Nunnery Brides: A Medieval Romance Collection

by Kathryn Le Veque

  With the room quiet and the tub steaming, Brighton eyed the bathwater. She now reconsidered her stance about food and sleep only. It had been weeks since she’d had a bath, as the postulants at Coldingham were told that bathing was impure for the body and soul, and that it brought about wicked thoughts. Therefore, they would wash their face and hands regularly but bathing their entire body was quite rare.

  The more Brighton looked at the hot water, the more alluring it became, something naughty and wonderful at the same time. Wonderful won over. She wanted to feel clean and warm again, even if it was a comfort provided by the hated English.

  The clothes began to come off.

  Beneath the smelly cloak, she wore a sheath-like garment of heavy, scratchy wool and a woolen shift underneath it that wasn’t much softer. She had simple shoes on her feet, just two pieces of leather sewn together, really, and they didn’t do much for comfort or warmth or anything else. She pulled them off. The outside garment came off first, then the shift beneath. She grabbed the bar of soap on the table before plunging into the hot water, sending it splashing out all over the floor. Steam rose as the water splashed onto the heated stones of the hearth.

  A bath!

  It had been such a terribly long time since she’d known such luxury that Brighton submerged herself completely in the water, saturating her hair and body. But, God, it felt delightful and she began to lather up the soap furiously, smelling it, only to realize that it smelled of roses. It was sweet and heady, and the lather wasn’t really more than a slick foam, but she slathered her entire body with it, rubbing the soap in her hair and scrubbing until her skin was red and tingling. It was heavenly. And it was enough to make her grateful to the English for providing her with this rare opportunity.

  But that’s where her gratitude ended.

  Brighton eventually rinsed the soap off, leaving the water white and murky, but it was still warm and lovely and she huddled in the tub, simply enjoying the enveloping heat. She hugged her knees against her bare chest, her thoughts wandering back to the trials of the day, back to the horror that she’d lived through.

  Back to thoughts of Sister Acha.

  Thoughts of the dead nun swept over her and tears filled her eyes. Brighton wept softly for the woman, truly devastated for the loss. But she comforted herself with the thought that Sister Acha was with the Heavenly Father. The old woman with the heavy Scots accent had been blessed with very strong faith so she had no doubt the old woman was where she belonged. Still, Brighton would miss her. She would miss that stubborn, strict, and honest woman.

  … honest?

  A woman who, according to the enormous English knight, had been harboring a deep and disturbing secret about her young charge. The knight’s words rolled through her mind – you are the daughter of the King of the Northman and your mother is Scots. I promised the old nun I would protect you. In hindsight, she’d never known Sister Acha to lie and the truth was that the English knight had no reason to lie to her, either. He told her a greatly puzzling and complex story. The man had no earthly reason to make it up simply to confuse her. It would have been an elaborate hoax with no purpose.

  Therefore, it stood to reason that Sister Acha may have told him exactly what he said she did – a story of a bastard infant who had been placed in her care those many years ago.

  The daughter of a king.

  The more Brighton pondered that, the more it began to make sense. She was a bastard, a child committed to a convent, someone with no past. But one thing had been certain – her future had been set. She had always known she would take the veil. She didn’t want to be someone else, someone she didn’t know and someone she was afraid of. A future that was uncertain now. She simply wanted to return to Coldingham and take her vows as she’d always planned. She wanted no part of this disturbing new world.

  Lost in despondent and frightening thoughts, the water in the tub finally cooled to the point where she had to climb out and dry off. The female servant had left drying linens on the bed and she used one of them to vigorously dry her skin. Her first instinct was to put on the smelly, scratchy woolen robes she was so accustomed to, but her gaze seemed to drift to the clothing on the bed.

  … new, lovely clothing.

  Did she even dare? It was clean and it was beautiful. Brighton could see several garments piled up so she went to the bed and began to go through them. A green wool, a red silk, and a blue damask were all very beautiful and elaborate. She’d had never seen such pretty things. But they were very intimidating for a woman who had only worn simple wool her entire life. When she came to the bottom of the pile, however, there was a shift of lamb’s wool, unbleached, and very soft. It was enough to cause her to toss the linen towel aside.

  The lamb’s wool shift went over her head, soft and warm. For the first time in her life, she experienced something against her skin that wasn’t poking or scratching it. It was pure heaven, like wearing clouds, but she knew Sister Acha would have frowned upon it because wearing scratchy clothing meant to suffer, or so the woman would preach. Brighton had been content to accept that until she tried on the lamb’s wool.

  Now, she wasn’t so sure.

  Smooth and flowing, it tied beneath her breasts for some form against her body and the sleeves were very long, flowing past her hands and warming them. Delighted at the feel of the fabric, it was enough to cause her to forget her misery, at least for the moment. For once in her life, she was experiencing comfort as she’d never known. It was a small bit of brightness in an otherwise horrendous day and she collected the comb from the table that Lady Katheryn had left behind, sitting on the warm stones next to the hearth and running the comb through her hair to dry it in the warmth of the room.

  For all of the hell she’d been through that day, at least this moment was moderately comforting. She may not have been happy or even content with anything about her circumstances, but at least this small sliver of time was peaceful. She was alone without the hovering English women. She’d bathed alone and she’d dressed alone. It was what she was familiar and comfortable with. She murmured a prayer of thanks, which included a plea for strength for what was to come. For what she must do. She was certain God was listening.

  She had to go home.

  A soft knock on the door roused her from her prayers. Thinking it was the servants returned for the tub, she bade them to enter.

  But what came through the doorway was not what she had expected.

  The peaceful moment, achieved with such difficulty, was gone.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Patrick had heard the entire thing.

  Unable to sleep, he’d been listening at his door when his sister had escorted Brighton to the chamber next to his and he’d heard the ensuing conversation. His sisters wanted to be helpful but Brighton wanted nothing to do with them. She hadn’t been rude but she hadn’t exactly been kind. He could hear the apprehension in her voice, the confusion and sorrow of a day that had changed her entire life.

  Not that he blamed her.

  His sister had been surprisingly obedient to Brighton’s wishes and the voices had eventually fallen silent. He’d remained at his door, however, listening, wondering if he shouldn’t try to speak with Brighton and apologize for his role in her traumatic day. Every contact he’d had with the woman had been volatile and upsetting, and being a man of feeling, he didn’t like that. He hadn’t meant to upset her with what the old nun had told him, but he still felt strongly that it had been the right thing to do. The woman had to understand her station in life and the threats against her, now that she was out of the confines of the priory. He wouldn’t always be around to protect her, especially in light of his appointment for Henry. So perhaps if she understood how unique her bloodlines were, she would understand the need for caution.

  Servants arrived at her door a few minutes later. He could hear them banging about. Water splashed. But the door shut again and he didn’t hear anything more after that, not for quite some time. In fact, he began
to worry about the silence, his mind concocting a few terrible scenarios. What if the woman had taken that bathwater and drowned herself in it? What if she had fashioned a noose with the bed linens and was, even now, hanging from the rafters? Being as distressed as she was, he couldn’t be certain she hadn’t done one or the other.

  It wasn’t that Patrick was a worrier; he was simply one of those people who tried to think of all angles of a situation. That damnable emotion he was so capable of saw to the stress part of his personality and, in a situation like this, he couldn’t help but think the worst. He didn’t want the woman killing herself because of what had happened on this day. That would have made him very remorseful, indeed.

  Patrick was vastly intelligent and flawless in his decision-making skills, but there were times when his concern for a situation – or people – gave him pains in his belly. The physic told him he needed to relax more, to pursue something that would calm his naturally strong character, but so far he hadn’t found anything to keep his attention long enough to actually relax him. Heading to London as he was to assume his prestigious post, he was fairly certain he never would.

  He was going to be on edge the rest of his life.

  It was, therefore, his strong personality and sense of curiosity that kept him by the door, listening, letting his imagination run away with him until he finally heard movement. He congratulated himself on the fact that she hadn’t killed herself. But he was still inclined to believe that he needed to have at least one calm, civil conversation with the woman to ensure she understood what her life would be like from now on. More than that, he hadn’t even told her that he would be taking her to Castle Questing on the morrow.

  It would probably be the polite thing to do.

  Summoning his courage, he opened the door to his chamber and stepped into the dark corridor. Lifting his hand, he rapped softly on her chamber door. When she bade the caller to enter, he opened the door and timidly stuck his head inside the chamber.

  “Lady Brighton?”

  His gaze fell on the bed but she wasn’t there. Soon enough, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye and saw her sitting in front of the hearth on the warm stone. He almost didn’t see her because of the angle of the entry and when their gazes locked, her head came up and her eyes widened. Patrick could see fear in her eyes and he lifted a hand to ease her.

  “I mean you no harm, my lady, I swear it,” he said quickly. “I came to see if you require anything.”

  Brighton shook her head, pulling her knees up against her chest in a move that was clearly defensive. “N-nay,” she said with apprehension in her voice. “I do not require anything.”

  Patrick almost bowed out, simply because she looked so frightened, but the cold tub caught his eye. “Let me have the bath removed,” he said, turning his attention out into the cold corridor and snapping his fingers at one of the servants lurking down by Katheryn’s chamber. “Send for men to take the bath away.”

  The servant fled down the stairs and Patrick stood by the door of Brighton’s chamber, awkwardly, as he waited for the servants to return to fetch the cold bath. The silence between them was tense but Patrick pretended not to notice. He kept his attention out to the corridor, not daring to look at Brighton for fear she would erupt in terror and chase him away. He didn’t want to go away, not yet. He was still determined to speak with her. Therefore, he refused to look at her until a contingent of servants finally clamored up the steps and into the lady’s chamber, removing the cold bathwater with buckets before finally removing the copper tub itself.

  Brighton, meanwhile, had moved to the other side of the room, far away from the English who were invading her chamber. Her hair was nearly dry now, with a slight curl to it as it hung to her buttocks, and the lamb’s wool garment was heavy and concealing. Still, she felt threatened by a knight in her chamber, who was by far the largest man she’d ever seen. Standing before him, she’d barely come to his sternum.

  His hands were big enough to crush her skull.

  As the servants came in and out of the chamber performing their task, Brighton had taken the opportunity to study the big Englishman from a safe distance. He had very dark hair, nearly black, and his eyes were a pale shade of green. With his square jaw and straight nose, she had to admit he was easy on the eyes. In fact, he was quite handsome in her opinion. But since she had no use for men, that opinion was for naught.

  Still, he had her interest, purely out of curiosity. He was out of his mail and dressed in a simple tunic and breeches, with boots rising on legs that were as big in circumference as her entire torso. He lingered in the doorway as the servants moved in and out, turning sideways in it because his shoulders were nearly as broad as the doorway itself. Surely it wasn’t easy to move around with size like that, but he seemed fairly agile. Aye, he was a fine example of a man, a rather surprising bit of perfection, if she were to admit it, but those thoughts didn’t matter. He was English and he was hated.

  That was all that mattered to her.

  The servants eventually cleared out, taking their buckets with them and leaving the chamber quiet with only the fire snapping in the hearth to fill the still air. As Brighton literally stood in the far corner of the room, as far away from the activity as she could go, Patrick finally turned to her.

  “I hope you are warm and comfortable now, my lady,” he said in that deep, rich baritone of a voice. “If there is anything else we can do to make your stay more pleasant, I hope you will let us know.”

  Brighton regarded him a moment. “T-there is something you can do.”

  “You need only name it.”

  “Y-you can let me go back to Coldingham.”

  He wasn’t surprised to hear that request. “Alas, I cannot,” he said. When he saw her features tighten, even from across the room, he sighed faintly. “My lady, I have come to offer my apologies for the role I have played in your turmoil today. I have contributed to the chaos and distress, but it has been unintentional, I assure you. Much of what has happened, or what has been said, is as much a surprise to me as it is to you. Please believe me when I say that I did not wake up this morning with the sole intention of upsetting you into hysteria. Quite the opposite. I hope you will consider that before judging me too harshly.”

  It was a very kind apology, in fact, and Brighton was rather surprised by it. He sounded humble and sincere. It was difficult not to believe him and as she mulled over his words, her stiff stance eased, just a bit.

  “I-I am willing to believe that is the truth, my lord,” she said. “I do not even know your name.”

  He smiled faintly, perhaps with some chagrin, and the deep dimples that carved into both cheeks set Brighton’s naïve heart to racing. “For that, I am terribly sorry,” he said. “Please do not tell my sisters. I would never hear the end of it.”

  “T-then who are you?”

  “Sir Patrick de Wolfe at your service, my lady,” he said without hesitation. “I am the garrison commander of Berwick Castle.”

  She nodded faintly, absorbing his name. Sir Patrick de Wolfe. “D-De Wolfe?” she repeated. “I have heard that name, I think.”

  Patrick nodded. “I have a rather large and extended family all over Northumberland,” he said. “My mother is Scots, in fact, and we are related to Clan Scott. English father, Scots mother. I am born of two countries.”

  Brighton was inevitably relaxing with the calm conversation. Considering his easy manner, it wasn’t difficult. “Y-yet you fight for the English.”

  He shrugged. “My father is an English baron and a much-decorated knight,” he said. “I was born in England, so that means I am English.”

  She nodded in understanding, but it was done in a manner that suggested she might not have agreed with his decision. “T-then you had no choice?”

  “Probably not.”

  He meant it in a jesting way, which was surprising. Brighton hadn’t considered that the big English knight might actually have a sense of humor. She did, too. But s
he wasn’t quite ready to jest with him in return.

  Not yet, anyway.

  “I-I am sorry for you, then.”

  He shook his head. “Don’t be,” he said. “I am fulfilling my destiny and I am content. In fact, it is good that we are on the subject. The last time I tried to speak with you about your destiny, or at least tell you what your nurse told me, you had a rather violent reaction. Although I am not unsympathetic to your response, you must look at it from a different point of view – destiny is nothing to fear, my lady. It is what we are born to be. It is to be embraced, as people like us are destined to make a difference in the world.”

  “D-do you truly believe that?”

  “I do.”

  Brighton’s first reaction was to resist what he was telling her as she had resisted before, but his words made a good deal of sense. With the air calm between them and the news of Sister Acha’s story having been something Brighton had already heard, it was easier for her to hear it a second time. But the fear, the disbelief, was still close to the surface. She simply couldn’t help it.

  “I-I was not there when you spoke to Sister Acha,” she said. “I do not know what, exactly, was said, but I simply cannot believe she would tell you such a thing. I have spent my entire life with her and she never even hinted about knowing something of my past. Surely, she would have told me.”

  Patrick shrugged. “Mayhap she never saw the need,” he said. “She carried the secret alone and when she realized she was dying, she was unwilling to take the secret to her grave.”

  Brighton thoughts lingered on Sister Acha and the great secret. The more she thought on it, the more puzzled she became. “B-but I cannot believe Mother Prioress would not know,” she said. “No one does anything without her blessing. Moreover, it was she who would have taken me in to the convent as an infant and she who would have asked Sister Acha to tend me. Therefore, the mother prioress would have known, too. Why did she never tell me?”