The Spell-Bound Scholar

Chapter 9

"Why, what villainy is this," Gwen said, voice low and trembling, "to use a man's love to strike at him?!"

"It is only as she was taught," Gregory said stubbornly. "There is great sweetness underlying the shell of malice she has grown, Mother!" Then he broke off, staring from mother to sister and back. "What have I said? What makes you so intent?"

"The clarity of your love for her," Gwen said. "It is not that you have been duped into loving a viper, but that you have seen the loving babe she was 'ere the sorcerer transformed her."

"This love, at least, is not blind," Cordelia agreed, "though at first I thought it was."

Gwen shook off the mood and spoke. "If your love sees truly, I shall have to be extraordinarily wise and skillful to peel away that shell of scars to reveal the sweet and gentle child beneath—if that child has not died."

"She has not! Oh, Mother, she is still there and alive! I know it, I feel it!"

"How is this, then?" Gwen said with a rueful smile. "Do you love the child, or the woman she grew to be?"

Gregory stared, more into himself than outside, then said slowly, "Neither. I love the woman that child could have grown into and that may yet be—a Woman of If."

"Then let us see if we can make of her a Woman That Is," said Gwen. "I shall go to learn what I may of the human heart and mind. Whiles I am gone, do you submit yourself to the less-than-gentle ministrations of your brother, and when he lets you rest, read the sleeping mind of this woman in depth. Come to know her needs, delights, and secret fears, that you may fulfill the first and avoid the last."

Gregory nodded, huge-eyed. "I shall, Mother."

"You shall also have to acquire a sense of fun and play," Gwen said grimly. "I know you have never truly done so, but few women would wish a man who can never be gamesome." She turned to her daughter. "Tease him unmercifully, Cordelia, until he has learned to recognize it and enjoy it."

Cordelia looked dubious. "I shall try, Mother, though Heaven knows I did enough of that when we were young, and he always mistook it for cruelty."

"I shall learn it now," Gregory assured her.

"Betimes engage him in contests of wit," Gwen counselled. She turned back to Gregory. "Therein, at least, you may discover pleasure in the game itself. Once you do, you can enlarge that to other play."

Now Gregory looked uncertain, but he said, "I shall do all that I can to achieve it."

"There is something more you shall need to know," Gwen told him. "Geoffrey shall teach it to you, mind to mind."

Gregory blushed even at the thought.

Cordelia smiled wickedly. "He shall listen with a beet-red face, Mother."

Gregory turned to her with a frown but saw his mother's smile of amusement. "Oh! I see. This is some of that 'teasing' of which you spoke. Well, if I must learn lovemaking, I shall, even if it must be with a purple face—but it shall also be with dogged determination."

"I would rather it would be with delight and wonder," Gwen sighed, "but I will take what I may."

Gregory glanced at her uncertainly, then glanced away. "Mother—do you truly believe I can become all these things?"

"What have I told you of your ability to learn, Gregory?" his mother demanded.

"Why, that I could learn anything I wished. . . . Oh. I see." Gregory tried to smile. "At last I wish to learn it, is that what you mean?"

"Exactly," Gwen told him. "I will say now what I said then, my son—you can learn anything you truly wish to learn. It is simply that, before this, you have never seen any sense in it."

Gregory frowned, looking inward again. "Am I truly being a devoted lover, Mother, or am I seeking to remake myself in slavery to a woman's whims?"

Cordelia looked quite worried, but Gwen let the question roll over her and took her time phrasing the answer. "You are setting yourself to realizing your full potential, my son, with which you never would have bothered if this Finister had not spurred you to it."

"To become her ideal male, and to cure her of her urge to maim and kill," Gregory whispered, daunted. "Surely only magic can bring about either one!"

"Then I shall go and learn that magic," Gwen promised him. She turned to Cordelia. "Be sure she stays asleep."

The trip took Gwen the rest of that day and most of the next, for she had to fly half the length of Gramarye, and even at airspeed and with a favorable wind, that took time. She stayed the night at an inn, then went on to her goal at sunrise and came in sight of the convent early in the morning of the third day. She brought her broomstick down in a clearing so as not to frighten the holy women and walked the rest of the way.

When she came out of the trees, though, Gwen stopped, staring, wondering if she were in the right place. A mob of children was running about outside the walls, some playing with a ball, some whirling tops, others playing an intricate game involving small hoops, and some simply standing about and chatting. Gwen watched, rather startled—on her last visit, she'd had the impression that the nuns isolated themselves from the neighboring villages. That had to have been a mistake, of course—they were healers; patients must come to them in a regular procession. Her last visit had been in the Christmas season; no doubt the children had been home with their families.

But what were they doing here?

A nun came out of the convent gate and clapped her hands. The children immediately quieted and formed concentric circles, the oldest on the outside, the youngest and shortest on the inside. The nun nodded, satisfied, and said, "Good morn, my pupils."

A chorus of voices answered, "Good morn, Sister Elizabeth!"

"Let us ask God's blessing on our day's work." The nun knelt and the children imitated her. She began to pray aloud, and Gwen watched, scarcely able to believe what she saw. Was this truly a school for peasant children? In a land where only the nobility and the clergy learned to read and write?

But never women. No, Sister Elizabeth must have been there to teach them only religion.

The prayer done, they stood. One of the smallest raised his hand.

"Yes, Lawrence?"

"Must we go inside, Sister?" the little boy asked, his voice plaintive. " 'Tis so warm and so sunny outside!"

Sister Elizabeth cast a knowing smile at the oldest children, one or two of whom had the grace to blush and look down; they had put the child up to asking but hadn't fooled Sister for a minute.

"Nay, I think not," Sister said. " 'Tis indeed beauteous, and like to be one of the last warm days of autumn. We shall stay out of doors."

The children cheered. Sister Elizabeth smiled and waved for them to quiet down. As their noise subsided, she said, "Sit, now, and take out your slates."

The younger generation disposed itself on the grass, not without a bit of chatter. Sister Elizabeth clapped her hands. "Pay heed, an't please you! Senior students—write out an answer to this question: 'How could Christ be both fully man and fully God?' "

The older teenagers bent over their slates, frowning. One or two began writing immediately.

Gwen stared. Peasant children, writing?

Sister Elizabeth was going on. "Junior students—are those we call witches truly evil magicians devoted to Satan, or people like any other, but with talents few of us have? Judge by their works, good or evil. Then say if your answer could be true anywhere but on this Isle of Gramarye. As you write out your answer, bear in mind the three parts of an essay."

The younger teenagers frowned at her, puzzled, then looked down at their slates, growing thoughtful.

Gwen was astounded, not only by the fact that these youngsters could write and therefore presumably read, but also at the nun's application of religion to a problem that was, for anyone on Gramarye, an issue of daily life.

"Older children, come near this tree!" Sister Elizabeth took a sheet of parchment from her sleeve and tacked it to a tree trunk. It was covered with arithmetic problems. "Solve these on your slates," Sister said as she glanced back at the senior students—then glanced again. "Garrard! Your eyes on your slate, young man! Truly, one of your age should be above letting your eyes wander without purpose!"

There was a smothered snicker from the teenagers, and one of the boys snapped his gaze back to his slate. The girl at whom he had been gazing glanced at him out of the corner of her eye, then back at her slate with a covert smile.

Sister Elizabeth turned to the youngest children. "Now, then! Let us recite the alphabet!" She held up a hand, but glanced back at the older children and snapped, "Matthew!"

One of the boys looked up, startled and guilty.

Sister Elizabeth stepped over to him and held out her hand. "School is for slates and chalk, naught else. Give me your reed, young man."

In sullen silence, the boy pulled a narrow tube out of his sleeve and gave it to her.

"You may keep the beans," Sister said, "so long as you do not use them. If you are well behaved the remainder of the day, you shall have this reed again." She didn't say what would happen if he didn't; apparently everyone knew. She turned to go back to the youngest students but stopped short as a girl quickly covered her slate with her sleeve. Sister levelled a forefinger. "Ciphering only, Cynthia. I wish to see naught but numbers on your slate."

Other students craned their necks, trying to see what Cynthia had been drawing or writing.

"Eyes on your own slates," Sister reminded them, and they all whipped their gazes back to their work. Sister sighed and shook her head as she returned to the youngest—and Cynthia took out a scrap of cloth to erase her slate. "Now," said Sister, "the alphabet."

The children began to chant with her.

Gwen moved on, shaking her head with amazement. A school for peasant children was unheard of! Still, now that she knew of it, it made a great deal of sense—an order dedicated to the health of the mind would naturally wish to develop those minds as fully as possible.

She was also amazed at the woman's patience. A few days of that would have reduced her to a screaming scold—or a gibbering idiot. She wouldn't blame the nuns if they changed teachers every few days—but from the children's air of familiarity, it was evident Sister Elizabeth was with them constantly. A truly amazing woman, indeed.

The novice at the gate started looking frightened as soon as she realized that Gwen wasn't just an accidental passerby, but she held her ground and stammered, "What would you, milady?"

"Speech with your Mother Superior," Gwen answered. "Good day to you, lass."

"G-good day." The girl's eyes were huge. "Who shall I say wishes speech with her?"

"The Lady Gwendolyn Gallowglass."

The girl swallowed heavily, nodded, and stammered, "Y-yes, your ladyship." Then she turned and scrambled away, leaving Gwen to wonder why they bothered with a gate when the wall was so low—or, for that matter, why they bothered with having a porter.

She took the opportunity to study the layout of the convent. It was very obviously a homemade affair, built with the willing labor of the local peasants—Gwen had a momentary vision of fathers and brothers hauling blocks of stone for the curtain wall and wattle and daub for the buildings. The structures were only larger versions of peasant huts—considerably larger, since several of them were double-storied. But regardless of their construction, their layout adhered to the time-honored ground plan of convent and monastery alike—dormitory, refectory, cloister, and chapel—though the cloister's pillars were wooden and the chapel was of painted boards. Not for the first time, Gwen wondered if the sisters were wise to try to keep themselves secret from the monks, who would surely have aided them with funds and labor had they known.

Of course, they also might have wished to establish their authority over the women's Order, as the nuns feared. That didn't seem terribly likely to Gwen, but she did think there was a definite chance that the Abbot might have forbidden the Order to form.

Her speculation was cut short by the advent of the Mother Superior, hurrying across the grounds so quickly her brown robe snapped about her ankles. The novice trailed along in her wake, still looking scared.

The older nun came up to the gate and curtsied in greeting. "Good day, Lady Gallowglass! You honor our house!"

" 'Tis a house of God, Mother, and 'tis my honor to be herein," Gwen returned.

"Only 'Sister,' an't please you," the nun reminded her gently. "We hold no official ranks past our final vows; 'tis simply my sisters' regard that doth give me precedence. I am only Sister Paterna Testa, like to any among us."

"Your pardon, Sister." Gwen inclined her head. "I come seeking wisdom."

The nun laughed. "You, the wisest witch in the Isle of Gramarye? What wisdom might I offer you?"

"Knowledge of healing," Gwen returned. "I had cause to see, when last I journeyed here, that you and your sisters know far more than I of the healing of the mind."

" 'Tis gracious of you to say so." The nun turned serious with compassion ready in her eyes. "Has your husband gained worse hurts?"

"None new, I think," Gwen answered, " 'Tis not one of my own I seek to cure, but an enemy who might cease to be a foe if she were healed."

"What an amazingly Christian deed!" the novice exclaimed, round-eyed, then clapped her hand over her mouth, appalled at her own temerity.

Gwen smiled with gentle amusement. " Tis not true charity if we wish to spare ourselves trouble thereby."

"But it is true charity when the headsman's ax would be simpler and far quicker," Sister Paterna Testa said, her gaze probing and speculative.

"There are even better reasons than that," Gwen admitted, "though I do not wish to speak of them. Canst tell, Sister, why the wounds of the body heal with time and harden with greater protection of the softer flesh within, while those of the mind fester and grow worse?"

"For that they have not been well tended," the nun said promptly. She held out a hand, turning back toward the interior of the convent.

Gwen accepted the invitation, stepping through the gate with her and toward the main hall.

"You know," said Sister Paterna Testa, "that if a soldier is struck by an arrow but does not die, the barb must be cut out and the wound anointed with healing balms, then bandaged with a poultice."

"Aye, certes."

"Then will the cut flesh grow together once more and the skin seam itself over. Even thus in the mind, the barb must also be drawn out and the balm and poultice given."

Gwen looked up, frowning. "I have given what balm I may."

"Yet we may know of others," Sister assured her, "and there is yet the matter of the barb."

"Why, even so," Gwen said slowly. "Yet how can one draw out that which one cannot see?"

"Or even know is there?" The nun nodded. " Tis that which we may tell you of, milady—but anon. For the present, you have journeyed far and are surely wearied and a-hungered. Will you dine with us, thereafter to take your ease in our guest house?"

The refectory was a long hall, with cream-colored walls, a crucifix at the far end, and a picture of two women in peasant dress, one holding a baby, one with a face that would have turned plums into prunes if the smile on it hadn't been so warm and welcoming. There was no other decoration, but the cleanliness of the hall and the huge open windows that filled it with light made it cheerful and refreshing.

Sister Paterna Testa said grace, her sisters said "Amen," and immediately broke into happy conversation. Two of the nuns and two novices rose from their places and went out of the room. They came back moments later carrying trays laden with hearty, but very plain, food.

"I trust you shall not find our company burdensome, milady," Sister Paterna Testa said as she dipped her spoon into her soup.

"I feel peace suffusing my soul already, simply from being within your house," Gwen rejoined. "But who are those dames pictured on the wall? Surely the one is not meant to be the Blessed Virgin."

"You have it; she is not." Mother Superior (for so Gwen thought of her, regardless of her claims) smiled. "She was only a peasant woman, milady, alone and forsaken with her babe—though she was far younger than she is pictured while her daughter was yet an infant."

Gwen began to understand. "Yet she was one of your founders?"

"Aye—the mother or our compassion, much as the other, Clothilda—blessed be her name!—was the mother of our strength." Sister Paterna Testa settled down to tell Gwen the story of the founders of her Order.

Morning started with a bang, one loud enough to bring Gregory out of his trance. He turned his head slowly, feeling his metabolism rise but not yet trusting it enough to leap up— and saw there was no need, for the explosion had simply been the burst of air compressed outward as his brother's body had suddenly filled the space where it had been.

The knight-errant strode up to him, grinning. "Good morn to you, brother!"

"And to you, brother," Gregory returned. "I thank you for coming to aid me."

"Though somewhat tardily," Cordelia said, rising from her bedroll. "Good morn, brother, even though you could not afford us the benefit of your company sooner."

"Ah, but if I had, I should have left Quicksilver to languish," Geoffrey said, "and you would castigate me for a careless suitor."

There was truth in that, but Cordelia wasn't about to admit it, especially since she was quite sure how Quicksilver had benefitted from Geoffrey's company and he from hers. She kept her expression of severity but said, "How say you, Geoffrey? Shall we make a lover of our ascetic brother?"

"Let me see if the game is worth the candle." Geoffrey stepped up beside the sleeping Finister and looked down. His eyes widened and he gave a long, appreciative whistle. ' This is her natural semblance, yet she chose to go in disguise?"

"She has low self-esteem," Cordelia explained.

"It must be low indeed, not to know the power of such a face and form!"

"She thought the power came from her projective talents," Cordelia said, "that men loved her not for what she was but for how she could hypnotize them into feeling."

"Not without reason." Geoffrey turned to his brother. "Even you, who pride yourself on the cold and emotionless clarity of your mind, have fallen under her spell."

"I cannot altogether deny it," Gregory admitted, "but I can at least claim not to have fallen in love with the form, for I saw her in so many disguises that I knew not which one was real."

"So it would seem," Geoffrey said. "What do you think of the true shape?"

"Far more beautiful than any image she has worn!"

Geoffrey raised his eyebrows at the emphatic tone. "So speaks a man who indeed loves the mind and heart—but how can you, if she is a treacherous murderer?"

"Because I can feel beneath the roil of confusion, anger, and hatred to the forlorn child beneath, the heart of hearts, and it is beautiful indeed."

"That deuced empathy of yours!" Geoffrey exclaimed in exasperation. "Did I not say it would prove your undoing?"

"Then rejoice that you are proven wrong," Gregory said, looking steadily into his eyes, "for it shall prove instead the making of me."

Geoffrey gave him a long, weighing look, then said, ' 'Perhaps. It shall, at least, give you reason to make yourself into a more conventional notion of manliness." He did not say whether that convention was wise or foolish, but only asked, "Have you dined?"

"Why ... I have not," Gregory answered, surprised by the question.

"So I thought." Geoffrey took a packet from his wallet and held it out, unwrapping it. "A gift from Cook to you, my lad, and freshly and expertly grilled it is!"

Gregory looked down at the huge slab of steak and blanched. "Meat!"

"I know the stuff is alien to you," Geoffrey said, "but you shall become quite attached to it, and it to you."

"But— for breakfast?!!"

"And lunch, and dinner, and belike for elevenses and tea, too," Geoffrey said, grinning but remorseless. " 'Tis high time you were introduced to a high-protein diet. Steak," he said, looking down at the slab of meat, "this is Gregory. Gregory, this is beefsteak. Come now, embrace it and make it yours."

Gregory took the steak warily, "This will make me more attractive to a woman?"

"No," said Cordelia, "but the muscles it builds within you shall." She looked at the huge slab and wrinkled her nose in disgust but said, "Eat it, Gregory. Tell yourself it is medicine."

"Well, if I must, I shall," Gregory sighed, and drew his dagger to begin cutting.

"Clothilda it was who first built a dwelling in this place, though 'twas only a cottage, and a poor one at that. It had but two rooms, in one of which her chickens roosted." Gwen frowned. "Why did she dwell alone in the forest?" "Her parents were dead and she had no husband, having been born poor and unusually . .. plain. ..."

"Aye." Gwen nodded, glancing at the picture. The woman was not merely plain but downright ugly. "Yet I have seen plain women married afore, if their natures were sweet."

"Hers was not. She was a termagant and a scold, with a sharp tongue and no pity—for she bore a grudge 'gainst all the folk of her village."

"Against the men, because none did want her?"

"Aye—because none was strong enough to stand against the vinegar of her tongue, nor wise enough to see the treasure of the spirit within her. And she hated all the women for sneering at her."

Again, Gwen nodded. It was a common enough story; people always seemed to need to have someone at the bottom of the social heap, and in a medieval society, the women determined that by who was married and who was not. Then, among the spinsters, they determined rank according to who was liked and who wasn't. "She does not seem the sort of woman who would have borne such treatment with patience."

"She was not. She railed against the other women, scolded the men, and became quite the terror of the village."

"Such folk begin to pride themselves on their loathsomeness, or seem to."

"And so did she."

Gwen nodded. "That could not endure. They would oust her soon or late."

"So they did. Someone unnamed denounced her to the priest, charging her with witchcraft. None spoke in her defense; indeed, all were quick to cry that she must needs be a sorceress. They drove her out with bell, book, and candle, and she fled here to this hillock, where the rock beneath the ground made a small clearing. Here she built a hut, then went back to steal a hen and a cockerel and scraped out a lean and meager existence with a garden and chickens, and nuts and berries to gather."

"Hard enough," Gwen murmured.

"Aye; but her true diet was her own heart. She nurtured herself on bitterness and hatred, on thoughts of revenge and plans for dire deeds."

"I have met such as she—yet they commonly become the village wise women, learning the virtue of each herb and simple."

"Clothilda did not; she swore she would never do good to her folk, only ill to those who had cast her out. Yet she did learn the powers of the herbs, but to harm, not to heal."

Gwen shuddered. "How could such an one endure?"

Mother Superior shrugged. "Given time, she might have sought to wreak havoc on one person or more and been burned at the stake—but ere she could fulfill her desires, she was distracted."

"By what?"

"By a baby's cry."