something he had not seen before. For though he knew he had hidden among the peas, could as yet smell them, still, at the same time, he also knew—or at least had always believed— that the rites performed that night were undertaken by hill people only during the short days, mid-winter, long before any crop would have come in. So how could he have hidden among peas?

  But there was no changing it. He remembered peas, the smell of peas, their placid vegetable scent somehow reassuring after the alarms of the night. And stars. He was sure of that, winter or summer there had been stars, a great dark dome of sky struck through with stars—and beneath that silent turning beneficence, torches, the one upon the ridge waving and the others, those up on the mountain, waving back. Or something. Were they dancing? It seemed, as he watched them, that they were, and that there was one, a giant seemingly, taller than the others, much taller than the others, that danced with an abandon he could not credit, an improbable jangling that defied logic, the human form not meant to bend like that, the chest seeming to flex at mid-point so that, for a moment, his mind told him he watched not a man but a snake, a snake capable of bending where it willed. And then, again in an instant—the entire evening a collection of such moments, fragments of time clashing and colliding with one another—he realized his error, the dancer not taller but raised, suspended, the dancer not dancing but dangling, the dancer not a dancer but....

  And again he was running, tearing through the fields mindless now of stake or stem, feeling neither obstacle nor blow, hurrying to her though it was of course impossible, too late, the fields great, the river deep, the mountain high between them, and yet he was already hurrying toward her, arms already raised as if to hold her, lift her above the noose’s suffocating embrace, for what else could he do? What else could he do except pray, pray as he never had before, that the heathen would relent, relinquish their devilish plans for her, take his mother down, save her.

  And it was that, he told me, that in the end he found the most cruel. For they did. Amazingly, incredibly, after he had taken not more than three or four running strides, as if in answer to his prayers, as if petitioning heaven with him, the heathen lifted their arms toward his mother, torches dancing, sparks rising into the sky, lifted their arms toward her and carefully, gently, took her down, removed his mother’s head from the rope, deposed her, took her down from the tree. And she was still alive. You could see that—faint clearly, unable to walk on her own, men supporting her

  on either side, someone else holding their torches—yet alive, his prayers answered, fulfilled, the miracle, his first, performed, accomplished, confirmed.

  But then they lifted her up again. At first it looked so gentle, so kind, the men locking arms, cradling her, each clearly taking his position with some pride, an awareness of the responsibility incumbent upon him, lifting in a single movement, all heads turned toward his mother’s, gentle, caring, solicitous, but going the wrong way, the strange procession lit by torches held high as if to see her face, watch for any discomfort it might betray, but turning the wrong way, going not down but out, not down the mountain but out, out onto Dacca’s crag.

  And it was then that he knew what they were going to do. As if he controlled the men, as if it were his thoughts that determined their behavior, he knew what was going to happen next, how they would come to a stop at the end of the crag (his mother’s feet suspended above the abyss), how they would stop, hesitate, look at one another, out at the lone torch floating above the fields, back at one other, and then, in accord with some signal he could not perceive (could not imagine), they would begin to move, begin to rock his mother, in unison, back and forth between them, rock her like a baby, arms swinging from side to side, first his mother’s head, then her feet, protruding from their little huddle. And then they were doing it. As in a dream when our worst fears call forth exactly that which we most dread, they were doing it, rocking her, torches held high, the sacred bundle that was his mother rocking back and forth there upon the crag, upon the very tip of Dacca’s crag.

  When they threw her there was a moment in which Gwynedd’s mother seemed to rise instead of fall. He told me that, remembered that, how she’d seemed to rise into the torchlight, arms
thrown out as if enjoying herself, as if this were all just part of some wild and scary game; and then she’d vanished, disappeared into the vast and echoing darkness that hung, loomed, before the crag. She didn’t say anything. He didn’t hear her scream or anything. Just that one reflexive movement of the arms, a final attempt

  to grab something, save herself, and then the small bundle that was his mother had entered the night, his mind madly plotting the arc of her descent, making desperate calculations, contriving improbable outcomes, unlikely interventions.

  There was a sound, he said, I remember him telling me that, that there was a noise. Branches breaking somewhere on the side of the mountain, the first of the trees being struck, and then, in quick succession, an awful sound, and a second. Gwynedd’s mother had come to rest.

  You know, even after all these years, even though I’ve had a lifetime to grow accustomed to the idea, it’s still hard for me to believe that, child that I was, I was able to discern the link that exists between myself, that dream, and the disreputable doings of those old ones. And how much more difficult it must be for you, my brothers. Even now I can hear you complaining, reminding me (as we always do) that some things are best left unsaid, that some histories should not be recorded, are unworthy of the vellum. After all, you ask, what’s the point? How could anyone, even in a dream, connect two such things, the pagan practices of our pagan past with a wagon ride up the abbey path? Yes. Yes indeed, how could one? Yet that is exactly what my mind did. And when, at last, my poor dim faculties recognized the connection, saw in it the genesis of my dream, the bolt slid quietly home. The door closed, the bolt slid home, and any other possibility was shut off from me. The fear the little boy Gwynedd felt when he realized the women who watched over him were not his guardians but his guards, this was my fear. The terror he felt, the terror that sprang from him at that moment, all the more ferocious for having been so long repressed, this was the terror I felt—had, I now realized, felt and repressed every day of my oblate life. For years now I had told myself I wanted nothing more than to grow up, could hardly wait to assume the responsibilities, the privileges, of a solemnly-professed monk. Yet now, now that the wagon had begun its

  climb, now that the monastery was within view, solemn profession an inevitable fact, I realized I knew nothing of this, had not an inkling of what it meant, where I was being led to, what I was going to do.

  XXXV

  The end, when it came, was, I suppose like most endings, anticli-mactic. Godwin was not subsumed, bodily, into perdition; my father did not return to call me home, declare me his true and rightful heir; Eanflæd did not cover her hair, join us upon the terrace— my wishes, my dreams, remained, as I suppose they always had been, phantoms, nothing more. But Victricius did die. Oh yes, as we all know, Victricius died.

  Of course people will tell you he sent everyone away, monks will tell you that, but it’s not true. He didn’t send me away. And if it really was intentional, if sin was involved, doesn’t that strike you as odd? I mean, after all, he had no real affection for the helpers Godwin had given him, the ones he’d stolen from Brother Osric. Brothers Athelstan, Rufinianus, and Tilmon were good men, hard

  workers, but they were like everyone else. They didn’t think much of Victricius, did little to hide their contempt for him. So why should he have gone to such lengths to save them, protect them from complicity in his supposed act? And what is more, why hold me close? Why risk the one person I honestly believe he still cared for? I know he should not have. It shames me now to remember how badly I treated him, but I believe Brother loved me still, cared for me, in his own peculiar way, as much as Gwynedd or even Dagan. Yet it was I he asked to remain behind that day, I he asked to take my place at the bellows, to pump as he fed, the two of us once again united in work if not in mind, our shoulders and backs in thrall to the furnace.

  I can still see those bellows, can still feel the pole, solid, beneath my palms: the initial opposition as I bear down upon it, the anguished sigh when, reluctantly, it gives way, submits to the pressure of my weight, whistles—at my insistence and not its own—lewdly up the thighs of old brother furnace. All of which must seem strange to those of you whose only knowledge of such a thing is the pile of rotted hides and beams that now lies alongside what we still call the furnace path. Yes. Yes, that was the bellows. But when you imagine that moth-eaten collapse animated, breathing, you must not picture a simple bladder squeezed between two sticks such as Brother Kitchens might use at his oven or a smith at his forge. No, our bellows was a far grander affair than that. It took the lives of four full-grown deer to make the bag, their skins worked by a company of virgins that then lived upon the lower Meolch. When I was given in service to Brother Victricius that bag was already many years old, yet it remained soft, supple, like glove leather, its surface still bearing, here and there, the impress of tiny teeth. Ultimately the hides had been delivered (with much ceremony) to Redestone for sewing. Until just a few years ago there was a brother yet alive at our abbey who, when the weather changed, could point at a sliver of scar on the little finger of his right hand and, with a movement of that hand, remind you of the way in which he’d pulled those stitches tight. Once his (and how many others’?) work on the hides was done—the seams

  tarred, the chamber airtight—the resulting sack, looking now like a giant’s stomach trussed and bound for market, was roped in place between linden poles and slung up at the base of the furnace. The whole thing—poles, bag, spout—nearly as big as an ox.

  And this, I can hear you wondering, was driven by a boy? Well, yes and no. I did operate the bellows, but I would not have been able to do so long without the assistance of an ingenious device created by Brother Victricius. The way it worked was this: Pumping a blast of air into the furnace by forcing the top pole of the bellows down against the bottom had the simultaneous effect of raising a large stone into the air, the stone being connected to the upper pole by a length of cord strung over a beam. Once raised to the level of the beam—and left to its own devices—the stone naturally enough sank back to the earth whence it had come, its weight, in turn, pulling the cord after it over the top of the beam; which, in turn, pulled the bellows back open again. And here it was that I came in, for I weighed slightly more than the stone. Grabbing the upper pole and raising my feet, my weight alone was enough to pull the bar back down to earth, once more pumping air into the furnace and, at the same time, raising the stone back up to the wooden beam. Releasing the pole of course reversed the action, stone returning to earth and bellows reopening. A complete cycle took about as long as a Pater Noster said quickly, but over time I could, with the aid of Victricius’s machine, deliver quite a bit of air into the furnace.

  On that day, as I remember it, all was working as it should have been, the stone rising and falling monotonously, the furnace hissing and popping, so that, as was my habit, I had fallen into a sort of reverie, not really attending to the motions of the day but, instead, abstracted, the regular wheeze and sigh of the bellows providing a sort of rhythm for my thoughts.

  And then it stopped. Suddenly and without warning, the bellows stopped, and for a moment I dangled beneath its upper pole, daydreams dissolving around me, thoughts in tatters, the bellows yawning wide-open before me, triumphant, leering, refusing to close. Then, thankfully, I noticed the hand, and was at once both

  furious and chagrined. It was Victricius. Victricius had crept up on me and, as was a habit of his, a trick he sometimes played, had stayed my stroke with the strength of one of his short but sturdy arms.

  I lowered my feet to the ground. Feeling useless and small, impatient and annoyed, I lowered my feet to the ground, touched earth, stood up.

  Victricius glanced at me, then back up at the sky, nodded in that direction. I looked where he indicated but could see nothing, the sun still below the tops of the trees, the light as yet liquid, fragile, cold. I shook my head, No, no I don’t think it’s Terce yet.

  The furnace master’s expressio
n did not change. He lifted a hand, pointed, not at the sky but at the stack, the stack which.... But here my mind stuttered, stopped, went, for a moment, deaf and dumb. The stack was empty. The stack which sat atop the furnace, which sat atop the furnace I’d been stoking since before sunrise, the stack which sat atop the popping, hissing, broiling furnace was empty, not a whiff of smoke issuing from its throat,

  only a slow and sinuous wavering of the air around it to show it was even attached to, part of, the vent for, the hot and bulging shape beneath it.

  “There’s an obstruction,” said Victricius. It was the first thing he’d said all day and—like so many things Victricius said— seemed unnecessarily brutal. “A pestilence is coming,” he’d told the community, and so it had, and half the community had died. And now he said there was an obstruction and, by saying it, seemed to make it so, gave the situation all the gravity and alarm he had taught me to associate with the word obstruction. Yet even as I thought this, even as I felt myself annoyed with the furnace master, irritated, another part of me was secretly pleased with Victricius, glad to have him with me. For if anyone could deal with a problem like this, if anyone knew how to face down such a danger, defeat it, it was the furnace master. I looked at him. As a child looks to its mother when in danger, I looked at Victricius and, in my heart, I drew near.

  I wondered what he would do. This had never happened

  before. He had talked about it of course, warned of such things, had even told me what must be done in the event of an obstruction, that the blast must be stopped, the furnace dismantled, the blockage, whatever it was, cleared; but I wondered if he would do that. Now that the crops were in the ground, Father Abbot was anxious again about his iron, had ordered Victricius to work unceasingly till he had made up all that had been lost to the Mercians in their raid. If Brother stopped now, all our charcoal would have been burned for naught, all the limestone ruined, to say nothing of the time required to rebuild the furnace, reestablish a proper charge. Who knew what Godwin would say—Godwin who knew nothing of iron-making yet spoke as though he knew all?