He mounts his horse just outside the courtyard gate in the hazy gray light of the day and canters toward the familiar trail in the woods. Distant features are nonexistent, yet there is no fog. The haze permeates all aspects of his sight, however none of this matters. He has a commitment to fulfill.
His armor and helm gleam brightly in the hazy light. He is a beacon that remains undiminished even as he enters the familiar woods. The stream crossing in the hollow of the depression is uneventful as is his passage beyond the spur trail to the pond. That way has passed; his destiny lies forward. Onward and onward, his horse climbs the hill.
He reaches the tree line that rings the crown of the hill. Here in the open ground is where his happiest memories are. Here is where his heart lies. Here is his sacred ground.
Ahead, he spies a lone figure at the very summit. The solitary silhouette stands at attention with his hands clasped in front. His presence is an affront to the luminescent rider.
“You there!” Pierre yells to the mysterious stranger. “Announce yourself and your intentions!”
His command is met with silence.
“I said to announce yourself. You are standing on private lands, sacred to me and my family. Who are you and what are you doing here?”
More silence is the response. The mysterious stranger remains unmoved.
Pierre dismounts and ties Devoir’s reins to a low tree branch. As he turns to face the summit, the stranger unsheathes a long sword and assumes a battle stance. Pierre is furious at this affront to his honor, but retains control of his emotions.
“Stranger,” he calls out, “I must warn you. I am Pierre Levallier, Baron of Neufchâteau and owner of these lands by grant of my liege lord, Rudolf, the Duke of Lorraine. You are standing on the site of my family’s history and legacy. I demand that you sheathe your weapon and remove yourself from my sight. I will not ask you a second time.”
The silhouette neither moves nor speaks. Instead, a soft wind begins to blow about the figure causing an previously unseen cape to flutter in the breeze; its movements betray the shape of a cowl about the stranger’s head.
Upon seeing the cape, memories of recent dreams are jarred loose in his mind. Pierre purposefully draws his sword, adding its light to the hazy surroundings. He begins to climb the remainder of the hill as the fresh pain of his family’s deaths rise from his spirit. Faster and faster forward he climbs until he is charging the stranger at the summit.
The confrontation is a violent meeting of metal as the stranger’s sword parries Pierre’s attacking swing. Together, the two warriors parry and thrust in ever widening circles around the hill’s summit. Sword meets sword in an furious series as each warrior’s attack is met with the proper defense. Pierre’s sword and armor gleam in the hazy light, while the stranger’s accoutrements neither reflect nor reveal themselves to the surrounding light. Even up close, the stranger’s features remain at the edge of sight, his face buried deep within the hooded cowl.
After many minutes, the combatants separate. Pierre breathes heavily and assumes a defensive posture. The stranger mirrors Pierre’s stance, but does not seem as fatigued.
“Stranger,” Pierre calls out. “what is your name, that I may properly address you?”
The stranger remains silent.
Pierre remembers then the recent dream with his wife and realizes that this is the battle she was preparing him for, a battle with death itself. He considers the impact of what a victory over death would be. The world would be such a better place than it is now. No one would ever need to fear their mortality ever again. The glory would be unimaginable. People would sing of him and his family forever. Perhaps, even, the dead would be returned to life. He would have his family back and his sin’s debt would be paid. He could get back the life he forsook in a weak moment all those years ago and he and his family could live together in happiness for eternity.
A voice filled with sadness interrupts Pierre’s musings. “You shan’t get them back.”
“What?”
The stranger says again, “You shan’t get them back. They are beyond your reach.”
Pierre feels tears begin to sting the corners of his eyes. In his mind, he hears his wife’s laughter and his children’s songs and a need for vengeance springs to life within him.
Pierre charges the stranger and another battle ensues. Sword again meets sword, and armored blows are exchanged between them. “How could you?” Pierre asks in between attacks. “How could you take the lives of the innocent?”
The warriors separate again. Pierre stands fatigued with anger and adrenaline coursing through his veins. His combat posture is not perfect, but still dangerous. “How could you take my children?” he yells to the seemingly calm adversary. “And with a sword no less. Such nobility! Such honor,” Pierre spits out, “to cut down innocent babes with a sword!”
The stranger remains silent for a moment. Then, he shakes his head and, with his free hand, moves his cape aside to reveal a previously unseen dagger, sheathed and tucked in his belt. After tapping the dagger, he releases the cape and, with his index finger still extended, makes a single, slashing gesture across his throat.
“God damn you!!!” Pierre shrieks as he charges the stranger. The stranger barely meets the attack and backs down under Pierre’s furious onslaught. Over and over again, Pierre slashes and thrusts at the stranger, driving him back down the hill. Several of his blows pass through the stranger’s defenses and strike the armor, but the blows were not true and the stranger is only slightly wounded.
Eventually, Pierre’s strength begins to flag and they separate for a third time. Pierre is breathing hard now and his combat stance is barely adequate. The stranger stands a ways apart and down the hill. His cape is tattered and he is fatigued.
Regaining his composure and standing erect, Pierre calls out to the stranger, “Yield to me and I shall be merciful.”
The stranger responds to Pierre’s offer with sadness and scorn. “Mercy? You know nothing of mercy.”
“You offend me, sir,” Pierre replies. “I am the very image of mercy.”
“Really?!” the stranger spits out. “What of Augustin? Where was your mercy then?”
Pierre struggles, but cannot remember who Augustin was.
Raising his weapon, the stranger begins to quickly close the distance to Pierre. “You don’t remember Augustin? The man you had hung from your castle wall?” Sword meets sword yet again, but this time it is the stranger who is pressing the attack. “Augustin, the man who ‘slew a maiden’s virtue’ as you righteously put it. Augustin, the married man who accepted the offered virtue of an unmarried, young woman.” As the stranger speaks, the tempo of his attack increases. “Now, do you remember Augustin, the poor soul who dared offend the sensitivities of the liege lord of Neufchâteau, a man who himself committed the same sin against his own wife and house. Where was your mercy then, Pierre?” Attack after attack begins to strike home, with Pierre’s armor absorbing most of the damage. “Tell me. Where was it?”
After the stranger’s attack forces Pierre backward over the crest of the hill, they separate again.
“Augustin was a deserter. He deserved to die,” Pierre yells up to the stranger who stands before him. “I did my duty as I saw fit.”
“Look deep within your heart, Pierre. You killed him because he committed the same sin as you. You could have easily impressed him into service as you did with the poachers. But, you didn’t. Instead, this man reminded you of your own sin and in your anger and guilt you had him put to death.”
The stranger’s words strike home more than his sword has done to this point. From his weakened stance, Pierre first notices that his sword, and then his armor, no longer shine in the hazy air around them. Furthermore, the surfaces of both feature numerous scars.
As the stranger walks toward Pierre, he notes the condition Pierre’s armor and says, “What is the matter, Pierre? Is your nobility failing you?”
“I did my duty,” Pierre weakly replies.
The stranger approaches Pierre and renews his attack. This time, however, there is no urgency behind it.
“Yes, yes, your duty,” he says between strikes. “That is another thing you know nothing of. What part of your duty to Danielle were you tending to when you lay with Corinne in that pond behind you?”
Pierre’s parries are half-hearted now. “I was weak,” he says feebly.
“Yes, you were, as you are now,” the stranger replies soothingly as his blade easily avoids Pierre’s and pierces the armor.
Pierre closed his eyes and sank to his knees with the stranger’s sword still embedded within him. Trying to sense the pain around the wound, he found none. Instead, there was a feeling of calming peace emanating from it. Opening his eyes, he looked down and saw water flowing from the wound and along the stranger’s sword, the streams evaporating before hitting the ground. Within him, he could feel the encroaching peace spreading throughout his body.
Pierre looked up and saw the unhooded stranger kneeling before him and holding him upright, half cradled in his arm. Without the cowl obscuring Pierre’s vision, he could see the stranger’s melancholy eyes appraising him.
“It is always most difficult with you noblemen. Everything with you is about vanquishing foes and codified ideals that you either horde or break at will. You speak of things like duty, honor and glory, but your duty is to each other and your honor and glory are handed out amongst each other like currency. You buy and trade each other’s loyalties and convince yourselves that you are free. You hold each other in high esteem and save the best qualities of life for yourselves. There is nothing noble about that. Your sense of duty, while admirable, is misspent in servitude to your betters and your obedience is paid for with honorifics and lands. You leave your loved ones behind to serve others who you do not love and your rewards only serve to attract temptations that further keep you from the life you’d rather lead. No, you may speak of mercy and duty, but their meaning has escaped you.”
“What does Death know of mercy? What does Death know of duty?” Pierre asked scornfully.
“So, you still do not know who I am? Whatever you may think, I am not Death. Death is a foe that has been conquered long ago. He has no power here.”
“Who are you then?”
The stranger replied, “I am called by many different names. To some, I am Prayer’s Answer. To others, I am Life’s Last Visitor. To those who pass from this life to the next, I am Heaven’s Guide. You, however, know me best as Mercy.”
“Mercy?” Pierre scoffed. “Surely not. You are a slayer of the living. Death has not been conquered. Death still is. My family is dead and by your own hand.”
“Yes, your family is dead and I did take them, but by taking them I also saved them. You misunderstand, Pierre. I do not prey upon the living. I do not corrupt the body. I answer the calls of those who die. I shepherd the souls of all who pass from that life into a new one. Without me, death reigns. Death, as you know it, still exists, but death’s power is broken by He who sends me.”
Pierre listened as he felt more of his senses fade from around his wound. “And your duty?”
“Look into my eyes, Pierre, and see what I know of duty.”
Pierre looked into Mercy’s melancholy eyes and saw nothing at first. Then, after noticing his reflection on their surfaces, he began to see several scenes played out before him. He saw his wife’s and children’s fevered bodies in their death beds. He saw battlefields littered with dead. He saw infants, the elderly, the broken flower of youth. He saw the sick, the infirm, the murdered, the old. In all, he saw their pain and the peace afterward. Spanning history, he saw death do its work only to see the misery and anguish replaced with peace and calm.
Finally, he saw a gathering of people on a hill outside of an ancient city. At the hill’s summit, three men were being crucified. Two of the men were dead, but the third, the one wearing a crown of thorns, lingered on. Among the witnesses at the foot of the crosses was a soldier with melancholy eyes who looked upon the third man with heartfelt sympathy. This soldier took up a spear and mercifully pierced the broken body of the dying man, opening a wound from which water flowed.
When the scene abruptly finished, the stranger said, “That is my legacy. That is my duty. From a single act of mercy, boundless others flow. I take the children knowing that mothers and fathers remain behind. I take the parents, knowing that orphans remain behind. I take the noblemen, knowing that plots and wars will keep me busy for a time afterward. I take the innocent and the guilty, knowing that, for most, a wake of sadness and despair will accompany their leaving. I bring them all home, in full knowledge of the consequences and regardless of how much it pains me to do so. Any why. For the glorious songs sung about me? For the high esteem that people hold me in? No. I do it for the honor and the glory of He who sends me. Could you do as much?”
Pierre was dumbstruck. All that he was raised to believe in was pulled from his eyes like a moth-riddled tapestry. Here, poor in spirit, he saw all of his faults and beliefs stripped bare. “God forgive me,” he cried as the truth of his life was revealed.
“He already has,” Mercy replied. “Now, you need to relax. It is time to go home.”
“No!” Pierre called out frantically. “I can’t. Not now. Not like this!” More and more of his senses were fading, but his spirit did not share the peace that was filling his body. He clutched at the sword and tried to push it out, splashing at the water that continued to flow from his wound. Seeing his agitation, Mercy pulled the sword from Pierre’s body. Pierre pressed his hand to the wound to staunch the flow, but it was no use. The water’s flow continued unabated. Finally, seeing the futility behind his efforts, Pierre surrendered and, with much tenderness, was laid down to rest upon the ground and Mercy’s lap.
Turning towards him, Pierre weakly said, “I don’t understand you. You display such care and tenderness. And yet, you have passed such harsh judgments upon me. Where is the mercy in such actions?”
“Mercy is not found in hiding the truth. Mercy is found when the truth about our lives is revealed. Only then can the pain of it be soothed. Now, please, becalm yourself. Your moment approaches.”
Leaning into Mercy’s support, his body was willingly losing its hold on life, but his unrequited sense of duty remained strong. He looked back into Mercy’s eyes then and saw the pity and deep sadness within his spirit. In that moment, he knew where his destiny lie. “You don’t have to do this anymore,” he said.
“Do what?” Mercy replied.
“Your duty. It is time for another to take your place. You deserve to be home,” Pierre explained as he felt his sense of duty and purpose grow within him. “Earlier, you asked if I could do as much, and the answer is yes, I could. God help me, but I could.”