The Book of Dreams
Page 25
He sank beneath the surface. Water rushed into his pocket. Dana and Jean were thrown into the sea. They spluttered and kicked, attempting to swim. The water was too cold, too wild. There was nothing they could do to save themselves. Sucked into the icy foam, they were choking, somersaulting, drowning.
A big hand plunged into the deep and grasped the two of them. Now they were pulled from the brink and held high.
Fingal would not let them drown. Not while there was breath in his body.
A mountain of water crashed against him. It was the ninth wave. The one all sailors dread. The one that takes you down to Davy Jones’s Locker. Despair darkened his eyes, as the giant began to sink for the last time.
But just when all seemed lost and the twist in the tale was a tragic ending, hope sailed over the horizon in a leather boat. From its mast flew a sail emblazoned with the sign of the Celtic Cross. In its bow stood a man garbed in the robes of a monk. His arms were outstretched to the heavens as he prayed out loud to banish the storm.
Fingal’s head was disappearing under the waves when the leather boat reached him. In the bow, the medieval monk stood fast, holding a wooden cross aloft. The monk’s brown cloak swirled around him in the wind. His face was lost in the shadows of a deep cowl, but his prayers rang out with power and clarity.
The squall gathered in force like a tornado and charged toward him.
For a second, both were frozen in time: the monk holding his cross and the raging storm. Then came an explosion of light.
The sudden calm was profound. The seas lay still. A warm breeze played gently over the lapping water. Morning had arrived in a rosy glow.
The giant righted himself in the water and leaned over the little boat. Once again the monk lifted his cross.
“Death is above you!” cried the saint. “What is your ransom?”
“I hain’t with the storm demon,” Fingal hurried to explain. “I’ve a couple of pilgrims to join ye. Will they do? Ye’re Saint Brendan the Navigator, am I right?”
The giant and the monk were both speaking Gaelic. Dana translated for Jean, and the two waited anxiously for Brendan’s reply.
The saint’s eyes flashed from the depths of his cowl.
“I have the Two Sights,” Brendan declared. “I am able to see in the world of the body and the world of the soul. The Second Sight tells me that you are good. Your spirit shines brightly.”
The giant blushed with pleasure. “Thank ye kindly. That’s a great compliment comin’ from a saint.”
Gently, Fingal lowered Dana and Jean onto the boat.
“If he canny help ye, no one can,” Fingal told them, switching to English. “He’s a magus and a Druid. Ye saw his power over the winds and the water.”
“I also have the Gift of Tongues,” Brendan interjected in English. “That was not my power you saw, but the power of my God. He is Dia duilech, God of the Elements, even as he is Coimdiu na nduile, Lord of Creation.”
“Well, ye’ve got power on your side, then. Would ye be on for givin’ them a hand?”
“I will if I can,” Brendan replied.
“I’m off, then,” said Fingal.
“Thank you so much!” Dana called out to him. “Will we meet again?”
“When the Kingdom is restored,” boomed the giant.
“Merci beaucoup!” called Jean.
“À bientôt, mon ami.” The giant’s reply sailed over the water as Fingal disappeared into the distance.
How strange it was to find themselves on the original of the boat that would one day be called Brendan! Constructed of oxhide stretched over a wood frame, it was surprisingly like the one they had left behind in the future. But this boat was much greater in size, could almost be called a ship, and had a bigger crew. It was also more at home on the ocean. Dry and even cozy, the craft was not as open to the elements as the modern version. Two huts of woven wattle stood on deck, reminiscent of an ark. The large one amidships housed the crew, while the smaller one in the stern was the private quarters of the saint. The huts were round in shape, like the beehive cells hermits used in Ireland. Overhead, sheets of tanned leather hung between the masts to catch rainwater for drinking. Dried fish and plucked birds dangled from poles and lines. Bags of grain and other provisions were stowed under the gunwales.
Like Brendan, the crew were also monks. Eight were awake and manning the vessel, while an additional four slept off watch. Their clerical garb had been adapted for sailing. The wool tunics were like long sweaters over baggy trousers, all oiled and waterproof. Most of the crew were country men with raw red faces weathered by the elements. They moved about the boat with the ease of experienced sailors.
“You are welcome here,” Brendan said to Jean and Dana.
Only now did he uncover his head. As the cowl fell behind him, the two gasped. Dana almost laughed out loud. No wonder Tim was haunted by Brendan’s voyage! For here he stood again, an older version of himself, still tall and slim, but with lines in his face and streaks of silver in his hair. The eyes were the same, shining with an unquenchable thirst for adventure. He was dressed like his crew with the addition of the broad mantle that marked his status as abbot. Like the other monks, he wore the Celtic tonsure, head shaven from forehead to midpate, with long hair falling onto his shoulders.
Taking in the plight of his visitors, who stood wet and shivering before him, Brendan gave orders to his men.
“Dry clothes for our guests, then bring them to my cabin. Bring also food and drink.”
After their dousing in the frozen Atlantic, it was heaven to pull on the rough dry fabric of the monkish clothes. The weave was tight and thick, providing instant warmth.
“So Brendan is Tim!” Dana said to Jean. “I wonder if the others are here?”
“We look for them.” Jean nodded.
After they had changed, Dana in the cabin and Jean out on deck, the two were taken to Brendan’s hut. The wattle-and-daub structure was built to keep out wind and rain. It was warm and snug, with rush mats on the floor, woven hassocks for seats, and a brazier burning clumps of sod. A low table held the monk’s writing materials: feathered quills, sheaves of parchment, and pots of pigment and ink.
Brendan directed them to sit as their food arrived. There was hot mint tea sweetened with honey and a platter of fruit and unleavened bread. They were both exhausted, but the refreshment revived them, as did the mischievous grin of the cook. By far the tallest of the crew, he was well over six feet and had to stoop as he entered the cabin. He also had enormous feet encased in hide boots.
“Boots!” cried Dana.
“What name is this?” he said, laughing. “I am called Artán. ‘Little Art’ it means.”
That made everyone laugh.
The food he brought was delicious. The grapes were as big as apples, and though the bread was unleavened, which called for a lot of chewing, it was seasoned with herbs. There was an odd purple-and-white fruit the size of a football that dripped with juice. It was like nothing they had seen or tasted before, with a mixture of flavors that hinted of strawberries, blueberries, plums, and oranges.
“A gift from the heavens,” Brendan told them. “The fruit was brought to us by a flock of white birds singing celestial hymns.”
“The white birds again!” Dana exclaimed.
The saint studied her closely. A silver rim formed around the irises of his eyes, like a corona around the moon. The Second Sight. In a melodic voice, he chanted.
Are your horns the horns of cattle?
Are your ales the ale of Cualu?
Is your land the Curragh of the plain of Liffey?
Are you the descendant of a hundred kings and queens?
Is your church Kildare?
Do you keep house with Brigid and Patrick?
Jean looked at her dismayed. More riddles? But Dana understood the nature of the questions.
“It’s a greeting. He’s just asking if I’m Irish and what province do I come from.”
She answered the
saint in the same formal manner.
“I am of Ireland and the holy land of Ireland. I am of the province of Leinster that is the plain of Liffey. But my companion is not. He is from—” She paused. What did the early Irish call the land to the west?—“An tOileán Ur,” she finished. The New Island.
The saint was satisfied with her response. “The giant declared you pilgrims, and the Second Sight tells me this is true. Are you practicing ban martre?”
It was Dana’s turn to be dismayed. She could translate the words literally but had no idea what they meant. White martyrdom? They obviously referred to something medieval that she knew nothing about.
Brendan saw her confusion and explained, “There are three kinds of martyrdom that pilgrims practice. In glas martre, green martyrdom, you become a hermit or ascetic. You give up the comforts and delights of life such as family, friends, food, drink. In derc martre, red martyrdom, you shed your blood in God’s name. A noble death. Ban martre, white martyrdom, is exile. You leave your home, perhaps forever, and journey for a divine cause.”
“You could say I’m in exile,” Dana said, thinking about both Ireland and Faerie, “and what I’m looking for, the Book of Dreams, is something special.”
“You are looking for a book?” Brendan’s voice was both astonished and eager.
With great excitement, he produced a jeweled box from his desk. Inside was a manuscript of fine parchment. The vellum sheaves were inscribed with gold orpiment and illustrated with ornate borders and drawings in colored inks.
“The manuscript is composed of quinions,” Brendan said proudly, “quires of five sheets laid on top of each other and folded. Hence a gathering of ten leaves makes twenty pages.”
Dana’s heart beat wildly. “Is it the Book of Dreams?”
She could hardly believe it. Her quest fulfilled! Just like that! But her joy was quickly dampened.
“No, my child,” he said gently. “It is The Book of Wonders. The very reason why I am on this imram, this voyage upon the sea which is also a pilgrimage. I will tell you my tale.”
As Brendan spoke, they followed his words through the manuscript, where pictures depicted what he described.
There he was, a younger man, the renowned abbot and founder of many monasteries. An accomplished sailor, he had already traveled to Wales, Scotland, and the Orkney Islands. One day he was doing his rounds in the great monastery at Clonfert, where three thousand monks lived under his rule. Psalms rose from the nave of the church. Pots and dishes clattered in the kitchens. Men delved with hoe and spade in the vegetable gardens.
When he came to the scriptorium, Brendan lingered a little longer. This was his favorite place. He liked to watch the monks at their work, dipping their goose-feathered quills into ink-horns and trimming nibs with their pen knives. The pages of vellum were carefully cut, then ruled with lines. Colored powders were mixed with water to make ink. Most of the young scribes copied psalters or gospels for use in the monastic schools. Only a chosen few, the most gifted artists, illuminated the manuscripts prized by Christendom. The monks wrote in Latin and Old Irish and a hybrid Hiberno-Latin. It was a labor of love, but once in a while they noted their complaints, jotting personal glosses along the margins.
Is scith mo chrob on scribainn.
My hand is weary with writing.
Tria digita scribunt, totus corpora laborat.
Three fingers write, but the whole body labors.
• • •
Brendan stopped at the desk of a young scribe new to the monastery. As he leaned down to peruse the monk’s work, the shock on the abbot’s face told a tale in itself. The scribe was recording the story of a fabulous journey across the sea to a magical land behind a rampart of fire.
Brendan was incensed. “I do not credit the details of this fantasy!” he cried. “Some things in it are devilish lies and some poetical figments. Some may be possible but others are certainly not. Some are for the enjoyment of idiots!”
As he finished his tirade, he seized the pages of the manuscript and flung them into the burning hearth. The young monk hung his head in shame. The others continued to scribble silently, without looking up. Brendan was the abbot. His word was law.
But that night, in his bed, the saint had a dream. He was standing at the front of the monastery chapel. From overhead came the sound of wings. A great bird settled on the altar. Shining with light, it had the shape of an albatross and the wingspan of a swan.
“A blessing upon you, priest,” said the bird.
Brendan fell to his knees. “Are you the Paraclete?” he asked, bowing his head.
“I am the archangel Michael, sent to chastise you for destroying the book. Who are you to question the wonders of life? Between heaven and earth, more things exist than you can know of. Who are you to doubt the boundless power of the Creator?”
It was the saint’s turn to hang his head in shame.
Now the angel charged Brendan with a mission. He was to set off on a sea voyage to seek out the marvels described in the very manuscript that he had burned. By recording all that he saw and experienced, he would restore The Book of Wonders for the glory of God. And not until he found the Land of Promise could he return home to Ireland, for only then would the book be completed.
Jean and Dana turned page after page of the manuscript. Each adventure on the voyage was more exciting than the last. There was an island where it was always dark, but the soil was lit up by glittering carbuncles. Then came the Liver Sea, a nightmare of still waters that held the boat fast. Only when prayers from Brendan called up a wind were they able to sail free. In a smoke-filled land where volcanoes spewed ashes, the inhabitants threw lumps of coal to chase the sailor monks away. Friendlier than humans were the herds of sea monsters who surrounded the boat.
“Whales!” said Jean, when he saw the illustration.
“This is the seventh year of my pilgrimage,” Brendan said. “Many wonders have I seen and recorded, but Tír Tairngire, the Land of Promise, eludes me still. Thus my voyage continues without end, for a journey is not completed until one goes home.”
He returned the manuscript to its jeweled box.
“And so you see,” he concluded with wry humility, “the penitent became a pilgrim and the pilgrim a writer. Today I shall transcribe the tale of the giant who brought me two young visitors. You will be part of The Book of Wonders.”
Dana was taken aback. An idea struck her that made her head spin.
“Could I be like you?” she wondered. “Am I creating the Book of Dreams while I’m searching for it?”
“The dreamer is the dream?” murmured Jean.
Brendan folded his hands in front of him and gazed at Dana thoughtfully.
“To what end do you travel?” he asked her. “I know my destination. Tír Tairngire, the Land of Promise. It is a place where there is no grief or sorrow, no sickness or death.”
His words sent a shiver through her. The description fitted Faerie exactly! Were she and the saint trying to reach the same place? The manuscript he had burned sounded like a book of fairy tales. Dana’s head was spinning. He was in her tale even as she was in his! “If I’m writing my own book,” she thought to herself, “I could be a third or even halfway through by now!”
“I think we’re going the same way,” she said, finally. “I think we’re on the same quest.”
The monk smiled at her serenely.
“Indeed, my daughter, we are all going the same way. We are all on the same quest. For life itself is a peregrination through a foreign land and we are all traveling Home.”
“I understand what you say,” Jean spoke up. “It make my heart want to fly like a bird.”
The saint rested his hands on their heads. Though they couldn’t describe what they felt, each suddenly wanted to be quiet and alone.
“Go now and rest, my children. Leave all your worries aside. I will pray and meditate upon this matter. The next step we take, we take together.”
• • •
“It’s just like Tim said,” Dana pointed out. “The climate was nicer at this time.”
A voice called out from the lookout near the top of the mainmast.
“Na péistí! Ansin!”
“Sea monsters!” said Dana.
The rest of the crew stopped what they were doing and hurried to see. Some looked frightened, but most seemed merely curious.
“There!” Jean cried.
The ocean was alive with leaping bodies. Their appearance was sudden and miraculous, a natural wonder of the far-flung seas. The first to arrive were dolphins, gamboling in the waves like calves in a field. Then came the white-bellied whales that surfaced in bursts of spray before diving again with a huge flick of their tails. To watch them was sheer delight!
One of the monks began to chant quietly. Words and phrases drifted through the air as he quoted from the Bible where it described the leviathan. His eyes are like the eyelids of the morning. Sorrow is turned into joy before him. He maketh the deep to boil like a pot. He maketh a path to shine after him. Upon earth there is not his like.
Jean’s eyes shone like the sky. After the school had passed them, he breathed a deep sigh.
“Magique, n’est-ce pas?”
Dana knew what he meant. Wasn’t this what the saint was sent to discover? The beauty of the world? The wonder of creation?
Nearby, two of the crew began to quarrel. One was a big burly man with curls of brown hair. He clutched a manuscript bound with wooden boards. The other was tall and thin with piercing eyes. He had taken a book out of a white satchel. Both were agitated as they pointed at the whales who swam in the distance.
“Never mind those two, they are always at it,” Artán said, joining Jean and Dana.
He leaned on the gunwales with a genial grin.
“What are they arguing over?” Dana asked him.
“Brother Sigisbert has a book he copied in Wales. The Liber Monstrorum, a catalogue of curious and unusual animals. He’s an unusual animal himself, being a Christian Saxon. All his people are pagans. Brother Fnör, from the land of Thule, has a book from his own country. The Physiologus is a bestiary of fabulous creatures. They like to argue, you see, over the names of the animals we meet in our travels.”