Authors: Joseph Finley
PART IV
He reveals deep and hidden things; he knows what is in the darkness, and light dwells with him.
—Daniel 2:22
T
he merchant ship’s prow cut
through the sea, spraying brine over the hull and up onto the deck. Ciarán leaned against the railing and looked out to the coastline of narrow beaches and rolling hills draped in a collage of dark foliage and wild grass. As they neared the Basque waters north of Spain, he realized this was the last he would see of Aquitaine. But despite the land’s beauty, Ciarán found himself longing for Ireland’s moss-covered cliffs and misty green hills—an emerald land touched by the hand of God.
Yet Ireland seemed but a dream now. At times since they left Bordeaux, Ciarán had felt like Odysseus, blown farther and farther from home by the whims of the gods. He reminded himself that Odysseus eventually found his way back to Ithaca, but then, Ciarán and Dónall were not even seeking the way home. Their quest had become far more like Jason’s for the Golden Fleece—a mythical treasure guarded by a dragon, no less. Ciarán wondered whether the fleece shared some connection with Enoch’s device, as if Jason and his tale were yet another reflection of the universal myth, stemming from the same Atlantean source.
Ciarán glanced to the southern horizon, where no ship followed. Ever since Isaac’s family had smuggled Alais and the two Irish monks out of Poitiers in a cart full of merchant’s wares on the morning after Christmas, Ciarán felt certain they had escaped Bishop Adémar and Prior Lucien, but he remained wary of storms. Even the hint of a darkening sky or the distant rumble of thunder caused his nerves to tense, for the demons manifested themselves as storm clouds, and although he had seen no sign of them since the amphitheater in Poitiers, he doubted very much that they had returned to whatever dark hell spawned them.
Since leaving Poitiers, Ciarán, Dónall, and Alais had traveled under the protection of one of Isaac’s many nephews. Josua was a slender man with a sun-baked complexion and a talent for guile, which had proved useful in evading the guards at the Poitiers gate. Isaac joined them in Bordeaux a week into the New Year—998 by the Christian calendar, although Isaac reminded them it was still the year 4758 by the Jews’ reckoning, and the year 388 to the Moors, to whose lands they were traveling. According to Isaac, Bishop Adémar had left Poitiers, but not before convincing Duke William to ready for war in the spring, against the viscount of Limoges. Why Adémar sought to turn William against the allies of Fulk the Black remained a mystery, but Ciarán felt certain the bishop’s motives were anything but pure.
In the days that followed, Josua had introduced them to his business partner, Évrard de Barsac, a Christian merchant and captain of the ship that now bore them toward Moorish Spain. Évrard had the round belly of a man who ate well and regularly, and a seafarer’s oily hair, thick with the smell of brine, which hung over his broad forehead above a protuberant nose and jutting jaw. His twelve-man crew seemed wary about Alais, for a woman at sea was held to be bad luck. But Évrard was smitten with the raven-haired noblewoman, and loyal enough to Josua to allow her aboard. While gruff with his crew, Évrard was cheerful toward the Irish monks and eager to hear stories of the Emerald Isle, which to him was little more than a mythical land at the edge of the world.
At night, the captain revealed his fondness for Spanish wine, and his robust laugh grew heartier with each cup. While Évrard drank his fill, he left the sailing to his curly-haired first mate, Eli, who was Josua’s nineteen-year-old son. Ciarán found Eli to be a studious young man intent on mastering the mariner’s trade, while his father managed the inventory bound for Córdoba and handled the duties of principal negotiator and tradesman. Aboard the ship, Christians and Jews worked in harmony. “One day,” Évrard had said after a mouthful of wine, “the merchants will own Europe. Whether Christian or Jew is the least of it. Money is money, I always say.”
The merchant ship, which Évrard leased to Josua for a cut of his profits, was a sheer marvel to Ciarán. A potbellied craft built of thick timber, it had a hold for the Jews’ cargo, and a deckhouse protected from the elements. It had a tall mast and broad sail with sturdy rigging, and nary an oar—testament that in other parts of the world there lived shipbuilders with far greater talents than the Irish with their ox-hide curachs.
At night, the captain offered his deckhouse to Isaac and his new companions. Alais slept beside Ciarán, where he could feel the warmth of her body and breathe in the honey smell of her hair. On their first night at sea, her closeness aroused him, but he calmed the unbidden urges by focusing on the sounds of the sea.
During the day, Ciarán found reasons to stay near her by having her teach him the Aquitaine tongue, and if Dónall thought they were growing too close, he didn’t say. Instead, he spent much of his time with Isaac, poring over the symbols in Maugis’ book. Isaac firmly believed that the Fae characters contained Hebrew letters as their root, which made Ciarán wonder whether a language as ancient as Hebrew had been derived from a far older tongue, one that dated to the time of creation—or even before, if such a thing were possible.
At the ship’s rail, Ciarán glanced at Dónall and Isaac, who sat toward the bow with the Book of Maugis open between them. On the open page, Ciarán spied the picture of the wheel cross, with Dónall pointing out the four symbols that reminded Ciarán of the four treasures of the Tuatha Dé Danann: the sword for air, staff for fire, stone for earth, and cup for water. Beside Dónall, Isaac’s eyes gleamed as if he had discovered a hidden treasure. Dónall gestured passionately, and Ciarán found it remarkable how fondly Dónall had taken to the rabbi. Perhaps it was their common love for knowledge, or maybe their shared proclivity for laughter, for as scholarly as the rabbi could appear at times, he had a ready sense of humor.
Alais sat aft with Eli, leaning against the deckhouse, where the two had spread out large sheets of parchment. She waved for Ciarán to join them. On the parchment were drawings of lands and seas, similar to the ones Merchant mac Fadden used on their journey to the mainland, but these were far more elaborate in design. “Eli says they show every kingdom in the world,” Alais said, “but I thought you’d like the drawings.” She was right. Illuminations decorated the charts: tentacled sea monsters and serpents with many humps, giant toothy fish and spewing whales, and a compass pointing north, embellished with an elaborately drawn rose. Each sea was marked by a ship with wind-filled sails.
Ciarán sat down beside them, studying the drawings. “They’re masterful,” he breathed.
Eli smiled. “We bought them in Córdoba.”
Alais placed her hand on Ciarán’s arm. “Show me Ireland.”
He found it for her and then showed her the Isle of Britain, with the Scott lands in the north. Eli pointed out Iceland, near the top of the world, and the lands of the Northmen. The map depicted France across the Celtic Sea, along with Bavaria and Saxony, moving east to the Hungarian lands and the home of the wild Magyar horsemen, and south to the Black Sea and the Byzantine capital of Constantinople. South of Europe was the mysterious African continent, land of the Berbers and Egyptians, and across the narrow strait of the Mediterranean Sea, where stood the Pillars of Hercules, was the Iberian Peninsula, with the city of Córdoba marked by a star in the heart of the Moorish lands.
Alais traced a slender finger around the outer edge of the ocean. “What’s past here?”
“The edge of the world,” Eli said. “You’d plunge into the abyss.”
“Actually,” Ciarán remarked, “Dónall thinks the world is round.”
“
Round?
” she asked as if uncertain she had heard aright.
“Seriously,” Ciarán said, “that’s what some of the scholars at Reims believe.” Of course, the theory belonged to the notorious Gerbert of Aurillac, and given the source, Ciarán left some room for doubt. “The Irish claim there’s another land out there, far to the west: Tír na nÓg, the Land of Eternal Youth. It’s where the Tuatha Dé Danann, the Fae folk of my homeland, sailed after they left Ireland’s shores. They say it’s the most beautiful place in all the world.”
“Like a Garden of Eden?” she asked.
“Maybe so.”
“Do you think it’s real?”
“Maybe someday I’ll sail there and find out.”
Alais rolled her eyes, though the smile never left her face.
The sun was beginning to set and soon would cast a rosy glow over the western horizon. Overhead, three terns glided toward the shore. Évrard soon called the crew to supper, and everyone gathered near the mast. Ciarán sat against the railing, next to Alais and much of the crew, while Dónall, Isaac, and Évrard sat on benches. The meal consisted of stale bread and fresh codfish, hauled up by the crew earlier this morning. Ciarán relished the fresh fish, knowing that if the fishing turned bad in the days ahead, they would soon be surviving on the salted leftovers.
Évrard passed around a skin of Spanish wine. After taking a sip, Dónall asked him about events in the Moorish lands.
Évrard drained his cup of wine in one long gulp. “All you need to know about what happens in Córdoba,” he said, “is that nothing happens unless Al-Mansor wills it.”
“Who’s he?” Ciarán asked.
“His title is hajib,” Évrard replied, “but he controls the caliph like a puppeteer making a doll step to his tune.”
Alais raised a curious brow. “How did he come to do that?”
Josua explained. “It was the classic case of ‘be careful what you wish for.’ You see, when the previous caliph died, the caliphate passed to his minor son, and naturally, the boy’s uncle and the palace eunuchs plotted to kill him, hoping to usurp the throne. But the caliph’s old vizier stepped in. He needed to eliminate the uncle, so he found a man untroubled by such messy jobs: Ibn Abi Amir, the leader of the city guard—the man who would become known as Al-Mansor. So Al-Mansor murdered the uncle, but then he slowly eliminated all his rivals one by one, including the general of the army, and finally the poor vizier himself. Now Al-Mansor proclaims himself the noble king of all the Moors.”
“Of course,” Évrard said, “it helped that while he was conspiring to eliminate his rivals, Al-Mansor had the support of Al-Hakkam’s queen, whom he was rutting every night for good measure. And the general’s daughter, too, who ended up becoming one of his four wives! Can you imagine, four wives? And a royal mistress on top of that! I have enough troubles with just the one.”
The crew erupted in laughter. Alais’ cheeks grew flushed, and Josua shook his head and smiled, obviously accustomed to his partner’s crude sense of humor.
“Al-Mansor,” Josua explained, “retains his power through Al-Hakkam’s son, the current caliph, whom he sequesters in the palace and keeps distracted with every form of carnal pleasure.”
“He’s a devout hedonist,” Évrard said, working on his second cup of wine. “But then again, he has a thousand concubines in his harem, so can you blame him? Of course, you monks would know nothing of such things, eh?”
Ciarán glanced at Alais, whose jaw hung open in disbelief. “
Seriously?
” she whispered.
Ciarán held out his palms. “How would I know?”
Isaac said, “I have heard many Christian monks refer to Al-Mansor as your Antichrist. After all, men like Prior Bernard and Canon Frézoul believe he rules a city whose people worship a prophet called Mahomet. But if Al-Mansor is your Antichrist, I tell you, it is the Christian kings of Spain who created him.”
Évrard shrugged. “A year or two after Al-Hakkam’s death, the Christians sent an army to the walls of Córdoba. But Al-Mansor and his own army fought back and chased them all the way to Saragossa, so the people of Córdoba came to adore him. But he didn’t stop at Saragossa. He declared a jihad, a holy war against all the Christians of Spain.”
“And so went fifty years of peace between the Christians and the Moors.” Isaac sighed.
“He became known as the Illustrious Victor,” Josua added, “Savior of Córdoba and Defender of Islam. Every spring he rides from Córdoba on his black stallion with his great army to campaign against the Christian kings, plunder their cities, and add their riches to his vast treasury. Twice he attacked León and pillaged it ruthlessly. Barcelona was next. Other cities surrendered by the time his army arrived. After every campaign, he returned the victor.”
“But León and Barcelona weren’t the worst,” Évrard said in disgust. “Last July, he ravaged Santiago de Compostela and the tomb of blessed Saint James—the apostle, no less. He razed the whole town, even taking the great iron bells that rang from Saint James’s Church. Those beautiful bells. And you know what he did with them? He turned them into lamps for one of his mosques. Lamps!”
“I’m beginning to understand the whole ‘Antichrist’ thing,” Dónall quipped.
“And we’re going to his city?” Ciarán asked warily.
Évrard winked back. “Al-Mansor won’t give a rat’s turd about you two or our pretty lass. Half his own army is Christian malcontents from León and Castile. He doesn’t care. It’s the kings he hates, but it’s no matter. He keeps Córdoba safe and orderly, which is good for business. And that’s what matters, I always say.”
“Besides,” Isaac said, smiling, “wait until you see her. Córdoba will make you forget about the hajib who rules her.”
“Not to mention the beautiful women, eh?” Évrard said, slapping his knee. “Like flowers waiting for bees like us to dip into their nectar!” The crew burst out in laughter. Alais blushed again. Évrard took another swig of wine. Then Eli ran up and tugged at his sleeve.
“Captain,” Eli said nervously, “there are storm clouds abaft.”
Évrard’s eyes narrowed. “The weather should be clear.”
“They came in fast,” Eli explained.
Ciarán looked to the stern. Amid the growing dusk, black clouds boiled, rapidly filling the sky well before the horizon.
“I swear,” Eli stammered, “those clouds are following us.”
Dónall’s face turned ashen. His gaze reflected Ciarán’s thoughts.
“What?” Alais said, catching the look that passed between them.
“Get in the deckhouse,” Ciarán told her.
“But what’s happening?”
Ciarán jumped to his feet, ignoring her question, as Dónall hurried aft and stared into the face of the gathering storm.