Brother Cadfael 20: Brother Cadfael's Penance

fetters marking him as a prisoner. He had been lying on his bed when the key turned in the lock; his burnished black hair clasped his olive cheeks with ruffled wings, casting blue shadows into the hollows there beneath the smooth, salient bones. Cadfael had never seen him more beautiful, not even on that first day when he had glimpsed this face through the open gate at the priory of Bromfield, stooping suave cheek to cheek with the girl who was now his wife. Philip had not failed to respect, value and preserve this elegance of body and mind, even though it had turned irrevocably against him.
    Cadfael took a long step forward towards the light, uncertain whether he was clearly seen. The cell was spacious beyond what he had expected, with a low chest in a dark corner, and items of clothing or harness folded upon it. "Olivier?" he said hesitantly. "You know me?"
    "I know you," said Oliver, low-voiced. "I have been taught to know you. You are my father." He looked from Cadfael's face to the open door, and then to the keys in Cadfael's hand. "There's been fighting," he said, struggling to make sense of all these chaotic factors that crowded in on him together. "What has happened? Is he dead?"
    He. Philip. Who else could have told him? And now he asked instantly after his sometime friend, supposing, Cadfael divined, that only after that death could these keys have come into other hands. But there was no eagerness, no satisfaction in the voice that questioned, only a flat finality, as one accepting what could not be changed. How strange it was, thought Cadfael, watching his son with aching intensity, that this complex creature should from the first have been crystal to the sire who engendered him.
    "No," he said gently, "he is not dead. He gave them to me."
    He advanced, almost cautiously, as though afraid to startle a bird into flight, and as warily opened his arms to embrace his son, and at the first touch the braced body warmed and melted, and embraced him ardently in return.
    "It is true!" said Olivier, amazed. "But of course, true! He never lies. And you knew? Why did you never tell me?"
    "Why break into another man's life, midway, when he is already in noble transit and on his way to glory? One breath of a contrary wind might have driven you off course." Cadfael stood him off between his hands to look closely, and kissed the hollow oval cheek that leaned to him dutifully. "All the father you needed you had from your mother's telling, better than truth. But now it's out, and I am glad. Come, sit down here and let me get you out of these fetters."
    He kneeled beside the bed to fit the last key into the anklets, and the chains rang again their sharp, discordant peal as he opened the gyves and hoisted the irons aside, dropping the coil against the rock wall. And all the time the golden eyes hung upon his face, with passionate concentration, searching for glimpses that would confirm the continuity of the blood that bound them together. And after a moment Olivier began to question, not the truth of this bewildering discovery, but the circumstances that surrounded it, and the dazzling range of possibilities it presented.
    "How did you know? What can I ever have said or done to make you know me?"
    "You named your mother," said Cadfael, "and time and place were all as they should be. And then you turned your head, and I saw her in you."
    "And never said word! I said once, to Hugh Beringar I said it, that you had used me like a son. And never trembled when I said it, so blind I was. When he told me you were here, I said it could not be true, for you would not leave your abbey unless ordered. Recusant, apostate, unblessed, he said, he is here to redeem you. I was angry!" said Olivier, wrenching at memory and acknowledging its illogical pain. "I said you had cheated me! You should not so have thrown away all you valued, for me, made yourself exile and sinner, offered your life. Was it fair to load me with such a terrible burden of debt? Lifelong I could not repay it. All I felt was the sting of my own injury. I am sorry! Truly I am sorry! I know better now."
    "There is no debt," said Cadfael, rising from his knees. "All manner of reckoning or bargaining is for ever impossible between us two."
    "I know it! I do know it! I felt so far outdone, it scalded my pride. But that's gone." Olivier rose, stretched his long legs, and stalked his cell back and forth. "There is nothing I will not take from you, and be grateful, even if there