The blask rood

SIX

The treasure room is a small chamber in the centre of the house, with no windows and but a single low door. Its walls are good solid stone and very thick. It was, I believe, the first part of the house to be constructed, and all the rest-the sleeping rooms, stores, workrooms, kitchen and hall – was built around it. Many an Eastern potentate has such a room, I have learned, but few noblemen in the north. The reason is that such wealth as men possess in the wild northlands resides in the land itself-the fields, cattle, grazing land, and the like.

Murdo owns wealth like this in abundance, to be sure. But he also possesses a treasure that would make many a king grow heartsick with envy if the full extent of it were ever known. Murdo has ever been circumspect about his treasure; he never speaks of it, and seldom even visits the room wherein it is housed. Once, as a boy of six or seven summers, I sneaked the great iron key from its hiding place and waited until everyone was about some other chore, and then let myself in to see what I might find.

The room itself was, even to my childish eye, small and low. There was a table in the centre of the room with one chair, and a candletree with half-burnt candles. There were four large oaken chests-one on each wall-and each chest was bound in broad iron bands which were likewise locked. I had no keys for any of the locks, but the discovery of those chests proved almost as exciting as an entire silver hoard. I put my eye to the centre lock of the largest chest and beheld the dusky glimmer of gold within.

Footsteps outside the door prevented me from carrying out similar examinations of the three remaining chests. But that solitary glimpse was enough to fuel my fevered imaginings for many days afterwards.

Ah, but the truth, Gait, is more marvellous by far. One day, you will see for yourself.

That night, however, the treasure was far from my thoughts. I entered the low, candlelit room with the jars of ale, and before anyone remarked on my presence began filling the bowls-as if this were my usual chore. I filled Emlyn's first, then moved on to Eirik's and lastly to Murdo's cup. He thanked me, and then recollected himself and asked what had become of Haldi?

I replied that the lady had sent him to help the cook, and asked me to serve in his stead. 'Since you are here,' Eirik said, 'y°u might as well stay and hear this.'

The suggestion sat ill with my lord, I could tell. He was on the point of refusing when Abbot Emlyn spoke up. 'Yes, let Duncan stay.'

'Do you think it wise?' asked Murdo doubtfully.

'He must know the truth,' the abbot declared, 'if he is to serve it. Yes, let him stay.'

His words sent a thrill of excitement through me. Was there more to this than I guessed?

Murdo held his frown for a moment longer, and we all waited for him to make up his mind. 'Very well,' he relented at last. 'So be it.' He directed me to close the door and sit down.

I did as he asked and settled atop the great oak chest I had tried to peek into years before. 'We have been speaking of your brother's vision,' my father told me. 'What I am about to say is known only to three other people in all the world. Emlyn, my old friend, is one of them. Your mother is the other.'

He paused then, as if uncertain how to continue. 'Speak it out,' Emlyn exhorted gently. 'It is for the best, I do believe.'

Murdo nodded. Turning to Eirik, he said, 'A long time ago, when I was a young man-little more than a boy-I, too, saw the White Priest…'

This surprised me.

'Twice,' he added. 'Once in Antioch, and once in Jerusalem. He appeared to me and asked me to build him a kingdom.' Murdo paused, remembering, and added with a wave of his hand to signify not only the house and caer, but the lands and fields of the settlement beyond. 'This I have tried my best to do.'

'The promise,' said Eirik. 'He said the Lord of the Promise was pleased. He has found favour with your efforts, my lord.'

Murdo nodded thoughtfully. 'Many things happened in the Holy Land, and most of them are best forgotten. Though I have remained true to the vow I made, I had lately begun to think I would not live to see it fulfilled. Indeed, I had not thought to hear from him again.'

'Until today,' said Eirik.

'Until today,' confirmed Murdo.

'Forgive me, lord,' I said. 'But who is this White Priest? Is he a phantom?'

'Perhaps,' replied my father. 'He might be an angel. I cannot say. He told me his name was Andrew, and he appeared in the form of a monk – at least, he looked like one to me.' He paused, remembering, then added, 'Indeed, although I did not know it, I believe he guided me through all that followed-every step of the way from that day to this.'

Murdo went on to explain how he had been deep in the catacombs of the monastery of the Church of Saint Mary outside the walls of Jerusalem when he had his second encounter with the White Priest. 'I was alone for just a moment, waiting for the others to return, and he appeared to me,' Murdo explained, his voice taking on a softer edge as his mind took him back through the years to that portentous meeting.

'We talked, and he asked me to serve him. I asked what he wanted me to do, and he said he wanted me to build him a kingdom where his sheep could safely graze. He said: "Make it far, far away from the ambitions of small-souled men and their ceaseless striving. Make it a kingdom where the True Path can be followed in peace and the Holy Light can shine as a beacon flame in the night." You see,' said Murdo with a slightly embarrassed smile, 'I have remembered every word of it all these years.'

'Was that the first time you heard of the True Path?' I asked.

'Not at all,' replied Murdo, surprised at the question. 'It was Emlyn here who told me. Ronan and Fionn-you remember them; you and Eirik met them once or twice when you were boys-also instructed me. Although, at the time I took little of what they said to heart. I hated priests-and with good reason-as many will tell you.'

'Then this is even more remarkable than I knew,' said Eirik.

'How so?' asked Emlyn. The Cele De have always been the Guardians of the True Path and Keepers of the Holy Light.'

'And so I truly believe,' replied my brother adamantly. 'But today a man appeared to me in a vision, and told me that he was coming here to live. Why does everyone seem to know about the White Priest but me?'

'I have never spoken of it before now,' said Murdo. 'Nor has Emlyn. Who else could possibly know?'

Eirik put out his hand towards me. 'Duncan knows,' he said, and told them about our conversation earlier that day.

'Is this true, Duncan?' Murdo asked, and I confessed that it was. 'How did you come by this knowledge?'

Torf-Einar told me before he died,' I answered, and related what he had said about the sacred relics and their mysterious guardian. Torf said the White Priest appeared to the pilgrims in Antioch and told them to dig in the church to find the lance of the crucifixion.' Spreading my hands in a profession of innocence, I added, 'I had no way of knowing it was part of any secret.'

Abbot Emlyn had grown very quiet and thoughtful. He regarded Murdo with a look of kindly reproach. My father, becoming increasingly agitated, finally burst out, 'Very well!' Thrusting a hand at the abbot, he said, 'If it will put an end to your pestering, I will tell them everything.'

So saying, he moved to one of the chests, and I thought he meant to unlock it. Instead, he slid one of the iron bands to one side, and withdrew a long rod, with a flattened hook at one end. My curiosity increased as he walked to the centre of the chamber and selected a flagstone on the floor. Slipping the hooked end of the rod into the crack between the stones, he quickly prised it up and lifted it away.

Kneeling down, he reached into a stone-lined cavity and pulled out a long, thin bundle bound in leather which he brought to the table, and began unwrapping. Eirik and I gathered close to see what it could be, and Emlyn stepped to the table, standing with his hands clasped, a look of rapture on his round face.

Beneath the leather was a layer of fine linen, and beneath that, another. My heart beat fast as the last wrap was pulled away to reveal… a length of old, pitted iron, crooked with age and ruddy-tinted with rust. From the way both Murdo and Emlyn reverenced the object, I could see that it was a very valuable -nay, sacred-thing; but for the life of me I could not imagine what made it so. I beheld the slender rod and my heart sank. This? This is the great secret they had protected these many years?

Eirik, on the other hand, appeared dumbstruck. He gave out a gasp and went down on his knees, raising his hands and closing his eyes. He then lowered his face to the floor and lay there in an attitude of prayer. For his part, Murdo merely gazed on the object in silent wonder.

'What is it?' I asked at last.

My father glanced at Emlyn. The abbot stretched out his hand and held it flat above the thing, and said, 'Behold! The Iron Lance.'

I looked at it again. Less than a span in length, and bowed in the middle, it had an ugly stub of a blade at one end and a small hole at the other. Could this bit of scrap which I had taken for a fragment of broken hearthware-a piece of a spit for roasting meat, say – could it be the selfsame spear which had pierced the Blessed Saviour's side?

'If that is so,' I replied, 'I wonder that the emperor himself is not camped outside our walls at this very moment. Or, that the pope in Rome has not made pilgrimage to pay homage.'

'Watch your tongue, boy,' warned Murdo. 'You stand very close to blasphemy, and I will not hear it.'

Emlyn put out a conciliatory hand, and said, 'You promised to tell them everything.' Turning to me, he said, 'A simple explanation will soon set your mind at ease, Duncan. The reason we are left in peace with this inestimable treasure is that neither the pope nor the emperor – nor anyone else in Christendom-knows we possess the Holy Lance. For all the world knows, the sacred relic resides in the treasury at Constantinople.'

'That is what Torf-Einar believed,' I confirmed. 'He told me that he was there the day Prince Bohemond gave the lance to the emperor's envoy. He said he saw it with his own eyes.'

'Many people were there that day,' the abbot assured me. 'I was one of them. Oh, yes. I was standing on the quay in Jaffa harbour when Bohemond arrived. And I, too, saw him give the Sacred Lance to the emperor's envoy, Dalassenus.'

Murdo allowed himself a small, satisfied smile. 'People do not always see what they think they see,' he said and, taking up the jar, he poured out some ale then emptied the bowl. He then explained how this had come to be. That night he revealed his long-kept secret to us-as he will tell you, little Cait, when you are older.

'Why have you never spoken of this till now?' I asked when he finished.

'If you had seen half of what I saw in Jerusalem,' Murdo replied, 'you would not ask.'

'Terrible it was!' cried Abbot Emlyn. 'Like wolves loosed among lambs, they gorged themselves on the blood of the helpless. Their greed knew no restraint-and what they could not carry off, they destroyed.' The good abbot, almost shaking with disgust, bent his head and concluded sorrowfully, 'They broke their vows and disgraced themselves before God and man. They had the chance to show the world the benevolence of true Christians. Instead of presenting themselves the best of men, they behaved as the very worst.'

After a moment, he said, 'This makes the task of the Cele De all the more precious and important.'

'Perhaps,' suggested Eirik, 'that is why the White Priest is coming to make this his home.'

'No doubt,' reflected Murdo. 'No doubt syou are right about that.'

He placed his hand reverently on the Holy Lance, then picked it up and handed it to me. My fingers closed on the length of old iron; it was cold to the touch, as you might expect, and slightly heavier than it appeared. Beyond that, there was nothing at all remarkable about it. I passed the ancient weapon to Eirik, who bowed his head as he received it, and said a prayer. When he finished, we bound the sacred relic in its linen and leather wrappings, and replaced it in its hiding place beneath the floor.

That night, I could not sleep for thinking about the strangeness of the tale I had heard. All my life I had lived in that house, and never once suspected it concealed one of the holiest objects the world has ever known. What is more, I had touched it and held it in my hands. I thought about the Western noblemen, their greed and wickedness, and the insufferable arrogance of the pope, blithely sending so many thousands to their graves. As I lay sleepless, thinking these thoughts, there kindled in me a righteous rage that such faithless men should hold sway over the poor and humble in their care.

Then, as restless night gave way to placid dawn, I conceived the plan which, for better or worse, has led me to my fate.