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picture_prompt_funTitle: Dust
Fandom: Cadfael (book 'verse)
Rating: Gen
Length: 500
Summary: At the end of One Corpse Too Many, Cadfael reflects on all that has transpired.
Challenge: 53 - Picture 106
When it was all over, Brother Cadfael found himself one day, quite by accident, once more in the inner ward where the bodies of the slain had been lain out for claiming. He sat down on the dusty steps by the archway and contemplated all that had transpired.
Ninety-four killed. One murdered. All, finally, laid to rest, and justice meted out in its own way, at least for the death of Nicolas Faintree. Cadfael was not for King Stephen, who’d shown his iron fist in the death of the ninety-four, and he was not for Empress Maud, who had shown her own vicious hand on other occasions. He was for the two pairs of young lovers who’d been united and the future that he hoped they would create, that he would live long enough to see.
A future of without civil war. No more ninety-four, just the one, the class of violation to which Cadfael would always submit himself to Providence as an instrument of truth.
And in truth, if Cadfael were honest with himself and his God, he’d quite enjoyed the puzzle of ‘one corpse too many.’ He’d also liked besting Hugh Beringer about the treasure.
Hugh Beringer. He was a case of treasure lost, treasure found.
Hugh may have lost material wealth, but Cadfael felt as if he himself had gained that rarest of gems, a like-minded friend. The strength joy that filled Cadfael at the thought was startling. Monastic life afforded congenial relations but Cadfael realised he’d not found in any of the brothers so kindred a spirit to his own as that of Hugh Beringer. He’d not, in truth, known such sentiment since his days in the Holy Land.
Hugh was a brother-in-arms even though Cadfael had traded arms for the cowl long ago.
As a monk and as a man, Cadfael loved Hugh, and Hugh’s happiness as sheriff and with Aline was Cadfael’s own. Cadfael had the sense that more adventures, and more sparring with Hugh, were in the offing and that gave him a quite unholy thrill.
Well, as long as the adventures didn’t take him away from his garden for too long.
Cadfael dispelled the wool-gathering with a shake of the head, said a prayer for the ninety-five dead and their families, then got to his feet. It was time he was on his way back to the abbey.
All are dust and to dust all turn again, he thought idly as he brushed that eloquent substance from his clothing.
But, secretly and perhaps blasphemously, Cadfael did not think of himself as dust.
He was soil and one day, he hoped, to soil he would turn again, soil that nurtured life with the richness of compassion and love, soil that pushed green, towering, flowering stems toward the sky, and gave, to those who could be trusted with their secrets, aid in the remedying of suffering.
Cadfael smiled at the thought, then hurried on his way so as not to miss Vespers yet again.
Fandom: Cadfael (book 'verse)
Rating: Gen
Length: 500
Summary: At the end of One Corpse Too Many, Cadfael reflects on all that has transpired.
Challenge: 53 - Picture 106
When it was all over, Brother Cadfael found himself one day, quite by accident, once more in the inner ward where the bodies of the slain had been lain out for claiming. He sat down on the dusty steps by the archway and contemplated all that had transpired.
Ninety-four killed. One murdered. All, finally, laid to rest, and justice meted out in its own way, at least for the death of Nicolas Faintree. Cadfael was not for King Stephen, who’d shown his iron fist in the death of the ninety-four, and he was not for Empress Maud, who had shown her own vicious hand on other occasions. He was for the two pairs of young lovers who’d been united and the future that he hoped they would create, that he would live long enough to see.
A future of without civil war. No more ninety-four, just the one, the class of violation to which Cadfael would always submit himself to Providence as an instrument of truth.
And in truth, if Cadfael were honest with himself and his God, he’d quite enjoyed the puzzle of ‘one corpse too many.’ He’d also liked besting Hugh Beringer about the treasure.
Hugh Beringer. He was a case of treasure lost, treasure found.
Hugh may have lost material wealth, but Cadfael felt as if he himself had gained that rarest of gems, a like-minded friend. The strength joy that filled Cadfael at the thought was startling. Monastic life afforded congenial relations but Cadfael realised he’d not found in any of the brothers so kindred a spirit to his own as that of Hugh Beringer. He’d not, in truth, known such sentiment since his days in the Holy Land.
Hugh was a brother-in-arms even though Cadfael had traded arms for the cowl long ago.
As a monk and as a man, Cadfael loved Hugh, and Hugh’s happiness as sheriff and with Aline was Cadfael’s own. Cadfael had the sense that more adventures, and more sparring with Hugh, were in the offing and that gave him a quite unholy thrill.
Well, as long as the adventures didn’t take him away from his garden for too long.
Cadfael dispelled the wool-gathering with a shake of the head, said a prayer for the ninety-five dead and their families, then got to his feet. It was time he was on his way back to the abbey.
All are dust and to dust all turn again, he thought idly as he brushed that eloquent substance from his clothing.
But, secretly and perhaps blasphemously, Cadfael did not think of himself as dust.
He was soil and one day, he hoped, to soil he would turn again, soil that nurtured life with the richness of compassion and love, soil that pushed green, towering, flowering stems toward the sky, and gave, to those who could be trusted with their secrets, aid in the remedying of suffering.
Cadfael smiled at the thought, then hurried on his way so as not to miss Vespers yet again.
