The Irish Warrior

When they were both bent well below the eye level of the crowd, he leaned forward and kissed her lips, swift and hard.

“Ye’re stronger than ye know, lass, and I’ll be back for ye sooner than ye know.”

He straightened and, without looking back, started for the abbey where his spy was waiting.

Chapter 33

It was cool inside. The knobbly stone walls of the abbey kept the heat at bay, and the dim, chilled air wafted like vapor over his forearms and face. There was a short nave, the chancel at the opposite end. Finian bent to one knee, lowered his head and crossed himself, kissing his fingertips lightly. Then he rose and turned to face the small sound that had hissed behind him.

A robed figure moved closer.

“Mother.”

The abbess briefly touched his bent head. “This way.”

Finian followed her through the nave, through a small door, and out into a sunny courtyard. They crossed it and entered another building. The door slammed shut behind them. It took a moment to adjust to the darkness, but when he did, Finian saw they were in a large room, strewn with fresh rushes. This is where the nuns transcribed and illustrated their magnificent illuminated manuscripts.

Mother Superior turned. “My son, you are late.”

“I was delayed.”

“Mayhap too late.”

“I couldn’t help it.”

She eyed him severely. “What matters that, to the Lord?”

“It mattered to me,” Fi

nian muttered, and glanced around.

Her square-cut veil framed an impressively stern face. Tanned, from working outdoors in the gardens, he assumed. “They came.”

He looked back sharply. “Who?”

“Someone who wanted whatever he had as much as you do.”

“Mother, where is he?”

She pointed to a doorway on the other side of the room. The wide sleeve of her robe gaped open, revealing a surprisingly muscular forearm. Finian was taken aback. “Down the stairs, through the cloister, straight across to the dormitory. Last door on the right.”

She regarded him somberly. Her finger rotated and indicated Finian’s sword. “That stays with me.”

Finian handed it over without protest. The three other blades tucked in various folds of his clothing and buckled to his arm should serve at need.

He passed swiftly through the open-aired cloister, where nuns moved like floating blue bells in the bright sunshine, murmuring in quiet conversation. One swept the stone-laid walkway with a whisk broom. She glanced over, then quickly away. Finian leapt up the short stairwell to the dormitory and strode down the corridor.

He gave a perfunctory knock, already pushing open the door. “Red?”

He slammed to a halt.

Red was lying on the floor. A trail of drying blood marked a narrow stream that flowed directly from his bashed head.

Finian dropped to a knee.

“Red?” He slid his hands under the man’s head, disregarding the blood that smeared his palms. “Jésu, Red. What are you doing out of bed? Red!”

He went cold in the silence that followed. A fly buzzed by the small window. He could smell the old, cold wood of the shutters. Finian’s bootheel slid across the grainy floor of the chamber, gritting loudly as he lowered himself to the floor. He hauled on Red’s torso, pulling him into his arms. “Red!”