The Novice Bride

‘As you will, Mother Aethelflaeda.’ Cecily laced her fingers together and forced herself to smile at the mailed knight.

His squire stepped into her line of vision. ‘Lady…that is, Sister Cecily…we are looking for one Emma of Fulford. My scouts tell me she came here. I’d like to speak to her.’

The squire came yet closer as he spoke. Cecily, who for four years had had scant contact with strange men, apart from villagers like Ulf with whom she was familiar, found his physical presence overpowering. His eyes were green, and once they had met hers it was hard to look away. His face, with its strong, dark features, was pleasing, yet somehow unsettling. His black hair was cropped short and, again in the Norman fashion, he was clean-shaven. Most of her countrymen wore their hair and beards long and flowing. Cecily blinked. She had thought it would make a man look like a little boy to be so close shaved, but there was nothing of the little boy about this one. There were wide shoulders under that cloak. And his mouth…what was she doing looking at his mouth?

Becoming aware that they were staring at each other, and that he had been studying her with the same intensity with which she had been studying him, Cecily blushed. It’s as though I am a book and he is learning me. He is not polite after all, this squire. He is too bold.

‘Emma Fulford?’ Cecily said slowly. ‘I am afraid you are too late.’

‘Hell and damnation!’

Mother Aethelflaeda bristled, and Cecily bit her lip, waiting for the rebuke that must follow the squire’s cursing, but Mother Aethelflaeda subsided, managing—just—to adhere to her pretence of not speaking French.

The squire’s sharp eyes were focused on the Prioresss, and Cecily realised that he knew as well as she that the Prioress did speak French, and that she affected not to speak it merely to hinder them. The knight remained in the background, leaning against the wooden planking, apparently content for his squire to act for him.

‘Did Lady Emma say where she was going?’ the squire asked.

‘No.’ The lie came easily. Cecily would do penance for it later. She’d do any amount of penance to keep that mailed knight from finding her sister. Would that she could do something to ensure her baby brother’s safety too…

The squire frowned. ‘You have no idea? Lady Emma must have told someone. I thought perhaps she might have kin here. Who was she visiting? I’d like to speak to them.’

Cecily looked directly into those disturbing eyes. ‘She was visiting me.’

His expression was blank. ‘How so?’

‘Because Lady Emma of Fulford is my sister, and—’

A lean-fingered hand shot out to catch her by the wrist. ‘Your sister? But…I…’ He looked uneasy. ‘We were not certain she had a sister.’

Trying unsuccessfully to pull free of his hold, Cecily shot a look of dislike at the knight lounging against the wall, looking for all the world as though these proceedings had nothing to do with him. ‘Is it so surprising that your Duke has an imperfect knowledge of the lands he has invaded and its people?’ she replied sharply. She bit her lip, only too aware that if she were to find a way to help her new brother she must not antagonise these men. She moderated her tone. ‘Emma had a brother too. Until Hastings. We both did.’ She looked pointedly at the fingers circling her wrist. ‘You bruise me.’

Stepping back, the squire released her. ‘My apologies.’ His eyes held hers. ‘And I am sorry for your brother’s death.’

Cecily felt a flash of grief so bitter she all but choked. ‘And my father’s—are you sorry for that too?’

‘Aye—every good man’s death is a waste. I heard your father and brother were good, loyal men. Since they died at Caldbec Hill, defending their overlord when the shield wall broke, there’s no doubt of that.’

‘Oh, they were loyal,’ Cecily said, and try as she might she could not keep the bitterness from her tone. ‘But what price loyalty when they are dead?’ Tears pricked her eyes, and she turned away and struggled for composure.

‘Perhaps,’ the squire said softly, ‘you should more fairly lay the blame for what happened at Hastings on Harold of Wessex? It was he who swore solemn oath to Duke William that the crown of England should go to Normandy. It was he who went back on his word. It was his dishonour. What followed lies at the usurper Harold’s door rather than my lord William’s.’

Because Mother Aethelflaeda was in the habit of hugging what little news that filtered through the convent walls to herself, Cecily’s knowledge of goings-on in the world was limited. Her years in the novitiate meant she scarcely understood what the squire was saying.

A movement caught her eye as the knight—what had Emma called him? Sir Adam Wymark?—uncrossed his legs and pushed away from the wall. After stripping off his gauntlets, he lifted his helm. When he brushed back his mail coif to reveal a tumble of thick brown hair, and smiled across the room at her, the foreign warlord responsible for her family’s troubles vanished and a vigorous, personable man stood before her. Like his squire, he was young—not so handsome as the squire, but by no means ill-favoured…

Cecily fiddled with the rope of her girdle while she considered this sudden transformation, and an idea began to take shape in her mind—an idea that Emma had half jokingly presented to her. It was not an idea she had any great liking for—particularly since, given a choice between the two men before her, she would choose the squire.

Emma’s alarming parting shot: ‘Sir Adam Wymark…I give him to you, for I do not want him’ still echoed in her mind. Could she do it? For herself, no, Cecily thought, staring at the mailed knight. But for her brother and her father’s people? She straightened her shoulders.

She’d do it. For her brother…she must do it…

Mother Aethelflaeda shifted. ‘Hurry them up, Cecily,’ she said in English, in a curt tone which told Cecily she was fast recovering her sang-froid. ‘The sooner these Norman vermin are out of our hair, the better.’

‘Yes, Mother,’ Cecily said, deceptively meek, but in no hurry herself—for every minute they spent talking was giving Emma more time to get away.

The squire’s green eyes captured hers. He was frowning. ‘Your sister said nothing to you of her destination?’

‘No.’

‘You’d swear that on the Bible?’

Cecily lifted her chin and forced the lie through her teeth—not for honour, which was a cold and dead thing, a man’s obsession, but for her sister’s sake. Emma had been so desperate to escape. ‘On my father’s grave.’ She steadied herself to make what she knew all present would condemn as an improper and an absurdly forward suggestion. But just then the squire turned and sent a lop-sided smile to his knight.

‘It would seem, Richard, my friend,’ he said, ‘that my lady has well and truly flown.’

Cecily caught her breath and blinked at the mailed figure by the wall. ‘You…you’re not Sir Adam?’

‘Not I.’ The knight jerked his head at the man Cecily had mistaken for his squire. ‘Sir Adam Wymark stands beside you, Sister Cecily. I am Richard—Sir Richard of Asculf.’

‘Oh.’ Cecily swallowed. Face hot, she quickly rethought her impetuous plan. Her heart began to beat in thick, heavy strokes, as it had not done when she had considered it with Sir Richard in mind. ‘M-my apologies, S-sir Adam. I mistook you…’

A dark eyebrow lifted.

‘I…I thought Sir Richard was you, being mailed, and you…you…’

Sir Richard gave a bark of laughter. ‘By God, Adam, that’ll teach you to doff your armour. She mistook you for my squire!’

Cecily’s cheeks were on fire, but she did not bother to deny it.

This was not a good start in view of her proposal. ‘M-my apologies, my lord.’ If only the ground would open up and swallow her. Cecily lifted her eyes to Sir Adam’s, noting with relief and not a little surprise that he seemed more amused than angry. Most men, in her limited experience, would view her misunderstanding as a slight. Her father certainly would have done.

‘“Sir” will suffice, my lady.’ He smiled. ‘Duke William has not yet made us lords.’

Emboldened, Cecily rushed on before she could change her mind, thoughts crowding confusedly in her mind. Think of baby Philip, she reminded herself, now Maman is…no more. Imagine him being brought up by strangers with little love for Saxons, let alone for Saxon heirs. Think of Gudrun and Wilf, and Edmund and…

Step by step.

She hauled in a breath, bracing herself for step one. ‘Sir Adam, I have a suggestion…’

‘Yes?’

Cecily twined her fingers together and lowered her head, affecting a humility she did not feel to hide her feelings. Those green eyes were too keen, and the thought that she might be an open book to him was unsettling. ‘I…I wonder…’ She cleared her throat ‘Y-you will need an interpreter, since my sister is not at home. Not many will speak your tongue…and my mother—my late mother—was Norman born.’

Sir Adam folded his arms across his chest.

‘I…I wondered…’ She shot a look at Mother Aethelflaeda. ‘If you would consider taking me? I know the people of Fulford, and they trust me. I could mediate…’

The man her sister had rejected kept silent, while his eyes travelled over her face in the intent way that she found so unnerving. ‘Mother Aethelflaeda would permit this? What of your vows? Your duties to the convent?’

‘I have taken no final vows yet, sir. I am but a novice.’

His gaze sharpened. ‘A novice?’

‘Yes, sir. See—my habit is grey, not black, my veil is short, and my girdle is not yet knotted to symbolise the three vows.’

‘The three vows?’

‘Poverty, chastity and obedience, sir.’

His hand came out, covered hers, and once more those strong fingers wrapped round her wrist. ‘And you would return to Fulford Hall to interpret for me?’

‘If Mother Aethelflaeda will permit.’

Adam Wymark smiled, and a strange tension made itself felt in Cecily’s stomach. Hunger—that must be the cause of it. She had missed the noonday meal doing penance for her missed retreat, and then with Ulf’s wife there had been no time. She was hungry.

‘Mother Aethelflaeda will permit,’ he said, with the easy confidence of a male used to his commands being obeyed.

Not fully satisfied with their agreement, Cecily took another steadying breath. She thought of these warriors terrifying the villagers at home, discovering little Philip. With her parents dead and Emma gone, who else was left to protect them? Fear and stress drove her on.

Now for step two—the steepest step. ‘One thing more, sir…’

‘Yes?’

‘Since my sister has fl—’ swiftly she corrected herself. ‘Has gone, I was wondering…I was wondering…’ Her cheeks flamed. Cecily was about to shock even herself, and for a moment she was unable to continue.

‘Yes?’

Really, those green eyes were most unnerving. ‘I…I…that is, sir, I was w-wondering if you’d take m-me instead.’

‘Instead?’ His brow creased, his grip on her wrist eased.

Cecily tore her eyes from his and studied the floor as though her life depended on it. ‘Y-yes. Sir Adam, I was wondering if you’d be p-pleased to take me to wife in Emma’s stead.’

A moment’s appalled silence held the occupants of the lodge.

Mother Aethelflaeda, shocked out of her pretence that she could not speak French, stirred first. ‘Cecily! For shame!’

Sir Richard gave a bark of laughter.

Adam Wymark loosed her wrist completely and stepped back, slack-jawed, and Cecily was left in no doubt that, whatever he had been expecting her to say, he had not been expecting a proposal of marriage.

For a long moment his eyes held hers—Sir Richard and Mother Aethelflaeda were forgotten. She fought the impulse to cool her cheeks with the back of her hand, fought too the impulse to stare at the floor, the table—anywhere but into those penetrating green eyes. So briefly she must have imagined it his face seemed to soften, then he inclined his head and regained his hold of her wrist.

‘Mother Aethelflaeda,’ he said, turning to the Prioress, who was still spluttering at Cecily’s audacity. ‘I have need of this girl. And, since she has not taken her vows, I take it there can be no objection?’

He had made no mention of Mother Aethelflaeda’s attempt at obstruction. It was beneath him, Cecily supposed. She looked down at the long, sword-callused fingers holding her to his side. Her heart was pounding as though she’d run all the way back to Fulford, and she was painfully aware that Adam Wymark had not deigned to respond to her rash proposal. That, too, was probably beneath him. A man like this—a conqueror who came in the train of the Duke, and was confident enough not to noise his consequence about by lording it over strangers in his chainmail—would not dignify her boldness with a response.

He would not wed her.

He glanced down at her. ‘You are certain about returning with us as interpreter, my lady?’

‘Yes, sir.’ And that was about as much a reply as she was like to get from him, she realised. He wanted her to be his translator.

His lips softened into a smile, and that hard grip slackened. ‘It is well.’

A queer triumph easing her mind and heart, for at the least she would be able to look to her brother, Cecily managed to return his smile.

Mother Aethelflaeda’s bosom heaved, and her jewelled cross winked in the lantern light. ‘Novice Cecily! Have you no decorum? That you, a youngest daughter—a dowerless daughter—one who has spent four years preparing to become a Bride of Christ—that you should brazenly offer yourself…for shame!’ All but choking, the Prioress glared at the knight at Cecily’s side. ‘Sir Adam, forgive her her impertinence. I can only say she is young still. We have all tried to curb Cecily Fulford’s exuberant nature, and I had thought some progress had been made, but…’ Imperiously, Mother Aethelflaeda waved a dismissal at Cecily. ‘You may leave us, Novice. And you had best do penance for your impertinence to Sir Adam on your knees. Repeat the Ave Maria twenty times, and be sure to take no fish this Friday. You’ll fast on bread and water till you repent you of your hasty tongue.’

Long years had ingrained the habit of obedience into Cecily, and she made shift to go—but Adam Wymark had not released her wrist.

‘Sir…’ Cecily attempted to pull away.

‘A moment,’ he said, but his hold was not hard.

Mother Aethelflaeda gestured impatiently. ‘The girl has no dowry, sir.’

Pride stiffened Cecily’s spine. ‘I did have. I distinctly remember my father entrusting a chest of silver pennies to your keeping.’

Mother Aethelflaeda’s lips thinned. ‘All spent on improvements to the chapel, and to the palisade that was intended to keep out foreign upstarts.’ The last two words were laced with venom. ‘Much good it did us.’

‘And the altar cross,’ Cecily added. ‘Father donated that too.’ Raising her head, she gave the Prioress back glare for glare. For a woman of her birth to be labelled completely dowerless was shame indeed, and though it might have been unladylike of her to offer herself as wife to Sir Adam, she would not be so shamed before these men.

Sir Adam’s grip shifted as he moved to face her. He held her gently, only by her fingertips. ‘No dowry, eh?’ he said softly, for her ears alone.

Cecily’s heart thudded.

‘Be calm,’ he murmured, and swiftly, so swiftly that Cecily had no notion of what he was about, he released her and reached up. Deftly unpinning her veil, he cast it aside. Stunned beyond movement, for no man had ever touched her clothing so intimately, Cecily swallowed and stood meek as a lamb while quick fingers reached behind her to release the tie of her wimple, and then that, too, followed her veil into a corner. Reaching past her neck, he found her plait and drew it forward, so it draped over her shoulder.

For all that the brightest of flags must be flying on her cheeks, Cecily shivered, shamefully aware that it was not with distaste.

Mother Aethelflaeda spluttered with outrage, and even Sir Richard was moved to protest. ‘I say, Adam…’

But Cecily had eyes and ears only for the man in front of her—the man whose green eyes even now were caressing her hair. He no longer touched her anywhere, yet she could scarcely breathe.

‘No dowry,’ he repeated softly, still gazing at her hair. ‘But there is gold enough here for any man.’

‘Sir Adam!’ Mother Aethelflaeda surged forwards. ‘Enough of this unseemly jesting. Unhand my novice this instant!’

He lifted his hands to indicate that he was not constraining Cecily, his eyes never shifting from hers.

For a moment, despite herself, Cecily’s heart warmed to him—a Breton knight, an invader. It was beyond her comprehension that any man of standing should consider taking a woman for herself alone. Such a man should expect his marriage to increase his holdings.

And how on earth had he known about her fair hair? True, many Saxon girls were blonde, but not all by any means. As she stared at him, his lips quirked briefly into a lopsided smile, and then he stepped back and Cecily could breathe again.

The Prioress had a scowl that would scare the Devil. She was using it now, but for once Cecily did not care. She did not know exactly what was going to happen to her, but she read in Adam Wymark’s eyes that he would take her back with him to Fulford.

She was going home!

Not only would she be in a better position to see her new brother was cared for, but she would see Fulford again. The lodge was lost in a watery blur. Without her family Fulford Hall would not be the same, but she would see Gudrun and Wilf—there’d be Edmund and Wat—and was her father’s old greyhound, Loki, still alive? And what of her pony, Cloud—what had happened to her?

The longing to stand in her father’s hall once more, to be free to roam the fields and woods where she and Emma and Cenwulf had played as children, was all at once a sharp pain in her breast. Blinking rapidly, hoping the Breton knight and his companion had not seen her weakness, Cecily held herself meekly at his side.

‘How soon may you be ready to leave?’ he was asking. He shot a swift look at the Prioress before adding, ‘As my interpreter.’

‘But, Sir Adam.’ Mother Aethelflaeda glanced through the door at the murk in the yard outside. ‘The sun has set. Will you ride through the night?’

A swift smile lit his dark features. ‘Why, Mother Aethelflaeda, are you offering me and my men hospitality? I own it is too overcast to make good riding tonight…’

‘Why, no—I mean, yes—yes, of course.’

Rarely had Cecily seen Mother Aethelflaeda so discomposed. She bit down a smile.

‘I’ve brought a dozen men at arms, including Sir Richard and myself.’

‘You are welcome to bed down in this lodge, sir,’ the Prioress said curtly. ‘Cecily?’

Even now, when she was about to leave her authority, possibly for ever, Mother Aethelflaeda did not dignify her with her full title. ‘Yes, Mother?’

‘See to their needs.’ The look the Prioress sent Cecily would have frozen fire. ‘And make sure that your party is gone by the time the bell for Prime has rung on the morrow. This is a convent, not a hostelry. Sir Adam, you may leave your offering in the offertory box in the chapel.’

It was customary for travellers who stayed overnight in monastery and convent guest houses to leave a contribution to cover the cost of their stay, but so common was this practice that Mother Aethelflaeda’s reminder was pure insult.

Twitching the skirts of her violet habit aside, as though she feared contamination, the Prioress swept from the room.

‘Holy God, what a besom!’ Sir Richard said, grimacing as he set his helmet on the table next to the lamp. ‘As if we’d abide in this dank hole any longer than we must.’

Sir Adam ran his hand through his hair. ‘Aye. But we’d be better bedded down here for the night than taking our chance on a dark road with no moon.’

Cecily stooped to gather up her veil and wimple and, overcome with shyness, edged towards the door. ‘I’ll see some wood is brought in for a fire, sir, and order supper for you and your men.’

And with that Cecily ducked out of the room, before Sir Adam could stay her. She had never met his like before—but then, cloistered in St Anne’s, she had not met many men. As she latched the door behind her, to keep draughts out of the lodge, her thoughts raced on.

By the morning she would be free of this place! Her heart lifted. She would be free to care for her brother and, with any luck, free to distract the man in the lodge from tracking her sister. Recalling his fierce grip, she rubbed at her wrist and frowned. Sir Adam Wymark was not a man who would let go easily, but she hoped for her sister’s sake he would forget about Emma so she would have plenty of time to make good her escape.

Chapter Four

Veil and wimple safely back where they should be, on her head, Cecily took another lantern from the storeroom and lit it with hands that were far from steady. Then she hastened—not to the cookhouse, but to the stables. If challenged, she would say she was seeing to the comfort of their guests’ horses, but in reality she wanted to ensure that Emma had left no tell-tale signs of her visit—particularly no tracks that might be followed. She might not approve of Emma’s desertion of their brother and their father’s people, but she was not about to betray her sister’s destination to these foreign knights.

Two hulking warhorses, a chestnut and a grey, dwarfed Mother Aethelflaeda’s pony. Both carried chevalier’s or knight’s saddles, with high pommels and backs. Bulky leatherbound packs were strapped behind the saddles. Draped over one of the stalls was the mail body armour of a knight of Duke William’s company, gleaming like fishscales in the light of her lamp. A pointed metal helm shone dully from a nearby wall hook, and a leaf-shaped shield and sheathed sword leaned against the planking. Sir Richard had been wearing his sword and helm in the lodge, so these must be Sir Adam’s.

Staring at the sword, Cecily swallowed and thrust aside the image of it in SirAdam’s hand, being wielded against the people of Wessex.

The chestnut destrier stamped a hoof, straining at its reins as it turned its head to look at her. Cecily had never seen its like before. It was much larger boned than a Saxon horse. Giving the chestnut’s huge iron-shod hoofs a wide berth, for they were deadly weapons in themselves, she edged past to the end stall, where Emma and her groom had briefly stabled their ponies.

Straw rustled. The chestnut snickered, an incongruously gentle sound from such a huge beast, which put her in mind of Cloud, the pony her parents had given her as a child. Tears pricked at the back of her eyes. Maman!

Blinking hard, Cecily lifted the lantern so it cast its light in the end stall and fell on more scuffled straw and some fresh dung. These were of little import, since the Breton knight knew already that Emma had fled to St Anne’s.

Warily retracing her steps past the knights’ destriers, Cecily went back into a night that was pitch-black, with no moon. The wind whistled into the compound, and bit at her fingers and nose. Shrinking deeper into her thin habit, intending to destroy any betraying hoofprints at the north gate, Cecily was halfway towards it when behind her the south gate creaked open. She turned and froze.

In the flickering torchlight by the portress’s lodge Sir Adam Wymark was overseeing the opening of the gate, his cloak plastered against his long body by the wind. Outside the compound, a mounted troop of horse-soldiers shifted in the darkness—a shadowy, bristling monster that had no place entering a convent. Metal helms pointed skywards; pointed shields angled down.

Sir Adam’s voice rang clear over the wind. ‘This way, men. There’s only stabling for a couple more, but at least the others will be safer in the palisade.’

A murmur of agreement. One of the horse-soldiers tossed a joke at his fellow, and the troop plodded into the yard in disciplined single file, despite the cold.