Valley of the Dead (The Truth Behind Dante's Inferno)

by Kim Paffenroth

  On the other side of the road from the graveyard, and slightly further from the town, Dante saw a barn or storage building. It looked like a sturdy one, with stout wooden walls and a high, thatched roof. As he studied it, he saw some of the thatch move, followed by two hands thrusting upward through the roofing. Dante gripped his sword, thinking perhaps his morbid, fatalistic reveries were about to materialize. The hands made the hole in the roof bigger, then a man climbed through the opening to stand on the roof. The way he moved, with coordination and purpose, he was clearly alive and not dead. By now, Dante saw that the others had also noticed the man. As they got closer, Dante also noticed the low moaning of the dead coming from inside the building.

  The man on the roof now saw the four of them approaching on horseback and waved to them. “You there!” he called. “You’ll ruin everything. They’ll come out after you. We have to close the door. Quick!” Dante looked at the side of the building perpendicular to the road, facing back toward the town, and saw two large, wooden doors there. They were open.

  The man slid down the thatch to the edge of the roof, turned, and nimbly dropped down to the ground. He ran to the open doors and quickly closed them, securing them with a bar that he laid in two brackets on the door frame. He also barricaded the doors with some boxes and barrels that were nearby. Dante noticed the moaning inside the building had increased during this process, and the sound of fists hammering on wood was soon added to the chorus.

  “There, that should do it,” the man said as he turned from his work to address them again. “Who might you be? I don’t recognize you from around here. Visitors? Someone important?”

  “Well, I’m not important, sir,” Adam said. “We are just travelling up the valley as fast as we can, trying to escape from the dead and the invading army.”

  “I see. Well, good luck to you then. As you can see, I am taking care of some of my serfs and a few of my neighbors. Lured them into the barn, then I climbed up to the loft. Now I can be rid of them all in one shot. A little ingenuity always fixes a bad situation.”

  “Often it does, yes,” Adam responded.

  As the man turned back to his work, Dante examined him carefully. He was about Dante’s age or slightly older, with a full head of black hair, a slightly dark complexion, broad shoulders and chest. He carried himself confidently, almost imperiously, as he busied himself. Dante watched him take a small barrel and pull the plug out of it. The man started splashing its contents on the barricade he had built. “The roof will go up just fine, I think,” he said as he worked. “It hasn’t rained in so long. But this could use some oil.”

  Dante considered the plan. “It must be awful for any creature to die in flames,” he said. “But it is good to release them from their torment, to free their tortured souls from their wretched, diseased bodies.”

  The man grunted as he tossed the empty barrel on top of the barricade. “That’s one way to look at it, I suppose. But souls in torment? Really, stranger. Who believes that anymore?” He raised his eyebrows as he looked Dante up and down, then turned to give Bogdana a more lingering examination -- one that was both more and less appreciative than the one he had given Dante. “I mean, consider such a lovely but simple peasant girl as we have here.” He smiled and gestured toward Bogdana, lifting his right hand palm down, then lowering it palm up, in a motion that was as gallant and dismissive as his words. “From one with so fetching a body and so dull a mind, I would surely expect such old-time religion, such quaint drollery. Such people are ever credulous and easily manipulated.”

  He leered. Not enough to be blatantly offensive, but with the merely casual, offhand derision of a man used to authority and privilege, a man with enough intellect to be arrogant, and not enough to be humble. “And who really would have it otherwise? I know when I lay my weary eyes on such a captivating body, I almost long to hear the inane, superstitious ramblings of the inferior mind that goes along with it. For when I hear about her boundless, childlike faith; her undying love for her kind, heavenly Father; the value she puts on her chastity; the contempt in which she holds the flesh; all the hopes she has for the world to come … Then I know how easy it will be to mold her malleable will and feeble reason to my ends. I realize how quickly I’ll have her dainty feet on my shoulders, sharing the untold delights of her sweet, soft flesh.” His leer was now as blatantly offensive as his words. “Is that how it was with you, dear? Did you find yourself in the bed of some nobleman, such as myself, who was smart enough to see through the pathetic hypocrisy and emptiness of your uncouth religion, and crafty enough to use it to his own advantage? Did you bring home his sterner, hardier seed in your belly? Maybe even to a gullible husband, who thanked God he’d been blessed with a child?” He snickered.

  The way Dante was grinding his teeth, he thought he’d pulverize them into a mouthful of bitter, poisonous dust, even if they had been made of stone. He could see out of the corner of his eye that Radovan – though he had earlier allowed himself to disrespect the same woman – had reacted to this vulgar display, drawing his sword halfway out of its sheath, as Dante gripped the hilt of his own. But he could see, at the same time, Bogdana took the abuse neither with anger nor embarrassment but with cold disdain. “You know nothing of my mind or faith,” she said calmly. “And an arrogant fool such as you will never know my body.”

  The man rolled his eyes. “Oh, fine. You’re the most virtuous woman in the whole damned valley, I suppose. More chaste than all the strumpets, young and old, that I now have locked in this barn, now they’re of no use to me or themselves or anyone else. I had more than half of them in exactly the way I just described. You think you’re more virtuous than all of them? And you call me the arrogant one?” He shook his head and laughed. “Fine. I won’t begrudge you your high opinion of yourself. I already said it was only your body I found interesting. I couldn’t care less what you think of me, or of yourself.”

  The man finally turned his attention back to Dante. “Ah, is this the suitor who’s so in love with your mind, my pet? No need to get all in a huff, stranger. We’ll all be dead soon enough. As I said, I’ve had more than my share of peasant sexing, so I don’t need to fight you over the silly, proud girl you have chosen to spend your final moments with. Did she get you to swear to protect her and her child, if she’d but glance your way, bat her eyes, perhaps touch your hand? Is that part of the bargain?”

  Dante blushed more violently than he could ever remember doing so – past a flushed, warm pink and all the way to a burning crimson, overflowing with rage and shame. He could feel the sweat pour from his forehead, and his ears felt like they’d caught fire. None of it was lost on the vile but perceptive stranger.

  “Oh my God. She did, didn’t she? And I was only bluffing! Don’t be embarrassed. I’m sure you go in for that sort of thing. I don’t even accuse you of lying to her, just to get up under her skirt. That would be more my taste, simple and direct, but I imagine you enjoy all the gallantry and oaths and high-mindedness. That is some people’s tastes, I know, even among more intelligent, enlightened people. So, in a way, you’re exactly like me. You’ve gotten the pleasure you want out of her, and she out of you, so no one’s to blame. No one need blush! But I also know that delectable body of hers – and her elevated mind you claim to prefer – will be reduced to nothingness in a few short hours, or days at most.” He stepped back and looked serious, less lecherous or mocking. “You’re clearly not from around here. And not, I think, from such low, basic stock as this pretty, young thing. Yet you prattle on about the souls of my dearly-departed neighbors and servants? That mystifies me. It truly does. You look intelligent. Intelligent enough that such absurdity coming from you could almost trouble me, could almost make me rethink or regret what I believe. Almost.”

  “I do not say I’m intelligent,” Dante said softly. “But I do say your neighbors’ souls are in torment, and you are doing them a kindness by releasing them, whatever ugly opinion you hold of them, or whatever selfish, misgui
ded beliefs motivate you.”

  Again the man grunted dismissively. “Oh, the arrogance! Such blinding, overweening self-assurance! You two really do deserve one another! It’s truly a match worthy of Greek poetry, of high tragedy, rather than the low comedy of my more honest, less refined life! You say you know my neighbors have souls, even my starving, wretched serfs have souls, yet I know that I have none! Are you asking me to believe all these dirty, misbegotten creatures have this God-given gift, this amazing faculty of immortality, this indestructible spark of Divinity, which I know I do not possess myself? They are immortal, and I am not? Are they more beloved, more blessed by this non-existent God of yours? If so, what poor and ridiculous taste He has!”

  Dante shook his head, his gaze fixed on the man. The blood drained from his face, leaving him cold and distant. “No, you were as blessed with life and existence as they were. You were, it seems, more blessed with wealth and intellect and perhaps other gifts. But what you do with all that is entirely up to you.”

  The man waved them off as he started pulling handfuls of thatch down from the edge of the roof, making them into a pile by the barricade at the barn doors. “Fine. On that point, at least, we can agree. What I do is entirely up to me. And I choose not to believe in all your foolishness, and to seek what pleasures I can find in this life.” He knelt down by the pile of thatch he’d made and began sending sparks into it with flint and a knife. He laughed as he worked. “There used to be a lot more of those simple pleasures, as I just described to you, and which so offended your delicate morals. But now? Just some grim satisfaction in destroying the monsters in this world.” He laughed louder, as the thatch began to smoke and take light. “It just occurred to me how funny that is! These monsters are an inconvenience to me – more so than fleas or mold, to be sure – but still, just another inconvenience that makes life more difficult and threatens to diminish my pleasure. But to you they must be absolutely maddening and disheartening! Tell me, in your tidy universe of a just, loving God, who made these abominations, these creatures of evil, malice, and destruction?”

  “God made them so we may overcome them and grow stronger,” Radovan said.

  “They make no difference to us, since this life is unimportant,” Adam said. “We care only for the soul and eternal life.”

  “They are just people left to their own sinful ways,” Dante said. “They are what we have made of ourselves.”

  The man had taken a burning piece of wood from the barricade and was now lighting the roof. “Oh, my,” he said. “I did underestimate you. I thought you’d have no answer, but instead you have too many.” He pulled back his arm and tossed the brand high up to the top of the roof, apparently satisfied the barn was burning vigorously enough. He turned once more to Bogdana. “And nothing from you, my little plum? I thought you were known for your mind?”

  Dante watched Bogdana’s eyes reflect the flames. “They are here for us to pity.” Her eyes did not look as disdainful as before. “As are you.”

  The man laughed, though it seemed more rueful this time. “Ah, more of that arrogance! I suppose it’s only fair, isn’t it? I look down on your faith, and you look down on me. I pity your ignorance, and you pity my hopelessness.” He gave Dante a playful, slightly mocking glance. “Looking back on all those godly wenches I had in my bed, I still think I got the better end of the bargain, but to each his own, I suppose. Again, I do wish you luck. Perhaps you’ll still find some pleasure in the short time remaining of your life. There. That can be my ‘prayer’ for you: I hope you find pleasure. Now, do you have a prayer for me? I know you all are into that sort of thing, and I need to be going now.”

  The barn was ablaze now. The moaning from inside increased in intensity, turning into more of a pained, terrified wailing.

  “I hope you find there is something more than pleasure,” Dante said.

  The man nodded. “Something more than pleasure would be a very great thing indeed. Would that there were such a thing, but I know there is not.”

  Dante watched him turn and run away, back toward the town, presumably to find more of his neighbors to kill, or whatever else he had planned for what he believed were his last moments of existence. Dante pulled back on the reins, drawing his horse away from the flames, turning it back down the road away from the town. The others had also fallen in line.

  He looked over at Adam, as erect and compact as ever. The man’s words did not seem to have shaken him at all. Then Dante gazed at Bogdana’s long hair and her thin yet sturdy frame, not seeing her face, but certain that she too felt unmoved, either by the man’s theology or his insults. Radovan was further ahead, and Dante very much doubted the young soldier, with his simplicity and virtue, would be perturbed by the conversation they had just had. The four rode on in silence, Dante quite convinced that only his faith was weak, for he could feel neither outrage, condemnation, nor pity for the stranger. Dante felt his stomach twist and his head lighten, because he knew he could only feel envy. Not for the women the man claimed to have bedded, of course – Dante could never be so crass as that – but for the certitude and inflexibility of his unbelief, the utter unassailability of negation, the numbing comfort of oblivion. These were things that could never be loved or admired, but they could certainly be envied, in all the anguish and doubt gripping Dante that day -- feelings that had taken hold of him on many other days before, and would on many thereafter.

  Chapter 22

  And when he us beheld, he bit himself,

  Even as one whom anger racks within.

  Dante, Inferno, 12.14-15

  As they slowly rode on, Dante heard the roaring crash of the barn’s roof collapsing behind them. For some time before that, he had no longer heard the moaning of the doomed creatures inside, though after this final explosion, he imagined a faint wheeze, like an exhalation of breath or a light wind playing over dry grass. He did not look back at the ruin. Whether out of dread or respect, he did not know.

  Up ahead, he noticed two dark figures in a field with a decrepit wooden fence around it. Dante could not tell what they were at first, but they moved, so they weren’t trees or stones. Then he could see the figure closer to them was a man. From the way he was moving he was clearly not alive, holding his arms out in front of himself as he lurched toward them. The figure farther from the road was an enormous, black bull, its head down, tugging at what grass was there, oblivious either to them or to its undead neighbor.

  Dante had not considered whether animals were susceptible to the plague of undeath. “Do the dead attack animals?” he asked. “Do the animals here become undead as well?”

  Radovan was in front, and turned back toward Dante to answer. “I’ve heard the dead will eat carrion, if they’ve been unable to kill and eat any living humans for a long time and have grown hungry enough,” he replied. “But live animals never interest them. Not that I’ve heard.”

  “No, they don’t bother animals,” Adam agreed as he rode alongside Dante. “And animals cannot become undead. It is our curse alone.”

  Dante couldn’t help but ask: “Why?”

  Adam turned to him. “Humans receive many more blessings, and many more curses, from God than animals do. It is always thus, and usually pointless to ask why. But in this case, I believe it is because this plague is a disease of the mind, of the soul. The animals lack these essences, so they cannot be afflicted. Only their bodies hunger, while people desire with their souls as well, and desire so much more than just food. They desire so intensely their hunger can outlive even the death of their bodies. That is the cursed life we see all around us, threatening everything, even the sanctity of death.”

  They were right next to the field with the dead man and the bull in it, when Dante saw the bull raise its huge head and shake it, snorting as it glared at them. The dead man never took his eyes off them to look at the bull behind him, but just kept shuffling forward. The bull lowered its head and charged, impaling the man with its right horn, then thrashing its head to toss
him off to the right. The corpse landed in a ball, its knees crammed up under its chin, before it started to unfold itself, getting up to its knees and planting its one foot as it tried to rise. The bull charged again before the man could completely stand. This time the remorseless, unyielding wall of its forehead smashed into the man’s skull, sending him to the ground, where he remained, unmoving.

  They had stopped their horses to watch the attack. Now the bull moved away from the motionless corpse, walking parallel to the road, its stare fixed on them.

  “Why did it do that?” Dante asked quietly, mesmerized by the massive animal.

  Adam looked to Bogdana. “I’m afraid you’ve shown more knowledge of animals than I have.”

  She shrugged. “You might as well ask why didn’t it do that before? There’s no telling. You can walk by the same bull every day and it never takes a step toward you, then suddenly one afternoon it charges you. Walk behind the same mule every morning and it never moves, then one day it kicks you. You always have to respect animals and what they can do. But the dead don’t know to do that.” She pointed. “I do think it wants out of that field now.”

  The bull turned to face the fence by the road, and it charged. The barrier was just a rickety collection of sticks, and the giant beast crashed through it easily. The animal stepped out into the road and turned its head toward them. Radovan was the closest to it.

  “If you’re going to throw it a bone or something, I wish you’d do it now,” he said over his shoulder, keeping an eye on the bull.

  “Just stay still and let it go,” Bogdana said. “It’s outside your control. Just let it do what it’s going to do. All you can do is react.”

  The animal’s black-eyed stare remained fixed on them, and a muscle in its massive shoulder twitched, but still it didn’t move. It gave a huff, turned, and walked slowly off into the field to the right, only stopping to look back at them when it was some distance away. Then it lowered its head and returned to its task of trying to find some edible grass among all the dead stalks.