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This isn't really a story, so much as a sort of trial balloon. I'm wondering about the basic viability of the concept. Namely, is the idea 1) so boring that it should never see the light of day, 2) neat as a basic idea, but cut out the "letter" format and the stilted, fake medieval styling in favor of more normal style, or 3) a good idea, stilted fake medieval styling, letter-based format, and all.
Obviously, this has a lot more exposition and less action than the bulk of the story would have. The idea is more to introduce the sort of concept and atmosphere of the story than to go straight into the action.
A letter from Hannah of Eslohe, a nun of the Ordo Sanctae Clarae, to Heinrich II von Virneburg, Archbishop of Cologne, 1326
Anno Domini MCCCXXVI
Your Grace,
It is with the utmost reticence that I write you this letter, but having exhausted every other means of which I can conceive, I see no alternative but to beseach you for aid.
Several months ago, I was approached by an esteemed secret agent of the Holy Office. His identity will no doubt be clear to you, but I dare not write his true name openly in this letter, lest the secret spill out, reaching eyes other than yours or mine. This agent believed that the imperial free city of Rürenbourg had become engulfed in a most noxious heresy, whose adherents refer to themselves as the Restitvtores Ecclesiae Verae. He asked me for my help, in infiltrating the city and gathering information on the nature of Rürenbourg. Much of the content of this letter is based on notes I intended to give to the inquisitor, but events have intervened to prevent that. I am currently unaware of the man's whereabouts, and can only pray that he still lives.
I assumed the guise of a former villein, working as a scullery maid in Rürenburg, aspiring to stay in the city for a year and a day. I found the burghers to generally be a welcoming lot -- in fact, perhaps welcoming is not the right word, so much as eager to please. Many seemed mysteriously determined to prove their worthiness before a runaway serf. It took no inquiries to find myself inducted into their heretical church.
The perversion, spiritual and corporeal, that I found within the Sorores Christi (for so the most esteemed females of the heretics call themselves) has shaken me deeply.
Forgive me, Your Grace, if some of this letter seems lurid and impious in its content. What I write no doubt shocks the conscience, but I do so not for any ignominious purpose, but merely to report the truth. Once you are in full posession of the truth, it is not for one of my station to presume to tell you what you should do with it, but I have faith that you will reach a conclusion similar to my own: that the vile heresy must be crushed without mercy, its existence expunged from the annals of history, and, if the Lord in his infinite wisdom does not reveal some gentler path to us, the entire city of Rürenbourg must likewise be razed and all evidence of its existence expunged from the annals of history.
The theology of the Restitutors is based on twisted hermeneutics which turn the Holy Scriptures into the vilest blasphemy. They hold that the material world is a land of suffering and evil, created not by the true God, but by some diabolical being. This devil, they assert, is the one who spoke to the Jews, seeking power and domination over them for its own satisfaction. They claim that the Old Testament is filled with divine commands for horrible iniquities (such as Deuteronomy 22:28-29). The true God, they believe, appears in the Old Testament only as the serpent of Eden, partially undermining the devil's tyranny by granting Adam and Eve knowledge of Good and Evil.
They claim the Christ as a messenger from a greater God, just as the serpent was, coming once more to awaken the divinity in humankind and liberate us from the devil's bondage. Echoing the docetists of old, they deny entirely the human nature of the Christ, claiming that he was an entirely spiritual being.
The heretics distinguish between the Lex Ivdaeorvm, the wicked laws the devil sought to impose on his subjects, which they claim emanate from hatred, and the Lex Dei, the good laws brought forth by the true God and communicated to humanity by Christ, which they claim emanate from love. This doctrine has lead them to virtually destroy the Jews and Jewesses of Rürenbourg: for Jews are tantamount to diabolists under their doctrine, and they must renounce worship of the cruel false god or be destroyed. Thus has a third of Rürenbourg's Jewry converted to this heresy at swordpoint, a third fled the city in terror, and a third been slain after refusing to renounce their faith.
The heretics regard themselves as holding no loyalty to the material world, and profess allegiance only to the blessed spiritual world. They proclaim the equality of men and women, proclaim all believers to be priests, and deny any distinction between lords, vassals, and serfs. They abstain from meat, renounce marriage, and devise cruel methods of mortifying the hated flesh to exalt the spirit.
During my time in the Sorores Christi, I found a particular perversity in the womens' attempts to punish and agonize the flesh in their attempts purify their souls. That they abstained from any form of licit carnal pleasure goes without saying, for the heretics of Rürenbourg -- at least those devoted enough to acquire a place in the Fratres Christi or Sorores Christi -- do not marry. Yet they seek not a serene freedom from carnal desire, but rather a constant war with it. It is not enough for the soul to ignore the wants of the body. Rather, they seek to inflame their desires, only so that they may crush them. They stir perpetual rebellion within their bodies, so that they can perpetually triumph over them.