The Fellowship of the Talisman

2

Duncan's first warning that he had been selected for the mission came when he tramped down the winding, baronial staircase and went across the foyer, heading for the library, where Wells had said his father would be waiting for him with His Grace.

It was not unusual for his father to want to see him, Duncan told himself. He was accustomed to being summoned, but what business could have brought the archbishop to the castle? His Grace was an elderly man, portly from good eating and not enough to do. He seldom ventured from the abbey. It would take something of more than usual importance to bring him here on his elderly gray mule, which was slow, but soft of foot, making travel easier for a man who disliked activity.

Duncan came into the library with its floor-to-ceiling book-rolls, its stained-glass window, the stag's head mounted above the flaming fireplace.

His father and the archbishop were sitting in chairs half facing the fire, and when he came into the room both of them rose to greet him, the archbishop puffing with the effort of raising himself from the chair.

"Duncan," said his father, "we have a visitor you should remember."

"Your Grace," said Duncan, hurrying forward to receive the blessing. "It is good to see you once again. It has been months."

He went down on a knee and once the blessing had been done, the archbishop reached down a symbolic hand to lift him to his feet.

"He should remember me," the archbishop told Duncan's father. "I had him in quite often to reason gently with him. It seems it was quite a job for the good fathers to pound some simple Latin and indifferent Greek and a number of other things into his reluctant skull."

"But, Your Grace," said Duncan, "it was all so dull. What does the parsing of a Latin verb…"

"Spoken like a gentleman," said His Grace. "When they come to the abbey and face the Latin that is always their complaint. But you, despite some backsliding now and then, did better than most."

"The lad's all right," growled Duncan's father. "I, myself, have but little Latin. Your people at the abbey put too much weight on it."

"That may be so," the archbishop conceded, "but it's the one thing we can do. We cannot teach the riding of a horse or the handling of a sword or the cozening of maidens."

"Let's forsake the banter and sit down," said Duncan's father. "We have matters to discuss." He said to Duncan, "Pay close attention, son. This has to do with you."

"Yes, sir," said Duncan, sitting down.

The archbishop glanced at Duncan's father. "Shall I tell him, Douglas?"

"Yes," Duncan's father said. "You know more of it than I do. And you can tell it better. You have the words for it."

The archbishop leaned back in his chair, laced pudgy fingers across a pudgy paunch. "Two years or more ago," he said to Duncan, "your father brought me a manuscript that he had found while sorting out the family papers."

"It was a job," said Duncan's father, "that should have been done centuries ago. Papers and records all shuffled together, without rhyme or reason. Old letters, old records, old grants, old deeds, ancient instruments, all shoved into a variety of boxes. The job's not entirely done as yet. I work on it occasionally. It's difficult, at times, to make sense of what I find."

"He brought me the manuscript," said the archbishop, "because it was written in an unfamiliar language. A language he had never seen and that few others ever have."

"It turned out to be Aramaic," said Duncan's father. "The tongue, I am told, in which Jesus spoke."

Duncan looked from one to the other of them. What was going on? he asked himself. What was this all about? What did it have to do with him?

"You're wondering," said the archbishop, "what this may have to do with you."

"Yes, I am," said Duncan.

"We'll get to it in time."

"I'm afraid you will," said Duncan.

"Our good fathers had a terrible time with the manuscript," the archbishop said. "There are only two of them who have any acquaintance with the language. One of them can manage to spell it out, the other may have some real knowledge of it. But I suspect not as much as he might wish that I should think. The trouble is, of course, that we cannot decide if the manuscript is a true account. It could be a hoax.

"It purports to be a journal that gives an account of the ministry of Jesus. Not necessarily day to day. There are portions of it in which daily entries are made. Then a few days may elapse, but when the journal takes up again the entry of that date will cover all that has happened since the last entry had been made. It reads as if the diarist was someone who lived at the time and witnessed what he wrote-as if he might have been a man not necessarily in the company of Jesus, but who somehow tagged along. A sort of hanger-on, perhaps. There is not the barest hint of who he might have been. He does not tell us who he is and there are no clues to his identity."

The archbishop ended speaking and stared owlishly at Duncan. "You realize, of course," he said, "if the document is true, what this would mean?"

"Why, yes, of course," Duncan answered. "It would give us a detailed, day-by-day account of the ministry of Our Lord."

"It would do more than that, my son," his father said. "It would give us the first eyewitness account of Him. It would provide the proof that there really was a man named Jesus."

"But, I don't-I can't…"

"What your father says is true," the archbishop said. "Aside from these few pages of manuscript we have, there is nothing that could be used to prove the historicity of Jesus. There do exist a few bits of writing that could be grasped at to prove there was such a man, but they are all suspect. Either outright hoaxes and forgeries or interpolations, perhaps performed by scriptorium monks who should have had better sense, who allowed devotion to run ahead of honesty. We of the faith do not need the proof; Holy Church does not doubt His existence for a moment, but our belief is based on faith, not on anything like proof. It is a thing we do not talk about. We are faced with so many infidels and pagans that it would be unwise to talk about it. We ourselves do not need such proof, if proof it is, that lies in the manuscript, but Mother Church could use it to convince those who do not share our faith."

"It would end, as well," Duncan's father said, "some of the doubt and skepticism in the Church itself."

"But it might be a hoax, you say."

"It could be," the archbishop said. "We're inclined to think it's not. But Father Jonathan, our man at the abbey, does not have the expertise to rule it out. What we need is a scholar who knows his Aramaic, who has spent years in the study of the language, the changes that have come about in it, and when they came about. It is a language that over the fifteen hundred years it was in use had many dialectical forms. A modern dialect of it is spoken still in some small corners of the eastern world, but the modern form differs greatly from that used in the time of Jesus, and even the form that Jesus used could have been considerably different than the dialect that was used a hundred miles away."

"I'm excited, of course," said Duncan, "and impressed. Excited that from this house could have come something of such significance. But I don't understand you. You said that I…"

"There is only one man in the world," the archbishop said, "who would have any chance of knowing if the manuscript were authentic. That man lives at Oxenford."

"Oxenford? You mean in the south?"

"That's right. He lives in that small community of scholars that in the last century or so…"

"Between here and Oxenford," Duncan's father said, "lies the Desolated Land."

"It is our thought," said the archbishop, "that a small band of brave and devoted men might be able to slip through. We had talked, your father and I, of sending the manuscript by sea, but these coasts are so beset by pirates that an honest vessel scarcely dares to leave its anchorage."

"How small a band?"

"As small as possible," Duncan's father said. "We can't send out a regiment of men-at-arms to go crashing through almost half of Britain. Such a force would call too much attention to itself. A small band that could move silently and unobtrusively would have a better chance. The bad part is, of course, that such a band would have to go straight across the Desolated Land. There is no way to go around it. From all accounts, it cuts a broad swath across the entire country. The expedition would be much easier if we had some idea of where the Harriers might be, but from the reports we get, they seem to be everywhere throughout the north. In recent weeks, however, from the more recent news that we have had, it seems that they may be moving in a northeasterly direction."

His Grace nodded solemnly. "Straight at us," he said.

"You mean that Standish House…"

Duncan's father laughed, a clipped, short laugh that was not quite a laugh. "No need for us to fear them here, son. Not in this ancient castle. For almost a thousand years it has stood against everything that could be hurled against it. But if a party were to attempt to get through to Oxenford, it might be best that they get started soon, before this horde of Harriers is camping on our doorstep."

"And you think that I…"

His father said, "We thought we'd mention it."

"I know of no better man to do it," said His Grace. "But it is your decision. It is a venture that must be weighed most carefully."

"I think that if you should decide to go," Duncan's father said, "you might have a fair chance of success. If I had not thought so, we would not have brought it up."

"He's well trained in the arts of combat," said His Grace, speaking to Duncan's father. "I am told, although I do not know it personally, that this son of yours is the most accomplished swordsman in the north, that he has read widely in the histories of campaigns…"

"But I've never drawn a blade in anger," protested Duncan. "My knowledge of the sword is little more than fencing. We have been at peace for years. For years there have been no wars…"

"You would not be sent out to engage in battle," his father told him smoothly. "The less you do of that the better. Your job would be to get through the Desolated Land without being seen."

"But there'd always be a chance that we'd run into the Harriers. I suppose that somehow I would manage, although it's not the kind of role in which I've ever thought to place myself. My interest, as it has been yours and your father's before you, lies in this estate, in the people and the land…"

"In that you're not unique," his father told him. "Many of the Standish men have lived in peace on these very acres, but when the call came, they rode off to battle and there was none who ever shamed us. So you can rest easy on that score. There's a long warrior line behind you."

"Blood will tell," said His Grace pontifically. "Blood will always tell. The fine old families, like the Standishes, are the bulwark of Britain and Our Lord."

"Well," said Duncan, "since you've settled it, since you have picked me to take part in this sally to the south, perhaps you'll tell me what you know of the Desolated Land."

"Only that it's a cyclic phenomenon," said the archbishop. "A cycle that strikes at a different place every five centuries or thereabouts. We know that approximately five hundred years ago it came to pass in Iberia. Five hundred years before that in Macedonia. There are indications that before that the same thing happened in Syria. The area is invaded by a swarm of demons and various associated evil spirits. They carry all before them. The inhabitants are slaughtered, all habitations burned. The area is left in utter desolation. This situation exists for an indeterminate number of years-as few as ten, perhaps, usually more than that. After that time it seems the evil forces depart and people begin to filter back, although it may require a century or more to reclaim the land. Various names have been assigned the demons and their cohorts. In this last great invasion they have been termed the Harriers; at times they are spoken of as the Horde. There is a great deal more, of course, that might be told of this phenomenon, but that is the gist of it. Efforts have been made by a number of scholars to puzzle out the reasons and the motives that may be involved. So far there are only rather feeble theories, no real evidence. Of course, no one has actually ever tried to investigate the afflicted area. No on-the-spot investigations. For which I cannot blame…"

"And yet," said Duncan's father, "you are suggesting that my son…"

"I have no suggestion that he investigate. Only that he try to make his way through the afflicted area. Were it not that Bishop Wise at Oxenford is so elderly, I would say that we should wait. But the man is old and, at the last reports, grown very feeble. His sands are running out. If we wait, we may find him gone to his heavenly reward. And he is the only hope we have. I know of no one else who can judge the manuscript."

"If the manuscript is lost while being carried to Oxenford, what then?" asked Duncan.

"That is a chance that must be taken. Although I know you would guard it with your life."

"So would anyone," said Duncan.

"It's a precious thing," said His Grace. "Perhaps the most precious thing in all of Christendom. Upon those few pages may rest the future hope of mankind."

"You could send a copy."

"No," said the archbishop, "it must be the original. No matter how carefully it would be copied, and at the abbey we have copyists of great skill, the copyist might miss, without realizing it, certain small characteristics that would be essential in determining if it's genuine or not. We have made copies, two of them, that will be kept at the abbey under lock and key. So if the original should be lost we still will have the text. But that the original should be lost is a catastrophe that bears no thinking on."

"What if Bishop Wise can authenticate the text, but raises a question on the parchment or the ink? Surely he is not also an expert on parchments and on inks."

"I doubt," the archbishop said, "that he'll raise such questions. With his scholarship, he should know beyond all question if it is genuine from an examination of the writing only. Should he, however, raise those questions, then we must seek another scholar. There must be those who know of parchments and of inks."

"Your Grace," said Duncan's father, "you say there have been theories advanced about the Desolated Land, about the motive and the reason. Do you, perhaps, have a favorite theory?"

"It's hard to choose among them," the archbishop told him. "They all are ingenious and some of them are tricky, slippery of logic. The one, of all of them, that makes most sense to me is the suggestion that the Desolated Lands are used for the purpose of renewal-that the evil forces of the world at times may need a resting period in which to rededicate their purpose and enrich themselves, recharging their strength. Like a church retreat, perhaps. So they waste an area, turning it to a place of horror and desolation, which serves as a barrier to protect them against interference while they carry out whatever unholy procedures may be necessary to strengthen them for another five centuries of evil doing. The man who propounded this theory sought to show a weakening of the evil done for some years preceding the harrying of a desolated land, and in a few years after that a great increase in evil. But I doubt he made his point. There are not sufficient data for that kind of study."

"If this should be true," said Duncan, "then our little band, if it trod most carefully and avoided any fuss, should have a good chance to pass through the Desolated Land unnoticed. The forces of Evil, convinced they are protected by the desolation, would not be as alert as they might be under other circumstances, and they also would be busy doing all the things they need to do in this retreat of theirs."

"You might be right," his father said.

The archbishop had been listening silently to what Duncan and his father had been saying. He sat with his hands folded across his paunch, his eyes half closed, as if he were wrestling with some private thought. The three of them sat quietly for a little time until finally His Grace stirred himself and said, "It seems to me that more study, really serious study, should be made of this great force of Evil that has been loose upon the world for uncounted centuries. We have responded to it, all these centuries, with horror, explaining it by thoughtless superstition. Which is not to say there is no basis for some of the tales we hear and the stories that are told. Some of the tales one hears, of course, are true, in some cases even documented. But many of them are false, the tales of stupid peasants who think them up, I am convinced, to pass off idle hours. Ofttimes, other than their rude horseplay and their fornications, they have little else to amuse themselves. So we are engulfed in all sorts of silly stories. And silly stories do no more than obscure the point. What we should be most concerned with is an understanding of this Evil. We have our spells and enchantments with which to cast out devils; we have our stories of men being changed into howling dogs or worse; we believe volcanoes may be the mouths of Hell; not too long ago we had the story of some silly monks who dug a pit and, descending into it, discovered Purgatory. These are not the kinds of things we need. What we need is an understanding of Evil, for only with an understanding of it will we have some grounds upon which to fight against it.

"Not only should we get ourselves into a position to fight it effectively for our own peace of mind, for some measure of freedom against the indignity, injury and pain Evil inflicts upon us, but for the growth of our civilization. Consider for the moment that for many centuries we have been a stagnant society, making no progress. What is done each day upon this estate, what is done each day throughout the world, does not differ one iota from what was done a thousand years ago. The grains are cut as they always have been harvested, threshed as they always have been threshed, the fields are plowed with the same inefficient plows, the peasants starve as they have always starved…."

"On this estate they don't," said Duncan's father. "Here no one starves. We look after our own people. And they look after us. We store food against the bad years and when the bad years come, as they seldom do, the food is there for all of us and…"

"My lord," said the archbishop, "you will pardon me. I was speaking quite in general. What I have said is not true on this estate, as I well know, but it is true in general."

"Our family," said Duncan's father, "has held these lands for close on ten centuries. As holders of the land, we have accepted the implicit responsibility…"

"Please," said the archbishop, "I did not mean your house. Now may I go on?"

"I regret interrupting you," said Duncan's father, "but I felt obliged to make it clear that no one goes hungry at Standish House."

"Quite so," the archbishop said. "And now to go on with what I was saying. It is my opinion that this great weight of Evil which has borne down upon our shoulders has worked against any sort of progress. It has not always been so. In the olden days men invented the wheel, made pottery, tamed the animals, domesticated plants, smelted ore, but since that first beginning there has been little done. There have been times when there seemed a spark of hope, if history tells us true. There was a spark of hope in Greece, but Greece went down to nothing. For a moment Rome seemed to hold a certain greatness and some promise, but in the end Rome was in the dust. It would seem that by now, in the twentieth century, there should be some sign of progress. Better carts, perhaps, and better roads for the carts to run on, better plows and a better understanding of how to use the land, better ways of building houses so that peasants need no longer live in noisome huts, better ships to ply the seas. Sometimes, I have speculated on an alternate history, an alternate to our world, where this Evil did not exist. A world where many centuries of progress have opened possibilities we cannot even guess. That could have been our world, our twentieth century. But it is only a dream, of course.

"We know, however, that west of us, across the Atlantic, there are new lands, vast new lands, so we are told. Sailors from the south of Britain and the western coasts of Gaul go there to catch the cod, but few others, for there are few trustworthy ships to go in. And, perhaps, no great desire to go, for we are deficient in our enterprise. We are held in thrall by Evil and until we do something about that Evil, we will continue so.

"Our society is ill, ill in its lack of progress and in many other ways. I have also often speculated that the Evil may feed upon our misery, grow strong upon our misery, and that to insure good feeding it may actively insure that the misery continues. It seems to me, too, that this great Evil may not always have been with us. In earlier days men did make some progress, doing those few things that have made even such a poor society as we have now possible. There was a time when men did work to make their lives more safe and comfortable, which argues that they were undeterred by this Evil that we suffer or, at least, not as much deterred. And so the question, where did the Evil come from? This is a question, of course, that cannot now be answered. But there is one thing that to me seems certain. The Evil has stopped us in our tracks. What little we have we inherited from our ancient forebears, with a smidgen from the Greeks and a dab from Rome.

"As I read our histories, it seems to me that I detect a deliberate intent upon the part of this great Evil to block us from development and progress. At the end of the eleventh century our Holy Father Urban launched a crusade against the heathen Turks who were persecuting Christians and desecrating the shrines of Jerusalem. Multitudes gathered to the Standard of the Cross, and given time, undoubtedly would have carved a path to the Holy Land and set Jerusalem free. But this did not come to pass, for it was then that the Evil struck in Macedonia and later spread to much of Central Europe, desolating all the land as this land south of us now is desolated, creating panic among those assembled for the crusade and blocking the way they were to take. So the crusade came to naught and no other crusades were launched, for it took centuries to emerge from the widespread chaos occasioned by this striking of the Evil. Because of this, even to this day, the Holy Land, which is ours by right, still lies in the heathen grip."

He put a hand to his face to wipe away the tears that were running down his chubby cheeks. He gulped, and when he spoke again there was a suppressed sobbing in his voice.

"In failing in the crusade, although in the last analysis it was no failure of ours, we may have lost the last hope of finding any evidence of the factual Jesus, which might have still existed at that time, but now undoubtedly is gone beyond the reach of mortal man. In such a context, surely you must appreciate why we place so great an emphasis upon the manuscript found within these walls."

"From time to time," said Duncan's father, "there has been talk of other crusades."

"That is true," said His Grace, "but never carried out. That incidence of Evil, the most widespread and most vicious of which our histories tell us, cut out the heart of us. Recovering from its effects, men huddled on their acres, nursing the unspoken fear, perhaps, that another such effort might again call up the Evil in all its fury. The Evil has made us a cowering and ineffectual people with no thought of progress or of betterment.

"In the fifteenth century, when the Lusitanians evolved a policy calculated to break this torpor by sailing the oceans of the world to discover unknown lands, the Evil erupted once again in the Iberian peninsula and all the plans and policies were abandoned and forgotten as the peninsula was devastated and terror stalked the land. With two such pieces of evidence you cannot help but speculate that the Evil, in its devastations, is acting to keep us as we are, in our misery, so that it can feed and grow strong upon that very misery. We are the Evil's cattle, penned in our scrubby pastures, offering up to it the misery that it needs and relishes."

His Grace raised a hand to wipe his face. "I think of it at nights, before I go to sleep. I agonize upon it. It seems to me that if this keeps on there'll be an end to everything. It seems to me that the lights are going out. They're going out all over Europe. I have the feeling that we are plunging back again into the ancient darkness."

"Have you talked with others about these opinions of yours?" asked Duncan's father.

"A few," the archbishop said. "They profess to take no stock in any of it. They pooh-pooh what I say."

A discreet knock came at the door.

"Yes," said Duncan's father. "Who is it?"

"It is I," said Wells's voice. "I thought, perhaps, some brandy."

"Yes, indeed," exclaimed the archbishop, springing to life, "some brandy would be fine. You have such good brandy here. Much better than the abbey."

"Tomorrow morning," Duncan's father said, between his teeth, "I shall send you a keg of it."

"That," said the archbishop suavely, "would be most kind of you."

"Come on in," Duncan's father yelled to Wells.

The old man carried in a tray on which were balanced glasses and a bottle. Moving quietly in his carpet slippers, he poured out the brandy and handed the glasses around.

When he was gone the archbishop leaned back in his chair, holding out the glass against the firelight and squinting through it. "Exquisite," he said. "Such a lovely color."

"How large a party did you have in mind?" Duncan asked his father.

"You mean that you will go?"

"I'm considering it."

"It would be," said the archbishop, "an adventure in the highest tradition of your family and this house."

"Tradition," said Duncan's father sharply, "has not a thing to do with it."

He said to his son, "I had thought a dozen men or so."

"Too many," Duncan said.

"Perhaps. How many would you say?"

"Two. Myself and Conrad."

The archbishop choked on the brandy, jerked himself upright in his chair. "Two?" he asked, and then, "Who might this Conrad be?"

"Conrad," said Duncan's father, "is a barnyard worker. He is handy with the hogs."

The archbishop sputtered. "But I don't understand."

"Conrad and my son have been close friends since they were boys. When Duncan goes hunting or fishing he takes Conrad with him."

"He knows the woodlands," Duncan said. "He's run in them all his life. When time hangs heavy on his hands, as it does at times, for his duties are not strenuous, he takes out for the woods."

"It does not seem to me," the archbishop said, "that running in the woods is a great qualification…"

"But it would be," said Duncan. "We'd be traveling in a wilderness."

"This Conrad," said Duncan's father, "is a brawny man, about seven feet and almost twenty stone of muscle. Quick as a cat. Half animal. He bears unquestioning allegiance to Duncan; he would die for him, I'm sure. He carries a club, a huge oaken club…"

"A club!" the archbishop groaned.

"He's handy with it," said Duncan. "I'd put him with that club of his up against a dozen swordsmen and I'd give you odds on Conrad and his club."

"It would not be too bad a choice," Duncan's father said. "The two of them would move quietly and swiftly. If they need defend themselves, they'd be capable."

"Daniel and Tiny to go along with us," said Duncan.

Duncan's father saw the archbishop's lifted eyebrows. "Daniel is a war-horse," he explained, "trained to battle. He is the equal of three men. Tiny is a great mastiff. He is trained for war as well."