Page 72 of The Herald's Heart
“One of them.”
“’Tis God’s will then.”
“Who can know God’s will?” Mother Clement moved to leave, and Dame Margery pulled her back.
“I know.” A fire of belief and mystical faith blazed in her faded eyes. “I know God’s will.”
“Do not blaspheme, Sister.” The abbess’s shock pulsed through the air in front of the anchorage.
“God save me from such sin; I speak true. I have prayed for years that I might be the instrument of his justice. For my sacrifice, for all that I have given up, He has blessed me to His use.”
Mother Clement turned wary eyes on Talon. “Take care what you say, Dame Margery. Others may not understand your meaning as I do.”
The anchoress followed Mother Clement’s gaze. For a moment, Talon recognized the fear she showed on their first meeting, then her shoulders squared within the frame of the window. The fever-parched lips formed a tight grin. “God’s justice will visit you, too, sir, as it visits us all, the faithful and the faithless.”
Talon shuddered as if she had just pronounced his doom.
The anchoress released Mother Clement’s arm. “I am tired. I will sleep now.” She turned and disappeared inside her cell.
Mother Clement reached for the window latch. “God keep you, Margery. I will check on you soon.” Gentle snores issued from within as she shut the portal.
Talon stepped forward before her and picked up the crock. “Allow me, good mother.”
“Thank you, child.”
He turned with her, stopping to untie his horse. Reins in one hand, crock in the other, he paced with her toward the abbey gates.
“What troubles you, my son?”
“Is it so obvious?”
“I have had too many years of examining souls to be unaware when a person’s silence cries out loudly for solace. Now tell me.”
Still he hesitated. How could this woman, sheltered as her life had been, give him counsel? “So much troubles me that I scarce know where to begin.”
“Begin where your heart tells you.”
“Lady Larkin.”
“Aha, knotty problem indeed.”
“What do you mean?”
“Naught but that she, like much in the world, is more complicated than she appears.”
“Aye, she is that.” How did a man ask a nun about courting a woman’s favor?
“What do you want of her?”
“’Tis a simple matter of her trust in me.”
“Trust is never a simple matter.”
They walked on in silence for a few moments.
“Tell me, Sir Talon, do you trust her?”
“As much as I trust any man, more than most I think.”
