Her voice must have betrayed anxiety, for sharpened fear glistened in the pregnant woman’s eyes. “It is customary, before the birth, to seek knowledge only a mother can give about her child,” Anne quickly added, knowing it was a lie but not a sinful one.
Signy walked over to Malka and put a gentle hand on her shoulder. “I can relieve you,” she said. Then she gave the panting younger woman a brief smile. “Should the babe arrive while they are just outside, I think your mother and Sister Anne will learn the news soon enough from us both.”
Belia’s lips twitched with weak amusement.
For an instant Malka looked askance at the innkeeper. Then she nodded and murmured her thanks.
Taking the older woman by the arm, Anne pulled her toward the entrance. “We shall inform your husband about your progress,” she said over her shoulder to the daughter. “He will be eager to learn that his child’s birth is imminent.”
Bracing the young woman, Signy urged her forward and began a distracting conversation. “Was the bathwater I sent warm enough?” she asked.
Outside in the courtyard, Anne carefully hid her stained hands, then realized the gesture was futile. She could do nothing about the marks on her robe.
Jacob rose, his pleading eyes dark with worry.
“Nothing has yet happened,” she replied and forced a confident smile. “The birth is her first. They often take longer.”
He sat down but kept his eyes on her, rejecting an answer so obviously meant to placate.
A man not easily fooled, she thought, and turned her back to him while bending close to Malka’s ear. “The child is turned badly in her womb,” she whispered. “I am not sure I can move it so your daughter is able to give birth.”
“She will die?” Malka murmured hoarsely and turned gray. Then her mouth set with fierce determination. “She shall not.” Stepping back, the mother laid her crippled hand against the nun’s damp cheek. “Your father would never have allowed that. You are his daughter. I expect no less from you.”
Anne stiffened, and then met the woman’s steady gaze. “I will do my best. She is near the end of a woman’s endurance, and her suffering will increase. All births are dangerous, but survival when the babe is twisted in the womb…” She drew in a deep breath. “Both your daughter and the child may die, although one might be saved. Do you not think we should tell her husband?”
“You shall succeed in saving her.”
Anne hesitated but realized she had also been told the choice to make if only the mother or child could live. Bowing her head, she walked back to the stall. There was no time to argue.
Malka gestured to Gytha who stood nearby. “We need more hot water!”
The maid raced toward the inn’s cooking hut where a large pot of rain water was kept simmering at Signy’s orders. The steam struggled to rise in the heavy summer air.
When Gytha delivered the water, Anne poured some into a basin and explained to the young woman how to soak and wring the poultice. Then she sent the maid outside and began instructing Signy on what must come next.
The two women stripped Belia, and Anne showed her how to squat in the fresh straw. After washing her hands as her father had taught her, the nun picked up a bowl and a beaker filled with oil. She knelt in front of the young woman, poured the fenugreek and linen seed infused oil over her hands and began to rub it on Belia’s huge belly, thighs, and pudenda.
Gytha rushed in and passed a damp linen pouch to the innkeeper.
“Does this warmth give you ease?” Signy asked, pressing the moist packet of herbs against the young woman’s back as she embraced her to give support.
Belia groaned.
Quickly, Anne felt around the belly, seeking better knowledge of how the baby lay. Firmly, she pressed against the sides of where she believed the child to be and twisted.
It moved.
Belia howled.
Again, Anne twisted the unseen shape, gritting her teeth against her own terror and the pain she knew this young woman was suffering
Sobbing, Belia gazed at the ceiling.
Anne looked at Signy and nodded, then twisted once more.
The innkeeper gripped the woman tighter under her swollen breasts and began whispering in her ear.
Her back pressed against the stable wall, Malka murmured a prayer.
Pouring more oil on her hands, Anne reached between the woman’s legs and measured how much the birth canal had expanded. “Belia, this will hurt,” she said. “Scream if you must but save your strength for pushing the babe into the world when I command it. It won’t take much longer.” And may God make my words true, the nun prayed.
She eased her hand inside and felt two feet near the opening. She had not managed to turn the babe completely but did feel movement against her fingers. If only the womb would not shut before the head was free, strangling the child.
The feet emerged. She grasped them with one hand and waited, placing a palm against the belly to feel for contractions.
“Push!”
Belia screamed, her agony ripping through the thick air.
Malka pressed her bent fingers against her mouth.
“Mother!” Belia howled.
“Push!” Anne ordered, resisting all desire to wrench the child into the world. Many did, destroying both mother and child, but she felt as if her father’s spirit was hovering nearby, whispering instructions and urging patience.
“Push, beloved,” Malka urged with feigned confidence.
Blood now rushed through Anne’s hands. This is too much bleeding, too much.
Belia strained to obey. The stall reeked with sour sweat and the metallic tang of blood. Signy hugged the woman tighter and stared at the nun.
Anne looked up at the tortured face of the exhausted Belia. “Push,” she said, her voice soft and trembling. “Your child wills it.”
The young woman raised her eyes and screamed, willing her body to make one final effort. With no strength left, she collapsed in Signy’s arms.
Malka began to weep and reached out to touch her motionless daughter.
All voices fell silent. The rustling of Anne moving in the straw was the only sound.
Then Belia moaned, and Signy eased her backward with a sigh.
Suddenly a cry rent the air, rising in pitch. Whether meant as anguish or outrage, it issued from the tiny mouth of a baby boy.
17
Oseberne struck his son.
Adelard fell backward and just caught himself before his head hit the edge of the table. Shocked at the blow, he put a hand to his cheek, then stared at the blood mixed with tears on his fingers.
“How dare you lose that precious object?”
“The cord must have broken…”
“When did you last see the cross?” Oseberne turned his back to his son, lifted the pitcher, and poured himself a cup of wine. He offered none to Adelard.
“I had it just before Brother Thomas arrived to question me. I know because I kissed it so God might give me strength and a swift tongue.”
“Afterward?”
Adelard began to weep. “I do not know! Maybe I lost it in the street when I went to join those seeking to kill the Jews.”
“A silver cross, lost in the street, to be picked up by some villain.” Oseberne spun around and pointed a shaking finger at his son. “Do you have any idea what that cost me?”
“I shall repay you!” The young man knelt and stretched his hands toward his father. His eyes were wide with impotent misery.
“That cross was my gift, so that you might stand without shame in the choir of monks at Tyndal Priory next to sons of higher birth.” The baker gulped his wine and poured another cup. “Repay me?” he roared. “You owe me a far greater debt than the cross. The priory is your best hope of advancement on earth as well as in heaven. And have I not worked hard for this? Do I not deserve an obedient son in God’s service, one who would spend his life praying for my soul?” Sneering, he continued. “Dare you be so ungrateful as to
force my soul to suffer in Purgatory when it could be quickly freed from its agonies by filial devotion?”
“And my mother’s soul,” Adelard whispered.
“A wife who took nun’s vows? She’s in Heaven and has no need of our prayers.” Oseberne wiped a hand across his mouth. “And now you think you can crawl into that priory like some freedman’s son.” He looked heavenward. “Prior Andrew may not even accept you. I would not blame him, careless and ungrateful wretch that you are.”
Adelard covered his face.
“And all you do is whine.” His face red with anger, the baker grabbed a handful of his son’s hair and pulled his head back. “Ever since those cowards failed to punish that family of Jews for the crimes they have done and hope to commit, you have been bleating like a woman with her courses.” Bending down, he spat in his son’s face. “You are unmanned. Why?”
“I have sinned!”
“That you have. Most certainly against me for losing the silver cross, a crime you failed to confess until I discovered it.”
“Another evil yet.”
Letting go of his son’s head, Oseberne stared at the lad. “What else could be so heinous? Surely you have not lain with some pocky girl and seeded a bastard?”
Adelard shook his head, exuding a horror that matched his father’s disgust. “Worse! I have gone against the teachings of the saints and God.”
Oseberne stepped back, both worried and perplexed. “And what will this cost me?”
Staggering to his feet, the young man looked longingly at the wine jug.
His father ignored the hint. “Out with it! What have you done?”
“Brother Thomas told us all, as we gathered about the inn stables where the Jews stay, that when St. Bernard of Clairvaux preached the crusade, he forbade good Christians to harm those Jews living there.” He raised a trembling hand to keep his father from interrupting him. “And the good monk also quoted from a letter written by Pope Gregory, stating that the tales of these people drinking the blood of Christian children were untrue.”
Oseberne waved the words away. “Blasphemy.”
The son murmured a weak protest.
“At my most charitable, I shall say that this monk is sinfully ill-informed. The priest who taught me was firm in the belief that the world shall never be truly Christian until we sweep the earth clean of all unbelievers. What difference is there between those infidels who stole Jerusalem for their wicked purposes and the Jews who killed Our Lord?”
Adelard mumbled in confusion.
“Shall you trust Brother Thomas, a man who lacked a faith strong enough to keep him in his hermitage? Dare you take his word over mine, a man taught by one so holy that he never removed his hair shirt even when his skin rotted and dropped from his body?”
“I have always followed your teaching, but you have also directed me to take holy vows and enter Tyndal Priory so I might pray for your soul’s peace after death. There I shall meet Brother Thomas again, a man who may well become my confessor.”
“Then find a holier one than he for that. Seek a man who reeks with contempt for the world. Brother Thomas spends too much time with the secular sons of Adam, and for this reason, amongst others, I doubt his virtue.”
Adelard opened his mouth to speak, then drew back in fear as his father bent so close that he could count protruding nose hairs.
“Does scripture not demand that you honor, obey, and treat me with due reverence?”
His son nodded.
“I do not doubt that Brother Thomas has some benighted reason for spewing blasphemy and suggesting his foul lies were uttered by holier men than he. Did you ever see for yourself any proof that these letters came from the pope or the saint?”
Adelard shook his head.
“The Devil is clever with his tricks, often quoting events and letters that are only the spawn of hellish fantasy.”
“Aye, but…”
“Have you heard these tales before Brother Thomas spoke of them?”
“Never.” The young man began to bite at his knuckle.
“Then you do not know if they ever existed. Oseberne straightened his back and folded his muscular arms. “I would say that your greatest sin is to question my teaching.”
Wiping his hand on his robe, Adelard protested that he had never doubted his father.
“Have I not warned you about the wicked nature of women, creatures that caused Adam to be cast out of Eden and to this day lure his sons into sin? And have you not learned the truth of my teaching through your own observations?”
“Of course, but then why urge me to join an Order run by Eve’s daughter?” The youth stepped back as if fearing a blow for daring to ask.
Although Oseberne’s eyes narrowed, he only raised his fist at his son. “She is the daughter of a baron who found favor with King Henry. Her brother stands by King Edward’s side. If you serve her well, she may speak favorably of you to her well-regarded kin. In such cases, men have been granted small monasteries to lead. Or else I may profit from any favor you earn by gaining more business. I have offered a donation of bread to the hospital. Perhaps the priory will buy more, rather than having nuns bake when they should be praying for a soul.”
The young man lowered his head, the gesture suggesting he was humbled. A renewed sniffling reinforced the impression.
Oseberne smiled down at his eldest son, his eyes glittering with the expectation of an abject apology.
Suddenly, Adelard straightened and marched toward the door. “I must seek Brother Thomas,” he said, “and question him further about his meaning and ask for proof of his allegations. Surely you agree that I dare not reject the words if they prove true, but if he lies, the village must hear of it. The Jews cannot live if Satan protects them.”
Oseberne stared, rendered speechless by the unexpected intensity of this son’s gaze.
Adelard swung open the door and left the house.
Just as the door closed, Oseberne threw a pottery cup against the wall. It shattered into tiny pieces of clay and scattered across the floor, dotting the rushes with drops of scarlet wine.
18
Sister Anne sipped at a mazer of wine. “After we bathed and swaddled the babe, we called Master Jacob to see his son.” She ran a finger around the edge of the cup. “The child roared like a lion, but the new father stroked his son’s face as if the boy were a kitten.” Sadness swept across her face but lasted only as long as a wind-driven mist.
“His cry of joy pleased both his wife and Mistress Malka,” Gytha said, offering more wine.
Anne nodded. “Had it not been forbidden, he would have kissed the new mother in gratitude for the gift she gave him.”
“I did not understand why he kept such a distance,” Gytha said.
“The tenets of his faith forbade him to touch her after the birthing,” the nun replied and quickly turned to the prioress.
“How fares Mistress Belia?” Eleanor’s question showed concern for the young woman, but her troubled look was directed toward her maid.
“She suffered more than most, and it is a miracle that both she and the child survived.” Anne shook her head. “All danger has not yet passed. I pray she will continue to gather strength as she is now. After the difficulties of this birth, it is likely she will never bear another child. At least her bleeding stopped, and the afterbirth was soon expelled. Of course she had chills but that is normal.”
“I am grateful to you both,” the prioress said, “as the family must be as well.”
“My efforts were petty, but Mistress Signy assisted most,” Gytha said. She had drunk only a little of her wine before she set the mazer back on the table.
“Indeed!” Eleanor’s smile suggested this was not a surprise.
“I had only asked her to warm a bath for Mistress Belia, before the contractions grew too frequent, and she made sure the required herbs were well-infused. But later she insisted on helping to support the mother and massage her back. As she explained to me, she mig
ht not have birthed a child but she was still a daughter of Eve like us all.”
“Our innkeeper is a good woman,” Eleanor said. “I have known few others who understand the meaning of charity so well.”
“Where is Brother Thomas?” the sub-infirmarian asked. “He accompanied us back from the inn, but I have not seen him at the hospital.”
“He has gone to seek Brother Gwydo. Prior Andrew has not seen our lay brother since yesterday but assumes the bees had kept him from the Offices. I must ask him some questions about Kenelm’s murder.”
Gytha paled.
Anne, who had seen the same response, glanced at the prioress. “If you will permit me, I should return to the hospital,” she said. “If I am needed again by Mistress Belia…”
“You must go to her at once.”
Smiling, the nun departed.
Eleanor laid a gentle hand on her maid’s shoulder. “Stay with me, my child. We must talk.”
“I have feared this,” Gytha whispered.
Although she would have preferred to embrace the young woman and offer comfort, Eleanor believed she must put a formal distance between them if she were to seek truth without bias. As she sat in her carved chair and indicated that her maid must stand before her, she felt cruel and hated it. Only rarely had she insisted on such formality between them.
The young woman covered her eyes. “I have sinned, my lady. I have been so wicked that I contaminate all within the priory. Indeed, I have dishonored you by failing to confess what I have done and should have left your service…”
“You shall not leave my side until you marry,” Eleanor replied, then gestured at the abandoned mazer on the table. Her resolve to remain stern was already faltering. “Drink that for strength while you tell me what happened the night you returned from visiting Tostig. After all the years you have served me, and the love I bear you, do you think I would listen without compassion? What occurred between you two?” She deliberately left half of the pair unnamed.
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