The Scholar Tower: From the Chronicle of Brother Francis, Master Builder of Thornwick Abbey
Written in the Year of Our Lord 1358
Seven years more have passed since I first set down this account, and I write now to complete the record as my own time grows short. Brother Edmund died this past winter, peacefully in his sleep, having lived his final years in the simple grace that eluded him during his pursuit of greater things. At his funeral, the church was filled not only with monks and clergy, but with villagers whose gardens he had tended, whose children he had taught to read, whose sorrows he had shared without claim to special wisdom or power.
His sister Elizabeth spoke the truest words at his burial: "He learned to be ordinary, and in that learning, he became extraordinary." Father Aldric, now grown ancient but still sharp of mind, added his own observation: "The blade that learns to bend serves better than the one that breaks in rigid pride."
Of Geoffrey's manuscripts, I can report that they remain sealed in our most secure collection, examined only by senior scholars appointed by the Bishop himself. Three times in these past years, young monks or visiting clerics have requested access to them. Each has been shown Brother Edmund's own careful documentation of his experiences and warned of the perils that await those who mistake knowledge for wisdom. None has pressed their suit further.
The watchtower remains empty, though children now play in the meadows around its base without fear. Time has a way of healing even the deepest wounds, and the natural order reasserts itself when artificial manipulations cease. The village prospers in the ordinary way of villages-through honest work, mutual aid, and humble reliance upon divine providence rather than human cleverness.
Yet I have heard disturbing reports from other monasteries of similar discoveries, similar temptations. In York, a scholar claims to have found methods for transmuting base metals to gold. In Canterbury, there are whispers of a monk who speaks with the voices of angels. The blade of forbidden knowledge has many edges, and each generation must learn anew to resist its seductive gleam.
May God grant that they choose more wisely than we did, and may Brother Edmund's story serve as lighthouse to those sailing too close to shores where knowledge becomes peril and pride destroys what it claims to serve.