The Sorcerer's Apprentice

by FranCois Augieras

  The June solstice moon flamed over the hills.

  I could be arrested. I decided to avoid prison through magic, to ally myself to my eternal soul; I scolded myself for letting time pass without taking steps in this regard. Swiftly, very swiftly, I ran down to the river. Thick clumps of mysterious, tall trees grew under the rocks where the shadows and the waters had slept together since the beginning of time; box trees which had rotted because of the floods, and because the sun’s rays never reached them. I was young, which is pleasing to the spirits. After almost meeting my death in the clay, and just managing to extricate myself from a mixture of dead leaves and mud, I took a candle in my hand and approached a natural pool filled by a spring which entered it drop by drop. I saw my face in the water’s mirror. A smile came to my lips, a smile in which cunning vied with the joy of seeing myself, knowing that I was eternal. I stirred the surface of the water with my hand; my face was wiped away, only to reform when the mirror settled down again. I blew on the water, I vanished but came back to life a few seconds later. I began again, blowing all the air out of my lungs, until I was almost dying, losing my breath. I drew my soul out of my body, and without opening my mouth again I walked swiftly away from the spring.

  After doing as I have said, hiding my soul in the water’s mirror where the Lawyers would not think to look for it, sheltering my true self from legal proceedings, I went back to my priest.

  THE NEXT DAY I spent sitting by the hearth, poking the fire. The police inquiry had begun again, I knew that, but I also knew that the child had confessed nothing, and that I could stave off the danger which threatened me through magic. As evening approached, my priest took me with him to pull up some nets on an island upstream of the village, which lay across the river’s course. We rowed across the turbulent waters of a sound and dragged our boat up onto the pebbly shore at the tip of the island which, I might add, seemed barely negotiable because of the thick undergrowth which covered it. When we had removed the fish from the nets, he took a whip out of his pocket and dragged me into the trees. I was aroused, all my senses heightened, noticing here a rotten tree-stump, there a smell of dead leaves, or a softness in the air. The river flowed past on either side of the island, swiftly, with little lapping waves. No place seemed to meet his requirements. After roaming about in the undergrowth he made me lie down, bare-chested, on a tree-trunk thrown there by the floods. I lay there with my hands over my eyes, determined to show how brave I was, yet trembling; but I heard nothing save the sound of fluttering wings, and then the unexpected crackle of little twigs snapping. I opened one eye; he was breaking off the branches around him, which would have got in his way as he beat me. Finally the first blow came, then others followed. He stopped at the fifteenth, not daring to go on. You’re bleeding, he admitted, a little ashamed of having treated me so brutally. Proud that I had done no more than moan under the lash, I replied in a sing-song voice that I deserved more than a hundred. We left the island.

  He put the whip back into his deep pocket. Once we had crossed back over the river, we climbed back up to the presbytery by a roundabout route, so as to avoid going through the village.

  That same evening, I ventured beyond our garden, right up to the very top of the rocks, and a little clearing amid the dry grass drew my gaze; you could not wish to see anything more charming, or more attractive. I thought I was dreaming: the child was following me up the paths and he was smiling at me in that triumphant way of his, showing me his gracefulness and his taste for doing exactly as he pleased. “I love you more than myself,” he said, sitting down on a Fairy Chair hollowed out of the rock. He showed me two seats, hewn into the greyish stone. “See, this is your place and mine, since forever.” I was charmed by his words. The air was soft and golden on the hills of the vast Sarladais.

  He spoke again.

  “Things are going badly.”

  “Did you talk?”

  “I lied. If it goes wrong I’ll save you.”

  “How?”

  He smiled slyly. I knew he was very clever, and I was no less so myself. Supplications and responses for the use of the police were slipped into the coming night like the soft chirrup of a bird. When we had settled on our plan of action, he stood up and vanished into the bushes, amid the evening shadows.

  I walked slowly back. I was about to pick up the keys, which were hidden under the brambles, when a blaze of light in our garden so astonished me that it stopped me in my tracks. Completely unaware that I was standing a few feet away from him, my priest lay prostrate in the grass, worshipping a standing stone, which was thrown into relief against the dark trees by the flickering flames of a little fire. His face wore an expression of extreme, inconsolable pain. Suddenly he threw himself backwards, with a loud shout which froze my blood. Then, with matchless tenderness and modesty, he pressed his lips to the stone which the dying embers summoned back into the darkened garden. Shoulders hunched, he went back into the house without noticing me. When I dared to show my face, he looked at me disapprovingly and prepared the supper in silence. What did he know of my love affairs? Did he suspect that I had witnessed his adoration of the stone? As we never talked about anything, I went up to bed.

  Would I go to prison? After the cave, prison. Winter would come, the child would confess everything in spite of all our stratagems and I would be found guilty. I imagined life as one big game of Snakes and Ladders: cave, prison, river, church. Would I be in prison next winter, but only for a while, like in a board-game? I will save you: the child’s strange words gave me hope without really reassuring me. Although fear still racked my heart, tormenting me as it had grown wont to do, I was now facing my situation with greater courage. Was I destined to escape prison, or on the contrary accept jail, that temporary death, like the earth which next winter would only pretend to die? I had loved spirits and springs, a cave had been my wedding chamber, could I really complain about my fate? Monks, sorcerers, barons of Périgord—they too had come into conflict with the law. I was sadly mulling this over when I was shocked by a frightful howling. What was my priest doing in the next room? I blew out my candle. Someone was knocking on my door.

  “Come,” he shouted, at the same time as I heard him running quickly down the stairs.

  I got dressed. Shoving some bread into my pockets, I followed him into the woods. When we were a fair distance from the house, he discarded his priest’s garb under the brambles and continued on his way dressed as a peasant. Reaching a lonely meadow, lit by the moon and stars, he cried out:

  “Defend yourself.”

  Whatever did he mean? He picked up a stone, took a few steps back and threw it right at my face. Taking advantage of my confusion, my pain, and the blood which was gushing out of my mouth, he fell upon me. His fingers tightened around my throat and I lost consciousness. When I came to again, lying in the dew-soaked grass, he was holding my hand and sitting next to me.

  “Come on, get up, I will save you,” he said.

  The same words the child had spoken: If things go badly, I will save you.

  “I’m afraid for you,” he went on. “Quickly, quickly, help me.” His voice already sounded quite far away. Quickly, quickly, repeated the echoes, while I ran after him along the footpaths which criss-crossed the undergrowth.

  We reached what had once been a garden. There, we lit a fire using planks and beams we found among the ruins. Soon a powerful blaze lit up the nettles and brambles, and the fallen stones. Kneeling, he stirred the embers with his bare hands. The fire’s destruction of some beam or other liberated a red-hot iron ring; he retrieved it with the end of a stick, and hooked it onto a wall opposite us, where it continued to glow, slowly growing darker from contact with the cold stone, periodically pulsing fiery-red again, like a supplication.

  I thought I would die of fear; a second ring lay shining on the burning coals, this one was toothed, for without realising it I had thrown the remains of a cart onto the fire, and this was the pawl.

  “Go on, pick it up.”
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br />   I hesitated, and he seized me by the hair.

  “I said, take it.”

  Which I did, hanging it next to the first, on a nail where it gradually lost its fierce heat, progressing from transparent to vermilion red, blood red and finally reddish-black. With its pointed teeth it looked like a far-off sun, the most terrifying and the most radiant sight possible, shining over the whole of the Sarladais whose woods stood out darkly against the night sky.

  “There, behind you, in the garden, look.”

  From the ruins where we were sitting, a few stone steps led to a very old orchard, lit up by the flames from our fire. An incredibly powerful, living presence was there, watching us in the darkness. I saw nothing.

  “Look, under that apple tree.” My gaze fell on a white flower in the wild garden, taller than the grasses and the brambles, young and beautiful, its petals opening wide to the night. The omen was good.

  Aromatic smoke was billowing up from our dying fire. Large clouds drifted over mankind as it slept. We were lying down beside the cinders, propped up on our elbows on the remains of a sort of paved yard. There was no urgency for us to return. He took off his jacket which he placed round my shoulders, and I pressed my body against his. The dying fire made it easier to see the ruins where we were lying; black stone roofs, green laurels, and the hills on the horizon, shining in the moonlight. He gently stroked my face, which lay against his chest, and that calmed me and made me feel better. This man, whom I thought of as common, was showing that he was noble and simple, full of friendship for me, that he would not reproach me for my conduct, or resort to useless violence. He gave me respite from myself and I was happy in his arms. Now, when my wild, affectionate nature was at its height, he soothed it, approved of its transgressions; I lay next to him and was plunged into a blessed state of unconsciousness and peace. There in that forest, this sense of primitive brotherhood overwhelmed me with happiness; it reunited me with the deepest, most ancient part of myself, the part which I loved the best. His broad, long hands caressed my lips; among the shadows and the trees, aromatic woods, almost consumed by the fire, intoxicated my senses. I was now no more than a spirit in the arms of my priest. My loneliness was banished. He placed my head on his knees, like the body of a newborn child who is being rocked to sleep. With my eyes closed, I heard nothing but his whispering voice, nourishing me with tenderness, curing me of my fears now that criminality separated me from other men. He spoke to me in words I could not understand, but which pleased my soul; then there was nothing but silence.

  I opened my eyes. Intensely white, transparent clouds were passing across the dark blue night sky. There was a chill in the air. An owl hooted. We stayed there for a long time without moving, without saying a word. We were happy in the woods. He got to his feet: “Come on,” he said. “Let’s go home.”

  IN THE MORNING, still tired from my night’s exertions, I took some firewood from the stable and threw it into a pile in front of the hearth. Rain had blotted out the countryside. The weak daylight which filtered in down the chimney lit up the firedogs and the cinders, so that they seemed immaculately white. And when I laid the flat of my hand lightly on them, I experienced the soft touch of those pale, pure cinders, which had the fragility and unspeakable gentleness of true love. I left the imprint of my fingers in that fine, hot, Paradise-white powder. I did not strike a match, or light the fire; I sat on a little bench and drank cold coffee, watching the rain fall like tears on my lost love.

  Perhaps I could use magic not only to stave off all danger, but also to bring that beloved child back to me? We had a forge; I fashioned a kind of sword and beat it into shape with great hammer-blows. It was short, light, and twisted like a young snake, exactly as I had come to view the child. I threw it into the Vézère. I took my knife and plunged it into my arm, sawing through the flesh. At first it was just a deep gash which bled little; then my blood began to ooze out in large drops which fell into the river, whose grey, lively waters were carrying along a cargo of broken branches.

  A few days later, by some miracle, I found my sword further downstream, driven by the current towards the shingle banks. I covered it with kisses; I had found it again, after almost losing it in the tireless waters; I had rediscovered it steeped in the cool freshness of the river and my blood, as young and beautiful as the child who must now reappear and give himself to me as he had done before. I lived in a state of high expectation; I thought only of him, of his sweet madness in my arms, of his lips. Would he come? A different boy delivered the bread. I scarcely went out and dared not go down into the village. As it was no longer possible to go to the cave, I must search out an adequate hiding place for us here; I explored the presbytery, the sacristy, the church, and even a rather large wardrobe; the best place I could find was the staircase in the bell tower, which boasted this advantage: no one could surprise us there because the stone steps echoed underfoot.

  One morning, as rain was falling on the cinders, he entered the house without knocking:

  “You’re alone.”

  I smiled at him. He sat down next to me on my little bench, in front of the fireplace. He closed his eyes and took me in his arms. I kissed his sweet face, wet with rain, his tender, aroused lips. I made him some coffee, which he lapped out of a jam-jar which I used as a cup. He drank very little.

  “You will come back again.”

  “Yes,” he breathed, offering me his lips.

  When he had gone I finished his coffee. And so he had come back. How good this cinder-coffee tasted. It tasted of love, it tasted of his lips, and it had the same sweet softness as the rain which fell on the big stone roofs and on the ricks of straw which stood rotting in the yards.

  WE WERE NOT FAR from the village. One clear-skied evening, I recognised his bright, triumphant voice among the voices of the local children. It seemed he had deliberately steered their games on to the path which led to the church, so that he could proclaim his love to me. I hoped for more, that we could take up again where we had left off, this time on the staircase in the bell tower.

  Night was coming, and I dared not go back inside, for I was caught by the spell of that beloved voice. The moon rose above the green trees, still wet with rain; it shone among bright clouds. I was breathing in the scents of the garden, and dreaming of love, when my priest arrived home.

  I prepared his supper, a task for which I had absolutely no aptitude. Although Nature had generously endowed me in other ways, in this respect she had left me poverty-stricken. I lit all the fires of Hell, put our best foodstuffs into saucepans, threw in some salt and pepper, and gave the whole thing a stir; I wasn’t at all sure what the result would be. The thought of a delicious meal obsessed me every evening and, as we were poor, I was particularly taken with the idea of a meal made out of practically nothing which would, by some miracle, turn out to be the most exquisite thing in the world, and the very one capable of truly satisfying the hunger which tormented me. However I fared no better than on previous evenings.

  We went up to his room and he closed the door behind us. There, in the darkness, he tied me across a chair in his usual way, holding me firmly in place and ensuring that I was his and his alone. For this purpose he kept a whole drawerful of ropes.

  Whip in hand, he sat down next to me on another chair. With my trousers round my ankles, he began to beat me; I felt as though I was being well and truly devoured, that my flesh was coming away in shreds, that I was being roasted, that since I had not cooked anything good for supper, he was devouring me instead. He laid the whip across his knees; in the darkness I felt his hands on my naked flesh. He touched me as one might caress a woman, stroking me all over, his hands lingering between my thighs. For a while now I had been his maidservant, doing the things which I thought maidservants do, and which perhaps they do not; things which gave my priest far more satisfaction than any real maidservant could have done. Apart from having to prepare our spartan meals, I had to tidy the house and, some evenings, not only receive the whip, but a
lso act the loving wife. This change in status pleased me, not because of any perverse streak in my nature, nor from any sexual weakness, for I was extremely masculine and proud to be so, but because I believed that this would allow me to acquire certain powers. Before beating me he slipped his arm about my waist, he whispered in my ear, and I felt the feminine part of me come to life. When alone, of course, I was from time to time my own wife, but without much belief in the role; whereas in the arms of my priest I was very pleased to find someone more or less crudely convinced by my dreams, thanks to the darkness, and who, in return, convinced me. On this occasion I had the feeling not so much that I was giving myself to him than that his caresses were enabling me to discover the other half of my being, myself as my own wife. My reasoning was more or less like this, namely that having my whole life ahead of me to act like a man, at sixteen I ought to see what a charming, sturdy, priest’s maidservant I would have made. No other could match this one, intelligent in sexual pleasure, gentle and strong; I pitied her as she was beaten, and loved her all the more for it; when she was at the height of pleasure, I was astonished by it and admired her for the resilience it took her to bear so much joy; this dialogue with myself led to perfect happiness.