Joan of Domrémy

1425

‘Joan?’

The earth is rising. She looks up to see the sky; pale, half hidden by a wall of rolling black. Her stomach lurches and she sits up, wiping the dust from her hair. The sheep bleat, circling around her. Sunlight warms her cheeks. 

‘What happened?’

‘You were shaking,’ says her Mother, blocking out the sun. 

The sheep are running, the small lambs bobbing up and down behind their mothers as they flee across the field towards the trees.

‘Where am I?’

‘Home,’ whispers her Mother, kneeling to take her by the hand. The tips of her fingers are cold in her palm. ‘Your Father needs you.’

Thunder rumbles. Warm spots of rain fall on her forehead. 

‘Where is he?’

Her legs are heavy as she stands. She leans down on her mother's arm and begins to walk.

‘The barn.’

They walk to the trees, struck by wind, their dark leaves upturning to silver. Shimmering. A bright light in her eyes. 

‘Where was I? I was seeing to the lost lamb, there was a crow-’

‘You fell,’ says her Mother, squeezing her hand.

In the barn Joan sees her Father, kneeling in the blood-wet hay, heaving on the small legs of a lamb. The smell of iron. A blue cord throbs. Lamb's eyes blink in the light pooling across the floor from the open doorway. 

‘I need you to help me, Joan,’ he says, lifting the lamb to place it beside the mother's head. ‘We lost another.’

In the corner lies the dead lamb, curled up, its small legs bent.

‘I am here,’ she replies, kneeling beside her Father, his eyes swiveling, sunken in his large skull as he looks down to his blood-smeared hands. ‘I think it happened to me again,’ she whispers. 

‘God willing, we will be finished once theirs are out,’ he says, nodding to the far gloom where three sheep watch from behind a wooden rail. He wipes his hands down over his breeches and stands, waving away a fly as he walks out into the rain. It falls thinly, dampening his hair and shoulders. Joan sits back and watches as he looks up into the reeling heavens. Her Mother sighs. 

‘I shall need to see the cattle,’ says her Father, walking away toward the fields. ‘To see if they are all there.’

The bells from the church in Domrémy chime.

*

She is to be married says her Mother. Her Father does not like to talk about it. To a local boy. Henri the blacksmith's son? Handsome. Or Jehan the ugly son of Achart the miller. A good match, says her Mother. Her Father wants a son. Good or bad, handsome or ugly, rich or poor. She hopes there is more to life than this. But it is planned. It is His will.

**

The sun broke up the sky and up above flew a man. Sheep bleated down below, but up above there was only blue, a cloudless sky, and a sun shining in her eyes the golden light of God. She felt him. She knew him. The bells of the church tolled, dull chimes and howling wails resounded from the hills.

She opens her eyes and the air is thick with smoke from the fire. Her Mother has been cooking. The smell of herbs and wood smoke, and a meat unknown to her hangs roasting. She can see the dim light of dawn under the door. A shout. She can not see her Father or her Mother. The fire spits, and a bubble bursts, the liquid simmers, spitting out and hissing in the reaching flames. She wipes the sweat from her brow and listens.

‘Anglais are here.’

Angels.

He is here. Her heart drums and the door opens, her Father heaves back the heavy oak and spits the words: ‘Outside, Joan, to me now.’

He fights to find his breath as he runs to her, yanks her up to her feet, and shoves her towards the open doorway. Outside the world is as always but for the scent of smoke hanging heavy on the wind under the trees. Her Father takes her there.

‘Where is Mother?’ asks Joan, wiping the sleep from her eyes. She sees her, running from the barn carrying a satchel and a drinking skin. She reaches them, breathless, and says: ‘I can hear them.’ 

The drone of the horn, the yapping hounds on the heels of the horse as they chase the weary animal through vale and thicket. She had seen them plenty. The shaking of the earth under her feet, the pounding in her heart as the horses charged. Joan hears the squeal of a horse and the pounding of hooves on the dry earth of the road. The clink of iron stirrups, buckles, and straps, and the dull slap of a scabbard as it struck the leg of its master. A horse whinnies. 

Her Mother whimpers.

‘We can not stay here,’ she says, covering her mouth. 

Above the far trees lifts a thick plume of billowing black smoke from Domrémy. The cackles of burning wood. 

 Her Father shakes his head, placing a hand on the round of his daughter's cheek, and holds her to him. He smells of wool and sweat. Her Mother cries.

‘Into the trees, they will not see us there,’ he whispers, pulling them to him and running back to where the belly of the forest will shade them. Between the leaves, Joan sees the red dawn pierce the land and flood the world in gold, and glint off the helmets of the English as they ride across the fields towards the farm. Horses nicker and winnie, and the leather of their saddles creak as the deep voices of the soldiers are carried to them on a smoke-filled wind. A new dark descends as the rising smoke blocks out the sun.

‘Micheal will protect us,’ whispers Joan. ‘O God, save France.’

They stand without a word, waiting as they hear the bellows of the cattle and the course shouts and coughs of men. 

***

The soil of the garden is churned and cut, broken by the heels of the invaders when they carried away with them all of her Father's and mother's possessions. They had trampled the green beans and heaved up the carrots. The tracks of horses weave the yard around their home. All of the cattle are gone; they had seen from between the trees the large beasts being herded away, their backs beaten bloody by staffs and spear butts. The English had tried to burn the barn, but the rain had come to quell the flames, leaving only a black stain up one side of the weathered timbers. The sheep are dead. Joan had found the lamb, left alone by its Mother to wander. Its eyes had been taken by crows.

Mother cries into Father's arms as they lie in their bed. Joan can not face it inside, the air is heavy with sadness and the names of the dead and raped from the village. She rakes the soil and prays.

‘O God, save France.’

She hears the din of church bells. 

The earth is rising. She looks up to see the bright white of the sun behind the clouds and blinks, closing her eyes to feel the sunlight on their lids. The small birds are murmuring up in the trees as she hears the roar of the wind, rustling the leaves. The earth begins to move.

It has all happened before. A lightness in her head. 

This feeling.

The smell of iron. Burning. Warmth. 

She opens her eyes and sees the bright light of the falling skies, the clouds part, and there she sees him. Micheal. Angels. The blazing sunlight fills the soft feathers of their wings as they fly down to fill the skies above the trees. A great wind takes their branches and shakes the leaves down to earth, sending them swirling and rolling across the yard around her feet. Stillness falls and all is calm. Joan falls to her knees and clasps her hands together, shivering, she lies forward, bowing her head to the weight of hope and love that fills her heart. Her eyes roll back and she hears him, Micheal, archangel, flying up above her. He has come to her with a message, of this she is sure, a message from God. Tears fill her eyes and she wails and she hears the rattle of the door, and hears the cries of her Mother and Father and the squelch of their shoes in the mud as they run to her. He has come to her.

She falls back and blinks, opening her eyes to see the empty sky. A warmth fades from her heart, a glimmer of loss, as she searches here and there, crawling, filling her nails with dirt as she tries to find him. She wants him to take her. But he has left her for a purpose, she is sure, to push the Anglais back into the sea, serve him, serve Michael, to free France from English rule. The hot tears roll down her cheeks and she claws up to take her Mother by the arms and her world fades. ‘O God, save France.’