The Hermetica of Elysium (Elysium Texts Series) (14 page)

“Henry has not made a coherent sound in some months, Montrose. I don’t know how he can help.”

“How can I continue without seeing the last man who has read it?”

The old man turned his back and after a moment, waved his hand. As he made his way into an alcove, another brother stepped forward. This one was much younger, but still showed some gray in his tonsure. He smiled feebly at Montrose and beckoned. His hands were plump and pink inside his wide sleeves. Montrose motioned for Garreth and Nadira to follow. They did so as quietly as possible. The monk pulled a lit taper from a sconce and held it above his head as he led them through the archways out of the hall. Nadira glanced behind her, but Father Bertram had gone.

Montrose’s boots were loud on the stones, the brother’s footsteps silent. They passed through the vestibule and up a long staircase. Nadira glanced about, but in the fading light, she could see only directly in front of her where the brother’s candle illuminated the walls. She matched her footsteps with Montrose’s larger strides and kept herself at his arm with some trouble. She was close enough to feel his body’s heat on her face. Garreth brought up the rear with his reassuring heavy tread.

At length they reached a long hallway that seemed to stretch for a mile. Nadira was weary from the climb. Ahead of her lay an expanse of endless gray stone, pockmarked at regular intervals with the slanted pink light of a setting sun as it shone through the casement windows. Here there was no musty smell. They were high up in the third story where no water would stand. Instead, there was the dry, dusty smell of long stale straw and unwashed bodies.

She tucked her chin closer to her chest and inhaled the aroma of her cloak, still fresh from being outside and carrying faint whiffs of the pine forest. She thought she might faint before they finally stopped beside a cell. A narrow wooden door barred their entry. The monk handed the taper to Montrose while he fumbled on his belt for a heavy ring of keys. He held the ring up to the candle and squinted as he selected the correct one.

Nadira felt Garreth’s palm in the small of her back. She took his massive arm in the darkness of the twilight and leaned on him while the monk fumbled with the lock. There was a rasp and a click. The monk took the candle back and then gestured for Montrose to open the door. Montrose took hold of the handle with both hands and pushed. The door opened into a tiny cubicle, barely four feet wide and six feet deep, bare except for a wide bench.

On the bench lay a pile of rags. As the monk entered with the candle, the room was lit end to end. Dust filled the air as the pile of rags shifted. Something resembling a man cried out and put his hands over his face. The monk quickly lowered the candle and shielded it with his hand. The man in the cell began to sob, the rags shaking even more dust into the air. There was not room for all of them to stand together. Montrose took a long step forward, placing a hand on the monk’s chest to keep him and his candle out of the cell.

“Brother Henry?” he whispered.

Garreth pushed Nadira in front of him so she stood on the lintel. Behind her, the monk set the candle over her head in a waxy niche in the wall.

The rag man stopped shaking for a moment, and then began to cough. Montrose moved over and sat on the bench beside him. He pulled the rags from Brother Henry’s back revealing a worn and tired habit beneath. “Henry,” he murmured, “do you know me?” Brother Henry lowered his hands from his eyes for a moment, and then quickly replaced them, blocking Montrose from his view.

“Little Robin.” It was a toad’s croak, not a man’s voice.

The brother in the hall was impressed, however. He whispered “Mother of God” and crossed himself. Montrose looked up.

“Friend, brother,” he said to the monk in the hall. “We do not require your assistance any longer.”

“I am instructed to stay with Brother Henry during his audience with you, lest he injure himself or others.” He glanced meaningfully at Nadira’s small form. Obviously, Garreth was in no danger.

“And your devotion is exemplary. However, my man Garreth will easily protect us. Can you not see that Brother Henry recognizes me?”

“Brother, take my request to Father Bertram. Ask if I may seek counsel with my old friend privately.”

The brother nodded , unaware that leaving to ask permission was, in fact, giving it. He lit another candle stub from his taper and moved down the long hall. The sun had long since set behind the mountains. Only the faint glow from the candle could be seen moving down the narrow hallway. After a moment, the light disappeared down the stairway.

“Is he gone?” Montrose asked.

Garreth nodded. Montrose beckoned to Nadira to enter the room then gestured for her to sit on the floor. Brother Henry remained seated with hands over his face. From her position on the flagstones, Nadira could see that Brother Henry was very thin, and fragile. The cell smelled like a stable. Henry had been here a long time.

Montrose put his strong arm around Henry’s shoulders and squeezed him. “Henry, look at me.” He whispered. He gave the monk a shake. “Henry.” The monk brought his hands down slowly, revealing two teary eyes.

“Henry, I have to talk to you about Richard’s book.” Henry slapped his hands back to his face and let out a cry. He began to moan , the sound echoing from the cold stones. Nadira withstood an impulse to cover her ears.

“Richard is dead, Henry. I have brought another reader. I have to talk to you. You must talk to us. You must try to help. Soon the other monks will join us, and then you know we must hold our tongues. Please, Henry.” His face was lost in the dancing shadows of the faint candle that struggled to light the room. Nadira did not move.

The monk pulled his hands down again and wiped them on his knees. He sniffed loudly then glanced at the doorway. “It’s terrible,” he groaned. “I find I cannot speak of it.”

“You must. We have little time, as you know, my friend.” Montrose squeezed him tighter.

“Oh, aye, there is no time. All is gone. Nothing remains, nothing…” the monk began to sob, his open mouth ghastly in the weak light. Nadira shifted on the floor. The movement caught the monk’s attention. The bright eyes locked on to her.

“A woman! You brought a woman here…” his face twisted for a moment then he burst out laughing, a harsh and unpleasant sound. “How nice to see a woman again. It has been a long time.”

Nadira hunched deeper into her cloak. How could he tell she was a woman? It was very dark and her form was not more than a lump of wool. Montrose would be upset that their façade had not lasted a day. She glanced up to meet his gaze, but instead of the anger she feared, he was smiling at the older man.

“Henry, look at me.” Henry obeyed, turning his face from Nadira toward Montrose. “Henry, When did you last have the book?”

“Two months past, maybe more. It was hot summer. There was still light after vespers.” Henry turned to smile at Nadira.

“Tell us,” Montrose continued, “Who took it away from you?”

Henry’s face took on a lost look, as though everything surrounding him was fading away. In his dark eyes, Nadira saw him searching, searching. He did not answer directly, but spoke in a monotone, staring through Nadira into the wall behind her.

“I read the first page. It was easy, Aramaic. The book told me that everything would be revealed to me. But I had to consume the book first. In my eagerness, I read page after page, painstakingly deciphering each letter, each symbol, each mark. I copied countless possible translations. Some of the pages were in Latin, some in Hebrew, some in the Saracen tongue. Those words I could not read. There are other signs, pictures and symbols. Some are of birds and people. I could not read them either. I do not know anyone who can.

“Oh, there were profound thoughts, some mathematical figures, but nothing I had not seen or read about in other books. For days I pondered its mysteries. I burned so many candles into the night I was given penance for my extravagance. But still I could not release the book.” He paused, but his eyes remained unfocused. “I thought I had ‘consumed the book’. He laughed a short laugh, like a cough. “Then one night after praying for the answer for hours and hours, it hit my mind like a blow from a staff. I had to eat the book, consume it literally.”

“Maybe I was going mad, but as I turned the leaves, I could see that the last page was not vellum like the others. The last page was brittle and yellow, perhaps made from flax, or some kind of reed, I do not know. I could see fibers pressed one way and then the other. It was translucent and devoid of any writing. I thought it was just the endpaper. It was spotted with black dots, like fly specks. I could see that hands before mine had torn bits out of this page. They were torn in half circles, squares, cut with knives and scissors. Fully a third of the page had been eaten away like that.”

Henry rubbed his face, making a scratching sound on his sparse beard. “I tore a huge piece out of the page. Not content with tiny bits as other readers had, I tore half the page away and swallowed it with the abbot’s finest red wine. Then I sat, saying my rosary for four bells, waiting. Like a fool.” He began trembling again.

They heard the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs. More than one monk coming this time.

Henry looked to the door. “They will not understand,” he said sadly. “They do not see. They think I am mad. Perhaps I am. But they are the dead ones, not I.” He turned away.

The familiar monk returned with another brother and a torch. They seemed quite surprised to see Henry sitting docile on the bench. The flame was thrust into the room with a roar of spitting pitch lighting the tiny space with a violent red.

“Brother Henry?” The taller monk asked.

Henry smiled. “I am fine, my brother. Thank you for your concern. I am happy here, talking with my old friend Robin.” The two monks exchanged incredulous glances.

“We are all having a very pleasant conversation, honored brothers. Please allow us this small concession. Surely we do no harm.” Montrose said in his most courteous voice.

The torch was placed in a holder and the two brothers backed out of the crowded cell. Garreth followed them out far enough to encourage them to sit a little ways from the door. He kept his bulk in the doorway, though, blocking the residents from view. Montrose leaned out over Nadira to see through the small doorway. “We must speak quietly.” He looked at her before returning to his seat beside Henry. The monk was staring off into space. Montrose took his arm. “Henry,” he murmured,.

Brother Henry sucked in a great breath of the smoky air as he turned to Montrose. “My friend, it is all you have heard. More than you have heard. Much more. Too much,” he closed his eyes. “You should go home. Leave the book be. It will destroy whoever tries to use it. Do not worry. It protects itself.” He shook his head slowly side to side. “It destroyed me,” he whispered.

Montrose stretched a long arm across Henry’s shoulders. “You feel that way now, but you are not destroyed. I am talking to you right now. You are just the same as always. You are the same man who taught Richard his Latin and Hebrew. The same man who dined every winter in my father’s keep when we were children. You are the man I need now. We need you.”

Henry sighed. He was still for a moment, then his head came up. “Why did you bring a woman here?” he asked. “You know it is forbidden.”

Montrose was taken aback by the shift. He glanced at Nadira. “Woman?” he said weakly.

“You fool.” Henry whispered. Nadira scrunched down in her cloak.

“How did you know?”

Henry sighed again. “I can’t explain, but knowing and seeing…and seeing things and hearing…” his voice faded away.

“Henry, you must help us. Tell me what happened. You swallowed half the page with the abbot’s fine wine,” he prompted.

Henry nodded, looked at his hands. He began in a soft voice; Nadira strained to hear. “I was sitting with just a candle. As I sat,” he paused, absorbed in the memory, “as I sat the candle grew larger. The light flooded my cell. I looked up and from my little bench I could see every crack in the stones, every mark. If I stared too long at a crack, I could feel myself going into the crack as though I were made of mist. It was frightening.”

Henry wiped his eyes with his sleeve. He continued in a stronger voice, “I picked up the book with wonder. I turned to the first pages and read them. This time everything became clear. It was as though before the words were in anagrams and now they were in their proper order. I read the book cover to cover. I do not know how long I was there. It felt like days and at the same time just an instant. I heard voices talking to me, telling me what the words meant.

“I cannot explain it. I saw the world. I looked out of the casement and then I flew out of the casement. Everything I looked at drew me to it in an instant. Every question I asked was answered. I saw through things, Montrose; I saw into men’s minds, I felt their hearts. I spoke to a spider and it spoke to me in turn. When the book was finished, I looked up. My candle had gone out. It was dead cold; the wax was brittle. The cell was like a tomb, black as soot, yet I had just finished reading for hours. I think.”

“I couldn’t see the book in my hands, yet I had been reading it.” He trembled. “I felt exhausted. I slept for a day; I could not eat. I was weak as a kitten. Brother Martin brought me bread and broth. They say I was ill for three days. I don’t remember.” He sighed. “When I had the courage to do so, I picked the book up again, but the words were cold and flat. They sounded stupid to me when I read them.”