The Island House by Posie Graeme-Evans

Author:Posie Graeme-Evans
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub, mobi
Tags: General Fiction
ISBN: 9780743294430
Publisher: Atria
Published: 2009-02-01T08:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 23

BEAR WATCHED from a distance. He always watched from a distance now.

Being a lay servant, he stood at the back of the church, but he could see Signy lying facedown before the altar with the other girls.

He had not been able to change her mind. Now, in the blustering spring weather, as drafts rushed through the cold church, it would be accomplished. Today Signy would take vows. She would become a postulant and then, in time, she would be made a nun.

As the moon had waned last night, there had been one final, pointless conversation.

“You know why I am doing this, Bear.” She had been patient with him, as if he were a stubborn child. “I did not resist temptation. The life of our baby was taken to show me the sin of what happened between us—and that the Gods in the stones are false. It is for me to make amends now and serve my brothers and sisters, and the Lord, as faithfully as I can.”

At first he had tried to reason with her. “But what will you serve, Signy? A tortured man dying slowly so that you can drink his blood, eat his flesh?” His voice had risen. “We are not savages.” He’d grabbed her wrist when she tried to turn away. “Look at this scar. We two are joined by blood—our own and that of our child. Please. Please. This place just wants slaves, willing fools who cannot see the truth.”

Signy had shaken her head. Dark circles under her eyes told of deep suffering. “I will pray for you at the vigil tonight, Bear, and I shall pray, also, that you may be healed and find peace—as I pray for the soul of our daughter.” Her voice had cracked. That was something, some indication that she still felt emotion. His Signy.

But the girl in the black kirtle who lay before the altar today was no longer his Signy.

Last night, though, his Signy had faltered when she said, “I must give back your gifts, Bear. I can take nothing that is not sacred into the convent.” And she had handed him the little ship, then the knife.

Neither could speak. At last he’d said, “But this they cannot take from you.” He’d marked the little lead box with a cross.

So many weeks of winter work with only a rushlight to see by, but he’d made the box and the crucifix that lay inside. Jet from the cliff formed the body of the cross, smoothed and burnished with sand and pinned with a tiny nail of copper, and the crucifix was small enough to hang between Signy’s breasts. Something of him would go with her, if she would allow it.

Hesitant, she’d taken his present in her hands.

Bear groaned, and some of the monks turned. They frowned at him, but he did not care. That girl, the one on the end, she’s mine, not yours. That was what he wanted to say. But it was not true. Not now, for last night he’d destroyed their last moment together.

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