There was a sweet smell in the room. I felt about me with my fingers. I was in a sitting position, on a chair which had arms and a back and was covered with some sort of fabric, soft and smooth in places, worn in others. A comfortable chair. This wasn’t the boot of a car. It was no prison cell. I moved my feet. They were free. There was carpet beneath them.
I ran my fingers up my legs and my body. I was still wearing the same clothes; jeans, shirt, trainers. But when I felt underneath the shirt, the medallion wasn’t there. I breathed in sharply. This was nothing to do with Egfrith. He would not have taken the medallion. He may want me to give it up, but he wouldn’t take it from me.
I pushed myself to standing and felt about in front of me with my hands. They touched nothing, so I tried some shuffling steps. After a moment I encountered a table. I felt its surface and it was soft, like felt. A card table maybe. In the middle was a large vase with flowers in it, fleshy petals. This was the source of the smell. They were lilies, and although I couldn’t see them, I imagined they were white. I touched the stamens and felt powder on my fingers. It would be pollen, red and staining. I wiped it on the table top.
I turned the other way and bumped into a sofa. It was covered in the same fabric as the chair. It had a couple of cushions on it and large rolling arms with studs at the front. I felt my way behind it to the wall.
Now I could explore the dimensions of the room. Keeping my hands on the wall, I felt my way along. I encountered a bookcase full of clothbound books, and past that some sort of desk, made of wood. There were two picture frames leaning against it. I reached a corner and started along the next wall.
I found the door to the room and tried the handle, but the door was locked. I knocked on it loudly and waited, but there was no sound. The smell of the lilies was overpowering, but I thought I could smell something else too, a spicier, musky smell, like incense. If incense was burning in the room, surely I would see some sort of glow. There was nothing. Not even a line of light at the bottom of the door.
I ran my hands over the wall at the sides of the door, and encountered what I had hoped I would find: a light switch. I flicked it and the light came on, dazzling me.
The room was furnished with faded splendour. The carpet was threadbare in places, and the red chairs, which were once luxurious, were now pale and bulging with overuse. The wallpaper was yellow with dirty patches near the door and the light switch. The thick brown curtains were closed.
There was a chaise longue near the window. Beau was lying on it, watching me.
“Well done,” he said. “The bringer of light.”
“Lucifer.”
“No, that is not my name, though I am flattered that you mistake me for such a distinguished gentleman.”
“Lucifer is the bringer of light. That’s me, not you. You prefer to keep people in the dark.”
“Well,” he looked me up and down, “I’m not sure that I ever pictured him quite that way. But who knows? The devil has many disguises.”
“Where is my medallion?”
“Ah, the medallion. Ma chérie, I think you’ll find it’s actually my medallion. A small matter of a poker game, if you remember, which you lost. You’re not a sore loser, are you?”
“I need it back.”
“But why should I give it to you my dear? Tell me that.”
“I can get you money.”
“Yes, I’m sure you can. Egfrith would pay handsomely for the return of his queen, I’m sure. But I quite like the medallion.” He took it from his pocket and held it up by the chain, examining the coin as it dangled in front of his face. “It’s rather beautiful. And so very, very old. I’m sure its value is much greater than the gold it’s made of. If I were to take this to a museum...”
“You can’t. It’s mine.”
“No, it’s mine. If you can’t stand losing you really shouldn’t play games, ma petite fille.”
“I’m not a little girl.”
“Peut-être pas,” he said. He dropped the medallion into his other hand and put it back into his pocket. “We shall see.”
“What do you mean? Why have you brought me here?”
He rolled onto his side, bending his left arm to support his head. The smell I’d noticed before wafted more strongly when he moved. I recognised it as sandalwood. He was gazing at me intensely and I wanted to twist myself away.
“Do you have visions, Saint Etheldreda?”
Even when I closed my eyes, I could see him watching me.
“Does the Lord Jesus Christ visit you in the night? Does He show you His body? His wounds?”
I had been so busy recently, rushing about the country with Jen, that I hadn’t even thought about visions. I suddenly wondered where Wolf was, if he’d got to Rome.
“I have been visiting your friend, Jules. She has visions. But she is a very stubborn woman and will tell me nothing about them.”
“Why should she?” I said.
“Ah, why indeed.” Beau smiled at me. “Why don’t you sit down, have a drink. There is a carafe of water on my desk, and I have a bottle here if you want something stronger.”
My throat was parched. I couldn’t remember when I last had water. I went to the desk and poured myself a glass.
“I have been unable to persuade Jules to tell me anything, despite offering many temptations. She has struggled. She is not made of stone, and I flatter myself that I have made it very hard for her to keep her promises to God.”
“What temptations?”
“Temptations of the flesh, my child.” I snorted. “Ah, I see you don’t know your friend as well as you think. Jules has desires that she struggles to keep from her mind. All those lonely hours in her cell, with nothing to distract her. Her thoughts go wayward sometimes.”
“Why would she tell you about her visions?”
“I have offered her pleasures which make her eyes shine. She tries to keep her face clean of desire, but she is not the poker player that you are. I can see which things stir her. She found it easy to abandon the plodding folk of her village, the vanilla life she had with her husband. But when I talked to her of darker deeds, of the things a man and woman might do with each other without the grace of God, then she paced her cell, unable to keep her equilibrium.”
“She was probably disgusted by you.”
“No, she was not troubled by me. It was her own desire which caused her to request sackcloth to wear beneath her clothes. But in the end, I could not break her. Despite my tales of depravity, she would tell me none of her own.”
I drank the water from the glass in three gulps and poured another.
“What has this got to do with me?”
“You are going to tell me about your visions. You are going to describe what the Lord our Saviour does that makes young girls so keen to devote themselves to him. You are going to give me all the details.”
“No, I’m not.”
As I drained the second glass, I detected an aftertaste, something bitter which I’d missed in the haste of the first.
“But you are.”
“What was in that water?”
“Before long, you’ll be telling me everything I want to know,” he said.
The bitter taste was flooding through me. I put my fingers down my throat to make myself sick.
“I wouldn’t bother,” he said, holding up a small blue bottle. “It’s very fast. It will be in your system already.” He swung his legs around and stood up, then gestured to the chaise longue. “You might want to lie down,”
“What is it?” I asked.
“An opiate. I’ve been working on it for a while. I wanted something that would bring visions without producing a catatonic state. So that the subject would be able to speak, to describe what they are seeing as it happens. I’ve tried it out on some of the young girls and boys who tout their wares in the marketplace. It worked very well, although their visions were really quite tame, considering their profession. I’m hoping for something better from you.”
“You’ll get nothing from me.”
“I love your spirit,” he said. “Lie on the chaise longue,” as I stumbled a little, “you’ll find your legs are getting weak.”
I wanted to argue, but at that moment my legs gave way beneath me.
“Ah, too late. I will need to assist you I see.”
He grabbed me beneath the arms. I wanted to fight him off, but my limbs were now beyond my control, and he dragged me across the carpet and half lifted, half rolled me onto the chaise longue.
“Comfortable?”
I was more comfortable than I had ever been in my life, my body suffused with a delicious languor.
“No,” I managed to whisper, but the poison was flooding into my mind as well now and it was hard to focus on my anger.
“Just lie back,” he said. “Let it come to you. Invite Him in, your beloved, your Lord Jesus. Let Him come to you as you like Him to, and let the words flow from your lips.”
“He’s here,” I said.
“Dis-moi. What does He look like? What is He wearing?”
“He’s wearing the clothes of crucifixion.”
“Ah, the loin cloth. Is it before or after?”
“They are bloodstained. He has wounds.”
“Describe them.”
“He has holes in His hands, and His legs are bloody and torn from where He was tied. He has welts on His back from being beaten, raised stripes of red, which leak blood.”
“What is He doing?”
“He kneels before me. He offers me His wounds that I may touch them. He offers me His blood that I might drink.”
“Ah!”
“He has tears in His eyes.”
“Do as He says. Touch. Drink.”
“My mouth is in His palm. My tongue is exploring the hole. The blood is sweet and tastes of metal.”
“And His side? Does He have a wound in His side?”
“The wound gapes in His side. He is taking my hand and guiding it to the wound.”
“Ah, oui! Continue.”
“He puts my fingers between the lips of His wound. New blood trickles from it. He presses my head to His side that I may drink of it.”
“And your hand?”
“My fingers are sliding into His flesh. It is hot. I can no longer see my fingers; my palm disappears into His body.”
“And what of Him? Does He feel pain?”
“He groans with ecstasy. I can feel His groans vibrate through His body. My fingers are touching His organs.”
“And His other organ? Is He aroused?”
“It is hidden by His loin cloth.”
“Remove the loin cloth.”
“The loin cloth is on the floor. His organ is proud and ready.”
“Is your hand still inside Him?”
“The wound is gone. He has changed.”
“What do you mean changed? Healed?”
“He has changed. He is no longer my Lord and Saviour. He is my beloved.”
“What do you mean?”
“He is inside me, we are moving together.”
“You’re fucking Jesus?”
“Egfrith. I am with my beloved.”
“Egfrith! You’re not meant to be with Egfrith, fucking like humans.”
“Oh, this is sweeter than anything I have imagined.”
“Fucking hell! I should have broken that wall down and forced the other one from her cell. She’d have given me something better than this.”
“Eg!”
“Oh, fucking shut up, I don’t want to hear about you and your bloody Egfrith.”
“I love him. He is my husband.”
A door slammed and he left the room. I was alone with the dream of Egfrith, his body above mine, his dear face looking down at me. Beau had taken the medallion with him, but I didn’t care. I no longer had need of it.