The Omega Factor(59)
“I have many issues to consider. Not the least of which is my friend, lying dead in the local morgue. Whose body, I am told, was disgracefully photographed by the Dominicans.”
“I’m sorry about that.”
“We need to free her from there,” Claire said.
An idea occurred to him. The images he possessed were no longer a bargaining chip. So if he was going to keep making progress with these women he had to gain their trust. The mother superior had started the ball rolling.
“What if I could get her body back?” he asked.
“That would be most appreciated.”
She paused.
“In many ways.”
Chapter 38
The village of Las Illas sat niched against the Pyrénées, in a swath of mountainous terrain that lay at the fringe of what would one day be called France. The only road leading to it was lined with tamarisk, an occasional almond tree, and plenty of silver poplars whose white leaves shook against the blue sky. It had existed for over fifteen hundred years, once an important settlement, a place where Hannibal had encamped after crossing the Pyrénées in 218 BC. Its small cathedral was classic Romanesque. A fortified church, built of solid masonry, with the narrowest of loopholes serving as windows. The town was one of the earliest Christian strongholds west of Rome and, up to AD 600, housed a bishop. By 1200, it had dropped to the status of a mere parish, its church inside cruelly denuded and gaunt, all of the silver and gold sold off long ago. One treasure, though, had been spared. It occupied a side chapel without windows, which cast it in shadow and made it hard to see.
An altarpiece. Painted on wood, representing Saint Michael.
On the morning of June 9, 1210, a small contingent of soldiers approached the town’s outer walls. The main attack force was over a hundred kilometers away, ravaging the Languedoc, rooting out heretics, killing Cathars. The Albigensian Crusade was proceeding, town after town falling. This group was a special contingent selected by the Dominicans to carry out a clandestine operation under direct orders from the pope. They’d broken from the main army and traveled south, staying off the roads, making their way past the forested foothills and up into the mountains.
Waiting for them on the path ahead stood a man wearing a faded bonnet. He had a lean face, close-shaven like a priest, with a blue jowl and a long chin, the eyes small and deep-set. One of those inscrutable Spanish faces that suggested much and told little. He was clearly aged, but walked with a springy step, shifting on his feet like a cat. They’d been warned about him. Half priest, half villain, superstitious, devout, a man who would knife anybody for a silver coin. No surprise that he was the first to greet them.
“We are here for les Vautours,” one of the soldiers called out.
The old man waved them off. “Leave. Now. You are wasting your time.”
None of them were in the mood for defiance. They’d experienced enough of that over the past few months, and their response had always been the same.
“Deal with him,” the Dominican who’d come south with them ordered.
Two of their number drew swords and advanced, skewering the old man.
The body dropped to the dusty road.
The contingent proceeded ahead through the open gate, into a small central square. The people here existed in relative isolation, belonging to nobody but themselves, the long uphill trek more of a barrier than a link with the outside world. Living here with the wind, and the menace of the rocky heights, it was easy to understand how the residents became comatose, shut out, buried into themselves.
Unafraid.
“Move out,” the Dominican said, “and bring everyone you find to the church.”
Kelsey sat still in the chair, listening to her prioress. “Did they find anyone?”
“The locals had seen the soldiers coming, so most had hidden themselves away. They managed to find one woman, whom they dragged screaming from her children. They cut off her ear and tossed it in the main square, with an announcement that if the villagers did not surrender themselves, more parts of her would be severed. An hour later they cut the other ear off. Still, no one appeared. They were about to cut her hand off when the residents surrendered. Each was questioned. None provided a shred of information. So the women were raped, then everyone was slaughtered.”
She was shocked. “What were they after?”
“The Chapel of the Maiden,” the prioress said. “The women of Las Illas had once been la garde d’honneur. The guard of honor. Protecting it. But the crusaders were ill informed since, by the time they arrived, that duty had long passed to others.”
Now she understood. “The Maidens of Saint-Michael?”
The older woman nodded. “They became the guardians.”
“Of what?”
The Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, which lay at the heart of the New Testament, were all penned by the beginning of the second century after Christ. Mark and John’s accounts were silent as to Christ’s birth. For them Jesus existed only as an adult, his adolescence never discussed. Mary was mentioned only in passing in one line of Mark. Luke and Matthew dealt with Christ’s birth and referenced Mary, but neither delved into her origins or subsequent life. Instead, she appears as a woman, ready to accept the virgin birth as the wife of Joseph. In none of the Gospels was Mary ever a constant companion of her son. In fact, mentions of her were rare. Mark, Luke, and John recounted the crucifixion with no mention of Mary. Only John placed her at the foot of the cross, and the apostle Paul never named her in any of his famed letters.