The Maid: A Novel of Joan of Arc Read online

  Jehanne knew the curate. She'd confessed to him every morning for the last two months. She knew his thick, pale hands with the swollen red knuckles, knew the sight of them placing the wafer, Body of Christ, on her tongue, holding the silver communion cup as she drank, Blood of Christ, wiping the rim with the white linen cloth afterward. But the curate did not seem to know her now. He looked at her with cold, righteous eyes. As if he were looking down upon her from a very great distance. As if he had never seen her before in his life.

  "We have business with Jehanne," Sir Robert said to Thérèse. "Leave us, this is private."

  The curate turned to the boy, spoke quietly, words she could not hear. The boy set his sack down on the table and took out a gold bowl wrapped in flannel and a small glass bottle of water. He set the bowl down on the table, poured some water into it, and lifted it toward the curate with both hands.

  Jehanne stood up. "Don't do that. I won't be part of it."

  Metz had warned her that an exorcism was likely, but she had not believed it. They wouldn't, she thought. Not to me.

  But the curate was walking toward her now, holding the bowl out in front of him, murmuring Latin. "Ecce Crucem Domini, fugite partes adversae ..."

  Jehanne stepped backward. "Father, do not do this," she said, fighting to keep her voice steady.

  "Can't be sending a witch to meet the King, can we?" said Sir Robert.

  Her pride rose up then, a spiky black animal waking inside her, screeching. That they could think she was from the Devil, that anyone might imagine her a witch ... she started toward the priest. "You know I'm not a witch, Father. I've confessed to you every day for the last two months."

  "Witches are often excellent liars," said Sir Robert.

  The curate continued. "I command you, unclean spirit, whoever you are, along with all your minions now attacking this servant of God—"

  "Please, Father," said Jehanne, kneeling down at the curate's feet, pressing her face against his shins, her heart roaring in her chest. "You know there is no unclean spirit in me."

  But the curate was in a trance, chanting his holy words. "By the mysteries of the incarnation, passion, resurrection, and ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ, by the descent of the Holy Spirit, by the coming of our Lord for judgment, that you tell me by some sign of your name, and the day and hour of your departure. I command you, moreover, to obey me to the letter, I who am minister of God despite my unworthiness—"

  "Father!"

  "... nor shall you be emboldened to harm in any way this creature of God, or the bystanders, or any of their possessions."

  She was clutching the curate's legs now, sobbing as she looked up at him. She knew what happened to those who were exorcised. Whether they found you to be a witch or not didn't matter. You were marked for life. A freak. An outcast. "I beg you."

  Sir Robert stood with his lips pursed, eyes narrowed, arms crossed over his chest. "Throw some water on her, Father. See what happens."

  The curate lifted the gold bowl and dipped his fingers in the water. "We drive you from us, whoever you may be, unclean spirits, all satanic powers, all infernal invaders ..." He lifted his hand and flicked the water onto Jehanne. All eyes in the room, watching, waiting for her to go up in smoke.

  But she did not go up in smoke. She only wept. "Oh, Jesus," she cried. "Help me, Jesus."

  "Thus cursed dragon and you, diabolical legions—"

  "All right, that's enough," said Sir Robert. "She's not a witch."

  48

  "I began to fear the Church that day," she says to Massieu in the monstrous darkness of the tower. "I still loved it, but I began to fear it too." A shadow went over her heart when she thought of it. The curate coming toward her in his purple robe. The red look in his eyes. They wanted to kill you, she thought. They wanted your blood.

  PART II

  1

  Quickly now, the voices were saying. Go quickly, little one. No one can touch you! So she rode with her men across the cold yellow fields and the gray hills outside Vaucouleurs, toward the King in Chinon.

  A large crowd had gathered in Vaucouleurs to see her off that afternoon. It was a miserable day, freezing and rainy, fog creeping down the streets and swallowing up the rooftops. But still they'd come—hundreds of them, gathered together at the Porte de France, gaping and cheering and shoving each other, lifting children on their shoulders to see the Maid, the holy peasant on the black horse, possibly mad, dressed up as a boy, on her way to save France.

  The townspeople had bought her a new set of clothes for her journey. Once word had gotten around that Sir Robert was supporting Jehanne's mission, they'd pooled money to have an outfit made that actually fit her. A simple thing, an outfit any young man in her village might have worn: a thick black wool tunic with sleeves that did not hang below her fingers, some good brown woolen hose without holes in the feet, and snug leggings that laced up the front. Also, tall leather boots with spurs, a heavy gray cape, and a black felt cap with her name stitched crookedly in the back in red thread: JEHANNE, THE MAID. Every day I become more real, she thought as she looked at her new clothes. Every day I go further from my father. Further from the fury and the mud of Domrémy.

  As she rode through the crowds, Jehanne saw the Le Royers and Durand and Marie standing off to one side, huddled together in the rain, waving and weeping and smiling, their noses red with cold. Durand and Marie had come to the Le Royers' house earlier that morning to say their proper good-byes, Marie with a squalling, pink-faced infant in her arms, looking exhausted but satisfied. A look on her face as she nursed the child that said, Until you do this, you'll never know what real love is. Durand had been a wreck. Durand laughing, then weeping, when he saw Jehanne come down the stairs with her short hair and her boy's clothes. "God help you," he sobbed into her neck. "I hope I've done the right thing, helping you."

  Jehanne hugged him, thanked him for all he'd done, but she felt stiff, awkward, as if she were performing a pantomime. She did not like saying good-bye to him in front of so many people.

  "God bless you, darling," Thérèse screamed now as Jehanne rode past. "God bless the Maid of Lorraine!" And the crowds around her cheered and cried, "God bless the Maid of Lorraine!"

  Jehanne knew it wasn't about her, the love pouring out of the crowd. She knew it was about God—the thought of God alive inside of her, God here among them now—that made them all scream like that. But it was thrilling anyway. Every hair on her body stood up. She felt as if she were painted with light.

  There were six men who escorted her to Chinon, circling her in a kind of protective horseshoe as they rode: Metz and Bertrand; the King's wiry little messenger, Colet de Vienne; the archer Richard; and the two freckled servant brothers, Julian and Jean de Honnecourt, who, Jehanne knew, hated her from the beginning. Their looks said so when she met them outside the Le Royers' house that morning. Bold, sneering looks, openly disrespectful. "How those breeches feel on you, mam?" the older one, Julian, said when no one was listening. His teeth were white and very large, and his hair was orange and bushy like sheep's wool. Everything about him repulsed her. "Nice and tight, eh?"

  "They'll feel a lot better when we get to Chinon," she said dryly, as she climbed up onto the mounting stone and pulled her horse's girth tight.

  "Bet they will," said the boy, his younger brother laughing behind a large freckled hand.

  It took them eleven days to reach the King. A cold, treacherous ride through the worst of the Burgundian territory. Much of the countryside was flooded from the long winter rains—the pine forests turned into icy swamps, the rivers grown ferocious as lions. Crashing white rivers, very hard to cross. "One of them almost swallowed you up," Metz said later, although Jehanne knew it wouldn't. Yes, it snatched her off her horse and sucked her under with its freezing tongue, slammed her head against the rocky bottom, and rolled her over again and again, her lungs exploding in her chest, a red ribbon of blood rising from her skull. But she'd known the river would not be the end of
her. She'd known Metz would dive down and rescue her, grab her under the arms, and drag her up onto the shore, both of them lying there, gasping like beached fish as Colet led their frightened horses toward the banks. So she let the river roll her, let it slam her and toss her along its jagged corridors, her face calm, her eyes open, watching the storm of silver bubbles raging around her, thinking, Soon now, God will pull me up. Very soon a hand will appear ...

  They traveled mostly by night, in the dark, so they would not be seen. By day, they slept in caves and barns and ruined churches, curled up like dogs beneath their cloaks, their boots still on, hugging one another for warmth. Jehanne slept little. An hour, perhaps two, and then she was awake, her eyes wide open, the voices saying, Go, darling, go!

  She could feel the Godhead growing inside her now, growing and spreading like a secret plant. Feeding her and feeding off of her, its roots fusing with her bones, its delicate tendrils sprouting in her fingers. And as it grew, her wisdom grew, until she knew that the winds were with her and the stars in the night sky were with her, until she knew that holy rivers were coursing through her veins and ancient caves of knowledge were yawning open inside her skull, and she loved God then in a way she never would again, for her love was the naïve, untested love of a new bride—perfumed and dreamlike. Blind as a mole.

  Rarely was she afraid. War had run wild through the lands they were crossing—war jumping from house to house, from village to village, with its enormous torch, laughing as it tore the world apart, but the more Jehanne saw of war, the more eager she became to fight. As she rode, images burned themselves into her brain: a family hung from the branches of an oak tree, their blue feet dangling above the ground like wax flowers. Their eyes black, popped out like a crab's eyes. Another day a herd of starving cows lay wailing in the road—their sad maiden's eyes raised to the sky, their bellies swollen up tight as drums. A parade of horrors shouting at her, pleading with her. One day Jehanne saw a naked woman on the steps of a burned-down church, eating dirt. Stuffing it in her mouth greedily, as if it were a butter tart, shrieking when Jehanne tried to approach her. Shrieking as they rode away. And later that same night, Burgundians. A pack of Burgundians riding right past Jehanne and her men as they hid in the forest. Bertrand had spotted them first—a string of yellow torch flames streaking through the darkness. "Christ!" he said, snuffing his own torch quickly and hustling the others off the road and into the woods. They waited there, still as statues, holding their breath in the dark, praying silently as the riders approached. Please, Father. Help us.

  Drunk and shouting the men came, laughing and swearing, their faces red with drink. As they rode past, Jehanne saw a lumpy burlap sack tied with rope to the back of one of the horses. A pair of bare pink feet at one end, bouncing terribly on the back of the horse. When a muffled shriek came, the rider laughed, shouted, "Not long now, darling! Not long now!"

  After the men had passed, Jehanne and her little party waited for an hour before riding on. All of them trembling, too stunned to speak. "Jesus," said Bertrand, rubbing his hands over his face.

  Jehanne looked at her hands. "God's wrath will be upon them soon enough," she said.

  2

  There was darkness within the group too. The darkness of the Honnecourt brothers, freckled and defiant, elbowing each other behind Jehanne's back, laughing at her. On the first night of their journey, they had ridden through the Saulx-Noire forest, and Colet and Richard had been very upset about this. "Place is full of witches," Colet said, his face pale as chalk.

  Jehanne said that there were no such things as witches, and that they should not be afraid, for God was protecting them.

  Julian scoffed. "God my ass," he said.

  His brother giggled, then pretended to be coughing.

  Jehanne stared at him very hard and said that no man in her party was to blaspheme the Lord. "You do it again, I'll stick my sword in your heart, understand?"

  Julian made a girlish face and fluttered his hands in the air, a mockery of fear. Then Metz looked sharply at him and his brother until they both stopped smiling, and the group continued through the forest and down into a deep, wooded ravine.

  The muddy track lead steeply downhill through a tunnel of crooked beech trees, and soon the riding grew difficult. Jehanne's horse began to slip and stumble in the mud and rocks, the animal snorting and panting and pawing the earth, desperate to find purchase. A sharp wind had come up, a cruel hand on her back, forcing her downward into the mouth of the ravine. "Look, let me ride ahead of you," said Colet at last. "Watch how I do it."

  But as he moved his horse ahead of hers, Jehanne saw that Julian was waiting behind Colet, leering at her. He rode close behind her as they continued down the hill, snickering whenever her horse stumbled. And the forest seemed an evil place then. The bare black trees blocked out the night sky, and the wind made the branches creak and moan, and when the others were far enough ahead, Julian drew his horse up almost beside Jehanne's and spoke quietly, so only she could hear: "You ought to feel right at home in here," he said in a soft, ugly voice, "being a witch and all."

  Jehanne gripped her reins. "If you think I'm a witch, you shouldn't be here."

  "Don't have much choice though, do I? Got to go where the boss goes."

  "I'm not a witch."

  Julian smiled innocently. But as Jehanne rode ahead of him, she heard him hiss once more, "Witch."

  3

  Other kinds of darkness too. Darkness of a sweeter kind with Metz. One night, when they were deep into the Goddon lands, they stopped at the abbey of Saint-Urbain. A famous place. A known refuge for anyone in need of shelter—criminals, pilgrims, wandering monks, runaways. It stood in black silhouette against the gray night sky, a tall stone fortress with a bell tower, perched high on a cliff above the Marne River. On the way up to the gate, Metz rode alongside Jehanne and smiled gently. "No sense anyone knowing you're a girl, right?" She nodded and let him pull her hood up over her head, her ears blushing as he did, the base of her spine glowing with pleasure.

  She knew he wanted her. She knew it and liked it. In spite of herself, she liked it. The heat of his adoring eyes on her skin. His warm hand on her waist, helping her off her horse. When a monk appeared at the abbey gate to let them in, she kept her head down as Metz had instructed her to and stared at the brown rain-pocked puddles on the ground as Colet showed the monk their letter of introduction from Sir Robert. It was very cold. She could not feel her hands. She made fists and hit them hard against her legs, but it made no difference. As soon as the monk had turned away, Metz smiled shyly and handed her his fur-lined gloves.

  The monk led them through the big wooden gate and across a wet cobbled courtyard, into a dormitory where there was a large, long room with a big fire blazing at one end. It was all she could do not to run at the fire. There was hardly any furniture in the room: a small wooden table and two little rough-hewn wooden chairs by the window. Also a bed. One big bed pulled up close to the fireplace, piled high with blankets. Jehanne went and held her hands in front of the fire. She tried not to look at the bed, but she knew everyone else was looking.

  "Well now, this isn't half bad," said Bertrand, dropping his satchel onto the floor and stretching his arms over his head.

  Julian and his brother smiled at each other. Then they smiled horribly at Jehanne.

  When the monk left to get them some food, the younger Honnecourt bolted the door behind him. A sharp electricity took over the room. Jehanne looked up at the six men who stood around her, their wet faces flickering in the torchlight, and for a moment they all saw it: her body naked and spread wide on the mattress, her wrists and ankles tied to the bedposts, the men taking their turns with her, cheering one another on, leaping onto her like dogs, bucking and howling in the firelight.

  "This should be interesting," said Julian, raising his eyebrows.

  Metz slapped the back of his head very hard, and Julian stumbled a few exaggerated steps forward. "You say another word you'll sleep i
n the bottom of that river."

  Jehanne walked over to the bed and crossed her arms over her chest and looked at it. After a moment, she turned toward Metz and Bertrand. "Can I trust you two to protect me in the night?"

  The two men glanced at each other. Bertrand nodded quickly, a sharp soldier's nod. "Of course," he said.

  Metz looked at Jehanne. He nodded, but his eyes said something else.

  "All right then, you and Bertrand and I will take the bed," she said, her breath coming out in long white banners. "The rest of you can bunk down by the hearth."

  Deep in the night she awoke tumbling inside a wave of desire. She was aware of only the feeling at first. Just the hunger rinsing through her half-asleep body, the splendid heat of another body pressed up against hers ... whose body? God's, she thought, only God could make her feel this way. Only gradually did she realize that it was Metz who was pressed against her beneath the heavy woolen cloak, breathing quietly into her hair, his thick erection pressed into her back.

  And it was not so much that she was disappointed to realize it was Metz, as she was disappointed to realize that because it was not God or any of the saints, she must stop it. It couldn't go further. By the hearth, a tall black figure moved back and forth quietly, throwing logs onto the crackling red flames. And she knew that no one else knew what was happening to her. It was a secret. She lay still and closed her eyes, breathing, unwilling to let go of the sensation just yet—the hardness of him against her back, pressing gently, the smell of wood smoke and damp stone and skin in the air. She could tell by Metz's breathing that he was awake. On the other side of her, Bertrand was snoring lightly. Curled on his side with his fist pressed against his cheek like a child.