The Devil's Pawn

by Oliver Pötzsch

  Johann had asked Karl to leave him for a little while; he wanted to rest and prepare himself for what was to come. But he struggled to form any clear thoughts. He had been waiting for this moment for so long. Now he would finally face Tonio. What the two of them had begun many years ago with a pact would reach its conclusion, one way or another.

  When he walked to the window and gazed into the night, he saw dots of light moving from town toward the bridge and the gate. Torches and lanterns, glowing like yellow fireflies. Johann guessed they belonged to the mysterious guests Father Jerome had invited to this mass.

  The meeting with Tonio del Moravia, Johann’s former master.

  Every fiber of Johann’s body quivered with anticipation, almost as if he were about to make love. Tonio was his enemy and more. He was Johann’s alpha and omega; everything had started with him and everything would end with him. Johann felt certain: the disease Tonio had sent him was supposed to bring him to this place, to this moment in time. Strangely, he could even move his arm again a little. He couldn’t tell whether that was because of the old midwife’s cream or because of Tonio’s proximity.

  Behind him, the thin door opened and Karl entered.

  “Did you manage to get some rest?” When Johann shook his head, Karl smiled. “I didn’t think you would. I, too, can’t stop wondering what to expect inside the church.” He raised a hand. “I know, it’s not yet midnight, but we should still give the light signal.”

  Johann gave a start. He had been so preoccupied with the thought of meeting Tonio soon that he’d almost forgotten about his promise to send the signal each night. Instead he had been staring at the dots of light signaling the arrival of the guests. He looked around for the brazier by his bed.

  But it wasn’t there. Only a ring of soot on the floor showed where it used to stand.

  Karl followed his gaze. “Same in my chamber,” he said. “I had hoped there’d be fire in your room. The torches have also been removed.”

  Johann looked at the rusty brackets on the wall—they were empty. Someone must have taken the torches away while they were in the hall.

  “Damn it,” groused Johann. “Looks as if someone noticed what we’ve been doing each night. Let’s go—maybe we’ll find a torch in the corridor that we—”

  He turned to the door and stopped dead.

  Father Jerome stood in front of him with a torch in his hand.

  Karl hadn’t heard him enter, either. The priest hadn’t come in through the regular entrance; that door was still closed. Had he entered through Karl’s door or . . . ?

  Or through the same secret door that he used to visit me that first night, thought Johann.

  He wondered how much of their conversation the chaplain had overheard. Father Jerome’s face betrayed nothing. After a few moments, he hinted at a bow.

  “I thought it would be polite to fetch you personally for mass,” he said. “It’s a little early, but the guests are growing impatient. They long to see you, Doctor. Are you ready?”

  Johann would have liked to ask for more time, but he couldn’t think of an excuse. How could he give the signal when he and Karl went with the priest now? Father Jerome had probably ordered the torches and braziers to be removed himself. Johann should have thought of it sooner—now it was too late. But it didn’t really matter. He had only given the signal in the last few nights to put Greta’s mind at ease. Tonight, everything was going to be resolved, so there was no more need for signals.

  “I am ready,” he said.

  “Then follow me.”

  They stepped into the dark corridor. Here, too, any lights had been removed, making Father Jerome’s torch the only source of light in the darkness of the old walls. They followed the priest down the stairs, left the donjon, and turned right toward the church. There was no sign of any of the guards, and no watch fires had been lit on the towers like usual. Johann suspected the guards had been bribed—unless the chaplain had other means of making them compliant.

  Father Jerome pushed against the two-winged church portal, which swung open silently as if freshly oiled. They were greeted by a surprising brightness, and Johann was forced to squint. The nave was illuminated by dozens of torches, and, as during morning mass, the organ was playing, but it sounded incredibly low and the tune was very strange, like music meant not for mankind but for something much older. Once Johann’s eye had adjusted to the brightness, he looked around searchingly. Contrary to his expectations, the church was empty. No one was sitting in the pews.

  “Where are your guests?” asked Karl, who had been following Johann and the priest in silence.

  Father Jerome waved dismissively. “Don’t worry, everything is prepared.”

  He walked ahead, leading them behind the altar in the apse. Johann saw now that narrow stairs led down through an opening in the ground. During the morning services, it had been closed with a hatch that now stood open. Father Jerome pointed down below where, Johann realized, the organ music came from.

  “After you.”

  Johann hesitated briefly, then he started to descend the slippery, moss-covered steps. If the priest and his friends wanted to kill Johann, they would do so anyway. But he didn’t think they were going to—for some reason, Father Jerome treated him with something like respect.

  The steps led down into a low crypt directly beneath the church. Here, too, many torches had been lit, illuminating a long room that was supported by two rows of stout columns. Farther back, a type of well was built into the ground, torchlight reflecting in the water. The organ music was so loud that it hurt Johann’s ears, but he still couldn’t spot the instrument.

  Instead, Johann saw the guests.

  There were about two dozen of them, and it was the strangest conglomeration of people Johann had ever seen. It was a mix of men and women, older ones and younger ones, although Johann couldn’t see any very old people or children. It took him a few moments to figure out what was so odd about them.

  It was their clothes.

  Only a few of the guests wore regular garments; the rest were dressed like people in a painting.

  In a very old painting.

  Johann saw pale noblewomen with divided hennins and veils on their heads, men with pointed crakows and cloak-like upper garments that had been in fashion decades ago. The colors were garish and loud, the leggings tight fitting, accentuating the men’s private parts, and some wore scarves around their heads wrapped into turbans. Silver cloak pins and jingling bells on the garments gave some of them the air of jugglers.

  But on second glance, the outfits didn’t seem quite as magnificent. Some were faded, others threadbare and full of mold stains, as if they’d spent many years lying in a chest.

  Or in a coffin, thought Johann.

  The guests nodded at him and Karl. Some of them gave an elegant bow, but no one uttered a word. Each of their movements was measured and grave. Father Jerome pointed out an older man wearing a slightly scratched silver cuirass with a faded red cape of velvet. The deafening organ music ended as if on cue.

  “May I introduce you to Henri Montcourt,” said Father Jerome, “the Duke of Burgundy, valued friend of the king, and one of the most feared enemies of the English. He single-handedly decapitated eight of their knights during the Battle of Compiègne.”

  The duke bowed low, and Johann couldn’t hide his surprise. What in God’s name was going on here?

  “It is a great honor, sir,” said Montcourt as if he were standing before the king.

  “I didn’t realize the English were still enemies,” said Karl, who seemed just as astonished as Johann. “Hasn’t King Francis I signed an agreement with Henry VIII that England drops all claims of the French crown?”

  “Begging your pardon, I wasn’t speaking of King Francis I but Charles VII,” replied Father Jerome with a soft chuckle and slap to his forehead. “A very capable ruler who reclaimed Paris from the English eighty years ago. Duke Montcourt rode at his side back then. Yes, it’s been a while.” He pu
lled Johann and Karl along. “What you see here is old nobility, in the truest sense of the word. These people don’t think in days or years, but in generations. They are the most loyal followers of our master. I am so glad that you may meet him today! Not many are granted this privilege.”

  “I’ve already had the pleasure,” said Johann softly.

  “I know, Doctor. I know. We all do.”

  They were introduced to more guests, but Johann couldn’t remember the names. They were all French, and he believed he had heard of one or two of them before, in connection with a long-gone era. They were names from the Hundred Years’ War, in which the French had fought the English. On the French side, Charles VII had fought with many of his followers.

  Johann dared to ask a very particular question.

  “I would have expected to see Jeanne d’Arc among this illustrious circle,” he said casually. “I heard the maiden died a martyr, but maybe she isn’t dead at all but alive and well like all the others here.”

  Father Jerome gave him a hateful stare. “Let me give you a piece of advice—don’t ever mention this name in the presence of our lord. It makes him . . . well, rather sad. Jeanne could have had everything. The master loved her like none other, but she chose death by fire. A true shame!”

  The priest shook his head as if to rid himself of an irritating thought. “But enough of the chitchat. These people traveled a long way to see you, Doctor. That is why we had to wait a few days for this mass. They all want to help you meet the lord. But I must tell you one thing—one vitally important thing.” He raised an admonishing finger. “You have to say that you come willingly to him. That is the condition.”

  “We’re not haggling,” said Karl angrily, gesturing at the people around them. “What are you trying to achieve with this masquerade, anyhow? Do you really think we believe that all these people are over a hundred years old and personal friends of Gilles de Rais?”

  Father Jerome gave a shrug. “You can believe what you will, Master Wagner. But if you—both of you—want to meet the master, then you must fulfill the ancient ritual. Those are the rules.”

  Johann remembered his encounter with Tonio at Nuremberg. Then, too, it had been important that he came to the underground crypt of his own free will.

  “I come willingly,” he declared loudly.

  Father Jerome looked at Karl. “And you? Do you want to go with the doctor?”

  “If this superstitious hocus-pocus is really necessary . . .” Karl tried a mocking smile but failed. “Very well. I come willingly.”

  “Good.” Father Jerome nodded, then he turned to the Duke of Montcourt. “Please, monsieur, fetch the black potion.”

  Johann groaned when the memories returned.

  The black potion.

  He knew this potion. Two times already in his life he’d been made to drink it. He didn’t know the exact ingredients, but he guessed the brew contained devil’s trumpet, henbane, and other mind-bending herbs of the nightshade family. It made a person feel heavy and extremely light at once. Life was suddenly just an illusion and the delirium was reality; the borders between the world of dreams and real life blurred.

  But mostly, it was a nightmare.

  “For the journey you are about to undertake, it is crucial that you drink the black potion to the last drop,” said Father Jerome seriously. “You must be pure, from the inside as well as the outside. Which is why you are going to bathe.”

  “What journey?” asked Karl with increasing trepidation. “And what bath, damn it?” He looked around nervously.

  “You will learn the destination when you have drunk.” Father Jerome watched Johann closely. “Do you want to meet the lord? Do you want your disease to be healed? Or would you prefer your life on earth to be over very soon, dying pathetically and unknowing like a sick mutt?” The voice of the father took on the tone of a snake again. “Would you prefer the master to take his pleasure with your daughter following your inglorious end? If you don’t, then drink!”

  Johann stepped toward the Duke of Montcourt, who was carrying a chalice made of black obsidian. He yanked the chalice from the duke’s hand, causing a few drops to spill. Johann almost feared that they would vaporize on the floor like acid. He lifted the chalice to his nose and sniffed. The contents smelled rotten, like old fish and moldy seaweed from the depths of the ocean.

  “Drink!” said Father Jerome. “It’s different every time—no one can tell beforehand what the drink will show you.” He gave a little laugh. “But believe me, it is always a deeply profound experience.”

  Memories rose up in Johann from the time he traveled to a forest near Nördlingen with Tonio and Poitou; that had been many years ago. Now he had to go through it all again.

  “Then so be it.”

  Johann took a long sip that almost made him vomit, the liquid burning in his throat like fire. Then he went to pass the chalice to Karl but stopped short.

  “You don’t have to do this, Karl. You can still turn back. I am grateful for all you’ve done for me. No one can force you to do this.”

  “That is true. You must drink it willingly.” Father Jerome nodded at Karl. “But when you drink, there is no way back.”

  Karl hesitated. He looked at Johann, and Johann thought he could detect a silent sadness in his assistant’s eyes—sadness and something else. Johann was about to say something, but then Karl lifted the chalice to his lips.

  And drank.

  And just then, the droning bass of the invisible organ set in again.

  The most conflicting feelings raged inside Karl when he placed the chalice to his lips. He assumed the potion was not poison but a drug. Still, his hands shook as if he was being passed a cup of hemlock. All this seemed so absurd and horrible at once. Karl knew what had happened back in Nuremberg after Faust had been given the black potion. During a gruesome sacrificial ceremony, the doctor’s little finger on his right hand and his left eye had been removed. Was he facing a similar fate now?

  The liquid touched his lips and then seeped down his throat. It was the most disgusting thing he’d ever drunk. His body reacted by gagging, and he struggled to keep the potion down. He could feel the eyes of the guests on him, watching him like hungry wolves. Damn—these people were at least as crazy as those Satanists below Nuremberg. Karl couldn’t believe that the guests were hundred-year-olds who prolonged their life through some sorts of horrific rituals—or worse, living dead who had risen from their graves. He refused to believe it because he knew that otherwise his entire view of the world would collapse, a view that rested on reason and science and that had no room for a real devil, immortality, and all the other outrageous nonsense he had encountered over the last few months.

  But still he drank. He drank for one reason in particular—a reason almost as irrational as the existence of the devil.

  He did it for love.

  Karl couldn’t leave the doctor, not after all the years they’d spent together, and that was why he had to walk this path with him now. As painful and crazy as it was.

  The liquid burned like bile as it seemed to expand in his stomach; the pain reminded Karl of a pungent, high-proof liquor. Once he overcame the initial nausea, a heat spread from the center of his body and radiated into even the smallest pores. At the same time he felt light and strangely carefree. Suddenly he had no idea how much time had passed since he’d taken the first sip. Minutes? Hours? His fear was gone, and the glow of the torches in the crypt seemed warm and homely to him, like a cozy fire on a winter’s night.

  Karl looked over at Johann, who was standing beside him with his eyes closed. The doctor was so handsome. Karl wanted to touch him; he reached out for Johann but grew aware that they weren’t alone. The men and women inside the crypt surrounded them, but they no longer seemed crazy or evil to Karl. They were friendly, warmhearted people who beamed at him. Some laughed, others clapped their hands, and they chanted: “O lord, take them to you! Let them come to you!” And Karl laughed with them like a big, innoc
ent child.

  A hand touched him gently by the shoulder. It was Father Jerome, smiling at him.

  “Follow me to the bath.” Father Jerome’s voice was as warm and mild as the morning sunshine in early summer. “You must wash before you can set forth on your journey.”

  Karl and Faust followed him submissively. Father Jerome led them to the well at the back of the crypt. The water inside gleamed black, and the well looked much larger to Karl now, almost like a basin meant for swimming.

  Like an enormous baptismal font, he thought.

  “Take off your clothes,” said Father Jerome, not in the tone of a commanding priest but lovingly, like a dear friend.

  Hesitantly at first, then faster and faster, Karl undressed, and so did the doctor. Soon they both stood naked in front of the well, and for some reason Karl felt comfortably warm despite the chilly air inside the crypt. It was his first time seeing the doctor like this. Even though Faust was past forty now, his body still looked athletic and sinewy, without an ounce of fat on him. Strands of muscles showed beneath his skin like taut ropes, even in those places where he was paralyzed. Bushy pubic hair covered his manhood, which, Karl noticed, was rather large.

  “Now enter the pool and wash,” said Father Jerome. “Every part of your body! Nothing must remain untouched.”

  Karl didn’t hesitate for long. He found the water to be surprisingly warm. When he lowered his foot into it, circles formed on the surface that grew toward the outside edge, and Karl felt magically drawn to them. He sat down on the rim and slid into the bath; it came up to his hips when standing, and it felt wonderful. He leaned down and scooped the liquid over his body. When it wet his lips, it tasted as salty as seawater. All worry and exhaustion seemed to fall away from him.

  Johann climbed in next. They hadn’t exchanged a word so far, and Karl wasn’t even sure if the doctor was aware of him. He seemed to be entirely absorbed in his own world. Karl noticed a shine, a supernatural reddish glow that Faust exuded. What was it? Karl reached out and gently touched the doctor’s cheek. Only then did Johann notice him and smile.