Brother Eolann took Fidelma through the main doors, but instead of entering into the refectorium, he turned to his left and went along a short, dark passageway and across a smaller open courtyard with a fountain splashing from the mouths of two stone cherubs in its centre. He approached another door which gave access to a spiral stone staircase which rose in the interior of a tower. Halfway up was a stout oak doorthat gave ingress into a large square room lined with books and manuscripts. On one side were several tall, narrow windows, while at the far end was another large oak door. In spite of the windows, it was dark but, as far as Fidelma could see, the room was empty. With a muttered apology, Brother Eolann spent a little time lighting an oil lamp and then moving to a desk while Fidelma cast her eyes over the books, mentally trying to count them. It was an impressive library but not as impressive as she had thought it would be.
‘The copyists work in the next room,’ explained the scriptor, as if reading her thoughts. ‘Most of the main library is in that room. We store many famous and rare books here, from the poems of Colm Bán himself to some of the great histories written by the Romans, the Greeks, Alexandrians … it is a great honour for me to work here in peace and security.’
‘I am sure it is,’ Fidelma replied solemnly. ‘Yet you say that there are times when you would give it up to see your homeland again?’
Brother Eolann looked embarrassed. ‘I must follow the path God has set for me,’ he muttered. ‘I would not wish that you thought I was unhappy in my calling.’
‘I know that you are not, Brother Eolann. But it is hard not to long for the familiar hills, fields and places of one’s childhood.’
‘That is true,’ replied the scriptor. ‘Don’t we have an old saying — níl aon tintáin mar do thinteán féin.’
‘No hearth like your own hearth,’ repeated Fidelma with a sad smile. ‘Indeed, with that I can entirely agree. One has to have great fortitude to settle in a foreign place where there is conflict and tension surrounding one.’
‘You mean the conflict between the Arians and those ofthe followers of the Nicene Creed? I hear you witnessed the arguments between our abbot and Bishop Britmund.’
‘I was thinking more in terms of the Rule that you obey here. It is so unlike the Rule followed in most of our own abbeys and religious houses.’
‘It is no hardship for one who is a peregrinus pro amore Christi.’
‘Alas, I am not,’ Fidelma confessed. ‘I am just a messenger, an adviser in law, rather than one who sets out to bring the Faith to the heathen and barbarian. But Magister Ado told me that the Rule of Colm Bán was even harsher than the Rule of Benedict. How can that be so? Our own religious houses, mostly mixed houses, do not agree with such penitential methods.’
‘You forget, lady, that Colm Bán spent many years among the undisciplined Franks and Burgunds before he came among the Longobards.’
‘That is what Sister Gisa said. Then you agree that this shaped his thought?’
‘The society is harsh and barbarous. Crime is violent and punishments are severe. Colm Bán might have tried to establish similar religious houses to those in our own land but found that he needed to control and discipline many of those who flocked to join him. I have seen something of the laws of the places in which he dwelled — the wergelds — it was not unusual for infractions of the law to result in physical punishments. Half of Colm Bán’s Rule was devoted to punishments of the community.’
Fidelma was shaking her head in sad disbelief. ‘What sort of punishments?’
‘From fasting, confinement in one’s cubiculum to the saying of additional prayers and …’ he hesitated ‘ … even to physicalpunishments such as the use of the scourge. He listed two hundred blows, given at twenty-five blows at one time, as the punishment for some infractions. Confessions had to be made in public before the abbot and the entire community.’
‘I cannot believe such a Rule would be proclaimed by someone of our land.’
‘True, alas. The Rule also declared celibacy was the perfection — a goal one must make every wholehearted effort to attain by making the body a temple of virtue. He had declared a code of behaviour of asceticism and austerity. He claimed that the austere spirit had to be totally obedient and that obedience would win merit in the eyes of God. That was the ultimate aim of the life of the religious.’
‘It is amazing. I thought our people were so imbued with the essence of our law that they would never descend to such philosophies. How could Colm Bán believe that he could command the love and allegiance of his followers in this way?’
‘He did not. Many left this abbey during the time when his Rule prevailed,’ replied Brother Eolann. ‘However, his Rule lasted only a decade after his death before the abbey sought the milder form of governance as given by Benedict. I think it is Colm Bán’s myth rather than the reality which commands the present love and allegiance.’
Fidelma swallowed as she contemplated the picture that had been painted. Then she shook herself slightly. ‘And this Arianism? How does that affect the brethren here?’
‘We try to ignore it.’
‘But others do not?’
Brother Eolann gave a sad sigh. ‘It is good to have someone here from one’s own land. There are others of the Five Kingdoms here but not many that one is able to talk with.’
‘How do you mean that?’
‘Well, I mean to converse with intelligence. I do not wish to denigrate anyone … but, well, you have spoken to Brother Lonán? He only comes alive when speaking of herbs and plants. While that is laudable and I do not doubt his knowledge, his conversation on other matters is limited. He would not know the poems of our great poet Dallán Forgaill, nor even the poems of Colm Bán himself, any more than the works of Sophocles or the history of Polybius.’
Fidelma hid a smile. ‘Literature is only one form of knowledge, ’ she rebuked.
‘But these books,’ Brother Eolann waved a hand towards the ranks of shelves around the room, ‘these books open roads to all knowledge.’
‘So you would prefer to speak to scholars rather than gardeners?’
‘Is that wrong?’
‘Much may be learned from both, depending on what you want to know.’
‘I am told you spoke with Brother Ruadán last night.’
‘He was why I came here — to see him. He was my teacher when I was young,’ Fidelma replied, wondering at the sudden change of subject.
‘I suppose they would let you see him,’ Brother Eolann said reflectively.
‘Why would they not let me see him?’ Fidelma was puzzled.
‘Brother Hnikar allows no one to see him. They certainly won’t let me near him, and I would claim that I was closer to Brother Ruadán than anyone else in this abbey.’
Fidelma examined him curiously. ‘Are you saying that you were expressly forbidden to visit him?’
‘I was told that he is too poorly. Sad that, at his age, he should be so violently attacked for preaching the true Faith.’
‘Were there any witnesses to this attack?’
‘No one saw it. He was found outside the gates of the abbey early one morning. I was told that he had been preaching at Travo, which is further down the valley. I can only repeat the common knowledge which is that he was found at the gates, badly beaten, with a paper on which the word haereticus was pinned to his bloodstained robe.’
‘Heretic,’ nodded Fidelma. ‘I have been told.’
‘Those of the Arian Creed denounce us as heretics, even as we denounce them. Poor Brother Ruadán, he must have barely made it back to the gates of this abbey before he collapsed. God gave him strength. He is an old man but he survived until he reached here.’