John the Pupil: A Novel by David Flusfeder

Author:David Flusfeder [Flusfeder, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3, mobi
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2015-03-03T05:00:00+00:00

Saint Margaret the Virgin’s Day

This virgin Margaret had two names, she was called Margaret and Pelagien. Inasmuch as she was named Margaret, she is likened to a flower, for the flower of virginity blossomed from within her. And in that she was called Pelagien, she might be said of pena, which means pain, and lego or legis, to gather. For she gathered pain in a great and cruel manner.

We hear of a holy virgin in an adjacent province, of whom great wonders are told. We would like her blessing. But our way is treacherous, Ghibelline soldiers, Ghibelline towns, that mock the piety of the Pope and all who swear allegiance to him. These are the last times, war within and without. The Tartars drive west, through the gate that Alexander built to shut in the twenty-two kingdoms of Gog and Magog, who Ezekiel prophesied are destined to come forth in the days of the Antichrist. In the Holy Land the Saracens battle against the Lord. The Germans have control of the Pope’s kingdom in Italy and seek out his followers to punish.

We remember a time when we had to fight the attentions of robbers who would steal our treasures for brute reward. That seems a more innocent time now. It is a marvel, worthy of my Master’s investigation, how lies and rumour and gossip can travel faster than any man. Along with the tales we hear of the holy virgin, in hospices, taverns, monasteries, on hillsides, as we feign to be other than what we are, we hear tales of the magicians of the Pope, clad as friars, who carry a Book that contains the source of all power. The stories differ. Sometime they are a whole army, sometime there are three of them, sometime just one, who looks like a man, who has the devilish power to split himself into multitudes.

Were it not for this uncertainty of the tally, we would be even more in peril than we are. Nonetheless, in the interests of our mission, with the hidden potency of sincerity, we have to be hypocrites and blasphemers. We grant indulgences to men who would murder us if they knew who we are. We pray for their souls and for ours.

And then we find a Guelph town, where we may become ourselves again. There seems no order to this, no boundaries that we may recognise. Some towns are Guelph, most are Ghibelline, and until we see the shape of their battlements and the colour of their flags we do not know if we are entering into the territory of God or His Adversary.

I am diligent. I collect treasures along the way. And sometime, I pick flowers, because I hope to believe that their colours, like emeralds and rubies and amethysts, may have equivalent power to the herbs.

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