Brother Cadfael 06: A Virgin In The Ice

scornful. The void left by her dead man had ached unbearably, and drawn in the young stranger heart and soul into her life, to fill the gap. For a whole year he had known her, before the forces of the Cross had moved on to invest Jerusalem.
    There had been other women, before her and after. He remembered them with gratitude, and with no guilt at all. He had given and received pleasure and kindness. None had ever complained of him. If that was a poor defence from the formal viewpoint, nevertheless he felt secure behind it. It would have been an insult to repent of having loved a woman like Mariam.
    "They have alliances there that ensure peace now, if only for a time," he said reflectively, "I suppose an Angevin lord might well feel he's more needed here than there, now it's his own liege lady in the lists. And the man bears a good name, from all I hear. A pity he comes when hate's at its height."
    "A pity there should be cause for hate between decent men," agreed Hugh wryly. "I am the king's man, I chose him with my eyes open. I like Stephen, and am not likely to leave him for any lure. But I can see just as plainly why a baron of Anjou should rush home to serve his lady every whit as loyally as I serve Stephen. What a bedevilment of all our values, Cadfael, is this civil war!"
    "Not all," said Cadfael sturdily. "There never was, for all I could ever learn, a time when living was easy and peaceful. Your boy will grow up into a better ordered world. There, I've finished here for tonight, and it must be nearly time for the bell."
    They went out together into the cold and dark of the garden, and felt on their faces the first flakes of the first snow of the winter. The air was full of a drifting unease, but the fall was light and fitful here. Further south it set in heavily, borne on a north-westerly wind, dry, fine snow that turned the night into a white, whirling mist, shrouding outlines, burying paths, blown into smooth, breaking waves only to be lifted and hurled again into new shapes. Valleys filled to a treacherous level, hillsides were scoured clean. Wise men stayed within their houses, clapped to shutter and door, and stopped the chinks between the boards, where thin white fingers reached through. The first snow, and the first hard frost. Thank God, thought Cadfael, hastening his steps as he heard the Compline bell begin to sound, Herward and his company will be far on their way home now, they'll weather this well enough.
    But what of Ermina and Yves Hugonin, astray somewhere between here and Worcester, and what of the young Benedictine sister who had offered, in her gallant innocence, to go with them and see them safe into sanctuary?
    Chapter Two
    On the fifth day of December, about noon, a traveller from the south, who had slept the night at Bromfield Priory, some twenty-odd miles away, and had the good fortune to find the highroad, at least, in passable condition, brought an urgent message into Shrewsbury abbey. Prior Leonard of Bromfield had been a monk of Shrewsbury until his promotion, and was an old friend of Brother Cadfael's, and familiar with his skills.
    "In the night," the messenger reported, "some decent fellows of that country brought in a wounded man to the priory, found by the wayside stripped and hacked, and left for dead. And half-dead he is, and his case very bad. If he had lain out all night in the frost he'd have been frozen stiff by morning. And Prior Leonard asked would I bring word here to you, for though they've some knowledge of healing, this case is beyond them, and he said you have experience from the wars, and may be able to save the man. If you could come, and bide until he mends - or until the poor soul's lost! - it would be a great comfort and kindness."
    "If abbot and prior give me leave," said Cadfael, concerned, "then most gladly. Footpads preying on the roads so close to Ludlow? What are things come to, there in the south?"
    "And the poor man a monk himself, for they knew him by his tonsure."
    "Come with me," said Cadfael, "and we'll put it to Prior Robert."
    Prior Robert heard the plea with sympathy, and raised no objection, since it was not he who must ride out all those miles in haste, in what was now the shrewd grip of winter. He took the request in his turn to the abbot, and came again with his approval granted.
    "Father Abbot bids you take a good horse from the stables, for you'll need him. You have leave for as long as may be necessary, and we'll send and have Brother