Worlds That Weren't

Yolande’s mouth seemed tightly shut, the ends of her lips clamped down in white, strained determination. Her eyes were dark, and they met his with such directness that he almost flinched away, thinking she could read his lust.

But she doesn’t seem to mind that.

She’s afraid, I think.

“I might need you to bring me back, Guillaume.”

Ignoring the puzzled remarks of the other men, Guillaume exploded. “You’ve come here for that? You’re not letting that damn pig-boy practice sorcery on you again!”

She flinched at the word. “It isn’t sorcery. He has grace. It’s prayer.”

“It’s dangerous.” Guillaume blinked a sudden rolling drop of sweat out of one eye. The moisture was stingingly cold. “You were somewhere else, ’Lande. Your spirit was. What happens if you don’t come back? What happens if he has another fit! What if you do? What if God’s too much for you?”

The holm-oak carving over the altar was only a collection of faint highlights off polished wood, not distinguishable as a face.

With a shudder he would have derided in another man, Guillaume said, “I believe in God. I’ve seen as many miracles as the next man. I just don’t believe in a loving God.”

“It’s all right.” Her smile suggested that she was aware of his reasons for being overprotective. He searched for signs that she was angry. He saw none.

“I’m going to pray now.” She walked to the altar. Guillaume saw her reach for the lantern there. She bent down, holding it close to the corpse.

“Shit…” The stench made Yolande clamp her hand over her mouth.

By the lantern’s light, Guillaume saw that Margaret Hammond’s bare hands and feet were white on top, purple underneath, flesh shrinking back to the bone. On duty here, you could watch her flesh shrink, swell, bubble. The front of her head, where her face had been, was black, lumpy, wriggling with mites. Her slim belly had blown out, and contained by the jack she wore, it made her corpse look ludicrously pregnant.

Yolande’s voice sounded low, angry. “She should have been buried before we saw her like this!”

She knelt down clumsily on the cold stone tiles by Margaret Hammond’s reeking body. The knees of her hose became stained with the body fluids of her friend. She closed her eyes, and Guillaume saw her place her hands across her face-across her nose, likely-and then bring them down to her breast, where she still wore the mail shirt over her gambeson and doublet.

Layers of wool, for the cold nights…under which would be her breasts, warm and soft.

Breasts pulled with the suckling of one boy who would be older now than Cassell, if he had lived. I need to forget that. It’s-confusing.

“What’s she doing?” Cassell asked in a subdued voice.

“The boy gets visions. Gives visions,” Guillaume corrected himself.

A mixture of respect and fear was in the air. God has His ways of sending visions, dreams, and prophecies to men. Usually through His priests, but not always. It is not unusual for someone born a peasant, say, in a small village near Domremy, to rise to be a military prophet by God’s grace.

Guillaume shivered. And if Ricimer is that, too? The Pucelle put the king of France back on his throne. The last thing we need is a male Pucelle out of Carthage, knocking the Turks arse over tit. Not while we’re signed up with the Bloody Crescent.

The young man brushed past Guillaume, toward Yolande, catching his gawky elbow against the heavy wool cloak. Guillaume watched Ric’s back as he walked up behind her. His voice was gruff, with the cracks of young manhood apparent in it.

“I still have your rosary.”

“Yes. Yes, of course.” Yolande put her hand to her neck. She let it fall down onto her thighs, where she knelt. “Show me more.”

“But-these men-”

“Show me more.”

It’s nothing but the repetition of the words in a different tone. Guillaume doubted she even knew she was doing it. But her voice carried the authority of her years. And the authority that comes with being shot, shelled, and generally shat on, on the field of battle. The pig-boy doesn’t stand a chance.

“I need to pray first.” Ric’s thinner frame was silhouetted against the altar, where the second lantern stood. He knelt down beside the crossbow woman. Out of the corner of his eye, Guillaume saw that Bressac and Cassell had both linked their hands across their breasts and closed their eyes. Sentimental idiots.

Ukridge put his water container to his lips, drank, wiped his face with the back of his hand, and suppressed a loud belch to a muffled squeak.

The pig-boy sat back on his heels and held up the woman’s rosary. The dark wood was barely visible against the surrounding dimness of the chapel.

“Look at the light.” Ric’s voice sounded more assured. “Keep looking at the light. God will send you what is good for you to know. Vir Viridianus, born of the Leaf-Empress, bound to the Tree and broken…”

The words of the prayer were not different enough. They skidded off the surface of Guillaume’s attention. He found himself far from pious, watching the woman and the boy with acute fear.

Yolande stood up.