A Dirge for Prester John

The others acclaimed, and it was done. I belonged to a gryphon.

“Thomas,” I whispered. It was all I could hold onto, the terrible vision of him beneath the sphere. “Take me to St. Thomas, I know he is here! Leave me be, demons, I want no traffic with you!”

The snake, whom the others called Grisalba, sidled up to me and draped the tip of her tail over my waist, easing lower, as her wanton nature dictated, for I could already tell she had an irredeemably lascivious aspect. She lifted her finger and I watched as a drop of liquid formed on it, like a raindrop. It glistened green, then gold, then rosy as it shifted through the rainbow, searching for the right shade. The succubus looked thoughtful, as if it cost her great effort. Then she seized my mouth as if I were a babe refusing to take his medicine and thrust her finger into it. The liquid coursed into me and I groaned—the pleasure of its taste took me fiercely, and I could not help but suckle greedily at her, ashamed, but overwhelmed by the thickness of it, the milky richness. This is my body, I thought wildly, this is my blood.

And then the drug struck my brain like a fist wrapped in rose petals and I knew no more. Her laughter chased me down the black stair of sleep.

I woke in a warm darkness, with savory smells around me. As my eyes crinkled open, I saw that I lay on a long plinth within a cavern whose ceiling soared up into the distance. Some clever mason had carved shelves and alcoves all through the cave, up to its highest cranny, and many surfaces were laid about with rich furs and piles of scrolls and books. As my vision cleared I gasped, for the walls of the cave were all of gold, and the sheer wealth of those humble steps could have purchased a papacy. Over a pleasant fire the hulking gryphon stood sentinel, stirring a pot with an iron spoon clapped in his beak. I smelt onions and wild beets, harsh, bitter herbs, and even pepper—priceless pepper, for an invalid’s supper! Dimly, I remembered collapsing into fields of the precious stuff, but then I had been too sun-maddened to marvel.

“I can’t hold your head and let you sip it like a baby,” the gryphon growled. “Anatomy is unkind. You will have to feed yourself.”

And so I did, ravenous, desperate. The beast directed me, still shaky, to a pot of yoghurty beerish stuff, and my gratitude swelled so great I could not give it voice. He introduced himself as Fortunatus, and the name seemed to me Latin and home enough to bring tears to my eyes. I ventured some words:

“We have tales of creatures like you, where I come from.”

His barrel chest lifted a bit in leonine pride. “Is that so? Well, I am a fascinating individual. I suppose that is understandable. What do they say?”

I considered. My duty to minister and witness warred with my desire for more soup, and shelter against the demon with eyes on her breasts. I felt stronger already, and the nightmare of the sandy sea receded in the face of my own name, my own self returning.

“We say that you are like Our Lord Jesus Christ, part strong earthly lion, which is like the flesh, part soaring eagle, which is the divine soul. You are a symbol of the mystery of God.”

The gryphon blinked at me, his limpid golden eyes gleaming with concern in the firelight. “I am Fortunatus. I am not a symbol of anything.”

“No, what I mean to say is, God’s wisdom dwells in every living thing, and in your people He has chosen to illustrate His Divine Nature.”

“My people are gryphons. Not illustrations or symbols. It is not a simple thing to be a gryphon, but you are over-complicating it.”

I held up my hands. “Let me begin again. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God.” Fortunatus settled himself by the fire, kneading the fur rugs on the floor and after a long feline stretch, dropping his hindquarters abruptly down.

“Which word?” the gryphon purred pleasantly.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, there are many words. Which one is God? Love? Joy? Quince? Sandal? Blue? This is very interesting!”

“Christ is the Word of God, but Christ is God, and God is Christ. But Christ was also a man.”

“Like you?”

“Not like me. Christ was the Son of God. God incarnate, born of a virgin, died of crucifixion, ransoming us all from death.”

Fortunatus bent his feathered head. “Forgive me, John. I do not quite see how death can ransom death.”

“Your questions make me tell it all backwards! Before Christ comes Eden and Eve and the serpent, and Abraham and Sarah and Isaiah and many other very important things. The whole history of the world.”

“Please tell me about it, John. I enjoy stories.”

I sweated in the cave. I was not meant for such practice. Books and quiet prayer, study, reflection. I have never seen conversion come from words alone, and I have not the heart for those other tools. “God… God dwelt in the Void, until he made all the beasts of the field and the fruits of the earth, and he caused the water to be separate from the land, and great mountains to rise, and oceans to swell, and set the stars in their firmament.”

“Why?” The beast had a heart like a child, never able to let a sentence lie unworried.

“What?”

“Why did God make the… beasts,” the word seemed bitter in Fortunatus’ mouth. “In your opinion. Why did he make the water and the mountains? Why did he do it then and not at another time? Was the Void unsatisfactory in some way?”

“I… I could not say. I could not possibly say.” I was accustomed to wrangling my faith with men who all knew the same things I did, who shared a kind of tribal knowledge, a common table, and no one of them would have asked if the Void was not good enough for God. Yet he required an answer, and no older priest would appear and save me. “Perhaps He was lonely.”

For a moment I could not continue—a dreadful sorrow came over me, in this place, this golden hovel, without a friend or a face anything like my own. When I continued on, I felt the roughness of my voice in my throat. “Finally, He created Man, in his own image, and called him Adam, and this was the greatest of His endeavors. He breathed the living soul of His Divine Love into Adam, and set him in a wonderful garden full of every good thing, every green and growing plant, every proud and noble beast, and gave him dominion over all of them, and made his son to name each flower and beast according to their nature. This place He called Eden. Out of Adam’s rib He fashioned Woman, and called her Eve, and bade them eat and drink and enjoy every thing in the garden, save one tree, which was the Tree of Knowledge, and that God said was His and His alone.”