When Nicole entered the receiving chamber, he’d been briefly stunned to see how the adorable little girl had bloomed into a beautiful young woman.
Not even the black of Nicole’s robe could dim the ivory-hued glow of her heart-shaped face. Nor could the unshapely garment completely conceal the allure of her up-tilted, firm breasts or her nicely rounded hips.
And when, as now, her rosy mouth blessed him with a smile, he felt a tug on his innards he thought he’d possessed more wisdom than to feel.
Even as he attempted to pay more heed to the harp than the temptation to further notice Nicole’s charms, he conceded that if they weren’t deep in an abbey at the bedside of a dying woman, he might well be tempted to play a different sort of song.
One of seduction.
Nicole’s body was made for a man’s hands to caress. Her mouth fair begged kissing.
Even as his loins stirred, Rhodri acknowledged the danger of luring this particular captivating woman into his bed. Nicole de Leon was the object of his mission—and he couldn’t fail in his task.
Best to think of her as the petulant little girl who’d kicked him in the shins and caused him three long months’ worth of punishment, not ponder overlong on her womanly enticements or on the benevolent smile she turned his way. Except she was no longer a little girl, nor violently petulant, nor utterly selfish.
Mother Abbess’s hand shifted. Nicole was quick to notice. She covered the nun’s hand with her own soft-skinned, delicate fingers, bending low to hear whatever the nun whispered.
Giving him yet another perspective from which to contemplate the jut of her bosom beneath the habit. He almost groaned aloud in pain, fighting the nearly overwhelming urge to reach over and take the weight of a breast in his hand.
When she straightened, Nicole’s eyes sparkled with amusement. “You play so beautifully, Mother Abbess believes you must be an archangel sent to ease her way heavenward.”
He’d been called many things in his life. Stalwart, brave, and loyal by his friends. Dangerous, a conniving cur, or debased devil by his enemies. Charming, wonderful, and talented by his previous lovers.
No one ever had compared him to one of the heavenly host. If the nun only knew how the bulge in his pants urged him to commit unholy decadence, she’d be shooing him off to hell.
“I am no angel, Mother Abbess, though I would appreciate your recommending me to Michael or Gabriel should you happen to meet up with them.”
Nicole’s smile teased him, charming him so completely his fingers almost fumbled on the strings. “I could tell Mother Abbess a tale or two to disabuse her of her mistaken notion.”
What tales could Nicole tell of his not-so-angelic nature? She’d certainly been too young to remember much of what had happened during her visit to Wales. But then, she might have heard stories from her sisters or her brother, William. Tales he certainly didn’t want a nun to hear.
“You could,” he allowed. “But then I would have to tell a tale or two of my own, would I not?”
Her smile faltered but didn’t disappear. “Mother Abbess already knows I am no angel.”
Rhodri could have sworn he heard a snicker from one of the flock of nuns kneeling on the floor.
During his journey to fetch Nicole, he’d given brief thought to the rightness of taking Nicole away from the abbey, wondering if perhaps he’d be tearing her away from a true calling to the Church. Not that her calling mattered to Connor, or to Rhodri, who was duty bound to follow Connor’s orders. Still, he gladly set his mind at ease that Nicole didn’t belong to the Church and that at least one nun in the crowd agreed with him.
Rhodri refused to feel guilty that Nicole still looked a bit worried that he might inform Mother Abbess of just how unangelic Nicole could be. Instead, he revealed his own devilish tendencies with his harp.
The song was a common one, heard at every hall, tavern, or campfire where men downed ale. Out of respect for where he was, he didn’t sing the words, but he drew expected reactions all the same.
From the flock he heard soft gasps and saw a few disapprovingly arched eyebrows. Mother Abbess breathed a soft “Oh” before gracing him with a beatific smile.
And Nicole—she crossed her arms under her sweet breasts. Her reproachful look failed. Then her boot tapped the rapid beat against the plank floor.
Her decorum suffered further when she began to mouth the words, even the bawdy ones.
Sister Claire stood, her expression thunderous, her intent clear. Rhodri stared at her hard and played on, willing her not to interrupt the song he’d chosen with deliberate care.
She blinked when he finally sang.
“The journey is upon us.”
Nicole joined him, in a clear, sweet voice too angelic for his peace of mind.
“To faithful fellows farewell.”
His eyes locked with Nicole’s, and he surrendered the lead to provide harmony.
“Until next we raise an ale.
All hail! All hail! All hail!”
Sister Claire’s thunder never rumbled. Tears streaming down her face, she sank back down to her knees and bowed her head. Others softly sobbed while still others worked their prayer beads faster.
“All hail,” Mother Abbess said, her voice thready and faint, and Rhodri inwardly breathed a sigh of relief that for this woman, at least, he’d chosen his song correctly.
Nicole’s chin rose, her gaze peering over his shoulder, her stare so intense one would think someone stood behind him. Her lips parted slightly; her eyes welled with tears. With a mixture of sadness and an emotion he couldn’t quite identify, Nicole uncrossed her arms and bent toward the abbess.
What Nicole urgently whispered into the nun’s ear he couldn’t understand. He merely noted a look of surprise and—concern?—on the old woman’s face.
“Oh, Nicole,” the abbess whispered.
Nicole mustered a smile. “’Tis true. You will see.”
“But how—”
“You will know all soon. Be at peace, dearest Abbess. Heaven and friends await you.”
Which didn’t sound like a platitude to him. The confidence in Nicole’s voice said she knew for certain what awaited the nun on the other side of life.
“Oh, my. Praise… the Lord.” And with the words on her lips, the nun’s eyes closed for what Rhodri was certain was the last time.
Nicole kissed the abbess’s forehead and arranged the prayer beads around still hands. When satisfied, she turned those beautiful, moist eyes his way. He saw resignation and grief, but there was also peace and, somehow, joy.
“Pray, one more song, Rhodri,” she requested, then took her place among the kneeling nuns.
Rhodri swallowed the lump threatening to close his throat and again chose his music carefully. Not for this nun a mournful tune, but one of victory, triumph, and celebration.
Near the end, he noted the abbess’s chest failed to rise and fall. He played on to the glorious end, then quietly left the room to allow the nuns to mourn privately and prepare the body for burial.
To his surprise, several of the nuns followed him out, two of them rushing off down a long passageway. Nicole wiped away tears on her wide black sleeve as she approached him. For the briefest of moments he considered spreading his arms to offer her comfort, invite her to cry on his shoulder. But her tears were gone by the time she reached him.
“My thanks, Rhodri,” she said, her voice steady. “You so impressed Sister Claire she invites you to evening meal and asks if you will play at the burial on the morn.”
Oddly disappointed Nicole didn’t require the use of his shoulder, Rhodri would far rather have grabbed hold of her hand and removed her from the abbey. But she’d fight him, and as much as he wanted to be away, he reasoned that waiting one more day wouldn’t matter. As a bard, he also knew Sister Claire awarded him a singular honor.
“I would be most pleased to play at the burial. Is there aught else I can do to be of service?”
“Nay, I can think of nothing…”
Her voice trailed off as she stopped to listen to the deep, mournful drone of the chapel bell, announcing the abbey’s sad news to the countryside.
After a deep breath, she continued, “Let us gather your belongings, and I will point out the priest’s hut, where you may spend the night.”
N
icole’s knees ached from kneeling on rough, cold stone. The air in the abbey’s chapel had become both stale and odoriferous, a result of Sister Claire’s bad judgment, in Nicole’s opinion.
Last eve, not long after the tolling of the bell, people from leagues around had swarmed the abbey. So many pleaded with Sister Claire for a last glimpse of Mother Abbess that the doors were thrown open and all allowed to enter.
Mon dieu,
Sister Claire had decided to completely ignore the ban on males within the abbey, and so entire families were given free rein. Too many mourners spent the night in vigil with the nuns, and so too many prayers had been accompanied by the harsh rasp of snoring.
Nicole truly couldn’t blame the tenant farmers and villagers for wishing to bid farewell to one of the most fair and compassionate overlords they might ever know. Nor could she hold these simple people to the same rules of suitable behavior that she’d learned as a child in a noble household, the same rules practiced here in the abbey.
And perhaps, now well after dawn, heart sore and body weary, she simply couldn’t muster the tolerance necessary to contend with too many people in too little space. She needed sleep, and a bite of bread to calm her protesting stomach, and knew she couldn’t have either for several hours yet.
Nicole glanced at Sister Claire, who hovered near the bier where the body of Mother Abbess awaited burial in the great maw of a hole that had been dug in front of the abbey’s altar.
Sister Claire had been Mother Abbess’s assistant for longer than Nicole had resided in the abbey. The nuns would surely elect her to the position of abbess. Did the woman have doubts about her ability to assume the burden of responsibility for the welfare of her fellow nuns and of the many people who depended upon the abbey for their livelihood?
Nicole swiped at her eyes, moist from grief and lack of sleep. Sweet Lord, she would miss Mother Abbess. Her kindness, her steadfastness, and her sometimes irreverent humor had enlivened conversations until the very end.
That Mother Abbess enjoyed a drinking song hadn’t surprised Nicole. Rhodri chose his songs well, comforting Mother Abbess in a way no prayers and no priest could.
Mother Abbess no longer needed comfort. Indeed, all these prayers for the repose of her soul weren’t necessary. On one breath the woman died and, forswearing another breath, she’d gleefully greeted Sister Enid before the two of them fled swiftly through the veil between earth and the heavenly kingdom beyond.
Without a glance back. Without a word of farewell.
Spirits, Nicole acknowledged drolly, had no use for the living unless they required the living to perform some service. Having lived a long life, rich in service, Mother Abbess required naught of the living and left behind her mortal life as swiftly as she could. Leaving Nicole bereft. What good was the ability to hear the dead if not to receive a final, private fare-thee-well?
Nicole knew she shouldn’t be upset with Mother Abbess for doing what a spirit ought to do—sever earthy bindings and depart for the glorious beyond. Still, Nicole had yearned for a private parting word from the woman she’d adored.
With a sigh, Nicole admitted that more than Mother Abbess’s swift departure, more than the lack of sleep or food, more than a snoring farmer, what had bothered her most throughout the night was Rhodri’s ill-timed arrival at the abbey.
Certes, there would be changes at Bledloe Abbey. Sister Claire simply didn’t possess Mother Abbess’s commanding presence. Not that Nicole thought the nuns would suffer for it, but life at the abbey would be… different.
Sister Claire might require more frequent attendance at chapel, perhaps rein in the freedoms Nicole enjoyed in the infirmary. Without Mother Abbess as an advocate, Bledloe Abbey might feel more like a prison than a pleasant place to reside until the king decided what to do with her.
Damn Rhodri! Why had he appeared the very moment when her life was about to suffer an upheaval, making her vulnerable to Uncle Connor’s offer of refuge?
But then, she truly didn’t have a choice of whether or not to leave. No matter what her uncle wished her to do, she couldn’t leave Bledloe Abbey without the king’s consent. To do so meant putting her sisters in an untenable situation and probably angering both of her brothers-by-marriage.
Rhodri might be right about Alberic and Darian being well able to take care of themselves and her sisters, but Nicole saw no good reason to put them at risk over her uncle Connor’s whim.
And especially not over William’s. Her brother had said no more to her after giving her the ominous order to leave. She had yet to discern the precise reason for his order, other than to decide he’d done so to somehow further his quest for revenge against Alberic. She would
not
be used again in such fashion.
So she dared not leave the abbey, no matter how much running barefooted through long grass to chase butterflies appealed. When the burial was over, she would thank Rhodri ap Dafydd for playing his harp for Mother Abbess and send him back to Wales, to give her thanks and regrets to Connor.
A stirring near the chapel’s door snapped Nicole from the musings she’d wrestled with for too many hours. A few of the nuns were urging the villagers and tenant farmers to their feet and shooing them out the door, which likely meant the clergy from Oxford had arrived. Soon they’d be lowering Mother Abbess’s body into that cold, dark hole.
Nicole shivered and struggled to her feet, intending to help with clearing the chapel and, ’twas to be hoped, sneak a breath of rose-scented air from the cloister garden. She touched the shoulder of the woman who’d knelt beside her most of the night, the potter’s wife, who held an infant, the youngest of her six children. The woman looked up, seeming to come out of a trance.
“Madam Potter, time to leave,” Nicole said quietly and looked about for five small bodies, which were nowhere to be found. Puzzled, she asked, “Where are the other children?”