Spires of Spirit (8 page)

Alban paid very little attention. “And this upper section,” he continued, “you can see the face right here. See how this line runs down and forms a grimace? Why, the mouth is almost ready-made. You can feel His pain, the terrible throbbing in His hands where the pagans drove the nails through.” He looked at David. “Can't you, my son?” The silence grew, ominous, and Alban turned quickly back to the tree. “Such a fine piece of wood. A suitable crucifix it will be to crown my church.”

But then he suddenly turned to face the carver.

“Why have you not started work?”

David merely looked at him, feeling something welling up that he knew would be disastrous to let out. Grimaces and pagan nails . . . He glanced at the tree, and the calm face of a woman regarded him almost appraisingly in return. He did not know who she was, but her still-imaginary eyes held his.

“Are you going to answer my question or not?””

David tore himself from the vision and confronted the priest. “You wanted a crucifix,” he said. “I will carve it in my own good time.” He tried to keep his voice calm. He succeeded. Partially.

“Your own good time?” Alban was incredulous. “What about God's time?”

“Theoretically,” said David, glaring as though he would incinerate the priest with his gaze, “the Deity exists in eternity and is not concerned with human conceptions of duration.” Alban opened his mouth, but the carver added: “Or so I was taught in school . . . when I was considering a vocation.”

Alban had reddened. “Others,” he said, “may not have such time.”

“Others,” said David, “like a certain Jaques Alban?”

Alban drew close to him and leaned forward. “Others, like your sister, Catherine?”

David was silent.

“I want that crucifix.” Alban's voice was cold.

The carver could stand it no longer. Rising up, his fists balled as though he would strike the anthropomorphic pudding before him, he shouted: “You will receive your damned cross when I
decide
you will receive your damned cross! Do you understand, priest?”

Alban blinked for several moments, then recovered. “So, you . . . you set yourself up as an equal before God. I see. There have been precedents. Very interesting, my son. Very interesting.”

“Get out.”

Alban started for the door. “Very interesting indeed.”

“Get out of my house!”

Pausing at the door, Alban looked at him for a long moment, then turned and left.

David stood, shaking, until the sound of the priest's shoes crunching through the dead and dry leaves outside had faded away. He knew the meaning in Alban's eyes as plainly as if the priest had spoken aloud:
You have no choice.

Fists still clenched, the carver lifted his eyes to the tree, seeing only what was inside it, what he had to release. The woman's face was turned toward him, her gray eyes calm and clear, her dark hair falling softly about her shoulders in waves that only he could carve, her slender arm uplifted in benediction upon him.

He pressed his fists to his temples. “Why are you doing this to me?” he screamed at her. “Why? Have you no pity whatsoever? My sister is in danger, and you . . . you . . .”

Turning, he flung himself out the back door of his house and ran down the forest path that led into the shadows of the trees, his hands holding his head as though it would burst.

***

The path's twists and turns were familiar to him, for he had followed them many times before in calmer moods. But now, heedless of anything save his fears for Catherine and his inability to save her, he plunged wildly along the trail, half falling over roots, almost braining himself on overhanging branches, seeing very little of anything, in fact, including the large oak that suddenly loomed before him . . . into which he ran full tilt.

When he regained consciousness, it was quite dark, though a little starlight and moonlight managed to filter down through the forest canopy—just enough to let him see the trunk that had felled him. The earth was cool against his cheek as he lay at full length, breathing harshly, the days of built-up rage and fear and frustration hammering inside his skull.

“Damn you, Alban.
Damn you
.” The words were hoarse, whispered, inadequate to the burden of hate that he wanted them to carry.

Everyone knew of the burnings in the north, and David had, in fact, seen one of them during his time in Maris: the frail, abused figures tied to the stake, the kindling fired, the rising smoke. But, even so, it had never seemed quite real to him, not even when he had fled from that long-ago square, his hands over his ears to shut out the last, faint screams from the condemned, his eyes frantic to look anywhere but at the sight of that tongue of flame lapping against exposed and bruised flesh.

And he had, in much the same way, fled from the sight of crypts, too, and from the mystery plays that depicted death and dying. It was all terrible, to be sure, but it had always remained little more than a spectacle. Theater. Unreal. Until now.

Catherine . . .

Was it not in this very forest, near the river, that she had seized his hand, once upon a time, and, laughing, pulled him into the water? “Come on, silly,” she had cried. “You can swim. I've watched you!” Then, their mother and father had been alive and well, and though they had not been wealthy, they had not been hungry, and the love they had shared had made up for any lack of money.

Catherine especially had looked forward to the trip to Maris and had talked excitedly about it for months before they had set out, going on and on while she helped their mother with the housework. But the plague had struck Maris at the height of the festival, and it had taken their mother and father, and David and Catherine had been left alone.

It was strange to think of her now in the convent, cloistered, she who had chattered about Maris now vowed to silence. David had not seen her in years. But Alban knew of her.

He sat up suddenly, the cool forest air and the multitude of autumn scents making his thoughts far clearer than he wanted them to be. There was no way he could carve the crucifix for Alban. His hands would refuse to obey his commands even if he could bring himself to try. He could not carve death in any case, but most assuredly he could not carve it in the face of what he saw in that tree. His spirit revolted at the idea, rebelled, filled his imagination with white blankness when he contemplated the action.

And, as a result, Catherine's silence would be broken by her screams.

Sitting up, he leaned against the oak, tilted his head back until it rested on the rough bark, and wept. Above him, a few stars shone through the tangle of branches and leaves, but their light blurred into vague swirls as his eyes filled with tears.

Caught. Hopelessly caught between a priest's arrogance and his sister's life. It seemed obscene that the former should outweigh the latter. It would be easy for Alban: a word here, an accusation there. Such things had been done before, and there was no reason at all to doubt that they could be done again. And Catherine . . .

His cheeks were dripping, his hair damp and matted when he noticed that the bleary swirls above him had become more numerous. They had also brightened considerably, and the oddity finally forced its way through his grief far enough that he wiped at his eyes with the sleeve of his tunic.

There were no leaves above him: the forest was gone. He was in the open, leaning against a rock in the middle of a grassy plain that seemed to extend for miles on all sides. Above him, a sea of stars glittered powerfully in a black sky, shining with the strength of diamonds upon jet; and clinging to the horizon was a crescent moon gleaming as silvery as the polished ring of a Queen.

But what terrified him more than all of this, terrified him more even than the instinctive and absolute certainty that he was a great distance from his familiar forest, a much greater distance than he could ever imagine or comprehend, was the sight of the woman standing quietly a stone's throw from him, the light of the stars shining bright upon her. Her face was calm, clear-eyed, and her dark hair fell softly about her shoulders. She was infinitely strange, infinitely frightening, and infinitely familiar in that he had been living with her from the day he had first put his hand upon the dead tree and felt the stirring within the dry wood.

She moved, pacing slowly toward him, and the air was so very still that he fancied he could almost hear the blades of grass springing straight in her footprints. Before him now, she went down on one knee and peered into his face, and though the sight of her shining eyes made him avert his gaze, she took his head in her hands and gently made him look at her.

For a moment, he could see nothing but her calm, gray eyes, filled with starlight, filled with the reflection of the moon, then:

“My child,” she said, and her words hung quiet in the quiet air. He tried to speak, but he was crying again, and his vision blurred. He felt his hand taken, felt the touch of lips upon his brow, and he buried his face in his knees, sobbing out his grief, his fear, his impotence.

And when he had exhausted his tears, he found that he was back in the familiar forest, that the oak was, once again, behind him, and that someone was calling his name. There was the faintest rustle of leaves a few feet away, and he made out a flash of starlit eyes.

“David?”

“Hello . . . Varden . . .” His words were mechanical, numb.

“David?” Varden approached, knelt, looked at him carefully. “David? What is wrong?”

The woodcarver opened his mouth, but he knew before he did that speech was useless. He shook his head slightly and stared off at nothing. Stars. The touch of her lips. When Varden pulled him to his feet, his muscles obeyed, but they did so distantly, as though they were not actually connected with his thoughts.

“David, some of my people are gathered nearby. I am going to take you there. Fear not.”

The admonition was superfluous: David's emotional capacity had been thoroughly drained. His body submitted to Varden's guidance, but though together they walked paths through the forest, his mind traveled other, oblivious roads.

Then, suddenly, there was firelight about him, and grass under his feet, and the odor of food in the air. The homely smells and sights brought him partly back, and he could see that Varden had led him to a wide clearing beneath the night sky, and that there were others there: men and women dressed simply in gray and green.

“Is that not the carver?” someone called.

“Somebody please get him something hot to drink,” returned Varden. “And find some cushions and a blanket for him. He is not well.”

David felt a hand pressed to his forehead. “He is like an icicle,” came a woman's voice, soft and clear.

“Terrill, where is that cider?”

“Blankets coming.”

“Over here, over here. By the fire.”

They wrapped him up and sat him down next to a cheerful blaze in the center of the clearing. “I'm all right,” David found himself mumbling. “I'm all right.”

In the confusion of figures and voices about him, he saw Varden look him over carefully, his nose wrinkled. “That, my friend, you are not. Drink some hot cider. You are thoroughly chilled.”

The bowl that was offered him was warm and fragrant, and he took several swallows of the contents in rapid succession.

“That will put him to sleep,” came the woman's voice.

“Indeed,” said Varden, “I hope so.”

The warmth made David realize how cold he had been. Someone took the bowl from his hand . . . which was fortunate because he was suddenly on the verge of dropping it. He discovered that there was a pillow under his head, and he muzzily thanked whatever Providence was responsible just before he closed his eyes and let exhaustion take him.

***

When David awoke, it was still dark, and the fire was still burning. Sleep had distanced him from the events of the early evening, and for a few minutes he did not remember what had happened or where he was. Nor did he particularly care: the fire was warm, the heat of the cider still in his veins. He was content to drift in the twilight of half sleep.

Someone approached and put a few more sticks on the fire. The action was performed quietly, but the motion brought him fully awake, and memory flooded back. He opened his eyes to find Varden sitting beside him. A pendant in the form of an interlaced moon and star hung at his throat, and his face was thoughtful, pondering. He seemed to be looking through the blaze rather than at it, and the starlight and firelight mingled in his eyes.

David stared at him for some time. Varden. His people. The delicate shimmer of starlight. Quiet, silvery voices. And the hint of unimaginable power.

Swallowing, he found his voice. “Elves,” he whispered.

Varden heard, turned, helped David to sit up. “How are you feeling?”

Holding the blankets about himself, the carver took a deep breath, stared at the gentle face a few inches from his own. “Elves.”

Varden smiled. “It is so, David. You have indeed found us out. Now: how are you feeling?”

“Much better than when you found me.”

The Elf looked at him seriously. “What did Alban do?”

David countered with a question of his own. “Why did you direct me to that tree?”

“I do not understand.”

David's strength was coming back in force now, and, with it, the full brunt of his fear. “I wanted wood for a crucifix, and you told me about that tree.”

“I did,” said Varden, obviously puzzled. “It seemed to me to be about the right size for what you wanted. From what little I know about crucifixes, that is.”

David clenched the blankets about himself. “I can't carve a crucifix out of that wood. I just can't. It's awful. I . . . I think I'm going mad.”

“Peace.” Varden signed to someone, and an elven woman brought another bowl. It was wine this time, and as the carver took it from her, he noticed her eyes: shining, like Varden's, with starlight.

“Blessings,” she said. “I am Talla. We will have food in a short while.” And then she was gone. David took a swallow of the wine, and the whirl of his thoughts slowed.

“Is there something wrong with the wood?” said Varden.