Book of Water

Chapter 6

6

Astolpho opened his eyes. A faint sheen glistened on his upper lip. He blinked against the lowering afternoon sun and glanced around the campsite for Michaela. She often left him alone. Particularly when she saw him at prayer.

It had been days since his last vision of Bradamante, so Astolpho was unprepared for what he saw. He didn’t know what had happened to Rinaldo, only that he now lay ashen-faced and still, with his sister and their friend at his side.

Astolpho studied the despair on Bradamante’s face. He had rarely seen her look so defeated.

Go to her, said a voice in his head. You can help her.

Michaela can help her.

It was a voice he wasn’t certain whether to trust.

Astolpho was twenty-one now, tall and lean, muscles hardened from his year on horseback. When he left the king’s city of Abincort in search of Michaela, the red-haired young woman he had begun seeing in visions sent by his god, Astolpho didn’t realize he would be away for so long.

But now he knew it was a gift.

It had been a year of solitude and isolation. Of loneliness so deep and relentless, Astolpho sometimes wondered if he would ever hear someone speak his name again. A year of surrender: to his god, to the quiet, to the beauty of the mountains, forests, and plains. Nights of gazing up at the starlit heavens and understanding how small he was, how insignificant compared to the majesty of heaven and earth.

Finally he knew. What he wanted for himself did not matter.

What mattered was what his god wanted from him.

Astolpho was no longer a boy searching for his way. Not simply one of the monks of the White Temple, free to spend his life in study and prayer and teaching.

He was a prophet to the king now. He had a duty to perform, even if he didn’t fully understand it. His god wanted him there for a reason. Astolpho trusted in his god.

And so he put away other thoughts.

Of Bradamante.

Of a life he sometimes imagined they could have together.

Not that she would ever want that. Not after what he did.

It had been Astolpho, in his capacity as King Carleman’s advisor and prophet, who convinced the king that Bradamante should fight Lord Ganelon. Even though she was already rightfully the tournament’s victor. Even though she had already defeated every foe for three days straight and was so clearly beyond exhaustion.

“Let them fight,” Astolpho had whispered, and Bradamante saw him. He would never forget her look of shock and betrayal. Or the angry words they exchanged later that night, after both Bradamante and her horse had nearly lost their lives to Lord Ganelon’s bloodlust and treachery.

Astolpho had begun his own exile that very night.

His quest for Michaela provided him with the perfect distraction. It took him months to find her. Then even when he did, he waited and watched for months more, still not certain how to approach her. She was a fierce young woman, straight-backed and proud as she sat astride her horse, ever watchful and wary, even when surrounded by her own men. Those young men guarded her closely and treated her with great reverence.

Once Astolpho saw what she could do, he understood why.

When finally the sign came, Astolpho understood what he should do. Still, even knowing that the moment was right, he exercised the kind of caution toward Michaela that he would around a wild animal.

Even after traveling together for nearly two months, theirs was still a tenuous peace. If Astolpho longed for friendship and conversation, or anything more than sullen acknowledgment of his presence, he wouldn’t find it here.

And then one day his visions of Bradamante returned. After having had no glimpse of her for nearly a year. Suddenly there she was, muddy, severe, sword in hand as she taught Jara how to fight.

Then in the days afterward, visions of Bradamante striding across the army encampment. Bradamante eating bread. Mundane moments, nothing anyone else might need to see, but Astolpho sat riveted, grateful for every single glimpse of her that his god was generous enough to send him.

Astolpho thought he understood why the visions had returned. They served a purpose, allowing him to track the movements of King Carleman’s army so that he and Michaela could follow them at a distance.

The two of them were currently camped within a day’s journey of Monarch Pass. They had been for some time. Eventually they would return to Abincort on the trail of the army. Only then would Michaela show herself to any outsiders. It was what the two of them had agreed.

It didn’t mean Astolpho liked it. To be so close to Bradamante now, and yet forced to stay away…

Perhaps that, too, was a gift from his god.

Because with the return of his visions came a longing so deep he wondered how he would bear it. The longing to be near her again, to hear her voice, to feel the touch of her warm skin, to speak with her, to listen, even if her words were still filled with rage—whatever she offered, Astolpho knew he would gladly take it.

It was not the path of his god. And Astolpho wanted the path of his god.

“I tell you truthfully,” his master Samual had once told him when Astolpho was a young monk, “my god has often led me over roads I would not choose for myself. But I have found my greatest peace in surrendering to his will—in refusing to question why he leads me one way and not another.”

Was this such a road? Astolpho doubted it could offer him any peace. He thought he had finally driven all desire for Bradamante from his heart. Now he had to admit that he had not.

But Michaela could help Rinaldo. Wasn’t it right to try? Wouldn’t Astolpho’s god want that from him? Wouldn’t his god allow it?

Your god always knows your heart, the voice inside him said. You’re a fool to try to lie.

Astolpho quickly began packing up his camp. He and Michaela carried very little: just a few extra items of clothing, a few blankets, his sword, Michaela’s knife, a meager supply of dried provisions. He tied the bundle to the back of Frontino’s saddle and then followed the path to the river where he was most likely to find Michaela.

She often sat here at dusk staring at the restless water, thinking thoughts she never shared with him.

Astolpho prayed as he walked, asking for the words to convince her. He had no assurance that she would come out of hiding now simply because he asked. He had even less reason to believe that she would help a friend of his simply because he asked.

And even if she did agree to help, there was no guarantee that they would reach Rinaldo in time. Even if they left right now and traveled through the night.

But he had to try. For Rinaldo.

Liar, his heart told him. For Bradamante.