The Berserkers

by Roger Elwood

  In the kitchen, he locked the door behind them and led Freda down the hallway and into the church by a side door. Votive candles flickered on the altar, glowing on the golden candlesticks and the golden chalice with its jeweled rim that Dom Theophilus had brought from Rome, and on the golden edges of the tabernacle, where the ciborium rested that held the sacred Host. “This is the house of God,” Brother Bernard whispered. “Let me teach you a prayer.”

  Freda studied the altar, her eyes shining, and then she looked up at him. “The house of God? A new Asgard.”

  “What?”

  She didn’t answer. She looked around the church, and then began to walk down the aisle, away from him, toward the big wooden front doors.

  “Where are you going?” His voice echoed hollow surprise in the emptiness.

  Freda said nothing. She was turning the iron key in the lock, and then she had pushed the doors open and they were flying apart, helped by the wind, and those who waited outside were coming in.

  At first Brother Bernard could only see their shapes…four tall man figures bounding through the church toward him …and then, stunned into stiffness, he saw their wild eyes, and their wild yellow hair, and their cruel smiles. He watched them leap to the altar and seize the ornaments there. He saw one of them grab the chalice, sweeping the Bible to the floor, and then his frozen body could move again. He raised his arms in a futile attempt to ward them off. “Stop that! For the love of God!”

  For a moment all four of them stopped and looked at him, their eyes ice-blue emptiness, and in that moment Brother Bernard remembered the sacred wafers contained in the ciborium, hidden behind the tabernacle’s curtains. They would find the Host and desecrate it! He inched toward the altar as they watched him, and then he faltered. They might kill him. They would kill him. He stopped, and they kept wary eyes on him until the glitter of gold caught their attention again, and they turned away. Then Brother Bernard moved as quickly as he had ever moved. His hand darted into the tabernacle and pulled out the jeweled vessel that was inside. Swiftly, he tore off the lid, reached inside, and pulled out several Hosts, placing them on his tongue and swallowing them, and then the ciborium was snatched from his hand and Freda was smiling up at him. “What are you doing, Brother Balder?” She looked inside the container. “Little white circles? What are they?”

  “The body of Christ,” Brother Bernard said.

  “You worship your God now? Would you worship our god too?” Her free hand pulled a small leather pouch from the pocket of her skirt. She opened the mouth of the pouch and quickly emptied its contents into the ciborium, and Brother Bernard drew in a shocked breath.

  Then she held the vessel out to him. “Here. Since you and I are to be joined, let our gods be joined, too.”

  “What have you put in there?”

  “It is called fluesop. Some call it ’food of the giants.’ It has been used by my people since time began, in our ceremonies to Odin.” She pushed the cup toward him. “Here. Eat, and you will see things you’ve never dreamed of, monk!”

  He hesitated, and the four men began to close in on him.

  “It isn’t poison,” Freda said. “We have all eaten the giant food tonight.” She held up a hand to still the men, and Brother Bernard took the ciborium, lifted it to his lips, and swallowed its contents. He could taste that she had put in several mushrooms. He wanted to spit them -out, but the sacred Host…no, whatever happened, he had to keep that safe. He closed his eyes, then, and prayed, and when he felt the ciborium pulled from his clenched hands, he opened his eyes again.

  The man holding the vessel had a purple face under his wild blond beard. “My brother Gunnar,” Freda said. “And these are my cousins, and the one over there is Lars, my youngest brother.”

  It was crazy, Brother Bernard thought, introducing them calmly and politely, as though they were all at a tea party.

  “But you said that your brothers…he broke off, knowing that it was useless, knowing she had lied to him. “What do they want? What do all of you want?”

  “We came for your treasures…the gold on your altar and the money hidden in your abbey.” She seemed so unperturbed, while the men were reeling drunkenly around the sanctuary, grabbing at objects and quarreling among themselves. “But now,” Freda went on, “I have a better idea.” She went over to one of the men and jerked at his arm, to get his attention. “Gunnar! All of you! Listen!”

  They seemed to be intoxicated. They wavered unsteadily and watched her with vacant stares, but they were quiet.

  “We can take this whole place,” Freda said. “There’s nothing to stop us.” Her voice became shrill as she talked, and her hands moved restlessly. “The monks are all asleep. We can get rid of them and then the monastery will be ours, to dedicate to Odin. It will be a new Asgard, and the others can come here to live with us. We would be safe here. We could rule the whole countryside and there would be thick stone walls between us and any who tried to make us leave.”

  The men laughed and cheered, and one of them howled like a madman.

  “Devils!” Brother Bernard cursed them. “This is the house of God!”

  Gunnar started toward him, his eyes suddenly madly alive. “A sacrifice! Sacrifice him to Odin!”

  Freda moved like lightning, placing herself in front of the monk. “Not this one. He is mine. You are not to touch him.”

  Gunnar halted, growling in his throat, still staring at Brother Bernard menacingly. The monk shivered with fear and closed his eyes, praying that the other monks would not waken. He didn’t have any idea what time it was, but he knew if they came into the choir now, unsuspecting, to recite Matins, some of them would surely be killed. He was sure that he, himself, was going to die, but the thought seemed unimportant. In fact, the more he thought about the whole situation, the less it seemed to matter. And there were interesting colored dots moving in his vision, even with his eyes closed. He opened them and the colored dots became great moving blocks with lines inside them. These exploded into patterns of vibrant color. It was relaxing, watching them. He knew the others around him were stirring; some talking, some just moving close to him, but it didn’t matter, really, what they were doing, except that somebody…Freda…wanted him to pay attention. Yes, .she was there. Her lips were on his and her arms were around him, and she was not cold after all, but warm. Burning him with her touches. His arms were holding golden fire that he could see and hear, feel and taste, and each one of his senses was more alive than he had known they could be. Time became lost in symphonies of color and surging sensation. He was a body and a spirit, conscious on both levels at once, soaring upward through rainbow clouds, looking down on strange forms that moved by the white-clothed altar and a white-robed figure that screamed in the dark aisle of the church.

  He knew that voice. It called him back, and he sank, uncaring, downward. It belonged to Dom Theophilus, whose face was contorted in rage and whose words vibrated purple and black toward the altar. “Stop this desecration! Stop in the name of God!” ^

  Four figures floated down the aisle toward the sound. Four pairs of hands seized Dom Theophilus and tore his robes from him, and Brother Bernard watched the purple and black vibrations turn scarlet as the forms produced a writhing rope that twisted itself around the cornice of one of the columns and then around Dom Theophilus’ neck, and there was the stern abbot motioning with all his bare limbs, three feet from the stone floor. His motions seemed full of obscure meaning. Brother Bernard tried to understand their significance, but the motions stopped before he could decipher them. He would have to ask Dom Theophilus later what they meant. Later, when his senses were still and the wild shouting had died away. He looked at the angel beside him, shimmering in the gloom, and she spoke to him.

  “They’re going berserk! They might turn on us, soon. We have to get out of here until they’ve done their work.”

  Lord, but she was beautiful! Why hadn’t he recognized before that she was an angel? She was taking him with her, and he went
with adoration in his heart, wading through floating colors, stopping only to steady himself against a choir stall and then following her through the vaulted blackness of the church, with a howling choir behind him.

  A blast of wind suddenly hit him as the wide wooden doors of the church flew back. Moonlight flooded the doorway. A horse snorted and stomped and then Brother Bernard saw the figure mounted on its back.

  That dark, hulking body. That fearsome black horse. The cold wind that swirled around them. He recognized the one he had met before and was held motionless by the force of its presence.

  Freda dropped to her knees beside him. “Odin! Allfather!”

  Behind him, footsteps pounded down the church aisle and stopped, and hushed, hysterical voices took up Freda’s words: “Hail Odin! Hail Allfather!”

  The girl tugged at Brother Bernard’s robes, trying to pull him down, but he struggled against her and stayed straight. The figure moved slightly so that a shaft of moonlight fell on its face, and then Brother Bernard saw the red eyes that glared fire in the night, and the two pale protrusions above them. A vile and sulfurous mist rose around them, and Brother Bernard looked into the face of evil that he had know all his life… that he had never seen before…that was not one, but many, and each one his ancient enemy. The figure threw back its head and laughed, and Brother Bernard saw himself.

  He covered his head with his arms and stumbled away from the doorway. Everything was gone now. There were no colors to hide him…no carnal sensations to deceive him…no prayers that would come to his dried-up throat.

  “Welcome to New Asgard, Odin!” the frenzied voices chanted, and the memory of other chanting voices— those of his brother monks—sounded in his head.

  The other monks! They lay asleep, knowing nothing of this horror, and they would all be murdered in their beds! He uncovered his eyes and looked quickly around. Behind him, five pale-haired worshipers groveled on their knees before the open church doors, but he couldn’t make out the horseman. There was only a shaft of pale moonlight in the doorway now. In front of him, across the church near the chancel, was the entrance to the stairway that led to the bell tower.

  Brother Bernard bent down and slipped off his sandals. He moved silently between the pews and hurried down the aisle, keeping his eyes on the dark oblong that was the door he was headed for. It was only a few feet away from him when he stumbled in the half light and hit the end of a choir stall. The sound was like thunder, echoing. There were shouts now behind him, and then footsteps coming through the church after him. Hurry! He had to hurry, but a pale form slowly swinging near a column made him stop for one dizzy moment. Oh, God! No! His legs trembled with the shock but he ran on, flinging open the door and taking the steps to the bell tower two at a time, holding his robe away from his flying feet. In a moment he heard them pounding after him, around and around the narrow staircase, but he could see moonlight now and knew that the bell was just ahead. He was gasping for breath as he came to it, and he leaped for the thick bell rope, grabbing it with both hands and swinging on it The great bell bonged, vibrating through him, ringing out a warning to the sleeping monks and to the sleeping town, drowning out the sounds of those who were coming after him. He looked out through the open arches of the tower, over the moon-silvered treetops, and then rough hands seized him, tearing him away from the bell rope.

  The berserks panted and muttered as they dragged him toward one of the openings to push him out. Brother Bernard offered up a prayer for his own soul and for the safety of his brother monks, but as he did so he could hear Freda’s cool voice calling up the staircase, “Bring him down here! Quickly!”

  The two who held him hesitated only a moment, and then he was being pushed ahead of them back down the stairs, his arms twisted painfully behind him.

  Freda waited for them by the doorway. “You are brave, Brother Balder, but foolish. We could have shared so much.” She motioned to the men with him. “Sacrifice him to Odin!”

  Brother Bernard looked at her angry white face, no longer beautiful in its cruelty, and then past her to the altar where it seemed a strange, cold darkness had settled. The candles still flickered…the altar cloth still gleaming whitely…but something else was there. He was still trying to decide what it was as the four men forced him across the church toward the hanging body of Dom Theophilus. He was sick, but not afraid. Whatever his fate, he deserved it for his sins and his foolishness. But what was that shadow on the altar that seemed to reek of evil? Had the god of these people taken over the church? He turned to look through the still-open front doors, to the place where the horseman had stood, but the moonlight showed him only an empty doorway. Wait…it wasn’t empty! White-robed figures were running through there, up the steps and into the church, and the side door had crashed open and more monks were coming through that way, hurrying to see what had caused the bell to ring.

  Freda, behind him, shrieked, “Kill them! Kill them all!”

  The four men surrounding him bellowed, and one of them pushed him to the floor with such force that he was stunned for a while and was only dimly aware of the movements around him. He could hear the surprised shouts of the monks, and the crazed voices of Freda and her followers, and the cries ‘of pain and groans of shock that sounded like a battle. He struggled to get to his feet, rising painfully on unsteady legs, blinking to clear his vision. There, in front of the altar steps, the four berserks slowly advanced on a group of monks who waited bravely for the onslaught, grasping candlesticks and other metal ornaments to use as weapons. Behind them, several of the monks knelt in prayer. Three of the Trappists lay motionless on the floor.

  There was a violent, triumphant scream from Freda, and Brother Bernard looked up to see her standing in the raised pulpit, her ice-fall hair streaming around her contorted face, her arms waving furiously. “Kill them! Kill them in the name of Odin!”

  Brother Bernard willed himself forward to help the group by the altar, but he managed only a few weak steps before he collapsed once more. His heart was pounding frantically as he tried to get up again, but he was just able to get to his knees before the berserks hurled themselves on the waiting monks. The only thing he could do now was pray, and so he did, closing his eyes and forming his anguish into words.

  There was a sudden silence. Freda shrieked again, but this time in fright. Brother Bernard opened his eyes.

  The figures before the altar—the monks and the raging berserks—stood as still as the statues around them while a faint white light flickered in front of the altar, growing in power and intensity until it was a blaze of brilliance, and as this light grew, the cold darkness Brother Bernard had felt on the altar grew too, starting as a shadow and swelling to the size and shape of the dark horseman. The watching figures fell back as the light and the darkness took up their fight, each trying to extinguish the other, it seemed, as sulfurous black explosions filled the church between flashes of warm radiance. The floor shook, the building quivered, and a strange humming sound beat against his ears. Brother Bernard could not tell how long the struggle lasted, but finally darkness lay over them with icy finality, the humming stopped, and the cold wind swept through the church from the open doors. Brother Bernard saw the attackers in front of the altar moving again, but now the monks did not try to defend themselves. Now that the force of darkness had won, they waited in sorrow, heads bowed, while the others behind them still knelt by the altar rail. Freda, her voice shaking, ordered her men to sacrifice them.

  Brother Bernard reached for the end of a pew and pulled himself up. Evil could not have won…not while he and the others were alive to sing the praise of God. His voice came out in a whisper at first, but he forced it into a steady chant. “Kyrie eleison, Domine miserere: Christus Dominus factus est obediens usque ad mortem.”

  White faces were turning toward him in the darkness. Through one of the high windows he could see a faint finger of light, and he could hear the monks murmuring. He sang out again, the same words, and this time some of the
brothers chanted the response: “Kyrie eleison.”

  Freda began to shout again, but now the other monks were taking up the chant, and their voices drowned hers out, as they lifted their heads toward the shaft of light.

  The four berserks seemed confused. They stumbled toward the chanting monks, but did not touch them, and as the light grew brighter and the monks stood their ground, they hesitated, looking toward Freda, whose voice was lost in the music. The monks saw their confusion and advanced on them, and Freda suddenly ran down the pulpit steps. But Brother Bernard had enough strength now to get in front of her and block her path. He grabbed her by the shoulders as she tried to pass him, and they faced each other for one long moment before she squirmed out of his grasp and raced toward the front doors. When she reached the doorway, she turned and looked at him and then she was gone, with her four followers hurrying after her, and as the sunlight gradually filled the church and the Trappists finished their hymn, the cold darkness that had been present there seemed to melt away until it, too, had disappeared.

  Later, the sorrowing monks cut down the disfigured body of Dom Theophilus and prayed for his soul and the souls of the other three brothers who had been killed that night. They agreed to tell the police of the town only part of what had happened—the whole story would never be believed. And in the true manner of Trappists they spoke little about what they had seen.

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