Pilgrims of Promise: A Novel (The Journey of Souls Series) Read online

The monk shielded his eyes from the sun and surveyed the grounds. “Ah, there. He is coming toward us. He looks worried.” He turned to Arnold. “Well then, good day, brother. May God treat you well.”

  Arnold ignored the kindly fellow and strutted toward the prior. The two met by a flower garden in the center of the courtyard. Mattias bowed nervously.

  “Prior Mattias, I shall come directly to the point. I know a secret, and I have it tucked safely away.”

  The monk paled. “Follow me,” he mumbled. Mattias led Arnold through a labyrinth of gardens, past a small orchard, and into the shade of the cloister. Standing by a windowless wall, he stared down his long nose at the ground, deep in thought. He nodded, then fixed a hard eye on Arnold. “I do not like thee. I think thee to be a wicked man destined for hellfire. Thy soul shall become a smoldering ash that never cools. I have been in this place for more than twenty-five years, and I’ve known only one other to be as evil as thee. That would be thine very own brother, Baldric. May he suffer in torment always.

  “If thou hast robbed my chamber, thou shalt surely hang. Thee and thy nephew and his wicked son. I should summon my guard now.”

  “Please do. I am weary of this world. But do you think I am such a fool as to keep such a treasure to myself? Hang me, have me tortured if you will, but there are others who would then demand an even higher price.”

  The monk clenched his hands in fury. “What is it you want? I’ve not much silver left.”

  Arnold shrugged, then grinned. “So you’ve a thought to squeeze Lord Heribert?”

  “It is legal to collect a debt.”

  “You did not buy the debt with your own money.”

  Mattias’s jaw tightened. “I did.”

  “No, methinks not. I suspect you had a partner.”

  “I’ve … I’ve no partner,” insisted Mattias.

  “If you keep lying to me, I shall have to raise my price.” Arnold smiled slyly.

  The monk began to pace and look nervously about.

  “Your partner is Steward Hagan. He stole money from Heribert. With the loss, the poor lord had to borrow from the Jew to pay his debts. Then you and Hagan used Heribert’s own money to buy the debt from the Jew! Now the two of you expect to sell it back to Heribert… or perhaps the abbot… for your own profit. You, sir monk, sir godly man, are a genius.” Arnold smirked.

  Mattias was perspiring. White as winter’s snow, he stammered and paced about the grass. “What is it that you want?”

  Arnold smiled. “Well, what would Hagan pay to not be hanged for this plot?”

  “I do not know,” muttered the monk.

  It was then that Arnold knew. He had thought it to be a good conjecture, but knowing that he had hit the mark made him nearly cry out for joy! His eyes sparkled. “Well, you’ll need to speak of it with him, and quickly.”

  “He is not yet returned from a journey. He is to come on Thursday.”

  “And he is to hold court on Friday?”

  “Ja.”

  “I see. Well, first, tell me why you do this thing. You put your abbot in a bad place, you have Hagan betray his lord, you betray your own vows. I am interested in such a man as you—you remind me of myself.”

  Those words made Mattias feel suddenly sick. “I … I am nothing like thee.”

  “Oh, but you are!” Arnold grinned a toothless grin. “So tell me.”

  “You were not the second all your life! I am always to be the prior, never the abbot!”

  “Ah, but I was! I was second to Baldric always.”

  Mattias cursed. “What do you want?”

  “I want the baker and his son set free … and I want to share in one-third of the profit of your little scheme.”

  Shocked, the prior stared blankly at the man.

  “Aye, that is my price.”

  “No! Never. It cannot be. It would bring too much suspicion on Hagan or even the abbey if we … if we withdrew the charges.”

  Arnold turned and walked away. “Have a care, brother, have acare.”

  “Wait!” cried Mattias. He hurried after the man. “How do I know you even have it? Hagan will want to know that I’ve seen it.”

  Arnold kept walking. “How else would I know it is missing? You just had it delivered by the Jew yesterday.”

  Grinding his teeth, Mattias trotted alongside Arnold. “You … you might have heard of it from another. You may not have it at all.”

  Arnold stopped and sighed, feigning boredom at the ridiculous assertion. “Monk, how long have you known me?”

  “Most of my life.”

  “Have I ever bluffed a secret?”

  The man shook his head. “But I must see it. It is the only way Hagan will believe this.”

  Arnold moved toward the portal again. “Then follow me, fool.”

  The trembling prior followed Arnold through the gate and into the streets of Villmar. Arnold looked amongst the folk milling by the inn. Where the devil is she? he wondered. If she ran off with it, I’ll—

  “Hello,” came a voice.

  The two men whirled about. It was Katharina.

  “Move off, wench,” growled the prior.

  “Good day, then,” she answered.

  Arnold laughed out loud. “You’d best beg her pardon, Prior, and then look close in the woman’s hand.”

  “What?” Mattias scowled. “I know thee, woman, from Weyer!”

  “Ja, and I know you as well.” She lifted the folded letter from her gown and stepped back one pace. She slowly opened it so that Mattias could read it yet not grab it.

  “Stand where you are, monk,” sneered Arnold. “Squint if y’must, but read it to yerself and know.”

  The man’s lips muttered the words, and soon his eyes dropped. He nodded. “It is so, then.”

  “Yes, good fellow, it is so. Woman, return the thing to your gown. He’d not dare reach in there … at least not here!

  “Now, Prior, do this. Talk to the steward and explain your problem thoroughly. There is no need to send a search for the letter, for you’ll not find it. This I swear. You may have me arrested, but I’ll not have the letter on my person or in my humble cottage. You’ll not see her or the letter again until we’ve arranged our exchange.”

  The prior cursed.

  “You say Hagan is to arrive in Runkel on Thursday. Good. I shall meet you on the road between Weyer and Villmar an hour after compline prayers. You will come alone. There we shall discuss your decision and, unless you are a fool, the method of our exchange. Remember, Wilhelm and Heinrich of Weyer to be released and one-third of the profits of this letter to me. Agreed?”

  The monk glared at Arnold with eyes molten with rage. Barely able to speak, he sputtered, “I shall meet thee then, and may thee burn in hell.” With that, the man spun on his heel and stormed into the abbey.

  Relieved, Arnold turned to Katharina. “Good woman, well done. You make me proud to hail from Weyer!”

  Katharina was troubled. “Why, sir, do you demand a third of the profit? It is too much to ask for that and for both men to be released!”

  “Too much? How much is too much? Listen, wench. Do not tell me how to do my business. It is never too much. Do you think they’d ever give all that you ask? No! They’ll not give the third, I know that. Do y’think me a fool? But they might give us both men if I yield on the third. If they won’t, I would swear on my miserable soul that they’ll give us Heinrich at the very least!”

  Katharina hung her head. “Alwin said it was not wise to press too hard and—”

  “Alwin? The hunted Templar? He is with you? Another blessed secret to my account!”

  Katharina quickly paled. “Arnold, if you betray Alwin, I’ll deal with the prior myself.”

  “Ha, ha!” laughed the man. “That’d be rich. Fear not, m’lady. Come! Let’s share a pitcher of ale. You’ve no cause to worry.”

  Chapter Twenty-two

  WISE AS SERPENTS

  While Katharina and Arnold were busy in Villmar, Pieter, To
mas, and Otto had made their way carefully toward Weyer once more. It was in the late morning when they entered the village, and many of the folk were preparing their main meal of the day. Not wanting to be recognized, Tomas and Otto remained hidden in the shadows of their hoods as the three picked their way through the sprawling, haphazard collection of hovels and barns.

  The day was warm and would soon be hot. Children dashed about in the summer sunshine, no doubt avoiding the many chores of the season as best they could. Housewives gawked curiously at the mysterious trio, and a few old men waved from their seats in the shade. It was a village like countless others—blessed with a few days of joy, burdened with months of sorrow.

  “There.” Tomas pointed. “She lives in there.” Pieter followed Tomas’s finger to a poorly maintained hovel in the midst of many others. It was Frau Anka’s home. She was the widow of a dyer and was the village shrew. Once a friend to Heinrich’s wife, Marta, she had spent most of her life consumed with envy. Red faced, stout, easily angered yet fearful, the forty-year-old woman had few friends.

  Otto hesitated. “Maybe we should just steal her away.”

  Pieter understood. It might make things so much simpler. “It was considered. However, Pious will check on her soon before the trial. If she’s gone missing, hell force an oathhelper to swear another testimony.”

  “Then what if she resists your words?”

  “We’ll tie her like the sow she is and drag her away!” snapped Tomas.

  Otto knocked timidly on the woman’s door, and she answered, wiping her hands on her apron. “Eh?” She blew a wisp of gray hair out of her eyes. “Otto? Otto the miller’s son?”

  “Ja. ‘Tis me.”

  “Don’t cross this threshold! You’ve shamed us all. Yer father hated me all these years, and now you come to bring yer curses to my door. Y’failed in yer faith, whelp. I sewed the crosses on yer hearts, and y’failed me.”

  Tomas removed his hood, and the woman gasped. “Aye, you old hag. ‘Tis me. I’ll not cower from your foul breath like m’good friend here. Now back away. We’re coming in!”

  Anka stumbled backward into her modest hovel, and the three followed her inside. No one else was home. Fortuitously, her tenants were delivering hay to the stables in Villmar. “What… what do you want of me?”

  Tomas closed the door and answered, “First, food and drink. A loaf of that bread there’ll do, and that mead is fine.”

  The woman obediently handed Tomas the items, and he, in turn, shared with the others as they took seats around the woman’s table. Anka fixed a fearful eye on old Pieter. The man had not smiled nor said a single word. He had simply stared at her unwaveringly from the moment she had answered the door. Finally, Pieter turned to the boys. “Aye, ‘tis her.”

  “What? What do you mean?” Anka’s face flushed.

  “Are you sure, Father?” asked Otto.

  The priest nodded.

  “What? What is this?”

  Pieter stood, walked to Anka, and peered directly into her widening eyes. “Woman, thou art in the grip of sin.”

  “Eh?”

  “Tis true. I am a priest, one serving the folk throughout all the kingdoms of God. I have led holy processions in Palestine, even once carrying a cross past the Holy Sepulcher.”

  Anka sat down nervously.

  “He is a prophet, of sorts,” said Tomas, “and he found Otto and me in need of repentance. He heard our confessions and then had a vision. It is why we are here.”

  “You have visions?” asked Anka. A tone of respect now melded with her terror.

  Pieter humbly bowed.

  “Frau Anka, you must listen to him,” insisted Tomas. “On Holy Week past he returned from the relics in Ulm to lead a procession in Lorraine. He and his followers traveled to the Rhineland, where they prayed in nearly every pilgrim’s chapel. He was blessed by the bones of… of…”

  “Of the apostle Bartholomew,” Pieter finished glibly. “They were delivered to the cathedral in Trier for a short time. I was most blessed indeed.”

  “Tell her, Pieter. Tell her of the journey by the Rhine.”

  “Oh, I must not boast of such things.”

  Anka leaned forward. “No, Father, please … please tell me.” She poured herself a tankard of mead and lifted it to her lips with a trembling hand.

  Pieter hesitated, then politely asked the woman for a drink before proceeding to spin a long tale of suffering and visions that drew Anka ever closer. “Then, finally, near the city of Worms I saw the Holy Mother bathing.”

  “Bathing?” Anka was astonished.

  Pieter nodded, astonished as well. “Ja, my child. The water was to her neck, and a golden glow hovered over her. The river sang with the sounds of a thousand sirens. I saw fish leaping for joy, and then the heavens opened. Two angels bearing a gossamer gown descended to the water and then beneath, guarding the blessed modesty of our Lord’s Mother by wrapping her before she was drawn from the river to the clouds above, refreshed and smiling.”

  Dumbstruck, Anka nearly fell from her stool.

  Pieter drained his tankard and continued. “It was then, on this Pentecost past, that I vowed to purge all Christendom from what vice and wicked deeds my path might cross. I have sent a baron to justice for defiling a holy shrine, and I have sent a bishop to Rome in disgrace for his blasphemy. I could go on.”

  Anka was speechless. She stared at Pieter with worshipful eyes.

  “Which is why he is here, Frau Anka.”

  “Why?”

  Tomas lowered his voice. “Hear me, hag. I’ll malee it plain. With my own ears I heard that snake Pious tell Wil what herb to give his mother.”

  Anka stiffened. “No! It cannot be! It was Wil who chose the poison!”

  Otto shook his head. “No, Frau. It was not. I, too, heard the priest tell Wil. I was doing errands for m’papa. I came by the bakery to see what flour needed grinding. Tomas was working in the attic and saw me come. He was watching Pious and Wil below, through a knothole in the floor. I came up slow and quiet, and I heard it too.”

  Anka stood to her feet. “No, it cannot be. Why did you not say it then?”

  “We didn’t know it to be poison then, and neither did Wil.”

  The woman looked at Pieter. The priest bowed. “Good woman, it is true. I found these poor lads yesterday, hiding in the wood near Limburg. As you know, Otto, here, was put out from his father’s home. He believes it is for some sin in his life. Both he and Tomas then learned of this Wilhelm fellow’s arrest, and they wanted to confess their many sins to save him.

  “I listened to their confession and then fell into a deep sleep. It was then that I saw a face of a woman. The face of a woman deceived … like Eve by the serpent. I then saw the serpent crawling about her feet. It was short and fat; it hissed from behind its squinted eyes. It is the Devil that slides about, emboldened by the ambition of mere men. His evil ways sprout in soil watered by the blood of innocents … and he must be stopped.

  “I did not know what this meant until I described the woman to these good lads. I said she was aging, but as yet pleasing to the eye, stout as a strong woman should be. And, I said, she had a face that glowed warm and red like a ripe apple.

  “Well, I had no sooner said the words when Otto and Tomas both cried out, ‘Frau Anka!’ Now that I see thee in the flesh, I know it is true.”

  The woman was utterly flabbergasted. She collapsed on to her stool. “B … but deceived?”

  “Frau,” stated Pieter sternly, “thou art in the hands of a devil—a serpent named Pious! He has deceived thee, and worse—he has stolen what would have been rightfully thine.”

  “What do you mean, Father?”

  “These lads tell me that Wil had foresworn to thee and to a Father named Albert, that thou wouldst be granted one-fourth of his lands if his mother lived until his return. Is this not true?”

  “It is. It is why I am so angry at the boy. He deceived me—”

  “Woman, canst thou not se
e? What did he have to gain? The loss of a mother to save some land? Did he hate his mother so?”

  Anka shook her head. “He did not love her, but methinks he did not hate her.”

  “Look into my eyes, my sister,” continued Pieter. “Under God I do so swear to you that Wilhelm of Weyer did not murder his mother.”

  Tomas was pacing. “Listen! Can y’not see? Who got all the land?”

  “Father Pious.”

  “Aye! Who must Pious fear most?”

  “Wil.”

  “Aye!”

  “But Pious had visions.” Anka was now wringing her hands. “He said he had dreams and visions of Wil grinding the poison.”

  “Woman,” said Pieter, “I have told ye the truth of Wilhelm. Do with it as thou wish. But be warned. I have come to set the captives free. I have come to seek God’s almighty justice for those who would deceive. If thou art part of this deceit, if thou art a tool in the serpent’s hand, I shall strike thee down!”

  Anka shuddered and began to weep. “I… I saw nothing of this m’self.”

  “My dream says thou hast a good recollection of Wil telling thee of Pious’s advice that the herb be given. Is it not so?”

  Anka trembled. “It… it may be so. I… I… I cannot think clearly now.”

  “Then thou ought not put thy soul in further jeopardy. Do not bear false witness against the lad. Dost thou hear me, woman?” Pieter’s voice was now hard and demanding.

  Anka hesitated. She feared Pious’s wrath if she did not attend the trial, yet her confidence had been shaken to its very foundation. She nodded mutely.

  Tomas leaned close to her. “Otto and me shall be in that court. We shall gladly bear witness to the truth. When the judge sets Wil free, he will turn against you and against Pious. Consider that!”

  Anka was now shaking. She looked at Pieter with imploring eyes.

  “Fear not, child,” said Pieter, now gently. “I’ve not come to harm thee but to save thee.” His tone changed again. “But if I see thee in the court, I shall bring the judgment of all heaven down upon thee. Terrors and visits of the dead shall surely greet thee by night. Boils and oozing sores shall rise with every dawn. I shall summon demons to pluck thy hair at eventide and gore thy belly by day with a pain that has no end. And this, my child, shall be only the beginning. The truth shall be surely avenged, so help me, God.”