Enoch's Device (7 page)

Until one day when her courage returned on a muddy road near the Anglin River. The day her miracle happened.

*

It was the fourth day after Geoffrey’s party had left Poitiers following the wedding. Geoffrey and his men had stopped to water and rest their horses. The men were fretting about the dark storm clouds filling the sky and turning the bright fall day almost to night. Thunder rumbled in the distance, and the next village was still a full league away, perhaps more. For her part, Alais did not care if it poured all day and night, even if it should flood the land, as in Noah’s time, and drown these men whom she hardly knew.

She had barely spoken to her husband, who seemed content to give her room. Maybe he was being kind, or maybe it was because he didn’t care for her at all—at least, until the sun set and he desired to have his way with her again. She knew she had not been a good wife. But why would she be, when she was not in love?

The wind whipped up, rustling through the wheat fields bordering the road. Alais had no idea who farmed these lands, for there was no cottage or barn in sight. Just her and four foolish men worried about the rain. One of the horses’ shoe had come loose, and the four men gathered around it like young boys fixated on a new toy. She half hoped the horse might kick one of them in the face. But soon she found her gaze and her thoughts drifting over the wheat field, which rippled like waves on the sea. And then Alais saw her: the woman in white.

Deep within the field, she seemed to float above the wheat like Christ himself on the Sea of Galilee.

Alais’ first reaction was horror, as if she beheld some terrible apparition. But she stifled the cry that threatened to rip from her throat, and stared in awe at the ethereal figure in the distance. There was something about the figure—not ghostly, but regal. The folds of her white dress billowed, and her hair floated like spun silver on the breeze. She was slender yet tall and strong, like the statues the Romans had built of Diana or Venus. Like a queen.

Like Radegonde
.

Alais trembled, and her heart began to race. She glanced back at the men. Not one of them noticed her. She felt the breeze calling her. She searched for the courage that until now had eluded her, but this time it was different. The woman in white beckoned her.
Radegonde . . .
This time, the courage was there, and summoning every ounce of it, Alais stepped off the road. She entered the field, brushing back the wheat stalks, each as high as her waist, and started toward the woman, who held Alais firmly in her gaze. Trepid steps hastened to a trot, then to a run. The wheat parted. Whether it was the wind or something else, she did not know. The woman stood just a few paces ahead. There was something about her—not only an unearthly beauty, but an
agelessness
.

“Saint Radegonde?” Alais stammered.

The woman said nothing but gazed at Alais as if she were measuring the worth of this scrawny girl who stood before her.

“Have you answered my prayers?” Alais asked breathlessly.

But the woman looked past her. Hooves pounded over the field.

Alais glanced over her shoulder to see Geoffrey’s roan charger galloping through the wheat. Gripping its reins, he leaned forward in the saddle, like Clothaire himself.

“Cover me with the wheat!” Alais shrieked. “Take me from here!”

“Not now,” the woman said in a voice like the wind.

“Please!” Alais sobbed, burying her face in her hands.

The woman responded with a single word.
“Choose.”

Bewildered, Alais looked up, but the woman was gone as if, with her last word, she had vanished in the wind.

Alais gasped. Geoffrey was nearly upon her. Her only instinct was to run. She bolted deeper into the field, yet the wheat stalks in her path no longer parted. Rather, their bristly beards caught at her clothing so that she must fight her way through.

Behind her, hoofbeats thumped louder.

She stumbled to the ground, certain that he would strike her or ride her down beneath his mount.

The charger burst through a wall of wheat and was almost on her when Geoffrey reined it back. He dismounted, his face as stormy as the sky behind it.

“Am I so terrifying to you that you would run off in the middle of nowhere?”

Alais could not find the words to answer. Had he not seen the woman in white?

“I am your husband!” he growled. “Your father gave me your hand in marriage. It is what he decided.”

Sobbing, Alais shook her head. “It is not what
I
decided.”

“Perhaps, but in time . . . who knows? I will be faithful to my vows, Alais, and will always protect you.”

“Should not marriage be for love?”

“You may grow to love me.” Geoffrey reached out his hand to help her off the ground, but Alais recoiled.

“I cannot love you.”

“How do you know, when you have not tried?”

The sky rumbled, and the rain came—a few wet drops at first, growing quickly into a seething torrent. It drenched Alais’ hair and dress and streamed down her face.

“Come,” he said, forcing a smile, “before we both drown.”

“I might prefer that,” she spat.

Geoffrey sighed. “Alais, I will not take a wife by force. So if you cannot stand me, then so be it. I can take you back to your father. We could have our marriage annulled. I will swear the union was never consummated.”

She looked at him in sheer bafflement. She could see in his eyes that he meant his words. But would the next time be any different? Indeed, might her father’s next prospect be a brute like Renaud, who would have beaten her in this field, rather than the man who offered her this humane choice? For that was what it was, she realized: a choice.

Choose.
The word echoed in her mind.

She found herself struggling with this newfound freedom. Had Geoffrey been anything but kind to her? She looked into his eyes and saw the blue of a summer sky, not the darkness of the storm. Cautiously she took his hand and let him help her to her feet.

Geoffrey lifted her into the saddle and began leading the horse back to the road. “When we reach the road,” he said, “just tell me which direction to turn.”

One last time, Alais searched the wheat field for any sign of the woman in white, yet she saw nothing but sheets of rain. She rode in silence, deep in thought, until they reached the road, where Geoffrey’s three men-at-arms waited.

She turned to her husband, whose face looked pained with anticipation.

“Turn east,” she said. “Take me to Selles.”

*

As Alais followed Brother Thadeus up the broken path to the abbey, she realized how far things had come. Yet it still seemed like only yesterday when she awoke one April morning and found herself in a state she had never been: in love. Not the love of her girlish dreams, but a mature love—a realization that Geoffrey of Selles had become the most precious thing in her life. A man who adored her, honored her, who had lived up to the promise he made in that wheat field by the Anglin River—the place where she made the choice that changed her life. At the time, she had not known what brought her to that decision. A feeling, perhaps? Yet it was a decision she would never regret, even though her love for him now brought such sorrow.

They passed through the open gateway in the abbey’s earthen wall and headed to the infirmary, a small stone structure set off from the cloister and surrounding buildings. When Geoffrey first became ill, he insisted the monks move him here. Alais had begged him to stay at their manor, where she could care for him, but Geoffrey refused to contaminate their marital bed, even though Alais had shown no symptoms of the terrible disease. Thadeus had suspected the disease was Saint Anthony’s fire, but he didn’t know for certain. Alais did not care about its name, only that it was killing the man she loved.

Thadeus opened the infirmary’s narrow wooden door and led her inside. Gagging at the stench, she brought her hands to her mouth, fighting the urge to vomit. “It’s getting worse, I know,” Thadeus whispered to her. “But it will pass in a moment.”

She stepped into the cramped room. Prior Ragno was there, standing beside the bed. In it lay her husband, covered to his chest in blankets. Stained bandages wrapped his arms and hands, and the sores had spotted more of his face, around his cheeks and neck. Alais choked back a sob. It was spreading. Her eyes caught his, those beautiful blue eyes that were the windows to her husband’s soul.

A tear ran down Alais’ cheek. He was wrapped in so many bandages that she could no longer see the tips of his fingers, but she took his hand nonetheless. Weakly he squeezed back.

“My day is already brighter,” he said. His voice was thin and strained.

“As is mine.” She smiled as warmly as she could bear.

Geoffrey hesitated for a moment, as if choking on his next words. Finally, he said, “I may not be here much longer.”

“Geoffrey,” she insisted, “don’t. The salves could work. You could get well.”

He shook his head. “But if I don’t . . .” He coughed. “If I don’t, you must stay here, in Selles. I’ve sent word to King Robert. He knows of my condition. He will send men to protect you until you can take a new husband.”

“
Never,”
she said. “I want no one else.”

“But you deserve someone else. I was never able to give you a child. And you will need one, a son who can inherit these lands. They have belonged to my family since the days of Charlemagne. They are my legacy. I want them for you.”

Alais felt the tears welling in her eyes. She nodded, then leaned forward to kiss the corner of his lips.

Geoffrey closed his eyes for a moment. “There is one more thing,” he finally said, glancing at the two monks in the room. “Let us be alone.”

“Of course, milord,” Thadeus said. Prior Ragno nodded reluctantly.

When they were gone, Geoffrey reached for Alais with his other hand. To her surprise, he placed something in her palm: a chain with a pendant—one she had seen before.

“I need you to keep this,” he said. “Like every lay abbot before me, I have protected it.”

She let the pendant dangle from the chain. It was of dark metal but outlined with gold and strangely shaped, like a cross with a handle. And she knew that it was more than a mere bauble, for it was hollow at the bottom, with metal teeth.

“This is your key,” she said.

“You remember what it unlocks? It is the secret that I was sworn to protect since I came to rule these lands—part of a sacred oath taken from my father, and he from his, back to the early days of the Carolingian kings. Do you recall where it is hidden?”

She nodded.

“Then keep it safe, and let no one know about it unless you see this symbol again.”

“I’ll keep it next to my heart,” she said, though she did not fully understand what he had meant. She placed the necklace around her neck and tucked the strange symbol beneath the neckline of her dress.

Geoffrey lay there, his eyes smiling up at her from his ravaged face. “I will always love you.”

“And I you, my love. And I you.” She embraced her husband and let the tears loose. As he wrapped his arms around her, she found herself uttering words under her breath. A prayer to Saint Radegonde, for Geoffrey.

Because Thadeus was right: prayers were all she had left.

F
rom the stern of the
Irish curach, Ciarán peered west, searching for any sign of the bishop and his ship. To the south, waves crashed against the cliffs of Antrim, which rose from the sea like the green-encrusted fortress of some ancient giant. For more than a day since fleeing Derry, Ciarán had seen no sign of the Frankish vessel, but fear of pursuit kept him on edge.

“They likely sailed west, lad,” Merchant mac Fadden said, chewing on a rind of salt-cured pork. “Once the Foyle meets the sea, you can go east or west to head back to the continent. We went east, but let’s pray the Northmen don’t give us any trouble around Dublin. And while we’re at it, let’s ask that we not bump into those Franks when we reach the channel between Britain and France.”

“I’ll feel better once we reach the Irish Sea,” Ciarán said.

Merchant mac Fadden gave a slight nod. “Won’t we all.”

Beneath the ox-hide hull covering the curach’s wooden frame, Ciarán could feel the undulation of the sea, and the knock of the oars in their locks. His habit seemed constantly damp and permeated with the smell of brine, though the morning sun provided a hint of warmth. Ever since mac Fadden and his crew met Ciarán and Dónall a half league north of Derry, the six rugged oarsmen had rowed hard, resting only when the wind filled the curach’s sail and carried the light little craft like a leaf on a rushing river. Dónall sat alone in the curach’s bow, as he often had since their flight from Derry, staring at the sea and the sky as if beseeching the Heavenly Father for guidance.

When not searching the horizon for the bishop’s ship, Ciarán sank into spells of melancholy, filled with sadness and guilt over his friends’ deaths. “It wasn’t your fault, lad,” Merchant mac Fadden had said. But Ciarán knew that it was. For none of this would have happened had he embraced his friends’ cause instead of lingering in the grove—the act that alerted Father Gauzlin to his presence. That act of indecision had also led to Dónall’s capture and the battle that ensued, all because Ciarán had defied his friends and doubted his mentor.

But even in these restless moments, he wondered whether he could trust Dónall. For hadn’t his lies brought this about, too? Without that accursed tome, none of this would have happened. That book was the reason the bishop came to Derry, looking for whatever secrets it held—secrets that Dónall still kept to himself.

By their first night on the Irish Sea, Ciarán was determined to learn some answers. He waited until Merchant mac Fadden and all but two of his oarsmen were asleep, leaving Ciarán alone in the stern with Dónall, who stared out at the sliver of moon in the night sky. His face bore the look of a tortured man.

“Why does the bishop want the book?” Ciarán asked in Latin, hoping the oarsmen did not speak the language.

Dónall sighed. After a moment, he turned his gaze away from the moon. “I presume he thinks it’s proof I’m a heretic.”

“I don’t believe that,” Ciarán said. “He came to Derry with all the evidence he needed. He said your brothers at Reims confessed to practicing sorcery, and that you and your friends murdered a priest to cover it up. What more proof did he need?”

“And you believe him?”

“I don’t know what to believe. I saw what you did to those Franks, with the fire and the wind.”

“That was the power of the Fae, not sorcery.”

Ciarán eyed his mentor skeptically. Outside the curach, the waves, with their longer fetch, rose higher, rhythmically lifting the vessel and then sliding it down the lee side.

“What if the bishop wants that power for himself?”

“Impossible,” Dónall said. “The Roman Church and its bishops are deathly afraid of anything remotely pagan. At best, they’d seek to destroy the book, like so many other things that threaten their joyless view of the world.”

“But
isn’t
it pagan?” Ciarán asked.

Dónall scoffed. “What does the word even mean? The Fae have existed in legend throughout history. The works of Homer and Virgil abound with tales of immortals, just as our own Celtic heritage does. To the ancient Greeks, the Fae were the nymphs and satyrs, while to us they are the Tuatha Dé Danann, the sidhe of Ireland. The real questions are, where do these myths come from and why are they so similar?”

“What are you trying to say?”

“That there’s a universal origin to these myths. My friend Thomas developed the theory while we were students at Reims. If the origin of these myths was in fact universal, he reasoned, where else would the proof be but in the Bible?”

Ciarán shook his head. “It’s not in Scripture.”

“Really? Do you remember that curious verse from Genesis?” Dónall’s brow rose as it often did when he posed an especially thorny challenge. “The one Maugis inscribed on the first page of his book: ‘
When the sons of God went into the daughters of men, who bore them children, and these were the heroes of old, the warriors of renown
.’”

Ciarán nodded, recalling the verse inscribed on the first page of Dónall’s tome.

“
That’s
what I mean. It’s a verse the Church deliberately ignores, yet it tells of a time when angels came to earth and mated with mortal women. And that’s not the only reference in scripture. The epistle of Jude tells of angels who had left their habitat in heaven for earth. This event brought about the war in heaven spoken of in the book of Revelation. Some of the angels who lost that war were imprisoned in the abyss—both Jude and Revelation make that clear—but what if some were not? What if some of the angels were granted clemency and allowed to stay on earth, yet banned forever from heaven? They could be the Fae, the immortals of legend.”

Ciarán listened intently, wondering if any of this could be true. “Do you think they really exist?”

“That’s what Thomas and I were determined to find out. Thomas discovered evidence in a diary that had been hidden in the library at Reims, stuck in the back of a shelf, covered up by other tomes. The diary’s author was none other than Archbishop Turpin of Reims, one of the paladins of Charlemagne, and his words offered proof that the mysteries of the Fae were real. He wrote of a time when the druids were in retreat, though something of the old magic still lingered in the world. Of the relics of Merlin of Britain, the tales of Oliver and Roland, and journeys to the Otherworld, the land of the Fae. According to the diary, one of the paladins, Maugis d’Aygremont, had been tutored by a Fae named Orionde, in a tower called Rosefleur, where he preserved all that he learned in a book that bore his name. All we had to do to have further proof of the Fae was find this Book of Maugis.”

Ciarán pointed with his chin at the satchel by Dónall’s side. “And you did.”

“It wasn’t easy,” Dónall admitted. “We thought, if any books existed bearing Maugis’ name, we might find reference to them in the royal library of Charlemagne at Aachen—in its day, it was the greatest archive in all Christendom. Unfortunately, after Charlemagne died and his grandsons proceeded to tear the empire to pieces, the library was scattered piecemeal among monasteries all over Europe. Soon, ten of our brothers at Reims had joined our quest, including Remi, who, after years of searching, found an index to Charlemagne’s collection in the Cathedral of Saint-Denis. Buried in that index was a reference to a Book of Maugis d’Aygremont, and the index even told where the book had been sent: to Reims, no less! It was right under our noses! We scoured the school’s library but found no sign of it. Then one night, Thomas discovered a hidden passage along a corridor connecting the school to the cathedral. It led to a room that proved to be a treasure trove, filled with tomes by Plotinus, Porphyry, Iambilchus, and others, all banned by the Church. We called it the ‘Secret Collection.’ And there, in a book shrine carved of oak, was the Book of Maugis. For the twelve of us, our lives changed forever. Over a year, we gathered at night in the Secret Collection and taught ourselves the book’s mysteries: the power of the Fae.”

“The bishop knows this,” Ciarán insisted. “He said you and your friends practiced sorcery in a chamber beneath the school. And he knew about Remi’s warnings, too. He spoke of a prophecy, just as Remi did!”

A look of alarm flashed across Dónall’s face. “Are you sure?”

“I heard it with my own ears.”

Dónall scratched his chin with his thumbnail, as he often did when working through a problem. “How could he know?”

“Did Maugis mention a prophecy? Maybe that’s why the bishop wants the book.”

Dónall shook his head in disbelief. “The book contains but a few cryptic references to prophecy—so obscure, no one really knows what they mean. Thomas thought he had figured it out, though I question that. The references may be nothing more than the delusions of a madman, once the power had ravaged Maugis’ mind. It’s dangerous to have faith in cryptic words. That’s how people get killed.”

“Did Thomas die for it?” Ciarán pressed.

“Without a doubt,” Dónall said solemnly.

“Did my mother?”

“Her faith in Thomas and what he believed put her life in danger, even if it was Adalbero’s inquisition that finally took it.”

Dónall’s words stung like a blow to Ciarán’s gut. His anger, which had faded in the passing days, flared anew. “Then I damned well deserve to know about it! Show me what Maugis said.”

One of the oarsmen glanced back at them, and Ciarán looked away.

After the oarsman resumed his dour humming, Dónall shifted on the bench until his back was to the oarsmen. “Turn around,” he said, and Ciarán shifted, too, until he faced astern and looked out at the faint wake glistening on the sea. Dónall removed the leather-bound tome from the book satchel. “Maugis hid the reference to it on one of the blank pages.”

“A blank page?” Ciarán asked, wiping the brine from his face. “How?”

“See for yourself,” his mentor replied, leafing through the pages until he found a stained old vellum with no writing.

“I don’t see anything,” Ciarán said.

“That’s because you’re not reading it in the proper light . . .” Dónall drew a small crystal from his robe. “Watch.” Closing his eyes, he sat still for a moment, then put the crystal to his lips and blew on it. “
Eoh,
” he said softly, continuing to blow until the crystal glowed with a soft, pearlescent light. Ciarán’s eyes opened wide. His hands clenched the side of the boat as the light dimmed to a faint glow. There was something about the light that seemed to calm his startled nerves—something in its color, pure and white like newly fallen snow. The light illuminated Dónall’s face, which, for once, appeared not angry or threatening but serene. “This light is inside us all,” Dónall said. “It is the spirit element that abides within our mortal shells.”

Ciarán sat speechless.

“Are you surprised that my soul’s not black as coal?”

“No, I . . . How?”

“Through a Fae word born of the tongue of angels, which allowed me to reveal an energy that lives within us at all times and produces an effect that one could call magic—that’s how. Through the light in this crystal, I can see things hidden from our mortal eyes—the truth of our surroundings. You’ll be happy to know that here on this boat, everything is as it seems. But that’s not always the case.” Dónall lowered the crystal until it illuminated the blank page. As the light hit the vellum, words began to appear as if being written by the pen of some ghostly scribe.

Ciarán stared slack-jawed at the page. The words formed a heading that read, “
The Prophecy of Arcanus.
” Beneath it flowed a verse:

Dark cycle of a thousand years, when the dragon is freed. The prophecy is etched in the heavens. The sphinx is the key.

Then came the word “
Salvation,
” followed by a second verse:

In Virgo’s seed of Charlemagne’s line, and Enoch’s device, where the answer lies, in the whisper of breath, or all hope dies.

“Not exactly clear, don’t you agree?” Dónall said. “Thomas had his theories—Remi, too. But unlike our work on the Fae, I’ve never seen proof that any of their theories are true.”

“The prophecy of Arcanus,” Ciarán said, still gazing in awe at the cryptic words that appeared as if by magic on the page. “Who is Arcanus?”

“Homer referred to him as Alkynous, king of an island called Phaeacia, which many believe was the lost isle of Atlantis. Plato wrote of it in
Kritias.
Arcanus was a prophet, yet all that Maugis chose to tell us of his prophecy is that it is etched in the heavens and that the sphinx is the key.”

“The riddle of the sphinx, the creature in the story of Oedipus?”

“A beast with the head of a woman and the body of a lion,” Dónall said. “That’s all, until one gets to the theories those few words have spawned.”

“My mother believed those theories, didn’t she?”

“Sadly, yes.”

“Then I want to know what they are.”

Dónall let the crystal’s light fade until it was gone. The words disappeared, leaving only the stained blank page in the dim moonlight. “Knowledge of any value has to be earned, lad. So if there’s any value to those theories, you’re going to have to sort it out yourself. I’ve already given you the same clues we started with.”

Ciarán shook his head. “What am I supposed to do with them?”

Dónall looked at him sternly. “Solve the damned riddle.”