The Fire and the Light

by Glen Craney

  “Oc bitch!” He slammed a fist into her stomach. “You think you can deprive me of an heir?” He rifled through her baggage and slung her belongings across the floor. “What other pagan charms did you bring?”

  “It’s only a medicinal!”

  He shook her shoulders violently. “You take me for a fool? Expel it!” He punched her in the plexus again. “Give it up, damn you!”

  “I see you’ve commenced the marital education without us.”

  De Montfort stood grinning at the door with Folques. Esclarmonde scrambled under the quilt to hide her nakedness and spied the merel hanging over the edge of the mattress. When Jourdaine turned, she covertly slid it back under the matting. She held her breath as he crawled back into the bed and rolled over the talisman.

  “She’s just had her first lesson,” said Jourdaine, his hirsute chest heaving. “She may need a few more.” Seeing Folques mesmerized by Esclarmonde’s bared shoulders, he threw a boot to stir the monk from his unholy rapture. “Bleat your hosannas, Cistercian, then it’s back to your hair shirt.”

  Folques was sent reeling by the heel against his forehead. He recovered to his clerical duty with hands shaking as he sprinkled the betrothed with holy water. “I bless this bed in the name of the prophets. May Christian progeny result from it.”

  “Progeny will result from it,” promised Jourdaine.

  Folques circled the bed with an uncertain gait, unable to take his eyes from Esclarmonde in her revealing chemise. He, not the Gascon, had been destined to be in her arms this night. For years he had tried to chase the lustful fantasies. She was to blame for this deviation from God’s will. Now evil thoughts of adultery would be added to his shameful list of required expiations. “It is the prescription of the Church, woman, that you submit to your husband. You are forbidden to take pleasure from the consummation.”

  She escaped Jourdaine’s hold and rushed at Folques. “That will be the only wish of yours I’ll ever gladly fulfill!”

  Jourdaine wrangled her back to the bed. “Rattling cow! You’re not in that stinking mountain crib anymore. You’ll not speak unless ordered!”

  “You bless this, Folques?” She forced him to examine the mottling bruises under her eyes. “You bless this bed of blood?”

  Jourdaine’s hand sent another wave of prickly numbness across her face.

  Folques made a start to go to her aid, but de Montfort held him back and teased his old tilting mate with a lascivious wink. “Does she deny you your just reward, Jourdaine?”

  “She and that runt of a brother thought they could deceive me of an heir,” said Jourdaine. “I’ll have a son if I have to beat it out of her.”

  Distraught by the rough handling of Esclarmonde, Folques resolved to remind Jourdaine of the Church’s prescription against violence, even against recalcitrant wives. But before he could summon the words, de Montfort thumped the back of his tonsured head to speed his departure.

  At the door, de Montfort turned to impart a last indignity. “I leave on the morrow for the Holy Land, Madam L’Isle. No doubt I’ll encounter your Templar acquaintance. Shall I convey a message for you?”

  Esclarmonde could not bear the thought that this might be her last chance to communicate with Guilhelm. As Jourdaine’s hands caressed her throat with a promise of retaliation, she remembered Phillipa’s warning about the Demiurge and his Lords of Darkness. She had given little credence to the Cathar belief in such evil archons, but now she knew with certainty that they were all too real.

  She was surrounded by them.

  For the time will come when you will say: “Blessed is the womb that has not conceived and the breasts that have not produced milk.”

  -The Gospel of Thomas

  XII

  Gascony

  October 1201

  After three years of holding daily vigils at the window, Esclarmonde had given up hope of receiving news from Foix. To ease her boredom and loneliness, she would often escape to the church in L’Isle and brighten its walls with whitewash. The reward for this service was her discovery that the Benedictine friar who visited the village every third Sunday left a missal unlocked in the sacristy, confident that none in this isolated outpost could read Latin. Always confirming that she was alone, she would pore over the Scriptures, rewriting the verses in Occitan and adding her own exegetical commentary on scraps of linen. She argued with herself about the parables and allowed her imagination to run wild with their possible meanings. When finished, she was careful to burn the evidence of her study.

  On this frigid evening, suffering from one of her lowest moments, she hurried to the church and knelt before the Blessed Virgin. With the missal opened, she again begged to know why she had been cast to this Hell on earth. Receiving no answer, she was about to leave in dejection when the church shook with a thunderous crash. Her head exploded with the same swirling orb of Light that had incapacitated her in Lavaur. When she regained her sight, she felt compelled to focus upon the whiteness that surrounded the missal’s script. Her intuition of this command could only be described as the invisible giving form to the visible.

  The Light of the body is thine eye. If therefore thine eye be single, the whole body shall be full of Light.

  Tears of joy trickled down her cheeks. She had not been abandoned after all. The Voice from her youth had returned. She had always read the references to this Light as a metaphor for purity and goodness, but now she knew it to be a real force, one that acted directly upon the body. She looked down again at the Gospel of St. Matthew and there, coruscating on the page, were the very words she had just heard. She narrowed her concentration on the white borders only.

  John.

  This shift of attention from foreground to background of the letters had the inexplicable effect of admitting her into another realm of understanding. But what did the Voice mean by “John”? St. John the Baptist? The Gospel of St. John? She turned to John, her favorite of the gospels. Feeling vertiginous, she took the sensation as a sign to reread the passage she had just looked upon:

  The words that I speak unto you I speak not of Myself, but the Father that dwelleth in me, He doeth the works.

  Could this be the same Voice that had spoken to Jesus? Dare she let herself believe such a thing? She had performed no miracles or healings. Perhaps Satan was whispering these thoughts into her head.

  Verily, verily, I say unto you. He that believeth in me, the works that I do shall he do also. And greater works than these shall he do, because I go unto my Father.

  Her questions were being answered by Our Lord’s own words! If she could hear the same Voice that had guided Him, how could any person, great or small, be required to give up such a gift as the Church demanded? She searched for the passage cited by the monks to demonstrate the righteousness of Rome’s worldly rule. She found the verse in St. Matthew:

  Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I build my church, and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it.

  Flaming tongues consumed the passage as the whiteness bordering the words fought against the blackness of the ink. She rubbed her eyes in amazement: A new verse took form from the substance of the disappearing words:

  Jesus said, “Let one who seeks not stop seeking until one finds. When one finds, one will be disturbed. When one is disturbed, one will be amazed, and will reign over all.”

  Reign over all? If the Church was the supreme arbiter of God’s will, how could a mere mortal reign over all? She searched the passages in all four gospels, but she could find no evidence of that claim.

  The true revelation, said the Voice. The Gospel of Thomas.

  St. Thomas wrote a gospel? Why was it not included in the New Testament? The Voice of the Light seemed to be advocating not a blind obedience to the Pope and his doctrines, but a personal search for God.

  The line of script transformed anew:

  The Father will love you, and make you my equal.

  Had Jesus come into this world to reveal that all of us were His equal i
n potential? Was the Voice saying that we are gods? Or that Jesus was not God?

  James the brother.

  The older brother, again. If a gospel written by St. Thomas was rejected by the Church, then James, the brother of Christ, might also have authored a suppressed tract as the Cathar bishop had claimed. But why were these gospels not recognized in the canon? She waited, but this time the Voice did not answer.

  The rumbling of hooves shook the walls. She hid the missal under the floorboard and hurried from the church to find Simon de Montfort riding through the gate. In a crass demonstration of brute strength, he grasped the iron loop that hung from the arch keystone and braked his horse. Accompanying him on a palfrey was a wimpled lady with hard cyan eyes and a severe, mole-ridden face.

  Jourdaine ran out from the chateau to greet the unexpected arrival of his old comrade. “If you break my gate, you whoreson’s father, you’ll pay!” He inspected de Montfort’s new female consort. “What booty is this? A Greek princess from the emperor’s harem?”

  “My new bride,” said Simon in an uncharacteristic tone of rectitude. “May I present Lady Alice de Montmorency.”

  The lady waited with an air of hauteur until de Montfort came to assist her from the saddle, then she repulsed his tardy hand and dismounted of her own accord. She harrumphed at finding Esclarmonde still watching from the church steps. “I am accustomed to being greeted by both castellan and chatelaine.”

  Jourdaine jerked his head to summon Esclarmonde. “My wife was raised in Foix. They learn manners there from the cloggers and Saracens.”

  “I’ll abide no heretical talk in my presence,” warned the lady.

  “The Lord of L’Isle is a stickler on that discipline, my love,” assured de Montfort. “You can be certain he’s weaned her of such baneful influences.”

  “She’s become as meek as a lamb,” confirmed Jourdaine with a grin.

  Without waiting for an invitation, Alice marched nose retroussé into the chateau and coldly inspected the poorly lit walls that were hung with only a few frayed bargellos, a testament to Jourdaine’s niggardliness. She shook her head in abhorrence and threw her gloves at Esclarmonde’s feet. “See to my baggage.”

  Before Esclarmonde could recover from the woman’s astounding rudeness, Simon came sniffing up on her. “You remember me, I dare say.”

  She resolved to endure the debasement if it meant coaxing news about Guilhelm. She led them to the table and brought out a platter of cold duckling. Simon dug in with abandon. His wife refused to touch the serving.

  Jourdaine allowed Simon another ravenous bite before demanding, “Well, out with it! What news from the crusade?”

  Simon nearly choked from laughter. “Crusade? Is that what they’re calling that death march here? I left that rot-gut rabble before it set sail.” He remained oblivious to his wife’s glare of disgust at his reversion to camp manners.

  Jourdaine quaffed the last of the cheap cellar wine in his goblet, so thick that the dregs collected on his gaped teeth. “I’ve never known you to abandon an enterprise before the plunder is gained.”

  “The Franks are being played for fools,” said Simon. “The Venetians have taken them hostage on the galleys.” He gazed longingly at his new bride. “I returned to Paris and found my true love in the Capetian court.”

  Jourdaine chortled at his old friend’s unwonted display of affection. “A pity. I hear the Doge has designs on Constantinople. There’s enough gold in St. Sophia’s basilica to buy us both a kingdom.”

  “Greece is no place for a civilized man,” warned Lady Montmorency.

  Simon saw that Esclarmonde was hanging on every word. He broke a waggish grin and asked Jourdaine, “You remember that rogue Templar?”

  “I trust he dutifully fulfilled that vow we saddled on him?”

  “I encountered the lout at Corfu. He was—”

  “I wish to pray before retiring,” interjected Lady Montmorency.

  “Take her to the church,” Jourdaine ordered Esclarmonde with a wave of his knife. “Simon and I will plan our next tournament.”

  Esclarmonde tarried, desperate to learn if Guilhelm was alive.

  “My jousting days are over,” said Simon.

  Jourdaine could not believe his ears. “What say you?”

  “My beloved has convinced me that God holds greater use for my talents than breaking lances for hire. I’ve been graced with a newfound faith.”

  Lady Montmorency challenged Jourdaine’s hoot with a glare of threat. “Take heed of your own soul, sir, and leave my husband’s to my care.”

  Jourdaine’s mirth gave way to hot anger. “I knew your husband and his soul long before you leeched upon them, madam!”

  The lady retaliated by shoving Simon’s plate from his reach. “Apparently not long enough, or you would know that he will never take up the sword against fellow Christians, even if they be filthy Greeks.”

  Esclarmonde admired the lady’s mettle, however poisonous her tongue might be. She had never witnessed anyone leave Jourdaine speechless. Yet she was amazed at how little the woman knew about the reprobate she had married.

  “I am intent on Palestine,” revealed Simon sheepishly.

  Jourdaine greeted the revelation of that ambition with a dismissive huff. “You’ll pay your own freight. No Venetian will ever ship you over there.”

  For once, Lady Montmorency agreed with Jourdaine. “Why must you cross the sea when there are infidels here in our own lands to exterminate?”

  Jourdaine pounded the boards in mock excitement. “A crusade in Occitania! What say you? Gain our indulgences without suffering the heat of a desert!”

  Simon turned serious as he leaned across the table. “You jest, but the Cistercians say Innocent plans to rid the South of these wretched cloggers.”

  Esclarmonde tried to conceal her listening by removing the cutlery. She had been kept deprived of all news regarding the developments in Occitania. This was the first she had heard of the new directive from Rome. If Phillipa’s people were in danger, she had to find a way to send a message to Foix.

  “Innocent would never use force in a Christian kingdom,” said Jourdaine.

  “He’ll learn soon enough that these damnable heretics won’t be converted from the pulpit,” said Simon. “Let him send his monks into the Languedoc churches. When the Ocs toss them out on their asses, we’ll swoop—”

  “I wish to leave this outpost at first light!” The lady had suffered enough of their vulgar conversation. “Simon, will you join me for evensong in the chapel?”

  Arising, Simon caught Esclarmonde watching him intently at the door. “Jourdaine, I believe your wife wishes me to finish my news about that Templar.”

  Jourdaine erupted from his chair and struck Esclarmonde across the face. Stifling painful coughs, she opened the door for the de Montforts to exit.

  “Wait!” Simon turned. “I nearly forgot.” He motioned for his lady’s handbag and pulled a letter from it. “The nuns at Grandselve asked me to deliver this.”

  Annoyed, Jourdaine tore open the wax-sealed letter. “What do those hags want now? I gave them their annual donation.” He read its contents and nodded with grim satisfaction. “They’ve bestowed a Mass on my behalf.”

  “For what purpose?” asked Simon.

  “They wish to pray over me ... that I be granted an heir.”

  “They’re angling for an endowment,” insisted Simon.

  “Signed by the Abbess herself.” Jourdaine sneered at Esclarmonde. “It’s heartening to know that at least one woman wishes me so rewarded.”

  Shamed by their judging glares, Esclarmonde rushed to remove the serving platter. She had submitted to Jourdaine’s advances, but he continued to accuse her of plotting to avoid becoming with child. She acceded to his inane regime to improve the chances of conception: Crossing her legs, avoiding sudden movements after coitus that might jar the seed, gorging on chestnuts and leeks, reciting the Nicene Creed ten times before bed. He constantly monit
ored her for generative signs such as shivers or the grinding of teeth and was now insisting that she place garlic cloves in her womb to fertilize it. Her spirit had long given up the resistance to his demands, but her body had not.

  Jourdaine tucked away the letter with a troubling grin. “The Abbess has also offered to examine you for demonic marks.”

  Esclarmonde dropped the tray and sent the tableware crashing in shards. “I’ll not have sterile nuns pawing my person like some altar relic!”

  “Impertinent cow! They’re no more sterile than you!”

  “Then take one of them as your wife!”

  Jourdaine slapped her to the floor. From her knees, Esclarmonde looked up to find Lady Montmorency tapping her foot in irritation at the delay.

  Two hundred veiled nuns and widowed conversi filed into the choir stalls of Grandselve, a dour Cistercian compound that sat like a giant dovecote amid the sweeping vineyards north of Toulouse. The abbey’s most notable feature was its sprawling double houses of monks and nuns separated by a high curtain wall that prevented the holy orders from leering at each other with lascivious intent. The buttressed church with its thick corner turrets and machicolated arches looked more like a fortress than a place to inspire worship. Instead of being built with a clerestory, the thick perimeter of its lugubrious nave was rimmed by slatted allures that allowed access to narrow embrasures for the firing of arrows.

  The Abbess, distinguishable from the other nuns only by her red mantle, led Jourdaine and Esclarmonde down the aisle to the front pew. Esclarmonde’s bruised face remained covered, as was required of women in the presence of the Eucharist. A ringing bell on the far side of the screen signaled the Introit.

  The Abbess whispered, “The inspection will be conducted now.”

  “I must witness the perusal,” said Jourdaine.

  “It would not be wise,” warned the Abbess. “If there is necromancy at work, the demons could attach to your own soul. Remain here and say the Pater Noster five hundred times without error to seal the spiritual protection. Should your mind wander, you must start the recitation anew.”