Paradise for the Damned. - 12. Chapter 12

The next day Amaline came over with a cloth bag in one hand and a book open in another for questions. Her loose hair exhaled a heady aroma of bread, and her eyes, apple eyes, held to an anticipatory gleam. Neither her male relations nor Aurin mores could prevent her from coming alone to Claude's cottage in order to learn her letters.

That she was not Alphonse, Claude thought a crime, a great grievous crime. Alphonse had condescended to learn how to write his name and no more. The stripling had been adamantly against learning, as letters did not plow the fields or fix the fence and certainly would not bring him the elusive gift of Clarisse’s cunny, no matter what Claude had said about letters elongating the member.

Most days, however, Claude could not decide between deforming the object of his sexual need into the form of the shawl-bundled peasant girl, or feeling embittered that he had done the task of educating her. It had been easier to shove a book into those soft paws than to endure her Cassandra-like pronouncements on lurking beasts and sure perdition.

Amaline flounced about the common room in a frightening meddlesome air. Opened jars, sniffed flagons, commented on the unlit hearth, opened the backdoor and praised his humongous cabbages, sighed at the heavens and its miserliness of late in refusing the bounty of rain, then sat across from Claude and plunged into a serious fit of blinking.

Bits of skin flaked on her lips half-open to a view of yellowed shards of teeth. Her eyes were demanding—more demanding these days, Claude thought—like the torches of a crowd intent on an auto-da-fé. He reddened and fingered the still-fresh slice of his wound under the table.

Gruffly, he arose to the hearthside. The wall above it was festooned with hanging herbs and sausages, and a bowl of oranges. Guy had been very particular of his food. He would be fed, and fed well. That meant the good meat, the good wine, the good white bread with the heavenly cordials. He was almost overtaken with shame over the rich larder that would have the once-a-year-meat-eating villagers smatter in envy.

Penitently, he threw an orange to Amaline. “Here, have an orange.”

Amaline sniffed it. “Is that what it is called?” She kept sniffing and perusing it in a manner that caused Claude some consternation. Perchance the orange was bad, he wondered.

“Cut them in quarters and you suck on them,” Claude said to find some ease in her actions.

“I’ll save it for the little ones.”

Sighing, Claude proceeded to gather oranges, leeks, cabbages harvested from his garden and dumped them on the table. “Take these as well.”

Amaline’s cheeks rounded happy mounds; all suspicion was gone as she blithely put vegetable after vegetable into her bag. Claude thought it was a good face, especially welcome in his abode of leprous iniquity. Yesterday, while he was nursing his wound, Sabrine, with all the scholarly gravity lent by her bared fangs, sermonized on sheep raising. In her esteemed opinion sheep did not take years to raise, a month or two and then a rambunctious slaughter. Guy countered that the long years of tender care make for delectable mutton.

A whorl of unease unravelled in Claude's belly, causing him to flump upon the bench. He was careful to put away his wounded hand under the table. Amaline had taken to rolling an orange on the table, thinking aloud on whether aubergines paired well with nettles. But he darkened on every palatal syllable of hers, every long-lashed look on her orange babies. For one so close to goodness, did she not feel the rot of his soul or the rank evil in the hut?

“Mayhap, you come here again, I shall force myself upon you,” Claude said suddenly.

Her hands dropped the orange, and her cheeks dimpled into the makings of a frown. “What evil has come upon you?”

“Have you no care as you come here alone, merry without thought for your person?”

She shifted, flitting eyes from end to end of the table in a shuffle of hurt. Claude regretted a little for unnerving her.

“I hear Martis Algais takes interest in you,” Claude said to mollify her agitation.

“He pleases Papa. Leo thinks him good,” Amaline said, her voice dropped an octave.

“And why do you come here still? Your Papa gives me the bad eye of an angry frog. Your Mama frowns at me of late. Clarisse gossips about you and I.”

“You ever grouse. Papa doesn’t know I’m here. He thinks I’m gathering nettles.”

Claude imagined her father dashing upon him with a pear of anguish for his buttocks. The resulting horror of the image made his vision bouncy to the view of the lute and sword on the wall. “You know how to read and write. What more do you want?”

“I know Occitan. But I must learn French and Latin, especially Latin. I want to know what the priest says.”

“You’re evermore demanding. What would Martis think of you knowing how to write when he doesn’t?”

“It would be his concern, not mine.”

Claude clenched. “I have taught you enough. Come here no more.”

A blustery moment followed in which Amaline smoothed her skirts, rubbed her cheeks, scuffed an orange against the table. Then she exhaled powerfully, landing fists on the table. “If you do not wish to teach me, I will speak with your tutor for proper lessons.”

Glaring, Claude fisted his hands on the table. But Amaline’s face failed to return scorn for scorn, fading into a look of concern. Her eyes were strong on the blood trickle on the side of his right hand. Claude tsked. It was a petty wound, barely a slice, not in need of any bandages or sedulous care, but there it was bleeding like a throat gashed at a battlefield.

“Leave,” he said, gathering his hands to himself.

Amaline would have none of the stoicism and so flurried to his side, saying, “You’re hurt, you’re hurt.” She fussed and lapped him up with teenage maternal concern. Claude glared helpless, could erect no shield against her warmth. He melted and smiled and nodded to her outrage of the wrathful circumstances.

“What happened?”

“My—”

His heart turned to sand. Claude saw in those small hands holding his hands the shackles and chains of affection. He saw Guy dangling her over him as collateral. He saw Guy strangling her long neck and sucking her blood. He saw Guy using her to bend him. He saw Sabrine deciding to make her sheep. The Virgin! And he rushed to the hearthside.

“A dog did me its curses,” he said, dazed with the logistical maneuverings for firewood and supper.

“A cursed dog it was,” she exclaimed.

Claude laughed tensely.

The door jangled and Guy strode in with a look of jolly, gemmed fingers, an ostrich-plumed hat and all.

“God be with you, fair lady.” He doffed his hat to Amaline. She colored and simpered.

“She detests the dog that bit my hand,” said Claude hopefully.

“Does she?” Guy jostled into a seat by Amaline. She flinched, dropping her gaze to her lap. “Donaisela, if God commandeth and you disobeyed thereupon he struck you dead, who’s in the wrong?”

“I would be.”

“You have great wisdom for one so young.”

“What if you contravened the Devil demanding you bend?” Claude asked.

“I do not hold congresses with the Devil,” she said.

“Say he did.”

“St. Catherine keeps me. No demon could hex me.”

“Say—”

“Claude, our lady is pure of heart and body. The Devil would flee from her holy presence,” Guy said.

“But Diamhin,” Claude crooned the name he was forbidden to say, “even the Devil appeared to our Lord.”

Guy gave him a private glance of fangs.

A wet fear glided down Claude’s , then an angry musing to drill out those fangs deflagrated, but that would lead to his crucifixion upon the table. And so he grabbed her hand and said, “Amaline, shall we gather those nettles?”

The day was hot and dry. Sunlight smeared over the tree trunks walling one side of the path, distributing shadow petals over his shoes. Claude plodded a few steps behind Amaline who was scampering from bush to bush in search of the greenest, waxiest nettles to be used for soup.

“We must ask Mama to prepare you a poultice. The wound might fester,” she said.

Claude was much too lost on Guy’s thoughts on godly punishment to notice her face patched with red and pink blotches, or that the yellow flowers of the broom shrubs had come into full bloom.

“Have enough nettles?” he asked to evade her demanding smile.

“Enough nettles.” Amaline showed the bag of jagged-edged leaves with silvery bristly skin.

A stray dog lay on the path, eyes half-closed, fainting in the sun. The great oak passed them by with its offering of shade like a tattled coif. The cylindrical tower of the granary came into view, as did the green fields swaying and breathing, dipping, rising, dipping to the far horizon.

Then they walked into Quentin slapping Leo in the front yard and Matheva quaking in time to his booms of chastisement. Apparently Leo played taverns in Toulouse, raped women, made bastards, which perhaps would have been forgiven, but he stayed four days away in Toulouse, causing Matheva to cry over her son stolen by thieves.

Claude stalled and groaned in quiet consternation. The sound of Amaline’s bag dropping ruthlessly on the ground alerted him to her flitting to the scene. She stopped midway between Quentin and Leo and spread her arms wide like Jesus on the cross.

Christ’s blood. Claude knelt down and shoved the spilled items back into the bag, only for the nettles to sting his hands, which in turn broke up more slabs of mental curses. A slap and feminine whimper startled him to look up again.

“What were you doing with the stranger?” Quentin yelled at Amaline. “I told you to keep away from him.”

The rest of the sons clustered around Matheva wading in her tears as if looking for the courage to stand. Leo was mumbling in the pose of an enraptured sinner behind the tottering crucifix of his sister.

The nettles had irritated Claude’s wound, causing it prickle with blood. How long would it take for her fall and marry the dust, he wondered morosely. It had taken Antoine exactly three blows to the belly. Ruffians had jeered that Antoine had the affectations of a maiden delighted on hippocras. Antoine countered that he passed water standing. They were very determined to correct that travesty, and so began the comedy of six men and a sissy before Claude’s enthralled eyes. It was better theater than the Christmas nativity play one street over.

Claude threw back a glance to another sound of a hefty whack.

Amaline still standing like Jesus.

Claude picked up the bag and walked gingerly around the scene to the side of crying Matheva and placed it right by her shaking five-year-old son. It took another moment for Quentin to stop mid-slap and notice his gangly monkish presence.

“’Twas you who corrupted Leo,” Quentin said. “Now you aim to corrupt Amaline?”

Claude could not quite decide between a frown and a crafty prideful sneer over his corrupting company, but Amaline…. A patch of red had spread like claws from her lips to her ear.

He should say something, but walking away seemed more prudent. Amaline would bother him no more. Guy would not use her against him. Sabrine might not think she would make for good sheep. And his heart would be sealed shut against intruders. Was achieving peace this simple?

Claude saw Alphonse and his mother trundling along to the church on the main path. Already the whimpers and cries lost their sting as the man looked taller and brawnier than a week ago. He should hop after him and cackle a good tale of Zeus and Ganymede, but his stupid wound was bleeding generously now. Paire Dennis had said Christ’s wounds bleed when sinners grieve him.

While Claude was fizzling over his dithering tower of justifications, Quentin gaped at him as though he were told two and two was five.

“You shall keep away from her,” he growled.

“Claude, leave us,” Matheva pleaded, drying her eyes.

Ah, yes, country people with country concerns for familial integrity and loyalty. Quentin was indeed dominus over his ostale. Claude caught a glimpse of Amaline’s drooping head and felt like the ball being kicked between foolishness and village propriety. Amaline herself would be just as provincial if she discovered his heretical desires. She had God to blame for her weaker sex, not him. He would remain whole and strive for no one even if he must sink below a demon. He walked away, not quickly, but with a wobbly self-pride as if each step could secure the foundations of his integrity.

“And you, Leo, what did I say about keeping her away him?” Quentin commenced again.

Claude’s pace hastened. His hair flared in his own nervous wind. However, Sabrine was sauntering towards him, arrayed in a colored disarray: brown sleeves, blue kirtle, green kerchief and the dirty white smock underneath them all.

Just as he decided to pretend that he did not see her, Quentin whacked Leo’s head. “What kind of a man can’t keep his sister bridled?”

Sabrine paused, looked to Claude to pair her sense of disgust. He looked away, and the silence was splintered with more cries. With a soldier's air, she smashed past him to the commotion, muttering, “How you spoil my good day with your brawling.”

Paralyzed, Claude watched the family sniffle and nod desperately to Sabrine’s invasion of peace. “You are dominus, you must rule with reason and restraint … why you lad whore-mongering and displeasing your Mama so … Such a beauteous maiden wrinkled in tears, Senher, would you ruin her face and have her miss her good day?”

Claude went away, feeling evilly as though in a distorted land where his chest was thin, his feet were heavy ingots, his neck was long and wispy barely supporting his pinhead. He walked long and heavy, and upon opening the door to his hut, judgment hounded: Guy was right.

***

Over the next few days Claude gave particular attention to his loathsome self. Though he said he strove for no one, he had, and ruinously so. The comedy of a six men and sissy had ended a tragedy of six men and two sissies. He had to intervene with the Sissy because—even after Antoine’s death he never determined why he stepped out of himself to help a stranger. The man was no fair pillicock, and his voice had an annoying whistling to it. That uncommon moment was the start to a dim relationship.

Antoine is dead and buried.

With that, Claude shunted away unwholesome brooding and returned to reading French romances and Occitan verse. Books were good. Books were salvation. Books were a balm. The wound healed without leaving a scar. Deo Gratias. He celebrated the cooler weather and escape from the omen of ugly hands by singing praises to the Virgin and tending to the vegetable plot. The excess cabbages and carrots would go to Alphonse and his mother, not Matheva or Quentin who, these days, glared at him as if they were tossing coins to a beggar.

Guy shouted from the backdoor. “Get thee away from the sun. We have an invitation to a grand party of rich humans. You must look soft like the sissy you are.”

“Help me with the weeding,” Claude said.

“Do I look like a boar-ravished peasant?”

“You look like a demon.”

“Bless me. Woo me a little. Tell me what a great horn I have.”

“Horns you mean,” Claude said. “Besides, am I to waste pretty words on a man who swore, ‘Upon my blood honor, I, Diamhin Nogallach, have never taken a man to my bed’.”

“Oh ye of little faith. Miracles happen, although I have never seen them happen in my five centuries of existence. But as they say, God’s mercy endures forever. A gentle word here and there might just turn me green-eyed for your short implement,” he puffed.

“I’d do brave jousts for your possession, but alas … I would that you were dead.”

Guy tumbled into a wide lake of laughter. “Little human, shall I recite the ledger wherein filled the names of those who want me dead?”

“The whore speaks evil to your person, and he still lives,” Sabrine’s crisp tone interrupted. She had planted her chin on Guy’s shoulder from behind, her black hair loose over his chemise.

“He may say whatever he will about my person, for his end will be the same.”

“When Matfre called you a dawdling hen, you cracked his neck. And Bidonne … I’d ne’er forget her ripped throat when she challenged your blood.”

Guy shrugged. “Blood and death will harken later. Now is the time for the sweet and the good and the merry.”

“And cabbages.” Claude raised a big one in the air.

Sabrine came over to Claude in the svelte grace of a lady cat, obviously not in want of the dusty carrots. “Shall I tell you of Matfre? Guy chased him until the lout threw himself to the mercy of the Garonne. Guy saved him, drained him of blood, ate his heart, and threw him back to the river.”

Claude squirmed. “No carrots for him.”

She yawned like a fanged beast. “Diamhin spoils you. Take care not to spurn his grace.”

The bright day petered to dull and grey, and Claude remembered to be calm and docile. In the end she was just Guy’s pet, and not his concern.

“You play with weeds to abscond from study,” came Guy’s big voice.

On Sabrine’s face was affixed a smile for Claude, and then she traipsed back to her tall rock of supreme strength. They bickered on the particularities of training sheep.

“He knows nothing of honor or respect, not even fit for sheep. ” Sabrine kissed Guy on the cheek, her insistent hands on his sleek waist.

“Mine pleases me greatly. Find your own sheep,” Guy said.

“I shall.”

A week later Claude ran into Sabrine at the church square. She had traded the color and pomp of a city wench for the raiment of a widow: black woolen kirtle, black coif. Amaline, Leo, and Alphonse circled around her, heads inclined towards her humble face, wondrously attentive to her tale of being Guy’s long lost elder sister. Claude saw death, and it would not be his.