The Warlock Heretical

Chapter Nine

"Oh, Milord Abbot!" The Baroness hurried over as the Abbot stepped into the room, lowering his cowl to reveal hair plastered against his head. "I had not meant for thee to come on so foul a night!"

The Abbot looked up in surprise, displeased. "Thy message, milady, spoke of urgent need."

"And so it is, so it is! Yet tomorrow would have been soon enough. Oh, poor man! Come, come stand by the fire! Mayrose, pour brandy wine! Adam, move a chair to the hearth!"

"Nay, I am not so wetted as that." The Abbot pulled off his monk's robe, revealing another beneath it. "When I saw the rain, I took a larger robe for a cover." But the inner robe was damp, too, and as the clergyman stepped in front of the flames, he steamed. Still, the look in his eye as Lady Mayrose handed him a goblet said he did not regret the trip. Indeed, there was a haunted hunger there.

The Baroness saw, but had tact enough not to mention it directly. She gestured for Old Adam to bring her chair nearer the fire. "I marvel that thou canst yet spare time for us, milord, when thou art so much taken up with matters of great moment."

The Abbot frowned, his troubles coming to mind again. "In truth, milady, thy house and thine affairs seem almost a refuge to me now."

"Why, come to sanctuary, then," Lady Mayrose said with a silvery laugh, and turned away in a swirl of skirts to stand by her mother. "Still, 'tis a somewhat troubled sanctuary, as who should know better than its confessor?"

"But thy troubles are so… wholesome, I might almost say." The Abbot smiled. "Nay, thy disagreements seem ever to be borne with love toward one another. Would I and the King might so quarrel!"

"In truth, the Lord did bid thee love thine enemy," Lady Mayrose murmured.

The Abbot nodded. "So indeed He did, Lady Mayrose, yet our enemy will not therefore cease being our enemy." His brow creased. "In truth, Their Majesties are so arrogant that they can scarcely abide the least challenge to their power."

"And art thou so great an affront, then?"

The Abbot sighed, looking up to Heaven. "Alas! How may I be otherwise? For I must oppose this steady extension of their powers, that doth encroach even on the domain of the Church… Oh! Rome is so blind] Not to realize that a worldly prince must needs hamper the Church's work if he doth usurp her offices! So blind, not to see what moves here—and so uncaring!"

The ladies were silent, surprised at his vehemence.

He realized, and smiled apologetically. "Pardon, ladies. My spirit grows agitated as I realize the hurt to the poor folk, in both soul and body, that must come from the Crown daring to take upon itself the alms-giving of the Church and the ordering of our clergy."

"Ah! How can a king or queen understand what is needful in that?" Lady Mayrose said, scandalized. "Nay, certes the Church must remain supreme in such venues!"

The Abbot looked up at her in appreciation. "I thank thee, Lady Mayrose, yet I doubt that even one so ardent as thou wouldst condone the step that I may needs take on this road."

"What step is that?" The Baroness was suddenly apprehensive.

"That of declaring myself to be Archbishop." The Abbot looked away, his mouth twisting as he said it.

The Baroness gasped, but Lady Mayrose's eyes glowed. She nodded, faster and faster. "Certes… aye, certes! Nay, what else couldst thou do, my lord? If the Church of Gramarye hath separated from Rome, it must needs have a head—and that head must be titled Archbishop! Yet ought it not ever have had bishops and archbishops?"

"It should have, Lady Mayrose, it should have." The Abbot turned to her with a slow, approving nod. "

"Pis only for cause that all priests in Gramarye are of the Order, and owe obedience to the Abbot of the only monastery, that we have not."

Lady Mayrose's eyes widened. "Are there other orders of monks, then?"

"Aye, and priests who are not monks." The abbot smiled at her astonishment. "There are many holy houses named in our books—the Order of Saint Francis, for one, and the Order of Saint Dominic, for another. There is also the Society of Jesus, from which came our founder, Saint Vidicon. Yet 'twas a monk of Saint Vidicon's alone brought the Faith to Gramarye. so that the only priests here are those of our Order."

The Baroness's hand trembled at her throat. "Yet will not Their Majesties see thy taking the title of Archbishop as an attack upon their authority?"

"I doubt it not," the Abbot said, frowning, "and 'tis that which doth give me pause in so declaring myself. Yet, milady, would I thereby claim aught that the Abbot hath not always had, in this Isle of Gramarye?"

"Thou wouldst not, and thou wouldst thus do as an archbishop must!" Lady Mayrose insisted. "Who can trust the judgment of kings or queens? For they must, by their natures, be worldly, and therefore liable to corruption!"

"'Tis even so, Lady Mayrose, even so." The Abbot nodded, pleased. "There must be a check on the powers of them who govern, or tyranny will follow."

"And who can check a king, save an archbishop?" Lady Mayrose shook her head, fire in her eyes. "Nay, milord! An archbishop thou must needs be, and naught less than archbishop! For just and right behavior is natural to men of the Spirit—but greed and violence are natural to men of the World!"

"Why, even so had I thought!" the Abbot declared, with a warm smile for her. "Only in men of God may the people trust, for justice!"

"Folly is the prerogative of the Crown," Lady Mayrose answered, "but wisdom is the prerogative of the Mitre!"

"I could not have spoken it better," the Abbot breathed, gazing into her eyes.

She met his gaze a moment, then blushed and bowed her head.

The silence became awkward.

The Abbot turned away, with a noise of impatience. "What a rude guest am I, to so dwell on mine own affairs! I had forgot, milady, the cause for which thou hadst summoned me."

"Oh… 'tis only some disagreement 'twixt this willful child and myself." The Baroness looked up over her shoulder at her granddaughter. "Our quarrel seems petty indeed, weighed against thy matters of great moment."

"I assure thee, milady, that naught which doth trouble thee and thy granddaughter can ever be of small moment to me," the Abbot said with fervor. "What quarrel is this, that can so disturb the loving harmony between thee?"

"What is it ever!" the Baroness sighed. "I have brought to her mind once again, Lord Abbot, her duty to her house and country, yet she doth once more defy me!"

"Lady!" The Abbot turned to Lady Mayrose in mild reproach. "Surely thou dost not deny thou shouldst wed!"

"Nay, not truly, milord." The maiden met his eyes with a deep, disconcerting directness. " 'Tis only a matter of person."

"I did no such thing!"

Squire Rowley frowned across the table at the village pain. Laughn was as scruffy as usual—his tunic probably hadn't been washed for a month, let alone changed; the warden had obviously dragged him in before his weekly shave; and there was something about the lice that kept peeking out from his mange, as though they were finding the aroma inside a little hard to take themselves. Rowley was just glad it had been a clear day, so he could have his men bring his table outdoors to hold court—but he hadn't thought to make sure he was upwind of Laughn. He tried to breathe lightly, and said, "The keeper found thee coming away from the deer, which had still thine arrow in it."

" 'Twas an arrant knave stole that arrow from me!"

"An arrant knave shot the deer, surely." Rowley gasped at a sudden gust and held his breath till it had passed. His knight, Sir Torgel, had a very enlightened attitude toward poaching— he only forbade hunting to people who had enough to eat. But Laughn still lived with his parents, though he was in his twenties, and was well-enough fed, though he was more often seen in the woods than in the fields—and that deer could have fed the whole village for several days. No, Sir Torgel would not take the large view toward this deer slaying. "And how didst thou come to be near the deer?"

"Why, I sought deadwood to gather for the fire! How was I to know a dead deer lay nearby?"

"How, indeed?" the squire sighed. "Yet thou hadst no billets about thee, nor even a bag with which to carry kindling."

"Only for that I had not found any yet!"

"Though 'twas high noon? Our woods are not so well kept as that'." Rowley frowned and glanced at the horizon; the sun had almost set, and gloom was gathering. The trial had lasted far too long. "Nay, I must needs hold thee guilty of poaching."

"Thou canst not!" Sweat started on Laughn's brow; he knew the sentence could be death. "I did not shoot!"

"Yet all signs say thou didst." Rowley's face hardened. "Unless thou hast a witness to say he saw thee without thy bow as he saw the deer fall, I must needs hold thee—"

"Yet there was!" Laughn shrilled. "Such an one did see me so!"

Rowley paused, scowling. "Who did?"

"Stane did!"

Rowley sat, eyes widening at Laughn's audacity. Stane had been found dead by a keeper about the same time that another had discovered the slain deer and had caught Laughn. The young man had been a short distance from both, lying near a rock that fitted the dent in his head. To all appearances he had tripped and fallen. Rowley had sent a guardsman back for the body; he had found it stiffened. "Thou knowest Stane lieth dead."

"Naetheless, he did see me even as he let fly the arrow! 'Twas Stane slew the deer, not I! I did not wish to speak ill of the dead, but thou dost leave me no choice!"

"Ill indeed." Rowley's eyes narrowed. "Thou art, then, the last to see Stane alive. Methinks thou mayest know more of his death than thou speakest!"

"I do not!" Laughn fairly screamed, straining against the guards' grasp, raising his bound hands. "I call him to witness!

Stane, come! For if thou didst, thou wouldst bear witness that I am innocent!"

This blasphemy was too much even for Rowley. "Thou dost lie, vile murderer! I would Stane could stand here, for—"

He broke off at the look of absolute terror that came into Laughn's eyes, and turned to follow his gaze.

There, dimly seen in the gloaming, but there quite clearly, was a wisp of smoke in the form of a man, a young man in smock and leggins with a raw bloody dent in his forehead.

"Stane," Rowley whispered.

He doth lie, said Stane's voice inside their minds. He slew the deer; I did see it. And for that, he slew me. Then he half buried the rock, so that it would seem my own clumsiness had slain me.

Laughn screamed, then screamed again and again, thrashing against the hold of the white-faced soldiers while Stane's ghost faded, as though the sound of Laughn's howling were shredding the shade and dispersing it. Then Laughn's voice cut off short, eyes bulging as he stared at the place where Stane's shade had been, before he slumped, unconscious.

The tinker wore a three-day beard and an assemblage of clothes that seemed to be made up of equal parts of tatter and grime. The boy beside him was a little better off; his face was unwashed instead of unshaven. Both of them were hung about with pots and pans that jangled and clattered as they walked. Of course, the alert eye could have seen that under the rags they were both well-fed and well-muscled, and the tinker, at least, seemed to be unwholesomely happy about the whole thing. He ambled into the village with his thumbs hooked around pot handles, whistling.

The boy, on the other hand, looked rather glum about it all. He glowered up at his father. "Do you have to be so happy about the whole thing, Papa?"

"What good would it do being sour?"

"If anybody you knew saw you, they might think you were glad to get away from Mother."

"Never! Well, no, I have to amend that—I'd rather not have her around when I lose my temper." Rod grinned. "But I always do enjoy getting away from Their Majesties and the court for a little while. There's this tremendous sense of… freedom."

"Freedom." Magnus jangled his pots and glowered at the grime in his homespun tunic. "This is freedom?"

"Son, I've been meaning to tell you—freedom and luxury are not the same thing. In fact, they don't even go together, most of the time." Rod stepped into the center of the village common and shrugged off his load. It fell with a jangle and a clatter, and he called out,

Magnus winced. "You've done better, Papa."

"Well, what do you expect for improvisation? Besides, who made you a critic?"

"You did," Magnus said instantly. "At least that's what you said the last time I didn't want to do my homework."

"I know—every educated man should be a critic," Rod replied, sighing, "and if you're not willing to learn, you have no right to criticize. An unkind cut, my boy, an unkind cut."

"I thought we were talking about education, not steak."

"Are you still beefing? Try to simmer down—here comes a customer."

"Ho, tinker! I've waited long for thee!" The housewife was broad and plump, with a pleasant round face and a small cauldron that had a long jagged crack. She swung it up into Rod's hands. "For months I have cooked in a crockery pot!"

"Eh, I should have come sooner." Rod's voice moved into a country dialect. "'Twill cost thee a penny, missus."

The woman's face clouded. "I've no coin to spare, tinker." She reached for the cauldron.

"That being so, we're a-hungered," Rod said quickly. "Can ye spare us a bowl of stew with a taste of meat?"

The woman beamed. "I've a bit of dried beef on the shelf yet." She frowned down at the odd noise the boy made, then shrugged and turned back to his father. "Still, I cannot stew it without a pot."

"Why, then, a mun mend it quickly." Rod sat down tailor fashion, pulled out a knife and a stick, and began shaving tinder. "Fetch a few sticks, lad, like a good 'un."

"Pretend, anyway—right?" Magnus muttered, before he turned away to hunt for kindling.

A few other wives came up as Rod laid the fire. One had a pot with a bad dent, but the others had only interest. "What news, tinker?"

Rod always had wanted to be a journalist. "Naught that's so new as all that. The Abbot hath declared the Church of Gramarye to be separate from the Church of Rome."

A housewife frowned. "How can he do that?"

"He doth ope his mouth and speak." Rod shaved a curl of wood.

"Can we not hear Mass, then?"

"Rumor saith that the Abbot himself doth so, every day."

The first housewife knit her brow. "Then what matters it?"

Rod shrugged. "Little enough, I would say." Privately, he was appalled that the peasants took the news so blandly. "Yet what know I of the Church? 'Tis a priest must say." He looked up as Magnus came up with an armload of broken branches. "Ah, that's good enough, lad."

Magnus sat down with his bundle of sticks, trying not to look at the erstwhile customer who was running toward the only building with a wooden roof. It also had a small steeple.

"Now, when I can find one who hath a brother or son in the monastery," Rod said easily, "I can find the truth or falsehood of this rumor." He struck a spark into the tinder and blew it into a glowing coal, carefully leaving enough silence for a villager to volunteer a comment. When no one did, he sighed inwardly and said, "Other than that, there's small enough news. Twas a storm in the north, off the Romanov coast, and a fisherman swore he saw a mermaid singing in the midst of the lightning."

The housewives gasped and exclaimed to one another, and Rod started feeding kindling into the glowing coal. Flames licked up.

"What had the fisherman been drinking, Papa?" Magnus asked, and the women turned toward him, startled.

Rod swung a backhanded slap at Magnus's head, but Magnus ducked it lazily. "Go along with 'ee, now! Hast no respect for thine elders?"

"Not so harsh," a housewife protested. "I've known mine husband to see odd sights when he's been a-drinking."

The other women chortled, and Rod wondered if the woman's husband would thank her for the broadcast. "Mayhap, goodwife, yet bear in mind this: the fairy folk have a fondness for tosspots."

"Then why do they not take them away?" a woman snorted, and the others hooted their agreement.

Rod waved a hand over the little blaze and nodded, satisfied. " 'Twill do." He laid a strip of welding wire along the crack and held it over the blaze.

"I do the real work, right?" Magnus murmured to him.

"So why do you think I brought you along?" Questions don't qualify as fibs. "But it's your choice. I can make a try at it on my own."

"Oh, I don't mind," Magnus said quickly. Rod gave the boy points; he didn't want to hurt Papa's feelings by letting him botch the job. And Magnus had practiced a lot more, Rod had to admit.

Magnus stared at the crack, and the wire melted and flowed, though the fire wasn't really hot enough to do it. Rod knew that, under the cover of golden metal, the iron of the pot was softening all along the crack line and beginning to flow together as Magnus excited the molecules. The kid really had great control—the intense heat spread only about half an inch from the crack on either side. Rod had checked that, the last time Magnus had mended a pan for his mother.

They were so absorbed in their work that Rod was able to pretend not to notice the parish priest come striding up behind the young wife who had run to tell him the news.

The pot glowed red along the seam, then yellow, but the villagers couldn't see that under the flow of the welding wire.

Then Magnus relaxed. Rod took his cue and lifted the pot away from the flames, setting it aside to cool. "Let it stand an hour, goodwife. Then try it, and I'll warrant you'll find it as good as new." He was quite sure of that.

"Quickly done, and quite well," said the priest. "Thou art the most skillful tinker that ever I've seen."

"Why, thank'ee." Rod looked up, then widened his eyes and added, "Father," as though just realizing he was speaking to a priest.

The friar smiled. "I am Father Bellora, good tinker. Be at peace."

Rod tried to look nervous. "Hast thou a pot to mend?"

"Not a pot, but a heart." Anxiety creased the friar's face. "Is't true, this news that ye bring?"

"What—that the Church of Gramarye be parted from the Church of Rome?" Rod shrugged. " Tis the news, Father. Canst not say if 'tis true?"

"I have not heard speak of it." The friar shoved his hands into the sleeves of his robe, his face taut, his eyes haunted. "Nay, then, can it be sooth?"

"If 'tis, Father," a woman asked with foreboding, "canst thou still say mass?"

"Or," Rod quipped, trying to lighten the atmosphere, "must we needs stop dying till thou canst once more say the funeral?"

The friar's lips quirked with amusement. "Nay, surely not. 'Tis years since I was ordained; my hands are yet consecrated to the Eucharist and the work of God. I may minister the Sacraments, unless the Pope doth place Gramarye under the Inderdict."

The little crowd was silent, aghast at the thought of Rome abandoning them to the Devil.

Rod made a feeble try at his original purpose. "Canst not send word to the monastery to ask if 'tis true?"

The priest shook his head. "Only were I to discover some holy friar who doth thither wend."

"Yet there must needs be some soul in this village who hath a son or sib at the abbey, who may come bearing word."

Father Bellora frowned down at him, then shook his head. "Nay. None here have folk in holy orders, save myself, and I do not hearken from this village."

"Hast no friends from thy days of schooling?"

The priest's smile soured. "Aye, friends did I gain whilst I did study holy writ; yet they, too, are among the parishes, even as I am."

"Why, how is this?" Rod said, scowling, even though he knew well. "Are not all friars taught together?"

"Nay," the priest said. "We are not all numbered among the elect."

"Not?" Rod pretended to be startled. "Yet I thought that once tha wert of the monastery, tha wert all as one."

"Nay, neither in heart nor in schooling. Some are drawn away into the cloister, and some remain in the novice's dormitory and scriptorium."

A separate scriptorium for the novices? As monasteries went, this was definitely something new. "And those who rest without, do go without?"

Father Bellora nodded. "Out to the world from which we came, to contend with the temptations and burdens that divert a man from Heaven."

"Yet 'tis a holy calling withal." Magnus sounded shocked. "How would the… we poor folks find our way to Heaven without such as thee?"

Father Bellora's face softened. "Truly said, lad, and I thank thee. Fie upon me that I may let old bitterness rise to veil the worth of my life from me! For I must own, my superiors were right; I have found this life rich in a feeling of others' need. Never, since my first week here, have I asked why I was made."

"Yet thou didst not choose it?" Rod frowned; he had had visions of a parchment application form. "Didst thou wish the cloister, Father?"

"Aye, as do all young men who go there. Well, mayhap not all," the priest corrected, "but surely the greater number of us. Yet 'tis not for a postulant to decide his own course; there are older heads than his, and wiser, who can read his calling more clearly than he himself."

"Yet tha dost feel thaself set aside, as lesser clay," Rod interpreted.

Father Bellora's shoulders shook with a single ironic laugh. "Aye, 'tis quite foolish when thou dost say it aloud, is't not? For surely the parish priests serve God as fully as they who are cloistered, mayhap more, and surely we are no lesser stuff."

"Mayhap better," Magnus suggested. "For must ye not be stronger, to withstand the temptations of the world and bear up under its burdens?"

Father Bellora nodded, an approving glint in his eye. "Aye, so we were told, though I put it down as an attempt to persuade us to remain in the order, and to console us for being among those rejected. Yet I have come to see the truth of it."

"Yet who bid thee be a parish priest?" Rod asked. "How could they tell?"

Father Bellora spread his hands. "I know not. Mayhap when

I am aged, I will. Tis they of the cloister who decide—and the seniors among them, at that."

"Yet how can they know this of thee?"

"A wise old monk sat down and spoke with me a while. Then on the next day, after Mass, the master of novices took me aside to tell me my fate."

"Only that?" Magnus stared. "Only some minutes' talk?"

"Perchance the half of an hour. Yet 'tis even as thou dost say—on that they decided my fate. That and the report of the Master of Postulants," the priest said thoughtfully. "He had watched me for two days, at that."

"Two days, and half an hour's talk, to decide a life's work?"

"Be not so dismayed." Father Bellora turned to Magnus with a smile. "The wise old monk was right, after all."

"Yet still dost thou wish to be of the cloister!"

"That is my besetting sin," the priest sighed, "overweening pride. I pray daily that it may be lifted from me."

"Canst thou not be what thou dost wish?"

"Nay." Father Bellora gave Magnus his full attention now. "For look you, lad, 'tis not only hard work and determination that will win thee the work thou dost wish—'tis also a matter of talent. In cloister, I doubt not, I would have been too restless, though I find it hard to credit—and, belike, I'd be beset by a feeling of lack of purpose. Nay, he who judged me, judged well." The last sentence sounded definitely forced.

Rod was impressed by the man's merciless self-evaluation. "Yet have they never erred, these monks, in their judgment as to who should go, and who should stay?"

The priest shook his head. "Never, so far as I know."

"Father! Father!" A young man in a farmer's smock came running up. "Praise Heaven I've found thee!"

The priest turned, attention completely on the runner. "Good day, Lirak. What troubles thee?"

" 'Tis old Sebastian, Father! He hath fallen in the field, and's breath doth rattle in's throat! Oh, come, I beg thee!"

Father Bellora glanced at Rod and Magnus. "Thy pardon, yet here's one who doth stand in need of me." He pressed his breast pocket, next to the tiny yellow handle of the emblem of his order. "Aye, the sacred oil's there. Nay, show me the way, Lirak." And he hurried away after the boy.

Rod watched them go. "Well, they didn't make any mistake about that one, anyway."

"Aye, one." Magnus scowled. "Yet they must have erred now and again, Papa!"

Rod glanced around; all the housewives seemed to have gone home, probably to discuss the scandalous news about the Church by themselves. "Yes, that definitely sounds a bit odd, son, not to mention inhuman. They couldn't possibly have a perfect track record on something like that. There're just too many variables."

"Mayhap the postulants each have some sort of sign impressed on their foreheads, that we mere mortal folk cannot see," Magnus said.

Rod looked more closely at his boy, surprised at the sarcasm. He was definitely beginning to grow up. "Well, they know what to look for, at any rate." He frowned at a notion. "Or, more likely, they never know about their mistakes."

Magnus looked puzzled.

"Look," Rod explained, "if a parish priest starts sinning, they can just say he has weakened."

Magnus's eyes widened. "Aye, and if a monk doth make a clamor in the cloister, they may say 'tis only that he doth lack discipline!"

"On your home territory there, are you? But you do have the gist of it there, yes. Makes sense, doesn't it?"

"Too much so!"

"Well, they're only human," Rod sighed. "They've got to do the best they can under the circumstances."

"Nay, they need not! They could let each postulant choose his own way, and try it!"

"Yes, they could," Rod agreed. "Probably yield just as high a success rate, in the long run."

"Bless thee, tinkers!"

Rod looked up, startled. It was the housewife whose pot they had mended, coming up with a big, steaming bowl in her hands and a loaf tucked under her arm.

Rod grinned, and reached up to accept the bowl. "Bless thee, goodwife." He stuck his nose over the bowl and inhaled deeply. "Ah! God send thee more broken pots, whene'er I chance this way again!"

"And take this also." The woman pressed a fat sausage into his hand. "And godspeed!"

Magnus lifted the spoon and sipped as she turned away.

"Why, 'tis good! Mayhap we should think of this trade more often, Papa."

"Pays well enough, you mean?" Rod smiled. "Well, not bad, for fixing one pot—a big bowl of stew, a loaf of whole wheat, and a salami. Not only dinner, but journey rations for tomorrow."

"Had they more pots," Magnus pointed out, "we could also trade in foodstuffs."

"Didn't realize you had an aptitude for business…"

"Naetheless," Magnus said, through a mouthful of stew, "we've not found the one thing we came for."

"Yes." Rod frowned. "Nobody in town has a relative in the monastery. Well, there's always the next village, son."

Magnus groaned.

Father Bellora stepped out the door to dump the dirty wash water, calling, "Wee Folk, take care!" His teachers at the monastery would have been scandalized to hear him, and would have rebuked him for the sin of superstition, but they didn't have to deal with the realities of life. An elf with dampened dignity could become extremely inconvenient.

Having called the warning, the good country parson tossed the contents of the basin. They splashed into the weeds—the greenest patch anywhere near the rectory—and Father Bellora turned back toward his kitchen. But out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of an approaching figure and turned to look. His eyes widened, and he yelped. "Brother Matthew!"

The other friar waved, grinning, and broke into a run.

Father Bellora clapped him on the shoulder with a crow of delight. "Thou old curmudgeon, what dost thou here? Oh, right glad I am to see thee!"

"And I thee, Father Bellora." Matthew was a year older, but they had studied together at the monastery.

"Nay, come in, come in!" Father Bellora cried, and led his old schoolmate into the kitchen.

Half an hour and a large meat pie later, Brother Matthew sat back with a sigh and a toothpick. Father Bellora grinned, leaning back and patting his belly. "Now, good Brother! What matter is't doth bring thee to my parish?"

"News which our good Abbot doth enjoin thee to proclaim to all thy congregation." Brother Matthew's face darkened.

"He hath declared the Church of Gramarye to be separate from the Church of Rome."

Father Bellora's face fell. "Rumor had spoke of this, yet I had hoped 'twas not true."

"So soon?" Brother Matthew looked up, startled. "Doth word run faster than writing?"

"Ever, Brother. 'Twas a tinker came by, yester e'en. He mended a pot, slept the night, and went on. Belike another parish doth leam of it, even now."

"Aye, Brother," Matthew said, sympathizing. "It doth make for turmoil in our souls, doth it not?" He withdrew a roll of parchment from his sleeve. "Here is the text of it, which thou art to copy and read at Mass for a week, and carry this scroll to Father Gabe, in Flamourn parish o'er the hill, even as I have brought it to thee."

Father Bellora accepted the scroll with all the delight of a man ordered to cuddle a tarantula. "Tell me the gist."

"Why, 'tis that the Church of Rome hath erred…"

Father Bellora went stiff as a Puritan in a ballroom, eyes wide in horror. "How can he dare speak so!"

"He is the Abbot," Matthew answered with a shrug. " Tis hard, is't not? When we had thought the Pope infallible in matters of doctrine. Yet our good Lord Abbot doth say that he whom we have called the Holy Father knoweth not how matters fare here, nor their complexities; and furthermore, that he is too much bound by the licentious easiness of his forebears, and by the corruption of his clerks and scribes in the Curia."

"Yet how can he chastise the Holy See?" Father Bellora whispered.

"Because, saith the Lord Abbot, the Pope is, when all is said and done, only the Bishop of Rome, and is not truly greater than any other bishop. To make all of us mindful of that, and to make clear his standing as head of our Church, the Lord Abbot hath declared himself henceforth Archbishop of Gramarye."

Father Bellora only sat, transfixed in shock.

"And," Brother Matthew went on, "the Archbishop of Gramarye may surely chastise the Bishop of Rome. He doth decry the Pope's errors, saying that he doth err most especially in not demanding that all princes recognize the Church's greater wisdom in all matters of morality."

"But such matters encompass all of government!" Father Bellora protested. "What matter can a prince rule on that is not moral or immoral?"

"That is his point—and therein, saith our good Lord Abbot, lieth the cause of all the miseries of our worldly state."

"Yet the words of Christ! 'Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's!'"

Brother Matthew nodded. "Yet, saith our Lord Abbot, even Caesar must render unto God that which is God's—and in so doing, he must recognize the guidance of the Church."

Father Bellora paled. "Doth he mean to say…" but he couldn't finish the thought, his voice fading.

Brother Matthew nodded, aching with empathy. " Tis even so, Father. Our good Lord Abbot doth thus conclude: that the Church must needs be superior to the King, for that it is closer to God, and must therefore know what He doth wish far more accurately than any King could. And the King must recognize the authority of the Archbishop."

"How can the King not march against him?" Father Bellora whispered.