Pope Joan by Donna Woolfolk Cross

Author:Donna Woolfolk Cross [Cross, Donna Woolfolk]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 978-0-307-45319-8
Publisher: Crown Publishing Group
Published: 2009-06-09T04:00:00+00:00

“TERRA es, terram ibis,” Abbot Raban intoned. With the rest of the brethren, Joan stooped to scoop up a handful of earth, then tossed it into the grave, watching the dark, wet lumps smear unevenly across the smooth wood of her father’s coffin.

He had always hated her. Even when she was little, before the lines of battle between them had been drawn, she had never elicited anything more from him than a sour, grudging tolerance. To him, she had always been only a stupid, worthless girl. Still, she was shocked to learn how willingly he would have exposed her, how unhesitatingly he would have consigned her to unspeakable death.

Nevertheless, as the last of the heavy earth was mounded on her father’s grave, Joan felt an odd, unexpected melancholy. She could not remember a time when she had not resented her father, feared him, even hated him. Yet she felt a peculiar sense of loss. Matthew, John, Mama—all were gone. Her father had been her last link with home, with the girl she once had been. There was no Joan of Ingelheim anymore; there was only John Anglicus, priest and monk of the Benedictine house of Fulda.

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