Valley of Dry Bones

Chapter Twenty

The Office had ended. Nuns filed out to attend their tasks, whether prayer or less welcome work under the blistering sun.

Eleanor remained in the shadows of the chapel, hands clasped and neck bent. Her spirit seethed. Rarely had prayer failed to soothe or bring her much needed insight. Now was that uncommon occasion.

Every muscle and nerve tensed as she willed her mind to concentrate on those supplications she had promised to send to God. At the very least, she must pray that certain souls be granted an early release from Purgatory. The instant she completed each petition, her thoughts drifted away with mulish determination.

From the world outside, voices of men and women wafted through the hot air, their words muted and all meaning lost. Closer by, she could hear the novice choir singing one portion of a chorus from the Play of Daniel over and over again.

None of that was a distraction to her. A light scuffling sound nearer to hand was more difficult to overlook.

She opened her eyes.

A small, dark, and furry thing sped past her knees.

One of her cat’s many feline progeny bounded after it.

Although she had no love for rodents, and found the many kittens a delight, she rather hoped this mouse would escape. After all, this was God’s house and violent death had no place here.

She sat back on her heels, let her unclasped hands fall to rest on her knees, and surrendered to her failure. No matter how hard she tried, her prayers were as heavy as leaden tiles and would not rise heavenward. She’d not offer God any excuse for this inability to set worldly things aside even if one cause was not difficult to understand. She was troubled by murder.

The killing of one of the queen’s men near the priory boded ill for future beneficence from either King Edward or his wife. When kings withdrew their favor, other men of rank followed their lead. Like any leader of a religious house, Eleanor depended on those small gifts of land, rents, or gold chalices to feed, clothe, and inspire her nuns and monks.

The prioress was not just concerned with the state of her accounting rolls or how brightly the priory plate glittered, she was angry that anyone would dare commit violence against a priory guest. Since all staying here were presumed to be under God’s protection, the act was not only brutal but an affront to hospitality and an offense against God. Although Baron Otes had committed uncounted sins, the right to punish him belonged to God or the king. In this case, she believed the killer had encroached most on God’s authority.

She gazed up at the window behind the altar. Dimmed by the moss outside, the light struggled to pass through the glass into the chapel. She had refused to order the growth scraped away. The weak glow reminded her and her religious that the human spirit must always strive to see light in the darkness of earthly sin. Now she needed the reminder more than ever to keep her seeking the elusive reason for this crime.

The first inquiry must establish whether an outlaw or someone from the village was the perpetrator. Since the body was found by the stream outside the priory, both were reasonable possibilities and would be thoroughly investigated by Crowner Ralf. She prayed that investigation would solve the crime.

She feared otherwise. To her mind, the most significant question lay in why Otes had left the guest quarters at all. He was not native to this region and, to the best of her knowledge, had neither kin nor allies in this part of England. Although he might have slipped out for an evening of whoring and drinking, Eleanor had strong doubts.

Otes was no longer young and had been giving lavish gifts to the Church. These efforts on behalf of his soul suggested he was either moved to repent his sins or, unable to satisfy favorite lusts with the ease of younger days, he had grown to fear the eternal consequences of past pleasures as each day brought him reminders of mortal decay.

Whether the baron was trying to bribe God to forget his sins or had learned He did love mended hearts, Otes’ pattern of munificent gifts suggested a man who was now responding more to the rotten stench of Purgatory than the perfume of willing women.

She ran her fingertips over the rough stone on which she knelt. Whoring was probably not the baron’s aim, yet she suspected he had left Tyndal to meet someone. With no reason to think that person was a local man, she concluded the killer was another member of the queen’s party. If so, she was left with the question of why the meeting took place in that particular spot. The men might have met within the walls of the priory, unless the murderer did not want to add sacrilege to murder.

A sharp flapping of wings over her head disrupted her thoughts. Looking up, she saw that a bird had flown in and was perched high in the rafters. In due course, it would fly out again. In the meantime, she was glad it had found refuge from the heat. Although Sister Ruth complained that birds often drank holy water, the prioress had no quarrel with the creatures. God made them too, and she doubted He begrudged the sips of water.

The concept of refuge reminded her that the location of the crime was close to Brother Thomas’ hermitage. And that made her think of Father Eliduc.

She asked herself if the priest had visited the hermit, hoping to lure him off for some task without her permission. That was an innocent thought compared to her second and more sinister one.

After visiting with her monk, Eliduc would have realized how remote the place was. If the priest had some quarrel with the baron, he might have lured him to the pond for private talk. If the two men then argued, the priest could have killed Otes.

A tiny voice within her quickly insisted that Eliduc would have done so only in self-defense. A louder one expressed doubt about that.

Eleanor shivered. Her logic was obviously flawed. She was equally certain there was a bit of truth in her suspicion.

The priest had shown interest in any gift of land that Otes might have offered Tyndal. As she thought more on her conversation with Eliduc, she remembered how relieved he had been when she said she had refused Otes’ offer. That land might have been the cause for disagreement between the men, especially if it was rich enough.

One flaw in this reasoning was that she had spoken with the priest after the killing. If Eliduc was the perpetrator, he would not have been so pleased to discover the baron’s death was not necessary after all.

“He is still a priest,” she murmured, bowing her head with shame that she would even consider him likely to break a major Commandment.

On the other hand, all mortals were prone to sin, priests included. Despite being convent-raised, Eleanor had not been sent out to head a priory like some lamb to face wolves. Her aunt, who had raised her in Amesbury, made sure her young niece understood that tonsures, vows, and pretty phrases were not always matched by honest or even kind hearts.

She made a fist and pressed it into the stone until pain made her stop. Would she have even considered the priest a suspect if she did not have a quarrel with him over Brother Thomas?

“My logic is fouled by my own anger,” she whispered. “Although his missions may have been to the Church’s benefit, Father Eliduc deceived me when he came, with sorrowing demeanor, to take Brother Thomas away on pretense of family illness. I have not forgiven him for those lies.”

Gritting her teeth, she reminded herself that she had been taught to be just even if the result was not to her liking. Aye, she hated the priest, even though God condemned that as a sin. The man was duplicitous, and she did have the right to complain of his treachery.

With significant effort she reversed her inclination to denounce. “Eliduc has done nothing on his own volition. The priest is only following the command of his own lord,” she muttered.

Those words had a hollow sound. “And were a poor defense,” she admitted to the surrounding silence. “Lies are unacceptable, but they are not the same as murder. I am still blinded by his deceptions.”

With a bitter sigh, she stepped away from the easy conclusion that a man she loathed must be capable of homicide, even if her heart refused to reject the idea as quickly as a logical mind demanded.

From behind the altar, an orange and grey-speckled kitten emerged and boldly approached to sniff at the Prioress of Tyndal. She whispered that this act was an arrogant presumption of familiarity, then contradicted her stern rebuke by petting him. As he wandered off, Eleanor noticed with guarded relief that the creature held no mouse clenched in its teeth. Of course, he might well have eaten it in the shadows.

As she tried to quiet that inner voice stubbornly arguing for Eliduc’s involvement in the violence, she knew that little was as straightforward as appearance suggested. “I do not know enough and have no actual reason to conclude Father Eliduc would slit a man’s throat,” she said to her willful heart.

In the silence of the chapel, she heard her heart reply that the priest might turn his head and let another do what he might not.

The fact remained that Eliduc acted only at the command of the man he served, someone who must be of high Church rank. The wily priest dressed simply, but his soft robes were finely made, his small gold cross skillfully crafted, and his grey horse notably well-bred. None of this spoke of a man in service to some poor lord. Surely such a mighty Church prince would never defile his own vows and order his servant to commit murder. The cost to both their souls was too great.

“And this piece of land must be of little value or the baron would not have offered it to my small priory. Should the gift be of more worth, a reasonable man would grasp that I might be agreeable to exchanging it for something just as useful to our needs here. Murder is far too extreme a solution for such a small problem.” Clenching her teeth, she muttered with forced charity, “Therefore, the killer cannot be Father Eliduc. He would understand all this. Who else might have murdered the baron?”

Was it Sir Fulke? She had little direct knowledge of him since he stayed with the king’s court and let Ralf handle all matters of wrongdoing in the county.

Her father, Baron Adam, had never said much about the sheriff except that he owned a fair cleverness and was reputed to suffer from no more than middling corruption. The crowner mentioned his eldest brother only with contempt, calling him a man who preferred comfort and prestige to catching thieves and keeping other lawless men far from Tyndal village. Between the two assessments, Eleanor concluded that Fulke might suffer a surfeit of ambition but shrink away from self-serving violence.

That assumption noted, many sheriffs were losing their positions as bribery and other unlawful deeds came to the king’s attention. King Edward was swiftly eradicating fraudulent practices in the shrievalty, corruption his father had let run rampant. If Sir Fulke had committed transgressions in the pursuit of power and feared he might lose his rank and influence, could he be driven to extreme measures to save himself?

If Fulke had something damaging to hide, Eleanor also wondered if the crowner knew about it. Dare she ask Ralf if his brother hid a secret that might drive him to kill a man known for using knowledge of such things for his own gain?

Out of family loyalty, Ralf might lie, no matter how honest he was himself. On the other hand, the crowner had always honored his friendship with Eleanor. Forcing her friend to choose between two conflicting, yet equally compelling, loyalties was not something she wanted to do.

She had grown weary with these numerous complications and unanswered questions. No firm conclusions could be made without more information, nor could any clear path to the truth be seen.

The prioress stood, bowed her head, and begged God to pardon her inattention and negligence in prayer. If He willed it, she added, she would be grateful if He enlightened her in this matter of violent death. Being a frail mortal, she conceded that she would better attend her religious duties if she did not have this crime to distract her.

In the meantime, her promised visit to Lady Avelina was long overdue. Father Eliduc had said the lady was weakened by the hard journey and fearful because of Otes’ murder. Providing hospitality demanded Eleanor also supply comfort and ease. Of course she must find out if the woman had need of Sister Anne’s expertise.

“May God forgive me,” Eleanor said, knowing full well what she also intended. She was not so oblivious to her failings that she did not recognize another, less benevolent motive in her concern for this woman.

She turned and walked out of the chapel into the harsh glare of the summer sun.