The Fire and the Light

by Glen Craney

  “No!” insisted Loupe. “It is not decided.”

  Corba crawled toward Loupe in despair. “Is it not enough that the rest of us have forfeited our souls?”

  Loupe was implacable. “I said all must agree.”

  At the chapel door, Esclarmonde turned on Loupe with a wrathful glower. Only when Loupe broke off their silent challenge did Esclarmonde resume her entry into the sanctuary.

  Inside, she knelt before the altar and prayed for guidance. Yet after an hour of fervent supplication, the Voice had not answered her. In this, her moment of greatest need, she was again abandoned. She had sacrificed Guilhelm, Phillipa, and two children to this rapacious God. Even the Demiurge had held back Abraham’s plunge of the dagger into Isaac. She was only a woman of flesh. How could her love for these people be so contrary to the love demanded by the Light? Perhaps Guilhelm had been right in dismissing her faith’s abhorrence of violence. He had always insisted that certain acts were so evil that they cried out for resistance and retribution. If he had not killed Jourdaine, she would never have survived to take the Cathar vow and seek the Light’s salvatory release from this world. If Trencavel had not hesitated in dispatching de Montfort in the field below Carcassonne, Giraude and thousands of their countrymen might have been spared horrific deaths. If she had driven the knife into Folques’s heart that night of the Foix siege, her son would be with her now.

  The chapel door hinged open.

  Esclarmonde walked into the bailey with deadened eyes. She seized Loupe’s impaled sword by its cutting edges to indicate her assent to the raid. Blood trickled down her wrist—until Loupe pulled her aunt’s trembling hand away.

  Thus force will prevail where gentle persuasion has failed.

  - Dominic Guzman

  XXXII

  Avignonet

  May 1242

  The labored breath tinged with wine—a sweet Italian vintage, most likely one of the vernages preferred by the northern abbeys for their altars—warmed Chandelle’s neck again. Since childhood, her blindness had so heightened the compensating effectiveness of her other senses that some of her fellow perfectas had proclaimed her possessed of the second sight. In truth, she could never be certain when her common faculties gave way to the clairvoyance.

  Now, raw fear sharpened her instincts even more.

  Her wrists were bound in manacles and her feet stung from blisters raised during the forced march from Montsegur. Fighting fatigue, she stood erect to avoid showing weakness of resolve. Although her captors refused to reveal where she had been taken, she deduced from the cycles of darkness on her lids and the sunburn on the left side of her face that she had been led north for three days. A cacophony of urban sounds and aromas swirled around her. Clanging bread racks were being removed from the kilns, so it was early morning. The yeast, twice-baked for preservation during travel, smelled laced with sawdust, a ploy to deceive unsuspecting pilgrims. The nickering of horses was strenuous and deep, indicating military mounts. Hawkers with strange accents shouted their offers for religious baubles and competed against the percussion of clanking alms cups. The street stalls had been washed with lime and burning candles gave off the fragrance of expensive pork fat. Her eyes watered from the irritation of tannin used to dye wool black. The swishing of heavy robes near her feet was accompanied by the clop of sandals. Despite her fervent prayers that it be otherwise, every indication pointed to an ecclesiastic proceeding.

  “Where did you find this one?” That voice was perfumed with cloves used in monastic pompadours to ward off diseased humours.

  “Below the heretic mount,” said a younger man of small stature, old enough to shave but not deftly; the astringent of sweet gum on his jaw was mixed with dried blood.

  She was dragged barefoot through the sucking mud and forced to climb ten splintered steps. A restive crowd below her screamed curses. She heard a jangling of chains; other prisoners were also on the platform, muttering fearful prayers and calling for their families. Below her, musicians halfheartedly played tunes above the din, their keys intentionally off in a veiled act of protest. A slender hand that had never been roughened by a day of hard labor came under her chin and lifted her head.

  “Your name?”

  A woman shouted, “Give them nothing to write in their death books!”

  The hand firmed its threat to force her answer. “Chandelle.”

  “Who gave you such a pagan appellation?”

  She remembered Loupe had warned that the Catholic monks sensed fear like hounds smelled blood. Always offer a question to a question, she had been instructed. “Does not God give us our names before we are born?”

  “This one is clever,” said the older monk.

  “Where am I?” she asked.

  “Avignonet.”

  She was still in Occitania, praise be to God. Esclarmonde had preached in this village situated only a few leagues from Toulouse. There were several Cathar houses here and the populace was known to be sympathetic.

  Heavy footsteps circled her. “You wear the black robe.”

  “Is that forbidden?”

  “I will conduct this inquiry, not you.”

  She bowed her head in contrition. “I was told that the friars wear the black. I thought it was a color pleasing to God.”

  “What business did you have at Montsegur?”

  “Am I to know who questions me?”

  “The Inquisitor of the Languedoc.”

  She shuddered; the refugees at Montsegur had spoken of this new leader of the Dominican persecution as if he were the reincarnation of the devil Folques. The acrid smoke and stench of burnt flesh confirmed that she had not been the first to face such an ordeal here.

  “Because you cannot witness God’s work, I will describe it for you,” said William Arnaud. “Today is the fourth Sunday of the month. The day that our period of grace ends for voluntary confession of heresy. Those moved by God’s righteousness have come forward in the hundreds to profess their errors. They wear the yellow cross of lapsed faith.”

  “What has any of this to do with me?”

  “Those sinners who refuse to repent are chained to stakes,” said Arnaud. “I urge you to unburden your soul while you have the opportunity.”

  “I love God.”

  “Yes, but what Brother Otto and I must determine is whether you obey God. A heretic seductress named Esclarmonde de Foix once took refuge on the mount where you were found. Did you know her?”

  Why did the name Otto ring familiar? Her faith prohibited the utterance of a lie, so she searched for some answer that might satisfy the Dominicans while giving them no damning evidence. “I have heard of the woman. As have you, it seems.”

  “Where is she buried?”

  She realized that these monks believed Esclarmonde to be dead. Her godmother had not been seen outside Montsegur for years and rumors were rampant throughout the Languedoc that she had passed away soon after Bishop Castres’s death. The Cathars had done nothing to dispel the confusion in the hope that the Dominicans would finally give up their efforts to find her. But these black dogs remained hell-bent on digging up her remains to burn them in a public trial. She answered elliptically, “I have never seen her grave.”

  “Take the Eucharist,” ordered Arnaud.

  A bitter wafer was forced into her mouth. She tasted blood—she had bitten her tongue in the struggle to refuse the host. The inquisitor’s slap stung her nose like ant bites. She flinched with each passing shadow, not knowing when the next blow would land. All she had to do was swallow the crust. It was only unleavened wheat. What harm could come of it? No, it would be a betrayal of her family. There was no transubstantiation. God is not to be forced through the viscera and turned to excrement. The Demiurge was testing her. Even if she accepted this Roman sacrament, the demands would not stop. Next would be the kiss of the crucifix, then the declaration of apostasy. She could never return to Montsegur wearing that despicable yellow cross.

  Someone shouted, “Chew their damned
morsel and save yourself!”

  She spat out the host and clenched her teeth to prevent the abomination from being thrust down her throat. A cheer came from the crowd followed by a collective gasp of warning. Her wrists were hoisted above her head and her tunic was ripped from her shoulders, leaving her back exposed. The air snapped and cracked—her skin burned as if set afire. The lashes came so fast that the lacerations threatened to cut to the bone.

  “Who charges this woman?” shouted a man.

  The punishment abated as footsteps ascended the steps.

  “The Lord Jesus Christ is her accuser!” warned Arnaud.

  The protester came another rung up the platform. “Then let Christ Himself appear to testify against her!”

  Swarmed by murmurs of agreement, the Dominican guards raised their weapons in preparation to put down the nascent uprising. The platform swayed from the press of the angry mob.

  “Today it’s that woman up there! Tomorrow it’ll be us!”

  Arnaud stood behind Chandelle to ward off a hail of rocks. She lost consciousness as the soldiers dragged her down the steps.

  Chandelle was awakened by a scalding pain that branched down her torn back. She jumped to her feet and ran crashing into a wall. Crying and disoriented, she fell to her knees.

  “Sheep’s lard. Boiled with bark rind. Smells like rotten eggs, but it will speed the healing.”

  That was the same man’s voice that had come to her defense that morning. She crawled to a corner and gathered the torn tunic around her, listening intently for sounds of his approach. She calmed by telling herself that if the man intended to violate her, he would have done so by now. He touched her back again. She tested him by exposing her shoulder for more balm. As he rubbed the cool liniment across the welts, she tried to conjure an image of him from the tenor of his speech and lightness of his touch. He smelled of livestock and his hands were small and calloused like those of a farmer or field peasant.

  “You must know something that monk wants very badly.”

  She recoiled in suspicion. “Why do you say that?”

  After an extended silence, the man said, “He told me I could purchase my freedom if I got you to talk.”

  She covered herself with the tunic and slid away, reminded that she had violated the priestess discipline of avoiding intimate contact.

  “Have you always been blind?”

  “Have you always been nosy?” she countered.

  He backed off with palms raised in contrition, then remembered that she could not see the gesture. “I’m sorry if I offended you. I am Jean Fressyre. My kingdom consists of twenty mangy sheep and a lazy dog.”

  “Your dog may be lazy, but at least he kept his mouth shut today.”

  “You had a chance to save yourself, too.”

  “You can beat me all you want. I won’t say anything.”

  “You cloggers aren’t the only ones hunted by those monks.”

  “Are you not of the Roman faith?” she asked.

  “I’ve not missed a Lord’s Day Mass in ten years.”

  “Then you’re no different than those Dominicans.”

  He sighed. “Are we all devils to you?”

  “Each of us is a child of the Light or the Dark. God has no orphans.” She expected a rebuttal, but he was silent. Fearing that she had been too harsh, she asked, “Have you no family?”

  “I too will leave no orphans. I suppose you consider that a blessing.”

  She huffed in exasperation. Would the Roman priests never stop slandering her faith with the falsehood that her people despised children and murdered them at birth? “After a woman has raised her family, she is permitted to take the vow of a perfecta and spend the rest of her life in meditation and prayer. Your nuns are no different. Before death, we are given the Touch of Salvation.”

  “Have you taken this touch?”

  She coughed back a surge of emotion. “I had planned to this year, but ...”

  “But what?”

  She hid her face, ashamed that her useless eyes were watering useless tears. “I will die without it.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I’ll be sent back to this world, to seek release from the flesh again. I pray that my brothers and sisters find the Light and avoid that misfortune.”

  “Then your god is not just,” he insisted.

  “And your god is just? Allowing your pope to hunt us down when all we’ve done is try to live in the manner of the Apostles?”

  Jean contemplated her explanation for nearly a minute. “This redemption that is offered by your religion ... I’ve heard said that only another clogger can give it.”

  “The Touch has been transmitted from disciple to disciple since the time of the Master,” she explained. “We try to wait until the last moment to receive it. To sin after taking it dooms one to this world again.”

  Jean dipped his fingers into the balm and offered to apply another layer, lightly touching her shoulder to avoid startling her. She relented and raised the hair from her bent neck. What did it matter now? She was going to die without the salvation. None of her brothers and sisters would be with her during these last hours to offer her the Consolamentum. She sensed from the slowing of his caresses that he had fallen into deep thought. After several moments of silence, he covered her shoulders with the tunic and retreated into the shadows.

  “Thank you for coming to my—”

  “Will you give me your sacrament?” he asked.

  “You mock my faith?”

  “Am I not worthy of it?”

  “Yes, of course ... but aren’t you afraid of going to Hell for apostasy?”

  Jean gazed through the slit at the smoldering pyre stakes in the square. The air stank from the prior day’s burnings that had cost him several cherished neighbors. “Could Hell surpass this misery?”

  “You can still save yourself. Call for the parish priest in the morning and ask him to attest to your devotion.”

  Jean was confused by her reticence to convert him. “I thought you Cathars cajoled others into joining your faith?”

  “You must find your own truth.”

  He saw her shivering and wrapped her with his tattered cloak. “I’ve watched as your people go willingly to the fires. Why don’t you fight back?”

  “None of us wish to be murdered,” said Chandelle. “But Jesus taught that to turn against what one believes is a fate worse than death.” She felt him staring at her and, self-conscious of his inspection, ran her fingers through her hair in a futile effort to render it less unkempt. “There’s no need for you to die. You must tell the monks something about me to save yourself.”

  “No ... I would take this Touch of Salvation.”

  “You truly desire this?”

  “With all my heart.”

  For the first time in her life, Chandelle desperately wished for sight. The voice could dissemble but the eyes did not. Could she truly trust him? All members of her faith were required to grant the transmission if requested in earnest. Was he scheming to ferret out the secrets of the ritual for the Dominicans? She had never been clever enough to detect deceit in others, having so rarely been exposed to it. The monks often purchased the loyalty of family members and infiltrated them into the Cathar houses. She remembered the reason that Father Castres had given for his decision to participate in the Pamiers disputation: If but one spark from the Divine Flame can be returned to its source, is it not worth risking the world? With a fortifying breath, she clasped Jean’s hands within hers and whispered, “You must promise to stand against the Demiurge and those who trap us in these bodies and keep us from our true home.”

  “This world is filled with both good and evil,” said Jean. “I have seen evidence enough of that.”

  She listened for the footsteps of the guards. Assured that they were alone, she whispered, “We hold that all living things have souls and should be shown compassion and mercy. We refuse to slaughter animals.”

  Jean contemplated the stra
nge belief and laughed at the irony of his predicament. “I’ll no longer need my sheep. On this night, I declare them free.”

  She dutifully related the other tenets of her faith, then hesitated before revealing the last commandment, fearful that he would belittle her. “You must also abstain from all worldly desire. No carnal love.”

  Jean sighed. “I doubt I’ll be marrying before the morning.”

  “Are you certain of this decision?”

  He placed her hands on his head. “More certain than anything in my life.”

  She whispered the ritual prayer over him, “Do you promise to die in Christ, to waver not in the face of fire, to never denounce your faith?”

  “I do.”

  “Do you promise to love all brothers and sisters of the Light and to toil without cease until they are rescued from this world?”

  “I promise.”

  She felt his tears on her hands as she kissed his cheek for the final benediction. “You are a Bon Homme, Monsieur Jean. From this moment hence, walk always in the Light.” She tore a ribbon of cloth from the hem of her tunic and tied it around his waist. “It is our tradition that your ministry belt be given now. This will have to do.” She sank back into her corner, drained by the Light’s use of her body as a channel for the transmission. She thought about her family and those she had left behind at Montsegur. With the passing of so many days, they would have long since accepted her loss to the cycle of reincarnation. She wondered how she would be returned to this world. Would she be blind again? Perhaps she would be forced to suffer another affliction. There must have been some lesson in this life that she had failed to—

  “Chandelle, do you accept the baptism of the God of Light?”

  She felt Jean’s palms press against her forehead—a surge of heat shot across her temples. “What ... are you doing?”

  “I won’t let you suffer this world again.”