After the Fire.
Jürgen stepped into the half-light, and I followed. The uneven stone floor swallowed the dull sound of our footsteps without giving anything back as an echo.
Beyond the threshold, everything fell silent at once.
Almost absentmindedly, I knocked my knuckles against the wall. The sound landed flat, with almost no resonance — the wall did not want to answer.
— Strange, — I said.
— What?
— It’s too quiet for a stone chapel.
The walls seemed excessively thick.
The window niches in the southern wall, facing the sea, sank deep into the masonry, and the light entered in slanting bands. High above us, an old vault lay motionless beneath dark wooden panelling; it seemed not merely concealed, but to muffle every sound, keeping it from rising any higher.
Against the western wall stood a Baroque altar — its ornate appearance almost defiant in this low, gloomy space. Behind it, the faint outline of an ancient semicircular apse could still be made out. Its old walls had almost dissolved into the bulk of the later addition, as though time had slowly erased whatever it deemed unnecessary.
We walked deeper into the chapel.
In a niche to the left, between the windows, hung an icon — a grey-bearded old man in a rough hair shirt sat beside a cave between two mountains, while a black raven brought him food.
It looked strangely out of place among those ancient walls.
— Is the icon from here?
— No. This icon of Elijah is from our own time. Someone from the military hung it here. And — this is what’s interesting — in the Orthodox tradition, Elijah is considered the patron saint of aviation.
Jürgen sat down on the stone bench by the wall, gathering his thoughts.
— He is often depicted like this. He called down fire from heaven. Before the eyes of all the people. It was… like a victory. And then he became afraid and ran.
— Why?
— Elijah was a prophet, — Jürgen continued. — He lived at a time when Israel worshipped Baal — the god of storms, rain, and fertility. Elijah stood alone against them all. He gathered the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel and set them a test: whoever could call down fire from heaven would be proven right. The prophets of Baal prayed all day — cut themselves, danced, shouted — nothing. Elijah simply prayed. And fire fell from heaven. It burned the altar, the stones, the water in the trench — everything.
Jürgen paused for a moment, then continued.
— Then Queen Jezebel, who worshipped Baal, swore to kill Elijah. And he ran. For forty days and forty nights he crossed the wilderness and came to Mount Horeb — the very mountain where Moses received the commandments. There he found a cave. He went inside and sat down.
I said nothing.
— And there, in the cave, the Lord asks him: “What are you doing here, Elijah? “ Elijah answers: “I am the only one left; all the prophets have been killed, and they are looking for me. Then the Lord says: go out and stand on the mountain before me”.
Jürgen looked at me intently, as though what came next mattered.
— First — a mighty wind. Strong enough to tear mountains apart and shatter rocks. Then — an earthquake. Then — fire. And after the fire — silence. The First Book of Kings, chapter nineteen: ‘After the fire — the sound of a gentle breeze.
I looked at Jürgen questioningly, still not understanding.
— He heard a voice?
— Not exactly.
— Then what?
— That is what you need to feel.
I stepped away from the wall.
Only then did I notice again that the silence in the chapel was so complete that I could hear Jürgen breathing — steady, calm, as though he had not been telling this story for the first time.
—The acoustics, — I said.
— I warned you.
The sound disappeared into the wall and did not return as either an echo or a resonance — as though it had been swallowed.
Jürgen pointed deeper into the chapel, where shafts of light reached in, barely touching the far wall. Beyond a row of columns, the northern side aisle lay in darkness — the only side aisle in the building.
— Stand here.
I took a few steps.
At first, nothing happened.
Then I felt it.
Not a sound — rather, its absence. Something very low, almost beyond the range of hearing. Pressure in my chest. A faint vibration that could not be caught by the ear.
I held my breath.
— What is that?
— I don’t know.
Jürgen shrugged.
— But almost everyone feels it here.
There was water beneath us.
Or wind moving through the stone.
The body could hear what the ears could not.
Suddenly, the underground vibration became a current.
1307.
Bernard was in the water.
The night of October 14. The icy impact drove the last breath from his lungs. The river dragged him under, spun him around, carried him over the stones. In the whirl of water, it was impossible to tell which way was up and which was down — only his left hand remained locked around the bundle, refusing to let it slip away.
With his right hand, he fought the current. Not toward the shore, but upward, through the dense weight of the water, toward the light.
He broke the surface. Coughing, choking, his lungs tearing from the cold. But his left hand still held on.
The horse had been pulled into the depths. The sword and scabbard had been ripped from his belt.
Bernard crawled onto the rocks. He collapsed chest-first onto the wet pebbles, struggling to drag breath after breath into his lungs. Far above, high on the cliff, orange sparks from torches flickered.
The pursuit. They were looking for him.
He was without a weapon and without a horse. The mantle bearing the red cross could betray him faster than any weapon. Bernard tore it from his shoulders, folded it, and hid it beneath the roots of an old tree.
He had no intention of returning for it, but he could not bring himself to destroy the sign of the Order.
In a woolen tunic and leather trousers, Bernard no longer looked like a knight — only a poor traveler. A few silver coins were sewn into a hidden seam at his waist. A cross lay cold against his chest, while in the crook of his left arm he carried a priceless burden — as though it were a shield. He did not let it go for a moment: the one thing his commander had ordered him to protect above his own life.
He rose. He kissed the crucifix and wiped the soot from the cross. The metal was cold, heavy, awkward. Bernard slipped it beneath the wet cloth, against his body where it was warmer, and headed south.
By morning, the forest had grown dense. By noon, a goat path appeared, winding downward toward distant plumes of smoke. Bernard skirted the village through the ravines.
In a lonely, leaning shed, the air smelled of dried mint and hay. On a shelf, beneath a layer of dust, he found a crust of stale bread and a leather flask of water. Bernard tied them into a bundle with a strip of cloth, making sure nothing would rattle as he walked.
In the corner stood a thin peasant horse.
He led it out, tucked the food inside his shirt, and set off again.
At sunset, Embrun appeared: a cathedral on the hill, lights glowing in the windows. There were people inside. And behind him, those searching for him might still be coming.
The old road followed the river, a narrow corridor between rock and water. By day, it would have been a death trap, but in the ink-black darkness the cliffs concealed him. Bernard led the horse by a short rein, moving from one outcrop to the next, freezing at every rustle.
The next day, near a small village, he saw two riders. They were asking the villagers about a Templar on horseback.
Bernard led the horse into the brush and released it. The hoofprints were too obvious, and beyond that point the road disappeared into reeds and river mud.
He spent the day waiting in the shadow of the cliffs.
Another night. Another day. And another night.
By the morning of the fourth day, the cliffs began to spread apart. The gorge of Sisteron was behind him.
The river emerged onto the plain — wider and calmer now, with shallows and fishermen’s nets stretched between stakes. Manosque lay ahead. The city was about two days away.
Bernard had no intention of entering it. There were too many roads, inns, and unfamiliar eyes. He stayed close to the river, hiding among reeds, near mills and riverside settlements, finding food and snatching what rest he could.
Below Manosque, right by the water, he saw an old fishing boat tied to a willow. Its owner was nowhere in sight.
Bernard waited until evening, then pushed the boat into the water. No fire. Only oars and the stubborn work of his shoulders.
By day, he hid among reeds, near mills and riverside settlements; after sunset, he returned to the current. The boat moved slowly, but still faster than he could have traveled on foot.
On the sixth night, torches appeared ahead.
At a narrow stretch of river stood a checkpoint: a low wooden hut on stilts and a chain stretched across the channel. Two guards were checking boats, stopping anyone who could not identify himself and account for his cargo.
Bernard lay flat on the bottom of the boat. The current carried him toward the reeds. He lay pressed against the side, holding his breath until the voices faded. Only then did he take up the oars again.
By dawn, a mill appeared ahead. Its wheel turned slowly in the grey water, drowning out the sound of the river. The current swung the boat sideways. The wood creaked, the hull struck a submerged stone, and water began to seep in.
Bernard pulled the boat into the reeds, plugged the gap with a strip of cloth torn from the lining, and bailed out the water. The book had remained beneath his tunic the entire time, pressed against his body. The leather wrapping had grown warm against his skin, but the book had not shifted.
Until evening, he had to walk along the bank, dragging the boat behind him by a rope. By nightfall, Bernard was rowing again.
The stars cut through the darkness overhead, but he kept rowing.
For eight days and nights, Bernard traveled along the Durance — past villages, bridges, mills, and scattered lights. The river carried him farther south, toward the place where it flowed into a greater river.
His heart hammered against his ribs like a steady metronome.
Each beat — one stroke of the oar.
Farther still from the pursuit, from the fires of Dauphiné.
Only at the confluence of the rivers did he see the Rhône for the first time. He did not know its name — only that it flowed toward the sea.
For another two days, the river carried him past low banks, reeds, and scattered lights. At dawn, the stone walls of Arles appeared, and beyond them a forest of masts and the dark hulls of ships.
A port lay ahead in the grey haze. A foreign place where ships sailed east and south, where no one asked unnecessary questions.
The boat ran aground on a sandbank. Bernard tumbled over the side and collapsed to his knees — not to pray, but simply because his legs could no longer hold him.
He unwrapped the bundle.
The book lay on the wet sand, swollen and heavy as cast lead. The leather had darkened with water, the edges of the parchment leaves had swollen, but the text remained intact.
Bernard wrapped the book in leather again. He looked at the masts in the haze, at the sun cutting across the edge of the horizon.
Arles was only the first point. The commander had barely had time to say anything — only where to find the man who would point him toward the next step.
Bernard pressed the bundle against his chest.
“I will preserve it, ” he whispered.
He no longer knew what day it was.
The 28th? The 29th? Perhaps the 30th of October.
After the thirteenth, the days had ceased to form a sequence. There were only roads, nights spent wherever he could find shelter, cold, and short hours of sleep.
He rose and walked along the coast, keeping clear of the port. He did not know the route, but he knew the destination.
A long journey lay ahead of him, toward the place where the cliffs propped up the sky.
Toward the place where the stars did not know how to remain silent.
In the darkened part of the chapel, on a blank wall where traces of an old painting showed through the later plaster, a fresco of stars emerged from the gloom.
Jürgen and I walked toward it.
(from
the notes of Viktor Stahl)