I stayed under the bridge with my father’s body, my mother above, watching the frayed rope flap in the wind. Two women alone, as alone as could be, the water flowing on as ever before.
* * *
—
Henry and Mason dug the grave under an oak tree, with Da’s own sleeping sheep the only other witnesses to his funeral. Brother Robert did his ministrations, sprinkling the body and the rest of us with hyssop and holy water. We all helped slide the homemade coffin off the cart. Then I saw it.
One of the planks of Da’s coffin had been cut from my drawing board. Right there, by his head, was a drawing of me and Mason sitting on the church wall.
“No,” I cried out loud.
Mason came and put his arm around me, but I shrugged it away. All I could think was that my last words with Da had been a fight over this boy. He nodded sadly and joined Henry instead. They lowered the open coffin into the grave, and the clouds parted, barely, to reveal a sliver of moon.
* * *
—
The sparks of the memory settle like fiery snow and disappear into the stone pavement of the cloister. My heart pounds in pain.
Sub-Prioress Agnes holds the terrified girl until she calms, then rises and sends her on her way with a kiss of peace. I’ve absently drawn a dragon on the parchment sheet in my psalter. Alice takes it from me before I can stop her.
“Pitiful,” whispers Alice.
“What?”
“I guess you’d act that way, too, if you’d gone through what Felisia did,” she says, examining the drawing.
“Who?” My ears are still ringing.
“That…dragon girl,” she says, waving her name away. Before Alice can say more, Agnes approaches us, and Alice shoves the drawing under her book.
“I’m sorry you had to see that, girls,” says the sub-prioress. “Felisia has a tendency toward the dramatic. People like her have a long journey of penance ahead of them.” She excuses herself and goes on her way.
“I can’t sort it,” says Alice, gazing again at the drawing.
“Sort what? It’s a dragon. See? That’s the head—”
“No, I mean the sub-prioress. She changes like the weather. I mean—one minute, she’s praising you, the next, she’s cracking the whip. Who is she?”
“I think she’s all right,” I suggest. “Strict, maybe, but she’s in charge, after all.”
“But everybody gets quiet when she comes in the room, waits for her to speak, hangs on her every word. And she loves it; you can tell. I don’t trust people like that.”
“Well, what I want to know is, where is the actual prioress? Isn’t she supposed to be running things?”
“Prioress Margaret? She’s never here,” says Alice. “But it would be nice if she’d come home once in a while.”
“Although you know what they say,” I counter. “Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t.”
— 9 —
The new year comes, and with it I turn seventeen. My birthday’s right on the feast of the Epiphany, and there are dried figs at breakfast, left over from Twelfth Eve. I slip one into my sleeve for later. Make that two.
After breakfast, Agnes de Guile announces a meeting for the novices and conversae, and we all gather at the lectern. The rest of the community files out to begin their work.
“Girls,” she says, “we’ve been watching each of you since you arrived to identify your unique gifts and where you will serve best. I am happy to announce your work assignments.” We all grin and some of the girls bounce on their toes. I’m curious to know where Agnes sees me fitting in here.
“Right,” she begins, “we’ll start with the sacristy. To work there is a great privilege. Not only will this person care for the holy vessels and vestments, but she will be in the presence of the Body and Blood themselves. This is entrusted to…Beatrice.” Agnes hands the girl a small parchment sealed with a linen tassel.
“Next: working in the library means being trustworthy with knowledge, and not leading seekers astray. Mary, this honor is yours. You’ll report to the armaria, the head librarian, in the scriptorium tower.
“Felisia,” she continues, “you will be my assistant. I will personally teach you penance and help you through your troubles.” We all smile with pity at Felisia, whose eyes brim with grateful tears.
“The care of the medicine garden requires encyclopedic knowledge, and responsibility for life and death. Alice Palmer, you will apprentice to Joan, our physician.” I’m happy for Alice; this is perfect for her. She beams with satisfaction.
All the girls smile at the honors they’ve been given, the way they’ve been noticed, the parchments with their names written on them. In Hartley Cross, women might be masters, like Mam with her weaving, but no one was going to give Mam a parchment with her name on it.
I wonder what mine will say.
“Edyth le Sherman, such an…earthy girl deserves a commensurate assignment. You’ll be in the scriptorium, preparing pigments,” the sub-prioress declares, that yellow tooth peeking through her smile. She makes the sign of the cross over us. “Thank you. You may all go to your work now.” The girls practically skip to their respective jobs.
“Come, Edyth, Felisia. We mustn’t be late.”
The scriptorium. The word rolls around in my mouth delightfully. It sounds like someplace distinguished, like a manor hall or a bishop’s house. I trip over my skirts trying to follow Agnes’s brisk pace. We wind through a labyrinthine succession of halls, and as well as I know my way around by now, I quickly lose my sense of space. We cut through winding halls, past other nuns and doorways hung with evergreens, across the nave of the wide church, and finally, panting slightly, Agnes whisks outside through the back church door, into the entryway of a three-story tower and up the dizzying steps of a spiral staircase. She pushes open the heavy door.
Instantly my tongue crackles.
The room smells of chalk and leather, smells I haven’t conflated before. A cluster of large oaken desks are pitched at quarter angles, each one occupied by a scribe rapt at work. An entire floor-to-ceiling bookcase is filled with heavy leather- or wood-bound books—and through a passageway, I see what can only be the library, with the novice Mary already talking to the armaria. It’s utterly quiet except for the scratches of quills and the swishes of brushes. No one raises their head.
“Sub-Prioress,” someone greets her plainly.