The Road To Jerusalem (42 page)

Knut Eriksson and most of his men stayed only another day at Forsvik to go through whatever might seem useful in the storehouses and lake houses. What they found was good, for in one of the lake houses there was enough sawn oak to build the ship they had planned. Eyvind Jonsson, Jon Mickelsen, and Egil Olafsen of Ulateig had to remain at Forsvik to finish building the ship before the ice on Lake Vattern thawed. It would be a mighty task that only Norwegian shipbuilders could manage.

With the rest of his Norwegian retainers and some of those from Arnas, Knut Eriksson headed back to Western Gotaland. He had taken his first long stride on the path that would lead him to the three royal crowns.

Listen, there is my friend!
Yes, there he comes,
bounding along on the hills.
Like a gazelle is my friend
or like a young stag.
See, now he stands there behind my wall,
he looks in through the window,
he peers through the grating.
My friend begins to speak,
he says to me:

Stand up, my beloved, you my beauty,
and come outside.

For see, winter is gone, the rainy time
is over and has gone its way.

Again and again Arn murmured the words of the Lord to express what filled him more than anything else. He was riding toward Husaby, making great clods of earth and frozen snow and ice spurt up around Shimal’s hooves. The stallion was hot and sweaty, but Arn bore his own heat within and thought that the springtime wind of speed could cool him. He knew full well that this might not be the most suitable state of mind for appear ing in the house of the Lord to sing the Lord’s praises and His alone. And he was very sure that Father Henri would have had many stern views on the matter.

But he rode like a lunatic with the speed of a fool because he could do nothing else. So filled was he with Cecilia that all else had to stand aside except the Lord Himself. And it felt as though the Devil were tempting him with evil thoughts, asking if he had to choose between the Lord’s love or Cecilia’s, which would he choose? Evil thoughts seemed to force themselves on him no matter how much he tried to defend himself, as if the Devil had truly discovered a soul with a great weakness.

He had to stop, dismount from Shimal, and pray for forgiveness for the wicked thoughts that had seeped inside him. He prayed until he was freezing cold and then even more. After that he continued on at a more modest pace, for he had come so close to Husaby that people there would soon be able to see him.

He arrived at the church in good time and led Shimal to the priest’s stable. He wiped the horse down, covering him with homespun so that he wouldn’t cool off too fast after the sweaty ride. Shimal looked at him with his big, grateful eyes—as if the stallion had been wronged and had seen through him.

It was Annunciation Day, the time when the storks came to Western Gotaland and when the plow was to be put to work in the fields at Vitae Schola in Denmark. This mass was suited to Arn’s voice just as well as the mass at Christmas. The Virgin Mary was the patroness of the monastery at Varnhem, and all singers who came from Varnhem thus knew every mass by heart that belonged to the Holy Virgin.

But during the singing in the church he still felt himself led astray into sin even though he sang with Cecilia as ecstatically as at Christmas. In lines of text when the words spoke of love for Our Lady he looked Cecilia in the eyes and meant every word for her, and in her voice when she replied he felt that she was singing in the same way and meant the same as he did.

Without realizing that he was thereby trampling on Algot Palsson’s self-respect, he invited himself to stay a few days at the Husaby royal manor so that he and Cecilia could practice new songs before the next mass. Arn had sensed, without knowing the reason for it, that Algot Palsson was not a man to refuse any request that came from a son of Arnas. So little needed to be said about the matter, before everything was arranged as Arn had requested.

But after that a conflict broke out between the two young people on the one hand, and everyone who wanted to or was required to watch over them on the other. They tried to use all their cunning to find a chance to speak together in private. Algot and the older women in the house saw this and in turn used all their cunning to watch them at every moment. As long as they sat demurely in the hall with other people close by and sang the Lord’s praises in one song more beautiful than the last, no one had any objections. Both Arn and Cecilia had a great tolerance for sitting together and singing, but it was no greater than other people’s tenacity in watching them. And a careful vigil was kept that they did not sit too close. At supper the two young people sat in the high seat, but with Algot as a mighty breakwater between them, and they couldn’t come near each other except when Cecilia politely poured more ale for Arn, which caused him some torment because he had vowed never again in his life to drink as much ale as he had at the first feast in Husaby.

Just before Annunciation Day, Priest Sune in Husaby had attended a collegium with Bishop Bengt in Skara. Despite the terrible condition of the roads at this time of year, many more clergymen from the diocese had gathered than expected, a sign of the great unrest that had spread on the winds of gossip in all of Western Gotaland after the
landsting
at Axevalla. Everyone knew that King Karl Sverkersson would not be content after having lost all power in Western Gotaland, just as everyone knew that Knut Eriksson was the foremost contender to oppose the king and take his crown from him. If the worst happened, King Karl would come with an army to Western Gotaland, and it was not easy to say who would win that battle. The only certainty was that such a war would severely ravage the land.

The question that the collegium with Bishop Bengt had to resolve was whether the church should speak for one or the other in this struggle for earthly power. The clergymen were equally divided between those who supported King Karl, including the bishop himself, and those who preferred Knut Eriksson. But most thought that the only wise position for the church to take would be not to get involved in this struggle. For if the church interjected itself in such a game, much grief could come from it.

But there were also other matters to discuss when the clergymen of the diocese had gathered. The cathedral dean had recounted for those who wanted to listen, and also for those who no longer wished to hear, how he had been an eyewitness to a miracle when a little defenseless monk boy from Varnhem, with the help of the archangel Gabriel, smote two warriors to the ground.

Since Priest Sune now sat at the supper table in the Husaby royal manor and saw Arn seated there too, he was reminded of this story of the miracle and recounted the tale as he had heard it. Everyone listened with eager attention except Arn, who did not seem to like what he heard. The priest was then struck by a thought that Arn perhaps knew more about this event; he came from Varnhem, after all. Perhaps he even knew the monk boy involved. So the priest asked Arn if he was familiar with the story.

Everyone could see that Arn found the question awkward, but they could not understand why. It was hard to believe that Arn might feel envy toward one of the other monk boys.

Arn was slow to reply since he felt himself trapped, but unlike other people, he could not resort to lies. So he told the truth, pointing out that the cathedral dean’s version of the story was all wrong. There was no question of a miracle, nor was the little monk boy defenseless, since Arn himself was the person in question. What happened was that drunken peasants had come running from a wedding ale and absurdly accused him of being a bride-robber, despite the fact that he had been outside the cloister walls for only a few hours. They had sought to kill him, but so that the killing would seem more honorable, they had given him a sword to defend himself.

At this point in his explanation Arn had to pause and think about how to continue. He would have preferred to avoid it altogether, as he thought he had already said what needed to be said, and as he was not the least bit proud of what he had done, but instead felt great remorse. Yet he had learned enough about how people thought out in the base world that he assumed they might find him boastful. The one who was bragging was actually the cathedral dean, who in his pride thought he had witnessed a miracle of the Lord, when it was merely an accident, but that too was difficult to assert without speaking ill of the dean.

In the intolerable silence that followed, Cecilia asked that he continue. He looked up and met her gaze, and it was as if the Virgin Mary spoke to him and told him how to couch his words to fashion a good story.

He passed quickly over the painful part. Drunken peasants had by mistake set out to kill someone they thought was a defenseless monk boy, although it was Arn, who had been trained in the art of the sword by a Templar knight of the Lord. So the fight was brief. It was no miracle, just as it was no miracle at the Axevalla
ting
.

And yet there was a miracle in this story, a miracle of love.

For in the subsequent events that the dean had not witnessed or failed to understand—the union of Gunvor and Gunnar—one could truly see the Virgin Mary’s ineffable goodness and Her care for those who set their trust in Her. Arn blushed a bit at his audacious words regarding the dean, but no one in the hall scolded him or frowned.

Having come this far in his account, Arn then recited the verses from the Holy Scriptures about victorious eternal love, which he knew so well that he could recall them at any time. With this he made a great impression on everyone at the table and especially on Cecilia, just as he had hoped.

The priest from Husaby had turned thoughtful and attested that the words Arn had recited were all truly God’s word. He added that love truly could accomplish miracles; the Holy Scriptures had many examples of this. It was assuredly no simple matter to understand, since most people who lived in the society of Western Gotaland were forced to celebrate the wedding ale for entirely different reasons than those granted to Gunvor and Gunnar. But Arn had told this story with good ecclesiastical understanding, and for that reason the priest of Husaby was in agreement with him. Our Lady had truly demonstrated a miracle of love and faith and not a miracle of the sword or violence. From this there was certainly something to be learned.

To all around the table it seemed rather unclear what was to be learned, although it was a lovely story. But the priest of Husaby did not choose to clarify further. On the other hand, he did take Algot aside after the conclusion of the meal and prayers and had a conversation with him that no one else heard.

It may have been this conversation that caused Algot to have a number of new ideas, for the next morning Algot asked Arn if he, who was good with horses, would take Cecilia with him on a ride in the beautiful spring weather. Arn did not have to be asked twice.

And so it was that Cecilia and Arn rode side by side up the southern slopes of Kinnekulle on this first warm day of spring with gentle breezes. There were catkins on the pussy willows, there was plenty of water in the streams, and the ground was only flecked with snow. At first they didn’t dare speak to each other although they were finally alone, for the retainers who followed them kept a polite distance so they could keep watch but stay out of earshot. All that Arn had said to her in his feverish nighttime thoughts or when he galloped along on Shimal and yelled the words to the wind now remained unsaid. Instead he soon found himself entangled in childish descriptions of Shimal’s superior qualities and why horses from the Holy Land were so much better than other steeds.

Cecilia seemed only moderately interested in the topic. But she smiled as if to encourage him to speak in any case. She had also had long nocturnal conversations with Arn in her dreams, although then she had always imagined that he would say the right words first and that she would then urge him on so that he said more of the same. Faced with talk of horses’ qualities and the best way to breed horses, she had little to say.

When Arn was near despair at his own shyness and the betrayal of all he had promised to say to her as soon as he had a chance, he prayed silently to the Holy Mother of God to give him just a little of the power that Gunvor had received. And at once the words came to him as if Our Lady were showing him the way with a gentle smile. He slowed Shimal, glanced nervously back at the retainers who were still out of earshot, and recited the words to Cecilia with his gaze fixed on her eyes and jubilation in his heart:

You have taken my heart,
you my sister, my bride,
you have taken my heart

with a single glance

with a single link of the chain
around your neck.

How beautiful is your love,
you my sister, my bride!

Yes, sweeter than wine, and the scent
of your salves surpasses all spices.
Your lips drip with sweetness
my bride
your tongue hides honey and milk
and the scent of your clothing
is like the scent of Lebanon.

When Cecilia heard the words of the Lord, which were also Arn’s words to her, she reined in her horse and gave him a long look, speaking to him with her eyes, just as they had been forced to say everything until now. She sat quite still in the saddle but was breathing hard.

“You can never understand, Arn Magnusson, how much I have longed for these words from you,” she said at last without lowering her gaze. “Ever since our eyes met as our voices merged in our first song. I want to be yours more than I want anything else on this earth.”

“I am also yours, Cecilia Palsdotter, more than anything else on earth and for all time,” replied Arn, filled with a solemnity that made the words sound like a prayer. “It’s true that you took my heart with a single glance, as the word of God says. From you I never want to part.”

They rode a bit in silence until they came to an ancient and half-dead oak leaning over a small stream. There they got down from their horses and sat on the ground, leaning against the oak tree. The retainers from Husaby hesitantly stopped a short dis tance away and seemed to disagree whether they should come closer. The sound from the stream meant that they couldn’t hear anything unless they came very close. They chose to sit where they were so that they could see but not hear.