Crusade of Tears: A Novel of the Children's Crusade (21 page)

Pieter laid a hand on his lambs, one by one, and offered a comforting smile to his flock. Sobbing, he put his arm around poor Otto, and led his bloodied crusaders in a quiet procession toward the gates of Dunkeldorf.

The children stared forward, paying no attention to the townsfolk mocking them or to the occasional stone or chunk of clay thrown their way. But a unity born only of suffering now bonded them more tightly than any word of scorn or ridicule could divide. Mercifully, they soon emerged from that dreadful place and were returned to the river roadway where they found a suitable night’s encampment. It was here, under a gnarled oak tree and in the pink light of the setting sun that they laid little Lothar in his shallow grave. A weeping Otto clutched Lothar’s wooden cross to his heart, then placed it in his own belt, setting his own gently above Lothar’s head. “I shall carry your cross, my brother.”

The children quietly withdrew into the lengthening shadows of twilight and drifted in pairs toward the river to bathe and bind each other’s wounds. And in the healing starlight they began to whisper among themselves of the drama and tragedy of the day past. But Pieter sat blank-faced before the small, snapping campfire as the flames in his own heart began to rise again. He ordered limping Solomon aside and wandered restlessly into a clearing where he lay amidst the dewy weeds and faced the canopy of stars above him. His aimless stare soon changed to a fixed gaze and he stood up with fists raised to heaven.

“Why, my God, why? You ought hide in shame! Why have You such little regard for these innocent ones? Look upon them at Your leisure and You shall find they love You … and yet You keep Your tongue and hold still Your hand. With a mere thought You might rescue them, but You pay no heed! Would that You were but a poor figment of my mind … such would be a lighter burden than You.

“I know not what to do with a God I do not understand. And yet, in such confusion You expect my gratitude in all things. Ha! Hard as I do try, I only know of one paltry thing to so give thanks for … the tear in Tomas’s eye when Lothar was laid to his rest. More than that, I’ll not grant.”

Pieter thrashed about the darkness swinging his staff at heaven and earth and fell to his knees in frustration. “You said, ‘Suffer the little children to come unto Me and I’ll give them rest.’ Liar! Deceiver! These suffering children
have
come to You; they have begged Your mercy and there is
no
rest for them … only misery and death.

“‘The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof? You refused to have them spared a single morsel this day. What sort of God are you? What nature of monster do I serve?”

Pieter climbed back to his feet and paced in a hurried circle. ‘Round and ‘round he stormed, driving his crook hard into the sod. He began to shout. “For seventy-seven years I have walked this woeful earth, and I still do not understand You. I have studied Your Word faithfully. I have dutifully endured the piety of Your pathetic Church and have faithfully befriended the outcasts of Your miserable creation. I have spent painful hours on my knees in prayer …
despite
Your eternal silence! I have trained my mind on things here and above, and yet I have less understanding of You now than ever before. Why do You hide Your truth from me? Are You not there? Do You not care?”

Unbeknown to Pieter, Karl was hiding wide-eyed and shocked behind a small tree, carefully watching and listening to the old man wrestle with his Maker. The priest’s words cut deeply into the boy, and Karl began to tremble in his own confusion. The lad had never suffered such chaos of the spirit, and such doubts as had come over him in these last weeks had never so shadowed his mind. Pieter’s struggle frightened him.

The war for Pieter continued until the man was too exhausted to fight on. At last he fell to the ground and cried out the words of the psalmist, “‘Awake, O Lord. Why do You sleep? Arouse Yourself! Do not reject us forever. Why do You hide Your face and forget our misery and depression? We are brought down to the dust. Our bodies cling to the ground.’”

Then he lay silently, as if waiting for an answer. But the night was mute and he eventually stood to his feet, wiped his face on his rough sleeve and reluctantly returned to the children. As he entered the yellow light of the campfire the crusaders were hushed, for they now gazed upon a different Pieter. His gentle smile and kindly eyes were gone; in their place was a hard-set jaw and odd stare.

Glaring at the crackling sticks, he broke the uneasy silence. “Woe to he who builds a city with bloodshed and founds a town with violence. Woe to you, you who are treacherous while others did not deal treacherously with you. As soon as you shall finish destroying, you shall be destroyed.”

Then he motioned for Wil and Tomas to come to his side and whispered to them. In a moment, the three hurried off into the darkness.

Night had settled upon Dunkeldorf, and its vacant streets were now shadowed by smoky, pine torches. The town had become a macabre menagerie of loud, brawling taverns and murky, threatening alleyways; its folk slumbering behind the safety of clasped shutters and well-barred doors. Pieter and his two comrades slipped past a drunken guard at an open gate and crept cautiously from one dark corner to another as they sought the market square.

The priest found some blankets strewn across a fruit cart and snatched one for Wil and one for Tomas. The three peered through the shadows for any sign of guards, moving like stalking cats from alley to table to barrel to crate, gathering salt pork, salted herring, vegetables, fruits, and breads. They packed their blankets quietly and quickly. Before long the three were heavy with provisions, including a clay jar of sweet honeycomb Pieter picked off a window sill. Then, as deftly as they had entered, the thieves slipped out the gate and hurried toward the safety of the forest.

Once they passed a reasonable distance, Pieter asked the boys to stop. “Go forward without me and feed the others,” he said. “I’ve a bit more business to settle and shall be along shortly.”

“But where are you going?” asked Wil.

Pieter refused to answer. Instead, he pulled his hood slowly over his head and vanished into the night where he found himself at the gates of Dunkeldorf once more. Again, he slipped past the sleeping guard and proceeded straightaway toward the timber chapel. Without the slightest regard for his own jeopardy he boldly grabbed a curl-flamed torch propped on a nearby post and carried it high overhead toward his mark. “There is a season for all things,” he muttered to himself. “A time to love and a time to hate. Silvester, thou hast earned thy wicked
burg
a proper judgment this night.” With not so much as a moment’s hesitation, Pieter hurled the flambeau on the dry, thatched roof of the chapel. He stood perfectly still and listened with perverse pleasure to the firstborn crackles of the fresh fire. Then, as a soft breeze wafted through the square, the flames suddenly rose higher and roared into an inferno, immediately pouncing onto the thatch of neighboring shops.

Pieter’s face illuminated in the yellow light; the hard edges of his nose and jaw cast deep shadows, his blazing eyes bearing the reflection of the fires within and without. Suddenly, however, a twinge of nausea stirred his inward parts and unsettled him. He closed his hood tightly under his chin and turned away, quickly retreating through the marketplace past the rush of soldiers and folk now scurrying toward the fire. He jostled and pushed until he slinked through the gate one last time.

The old man stumbled hastily through the wood toward his flock, though less joyful with each passing step and ever more mindful of the evil just exposed in his own heart. He looked over his shoulder but once, and the sight served only to worsen his vexation.

Wil and Tomas startled poor Pieter as they dropped from a treetop where they had kept vigil for their mysterious companion. The boys had watched the flames lick the night’s sky over Dunkeldorf and were suspicious of the priest. Tomas stepped forward and challenged him. “Pieter … you’ve set the place afire, did y’not?”

The old man said nothing but looked to the ground.

“I say it again. Did you set the town afire?”

Pieter locked his lips tightly. He gripped his staff and drove it deep into the earth, pushing past the two lads toward the camp.

“Ha! I knew so,” laughed Tomas. “Well done, Father! Well done, indeed.”

When the three entered the camp, Pieter walked to the darkest edge of the circle and sat quietly against a tree. Wil and Tomas had not yet shown the booty of their night’s scrumping and proudly carried their blankets to the firelight. But before either could speak, Georg bubbled, “Look. Look at that!”

The boys turned to see a rabbit roasting on a spit and heads of cabbage boiling in the pot. Jons I and II ran to Pieter. “Pieter, Father Pieter!” Jon I shouted. “While you were gone, Karl said we ought pray for God’s mercy. And … and just when Karl was praying, Frieda hollered ‘bout an owl with a rabbit.”

“Yes!” exclaimed an excited Frieda. “I heard wings flap-pin’ hard above and looked up and—”

“And then she screamed at it and threw a rock hard.”

“She spooked the owl and it dropped its rabbit… we heard the thing thud and found it!”

Karl beamed. “And then Maria and two others went to fetch more water from the river and found some cabbages that must’ve rolled off a cart! God is good, just as you’ve said.”

Gertrude charged toward the dismayed priest with a fistful of cooked cabbage. “Taste! And the rabbit’s near to done.”

Pieter was staggered and withdrew, confounded and unwilling to share the slightest hint of his vendetta. He turned into the shadows and became ill. In the meantime, Tomas and Wil displayed their quarry to the complimentary assembly. Though the children were impressed with the storehouse of ill-gotten treasure, Tomas and Wil were keenly aware that their own success paled in comparison to the odd events at the campsite. Nevertheless, the hungry crusaders were delighted to add some fruit and bread to their feast of roasted rabbit and boiled cabbage and were soon happily filled to satisfaction.

Some time after all had eaten, a few of the children noticed poor Pieter still sitting in shamed silence just beyond the ring of firelight. Karl, perplexed as were the others, motioned for all to gather ‘round their forlorn friend and offer their kindness. After several had taken a turn, the priest spoke. “My dear, dear children, you have instructed this old fool in faithfulness and my heart is blessed. My spirit had stopped believing, and the evil within me rose up. May God have mercy on me and may you each forgive this wicked man.”

Solomon rested his head on the old man’s lap and looked up at him with sad eyes. Pieter stroked his friend’s head and thought quietly for a few moments. He turned to the children with watery, tired eyes and sighed. He leaned to Solomon and whispered softly, “‘Food gained by fraud tastes good to a man, but his end is a mouth full of gravel.’” Pieter returned to the campfire with his young fellows and put his back against a smooth-barked tree. He closed his eyes to listen to the chatter of his children and was comforted by their gentle banter. He was touched by the ongoing compassion of those comforting Otto and how the whole circle paused to shed new tears for their lost little comrade. But then the biting tone of Tomas rose above the rest as he relived the other events of the night. “And why did Pieter leave you and Wil in the wood?” asked a voice.

The old man’s heart sank as he waited for Tomas’s sneering reply. “Ha. ’Tis the best part yet! Our good, godly priest had a fair night’s play. After he had us scrump the town, he went back to put the torch to it!”

Pieter wept.

Chapter 10

GLORY LOST

F
riederich woke with a start. He sat up in the predawn darkness with his brown eyes stretched wide with fear and looked nervously at the dark silhouettes of his sleeping comrades. “Wake, Karl,” he whispered as he yanked insistently on the sleeping lad’s tunic. “Please, wake up.”

Karl responded slowly to the persistent tugs and pleas of the anxious boy. He rubbed his eyes and sat up, peering in the moonlight at the dirty face of his friend. “What is it?”

“The trees are talking to me again.”

Karl sat quietly for a moment and pondered the little boy’s unusual comment before answering with a yawn. “Yes, Friederich, no doubt, but speak to me of it at prime.”

“Nay,” begged Friederich. “Hear me. Danger is afoot and we must waken the others.”

The lad’s rising voice stirred Lukas and Frieda. “Please, Karl, believe me. Tell them we must move!”

But there was no need to wake the others, for a perturbed group of grumbling crusaders had begun to huddle around their nervous comrade. Pieter, exhausted and bleary-eyed, stumbled into the circle and sat quietly between the others to hear Friederich’s fears.

“M’
Vati
taught me when I was little,” began the eight-year-old, “that the trees speak to each other by rustling their leaves in the wind. He says he knows not if it were the spirits of the woodland or the trees themselves what done the speaking. He says the leaves were their tongues and in their season they send their news from north to south and east to west… whatever is the way of the wind.”

Pieter raised his eyebrows a bit, but Tomas scoffed. “You’d be a madman to believe a sally as that. And then to wake the rest of us with such a tale! Aye, yer either a madman to believe it, else a fool. And yer papa is mad as well.”

“Listen all, and hear m’words. You’ve surely seen and heard how the trees act in a coming storm, then how they rest when it passes.”

Many nodded.

“Ah, yes,” observed Pieter. “And we’ve seen them flutter happy in a gentle summer breeze and we’ve seen them fall silent in autumn.”

Wil had listened quietly. He remembered old Emma of Weyer spinning similar tales. “Friederich truly believes he has heard a warning in the trees and, whether it be by trees or spirits I say we give him heed … so prepare to march … now!”

The dutiful crusaders held their tongues and prepared a hasty gruel of soaked oats and millet. And, before long, they found themselves rushing away from the reach of Dunkeldorf.

The sky began to lighten but an uneasy dread crept over the soldiers as they hurried on their way. They looked warily to either side of the roadway as if the very shadows of the misty forest were stalking them. Perhaps it was the sincere passion of Friederich that had affected their imaginations or the rush of the morning’s meal, or perhaps the trees had, indeed, given a fair warning. Whatever the cause, the fear was now shared by all, and the column began to run along the roadway until, at long last, the welcome edge of the sun broke the horizon on their left.

Pieter was equally relieved by the light of a new day. The night before his dreams had returned him to his failures in Dunkeldorf—the stealing and the arson, his wish to murder Lothar’s assailants, the hatred. But in the dark hours of that black night he had humbly confessed his humanity and resigned himself to rest in the mercy of his perplexing God. For Pieter, this was a day to leave the past far behind.

As the sun presented itself fully in the fresh morning sky, the priest looked at Karl and kindled a weak twinkle in his blue eyes. “My dear boy, I failed to answer your riddle of the other day.”

Karl brightened.

“Yet, I must say with some sorrow, my son,” said Pieter, “that you have failed to present me with a riddle worthy of your skill … this was the easiest of all, one quickly recalled from times past.”

“Well, go on then, Pieter, since you know so very much. Say the answer.”

“Very well, the answer is this: The souls of the damned are, by their very nature, selfish and self-centered and think only of how the world affects them. They took their long staves and tried to feed themselves. In so doing they paid the price of all such selfishness … they were left empty and hungry and angry.

“On the other hand, my dear boy,” Pieter continued, “the souls of the saints departed had learned the futility of serving the self and had experienced the joy of sharing and serving others. They used their staves to feed each other and each received the blessings of a life given to service and a life given to loving one’s neighbor.”

Karl nodded grudgingly.

The crusaders pushed hard until noon and came to the top of a slight rise where they stopped to take their rest. “Children,” Pieter announced, “look, we are at the edge of a magnificent forest.”

The children stood quietly as Pieter pointed to the tall trees pressing close to them. “This needled wood spreads for as far as one might see, and under its scented canopy is a wonderland of deer and fox and hare and squirrel. And here and there you may find woodsmen with arms like oak trees who cut and saw the timber for use all over the Empire.

“But here also dwell witches and sorcerers and the demons of the shadowlands. At night, even the moon cannot press its silver beams to the ground, and in the day the sun strains to pierce the green with even the thinnest shafts of its golden beams. In the east it is called the Black Forest.”

Pieter raised his eyebrows at his spellbound crusaders. “This woodland is refuge for saint and sinner alike and we may find it either a safe harbor or the fearful den of Satan.” Pieter had somehow managed to frighten himself with his own words and he now stood stiffly, eyes darting across the landscape. He had been worrying all morning about the magistrate of Dunkeldorf and the troops that might be pursuing them on the road. Now he was equally anxious of the huge woodland before him. Unable to decide which was the safer risk—the open road or the ominous forest—he sat by a large tree while the children boiled some cabbage for a midday meal.

While the others were attending their duties, Wil wandered down the road and then into the forest where he came upon an unusual clearing. He walked quietly through knee-high wildflowers and stopped to feel the heat of the full, yellow sun on his face. With his blonde hair shimmering in its light, he turned slowly north and thought again of old Emma, the wise Butterfly Frau.
She and her flowers!
he mused. He picked a bloom and put it in his satchel. He thought of Brother Lukas sneaking away from the cloister to laugh under the summer sun with him and Karl, and their father. His teeth clenched and he considered his father. He imagined a far-off bloody field in which his dead body was surely buried. Wil envisioned meeting him at the Judgment and he laughed to himself.
How pleasant it shall surely be to seize him by the throat and throw him down on heated cobblestones
, he thought.
How dare he leave me behind!

The boy thought of his mother, Marta. He wondered on which day she had died and who had buried her. He angrily suppressed the lump swelling in his throat.
She’ll demand no more of me now,
he thought. He remembered Father Pious and spat. He shivered as he thought of his horrid great-uncle Arnold and he shook his head with memories of the busybody Anka. He wondered who had been given his family’s tiny hovel, their land, and who had stolen their bakery. Other faces came to mind until another shiver crept along his spine. It was as if he could see the ghost of Ansel and a wave of guilt came over him.
Enough of this.

The boy ambled back to the road and tossed a few pebbles aimlessly when a sound like rolling thunder startled him. He spun about and fixed his eyes on a cloud of dust now billowing some distance away. As the road beneath his thin-soled shoes shook, the boy squinted to discern three mounted knights rushing toward him at full combat gallop, clustered tightly, as if a single mass of steel, leather, and horseflesh.

Wil was so taken by the moment that he stood paralyzed, his heart captured by the pounding of iron hooves and the clatter of armor. Then, as if commanded by a single voice, the horsemen reared their mounts in unison, spreading their cloud of dust over the entranced boy.

Three golden-haired knights on three black, snorting stallions bore their steely blue eyes into Wil’s. Not a single word was spoken but instead there seemed to be a mystical commingling of spirits as if the knights were somehow merging their war-weary souls with the young spirit of a new warrior. The heaving horses pawed and whinnied and threw their heads impatiently, eager to charge on. But the knights sat steady in their saddles, steeled for what horrors were ahead. One’s mailed fist clutched a morgenstern, the “morning star” mace; the second, a short-handle battle-ax, and the third a menacing flail. Against their muscular thighs hung sheathed longswords and each colored robe bore the sign of the Cross. Their pot helmets sported thick, black plumes and their shields the crest akin to the Order of Teutonic Knights, the proud warriors from the strange lands of the terrible marshy north. Their yellow beards were coated with a long journey’s dust and their weatherworn faces looked weary.

Mesmerized, Wil drew a deep, chest-swelling breath, snatched his dagger from his belt, and raised it in high salute. The three horsemen held their mounts a moment longer and returned Wil’s tribute with silent nods. Then, as quickly as they had appeared, they charged past the boy and vanished around a turn in the road.

Wil stood silently and gazed as their dust cloud drifted into the trees and he knew he had been somehow changed. His thoughts were interrupted, however, as his fellows came running forward, chattering wildly. He looked at them with sudden contempt and he replaced his dagger firmly into his belt. “Enough. Stay to this road. Now move on.”

Old Pieter walked silently behind Wil, troubled by the strange look in the boy’s face. “Those were mighty warriors, to be sure.”

“Aye, old man, indeed they were and I’ll be as one of them in time. When I come to Palestine I’ll be wearing a knight’s armor and I’ll strike fear into the hearts of the Turks.”

“Well, yes, ’tis sure so, my brave lad,” answered Pieter carefully. “I am certain of it… if God goes before you.”

Wil looked sharply at Pieter.

The priest continued. “Many years past I read something written by a man far wiser than I who was a soldier far greater than those you have just seen. He wrote, ‘I do not trust in my bow. My sword does not bring me victory. But
You
give us victory over our enemies. You put our adversaries to shame.’ Of course he was speaking to G—”

“Will you never stop talking of God? Your tongue wags of little else, yet you robbed a town and burned it!”

Pieter’s face tightened and the color left his eyes. “Aye, my son, I know myself to be oft a hypocrite … I am only echoing the wisdom of another.”

“Then take such wisdom, old man,” snapped Wil, “and offer it to Karl. He cares for it more than I.”

The road began to darken under twilight, and Wil commanded his followers to stop and make camp. Pieter walked into the forest for vesper prayers, but could not shake a vague sense of ill-ease.
Perhaps the column should have left the road in favor of the wooded range a mere half day’s march east.

At the campsite, Friederich also felt something to be amiss and tugged on Karl’s arm. “There is danger here, Karl,” he whispered. “Say nought to the others else they’ll laugh, but the trees … listen to the trees again.”