C. Brittain: The Witch, the Cathedral

After working out the route that would be least likely to end in something being dropped on my head, I hurried across the plaza toward the church’s entrance. Above the old doors, the figures of Christ and the apostles still stared stonily down, and the figures of the damned and the saved still pleaded or prayed at their feet.

All around the air was loud with the shouts of workmen and the sounds of hammers and stone chisels, and my nose was assailed by the mixed smells of mortar, sweat, and the sausages someone was grilling for lunch. But when I went through the heavy doors of the old cathedral I passed from noise and bright sunshine into the dimness and stillness of the church’s interior.

While I was still blinking a young man came up, a junior priest or a seminary student. “The dean’s expecting me,” I told him.

There was a quick step outside the little office off the nave where the young priest had put me to wait, and Joachim came in. “Good,” he said. “I’m glad you’ve come.”

I seized his hand, delighted to see him, even though lately he had always seemed older than I remembered. His handshake was still much stronger than mine, but the once black hair was gray at the temples, and his face had lines I had forgotten. My own hair and beard had turned snow white before I was thirty, but other than that I looked almost exactly the same as when I graduated from the wizards’ school. When I had learned the complex spells that slow down aging, I had not counted on all my friends leaving me behind.

“Sit down,” said the dean without preamble. “I have only a few minutes now, and I need to tell you about our problems.”

“Do you think you could have a demon here?” I asked cautiously. I had been wondering what would be serious enough to make Joachim call me.

“Of course not,” he said with a faint smile, about all he ever allowed himself. “Would a priest ask for help from a wizard against the supernatural? I think the problem’s natural, but it’s magic.”

I was fine as long as I stayed away from the supernatural battle between angels and demons. “So you think someone’s practicing renegade magic?”

“That seems the most likely explanation. Construction on the new cathedral goes well during the day, but something happens at night. The watchmen have seen lights, even what looks like a flame flickering on the new tower. In the morning, the workmen sometimes find material moved around, stones, scaffolding, things no one should be able to move unaided.”

“The Romneys,” I said. “It must have something to do with what the Romney children saw.”

He nodded slowly. “Several members of the cathedral chapter have thought it was the Romneys’ doing. You must have seen them as you came in- are they capable of casting powerful spells?”

“Not the Romneys themselves. But I talked briefly to some of the children-I even made them an illusory dragon-and they seemed disappointed in my illusions. They hinted they had recently seen someone else doing much more powerful magic.”

“This band has been camped outside the walls for about six weeks. The bishop, the city mayor, and the constable of the castle have all been unhappy about having them there, but they do not hurt anyone so there has been no reason to drive them away.”

“What is it,” I said, “maybe ten years since the Romneys first started to appear in the western kingdoms? I wonder where they were before then.”

“Probably in the eastern kingdoms,” said Joachim without interest. “Look. I shall be busy all afternoon, but I want to have dinner with you and we can talk more then. Do you think you could go up on the new tower to search for magical influences? Now is a good time, while the workmen take their noon break.”

Far above us, a bell began ringing. Joachim stood up and pulled a silk stole across his shoulders. “I must go; I’m performing the noon service at the high altar.” But he paused at the door to smile before he was gone. “It is good to see you.”

Being the head of the cathedral chapter, I thought, had given him an attitude of command he had never had in Yurt. I didn’t mind him ordering me around, but I wondered if he even realized he was doing so. I watched his black-clad figure hurry down the nave toward the high altar, where an acolyte was lighting the candles.

As I went back out through the heavy cathedral doors I was immediately struck again by the sounds, the smells, and the brightness of noon. Workmen were starting down from the scaffolding. I would have liked some lunch myself, but I had been told to look for magical influences.

First I found the crew foreman. “The dean’s asked me to look over your construction site. I’m a wizard, and he told me you had been having some sort of problem.”

“All right,” said the foreman. His manner was not insolent, but it was certainly not respectful either. “If you’re a wizard I guess you can fly, so I’ll let you have a look. But I wouldn’t let anyone else!”

He was short, thin and wiry, with very long fingers. I glanced down at his bare feet; his toes too were unusually long. The workmen now assembling were all built similarly. I remembered hearing that there was a valley somewhere far to the north that produced men both strong enough to move great stones and agile enough to carry them up a precipice.

The lower part of what would become the main stairs of the southern tower was finished, so I started climbing. The recently-quarried stone was smooth and light-colored, still covered with a fine coating of dust. I didn’t want to fly, at least at first, because I hoped to tell better what was happening from close up.

By the time I reached the fifth landing my legs had begun to ache, but I kept on. The last workmen shot by, jumping down whole series of steps with little apparent regard for their safety. What would one day become highly complex stone sculptures on the wall were now just roughed in, and the many windows were still no more than openings in the walls, without their tracery or glass.

And then the stone stairs ended and I was out in the open. I could just detect a faint hint of magic, as though a spell had been cast nearby sometime earlier.

The tower continued above me, though in much less complete form. Rough wooden steps continued upwards, and after a brief pause to catch my breath I followed them. Wind whirled around me, tugging at my clothes and hair.

The wooden steps were succeeded in turn by a series of toe-holds. I glanced down and wished I hadn’t. The tower zoomed downward, narrowing dizzily at what seemed an impossible distance. The workmen, their sheds and fires, and all the piles of materials were reduced to indistinct lumps. I could hear voices but very faintly, like the voices of insects.

But the magical influence seemed stronger here. I breathed deeply for a moment and began climbing again.

With sheer force of will I made my hands, one after the other, leave the crevices they were gripping and feel upward for the next. My knees trembled so hard that it was difficult to make my toes follow my hands. I had climbed as high as the towers of the old cathedral, and was abruptly startled by the sound of the bells. I plastered myself against the vertical stone face of the half-finished tower. If I could I would have held on with my ears.

When the bells stopped ringing, I made myself continue to the final scaffolding where I sat quietly, careful to make no movement that would start the board swaying on its ropes, waiting for my heartbeat to return to normal.

This is ridiculous, I told myself. I was supposed to be a competent wizard. The workmen went up and down here all the time, and they couldn’t even fly! But knowing that I could save myself even if I suddenly hurtled toward the ground was not reassurance enough.