A Place of Light

by Kim Silveira Wolterbeek

  Just as he feared he could not go another step, one day in early spring Robert climbed a gentle slope and spotted the Loire Valley. Gnarled cabernet vines budded pale green beside densely tufted squirrel grass. Along the great expanse of scattered tributaries, rush and trailing periwinkle blossomed in profusion. A green island of hemlock bristled in a wide bend of the river, and on the other side of the valley, a line of bluffs grew woolly with vegetation.

  Turning to the cluster of pilgrims, Robert announced in a voice that lifted up and carried through the clear air, “Today we celebrate mass under clear skies. Afterwards, we rest. Then tomorrow, God willing, we’ll reach Vendôme.” Guiding the ass beneath the shade of a cypress, he dismounted and began dragging sack after sack from the animal’s back. He placed the sack of holy implements on a patch of clover. On his knees, right arm buried deep in the burlap sack, he was searching for his silk amice when he heard someone approach.

  “Master,” Moriuht said, “Bernard and I have been hunting. Look what we bagged!” In one fist he clasped the ears of a hare, in the other he dangled two fat partridges by the legs. His smile revealed a scarcity of teeth, one chipped at an angle, a gift from the Vikings who had captured him in his youth and kept him in servitude for five years. His hair, which grew away from his face in great ragged snarls, was a shade or two lighter than his gold-streaked beard. “We have food. Let the women prepare a meal.”

  “And where did you hunt these animals?” Robert asked.

  Moriuht looked down at his bare feet. “Over yonder, in that forest beyond the stream.” He pointed to a lush expanse of trees covering the opposite slope of a valley.

  “Is that… open land?” Robert asked.

  “Some of the trees bore noble arms.” His right foot moved back and forth over new grass. “But our fare has dwindled so…” he added.

  Lean and hollow-eyed, the pilgrims looked to Robert for direction. If he were to lead them, he must tend to their physical needs as diligently as he ministered to their souls, fostering hope as freely as he dispensed blessings.

  “My son, do you realize that theft is a sin?” Robert said. His compassionate tone took some of the sting out of his words.

  Moriuht’s shoulders slumped.

  “Now my son,” Robert said, placing a hand upon his shoulder, “do not despair. Each of us sins seven times a day. What is important is to recognize your sins, repent, and avoid repeating them.”

  “Yes, master.” Moriuht said. “I shall pray for forgiveness and promise never to poach a Lord’s land again!”

  Robert marveled at how God could transform a mouth of rotten teeth into such a compelling smile. “What’s done is done. Now give your ill-gotten gains to the women. The pilgrims need sustenance.”

  Moriuht hurried off to join a group sitting on a field of grass commanding a view of the valley below. He lifted the game above his head, laughing. The women rose to their feet and cheered. Immediately they began gathering peat and cow dung—fuel for a dozen fires.

  Part of Robert took delight in their joy. More and more his mind felt muddled by contradiction. Theft was a sin. On the other hand, the people were hungry and deserved their share of God’s plenty.

  The pilgrims gathered for mass under a cloudless sky. Afterwards, Robert sat at the base of a tree and watched Marie prepare stew, adding radishes and carrots to the fresh rabbit and partridge. The sweet odor drew Robert and repelled him. He had not eaten meat for several years, nor even tasted warm food for months, since asceticism led him to eat mostly herbs and roots and drink only an occasional drop of wine.

  “What is it you’re thinking about with that far away look?” Marie asked. “Is this your place of light? Is this where you’re taking us?”

  “No, mother,” he said in a soft voice. “Our journey is not over.”

  “I thought not,” she said. As she stirred the stew, Marie looked off into the rolling landscape. Since they had left Rouen, her cough had worsened, her breathing grown shallow and labored.

  “You know the story of Mary Magdalene?” Robert asked, sitting at the base of a tree.

  “You mean the crazy woman who witnessed the Lord’s Resurrection?”

  He nodded, rolling his tense shoulders. He took strength in the scent of new growth and the solid feel of the bark against his back. “Mary Magdelene was a woman devoted to sin whom Christ saved, a great example of His love for even the lowliest of his creatures.”

  “I have heard she was a woman possessed.” Marie brought a wooden spoon full of stew to her lips and slurped noisily before adding several pinches of salt.

  “Yes, Christ expelled seven demons, and she became his follower.”

  “I guess the world has always been hard on whores,” Marie said, shaking her head and frowning at Agnes and Arsen who were spinning great dizzy circles in a patch of clover.

  Marie again brought the wooden spoon to her lips, blew away rising steam, and took another sip of the stew. This time she smiled and nodded with satisfaction.

  Robert followed the twins’ progress until he noticed Madeleine on a nearby knoll. She smiled at the flight of a starling before stepping into the shade of a broad-leaved oak and returning the call of a warbling turtledove. The twins’ laughter rolled up from the valley floor where they stood in knee high clover, watching Robert watch Madeleine’s every move.

  “Beatrice, Flo,” Marie called out, smoothing her serge cloak with the flat of one palm. “Tell Maddy to stop talking to those birds and the three of you come help me serve.”

  While the young women ran off to retrieve Madeleine, Robert went to stand beside Marie. “How are you feeling?” he asked.

  “The coughing fits come and go,” Marie said with a note of resignation.

  “I, myself, am given to frequent fevers. So I guess we have something besides our pride in common, don’t we?” Robert said.

  Marie looked at him and a wry smile formed on her lips.

  “Maybe we do,” she said.

  In Toulouse, the city of Philippa’s birth, the buildings flushed strawberry at sunrise. La Rose, the residents called it. The bricks, molded from Garonne river mud, were flecked with quartz. Sunlight fondling crystal gave the buildings their astonishing color although old timers attributed it to a miracle.

  Philippa was a young girl sitting on her father’s knee the first time she heard the story of the miracle of Toulouse.

  “An old nun seeking shelter for a band of weary pilgrims became hopelessly lost in the brambled forest of Espinasse,” he began.

  “What’s brambled?” she asked, for Philippa never hesitated to interrupt her father. She knew that, unlike most grownups, her questions delighted him.

  “Brambles are prickly shrubs, like rose bushes or raspberry canes,” he explained, tousling her hair. “The nun and her followers would surely have perished had the Virgin not looked down from heaven and, seeing their plight, warmed the cool night with her rose-scented breath. Then, guiding the pilgrims to a clearing, she instructed them to build a city on the hill. For many months the pilgrims quarried and cut stone, working long hours in the warmth of the Virgin’s command. Even after the task was completed, her holy presence lingered in the quartz-flecked Garonne river bricks,” he said, kissing Philippa’s crown. Her father’s kisses felt like warm tickles, but before she could share this discovery with him, he lifted her off his lap. “Now run along my gold-haired darling,” he said, “but never forget that you come from a place of miraculous beauty.”

  The day Philippa’s party arrived at Poitiers, puddles froze and fog dripped beads of moisture that clung to Philippa’s curls. What struck her first, however, was not the inclement weather but the starkness of the buildings; even William’s stone palace, situated on a large hill in the center of the city, lacked color. Massive crenellated towers with narrow loopholes flanked the entrance. William’s coat of arms, engraved abo
ve the doorway, provided the only ornamentation. Philippa pulled her cloak tight against her shoulders and wondered what manner of man could live in such forbidding bareness.

  The Duke’s steward, a tall man with an officious voice, greeted the travelers and explained that William had been called by the King to engage in battle against the northmen. He led them through an arched doorway into the Great Hall. The enormous rectangular room, cluttered with tapestries depicting battle scenes and hunts, smelled of mildew and yesterday’s repast. A raised dais lit by a double row of windows dominated the wall opposite the entrance.

  “A most imposing size,” Sophie said, lifting her head to the towering ceiling.

  “Careful with that trunk!” Sibyl chastised a servant, her fingertips nervously brushing her thumbs. The hollow echo of footfalls reverberated as she hurried across the tile.

  Philippa surveyed the cold expanse of her new home and her throat tightened. No vase of flowers brightened the enormous trestle table that ran the length of the platform. No bundles of dried lilac or bowls of rose petals sweetened the stale air. The thick walls reminded her of a dungeon.

  And indeed, after her brother returned to Toulouse, she and her aunts spent several days sequestered in a dank chamber on the upper floor of the palace waiting for William’s return.

  “I shall go mad with boredom,” Philippa said, rising up on tiptoes and peering through a high window to the empty keep below.

  “Let’s put our idle minds to work reading biblical passages aloud. Here,” Sibyl said, passing Philippa the leather-bound book. “You first.”

  Initially the familiar passages provided distraction. But after an hour Philippa closed the Bible, placed it on an end table and began pacing. “How much longer will he keep us waiting? I can’t stand it!” she said, pausing to stomp her foot.

  Sophie frowned.

  “Oh, dear,” Sibyl said, plucking at the cloth of her skirt, “I’m sure your Duke will arrive soon enough.”

  Before dawn the following morning, the sounds of shouts, clinking bridles, and slamming doors woke Philippa. The scent of cooking and the sound of loud, raucous laughter thrilled Philippa and reminded her of the time a spooked gelding had carried her wagon to the pebbled edge of a ravine. The fatigued tread of a booted man mounting the stone stairs ended Philippa’s reverie. She held her breath at the sound of a key slipping into the chamber door.

  “I am William,” the intruder announced, in a voice burnished with power. Philippa could not see his face, just his shadowed bulk in the doorway. And while she felt certain that the words were directed at her, they seemed to exclude her as well. The Philippa Lord William addressed was the daughter of a wealthy man. The one who listened was the secret climber of elm trees, the one with the courage to scale wobbly ladders and straddle fences. That Philippa could coax a laugh from gruff Uncle Bernard, knock almonds from the highest branches, sew French seams and flatter chrysanthemums into blooming long past their season.

  “Gold hair,” he mumbled. “Your father said you had gold hair.”

  Sibyl and Sophie buried their faces in blankets. Their gray hair, lit by the glow of a full moon, fanned against their pillows. Slowly Sophie slid both arms beneath her coverlet, a silent stealth that frightened Philippa more than William’s presence.

  His heavy boots scraping the floorboards, his scabbard dragging, he approached her bed.

  “Gold!” he said, winding a strand of her hair around his finger.

  A bolt of fear surged through Philippa’s body. Her breath puffed white in the icy room.

  Without another word, William removed his poppy-colored cloak, and climbed on top of her.

  Philippa wrapped her hands around William’s biceps. “Stop!” she said, dragging her nails the length of his forearms.

  With drunken urgency, he gathered a fist full of Philippa’s gown and yanked it up over her knees, belly, and breasts until the gown noosed her neck like a tourniquet. Hands shaking, Philippa reached up and pulled the gown over her head.

  His hard body—wooled over and muscled hard as a bull’s flank—bore down on hers with dumb animal insistence, prodding her insides and tearing her open. Her womb clinched like a fist and her stomach surged. Light splintered and exploded into pain that settled behind her eyes. She felt a brief flutter of William’s heartbeat before he gasped and rolled off of her.

  The musky smell of the barn filled the air. Standing beside the bed, William used a corner of the sheet to wipe a smear of her blood from his sex. And then, turning his head, he seemed to notice for the first time the scratches on his arms.

  “She devil!” he mumbled. “Golden-haired she devil!” Swabbing at his scratches with the soiled sheet, he mingled his blood with hers.

  Before he tugged up his breeches, Philippa studied his privates hanging soft between his thighs, the blond tuft of pubic hair that climbed and thinned below his navel. Wanting to see and not wanting to see, she looked until she realized that her curiosity delighted him. His smile turned into a smirk, and quite suddenly she was aware of her own nakedness. Blushing, she covered herself as best she could.

  “Now we’re married,” he said, and made to leave the room. At the door he hesitated. Palm flattened against jamb, he turned and walked back to her bedside. Time slowed as William lifted Philippa’s wrist to his mouth. Even as she struggled to pull free, she felt her pulse flutter.

  William shrugged off his tunic, unbuttoned his pants and took her again, slowly. His hands brushed her thighs and glided the length of her torso. His breath glossed her lips when he called out her name. Afterwards, he kissed her, dressed and left the room.

  Philippa huddled in silence, not wanting to wake the others (although surely they only pretended to sleep!). Sophie turned in her cot and sighed, as though relieved to have it over and done with. William’s smell—smoke-spattered and musk scented—lingered in the room. In the place where he had been Philppa felt cold sticky dampness. Clamping her thighs together, she willed herself to remember Toulouse—sunlight fondling quartz, the rose-scented breath of the Virgin.

  Wrapped in a wool blanket, Madeleine lay curled on the warm edge of sleep.

  “Madeleine,” Robert said in a hushed voice that reminded her of Bodkin’s raspy purr. “Wake up, Madeleine. I need your help preparing simples.”

  During the long fall and winter of their pilgrimage, Robert had often singled her out, spoke, without pride, of the years of penance he had undergone: the fasting, the vigils, the wearing of hair shirts. All this he revealed in whispers, as though forcing words through the grate of a confession. Therefore, although she did not understand his special trust in her, Madeleine felt no surprise when one cool spring day Robert woke her before dawn and asked for her assistance.

  “Simples?” Madeleine asked, rising up on one elbow.

  “Come,” he said, “I’ll show you.” He carried a folded blanket and leather satchel.

  Shivering in the morning chill, Madeleine braided her hair as they wove their silent way between sleeping pilgrims. The doves cooed their morning greetings as the edge of the sky turned from hyacinth to rose. Once the others woke and lit the turf fires, smoke and ash would foul the air, but for now a clean breeze blew fragrant with the honeyed scent of jasmine.

  Robert spread the blanket beneath an ash tree near the three sleeping oxen. “Please sit,” he said, dropping to his knees beside her. “My father learned the properties of herbs and passed on this knowledge to me. Herbal remedies are called simples because each herb possesses its own particular virtue and the brewing of each produces a simple remedy for a specific ailment.” As he spoke Robert removed a half dozen linen pouches from his satchels and sprinkled medicinal herbs onto the blanket. His fingers fanned and caressed the drying leaves. The flickering rim of his nimbus reached out and tangled with hers. The tug and pull of their separate colors produced an aching tension in Madeleine an
d her heart beat far too rapidly for a mere discussion of herbs.

  “Nettle strengthens the blood and violet fortifies the lungs,” he whispered or seemed to whisper. His dark hair looked glossy as a blackbird’s feathers in the light of dawn. “These green fennel seeds are fine for treating coughs, and this one, chervil, stops bleeding. These two, worm wood and absinthe, diminish fevers.” He fingered the appropriate bundles as he spoke. A breeze rustled leaves and carried the tangy, but not unpleasant, odor of cattle and manure.

  “Robert,” Madeleine said, “how much longer?”

  “Not much,” he said. “We are very near Vendôme.” Then, looking into her eyes he assumed a humble tone. “Please Madeleine, you must have faith.”

  Madeleine heard the fear and doubt beneath the humility and wondered why a holy man would seek reassurance from her.

  “Please,” he whispered.

  Madeleine dropped her eyes before answering. “Of course, Master,” she said.

  That day the pilgrims walked five grueling miles before pausing for a rest. Madeleine lowered herself onto a patch of grass and was admiring the beauty of a passing cloud when the twins joined her. The vertical bar of Arson’s silk cross had separated from her robe, and now it curled like a beckoning finger. She touched the frayed edge absentmindedly and mumbled to her sister in a voice just loud enough for Madeleine to hear, “Why did we follow this mad man? We’ve been walking forever in this god forsaken forest and there’s no end in sight.”