The Blood Gospel

Elisabeta’s maidservant held up the basket for the lavender. The wisp of a girl turned her head to the side to hide the raspberry-colored birthmark that covered half her face.

“Anna, take the basket back to the kitchen and empty it,” Elisabeta instructed, dropping in one more sprig of thyme.

Anna retreated across the field, struggling under the heavy load. Rhun would have helped the small girl carry such a burden, but Elisabeta would never allow it, considering it not his place.

Elisabeta watched her maid leave. Once they were alone, she turned to Rhun, her face now even brighter—if that were possible.

“A moment’s peace!” she exclaimed gladly. “It is so lonely with my servants constantly around me.”

Rhun, who often chose to spend days alone in dark prayer, understood all too well the loneliness of false company.

She smiled at him. “But not you, Father Korza. I never feel lonely in your company.”

He could not hold her gaze. Turning away, he knelt and cut a stalk of lavender.

“Don’t you ever tire of it, Father Korza? Always wearing a mask?” She adjusted her wide-brimmed hat. She always took great pains to keep sunlight from her fair skin. Women of her station must not look as if they needed to work in the sun.

“I wear a mask?” He kept his face impassive. If she knew all that he hid, she would run away screaming.

“Of course. You wear the mask of priest. But I must wear many masks, too many for one face to bear easily. Lady, mother, and wife. And others still.” She turned a heavy gold ring around and around on her finger, a gift from her husband, Ferenc. “But what is under all of those masks, I wonder.”

“Everything else, I suppose.”

“But how much truth … how much of our true nature can we conceal, Father?” Her low voice sent a shiver down his spine. “And from whom?”

He studied the shadow she cast on the field next to him and mumbled as if in prayer, “We conceal what we must.”

Her shadow retreated a pace, perhaps because she was unhappy with his answer—a thought that crushed him as surely as if she ground him under that well-turned heel.

The dark shape of a hawk floated across the field. He listened to its quick heartbeat above and the faint heartbeats of mice below. His service to the Church, the verdant field, the bright sun, the blooming flowers … all were bounteous gifts, given freely by God to one as lowly as himself.

Should that not be enough?