The Forgotten Cross
THE SUN ROSE early that day, and the soldier sat on the crest of the hill waited until it was almost directly overhead. He sighed as he absently scratched at the grey stubble that had formed on his chin. Beads of sweat stung his eyes, and he shifted uncomfortably as trickles of it ran down his back, sticking his undershirt to his leather armour. He stood up and turned around to watch the procession weave its way through the crowded narrow streets of the town below him. From up on the hill, the people looked like slow-moving ants trapped in a maze; scrambling over each other as they struggled to carry their dead back to the dank warm comfort of their underground nest. He gently rested his spear against the wooden post that had been dug into the ground and reached for his water bladder on his belt. Tilting his head back to take a drink of lukewarm water, his gaze followed the grain of the thick wooden post up towards the top of it. Looking down at him accusingly and with arms spread wide, the man nailed to the cross met the soldier’s stare and with an odd smile closed his eyes and died.
The soldier’s orders were clear, wait for the man to die and then move his body to the small cave where he was to be buried. The soldier stared at the man, looking for any signs of life. He saw nothing, not even an involuntary death spasm. The soldier had accepted the task readily - who wouldn’t want to punish this man for all the trouble he had caused. But now, as he looked at his gaunt face, he felt a strange emotion wash over him but couldn’t determine what it was. He definitely had no affinity with only one god as he knew there were many, but of them all perhaps Zeus was the one he believed in the most. He often offered worship to Zeus, the god of war, hoping for good fortitude every time he went into battle.
“Perhaps that is what I am feeling, the blessing of the gods,” he thought, as he raised his spear and pushed the tip of it slowly into the man’s ribs just under his armpit. The spears serrated edge made a disgusting grinding noise as its metal scraped against bone as it pierced the man’s body. The man did not move. The soldier left the tip of the spear in for a while until he was satisfied he was dead and then roughly pulled it out. For a moment, the skin around the tip of the spear stretched as it tried to resist and then with a slurping noise suddenly split open. Dark red blood wept out of the wound to the ground leaving a trail that looked like somebody had painted a thick red line down the side of his body.
The soldier released the ropes that had been tied around the trees to hold the cross steady and gripped them tightly to take the strain as he tried to lower it to the ground. He swore as the rope slipped through his hands as he struggled to control the combined weight of the cross and dead man. The soldier lost control of the cross, and it came crashing down to the ground with a dull crack.
Once the dust that had been thrown out settled, the soldier untied the rough ropes that had secured the man’s arms to the cross then took hold of each hand folding them into a fist before prising them away from the wood. The dull grey nails made a creaking noise as they came away, still in place in the palms of each hand. The feet were more challenging to release as a larger nail had been hammered through both, one foot on top of the other. As he worked, he looked down into the town and saw that the crowd had stopped moving and he watched as three crosses were being erected on the small hill to the north. “I’d better hurry,” he thought, and took out a small knife and scratched at the wood below the feet to work the large nail loose. Distracted by the cheering below, he slipped and the knife cutting into the end of two of his fingers. As he pulled on the man’s ankles, the wood splintered and reluctantly gave up its hold, causing the soldier to fall backwards as the feet came away still held together by the nail.
The soldier took hold of the man’s feet, the small cuts on his fingertips tracing a thin signature of blood as he dragged him unceremoniously through the dirt towards his outstretched cloak, the exertion causing his breathing to quicken with the strain. The back of the man’s head left a shallow furrow in the dirt as he was pulled along by the soldier.
“I’m not as strong as I once was,” the soldier said, and for a moment he was startled as the man nodded back at him. Unnerved by this, his grip slipped, and his left hand slid over the nail sticking out of the foot that was slick with blood. Pausing, he reassured himself that it was just the motion of the back of his skull riding over two rocks half hidden in the dirt. Even so, he didn’t take his eyes away from the man’s face until he had rolled him up in the cloak and secured him with ropes onto the donkeys back.
When he finished tying the ropes, he looked at his hands and saw that his fingers were coated with the man’s blood.
He took his helmet off and sat down, savouring the feeling of the light breeze cooling the sweat on his bald head. At first, it felt like a light tickle, as if an insect was crawling over the fingers of his left hand and he absently waved it away. Then the tickling feeling rapidly changed, growing into an intense, hot scalding sensation. Alarmed, the soldier held his hand up to his face and watched in horrified amazement as the cuts on his fingers slowly closed and completely healed, leaving no wounds or scars.
It was early evening when the soldier arrived at the cave, and he was glad that his travelling was over. Lashing the donkey’s reins to a tree, he waited and looked around for signs of anybody hiding in the bushes. The branches of the trees swayed in the light wind, and sensing movement behind him the soldier began to draw his sword from its scabbard without turning around. He tightened his grip, the muscles in his forearm tensing, making the myriad of small scars earned from battles long ago stand out. He slowed his breathing getting ready to spin and catch his enemy by surprise as they got closer. Long seconds passed, and the soldier doubted that there was anyone there at all when he heard the priest’s hushed greeting.
“Come now, Titus, get him inside.”
Sheathing his sword, Titus turned to face the direction of the voice and said to the hooded figure, “you are lucky priest - one more moment and I would have cut you down!” The priest muttered something and shrugged his shoulders, and with no intention of helping move the body, he turned back towards the cave, the bottom of his black robe dragging in the ground as he walked away.
The cave was deeper than Titus had expected, its entrance meandering first one way and then another and he had walked in almost complete darkness for a few minutes before he saw the dull glow of candlelight ahead of him. Several times the body he carried over his shoulder had scraped against the rough cave walls, and he seemed to get heavier with each step. It was quiet apart from the sound of his strained breathing and the popping and cracking of his knees. Eventually, Titus turned a corner and reached the end of the cave where the priest was standing and set the body down at his feet. Sweat found its way into his eyes, and he squinted, struggling to adjust to the brightness of the candles, which seemed to be everywhere. He looked around as he grew used to the light, and slowly, the outline of the priest appeared. Despite being of slight build, the priest’s shadows danced commandingly over the cave walls. The candles flickered constant changing the light casting shadows over the priest’s face under the hood of his robe. It difficult to work out his age, but his bearing suggested to Titus that he was at least 40 years old and he was taken aback when the priest pulled back the hood of his robe revealing the clean-shaven face of a teenager.
The tension was almost unbearable as they stared at each other for what seemed an age. The boy regarded Titus through suspiciously and nodded once towards a white sheet that had been laid out on the ground and waited. Puzzled by the young age of the priest, Titus paused and opened his mouth as if to say something but didn’t. The candles seemed to pause and then resume their flickering dance, and he felt rather than saw the intense stare of the priest as he laid his heavy cargo onto the ground cradling the man’s head as gently as you would a child’s.
“What’s your name?” Titus enquired.
“I am nobody… I have no name,” came the curt reply from the priest.
“But you…”. Titus began. Although he had commanded many men and had fought in many battles, Titus felt a strange deference to the younger man and decided not to pursue it. Still kneeling next to the body, he looked up at the priest and frowned as the changes in flickering candlelight added and then took away years of age from his face. He ran his thumb over the recently healed fingers of his left hand and looked around the cave for another way out more than anything else, and it was then that he saw the lifeless body of the real priest who had been originally sent to meet him.
