The Owl Killers

agatha

eVEN BEHIND THE CLOSED GATES of the beguinage I was scared. Though I was exhausted, I couldn’t sleep that first night. I was too afraid of what I would meet in my dreams. I’d lain awake, rigid, listening to every shriek and bark in the valley. I couldn’t get the horror out of my head-the flames, the screams, the terror as I tried to fight the monster on top of me, the weight of it pressing me down.

All the next day I was scared even to cross the open courtyard, because I knew that creature was crouching out there in the dark shadows of the forest, waiting for me to step outside. Though the foreign beguines were friendly enough, the beguines from the village stared after me coldly wherever I went, as if I was some kind of spy. To them, I was Robert D’Acaster’s daughter. I felt as if any moment they were going to bundle me out through the gate and offer me like wolf bait to that monster.

But that evening in the chapel I finally felt safe for the first time since that night in the forest, maybe for the first time ever in my life. Safe because I was in limbo. My old name hovered outside the chapel door. It couldn’t follow me in, for the beguines had forbidden it. I was nameless, without a shadow, without a reflection. Without a name, that demon couldn’t find me. I didn’t inhabit the world of the living or the dead. I couldn’t be called up to Heaven or down to Hell without a name. If I died now, I’d wander formless over the face of the earth. No one would see me. No one would know me. I wanted that: I wanted to stay like that forever. I wanted to be invisible.

The beguinage chapel was beautiful, small and simple, so different from our parish church of St. Michael’s. The altar of white stone, carved with pomegranates and bees, had a Mass stone, a dark green slab, set into the top of it. The green stone was shot through with flecks of madder as if drops of blood had fallen upon a glossy lily pad.

The paintings on the chapel walls were almost completed. The Blessed Virgin Mary in Glory shone down from above the altar, her crown gold-leafed and golden stars circling her raised hand. The other walls were decorated with scenes from the life of a woman who had evidently become a beguine, for she was depicted in the grey kirtle and cloak.

The service was also like no other that I had ever attended. There was no chaplain or priest. Servant Martha stood before the altar, her hands folded. In the candlelight her face no longer looked stern. Her voice was joyous; her words leapt upwards as if they would spring through the chapel roof. Father Ulfrid always hurried through the service, like a bored schoolboy chanting his Latin declensions, eager to get them over and go out to play. But these prayers were swallows soaring and swooping on the evening air. The words were familiar, but I had not thought they could be spoken like this. A shiver ran down my spine. It felt forbidden, wonderfully forbidden.

Three of the beguines rose and, settling themselves on low stools, took up their instruments. One began the rhythm, beating with a deer horn upon a drum; another much older woman plucked a citole, while a third, waiting until the tune had established itself, ran in and out of it on the pipes like a child between court dancers. The other women joined in, singing a hymn of praise, no solemn and mournful chant, but a song that bubbled and cascaded as a stream over stones. The music fell away as softly as it began. A single sob hung in the dancing candlelight, then it too was gone.

Servant Martha beckoned and suddenly the feeling of safety evaporated and I felt the panic rising. I could feel all eyes on me and I wanted to run out the door, but outside I’d be entirely alone. I shuffled towards her, staring at the floor. My legs still felt shaky. My ribs were still too painful to touch. Why did she have to do this in front of everyone? I watched, as if from a long way off, as Servant Martha sprinkled me with water from a bunch of hyssop. But I didn’t feel the drops fall. Then she pronounced my new name: “Osmanna.”

“Welcome, Osmanna” echoed back from the belly of the chapel.

I half turned, wondering who they addressed. It wasn’t my name. It was borrowed and hung upon me like the beguine’s cloak.

I knew all about Osmanna. She was a princess who fled her parents to live in the forest. A bishop consecrated her as a virgin of Christ, then left her to be raped by the gardener appointed to protect and provide for her. How could they have chosen that name for me? Of all the saints’ names, why did they have to choose that one? Did they not realise what had been done to me?

Servant Martha bent down and pinned a small tin emblem to my kirtle. “The boar-it is the symbol of the blessed Saint. When Saint Osmanna was living as a hermit in the forest she gave shelter to a hunted boar. She protected the beast with her own body and it did not attack her. When the Bishop who was hunting the boar saw how Osmanna miraculously tamed the savage beast, he converted her to Christianity and baptised her. May the symbol of your namesake protect and defend you, Osmanna.”

I wanted to tear the emblem off and grind it into the dust. What use was it now? It was too late. If I’d had Osmanna’s power to strike the gardener blind, I would not have prayed for his healing. I would have laughed as he crawled on his hands and knees through thorns and thickets. I would have snatched the food from his hands and dashed the water from his lips. I would have whispered him into swamps and sung him into icy rivers. I would have taunted him through burning deserts and left him silent in the frozen dark lands. I would have made him know what he had done to me. I was not Osmanna.