The Council of the Cursed Read online

  To the memory of a great friend,

  Peter Haining (2 April 1940–19 November 2007),

  Sister Fidelma’s ‘godfather’.

  His humour and support will be sorely missed.

  His like will never be there again.

  AD670:…et ad sacrosanctum concilium Autunium, Luna in sanguinem uersa est.

  Chronicon Regum Francorum et Gothorum

  AD670:…and at the sacred Council of Autun, the Moon became the colour of blood.

  Chronicle of the Kings of the Franks and Goths

  Principal Characters

  Sister Fidelma of Cashel, a dálaigh or advocate of the law courts of seventh-century Ireland

  Brother Eadulf of Seaxmund’s Ham in the land of the South Folk, her companion

  At Autun (the religious)

  Leodegar bishop and abbot of Autun

  Nuntius Peregrinus the Papal Nuncio or envoy

  Ségdae abbot and bishop of Imleach

  Dabhóc abbot of Tulach Óc

  Cadfan abbot of Gwynedd

  Ordgar bishop of Kent

  Brother Chilperic steward to Leodegar

  Brother Gebicca a physician

  Brother Sigeric a scribe

  Brother Benevolentia steward to Ordgar

  Brother Gillucán steward to Dabhóc

  Brother Andica a stonemason

  Abbess Audofleda the abbatissa of the Domus Femini

  Sister Radegund the stewardess of the Domus Femini

  Sister Inginde

  Sister Valretrade

  At Autun (the city)

  Lady Beretrude

  Lord Guntram her son

  Verbas of Peqini

  Magnatrude sister to Valretrade

  Ageric a smith and husband to Magnatrude

  Clodomar a smith

  Clotaire III King of Austrasia

  Ebroin his mentor

  At Nebirnum

  Arigius abbot of Nebirnum

  Brother Budnouen a Gaul

  Historical Note

  The events in this story occur at the Council of Autun. The city is situated in what is now Burgundy, in France. It had been a vital stronghold in Roman Gaul when it was called Augustodunum. The Council of Autun was an important Christian Council for it decided that the Rule of St Benedict would be the normal monastic code, overturning the practices of the Celtic monastic religious establishments in Gaul. The decisions of Autun put the Celtic Church once again on the defensive as Rome sought to challenge its rites and customs and bring it under Roman control. Autun attempted to reinforce the decisions made in Whitby in AD664 when Oswy of Northumbria adopted Roman Church practices in his kingdom and rejected those that had been introduced with Christianity by the Irish missionary monks. Oswy’s decision to go with Roman rules gradually influenced all the other Anglo-Saxon kingdoms.

  The Council of Autun also ordered all ecclesiastics to learn by heart the Athanasian Creed. Cardinal Jean Baptiste Francois Pitra (1812–89), in his Histoire de Saint Léger (Paris, 1846) believed that this canon or decision was directed against the ideas of monothelitism which were then spreading among the Celtic Churches of Gaul. This was an idea developed to explain how the human and divine related in the person of Jesus Christ. It taught that Jesus had two natures (human and divine) but only one divine will. Monothelitism enjoyed considerable support in Fidelma’s day but was officially condemned as heresy at the Sixth Ecumenical Council in Constantinople under Pope Agatho in AD680–81.

  The chronicles seem confused as to what year the Council of Autun was held but the majority opinion favours the year AD670. This is the date I have also adopted as being more reasonable than the other dates suggested. Precise dating is sometimes confusing in chronicles and annals because they have survived only in copies written or compiled many centuries later. I make no apology for placing the arbitrary decisions on an agreed date. After all, I have no other pretensions for the Sister Fidelma stories other than that they are written as fiction.

  For those who are sceptical about such events as the wives of clerics and other religious being sold into slavery with the sanction of Rome, I have to point out the following: during the time of Pope Leo IX (1049–54), the pontiff did sanction the rounding up of the wives of priests to become slaves in the Lateran Palace. Moreover, it was when Urban II (1088–99) was elected to the papacy that he reinforced celibacy not only by decree but also by force. While attending a council in Rheims he gave approval to the Archbishop of Rheims to order Robert, Count of Rheims, to abduct all the wives of priests and religious to be sold as slaves. Many of these women, driven to despair, committed suicide. Others fought back. While the Swabian Count of Veringen was away, hounding the clerical wives, his own wife was found poisoned in her bed as retribution.

  It might also help readers to place locations by observing that the Gaulish River Liga, the Celtic name meaning silt or sediment and Latinised as Liger, is now the stately Loire; the Gaulish river name Aturavos is now the Arroux, and the Rhodanus is the Rhône. The town of Nebirnum is now Nevers, Divio is now Dijon and the Armorican port of Naoned is now the city of Nantes.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Epilogue

  Chapter One

  The two cowled figures were barely discernible in the dark shadows of the mausoleum. They stood silently by the large sarcophagus that occupied the centre of this small section of the musty catacombs, which seemed to stretch in every direction under the abbey. This was the ancient necropolis; old even before the abbey had been built. Since the site was sanctified, after the coming of the New Faith, it was where generations of abbots had been laid to rest.

  There was silence here apart from the distant dripping of water. The atmosphere was dank and almost suffocating. A faint light permeated the underground caverns, giving a certain relief to the darkness, by which objects could be distinguished by their various differences in light and shade but without detail. The two figures stood without movement, almost as if they themselves were part of the stonework.

  Then, in contrast to the faint dripping of water, there was a sudden soft shuffling noise, as leather came into contact with stone. One of the figures stiffened perceptibly as a glimmering light appeared across the cavern and caused shadows to dance this way and that in the gloom. A third figure, holding a candle, emerged between the tombs.

  The figure also wore a hooded robe. It halted before the mausoleum.

  ‘I come in the name of the Blessed Benignus,’ its rasping voice intoned.

  The waiting couple in the darkness visibly relaxed.

  ‘You are welcome in the name of Benignus of sanctified name and thought,’ said one, in a soft, female voice. The words were exchanged in Latin.

  The newcomer hurried forward into the mausoleum and placed the candle on the side of the marble tomb.

  ‘Well?’ asked the second of the waiting figures. ‘Does he still have it?’

  The newcomer nodded quickly. ‘He has placed it in his chamber.’

  ‘Then we might easily take it. It will be a sign that God has blessed our endeavour,�
�� replied the other.

  ‘But we must act swiftly. The envoy from Rome has already spoken with him about it. If we are to use it as our symbol when the time comes, we must remove it now.’

  ‘If this is to work in our favour and the people to be aroused, he must be prevented from spreading the truth of this great symbol. The people must believe in it without question.’

  ‘Are we prepared for what we must do?’ It was the woman’s voice again.

  ‘It is for the greater good,’ intoned her companion.

  ‘Deus vult!’ the newcomer added solemnly. God wills it.

  ‘It is agreed, then?’ asked the woman with a catch of breath, as if caught by a cold air.

  ‘The deed must be done tonight,’ the newcomer said firmly.

  The three looked at one another in the crepuscular light, and then with one voice they murmured: ‘Virtutis fortuna comes!’ Good luck is the companion of courage.

  Without another word, the three shadowy figures departed in different directions through the dark vaults of the catacombs.

  ‘I will no longer tolerate the arrogance of that man!’

  There was an astonished silence in the chapel as the voice echoed in the stone vaulted building. The abbots and bishops, who sat in the dark oak carved seats arranged before the high altar, turned almost as one to regard their grim-faced colleague. He was still seated but pointed an accusing finger towards the religieux seated further along the row.

  ‘Calm yourself, Abbot Cadfan,’ admonished Bishop Leodegar, who was presiding over the meeting. The chapel had been so arranged to serve the function of a council chamber. ‘We are here to debate the future of our Churches, which are currently separated by language and rituals. Remember that blunt words may be spoken in seeking paths along which we might converge so that unity may be achieved. Such words should not be taken as personal insults.’

  He spoke firmly in the Latin language that was common to them all.

  Abbot Cadfan’s scowl merely deepened.

  ‘Forgive my bluntness, Leodegar of Autun,’ he said, ‘but I have the ability to recognise an insult from an opinion expressed in genuine debate. I will tolerate no insults from the enemies of my blood and my people.’

  The elderly, grey-haired cleric seated at Abbot Cadfan’s right side laid a gentle hand on his companion’s arm. He was Abbot Dabhóc of Tulach Óc, who represented Bishop Ségéne of Ard Macha; the latter claimed episcopal primacy over all the five kingdoms of Éireann.

  ‘I am sure Bishop Ordgar did not mean to sound arrogant,’ he said diplomatically. ‘While we speak in Latin, it is not the language of our mothers and thus we often lack the dexterity of expression with which we are comfortable. It may simply have been a matter of clumsy usage, or possibly different interpretation of emphasis?’

  Bishop Ordgar, the subject of the initial angry outburst, had remained staring at Abbot Cadfan with sullen features. A sharp-featured, dark-haired individual with an unfortunate cast of the mouth that seemed to present a permanent sneer, he now turned his belligerent gaze on Abbot Dabhóc.

  ‘Are you accusing me of not knowing good Latin?’ he growled. ‘What would you, a barbaric outlander, know of the refinements of the tongue?’

  Abbot Dabhóc flushed. Before he had a chance to respond, Abbot Cadfan gave a short bark of laughter.

  ‘Arrogance again–and from one whose people have not yet emerged from pagan savagery. Did we Britons not warn our neighbours of Hibernia that they should not attempt to convert these Saxons from their pagan ways, to teach them the ways of Christ and of literacy and learning? They are not yet sufficiently civilised to know what to do with it.’

  Abbot Cadfan used the Latin name of Hibernia to refer to the five kingdoms of Éireann.

  Bishop Ordgar thumped his fist on the armrest of his wooden seat. ‘I am an Angle, you Welisc barbarian!’

  Abbot Cadfan shrugged indifferently. ‘Angle or Saxon, it is both the same, the same rasping language and the same ignorance. At least I call you by a proper name, but you, in your arrogance, call me Welisc. I am told this means “foreigner”. Yet it is you who are foreigners in the land of Britain. I am a Briton, whose people were in that land at the beginning of time, while your barbaric hordes came but two centuries ago. You entered our land by stealth and guile, and then by invasions, bringing slaughter and death to my people. You seek no more than the wholesale eradication of the Britons. I tell you this, barbarian, you will not succeed. We Welisc–as you sneeringly call us–will survive and may one day drive you from the land you are now calling Angle-land that was once our peaceful land of Britain.’

  Brows drawn together, Bishop Ordgar had sprung to his feet, knocking his seat over backwards, one hand apparently searching for a non-existent sword at his side.

  Abbot Cadfan sat back and gave another bark of laughter and glanced round at the serious-faced prelates at the table.

  ‘You see how the barbarian reacts? He would resort to primitive violence, if he had a weapon. He is not fit to call himself a man of peace, a representative of the Christ, and sit in discussion with those of civilised degree. He is just as savage as the rest of the petty chieftains of his people who, when they do not make war on us Britons, are at war with each other.’

  A sudden noise interrupted the scene. A tall, swarthy-skinned man, seated beside Bishop Leodegar and wearing rich robes and a silver cross on a chain around his neck–which denoted he was of high rank among them–had risen to his feet and rapped loudly on the floor with a staff of office.

  ‘Tacet! Be silent!’ he thundered. ‘Brethren, you both forget yourselves. You are gathered in council under the eye of God and the bishop of this place. As the envoy from the Holy Father in Rome, I am ashamed to witness such an outburst among the chosen of the Faith.’

  That the envoy of Rome, Nuntius Peregrinus, had felt forced to intervene was a rebuke to the lack of authority displayed by Bishop Leodegar in controlling the delegates to the council.

  Bishop Leodegar now raised a hand and gestured to the envoy to reseat himself. Then he said firmly: ‘Brethren, you do, indeed, shame yourself before our distinguished envoy. This is a council of the senior abbots and bishops of the western churches, here to decide the fundamental ways of promoting our unity. It is true that this is supposed to be an informal opening, without the attendance of all our scribes and advisers, so that we could come to know one another before our main debates, but it is not a marketplace where we brethren can brawl and fight among ourselves.’

  There was a muttering from the twenty or so men who were seated around the table.

  Bishop Leodegar now turned to Bishop Ordgar.

  ‘Ordgar, you are here as the personal representative of Theodore, who has been newly appointed by our Holy Father Vitalian in Rome as Archbishop at Canterbury. Would Theodore truly utter the words that you have used to a prelate of the church of the Britons?’

  Ordgar was about to respond when Bishop Leodegar’s stern look caused him to sink back in his chair with a sour expression.

  ‘Cadfan,’ continued Bishop Leodegar, ‘you have come here representing the churches of your people, the Britons. Do you truly represent your people when you preach war and the elimination of the kingdoms of the Angles and Saxons?’

  Abbot Cadfan refused to accept this censure silently.

  ‘We did not ask the Angles and Saxons to invade our lands and seek our eradication,’ he snapped. ‘Is there a man among you who has not read the Blessed Gildas’ De Excidio et Conquesta Britanniae–The Ruin and Conquest of Britain? Have you not heard how my people were massacred or forced to flee from their homes to other lands when the Angles and Saxons arrived? We are still being pushed to the west; others have fled to Armorica, to Galicia, to Hibernia and even to the land of the Franks, to seek respite from the ravening hordes.’

  ‘That surely was in the past,’ replied Bishop Leodegar. ‘We have to live in the present.’

  ‘Was Benchoer in the past?’ demanded Abbot Cadfan.
<
br />   Bishop Leodegar looked puzzled. ‘Benchoer? I have noted that Drostó, the abbot of Benchoer, had not arrived here. What is it that you say about Benchoer?’

  ‘Well may you ask why Drostó of Benchoer is not here,’ went on Abbot Cadfan. ‘Benchoer is one of our oldest abbeys that housed three thousand brethren dedicated to Christ. I know that Drostó was meant to be the senior representative of our churches here, not I. Is the Saxon who sits before me afraid to tell you why Drostó does not sit in this place?’

  Bishop Ordgar scowled. ‘The Welisc are always causing trouble,’ he replied tartly. ‘Their leader, whose outlandish name I can’t pronounce, has been particularly boastful of what he intends to do to my people.’

  ‘The King of Gwynedd is Cadwaladar ap Cadwallon,’ replied Abbot Cadfan angrily. ‘He descends from a line of great kings, great when your ancestors were scrabbling about in the mud!’

  This time it was Bishop Leodegar who rapped on the floor for order.

  ‘We will disband this council immediately if this continues,’ he threatened.

  Abbot Goelo of Bro Waroc’h, which lay in Armorica, cleared his throat. ‘With respect, Leodegar, I think the council needs to hear the answer to the question posed by our distinguished brother from Gwynedd.’

  ‘It is true that we had expected that the Venerable Drostó would represent your church at this council, Abbot Cadfan,’ Bishop Leodegar said. ‘What is it you imply about Benchoer?’

  Abbot Cadfan turned his hard blue eyes directly on the tightlipped Bishop Ordgar.

  ‘The Abbey of Benchoer is no more and Drostó sleeps with the few survivors in the woods of Gwynedd, moving each night in fear of their lives. A months ago, the leader of the Saxons of Mercia…’