Asimov's SF, April-May 2008

by Dell Magazine Authors

  “Take your son with you. You don't have to acknowledge him. Make him your servant. He could learn to read and write. He has a beautiful voice. He could have a future life as a court musician, or a cathedral chorister.”

  “But they would have to cut him for that,” I said. “And some boys do die under the barber's knife.”

  She has never seen what they do, I can tell. Oh, I have seen fine chan-teurs with the voices of angels. The timeless melancholy of their songs comes, I think, from the wound to their manhood, which even when it has healed leaves a longing that can never be fulfilled.

  “I don't understand those things. All I know is that you have resources. You sleep in castles. You can call soldiers to throw people into dungeons. Your son has a grudging stepfather who doesn't want to spare the food to fill his belly, and he is the most powerless person in a village that men say is already damned. You must take him. Whipping yourself is all very well, but can't you see that you're also punishing him?"

  I had come to Tiffauges to investigate a crime against God. But was I myself also to be subjected to the Question?

  Alice kissed me. My flesh hardened, but I could not harden my heart. I turned away. I needed to be pure for tomorrow.

  “I'm sorry, mon pére.” She curtsied and left the room. Her scent remained. And so did the wound.

  Why the wound, what wound? There was no wound. Should I not have followed the example of almost-martyred Origen and made myself a eunuch for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven? Obviously a vow to God was an empty promise. Only the slice of a knife held truth.

  * * * *

  Both Brother Paolo and Alice had told me Guillaume could sing; I only knew how well that morning, when I said mass in the chapel. Brother Paolo had found an old psaltery, and he had badgered the boy into coming up to the chateau and had taught him, neume by neume, a short chanson by Dufay, the Burgundian; and during the offertorium they contrived to perform it, with the brother playing the tenor on the psaltery and essaying the contratenor himself, while Guillaume took the upper part, with the high notes that seem to hover in the air....

  I should say first that, at breakfast, over a loaf of black bread and a beaker of wine, the Chevalier Johan told me that all had been done as I had asked. They had requisitioned some of the peasants to dust and mop some of the rooms in the chateau; for they feared the soldiers more than they feared the curse of Bluebeard.

  The chapel, wherein the Marshall of France had permitted the most repulsive abominations, had been scoured of dirt by dawn. The peasants who had been commanded to do the work stayed for mass, but several from the village came, too. Perhaps they thought that the touch of the host upon their tongues could take away the lingering taste of terror.

  It was during the offertorium that Brother Paolo's ad hoc consort performed. The peasants had, of course, little to offer but a few loaves and cheeses; yet our torturer went among them, gracefully taking the gifts with a smile. They could never have guessed his normal profession.

  The music was a setting of a holy sonnet by Francesco Petrarca; I knew this must be Brother Paolo's doing, for though the composer was Flemish, he had been in service in Italy, and the chanson had an Italian lilt to it, for the Italians have the fashion of giving a soaring melody to the highest voice, reducing the others to little more than accompaniment.

  When I heard the words, I ached; for Petrarca speaks of the beautiful virgin cloaked in the sun and the stars, and then the poem goes on to say, “I want to offer thee my prayers, but I cannot even begin to pray without thy help....”

  And it was the issue of my loins who sang those words, and he made the notes linger in the chill air as they climbed, note piling upon note, like a stairway to the sky—

  In caelo.

  That pitiful creature claimed to reside in the sky! And now he had put a curse on me, and I could not see the face of the Blessed Virgin with the raiment of starlight, but instead, a more earthly woman, a woman whose earthy scent and moist lips cried out for me to sin, whose every gesture was derived from the temptation of Eve and the wiles of the Serpent. I stood there, sweat pouring down my face even though the chapel was cold.

  And my son's voice rose above the turmoil ... and there came dawn. A ray of light burst through the east window and illuminated the altar. And my son's voice was in that light. It lifted me out of darkness. In that melody was the voice of God himself.

  And I saw the beauty in his eyes, my eyes....

  I knew now how I had to redeem my sinful past. I had to rescue my son. Woman though she was, Alice had been a messenger. Those sweet sounds must not perish. He must be cut; surely the Lord would guide the knife Himself, for the saving of so perfect a voice. My son was not to know the sins of the flesh. He could not fall as I had fallen. I knew then why God had sent me back to Tiffauges.

  But for now, I kept this revelation in my heart.

  * * * *

  The papal regulations allow for only two sessions of Question; it is therefore the custom never to declare a session ended, so that the prescribed methods of ferreting out the truth may be applied until the truth is actually obtained.

  The first session, which is intended to proceed without torture, I always like to stage in a well-lit room, without a threatening atmosphere. So we used the largest room in the chateau. Apart from a minimal chaining of the ankles, the prisoner was given free rein to stand or sit as he chose, and given a stool. I myself occupied what must have once been the Marshall's magisterial chair; flanking me were Brother Paolo with his reference books, Brother Pierre, with his quill, ink, and parchment, and Jean the Barber; that, and our Chevalier and a few of the soldiers, were all that the huge council chamber held.

  Now that I saw him in broad daylight, I knew why the children had covered him with mud. He was green. Oh, not obviously green, like grass or an emerald, but he had a gray-green cast to him. With a tunic, belt, and shoes, it was less noticeable, because the eyes were what held you most about him. But I did not fail to notice what I did not see in the dim light of the innkeeper's cellar; his hands were webbed, like the feet of a duck.

  Once in a while, one hears of a child with webbed feet and hands being born in some remote village, and the peasants do not hesitate to kill it, for to dispose of a monster is not deemed murder. I had never heard of one surviving to adulthood.

  Still, save for the odd coloration, the scales, the webbed hands, the creature did not exude an aura of evil. Not in this light, at least. I thought him more pitiful than terrifying.

  Although I knew that he could speak Latin, I decided to begin the interrogation in the vulgar tongue.

  “What is your name?” I asked.

  “We have no names,” he said. “We are all fragments of an All. Names are bad. They fracture us from the One.” It was nonsense.

  “But you must have a name,” I said. It was a bureaucrat's nightmare; you have the papers, and you cannot even begin, because such things are filed away by name, and there is no name, how can one begin?

  “We shall give you a name,” I said. I turned to Brother Paolo. “Pick any name. We shall not fumble this case over mere sophistry.”

  “Call me Guillaume,” said the creature.

  Like Jean, Guillaume is one of the commonest names in France. But I could not help thinking that he took that name to taunt me with my sin. I was about to stop Brother Paolo, but he had already written it down.

  “No, you are wrong,” said Guillaume the Monster. “I honor him, he my first friend in this world.” His French comes and goes; sometimes it is perfect; sometimes it is disjointed, as though he were stringing the sentences together from a heap of words.

  “Why do you say this world? Know you another world?”

  “I am lost. My world is far.”

  “Where is your world?”

  Guillaume the Monster points only at the ceiling.

  “Are you an angel?”

  “Angel? ... Oh.” He seemed perplexed. He looked as though he was searching through so
me store of information to retrieve the word. “Oh. You mean Aggeloa. Then he said in French, “Messenger. Yes. I messenger.”

  “So you claim to be a member of the heavenly host.”

  “I fall from sky.”

  Brother Paolo cried out, “Listen! He condemns himself from his own lips. He is a fallen angel.”

  This was an outlandish claim; why would such an apparition not appear in some royal court, or before His Holiness himself? Why would a fallen angel choose an obscure village to bring his message to the world? But the answer was obvious when I thought about it. It was clear that the foul rites practiced by Gilles de Rais had left a sort of spiritual chasm here. When a man murders hundreds of children to satiate his sexual appetites, all the while invoking the names of the Dark Powers, there are surely consequences to the natural order. For the tiniest sin is a hideous affront to God, and these were monstrous. It was as though Bluebeard had dug a well straight through to the heart of hell. Why not, then, a fiend shooting forth from the infernal depths, cloaked in fiery brimstone, to tempt the mind of an innocent?

  Still, there were some elementary tests. “Can you say the Lord's Prayer?” I asked him.

  The monster said, “How can I know these things? I come from the sky.”

  Jean the Torturer said, “I'm afraid that there's very little we can do about this.” I knew he was not anxious to get out all his instruments, but like all of us he understood the meaning of duty.

  I said, “Let's not be in a rush to be cruel. I suggest we try an exorcism first.”

  As was the custom, I declared, and entered into the record, that the session was adjourned; and we took our midday break, after leaving the prisoner more securely chained up in the council chamber, and well guarded.

  The innkeeper sent up a brace of duck to the chateau; it was my son who brought the food, for though we had dismissed him after the morning mass, he had begged for some excuse to return.

  We ate quickly and prepared our vestments as well as an aspergillum and a large cauldron of holy water. I asked the Chevalier to send a swift rider to Nantes; I suspected that reinforcements were going to be needed; not more soldiers, but more expert demonologists. Reverently, I kissed the violet stola before placing it over my surplice. I have never taken exorcism lightly.

  But when I returned to the council chamber, I found the two Guillaumes alone together.

  “What are you doing?” I shouted.

  My Guillaume backed away. He had been bent over the prisoner; he had a cup in his hand.

  “I'm sorry, mon pére. I was giving him water.”

  I said, “You, of all people, need to stay away from him. He has invaded your mind more than anyone. He has plucked things out and will use them against us—against you in particular. Your immortal soul is in grave peril.”

  He looked at me and I could sense—defiance. And then, with bowed head, my Guillaume slunk away.

  “Do you know what I am going to do?” I asked the monster.

  For normally, when one is about to perform an exorcism, the demon has foreknowledge. When the holy water is brought into the room, he begins to howl. He hurls obscenities at the priest, and malodorous fumes begin to rise, which are best counteracted by the liberal use of frankincense. To that end I had already prepared two censers and the sweet fragrance was already seeping into the room. But Guillaume the Monster did not respond at all.

  I began the asperging, dipping the aspergillum and calling on the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, the Blessed Virgin, St. Peter, St. Michael, St. Denis, and all the company of heaven to witness. While Brother Pierre held open the book of exorcism, an ancient illuminated tome bound with rusty clasps, Brother Paolo held up the crucifix to the prisoner's face, but the creature did not flinch; he merely stared at it curiously, blinking.

  I started the preparatory incantations and then, summoning up all my inner strength, I bellowed out the words of exorcism: Exorcizo te, immundissime spiritus, omnis incusio adversarii, omne phantasma, omnis legio, in nomini domini nostri Jesu Christi eradicare... and with each sign of the cross I swung the aspergillum, knowing full well that the power that resided in the water would burn the devil from the being's flesh....

  But Guillaume the Monster merely sat there. Blinking. Was he so oblivious to the word of God?

  When the ritual was done, he spoke to me. “That was an interesting ceremony, Father Lenclud. What does it mean? May I see a repetition, so that I can play back the recorded memory to my companions in the sky?”

  There arose in me a terrible anger. He was mocking me! He was ridiculing God Almighty. I knew that my blind fury was a sin. I went outside to get some fresh air. I was panting and my heart was beating fast. In the courtyard, I saw my Guillaume, sitting by a well.

  My son pulled a fresh bucket of water, and gave me to drink. Though the noonday sun was brilliant, there were still piles of snow among the cobblestones. He held out the bowl for me, and the sun was behind him and the wind stirred his hair and I saw in his face all that I once wished to be, but could no longer, for that I had long descended into tainted ways of sin. I wanted to tell him right then and there, but perhaps it was not the moment. I drank deeply, and the water dampened my choler.

  “How is he?” my son said. “Is he in pain?”

  I saw in his face a profound compassion and I thought to myself, “Guillaume, my son, you are good to feel such Christian love for even a creature such as this.” I wanted so much to embrace him. But we are taught to avoid the warmth of human closeness, for darker dangers may lurk behind an innocuous caress. The mere touch of a boy's hand has aroused unnatural passion in many a cleric. It were better not to risk it. Love is best experienced solely in the spirit. I cursed myself for a hypocrite to think such things when only last night Alice had flung herself at me and I had released myself only with reluctance from temptation. I only said, “We are not torturing him at the moment, my son. It is possible that he will reveal all without recourse to the second stage of the Question. And we will all be spared much grief.”

  All afternoon, I wielded the aspergillum with a will. I asked my brothers to asperge the creature when my own arms tired. I shouted out the words of the ritual. Three times we commanded the devil to depart. Three times I flung the water and shouted out those puissant words, words designed to make Satan himself quiver in the very bowels in hell; yet the prisoner did not yield, did not even show fear; if he evinced any emotion at all, it was curiosity. Exhausted and exasperated beyond all measure, I finally hurled the entire basin at him. It struck him in the head. The water scattered and clouds of steam rose up. And at this unexpected turn, he slumped over and I was immediately concerned, for it is not a priest's place to inflict pain. But then, when I looked about him, I saw that the pools of water were all boiling, and that there poured from a gash in his forehead a thick green rheum; and the creature began to tremble as though he had the falling sickness, so that the chains clanked and made a racket that should have woken the very dead. A blast of heat emanated from him, and unearthly sounds poured from his throat; at last, I could see the normal signs of possession.

  Then, as I gaped, the wound in his brow knit itself together, and the pools of water ceased seething, and the room was as icy cold as before.

  And he sat there, unperturbed.

  I sank back on my inquisitorial chair. I was sweating. I called for wine. Slowly, the creature seemed to regain his senses, and sat up as before.

  I folded my palms and began to pray. “God,” I whispered, “I am already worn out. The demon will not budge. Oh God, give me strength. My faith is sorely tested.” These words I spoke for myself alone.

  So I was surprised when an answer seemed to come, not from heaven, but from my green-skinned adversary. “You know, Father,” he said, “there is another possibility.”

  We are warned never to engage in conversation with the devil, for it leads only to despair. But before I could think of that, I had already said, “And that is?”

  �
�Is it not possible,” he said, “that I am not in fact possessed, and that I am simply what I say I am?”

  I dared not respond for fear of further temptation. For I knew then that we were in the presence of a very powerful force indeed; that this was a stubborn being and that the light of truth would reach him only with the utmost difficulty. If the creature were not inhabited by a demon, he must be making those impious statements out of his own free will; which meant that he must be a heretic.

  I took another gulp of the wine, and I commanded that he be removed to the dungeon. This investigation was inexorably moving down a path I did not wish for. Nonetheless, I reflected, thy will be done.

  * * * *

  I rode down to the village because I could not bear to sleep in the vicinity of that being. Of course, in the village I faced demons as well, but at least they were my own.

  At the inn, I supped on boiled leeks and a morsel of greasy pigeon. I sat alone, long after the others had retired, nursing a warm ale. I dozed a little. I was startled awake, perhaps by the sound of the embers collapsing, for the fire was dying. I saw that my Guillaume was in the room, and that he was standing over me, gazing down at my face.

  “My son,” I said. A priest would say that to any boy. Yet I immediately feared to have revealed too much.

  “Mon pére, I would speak to you alone.”

  “Shall I take your confession?”

  “It's not that. Mon pére, Brother Paolo has been speaking to me. He says I should leave the village and seek my fortune as a singer. He told me that a voice like mine could gladden the hearts of prelates and of kings. He told me about cities and places I'll never see if I'm stuck here minding the pigs until I die. My mother told me the same thing. But they also say I will have to give up something—my manhood. I don't want that.”

  “Did they explain it to you?”

  “Yes. They said that if I undergo the cutting, I'll never become a man. But I'll never lose this voice, either. They say it's a sacrifice I must make. Otherwise I'll always be a peasant, and a bastard at that. But I know it'll hurt and I know people die, sometimes.”