The Witch, the Cathedral

I really would have had a lot to explain to the bishop.

We recovered the lantern and picked our way back out of the construction site. “Good-night,” Joachim said gravely as we passed the watchman, the first thing he had said since leaving the tower. But he whistled again as we walked back to his house.

Inside, however, in the light of the relit candles, his eyes looked distressed. “Would you like some tea?” he asked distractedly.

“Let’s just finish the wine.” I wondered if I should mention a delicate mental touch I was still not completely sure I had felt.

He emptied the bottle into our glasses. “I’m in much too responsible a position to enjoy magical flying,” he said bitterly.

I thought about this, sipping my wine slowly. He had enjoyed flying, and he had telephoned me to come help him in spite of the bishop. “Tell me what’s really troubling you,” I said. I considered adding, “Confession is good for the soul,” but rejected the thought.

He hesitated. I waited, knowing that at a certain level anything he said to me was a betrayal of his position in the Church. For that matter, Zahlfast’s warning to me may have included conversations such as this one.

“The bishop has been bishop for nearly forty years,” Joachim said at last. “He had already been here for many years when I first came to Yurt.”

I nodded, studying his face. It had always been hard to read, and I could only see now how truly worried he was about something.

“This last year, he has become extremely weak. His mind is as clear as ever, and he still directs the affairs of the diocese. But he never leaves his house, even to go to service in the cathedral, and for the last month he has not even left his bed. The doctors say he does not have long to live.”

I contemplated the blow it would be if I heard the old Master of the wizards’ school was dying and nodded again.

“When they made me dean, I knew that most commonly a new bishop is elected by the cathedral priests from among the senior officers of the chapter. Any member of the Church could of course be elected, but cathedral priests usually have a preference for their own officers. But since I’ve only been dean for a few years, I had not thought this would be a concern in my case. I had in fact always assumed that Norbert, the cathedral cantor, would succeed. He is quite a venerable scholar if not a senior officer, and very dedicated to the Church’s welfare-you saw him in the street this afternoon.”

“And aren’t you the youngest of the senior officers?”

He did not seem to hear me. “This last week both the provost and the chancellor spoke to me, separately and privately. Neither mentioned Father Norbert. Both said they were too old and comfortable in their present offices to seek the position of bishop. When the old bishop dies, I fear they may elect me bishop in his place.”

“But that’s wonderful,” I said. “It’s an enormous honor.”

“It is an enormous responsibility,” he answered with a flash from his dark eyes. “And I know I am not worthy.”

“I’m sure the old bishop thought exactly the same thing when they elected him,” I said encouragingly.

“But why me? What have I done to deserve this?”

“You were Royal Chaplain of Yurt for years,” I suggested.

“A position as chaplain to an aristocratic court has never been considered a great sign of spiritual purity.”

“And you’ve been to the Holy Land.”

“So have several other members of the cathedral chapter, including the chancellor. What special merit can they imagine I have?”

I took a sip of wine I did not want while wondering whether to remind him. “You brought someone back from the dead.”

“That had nothing to do with my merits,” he said, staring straight ahead. “Besides, it was so long ago I doubt they remember, even if they heard about it in the first place.”

When there was that note in his voice, I knew better than to argue with him. Instead I said, “I think you’d be a very good bishop.”

The edge of his mouth twitched in what might have been a wry smile. “The good opinion of a wizard is not what I need.”

I knew him too well to worry that this might be an insult. “At least if you were bishop you wouldn’t have to worry about someone else’s disapproval if you needed help with another magical problem.”

He leaned forward, resting his forehead on his fists for a moment, then shot me one of his piercing looks. “I realize wizardry does not demand the same level of spiritual commitment as religion, but maybe I can explain it to you. I know my own weaknesses. My fears of being unworthy are not a meaningless or automatic response. Do you remember the very first day I met you, when you had just become Royal Wizard of Yurt? You were talking about the land of wild magic and said that you had never been there because you were ‘not yet worthy of the voyage.’ Do you remember?”

“Yes, I might well have said that.”

“Have you been there yet?”

“Well, no. They used to have field trips from the wizards’ school, but I was never invited to go. I guess I could have gone myself any time in the last nineteen years, but somehow I haven’t.” Wild magic had been to meet me once too often; I had no desire to go meet it.

“Then even you, with the audacity wizardry gives a man, know what it is like to feel unworthy.”

Actually I had always had an excellent idea of what it feels like to be unworthy, or at least incompetent, but I had never let it bother me.

He sat back as though he had just explained something important. I still thought he would be an excellent bishop. “If they do elect you,” I said, “I’ll go to the land of wild magic. Maybe I can find the Queen of the Fairies and make her stop sending her fairies to your cathedral.”

Joachim said nothing but just looked at me.

“Or,” I added, warming to the topic, “you and I could try to arrange better relations between wizardry and the Church, so that bishops aren’t always warning young priests and old wizards warning young wizards against each other.”

I was pleased to see that this idea distracted him. He played with his empty wine glass, thinking about it.

“There are three who rule the world,” I quoted, “the Church, the wizards, and the aristocracy.”

“And the greatest of these is the Church,” he said absently.

“Hey! They never added that when I learned the proverb!”

This actually made him smile. “Did they tell you that the greatest were the wizards? It is a good saying. The Church is concerned with the souls of men and women in this world and their salvation in the next, and wizards with keeping the peace and keeping dragons away.”

“And the aristocracy with law-giving and administering justice, with wars-when we let them-and with the extremely vital mission of providing the income for priests and wizards. We don’t actually say that wizards are the greatest, you know, even if we are; after all, we’ve always served the kings.”

“That leaves the peasants and the artisans and the merchants.”

“Of course they don’t have time for anything as foolish as ruling the world,” I said. “They’re too busy producing what everybody else needs.”

Joachim smiled again and worked the cork out of another bottle. I was delighted to see him feeling less bitter. Maybe sometime he’d even want to go flying again. “But we are not discussing social theory,” he said. “You’re trying to cheer me up, and it may be the sin of despondency to resist such cheering, even from a wizard.” He filled our glasses; he had switched from white wine to red, and it glowed the color of rubies in the candlelight. “I still often feel like a callow priest fresh out of the seminary, but maybe even the most powerful men feel that way sometimes.”

I remembered him having an air of mature gravity from the day I met him and very much doubted he had ever been callow and shallow-unlike the young priest who was now chaplain of Yurt. But I did not mention this, and