The Book Without Words_ A Fable of Medieval Magic - Avi [24]
“I am,” said Sybil.
“You need not be. I’m little more than a presence with neither the strength nor inclination to do you harm. There are more important people to fear than me.”
“Who?”
“Thorston.”
“He’s dead,” said Sybil.
“Dead!”
“We buried him today.”
“Where?”
“In the house,” said Sybil, belatedly thinking she should not have made the admission.
Brother Wilfrid seemed to sway in a breeze. “Did he … did he not make the stones?” he asked.
Though she knew exactly what the monk was asking about, Sybil said, “What stones?”
“He was making them when I first came,” said Wilfrid. “They must be in the house. You need to find them. You are in great danger.”
“Why?”
“Do you know nothing about them?”
Sybil shook her head.
Brother Wilfrid was silent for a long moment. “Then you must hear me,” he finally said.
15
“It was in 973,” began the monk, “seventy-three years ago, that a boy was born. Extraordinary omens occurred: stars fell out of the heavens. On Saint Waccar’s day, the sun grew dark at noon. Sheets of fire hung in the night sky. Between cockcrow and dawn, frightful flashes of lightning were observed. There were those who swore they had seen dragons flying through the air. These dreadful omens were followed by a great famine that stirred the flames of civil conflict. All over Northumbria, thieves and brigands roamed. In the strife that followed, the boy’s parents were killed.
“Relations took the child in, but the ravages of famine overwhelmed all, and he lost them, too. Alone, he lived in fear. And when it appeared as if life could not be worse, news spread that Viking raiders had returned to Northumbria. They looted churches and slaughtered many, while taking some into slavery and holding others for ransom.
“Devastation ruled the land.
“So it was that by the time the boy reached thirteen years of age, beyond all else, he feared death.
“The boy heard that the safest place on earth was Saint Elfleda’s monastery, which was on a small island off the northeastern coast of Northumbria. There he accepted the only work he could get, that of a goatherd.”
“Who was that boy?” asked Sybil.
“Your master, Thorston.”
16
“One afternoon,” the monk went on, “long boats with high dragon bows and long oars appeared. The boats carried some two hundred bearded, long-haired men with iron helmets, and chain mail on their chests. Shields on the boats sides proclaimed them to be Viking raiders.
“After dragging the boats high onto the beaches, the men took up axes, swords, and shields. With fierce shouts and cries, they raced inland. When the monks of Saint Elfleda’s saw them, they dropped their tools and fled, only to be overtaken and killed. Screams of terror and cries for mercy filled the air. Looting began. From a place of concealment Thorston saw it all.
“How old are you?” the monk suddenly asked Sybil.
“Thirteen,” she said.
“His age at that time, exactly.
“As for me, at the time I was a young monk entrusted with a great responsibility, a book. Clutching this book I fled the monastery through a small door in the wall, only to come upon a very frightened Thorston. The boy reeked of goat. ‘Follow me,’I cried to him.
“The two of us ran to the western side of the island, and then over the sandbar to the mainland. Once we were safe—thinking he would help me—I foolishly told Thorston about the Book Without Words. ‘You should praise God,’I told him, ‘that He has sent you—as a means of your salvation—to help keep this book from evildoers.’
“‘Why do you have it, then?’
“‘Young and weak though I am, Abbot Sigfrid entrusted it to me that I might shield it from those who might use it,'” I said, and I opened the book and gingerly turned the stiff, yellow parchment pages.
“Thorston, looking down over my shoulder, said, ‘Brother Wilfrid, the pages are blank. How does one read it?’
“‘It requires green eyes and earthly desire.’
“‘Why green eyes?’he asked.
“‘The old religion claimed green to be the color of life.’
“And earthly desire?’
“The things