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prescribes. The first of us who died was a child. He believed devoutly in God
and the Gospels. He heard Mass every day. I never heard him speak ill of
anyone, nor knew him to do harm to man or beast.
And he died. If he had not been killed, if all had gone as our enemies
intended, he would have been burned alive."
Honorius tore his gaze from her. She was not gentle; she was not quiet. She
was afire with rage.
And justly, said the cold judge within, if all was as he had heard. "What
proof can you give?" he demanded of her. "How may I know that you tell the
truth?" "Look yonder," she answered.
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Another white habit, another gray cowl.
Brother Paul stood dazed, torn from a black doze under the eyes of two monks
and two mortal women and two witchborn children. "Brother Paul,"
Thea said, "was the mind to Simon's hand. His was the genius that found the
mad boy and knew him for what he was, and made him the chief of God's hunting
Hounds." "Not entirely." Even she stared at Father
Alberich. He had listened in silence, motionless but for the flicker of his
eyes; he spoke as coolly as Alfhad. "Brother Paul was given the power of
finding, but not that of making. Such was my part.
Like him I saw God's hand in Simon's coming among us; I saw the working of
God's will. Here was the sword we had prayed for, a keen weapon against the
powers of the dark; here also was our shield and our fortress."
"You knew what he was. You accepted him; you used him. Are you any less
culpable than the King of Rhiyana?"
"It was God's will." Alberich's words were like a gate shutting. "Your
Holiness, if Brother
Paul is to be punished, I beg leave to remind you that I am given full and
sole jurisdiction over my wayward brethren." Jehan stepped forward. "I claim
episcopal exemption. This monk has committed grave crimes against a whole
kingdom."
the hounds OF god 289
"Not yours, Bishop of Sarum," drawled
Brother Paul. "Mine for the duration of this embassy," Jehan shot back, "under
the forty-third capitulum of the Synod of
Poictesme, which states--" Honorius smote his hands together. "Sirs, sirs! By
no will of mine this has become a papal tribunal. It appears that we are
trying the guilt of the Order of
Saint Paul on a charge of murder and sorcery.
Or is it that of Rhiyana's King and certain of his nobility on a charge of
sorcery alone? Or shall it be both?"
"We do not deny either our possession or our use of power," Alf said, "which
men call magecraft and sorcery. We do deny that that power either stems from
or serves the purposes of God's Adversary. And we charge that our kingdom has
been assaulted without reason or justice; that the guilt lies not with us but
with the preachers of the Crusade. We have lived as best we could between the
laws of the Church and the laws of our nature. In return we have been set upon
with arms and with power; our children murdered or taken; our human folk
condemned to suffer for us, for no better reason than that we live."
"You live," Brother Paul echoed him. "There is the heart of it. You live. You
do not die."
"Save by violence."
"Exactly."
Thea tossed her head. "There's a dilemma for you. Lord Pope. God has made us,
certainly, unless you subscribe to the doctrine that the
Devil could have done so, and that is heresy; He made us immune to death by
age or sickness. So if we are to die, we have only two choices. Murder or
suicide. The latter is forbidden by the Church.
So is the former, unless, of course, one calls it war. Or Crusade. Or
destruction of a pestilence."
"You cannot live," said Father Alberich dispassionately. You are against
nature. All things on earth fade and die. Only spirit is undying."
"Such fine ecclesiastical logic. It exists;
it should not; 290 Judith Tarr deny it and destroy it. Are you absolutely
certain. Father General, that your vision is clear? That you see what we are
without an intervening cloud of envy?"
"I see what you are. Beautiful; seductive.
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Deadly."
"Ah, but to what? To your sense of superiority?"
"You are superior to no man."
She clapped her hands. "Bravo, Father!
Truly, we are not. But neither are we inferior.
We are another face of God's creation, no more good or evil than our human
cousins.
Consider what sets us apart: our beauty, our power, Our deathlessness. Have
you nothing to counter these? Think, Father Alberich. Have you?" He crossed
himself deliberately, eyes averted from her shining face.
To him she was doubly terrible, witch and woman both, and far too intelligent
for a female creature.
Demonically intelligent. "Demonically accurate," she said. "Tell me what you
have that we have not. Tell me why a good Christian faces worse punishment in
long life than in early death.
You have threescore years and ten, maybe more, very likely less. We have years
uncounted, bound to earth apart from the face of God."
A soft cry escaped from Fra Giovanni.
"I see. Oh, I see! He gives you the rest, the gifts men envy so bitterly, in
recompense for that one great grief. Lady . . . Lady, how do you bear it?"
"With ease." Brother Paul's hand swept out, taking her in, close as she was to
her lover, one hand unconsciously stroking his hair.
"Can you believe that they suffer? Look at them! No expectation of Heaven,
maybe, but none of Hell either. He can abandon priestly vows, sire bastards,
sin with happy impunity. She can do exactly as her devils prompt her. And
believe this. Holy Father. That lovely form is far from her favored one. Her
nature and her instincts, whatever her likeness, are the nature and the
instincts of a bitch in heat." Alf surged up, breaking her strong grip with
the ease of caret the hounds OF god 291
wrath. In spite of his courage--and he had a great deal of that, whatever his
flaws--Brother Paul blanched. He was one of a rare few who had seen
Alf enraged; and then as now, he had provoked it, and paid dearly after.
Alf smiled with sweetness all the more deadly for the white fury in his eyes.
"Brother, Brother," he chided, "your language is most unsuitable in that habit
and in this company. Will you make amends?
Tell His Holiness a truth or two. Tell him why you made use of my poor brother
who is dead."
"Whom you killed."
"He willed himself to death rather than wreak further destruction. Tell him,
Joscelin."
The monk gripped Honorius' knees. "I
cry foul. Holiness! He compels me with sorcery."
Alfs face set. He would not say it;
he would not permit Thea to say it for him. It was
Jehan who strode forward and lifted the man bodily, shaking him like a
recalcitrant pup.
"He does not. Do as he says, monk. A word will do it. Two. Power; jealousy. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]