Agnessa

“Brother Dmytro, you really need to do something about your taste in music.”

“What’s wrong with it?” asked the broad-shouldered monk, fishing another mummified head out of the burning fire with a stick and placing it in a row with the other three.

“I’d understand if you liked choral church singing. Something with angels hovering above, something that makes your soul overflow. Or, at the very least, something about a knight climbing through his beloved’s window only to get pierced by a sword for it. But you – it’s all mumbling Scots and droning Britons. And I can’t understand a single thing.”

Dmytro decided not to argue. He never liked to argue, anyway. He just did what he thought was right. If he got in trouble for his rebelliousness, he’d rub his stick-beaten back and carry on. Just a bit more cautiously so the abbot wouldn’t notice. Arguing with someone officially considered crazy was pointless, after all. Though he couldn’t resist teasing a little:

“So, when you’ve got zombies marching in formation through the remains of the village and shouting ‘Unter Soldaten,’ that’s supposed to be uplifting?”

“Naturally,” Agnessa was not one to be shaken by such nonsense. “It’s our folk song, about girls welcoming the homeland’s defenders with flowers when they return from summer camps.”

“And everyone understands that,” the man sighed, poking at the remains of torsos in the blazing fire with his stick.

“Of course they understand,” nodded the woman in the beaked mask, at the mention of whom half the Holy Roman Empire trembled. The other half didn’t tremble because they’d died from plague, the undead’s teeth, or soul-saving fires. “The soldiers will come home, change into civilian clothes, and head to the tavern. They’ll drink too much beer, then chase after whores in all the public houses. For fun, of course. But that’s a different song… A folk song, Brother Dmytro, I’ll point out! A folk song. Not this raspy stuff of yours.”

“It’s called growling,” the monk sighed, pulling a plump bottle out of his thinning sack. “You’ve got a dark soul, no sense for the new trends in music.”

“No, not at all. It’s just that your beloved mummies and corpses can only rasp. I prefer something different… All right, you idiots. Know ‘Ave Maria’? Yes? Excellent. On the count of one-two!”

Standing before the four charred heads on the log, Agnessa began to conduct, trying to recreate the familiar childhood tune “Ave Maria äiti maan lapsien…” Whenever the nanny came back from her Saturday break, she’d lock herself in her cell in the morning, belting out “Anna harras mieli joulu puhtain tuo...” while occasionally hiccuping and crossing herself before the icons. During this time, her father was drilling students at the University, her mother was keeping the sly nuns in line at the convent, and Agnessa would drag herself around the house, struggling under the weight of a chainmail shirt and dragging a massive sword. Her grandfather had hoped for a grandson, so he bought a heap of metal armor from a bankrupt neighbor. The grandson never materialized, but the granddaughter refused to part with the “toys,” first dressing the family wolfhound in armor and then launching “crusades” around the area. Neighbors would hurry to hide their chickens and tell their kids:

“Don’t you dare hang around with that crazy girl! Or you’ll get whipped!”

The boys would grumble, rub their backsides, and agree – only to sneak off to the empty lot later and stage yet another ‘siege of Jerusalem.’ After the fifth barn fire, the owner gave up, although the kids still got whipped. But resisting the chance to wear a real helmet or poke at boards with a spear was simply impossible.

“They’re off-key, the bastards,” the woman sighed, lifting the hem of her blood-red cloak. “Guess I’ll have to deliver a penalty kick... Take that!”

The first head went flying into the darkness.

“Agnessa, we’ll have to gather those up all over the countryside later,” the monk sighed, pulling himself away from the almost-empty bottle.

“The hounds will fetch them; I’m not feeding them for nothing, am I? One-nil. The striker breaks through the defense, it’s one-on-one… Take that!”

The godless craze ‘kick the ball’ had recently arrived from the islands and taken root in the empty heads of the locals. They’d modified the game slightly, allowing players to run the field in light armor. You could also shove, trip, and ram each other, but touching the ball with your hands was forbidden. The goalkeeper was the only exception; everyone else faced the wrath of ‘keep your hands off it, you clumsy fool.’

Agnessa was rarely allowed to play. It wasn’t because she was a woman—other ladies could only cheer from the stands. But she—well, try to stop her, and she’d complain to the Plague Sisters, who would dice up the players thin as paper. No, it was just that the Midwife played by her own rules. She’d plow her way through the battered defense, kick them where it hurt, and score a goal. So, the opposing team would demand compensation before each game. No armor could truly protect from her battering rams.

“Three-nil in my favor!” the football enthusiast bellowed, sending the last head flying. “A total blowout!… Hey, Dmytro, what’s the deal? Did you drink it all by yourself? What about something to wet my throat?”

The monk, struggling to focus on the red blur before him, waved uncertainly behind him:

“There’s a whole cart and five barrels back there! You’ll burst, child!”

“There was five. This morning. We used one for the cemetery consecration.”

“But not the whole thing…” the man in the gray habit carefully put the empty bottle back into his bag, then added with a hint of doubt, “I mean, there’s no way we drank an entire barrel between the two of us, right?”

Grabbing a jug that lay nearby, Agnessa marched to the cart and expertly positioned the vessel. She pulled out the stopper, sniffed at the aroma, and filled the jug almost to the brim before plugging it back up and patting the barrel’s side.

“Well, we may not be able to finish a whole one, but we can make a decent dent… Alright, time to wrap up this mess and get to dinner. Otherwise, these mummies will burn out soon, and I’m too lazy to haul more firewood… Ramsey, Cerberus! Enough warming your backsides, bring the heads over here. Fetch!”

Of course, the two massive coal-black Dobermans hadn’t been summoned from Hell. Agnessa had once found them as puppies, whining beside their mother who’d died of starvation. She’d nursed them back to health, trained them, and now they followed her commands on minor errands, occasionally allowed to have fun during another round of cleansing. Because when you’re getting drunk alone in a cell, reeking of burnt armor, you’ll be reprimanded the next morning. But when you’re doing it with your dogs, it’s more like a sermon and the saving of lost souls.

Today we were tidying up an abandoned cemetery. To be fair, outside the reclaimed territories, all cemeteries are abandoned. There’s no one to tend to them. And when no one looks after the dead, they start crawling out of their graves, disturbing the established order. So, occasionally, small squads would go out, sending “fire roosters” around the area. Agnessa was rarely invited – it wasn’t her kind of gig. But when they did call, she never refused. Mummified zombies are darling. They walk slowly, mumble to themselves, and hardly ever bite. The perfect clientele.

As for how these undead manage to sing harmonies, the woman didn’t think too much about it. Officially, the Church denied magic and blamed it on the Fallen One. Yet at the same time, the shepherds of the flock were happy to indulge in rejuvenating elixirs and horse stimulants. After all, the monastery is a big place, there are a lot of nuns, and the evenings get dull. And if anyone did end up pregnant, it was solely by the will of the Lord. Immaculate conception—read a book or two, you fools.

“Alright, let’s poke around a bit more to bring the coals to the surface. And I’ve got some sausages here. Spicy ones. They’ll go nicely with the wine.”

Dmytro sighed and warned:

“I’m not going for another cartload of firewood at night. So let’s stick to what we have.”

“Of course. The rest of the feast will be tomorrow. We’ll head back, give the folks a treat… I haven’t yelled out psalms stark naked from the monastery wall in a while. Gotta relive that… When the sun rises, when there’s dew on the stone walls. When the breeze carries snowflakes… And everyone in chorus: ‘Angels from the Heavenly Heights’…”