Passing Through Darkness- The Complete Cycle

by Malcolm McKenzie

  “Grew up on a farm with two brothers,” she whispered.

  “Well, best get ’em inside before they freeze,” said Tolf. He produced a massive keychain and fumbled at the lock with gloved hands. “Suppose they’ll need to go to the rectory to see Father Juniper. Heh. A Select. What a thing.”

  Our original escort left us at the gate after exchanging a few parting insults with Tolf. We climbed a little slope past a candle-filled grotto. Some sort of shrine, I supposed. The rectory proved to be the impressive, golden-domed building we had seen from a distance.

  The place reeked of antiquity. The structure was in good repair, but age hung on it, from the weathering of the ivy-coated, cream-colored bricks to the oft-patched cracks in the pavement underfoot. We entered through a wooden door, large, but not of the scale I would have expected. Maybe it was the servants’ entrance.

  Inside, dark marble steps rose to a landing. I blinked, eyes adjusting to the dimness. Before us stood a high stool and a sort of lectern with a little bell on it. A set of double doors separated us from the rest of the building.

  “Oh, sure,” Tolf grumbled. “I can stand outside in the cold all day, but this lazy git can’t be bothered to sit where he belongs in the nice, warm foyer.” He rang the bell with alarming force, sending up a raucous clangor. “Probably off drinking.”

  Nothing happened, and Tolf’s face darkened. This time I was amazed that the ringing didn’t send the clapper flying off.

  I heard the sound of running feet and a young man in a rough woolen tunic and pants burst through the doors.

  Tolf surveyed him sourly. “Not even a novice?” He turned to me. “No robe,” he whispered.

  “Postulant,” said the youth, bowing his head.

  “Pustulant, more like it. Off dipping your beak while you were supposed to be watching the door, I’ll wager. Who knows what all might have come through? Look, I’ve a Select here.” Tolf pointed accusingly at me, clear evidence of the kind of abomination that might penetrate an unguarded door. He winked.

  “I was just using the bathroom,” the postulant stammered.

  Tolf’s accusing finger shifted from me to him. Dee and I exchanged glances. It was all too easy to guess the direction the guard’s harassment of the boy might take next.

  “Well, he’s here now,” Dee interrupted hastily. “Who was it you said we needed to see? Father Juniper, was it?”

  Tolf shot Dee a disapproving look. The postulant seized the opportunity like a drowning man grasping a log. “I’ll run fetch him!” And he was gone.

  “Got to watch these kids,” Tolf said severely, shaking his head. “This younger generation, heading straight to hell they are.” He either hadn’t noticed or had willfully ignored the fact that none of us except Dee was older than the postulant.

  Only a short time passed before we heard the youth returning, his voice raised in excitement. The inner door opened, and the postulant anxiously followed a stout, bearded man. Even I could tell he was a priest by his robe and collar, although the pipe he was puffing didn’t fit my image of a holy man.

  His eyes widened a bit when he saw me. “So. We really do have a Select.” He stuck out a thick-fingered hand. “I’ve never met a Select before. Welcome. I’m Father Juniper.”

  “Minos,” I said, taking his hand a little warily. He had a strong grip.

  “And I am Doctor John Dee, student of all matters physical and metaphysical,” the occultist chimed in.

  The priest looked at him through slightly narrowed eyes. “You, I’ve heard of.”

  Dee beamed, although I didn’t get the feeling the comment had been meant in an entirely positive way.

  Loris, Hadal, and Doral all introduced themselves. Prophetess looked down, then met the priest’s eyes squarely.

  “I’m very pleased to meet you, Father. I am called to be Prophetess of the Lord. Will you hear my confession before I speak to the Metropolitan?”

  Father Juniper’s eyes widened and he pinched the bridge of his nose, as if struck by a sudden, blinding headache. I recognized the feeling.

  “And I thought the Select was going to be the strange one,” he muttered with his teeth clenched on his pipestem.

  We had been shown to hot showers, after which I was the only one whose skin still looked gray. And we had been fed. It was simple bread, cheese and stew, but it was warm and none of it was hard, stale, or tasted like it had spent two weeks inside a leather sack.

  In a show of trust that amazed me, we had been given almost complete freedom within the huge compound. Dee had been shown to a library and had promptly vanished. Loris, Hadal, and Doral were resting in a guest room that was small and spartan, but clean and warm.

  I was sitting in a public area of the huge rectory. Father Juniper had explained simply that places behind locked doors were off limits to us, but we could go anywhere else. Then he had taken Prophetess to hear her confession. I couldn’t imagine what she might have to confess.

  I had found a comfortable, padded bench in front of a large, elaborate clock. It was like no timepiece I had ever seen. The face was beautifully enameled blue, darker in the center, lighter toward the edges. But there seemed to be two hour tracks, eccentric circles one within the other and joined at the bottom. The outer track was gold, the inner silver. A golden sun reined over the outer circle at twelve o’clock, while below at the top of the inner circle an opening showed the phase of the moon. Hours were marked on both circles, and so were what I took to be times of prayer - sext, none, vespers, and so forth. The elaborately wrought hour hand appeared to float, not visibly joined to the dial. At the moment, it showed a bit after five in the afternoon, following the golden outer circle but nearing the point of convergence with the silver circle within.

  Father Juniper joined me there. “I see you found the Ermel Clock.”

  I nodded.

  “It’s one of my favorite things,” he continued. “From before the Fall. You see, the hour hand follows the inner track during the hours of the night, but extends to the outer track during the day. It helps remind me that even when we descend into darkness, we still emerge into a new dawn.”

  “And then fall into darkness again.”

  “Well. Yes. I prefer to think of it as showing man’s perpetual passing through darkness into the light.”

  We sat in silence for a time. Every minute or so he blew smoke from his pipe.

  “My friend… Prophetess…” I sputtered to a halt.

  “Yes. Of course, one doesn’t simply arrive at Our Lady and demand to see the Metropolitan. There are procedures. She’s in the hands of the bureaucracy now.”

  “Of course. I suppose if someone really was a prophet… or thought they were…”

  “Not for me to say what she is or isn’t, my boy. She certainly thinks she is.” He puffed several times. “There are at least two, maybe three people between her and the Metropolitan who think she’s crazy.”

  I winced. “I don’t suppose there’s a lot of precedent for a farm girl saying she’s a prophet and trying to round up an army to save the world.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t say that. There’s Saint Joan of Arc. Pretty directly on point, there. That’ll make sure she gets a hearing, at least. Still some guilt within the Church about burning a saint at the stake, even a thousand years later. But there are a lot of frauds and lunatics, too.”

  I bit my lip, then blurted out, “I saw her cast the Darkness out of a woman. I’m no Universalist, Father, but if there is such a thing as a prophet, she probably is one.”

  The priest gave me a long look, took a deep pull on his pipe, and blew out a huge cloud of smoke. “Why do I always get all the strange ones?”

  I saw little of the others in the days that followed. Dee remained ensconced in the library, emerging only to eat and sleep. Loris, Hadal, and Doral seemed content to do nothing other than eat and sleep. They seemed to be convinced that Prophetess would now raise an army and march triumphant into Stephensburg. Until they joined that glor
ious host, they were going to rest up and fill their bellies.

  I wandered around, exploring. The compound was beautiful, and while I got a few odd looks, no one threw anything at me, or even said anything rude. Still, soon enough I drifted down to the guard post where we had entered and found Tolf, who seemed happy to see me. Since I now had no weapon aside from my hickory stick, he arranged for me to practice fighting with staves with him and some other guards. I picked up plenty of bruises but soon enough was giving them back. The exercise in the crisp air felt good, and I no longer felt quite as unarmed as I had since giving up my sword.

  At one point, Tolf commented, “So your friend the prophet is going to lead an army against Yoshana, eh?”

  I blinked sweat out of my eyes and shook my head. “First off, I don’t know if she’s a prophet or not. Second, the only army she’s got is the five of us you saw come in with her.”

  Tolf feinted at my head, then swept his staff into the back of my shin, dumping me on the ground. “Sure does look like she needs a better army.”

  Father Juniper found me after one of the practice sessions, slightly sweaty and absentmindedly rubbing at the new dents in my staff as I watched the Ermel Clock pass its noon apex and begin the daily slide back toward darkness.

  He flicked the staff with a thick finger. “Hickory?”

  I nodded.

  “Tough wood, hickory. Hard to shape. But it holds like almost nothing else once you’ve turned it into what it’s meant to be.” He gave me a little smile that I didn’t know how to read. “You’re wanted at a hearing for your friend. Doctor Dee has already spoken about the incident at Brambledge, but by all accounts you were closer.”

  “What should I tell them?”

  He sucked in smoke, then blew it out through his nose like some sort of bearded dragon. “I’d suggest the truth.”

  The Advocate for Justice sat in a little office with a high window, light streaming through it onto his desk of pale wood. He waved me to a seat across from him, then rose and shut the door behind me.

  “The title sounds more impressive than the role really is,” he said easily. He rested his chin on steepled hands, looking at me unblinkingly. His piercing eyes and slightly hooked nose reminded me of a bird of prey.

  The title “Grand Inquisitor” would have been more intimidating, but not by much. He gave me a little smile that I found utterly unconvincing.

  “The question at hand,” he went on, “is whether your nameless friend, who rather maddeningly insists on calling herself only Prophetess, is one in fact, or just in her mind.” He looked at me expectantly.

  “And… if she isn’t?” I asked.

  He waved a hand airily. “Oh, no ill will befall her, young man. The Church hasn’t burned heretics or witches for almost a thousand years.”

  “Unless they happen to be infected with the Darkness.”

  “Ah! As you must know, that is not a punishment, but a violent and lethal cure for a most terrible disease. And ultimately, that brings us to why you’re here.” The predatory eyes locked onto mine. If this man was intimidated by my blank, black gaze, it didn’t show. “Your friend would generally be easy enough to dismiss. Certainly she’s likable, and quite intelligent despite her rudimentary schooling. Charismatic, even. That trio you picked up near the river seem very taken with her, although I dare say they’re intellectually… undemanding.” The little smile widened, inviting me to join him in mocking the rubes. I could tell I was being manipulated - which didn’t mean it wasn’t working.

  “Doctor John Dee is also rather taken with her, although I think somewhat in the sense of a man examining a new species of beetle. One way or another, there will be a story for him from that acquaintance.”

  I found myself staring at tiny nicks and scars in the Advocate’s desk. Centuries worth, no doubt, old gouges worn smooth over time, new scratches added on top. A chronicle of tiny corruptions and imperfections. The sort of thing that, among humans, the Advocate would try to obliterate.

  He was looking fixedly at me again. “So that brings us to you. A Select. A member of a race renowned for its rationality. Both this so-called Prophetess and the equally self-professed Doctor John Dee say you were in a jail cell when she cast the Darkness out of a peasant girl.”

  “A miller’s daughter, actually,” I said, meeting the priest’s eyes. “And yes, I was there. And yes, she cast the Darkness out of the girl.”

  “Through the power of the Lord?”

  I leaned back in my chair. This would be the crux of the question. Be honest, Father Juniper had said. “I don’t know. It’s pretty well understood that the Darkness finds it easier to possess the weak-minded than the strong-minded. And Prophetess is nothing if not strong-minded. I’ve never seen or heard of anyone persuading someone else to reject the Darkness - lending their mental strength to the struggle, I guess. But it seems possible.”

  “Ahh. Then you don’t see a miracle.”

  “With all due respect, sir, I don’t share your faith or Prophetess’. She persuaded. And she prayed. I couldn’t begin to tell you if the prayers were even orthodox, much less if they followed your rite of exorcism. All I can tell you is it worked.” I thought a moment more. “That, and though I don’t share your faith, I’ve never seen anyone represent it better than that woman. She’s fearless. Not that she’s never afraid, but she’ll always do what she thinks is right anyway. Forget Brambledge. I’ve seen her bury days-old corpses I would have left lying. I’ve seen her offer comfort to people I would have preferred to avoid. And I’ve seen her smack a drelb in the face with a stick when I’m sure she would rather have been running away.”

  The Advocate’s eyes widened. So no one had mentioned the drelb before. “I don’t know what a Universalist prophet looks like. But if there is such a thing, I hope it looks like her.”

  Two days later our whole group was called to an audience with the Metropolitan.

  “The bishop of the western world, Minos,” Dee enthused. “Quite an honor.”

  We entered the basilica through a small side door, its frame carved with images of saints. I read the words beneath and realized that one was Joan of Arc. That had to be a good sign. Didn’t it? Prophetess crossed herself, Dee opened the door for her, and we went in.

  We were clean, but our clothes were the same ones we had worn through the whole long trek. We approached the ragged edge of respectability, and I couldn’t say from which direction. That is, until I took in the interior of the church. Less impressive than the rectory from the outside, within it was a marvel of gilded marble columns, ornate carvings, and stained glass. Flights of angels looked down on us from a deep blue ceiling dozens of yards above our heads. If a pack of mangy dogs had wandered in and relieved themselves on the floor, they wouldn’t have looked much more out of place than we did.

  I glanced around nervously. I had only occasionally entered a church, always just slightly afraid that I might burst into flames. The stern gazes of the saints surrounding us looked like they could easily ignite better men than me.

  I wanted to slip into a pew at the back, or maybe hide behind a pillar, but Dee kept tugging at me. “We’re up front,” he hissed.

  Most of that vast space was empty, but a cluster of robed priests congregated near the altar. And some rumor must have spread that excitement was forthcoming, because small knots of people were beginning to filter in, lurking in the wings. They didn’t look threatening - except in the sense that a crowd gathering to watch a heretic burned at the stake might be threatening if you happened to be the heretic in question.

  Atop the dais in front of us, a figure in purple stood alone before the altar. He was not a large man, but he stood straight and radiated authority. Dee went down on one knee and sketched the sign of the cross. I bowed my head.

  “Kneeling might be wise,” Dee whispered.

  “I was taught it’s rude to pretend a religious conviction you don’t hold,” I murmured back.

  “I can see why the Se
lect are unpopular.”

  Dee nudged me into the second pew next to Loris, Hadal and Doral. Prophetess sat in front of us, between two priests. One was Father Juniper.

  Another priest stood at the foot of the dais, bowed to the man on it, turned to us, and announced, “His Eminence the Metropolitan of Our Lady, Bishop of the West.” He could have added “leader of the Universal Church in the known world,” but I suppose that would have been gilding the lily.

  The Metropolitan glanced from side to side. He gave the impression of a serious man, thin and with close-cropped white hair. Still, I thought I detected just the hint of a smile as he said, “I would have preferred to keep this a more private matter, but the news that a prophet may be among us has aroused quite a lot of curiosity in our community.”

  I could see Prophetess’ shoulders tense, and apparently the Metropolitan did as well. “I don’t blame you, child. It’s natural enough, I suppose.” He surveyed the church with a long look, before his eyes settled on her again. “Some members of this community have suggested we are called to raise an army to march with you on Stephensburg. A number of others have suggested, rather more forcefully, that you should be tried as a fraud and a heretic.”

  I shot furtive glances toward the exits to either side. There were far too many people between us and the doors, and I was unarmed.

  “The question, of course,” the Metropolitan continued, “is whether you are in fact a prophet.”

  I could see Prophetess shift on the bench as she prepared to stand. And also Father Juniper’s hand rest on her leg as he ever so gently shook his head.

  “Fortunately, we are not required to answer that question. You have requested nothing more than shelter from the weather, and assistance in reaching Stephensburg. Those things may be provided out of charity, without the need to address the presence or absence of divine inspiration behind the request.”

  A low rumbling of conversation broke out.