Free The Marsh King's Daughter by Elizabeth Chadwick

confessional, you mean. But that still does not stop the other nuns from speculation and gossip. Women are the same the world over.'
    'If not for me and my fellow nuns you would not be here now,' she said indignantly.
    He inclined his head. 'For which I would not have you think me ungrateful. But it is not safe for me to remain here much longer.'
    'You are not yet strong enough to leave.' She spoke quickly, almost as if panicking, he thought, and her hand gripped the bundle on her lap. He saw that it was a garment of some sort with lozenge-patterned braid on the cuffs. 'No, but I will be soon.'
    'Where will you go?'
    'Wherever the road takes me.' He pointed at the clothing. 'Is that for me, or are you on an errand elsewhere?' She sighed and placed the bundle on the bed. 'Mother Abbess says that since you are feeling stronger, you might want to move to the guest house. As you have no garments of your own save shirt and braies, of her charity has provided you with a tunic and chausses.' 'That is most generous of her.' Nicholas picked up the tunic and shook it out. It was fashioned of soft, tawny wool that had been both fulled and napped - a rich man's garment, than he had owned in a long time. The chausses were serviceable brown linen and there was a green hood with a short shoulder cape.
    'We keep spare apparel in the guest house,' she explained to his look of surprised question. 'Travellers often arrive in weather and it is miserable to spend the night in wet clothes.'
    'I pray you give her my deepest gratitude, and I will do so again myself when I have risen from my sick-bed,' he said with genuine sincerity, and rubbed his fingers over the luxury of the fine cloth. Then he glanced at her. 'You said that you heard tales of John in Lincoln. Was that your home before you became a nun?'
    She gave him a small, bleak smile. 'I lived there,' she said, 'but I am not sure that it was ever my home.' With a sudden look of revulsion, she stood up and shook out the folds of her habit, the weave coarse and uneven in contrast to the finery he held between his hands. 'And I belong to this benighted place even less.'
    Nicholas frowned. 'But I thought that
    'That I had a vocation?' She laughed bitterly and raised one hand to her head. 'This is the wimple of a novice, not a full-fledged nun, and if I had my choice, it never would be.' In a single movement, she jerked the linen covering from her head and her braid tumbled down, strands of hair wisping free of the thick tawny plait.
    Nicholas stared, his jaw dropping. He knew that nuns wore their hair short as a mark of respect to God and a rejection of vanity, but he had never thought for one moment that she was so recent a novice as to be unshorn. Without the prim folds of her wimple, her face was much younger and softer, and the blend of honey-bronze hair and golden-brown eyes was striking.
    'My family desired to be rid of me,' she said succinctly, 'so they paid my dowry to St Catherine's and put me here to rot.' She tossed her head and her braid shimmered with movement.
    Nicholas was both captivated and amused. 'What did you do to make them want rid of you?'
    She ran the wimple through her fingers. 'I spoke my mind. And when my stepfather beat me for doing so, I fought back tooth and nail.' Suddenly she almost smiled. 'I set the house on fire and caused such a scandal that half of Lincoln turned out to line the road the next morning when I left for this place.'
    'An unruly shrew then,' he said and grinned.
    'I am learning not to be unruly.' For a moment she answered his grin, making him think that it was a long time since he had seen a girl so attractive, but the expression was swiftly quenched. 'I hate it here,' she said. 'Mother Abbess thinks that one day I will come to accept it, but then she has the spur of my dowry to goad her hope. All I have is the knowledge that there is nothing else for me - and that is enough to drive me to despair.'
    Nicholas shifted uncomfortably. 'Mayhap the