Saint Fire (Secret Books of Venus Series)

by Tanith Lee

  During the night, as Volpa-Beatifica slept on the floor, two nuns entered the cell.

  “Get up, Beatifica. Put on your clothes.”

  When they took her through the Little Church and out into the yard, whose gate stood wide, Volpa-Beatifica was uneasy.

  Torches burned, and on the canal, black with night, a covered boat rocked up and down.

  Another woman would have protested, pleading to know where she was to be taken.

  But Volpa was a slave. The small chances of free will she had had in the cappella were swiftly mislaid. And she had expected change.

  She got into the boat without speaking, trembling, and sat where they showed her.

  There were also some casks in the boat, smelling of wine.

  She was rowed away into the night of Ve Nera, between the high black walls. In some, gratings and narrow slots evicted loud light. Stars littered the sky, forgotten candles.

  Some of the nuns stood crying at the water’s edge.

  They had been told Beatifica was to go to a religious house on the plain. They feared their care was not deemed adequate.

  3

  All the remaining year, past Christ-Birth Mass, Beatifica was at a farm on the Veneran Plain. How many properties, aside from the Island of Eels, and these one or two farms, belonged to Fra Danielus, was unknown. But a Magister, particularly a Magister Major of the Primo Suvio, must have revenues, and also places he might loan or give away or sell, as the Church’s needs dictated. Even recently, there had been a sale of another house, in order to supply the coffers of the Church, which in turn leant gold to the City’s ship-building.

  Beatifica knew nothing of this, of course.

  She was aware mostly that from the farm buildings she could see, far off, the mountains. Either she recalled them from memory, or from her mother’s told memories. They did not, certainly, seem familiar any more. They were gaunt and gray, and soon helmed with snow. Neither in the brazen sunrise of fall, nor the red setting sun of winter, did they turn to scarlet.

  At the farm, she saw slaves. This was a stumbling block, but having stumbled on it, she righted herself and beheld the difference. They demonstrated by their activities, their segregation—unlike her own—that she, now, was a slave no longer.

  Like the prayers she still regularly said and sang, this too she had needed to, and did, learn, by rote. Yet, she remained a slave.

  She slept in a bare, clean room. When she ignored the bed, which had frame, mattress, and curtains, they removed it. But they gave her for the winter chill three blankets, and a cushion for her head. These she took to. Also there was a brazier for wood. It was kept alight for her, as if she could not have lit it herself. She could not—not, as it were, cold. She must have impetus. She would need to be freezing to draw from herself the power—and, still slavish, might only have endured the freeze, as she had always done.

  She had candles, too. And a cross the nuns had sent with her, which she liked to hold. It was made of tarnished silver, which with her caresses, grew brighter.

  After only a day or so, the woman who came in the morning, (like the nun) a servant not a slave, brought Beatifica new garments.

  The girl looked at them, and the woman said, “The Magister Major says you’re to wear these, now. They’ll be warmer, and handier for your work.” A sentence prepared by others; the woman said it with an expressionless face.

  Presently she took Beatifica, as usual, down to the farm chapel. It was a vacant stable, perhaps a theosophic pun of sorts. The altar had been sanctified, but stood among wisps of straw. Here were some men of the farm, couth and combed always for the Dawn Mass, and two women, both elderly.

  None of them looked at Beatifica any more than they had ever done. Her clothes may have escaped them. Or not.

  She ate alone by day. At night, she ate with a man and woman of the house. They corrected her actions at the table as diligent parents might have done. The manners taught her, however, were higher than their own. She did not question this. Could anything surprise her? Little. In her limited world, most had been a surprise, and mostly a surprise that hurt or harmed. Amazements without pain she did not resist. But then, she had not resisted pain either, until it seemed to threaten life itself. (Eventually she might have ceased to resist even that.) She liked the honey and milk she was given, and the raisins and olives. These became an indulgence.

  Beatifica learned the use of spoon and knife and linen napkin, the trencher of bread that was not to be eaten but might be thrown to a dog, should she wish.

  Probably she did have a memory of farm dogs, for some reason friendly ones. Where the man and the woman had thought they would need to coax her not to be timid of the huge shaggy animals, they found her careless. Now and then she petted one. Never for long. She was not affectionate, or not in a physical way. And what was lost to her she did not search or lament for. (She had learned so many tenets of the priesthood in her slavery.) Unless, nothing had ever been worth lament or search.

  After the dogs, maybe her tutors wondered if she would be frightened, even so, of the horses Ve Nera’s means of travel, as a rule, was by her canals and other waters. It was true, the Ducem maintained some horses on his island, for riding in the gardens. And more on his estates on the plain, Forchenza principally, for purposes of hunting. Even the Primo kept horses on the plain, for its knights. And sometimes too it was possible in Ve Nera to behold horses, transported on some barge, or gathered, fabulously decked, for a ceremony in the Primo’s great square beneath the Angel Tower. But Beatifica had never seen anything like that. To her, a horse was surprising. Therefore, not unusual at all. Not until two men set her on a horse’s back, did Beatifica become alarmed.

  For a month before, she had been exercised, given things to do with her body in the new clothes—which were those of a boy, leggings, tunic, cloak. Her body, already firm and supple and spare, had loosened and knit further.

  So she kept a grip on the horse. But her mind plunged off. Another would have screamed for help. The horse was a steady creature of the farm, used to plough and plod. They led him round, and Beatifica sat on his top, her long hair tied off her face and falling down her back in a tail much like his own. Seeing her going like this about the fields, those who did not know—most—took her for a boy.

  She kept in her seat; when they took her off her legs gave way, both from the unused posture and from terror. The woman said to the man, “Is he insane, this Fra Danielus? What does he want from her? To ride like a man—”

  “Shut your lips, woman, till you have some sense. How do I know? He’s our landlord. We do what he says. Besides, for God’s sake, have you forgotten what he did for us? Would we be living still, if not for him? So, she’s in our charge. If he gave you a priestly robe to sew, you’d use a fine stitch.”

  “It’s a woman we’re stitching.”

  “Shut your lips if you want to stay wife of mine.”

  Nothing made much sense to Beatifica. No warnings such as were habitual to her tutors’ kind of servitude, a servant’s slavishness, for gain; from thankfulness. Beatifica obeyed, as always she obeyed. What sustained life she did.

  So, next day she was put up on the horse again, without cries or struggle. She did her best. By example, doing what she was shown, feeling out the country of the horse’s back, Beatifica once more learned.

  (She was fifteen. Her mind, unfilled by knowledge, gaping like a hungry mouth of sharp white teeth.)

  The lessons she devoured. Unconsciously mostly. From fright she moved to acceptance to an almost—interest, and so to aptitude. She rode. Bold as a man now. And when they brought the other horse, sword-slim and brown as malt, immodest as a man, she mounted him. She trotted with the horse and her escort through the bare fields, through the woods lashed by the tusks of winter boars. The air was spiked with coming snow. She had never known such freedom. Freedom which had come through obedient enslavement. The goal of the priest.

  Nine days before Christ’ Mass, the Magister
Major Fra Danielus went to inspect one of his farms. Three of the Bellatae rode with him, Aretzo, Jian and Cristiano. Snow was down in the foothills, and dusted on the plain. The high woods wove nets of snow-blossom. Wolves were seen, a black wind that passed across the distance. A boar appeared near the village of Mariamba, ten miles from the City, and menaced the cavalcade. The young knights killed this boar. It would make enjoyable eating, save for the Magister. But it was not a time for traveling. Fra Danielus rode in the customary litter jolted between two geldings. The Bellatae rode their horses. Villagers pointed out the white-haired knight, on his silk-white horse.

  Snow fell as they approached the estate.

  The faces of the young men were flushed with triumphant exertion and cold. (Cristiano had needed this color.) Danielus regarded them from the swaying litter. He himself seemed fatigued. He had been called to his sister’s island once more. It was patent she wore him out, this Veronichi, chronically unhealthy, an obscure woman with no proper existence.

  The boar gurned on its pole, gutted and dropping thick clods of black blood.

  When they reached the farm, everyone came out.

  The women were kissing the Fra’s hand, his ring, the men bowing low. Slaves ran to and fro. Chickens scattered, and on a post the cock crowed, not knowing six of his wives were due for the pot.

  “Is there news of the Infidel War, Magister?”

  Jian said, interposing himself between Danielus and his retainer, “No, not yet.”

  Danielus spoke gently, “I’ll send you word, as always. But you will need to butcher and salt down this winter.”

  “Yes, Magister.”

  “Don’t look so vexed. The number of their ships is exaggerated.”

  “Over one thousand, so we heard—”

  “Less than five hundred. And Ve Nera’s fleet will match them, by the spring.”

  “Thank God, bless the Virgin.”

  Aretzo said, on the outer stair, “You didn’t forewarn us, Magister, to lie.”

  “Yes, but do lie. A little. For now.”

  “It’s no sin,” said Jian, “not a lie of this sort. To save them distress.”

  Aretzo frowned.

  Jian amended, “Truth has varied somewhat in the matter besides. Depending on which spy has sent which report from Candisi. And whether he lived beyond its dispatch.”

  “Hell waits for Jurneia,” said Aretzo. His cheeks burned, as when he put a javelin into the boar.

  Cristiano, silent. He had been so most of the journey.

  The stair led to the Magister’s apartment, when visiting. The farm folk had seen to the bed and hung thick curtains. A fire burned, and there was a dish of winter apples, wizened but sweet. The Magister’s three knights would sleep in the lesser room, the four outriders and two Primo guard in the barn beside the kitchen.

  As servants sorted the baggage, there came the shriek of chickens chased with knives across the slippy courtyard.

  “What’s the matter, Cristiano? Sorry for the fowl?” Jian and Aretzo, worldly enough to like the jaunt, with its hunting and novelty. Cristiano smiled mirthlessly.

  “The chapel here’s a stable,” said Aretzo.

  Jian said, “So was the birthplace of our Lord. What bag is that? Hey, fellow, where are you lugging it?”

  The servant replied, “It’s to go up for mistress.”

  “Oh, take it then.”

  The woman came in with compressed lips. She did not look at Beatifica-Volpa, but the girl, as so often she did, kept her own eyes down.

  “The Magister Major has sent this. You’re to wear it.” An order. A slave obeyed orders, always. “He’ll conduct the service of the Venusium at sunfall. I’ll come for you then. Here’s the slave to help you dress.”

  This (second) slave came into the room. A true slave, Beatifica’s reminder by example that she was no longer of that kind.

  Over the chair which stood by the window, the clothing had been laid. It caught the glimmer of the brazier. Beatifica-Volpa stared one long moment at it.

  Then, with the other slave’s assistance, she took off her garments of a wealthy farmer’s son, and put on the new ones Fra Danielus had sent.

  As sometimes happened, in the minutes before it set, the sun appeared out of the clotted gray-white sky, a maroon ball, lightless enough to be gazed at. The sky was torn all around it, bleeding. Then the sun became a semicircle, and then a slice, and was gone. Color left the sky, and in the courtyard a boy was banging on a copper vessel, to summon the household to prayer.

  Advancing to the left of the stable-chapel, the women had entered in a group. There were five or six of them, the farmer’s wife, his elderly widowed mother and widowed aunt, to the front. At the other side, the right, the farmer and his sons were closest to the altar.

  For the Magister Major, Eastern incense-gum had been brought from its chest, and lit. The air was fragrant.

  Fra Danielus stood by the altar, and by the altar to the right, the three Soldiers of God. These four, facing the doorway, therefore saw her come in, as always, alone.

  Of the Bellatae, only Cristiano, who had seen her before, did not take her at first for some unexpected young man of noble birth.

  He noted the eyes of Jian slant inquiringly. Aretzo looked haughty, flaunting his own priestly rank.

  In Cristiano a shock-wave broke. He did not know what he felt—horror? Disbelief?

  But then Fra Danielus began to speak the words of the Sunset Mass.

  Were the peasant family, the Magister’s retainers, aware of what lived among them? This—changeling.

  Cristiano forced his mind away from the girl, standing now at the back, neither on the womens’ side nor the mens’, but in the middle, before the door. Her eyes seemed fixed on Danielus, or on the altar, perhaps. When the responses were uttered, and in the chant, he detected her voice easily, silver-pure, the Latin exact.

  And when they kneeled before the uplifted chalice, so did she. But on one knee only, as did the knights. Dressed as she now was, it gave her no difficulty.

  Cristiano sought for God blindly, and through his great self-discipline, shut out reaction to the girl. But even so, could not quite grasp the majestic otherness of the Venusium, its true meaning and heart.

  Religion was his food and drink, desire, rest, his life’s love. He rose, cheated. Just as, six times now, from the Vigil he had had to rise. For six times the essence of God had failed him—that is, been failed by him. Each month, through the summer and the autumn, the arrival of winter, kneeling before the Virgin window, lifted high above his pain and able to withstand it—but achieving nothing. The sheer white radiance, the overwhelmment of flawless bliss—they had not been his. And though in the past, occasionally, he had not achieved this state, always then it had been his the next time. Now no fast or punishment brought him back to it. Before the last Vigil, Cristiano had stretched out three hours on the floor, beseeching God, requesting to be told what fault of his had barred him from the pinnacle. Frustrated, unanswered.

  Was his fault so grave that God refused to reveal it? Frustrated … that now always. Reining himself like the horse he had ridden today, fighting over and over a restless bitter rage, like the boar they had slain.

  He must not become a petulant child, fractious because his toy had been taken from him for his own good, seeing that he valued it too highly.

  Was this the message God had sent him, then?

  Even holy delight might become the sin of greed?

  He had believed, while he stayed worthy—Ah, then, he must no longer be worthy.

  In what way? What had he done? Reveal, Oh Lord, my fault—

  Cristiano held himself finally in bands of steel. Self-governance was all that had been left to him.

  It was by now dark outside, and a torch burned on a pole in the yard, which was perfumed, after the incense, with chickens and sheep.

  But indoors the candles were lit, and they went into the farmer’s parlor to eat.

  The table w
as finely dressed tonight with a white cloth, and water for the hands. The woman of the house and her servants brought the dinner. Only the elderly women sat down with the farmer and his five sons.

  Danielus was placed at the table’s head, and his three Bellatae on either side. One place still stood empty. Then, in came the girl, the abomination of Woman dressed as a man.

  Cristiano stared at her. Her lids were not lowered, but she looked only at Danielus.

  The perverse garments were white. Whiter than the common white of ordinary things, the old tablecloth, the womens’ aprons. Church white. Pristine as the new snow. And the cloak, where it was looped back, was thinly edged by gold. While on her hips the low male belt was hatched with gold. She wore a golden crucifix, not large, but set with one smoldering red gem, to represent the Blood of Christ.

  In the candlelight, as she came nearer and nearer, her unbound flood of hair was like the torch from the yard, a water of fire. Cristiano saw her eyes were not after all yellow, but, like her cross, made of gold.

  “Beatifica,” said Fra Danielus. He spoke casually. No one at the table, or among the women, stirred. As if nothing much went on.

  Yet Cristiano felt Jian beside him abruptly alter. And Aretzo across from them, (by whom, it seemed, the changeling would sit down) craned his neck. His eyes started like those of a fish.

  “Speak the Grace for us, Beatifica,” Danielus gently said.

  She brought her hands together, folded one on the other. Her eyes now lifted above them all. Motionless, she moved beyond them. Cristiano saw it, as he had seen it that other time, in the court of the nunnery.

  She spoke the Grace.

  The table bowed its collective head, even the Bellatae. Cristiano felt his fellow Soldiers listening.

  Her voice—was not like a woman’s, not like a boy’s—certainly nothing like a man’s. It was like an instrument. The sounding-board of the sacred words. (Beside Cristiano, Jian shuddered.)