Oliver Potzsch - The Dark Monk

“It was you women who brought evil into the world!” he lectured, waving his finger in the air. “You ate the apple, and since then, we have been living in sin!”

Magdalena couldn’t resist an answer: “Aha, and Adam just stood there and watched?” A moment later, she regretted speaking up.

Brother Jakobus walked over to her and seized her head like a ripe pumpkin he wanted to crush between his hands. “She talked him into it, do you understand?” he mumbled. “Adam had a moment of weakness, but God does not tolerate weakness, not a moment. He punished us all- all of us!”

Once more, she could smell his sweet perfume, but now, for the first time, Magdalena detected another scent behind the fragrance of violets-a vile, overpowering breath. The monk’s whole body stank like rotting flesh; his mouth smelled like a sewer, and his crooked black stubs of teeth jutted out from foul, festering gums. The white tunic he wore under his black hooded cowl was stained with wet spots, which she came to realize were caused by festering ulcers. Magdalena could see that his tonsure was not shaved by hand but, in fact, that his hair on top had fallen out.

Brother Jakobus seemed to be rotting from the inside out.

The hangman’s daughter remembered she’d seen these symptoms before in a Genoese merchant who had come to see her father some years ago. The man had staggered into the hangman’s house, evidently in great pain. Most of his hair had fallen off, like balls of wool flying from a spindle, and he was twitching oddly. Her father had spoken of a French disease and sent the merchant off with a phial of mercury and a drink of opium poppies to relieve the pain. When Magdalena asked her father whether the man could be cured, he’d shaken his head. “He’s been sick for too long,” he had said. “If he’s lucky, he’ll die before he’s completely in the grip of madness.”

Was Brother Jakobus in the grip of madness, too? Magdalena wondered what the monk intended to do with her.

At times, he’d gently stroke her head, almost lovingly passing his hand through her hair. Then his mind seemed far off, on some distant voyage. On one such occasion, Brother Jakobus had poured out his heart to her.

“When I was still young, I was in love with a girl like you,” he whispered. “A…whore…And her name was Magdalena. She brought ruin upon herself-and me. I was lecherous, a drunken fool stumbling through Augsburg in search of gratification. But then God sent me a sign. He punished me with this disease, and I collapsed in front of the Dominican Church of Saint Magdalene!” He giggled softly. “St. Magdalene-what a divine irony!” His giggle gave way to a loud coughing fit, and it was a long time before he could continue speaking. “Since then, I have devoted my life completely to the service of the Order. And now God has given me the chance to make up for my past. Magdalena…” Lost in thought, he stroked her cheeks. “My Magdalena is dead, but you can be healed. I will drive the demons out of you like the smoke and stench from a stifling farmhouse parlor.”

While he read verses from the Bible, Magdalena closed her eyes, thinking frantically about how she might escape.

The situation looked pretty bleak at first. The door was impregnable and the window too small. She had no idea how many guards were here assisting Brother Jakobus. Besides, she was unarmed. She estimated she’d been in the coffin for two days. At their last stop, the men had been speaking a Swabian dialect. Was she already beyond the Bavarian border or perhaps still somewhere in Augsburg? Had she been taken away on a ship? All she knew was that she had to be near a large church. At regular intervals, she could hear big, heavy bells tolling-the kind only large congregations could afford.

For the hundredth time, she cursed her stupidity. Why didn’t she tell anyone before she went down into the concealed vault under the cathedral? Capturing her had been an incredible stroke of luck for Jakobus and his accomplices. Clearly, she, along with her father and Simon, had been on the trail of a huge conspiracy with the Augsburg bishop at its head! With the hangman’s daughter as their hostage, the conspirators could now be assured the mysterious Templars’ treasure would not fall into the wrong hands. Magdalena was certain her father and Simon would do everything in their power to free her.

Simon…

She felt a tickle in her lower body just thinking of him. If they were together, they would certainly have figured out how to escape this prison. What she liked most about the physician was how clever he was. Simon was sly, funny, eager to learn things, and well, perhaps just a little bit too short.

Magdalena smiled, thinking of all the things they had been through together. As far as shrewdness was concerned, Simon was even a match for her father, and that said a lot. The medicus had solved the riddle in the crypt under the St. Lawrence Church on his own. But then along came that accursed Benedikta who put herself between them-that elegant, blase woman from Landsberg! Even down here in her prison, the thought of Simon and Benedikta together made Magdalena flush with anger. Just let her get her hands on that woman!

Then it occurred to her that she had other problems at the moment.

To get her mind off these things, she thought back again on a conversation she’d had the day before with Brother Jakobus about the treasure. She’d asked the monk several times what the treasure was and if it really was something left behind by the Templars, but he avoided answering all her questions.

“It’s a treasure that will determine the future of Christianity,” he said, looking up to the Savior on the ceiling. “With it, we will finally destroy the armies of the Lutheran heretics! As soon as our master tells the Pope about it, the Pope will join forces with us in a holy war to drive the Protestant princes out of the German Empire. The master knows that the Great War is not yet over!”

“Who is your master?” Magdalena interrupted. “The bishop of Augsburg?”

Brother Jakobus smiled. “Our numbers are legion.”

The nights were cold and damp. Even under the wool blankets and in the warm glow of the candles the monk brought each night, she froze. Her arms and legs were stiff and tingled from lack of movement. The only indication it was day or night was the narrow beam of light that came through the little shuttered window. She was in despair.

Then, on the third day, something happened.

It was around noon. She had gotten up from the cold stone floor and was dozing on one of the pews when, half asleep, she rolled off the narrow bench onto the floor again. Sitting there, with blankets around her shoulders, cursing, she noticed a small bundle hidden under a pew. She hesitated for a moment, then quickly picked it up.

It was the little bag of herbs she’d been carrying around with her for the last four or five days since her visit to the apothecary in Augsburg. It must have fallen off her waistband and wound up under the bench. She’d completely forgotten it.

Carefully, she untied the string and looked inside. There was a sharp aroma of herbs. Everything she’d hastily stuffed into the bag at Nepomuk Biermann’s apothecary was still there-a little crumbled, perhaps, but still useable.

Magdalena rubbed the dried herbs between her fingers, thinking.

And in her mind a plan began to take shape.

From the top of the stairs leading to Schreevogl’s front door, Simon looked down at Benedikta, who stood at the foot of the stairs in full riding costume. Her horse was saddled, and she was holding the reins in her hand. The sorrel pranced around nervously, and the saddlebags on both sides were filled to the brim.

“I’ve been looking for you,” Benedikta said, patting her horse to calm it down. “I was told I might find you here. I’d like to say good-bye.”