Carol Berg - Flesh and Spirit

“And so I shall, good Brother.” I laughed and released his arm as we reached the refectory door. “So I shall.”

“I need to speak with you, Archangel,” I said quietly, when Jullian arrived with the boiled fish and stewed parsnips. “A work of mercy that will ensure your place in the heavenly choir.”

He bowed his head for the prayer as the abbot rang the bell. “You should not have lied about your reading,” he whispered, his lips scarcely moving. “Lies are the Adversary’s tool.”

The mealtime reading had begun, so I had no time to question how he had guessed or why such a minor offense caused him to sit there tight as a tabor’s skin. No time to remind him that secrets are the closest kin to lies.

“You once offered me whatever I needed of you,” I said. “Surely the god wishes you to help me become a better man.”

He nodded without looking at me. “Meet me in the garden maze just after supper. Tell Brother Sebastian you need to meditate on those you’ve wronged in preparation for Saint Dian’s Day.”

His direction sounded a bit pompous coming from a boy of twelve. Of a sudden, my mad whimsy insisted on reviving itself. An Ardran Pretender…here. If such were true, the danger would be unimaginable. I buried the thought as quickly as it had arrived.

Yet as a drifting cloud grayed the light from the great windows, my spirits chilled. I could not shake the sense of unseen hands propelling me toward an unseen precipice, and even the lovely mound of parsnips touched with thyme could not disperse it.

Every day between Nones and Vespers, I reported to work in the kitchen. Though I could not seem to satisfy the meticulous Brother Jerome with my work—my chopping was uneven, my fish wastefully trimmed, and after the third time I scorched the porridge, he forbade me to come near his precious pots—I enjoyed those hours the most of all my duties. Yet on this day I fidgeted through the time as if I’d buckthorn twigs in my trews, and I came near yanking out what was left of my hair as we dragged through Vespers and supper. I couldn’t have said what I was expecting.

Fog had rolled in from the river again, studding the neglected hedges of the garden maze with water droplets. Sprangling branches spattered my face as I hurried down along the graveled path toward the center of the maze and the stone bench that overlooked a green-slimed pond.

“Brother Valen!” Jullian jumped from the bench like a startled cat.

“Are you expecting other oversized supplicants this night, Archangel?” I said with a grin, hoping to put him at ease.

Unsuccessfully, it seemed. He glanced over his shoulder and gripped his arms about his slight body as if gatzi were poised to jump out of the hedges and drag him off to the netherworld. Blue-gray dusk had settled over the abbey. The days were rapidly growing shorter.

“Of course not.” He bit his lip and sat on the bench again, curling his bare legs underneath him. His eyes would not meet mine. One would think it was he undergoing the humiliation of seeking aid from a child scarce dropped from his mother’s womb.

“I thank you for not revealing my problem to the brothers,” I said. “They’d pitch me over the wall did they find out. I’ve nowhere to go.” And unholy murderers lurked beyond these walls.

When I tilted my head to glimpse his face and gauge the depth of his worry, he turned away. “I’ll help you,” he said. “I did say I would. But I’ll not lie about it should anyone ask me.”

“A fair bargain and a great kindness.” I held out my psalter and my lesson book. “All I need is for you to show me which page and to read me whatever I’m supposed to say at Compline, and then to read me the passage about the great virtues and vices from the other book.” I could devise some explanation for not writing the lesson.

“How will reading you the passage help you? You’re required to proclaim the whole text, and Brother Abelard will complain if you get even a word of it wrong.”

“I’ll remember. It’s just—My eyes—” Of a sudden all my usual excuses felt inadequate. “It’s like a blindness in me, Jullian. I see the marks on the page, and I can tell one letter from the other if I work at it hard enough. But when I look at two or more together, they tie themselves into knots that won’t unravel no matter what I do. I’ve tried to learn since I was a boy, but it won’t come. I’m just…broken…somehow.” Or lazy-minded, stubborn, demon-touched, god-cursed, soul-damaged, or willfully obtuse—all the things my tutors, parents, and siblings had named me. I must be mad. I had never told anyone what I had just exposed to a child I scarcely knew. “But I’m not stupid. Read it to me exactly, and I can remember it exactly.”

Heaving a great quivering sigh, the boy laid the books in his lap and carefully smoothed the worn covers. Some fine friend I was, who had so pompously set myself to ward him from unwanted advances of the flesh, only to subvert his conscience, which he likely valued higher. As for my mad speculations, an hour’s contemplation as I worked in the kitchen had already convinced me I was an idiot. Any youthful Pretender of Eodward’s loins would be secured in some remote fortress under the protection of pureblood defense works, not scuffing about an abbey in sandals.

“All right, then.” Jullian leafed through the psalter until settling on a page bordered with flying geese. “This is tonight’s Compline—” His head jerked up at some noise from beyond the hedge.

When his gaze shifted to something over my shoulder, I was still too taken aback to ask what distracted him, for in that moment of surprise, I had glimpsed his face…not conscience ridden at all, but keen with excitement and anticipation.

“Brother Valen.”

I jumped to my feet, enough blood rushing to my face to feed a cave of bats. “Holy father! I—We—”

Jullian stepped immediately to the abbot’s side, halting my stammering with a now-obvious truth. The boy had known he was coming. Saint Dian’s Day…they had conspired to get me here!

“Sit down, Valen,” said Luviar. Joining me on the bench, the abbot pressed a finger to his lips and then flicked it in a quick gesture to the boy.

Jullian bowed and melted into the hedges.

“I needed to speak with you in private, Brother Novice. And as you have no doubt learned in these past weeks, privacy is not a condition of monastery life. Not physical privacy, at least, even for the abbot.” His brows lifted, widening his gray eyes in an expression I would have called good humor were this anyone but Abbot Luviar.

Annoyed with the boy and the abbot—and even more with my own stupidity—I kept my jaw shut tight and dipped my head in agreement, sure I was now to hear word of my dismissal.

“Hmm. Not so forthcoming as at our first meeting?” Luviar’s scrutiny felt bone-deep. “I suppose I must take responsibility for that. Though I am aware that not everything you told me of your journey here is entirely…accurate…I believe I understand at least something of your reasons for dissembling. Tell me, Brother Valen, were you a more capable pikeman in Ardra’s service than you are a cook’s helper?”

My skin heated. So he’d guessed that I was a deserter. Best not add more lies, if I could avoid it. “No, holy father.”

“Your past loyalties do not concern me so much as your current loyalties, Valen, and I’ll not hold you to account for choices made before you were in my charge.”

The failing light made it increasingly difficult to read his face, thus I dared not feel relief.

“I’ve seen and heard enough of you these past weeks to believe that I can entrust you with a task I need of you tonight. Your instincts are ever generous, whether to old or young—or those in peril. You accept what is without complaint, bridling only at matters of justice. And you live your days with relish, no matter their mundanity. You have a certain honesty about you that has little to do with truth or untruth. I am not a fool. But I’m not sure if you trust me, and that is imperative, for I must insist that you keep silent about certain matters that could compromise others’ safety. Matters of great importance.”