Bertrand is a cursed hunter and Lost One of the Pit, a blue-skinned explorer who carried a lantern of Divine Flame through the descent until Adam, the harlequin of the Pit, took it from him.
| Type | Character |
| Condition | Lost One (condemned resident of the Pit) |
| Setting | the Pit |
| Epithet | ”the Second” |
| Spanish entry | Bertrand |
Description
An explorer with frozen blue skin, lunatic red eyes and a wide-brimmed hat whose feather’s flame is painted, not lit. He carries a lantern (dark oil, double wick, clear glass) and a long rifle with a worn stock. His skin is not diseased: its color comes from the circles where the Pit’s cold prevails over fire, a cold that reached him despite the lantern. His eyes are red from sleeplessness, lunatic from the lamp.
Condition
A resident condemned of the Pit, not a visitor, he came from an earlier place the archive does not fix, where he was a hunter, explorer and guardian of limits; the rifle is the sign of that trade. The Chorus of the Descent records him as the exemplary Lost One “with his trade intact”: he keeps the tools (rifle, lantern, hat, boots) but has lost their purpose. He hunts nothing; he tends the lantern and shoots when he feels dispossessed.
The lantern of Divine Flame
His lantern holds a fire that cannot be put out under ordinary conditions. It is the Pit’s counterpart of the Lamp of Hope carried by Swedenborg, but the Chorus distinguishes them: the Lamp shows the way (a pastoral function); the Lantern lets the hunter recognize the places of the descent (an exploratory function).
The lantern was bondeada (a “bonded weapon”): tied to his soul by an arcane bond that only a specific operation of the infernal apparatus could break, the standard protection of a Lost One who depends on his tool.
The tale of Francesca
At the second circle, Bertrand told the story of Francesca da Rimini — Paolo’s lover, dragged forever by the storm of the air — with stage skill and learned knowledge: he recited rather than improvised. The souls of the circle and his companions heard it. The Chorus counts telling a circle’s case in that circle as a minor liturgical tribute that briefly steadies the Pit at that passage.
The loss of the lantern
Near the end of the documented descent, Adam cast Suggestion, an arcane mind manipulation, to force Bertrand to hand over the lantern. It worked: Bertrand gave it up, and Adam bonded it to himself. Bertrand was left in visible despair, aiming his rifle — “el caño” (“the barrel”), in his own words — at the retreating group. The archive keeps one sentence of his, addressed to the harlequin specifically:
“Ya nos dejaste sin la linterna.” (“Now you’ve left us without the lantern.“)
The Chorus records that he lost not only the object but the condition it sustained: he is now a Lost One of trade without his tool, a state the Pit’s doctrine catalogs and that carries greater doctrinal weight. The documented arc leaves him aiming, not lighting the way.
Connections
- His companions among the condemned of the documented descent include Sven, Helter and Ärsvan.
- Sheridron, the silver dragon of the post-Triumvirate pantheon, and/or Sheridrón in his Descent facet, if the cross-reading holds.
- Maristo, who crosses the same infernal arc; their meeting in the Pit is documented under Maristo the Condemned. Both are tied to the collapse of the sacred apparatus.
- The Destruction of Notre-Dame frames his descent; the collapsed cathedral is the background of his dispossession.
Conflicting accounts
Some sources call him “the Second”, without a fixed reason. The hypotheses:
- second in order of appearance in the group’s documented descent;
- second in a line of cursed hunters of the Pit, implying an unrecorded First;
- second in order of dispossession, after someone stripped before him.
Open questions
- His place of origin before the Pit is not recorded.
- His role after the loss of the lantern is left open.