The Church without a God

He drank mead with Ninorad. He drank so much he started seeing double and had to sit down. The clouds were low outside, the mist crawling through the trees like silent, evil vipers, the air bitter and cold and thick with the threat of rain. He was not far from Malo's cottage. He thought maybe he would stop there on the way back along the muddy road and apologize for his behavior in the church and give her one of the jars of mead that were strapped to the horse. When he heard the sound, he thought it was thunder. He could walk by then and he got up and went outside, hoping to get to Malo's before the rain.

It wasn't thunder. It was horses. Archers and soldiers from the Baron of Swodjz, carrying torches and bows, and with them the Bailiff on a piebald charger. They churned up the mud and the men looked mean and sullen. The people were just coming in from the fields as the Bailiff gathered them together and read from a dirty scrap of linen:

"Whereas the village of Virlun is home to many witches and worshippers of Satan and his devils and monsters who wish His Most Excellent Sire, the Baron of Swodjz evil and bring sickness down upon him; and whereas witches and devils and monsters hate the cleansing power of fire and the righteous power of the bow and arrow; then the Baron decrees that every tenth house in the village of Virlun be put to the torch and if its occupants try to flee they do thereby demonstrate their guilt in the crime of witchcraft and shall therefore be slain by the bow and arrow for all to see, that they may thereby be an example for all the people of Virlun who may thus stop their mischief and evil works against His Most Excellent Sire, the Baron of Swodjz. So be it. Commence!"

And the men with the torches rode to one end of the village and started burning huts, counting every tenth one on their fingers, and counting none too accurately either, for they all were stupid and drunk, and as the people ran from the houses, men with steel helmets sat on their horses and killed them with bows and arrows, shot them down as they ran, men, women, old folks and children, left them writhing in the dirt where spear men came over and stabbed them easily in the throat or chest like animals, except for some women whom they raped, or some men whom they toyed with, spearing them in the rectum and balls and leaving them to suffer for their amusement.

Father Cyryl was drunk too, but he ran out and remonstrated with the soldiers, and was slapped in the face and pushed in the mud and thrown down and almost speared for his trouble. He was laughed at and despised, and once again God looked away and Jesus turned his back in contempt and he despised them back. He despised them with a hatred that was stronger than the love he once felt for them.

The soldiers passed Malo's house and torched the old lady's house two houses down and killed her with an arrow through the eye when she tried to escape. Then they got on their horses and rode away back to the Baron's castle.

**+**

When Malo came to the church that night, Cyryl didn't say a word. He pulled her inside and he kissed her desperately. He bit her mouth and he clutched her breasts as if he'd rip them off. He squeezed her to him as if he'd crush her to death, and tears rolled down his cheeks.

"Malo!" he said. "Malo! Malo!" It was all he could say. "The whip. Get the whip!"

The howling was already sounding in the forest. They could hear the slithering of vast bodies tunneling through the leaves.

"Take me outside. I want to go outside."

"Father Cyryl, no! No! The monsters are out there tonight!"

"But you're a witch. You know how to call them."

"But I can't control them, Father! I don't know what they'll do!"

He stripped off her clothes and gave her the whip, then took off his own clothes, gabbed her wrist and pulled her out the door in the transept and out into the weeds behind the church where the moonlight played through the trees in the woods.

"Where do you call them, Malo? Show me. I know you call them."

"Oh my God, Father. It's over there. Just in that clearing. By those two trees."

"How long have you been a witch, Malo? How long?"

"All my life, Father. All my life. My mother was a witch before me."

"Will they take me?"

"I don't know Father. Father, they're monsters! There's no telling what they'll do!"

He held her wrist and pulled her across the clearing towards the two saplings. He could see now the trees had ropes tied around them at chest height; old, frayed ropes, much used.

"What must you do, Malo?"

She was weeping now. "I tie you Father, and whip you. And they come."

"Then do it!"

"Oh God no, Father! For the love of Jesus—!"

"Do it! Damn you to hell! Do as I say!"

She could hardly see the ropes she was crying so hard but she got his wrists tied to the saplings so his arms were out to the sides. They were naked, both of them, as naked as Adam and Eve in the moonlit clearing and Malo couldn't stop crying, the snot and tears running down her face. Father Cyryl stood with his arms outstretched as if he were being crucified, and she got behind him and whipped him, whipped his back and whipped his ass and the sound of the scourge was sharp and clear in the moonlit clearing.

The howling started and there was the sound of wings in the trees and branches breaking. The howling got closer and with it came a darkness. Malo screamed and dropped the whip and ran back for the church, naked, running, and the wings came closer. Father Cyryl screamed when he first saw them but then he didn't scream anymore.