Scarlet From Gold (Book 3) (6 page)

BOOK: Scarlet From Gold (Book 3)
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“So when you go to Barcelon, you will no longer go to the temple for Folence,” the spirit told him.  “You will go down to your old haunts along the harbor, and you will call for your friend Kieweeooee to come fetch you and take you to the island.  Once you’re there, you’ll have no trouble seeing Folence, and then we can discuss the next step to revive Iasco.”

“I don’t understand,” Marco said softly.  “Why is all this happening to me?” he asked.

“It’s not happening to you Marco,” the spirit said softly.  “It’s happening to the world.  There is evil afoot.  You just happen to play a prominent role in how we’re going to fight back.”

“We?  We who?” Marco asked, no less enlightened.

“We, all of us,” Ophiuchus answered.  She waved her hands in a circle in the air to encompass the cathedral around them.  “The saints and the powers and the spirits of the old and the good, we are all joined together more strongly than ever before because we all fear what the evil side is plotting.

“Now, go and finish your prayers here, then resume your journey tomorrow and travel to Barcelon as quickly as you can.  When you reach Folence on my isle, your memories will return, and we will plan for the next journey,” the spirit spoke.  She stepped back from Marco, backing away from him as she smiled a warm and encouraging smile, returning to her place in the tapestry.  “There will be one stop along the way, and I want you to collect something, something very rare from that place.  You’ll know what to do when the time comes.”

“Can’t you tell me more?  I’m not a child!” Marco protested.  Despite the tranquility of the cathedral, and despite the overwhelming awe he felt at the power that the spirit radiated, he nonetheless felt as though he were being patronized, treated as a child from whom the truth was hidden.

“No Marco, you’re not a child, not after all you’ve been through – certainly not with all that yet lies before you,” her words made him shudder.  “But you are under the geas of Lethe, and so we must wait to clear this up,” Ophiuchus told him, and then she somehow stepped back up into the tapestry, returning to the  position she had stood in when he had first seen the woven fabric hanging on the wall.

“Your reward will come at the end, and your patience will be honored,” the woven image spoke to him, and then the sense of presence disappeared and he knew the tapestry was no longer possessed by the spirit.

Marco stood in stunned disbelief, wondering if he had somehow had a waking dream, or had otherwise imagined an impossible occurrence.  He looked down as he tried to focus his scattered thoughts, and then his eyes widened and he gave a soft gasp, as he saw the prints of bare feet in the dust on the floor, prints that came from and returned to the tapestry.

“What are you doing here?  How did you get here?” Marco jumped at the unexpected voice, and he whirled around to see a priest standing down the hall.

“I came up the stairs,” Marco swallowed as he spoke.  “I must have taken a wrong turn on the pilgrimage prayer route.”

“What stairs?” the priest asked.  “This area isn’t open to the pilgrims.  You need to go on back down to where you belong.”  The man wasn’t nasty in his tone, but he was firm.  “Follow me,” he called, and Marco meekly walked over to where the man was, and followed him down a dark hallway to a broad set of stairs, and then descended under the priest’s watchful eyes.

He came back to the main floor of the cathedral, and saw a steady stream of pilgrims, some still holding bunches of wilting violets in their hands.  He walked over to join the traffic, and quickly came to a niche in the wall, marked by the violets in stone, where pilgrims were praying.  He knelt and joined the group, not sure that his quiet droning of the words of the prayers actually made sense as he tried to comprehend what he had experienced just minutes earlier.

After minutes of inconsequential activity, he rose to his feet and started walking, knowing that he no longer had the peace of mind to benefit from the pilgrimage.

“We’re almost there, aren’t we?” another pilgrim happened to speak to him as they came to the end of a hallway.

“What do you mean?” Marco asked as they turned a corner.

“We’re here at the final station, the tomb of St. James,” the other pilgrim replied.  They looked at the new chamber they were entering, and Marco saw that a large, ornate altar was centered in the space, surrounded by a railing at which dozens of pilgrims were kneeling, praying for divine assistance in whatever problem had motivated them to travel so far to reach the tomb of the saint.

Marco joined the others, and found an opening at the rail, where he laid his still-held bundle of violets upon the rail, next to the many others that already laid by other pilgrims.  He looked at the brilliantly gold-gilded statuary that covered the altar tomb, and then closed his eyes, and tried to focus on a final prayer.

“St. James,” he prayed silently, “help me to get to Barcelon, help me to meet the lady Folence, help me to understand what is happening around me and to me.  I need your help,” he whispered urgently.

“You have our help and our support and our love in your labors, Marco,” a deep, masculine voice, one that connoted strength and steadiness, sounded in the recesses of his heart.  “One of us is by your side at all times, closer than you realize, helping when you do not know.  And you will see your guide when times grow most troubled.

“Your mission is vital, and more importantly, we know that you are a man with a good heart, one who will not fail us.  Go in peace, and serve the Lord,” the voice paralyzed Marco with its power and vibrancy.  He knelt at the altar, stock still, frozen by the impact of the voice of the saint speaking to him at the altar.

He suddenly felt a sense of suffocation, and realized that he had been holding his breath while he withstood the impact of the holy voice speaking to him.  Marco sucked in a deep breath, then opened his eyes and looked around. 

The railing around him was nearly empty; only a few pilgrims remained, and the light coming in through the golden yellow stained glass windows overhead was dim, and tinged with orange red, and coming in at a sharp angle.  It was late in the day.  Marco had spent a long time at the rail while listening to the voice of the saint speak to him.  His pilgrimage was finished, just as the day was finishing.

He had come as a pilgrim by accident, he thought to himself, and yet he had gotten as much out of the visit as anyone in the cathedral that day.  He pressed himself up off his aching knees, and looked around.  A priest discreetly pointed to the door that was the exit, and Marco worked the stiffness out of his muscles as he walked away from the altar.  He turned at the doorway and looked back at the ornate sculptures.  The orange light of the sunset was covering the entire structure now, and to Marco’s eye, it had an ominous appearance, as if blood had been coated over it all.  He feared that the sight was a premonition of things to come in whatever conflict seemed destined to come.

Minutes later Marco was outside the cathedral, and walking through the cathedral grounds.  He found the main gate he had entered through, and went down the road to the Gateway Inn, just a couple of dozen steps down the road.  He looked in through the smoky window glass and saw his friends sitting at a long table, Dex and Pivot, Saul, Sophia, and Mary, plus the two newlyweds, Lars and Ginger, had somehow found them as well.

Marco pushed the door open and reached the table before he was spotted and greeted by a happy round of salutations.

“Where have you been?”  Dex asked.  “We thought maybe the cathedral priests had converted you into one of their own and made you a resident of the place.”

“I thought you’d already decided to go on to Barcelon, in the company of a wealthy widow who was returning to her home in the city in her private carriage, delighted to give such a handsome young pilgrim a comfortable ride,” Saul outrageously proclaimed, drawing an impromptu raising and clinking of glasses in a toast with Lars, before Ginger’s disapproving stare made the young groom hurriedly lower his glass.

“Well, neither of those was the case.  I just happened to take longer than most other pilgrims, I guess,” he spoke.  Marco hadn’t thought about hiding what had happened to him, nor had he thought about proclaiming it.  But at the moment he joined his companions, he realized how impossible his tale would sound if he were to try to tell it, the story of the spirit emerging from tapestry and the saint speaking from the grave.

“Well, have a seat,” Saul said expansively, moving aside, and Marco sat down between he and his sister, Sophia, the quiet, pretty woman who was a nun alongside her own mother.  He sat and listened to the chatter of the others, occasionally adding something as they all ate and drank and enjoyed the feeling of achievement for having succeeded in reaching the end of the pilgrimage.

“We’ll turn around and head back home tomorrow,” Mary said as the evening wore down.  “I suppose we ought to turn in and get a good night’s sleep in our beds.”

“Is there no one else’s bed for me to sleep in?” Saul asked, then sighed.  “Very well,” he shook his head mournfully and stood up, then helped his mother and sister as well.  “I hope we’ll see you all in the morning, and maybe share the road again.

“And you,” he grabbed Marco’s shoulder, “good luck to you on this mysterious fate you’re heading towards, my young friend.  Take care.”  And with a final round of handshakes and hugs, the trio was off to their room for the night.

“I suppose we ought to take you up to the room to settle in for the night too, since you’ve got a long journey ahead of you,” Dex said, looking at Marco.  “These newlyweds will probably go out for a moonlight stroll now anyway,” he suggested to Lars.  “The cathedral looks beautiful in the moonlight.”

They said farewell again, and then Dex, Pivot, and Marco went upstairs to where Dex unlocked a door and lit a candle in a snug room under a gable, where two beds and a temporary cot covered most of the floor space, and Marco slept soundly during the last night of his pilgrimage.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter 3 – The Fight at the Inn

 

Marco rose in the morning, and saw that Dex and Pivot were already out of bed and out of the room.  He pulled his boots on, packed up his pack and weapons, then went downstairs and found the two men drinking hot coffee and talking to the morning cook.

“Will you join us for a bite?” Dex proposed, and Marco sat down.

“You’re going to go out the east gate of the city, and then follow the road for oh, about five hundred miles,” Dex told him.

“How long will that take?” Marco asked.  The number was meaningless in one sense, since he had to travel the route, regardless of distance.  Yet it was daunting as well, a number that meant a long journey ahead.

“It will take you around a month, I imagine, if the spring weather isn’t too bad,” Dex estimated.  “We’ll be going back to the cathedral today, so we’ll pray for you to have a safe and quick journey, with maybe a little adventure here or there to spice things up!” he laughed.

“If you want a bit of advice, you ought to get a violet tattoo on your shoulder while you’re in town this morning,” Pivot spoke up.

“That’s not a bad idea, father,” Dex said.

“Why?” Marco asked, bemused by the idea of a tattoo.

“Well, just like there are places that show special favor for those who are on a pilgrimage, there are places that will show favor for those who are returning from a pilgrimage,” Dex explained.  “If you see a place that has the swift signage for pilgrims posted, there’s almost as much chance of receiving hospitality there while on your way back  as if you were on your way to the holy place.

“It’s worth a try.  The tattoo will cost you very little, it won’t take long, and it won’t hurt very much,” Dex grinned as Marco finished eating a bread roll.  “And here’s a little bit of coin from father and me,” he said as he held out his hand and dropped the money on the table at Marco’s seat.  “You’ll need some money if you’re on the road that long, no matter how many pilgrim stops you make along the way.”

“Thank you,” Marco hesitated only a moment before accepting the coins.  It was a generous offer, but he knew that the two men meant it well, with his best interest in mind, and he knew they would feel hurt if he refused the coins.  And he knew he would need the money along the way.

“We’re ready to head to the cathedral too, so we can take you to a tattoo parlor on the way, if you like,” Dex offered, as Marco picked up the coins and said his thanks.

The three of them headed out the door, and Dex looked up at the cloudy skies above.  “You may want to get a good, strong cape to wear on the road,” he advised as they started walking.  They passed by the gates to the cathedral, and Dex steered Marco to a small shop door in an alleyway.  “Best tattoos in the city.  Father and I got ours here!” he laughed.

“Good luck, Marco,” the two men both embraced Marco at once, then stepped back.  “I hope we’ll hear that your story ends happily someday,” Dex said, then patted Marco on the back one more time, before the two men left their young pilgrimage protégé behind.

Marco had to wipe a tear from his eye before he turned and looked inside the tattoo shop.   It was not an appealing sight.  An elderly woman stood next to a wall that displayed dozens and dozens of sharp needles.

“Come in laddie,” she beckoned him to a chair.  “What would you like?  A pretty girl?  Two pretty girls?  The name of a pretty girl?” she asked Marco as he edged inward, feeling caught like a fly in a spider’s web.

“I completed my pilgrimage yesterday, and I’d like to get a violet tattoo,” Marco replied.

“You look pretty young to need indulgences already.  Are you that sinister?” the woman asked with a smirk.

“No, I didn’t ask for indulgences.  I just stopped at the cathedral and prayed for direction,” Marco answered as he removed his gear and piled it on the floor next to the chair.

“Take off your shirt too,” the woman directed, “and give me two brass pence.”

Marco obliged her on both counts, then sat down.  “Do you want it here,” the crone touched his shoulder, “or here?” her hand moved to his chest.

BOOK: Scarlet From Gold (Book 3)
6.66Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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