He stood a full head taller than those around him did. It wasn’t just his stature that seemed to attract attention. There was something more. Something special. It was the aura of someone who had been chosen by Gordon. I asked Plotpo, the farmer as to who the tall stern man might be. I was told it was Victor the Warrior Cleric.
I had heard of Victor the Warrior Cleric, but I had thought that he had only been a legend. It was said that Victor had single handedly slain more skeptics in battle than could be counted. His holiness was also well known. He could heal wounds with just the touch of his hand. Most remarkable of all, he had been the first man ever to be venerated in his own lifetime.
I worked my way through the crowd to hear what the great man was saying. His generals surrounded him. There were about eight of them.
"Many are called," he said. "But few are chosen. We seek goodness. We offer peace. It is therefore difficult to understand the retort of evil.
"The countryside is parched. Everyone suffers because of the drought. But what is the cause? Who is the cause? Take a good look my brothers. It is the heretics. Our great Gordon, Gordon, is punishing our world for allowing evil to exit.
"Hear me, my brothers. None will be safe while the scourge is loose upon the land. We must stop the defilers before they rape our daughters and steal our grain.
"Who is with me?"
"I am," said Blogo the wrestler, one of the most respected men in the village.
"So am I," said Plotpo, who stood beside me.
We all joined in the refrain. I myself got caught up in the religious fervor. It was Intoxicating.
"Good," said Victor the Warrior Cleric. "Tonight I will pray. I talk with Gordon himself and. I will ask for advice. I will ask for grace so that our sticks will cut as if they were the finest of blades. Our pikes will shoot searing lightning and blind with the light of infinite power.
Providence demands a crusade. It is the will of Gordon. I have seen it in a vision. Gordon’s mother said, `Fire shall rain down from Heaven. Pillars of light will fall from the sky. The ground will shake and open up to swallow your enemies. Ten of your troops will appear as hundreds. Ye shall march across the countryside and the chosen shall rule this in the name of Gordon. I promise you. Any of you, who are slain, will immediately ascend to Heaven. The blood of our enemies will wash away your sins.’"
The crowd cheered, as did I. Victor the Warrior Cleric turned with a sweep of his cape and departed.
The next morning, the men of the village assembled for the journey. Married men bid tearful good-byes to their family. Not having yet taken a wife, I was spared any sadness of separation. I was keen for the coming adventure. The change. I wasn’t leaving behind any family. My parents had both died the summer before, leaving me the family farm.
We marched off in a long procession headed by Victor the Warrior Cleric who sat tall upon his steed. His generals, who also rode magnificent horses, followed him. They held Victor’s banners aloft. The men of the village walked behind. We raised a cloud of dust from the dry parched road.
As we walked in the hot summer sun, I felt something small strike me in the back of my head. An insect? I tried to swoosh it away with my hand. I felt the sting again. I turned and looked behind me. It was Plotpo the farmer. He was tossing pebbles at me.
"Quit it," I said.
Plotpo only laughed. I often received such treatment from Plotpo and his companions. They thought that I, Nefti the farmer, was strange. I was a farmer as was Plotpo and his friends. Unlike Plotpo, I studied the crops that I grew. When I was a boy, my father once was unable to obtain an adequate supply of wheat seed. Instead, he planted beans where he normally planted wheat. The next year wheat was planted again and it yielded a bumper crop. When I took over the farm, I rotated all my crops every year. From the elders of the village I learned what mushrooms could be eaten and which ones could cause illness, or even blindness. I knew which plants in the forest could ease the pain from a toothache and which ones could induce sleep. Plotpo and his friends thought it was strange.
He threw another pebble at me. It struck me on the side of my head.
Blogo, the wrestler, who was walking nearby commanded, "Plotpo, leave the boy alone. We have more important things to do."
Again Plotpo laughed. I hated his taunting, but I was much smaller than the sinewy Plotpo. I had tried to stand up to him before but received thrashings. Once, I almost had the better of him, but his companions stepped in and beat me.
In the evening, we made camp. I sat on my bedroll and took out some jerky from my bag. Plotpo walked by with his companions. He snatched my jerky, from my hand, and ate it.
"Not bad," smirked Plotpo. I stood up to protest, but his companions motioned toward me in a threatening manner. I backed away. The gang walked on, looking to see what other mischievous they could cause in camp.
I spread out my bedroll and spied something moving in the nearby underbrush. I crawled closer and discovered a squirrel. There hadn’t been much wildlife to be seen since the famine had started. The squirrel didn’t run when I approached. I realized that she was hungry. She was starving. I reached into my bag and pulled out a hazelnut. Slowly and carefully I handed it to the squirrel. I was shocked when she accepted it from me. Her desperate hunger made her approachable. She ate a few more nuts out of my hand. Suddenly, inspiration struck me. I lifted the unprotesting squirrel and put it in Plotpo’s bag.
All I had to do was wait.
Plotpo and his friends soon returned. They rolled out their bedrolls and fished around in their sacks for food.
It seemed that a squirrel, which had been hungry from the famine, found its way into Plotpo’s sack and was eating his food. Evidently the squirrel didn’t want Plotpo clumsily poking at her. She bit him. Plotpo screamed.
"Ow, ow, ow," shrieked Plotpo.
Everyone in camp looked on in curiosity and amusement.
"Plotpo," Blogo asked. "Why are you dancing about like a lunatic?"
"There’s something in my bag. It bit me!"
Blogo dumped the contents of the bag on the ground. The squirrel fell out and scurried away.
"It looked rabid," I said innocently.
"Really?" asked Plotpo nervously.
"I didn’t like the way it ran off. It had a funny gait."
"I think that you should be worried Plotpo. He may be a crackpot but he knows a lot about this sort of thing," said Efuah, one of Plotpo’s chums.
"Nefti, my friend, perhaps you have some sort of medicine that could help me?" pleaded Plotpo.
"I don’t usually carry any anti-rabies elixir with me, but perhaps I could go out into the woods and prepare a remedy," I responded.
"O, thank you, Nefti. I knew I could count on you."
I ventured out from camp carrying a bowl. I found a plant that I knew would cause violent stomach cramps and even more violent dysentery. I then retrieved horse dung from the horse of one of the generals. I mixed it all up with some muddy water and stirred it with a stick. I took the bowl back to the waiting Plotpo and told him to drink it.
"Ugh," he choked. This is vile."
"It’s supposed to taste that way," I said truthfully. "Don’t spill any. You should drink it all."
Plotpo was grateful and in return he gave me a knife that he had. It had a good keen edge.
It turned dark and Plotpo’s diarrhea set in. He went into the woods and we could hear him groaning.
"Do you think that he’s okay?" asked Blogo the wrestler.
"Oh, I think he’ll be just fine. The medicine that I gave him is purging the impurities from his system. Now we know that the medicine is working."
Blogo patted me on my back with his huge hand. "You’re a good man, Nefti. I’m glad to have you with us."
Through the night the silence was occasionally pierced by the sound of Plotpo retching. Everyone was comforted for I had reassured them the ablution of fluids was the only way Plotpo could rid himself of the dreaded rabies.
When Plotpo’s annoying noises awakened me, I noticed that the squirrel had returned and sat next to me, staring inquisitively. I chuckled. I had made a friend. I went into my sack and gave her another hazelnut. I named her Tintina, after a beautiful maiden from the village, who had auburn hair. She had the same color of hair as the squirrel.
I determined that little Tintina would travel with me in one of my two sacks, the one without the food. I would have to keep her a secret, though, as my comrades would probably want to eat her.
That night, I dreamed of Tintina, the maiden from my village. I had hardly ever spoken to her but I secretly loved her. I dreamed that our army defeated the armies of darkness and then returned to the village where I was a hero. I would wed Tintina. Maybe I would ask the blacksmith to fashion a nice piece of do-dad for her to wear. She would probably be very pleased with that, I dreamed.
In the morning I checked my sack and little Tintina was sleeping comfortably. The concoction that I had given Plotpo had finally worn off. He thanked me once again.
We broke camp and continued to march. We were joined by contingents from nearby villages. We marched on and our army grew larger and larger. Every evening when we made camp, we were drilled by the eight generals of Victor the Warrior Cleric. They seemed disappointed in us. We were not very skilled in warfare. We were mostly farmers. Even Blogo was not trained as a soldier. By day, we stopped at more villages and our army grew ever greater.
One evening, as we made camp, we were marshaled out into a large field. There in his glorious splendor stood Victor the Warrior Cleric. We gathered around. Though there were thousands of us, everyone was quiet so that we could hear the words of the great man.
"Tomorrow we march into battle. I assure you, my brothers, we will do Gordon’s work. We will smite our enemies."
A mighty cheer rose from the crowd in response to the words of Victor the Warrior Cleric.
That night we fasted and prayed. We prepared for the next morning.
"Don’t be afraid," I told little Tintina who snuggled safely in my sack. "I will protect you."
I tried not to let Tintina see, but I was more frightened than she was. I sharpened my stick and tried to sleep.
In the morning I left Tintina safely in her sack in camp. We marched through the dry tall grass to our position. Thousands of us were on the southern lip of a large valley. The valley itself was empty. There wasn’t even a tree. On the opposite edge of the valley, about a half-mile away, stood the armies of darkness.
At the front of our lines was a proudly mounted Victor the Warrior Cleric.
He raised a banner, displaying the Double Helix, the sign of Gordon, above his head. I looked across the valley and oddly enough, the devil-knight leading our enemy was also holding a banner aloft. It was the Double Helix of Gordon. ‘Blasphemy,’ I thought.
Victor the Warrior Cleric motioned forward with a wave of his hand. With a roar of thunder, we charged. Victor and his generals quickly rode out ahead of us. The generals of the enemy also rode out ahead of the horde. In the center of the valley Victor the Warrior Cleric and most of his generals engaged the leaders of the enemy. Swords flailed against shields. The clanking of metal was drowned out by the thousands of running, advancing feet thumping on the ground
A few of the generals, of both sides, rode past their counterparts and headed straight toward the foot soldiers. One who was wearing a Double Helix over his armor bore down upon my section. We readied our poles and sticks. I saw that he was a man, not a demon.
His war-horse trampled some of my comrades. I tried to stab the knight with my stick, but I couldn’t even reach him. He was mounted too high up on his horse. The black knight raised his sword and swung. He lopped off the head of Plotpo. It took a moment before Plotpo’s body collapsed, as if it was a sack of potatoes. His head, with its dead eyes, stared emptily from a pool of blood.
We rushed onward. At the center of the valley, our forces converged upon our enemies. I I quickly learned that my pointed stick was not of much use as a sword, so I swung it like a club. I cracked it over the head of an enemy. There was not much mass behind the stick. The man fell, but he was not totally unconscious. I had opened a gash on the top of his head and blood flowed to cover his face.
"Damn you heretics," he cursed from the ground.
He had been carrying a more substantial club. I abandoned my splintered stick in favor of his weapon. I swung it like a madman consumed with religious passion. A fierce battle raged and pools of blood collected upon the ground. It was a slow and clumsy war of attrition. Wooden weapons thudded against bones. Occasionally an armored knight would ride up and cut through men as if his sword were a scythe cutting through wheat.
It became difficult to tell friend from foe. Almost all of the combatants on both sides were farmers. We were all dressed the same. There was nothing to distinguish one side from the other.
Some of the wounded stumbled away from the dusty battlefield. Others grew weary of the fighting and ran off.
Many thoughts raced through my mind. It bothered me that the enemy soldier had called me a heretic. Why? Didn’t he know that he was the heretic? Suddenly a rock struck my head. I fell to my knees as blood flowed from a deep cut over my eye. I felt pain like I had never felt before. Someone ran beside me and kicked me in the ribs for good measure. Then he ran off. I fell onto my stomach.
I rolled to my side and looked up. There in the middle of the valley was Victor the Warrior Cleric on his charger. The horse reared up on its hind legs. Victor twirled his sword above his head. He was rallying us.
A pair of strong hands helped me to my feet. I squinted through my sticky wet blood. It was Blogo the Wrestler.
"Come on lad," he said. Victor’s calling us to his side."
I leaned on Blogo and we wobbled toward Victor the Warrior Cleric.
Before we could reach him, a retreating foot soldier ran past Victor. Victor flailed his sword at the man, but he ducked. The blow missed. As quick as a rabbit, the man thrust a spear upward and stuck it into Victor’s stomach. The point found one of the few places where there was an opening in the armor. The man ran off as Victor the Warrior Saint fell from his steed. Blogo and I hurried to his side to guard him from further harm.
I cradled Victor’s head in my arms.
"Are you alright?" asked Blogo.
"Oh, I’ll be fine, my peasant brother," Victor responded.
Victor was wrong. His blood was a sickening dark brown color. His internal organs had been punctured. He closed his eyes. His breathing was heavy.
Blogo and I removed some of his heavy armor so that he could be more comfortable. The battle had quieted down. Most of the combatants had either died or left on their own accord. It was unclear as to whether there was any true victor. Men wandered here and there searching for fallen or missing comrades.
"Holy Victor," I said. "A man with whom we fought called me a heretic. Why?"
"Do not be concerned, my son. It was he, who was the heretic."
"But why were we fighting? Our foes also carried the sign of the Double Helix."
"They were our enemies. They denied truth. They claimed that a man couldn’t be venerated in his own lifetime. They fought against the legitimacy of my own veneration."
"Scoundrels!" said Blogo.
"But we showed them, eh lads?" said Victor.
With that, Victor the Warrior Cleric died. As Blogo and I discussed what we should do next, we were besieged by dozens of men who seemed to come out of nowhere. I recognized some of them. They weren’t the enemy. They were our own comrades. They descended upon the body of Victor the Warrior Cleric and tore it to pieces. One man ran away gleefully with the holy man’s right arm. He had torn it right off. Men ran off with feet, finger, eyeballs, and internal organs.
"What in Gordon’s name are you doing?" I demanded. I pulled out the knife that I received from Plotpo. "You are desecrating the hero whom we have venerated.
"No, my brother. You have it all wrong," said a man holding the newly severed head of Victor the Warrior Cleric. "We only seek to honor Victor. I will take his blessed head back to my Village. We will place it in our temple and honor it as a holy relic. The head of Victor the Warrior Cleric will heal our sick and protect us from our enemies."
It was the same with all the men. They were seeking relics, souvenirs. As men scurried away with portions of the cadaver, other men swooped down to pick up the left over entrails. Fragment by fragment, Victor the Warrior Cleric disappeared until finally one man scraped up the blood-soaked dirt and dumped it in a sack.
Blogo and I headed back to camp and collected our belongings. Tintina was safe and sound. We found a few men from our village and started back upon the dried up road toward home. I no longer had a thirst for adventure. My head still hurt. Though I was not in very good shape to travel, I just wanted to go home and tend to my farm.
Blogo and I trudged along side by side.
"You fought bravely, lad," Blogo said. "I’m proud of you."
"Blogo, I’m a little confused as to why we fought. Victor’s words were magic. There is no doubt that we were privileged to see his greatness. But it seems to me that we were fighting just for one man’s ego."
"Really? How do you mean?"
"We fought because Victor the Warrior Saint didn’t want to wait until he was dead to be venerated."
Blogo thought for a moment and then patted me on the back.
"That’s a good enough reason for me," he said.
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E-mail: MagicKirk1@cs.com
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