The Humming of Numbers Read online

  The nighttime and predawn worship passed in a sleepy blur, as those hours often did. When Aidan awoke again in the morning, he forgot briefly that the abbey held anything different. Eagerness spiked through him as memory returned. He rose in haste and then slowed, telling himself he might as well forget again. He would likely never get closer to Lana or speak to her any more freely than he already had. Yesterday’s risks had been disobedient and foolish. It occurred to him, belatedly, that her intriguing eleven-ness might even be the work of Satan, designed to tempt him from his duties, not to mention from the path that would lead him to the scriptorium someday.

  His guilt took flight right after breakfast, when old Brother Nathan caught him on the way out of the Great Hall where they ate.

  “See me after daily instructions,” the stern monk told him.

  Aidan nodded, struggling to keep his face from cramping in worry. A delayed punishment might be coming, and perhaps not just for hiding under a bench. Someone may have spotted him whispering with Lana yesterday.

  Standing among the gathered monks, Aidan thought instructions would never end. The abbot rambled on about the state of the crops, preparations for winter, and next week’s assignments for scrubbing the latrine. Aidan tried not to fidget and shuffle his feet. Distracted, he almost didn’t notice the mention of his own name. The awareness of others’ eyes on him honed his attention.

  “Brother Aidan has been with us almost a year now,” the abbot was saying. “His time as a novice is nearly done. Now his devotion and faith should be tested more severely. I want to make you all aware of a task set for him, that you might watch him and guide him if his feet seem even slightly to stray.”

  Aidan gulped, completely unprepared for anything Abbot Bartley might say. He knew that a novice’s final weeks were a time of close scrutiny. He’d be questioned hard before he took his lifelong vows. Only satisfactory answers would permit him to have the peak of his skull shaved in the tonsure that marked a full-fledged monk. But he hadn’t realized any other sort of test might be involved.

  The abbot cast a glance at Brother Eamon, who simply nodded approval.

  “A guest arrived here yesterday, one who may stay for a time,” the abbot continued, frowning ever so slightly. Aidan closed his eyes to receive what was almost certainly coming: humiliation for lurking beneath a bench upon the visitor’s arrival, then the assignment of penance disguised as a test.

  As the abbot went on, not at all as Aidan expected, it took a minute for his ears to recover and listen.

  “I remind you to remember your vows and treat this guest as though Christ Himself, in hooded robes, had come calling,” the abbot said.

  Aidan barely contained a nervous snicker. He’d heard guests described the same way before, but he’d never known any to be locked in the penitent’s cell. He wondered if Jesus would have minded.

  “To save you from being startled,” Abbot Bartley continued, “I will make you aware that this guest is a particular young girl who will serve God and this abbey as a scullion in the kitchen.”

  The monks were far too disciplined to murmur, but a few scowls and raised eyebrows revealed their surprise.

  “Most of you need not concern yourselves, nor should you speak with her, of course. As is our custom, one novice will take special charge of the guest’s guidance and protection.” The abbot’s blithe tone grew firmer. “That duty befalls Brother Aidan.”

  Aware that his jaw had gaped but unable to close it, Aidan met the abbot’s eyes. Abbot Bartley gazed back with serenity and a glint of mischief.

  “Through this challenge, I think the strength of his calling and faith will be made clear.”

  The abbot made a few final announcements while Aidan’s head swam. He could feel Rory poking a finger into the small of his back, somewhere far away, but the warning wasn’t needed. The truth of what had seemed for an instant like a reward settled over him. Lana was troublesome—that was why she was here, even if he wasn’t supposed to know that. It would be easy enough to show her the few places she would be permitted to go. But who could guess what new trouble she might cause? All of it would fall on his shoulders, and it would take only a slight lapse in attention or judgment for him to be barred not only from the scriptorium but perhaps from the monastery itself. Aidan’s entire life had just been placed in the hands of an irreverent girl who’d already committed a crime, who didn’t mind what she said about God to a monk, and who hummed of the number eleven.

  V

  The abbot unbolted the door to the penitent cell, pulled it open to enter, and nearly tripped over Lana. Instead of lying on the dirt floor, she’d slept curled against the threshold.

  “What are you doing down there, girl?” he asked. “Peeping out through a knothole?”

  She got to her feet, drawing her wool mantle closer around her. Her eyes darted to Aidan and away as if afraid to rest there too long.

  “The door is oak wood,” she explained. “It was protecting me in the night.”

  Her odd answer caused the abbot to raise his eyebrows and press his lips tight. Wondering if the fat fellow understood her remark better than he did, Aidan barely listened while Bartley questioned her to determine if the sass and fire she’d displayed yesterday had been quelled. The novice was too busy scanning the dimly lit cell. The roses he’d passed her were nowhere in sight. He exhaled in secret relief. If the abbot had seen them, he would have demanded to know how she’d gotten them.

  Aidan studied her from the corner of his eye. Lana’s sleeveless shift had been made from a fine linen with intricately embroidered borders. A much poorer mantle of dusty lavender warmed her arms and guarded the honey-colored garment beneath. Both draped loosely over a frame that looked ill-fed, considering the quality of her shift. She’d tied her gingery hair back with a bit of red yarn. Another length of yarn circled her throat, dangling a small cross made of two twigs tied together. She held her neck straight and proud as though her necklace were a jewel, not stray bits of wood. Perhaps because of her parentage, she was an odd combination of urchin and beauty. Aidan was sharply aware of his own rough-spun robe, which he wore day and night as all the monks did. Tomorrow was wash day, so almost a week’s dirt and sweat marked him today.

  In all likelihood, she didn’t notice, at least not right away. She kept her eyes low, with her hands clasped before her, and she answered the abbot humbly, assuring him that her hard night and a day without water or food had made her ready to follow a more righteous path. Only after Bartley had turned to Aidan did she peek up through her lashes to coolly gauge the effect of her words.

  “Show her where to empty her chamber pot, Brother Aidan,” said the abbot. “Then lead her to the High Cross where the people worship on Sunday, and finally to the kitchen. Those are the only places she should need to visit, except for the guesthouse, where you can convey her later tonight. Instruct her in the rules that apply to our guests. Brother Galen, in the kitchen, is prepared to set her to work.”

  A question struck Aidan so hard he flinched. He cast his eyes to the ground and licked his lips, afraid to ask his question and more afraid of the answer.

  “What is it?” the abbot asked, seeing the hesitation. Aidan could feel Lana’s curious gaze fall on him as well.

  He murmured, “Shall I wash her feet first?” It was a customary service to guests upon their arrival. He’d done it many times, but the visiting feet had always been male. The idea of touching her skin sent a flush racing over his own.

  “That will not be necessary in this case,” the abbot said dryly.

  Not sure if disappointment or relief drove the quick shiver down his back, Aidan dipped his head.

  “You should see her briefly in the guesthouse each morning and evening to escort her en route to the kitchen. You may also answer her questions as needed—I repeat, briefly. I do not expect this to take much time from your usual duties. Bring any difficulties to me.”

  Aidan nodded, full of other questions he didn’t dare ask,
afraid they would sound too much like protests. If the answers did not become clear, perhaps he’d get another chance to ask later.

  The abbot turned sternly back to Lana. “When you are not in the kitchen with Brother Galen, Brother Aidan will help you as much as he can, but please remember that he has important work otherwise.” The abbot eyed her, perhaps not completely convinced by the meek attitude she showed today. “Let me warn you: If you do not get along here like a mouse in a stable, unnoticed and harmless, he will suffer as much as you. Perhaps more.”

  “Suffer how?” she asked, taken aback.

  “Brother Aidan can tell you anything else you need to know.” After a polite but final tip of his head toward her, the abbot gave Aidan a cautionary look and trundled away.

  “What did he mean?” Lana wanted to know. “Were you punished for talking to me yesterday?”

  “Hush!” Aidan warned, peering over his shoulder at the abbot, who still might have been within earshot. He waved her back into the dim cell.

  “I’m not sure anyone knows about that,” Aidan admitted. “They have assigned you to me as a test.”

  “What are they testing?” she asked. “If I can get you in trouble or not?” Grinning, she reached up and ran her hand flirtatiously around his neck.

  “’Tis not funny,” he said, jerking away from the tickle her fingers left on his skin. “If you cause any problem, they’ll blame me. They’ll say my faith or devotion or prayers are weak, and I won’t be allowed to take vows. I might even have to leave. Without anywhere to go, really.” He didn’t bother to mention the books he’d never be able to create.

  “That’s not very fair,” she said.

  He gave her a long stare he hoped would impress her with the difficulty of his position. “Just follow the rules. ’Tis not that hard.”

  “Well, I’m glad I got you and not some crusty old monk with no teeth,” she declared. “So what are these rules anyway?”

  “Get your chamber pot,” he said. “I’ll tell you on the way.”

  As she retrieved it, his eyes fell on the oaken door.

  “What did you mean about sleeping next to the door?” he wondered.

  She stroked one palm over the heavy, age-darkened wood.

  “It still remembers the forest,” she murmured. “It helped me remember, too—sunlight spilling through branches, acorns dropping, leaves dancing on the breeze. And ’tis warm. Everything else in this dreadful pile of stones is so cold.” Her eyes jumped to his, guilt dancing briefly on her face. “Except your roses, of course,” she added. “And you. I was grateful to have them yestereve.”

  Aidan shrugged, more interested in what she had said about the door. The heavy-grained wood made him think of winter and the supper table and the number twenty-six, not summer sunlight.

  She saw his bemused look.

  “You can’t feel it, can you?” she asked. “If it is not the crucifix or the Ark, your people don’t seem to care about wood. Just sins and confessions and tithes.”

  “My people?” he asked, startled by the disdain in her voice. “I’m the same as you.” He did not add what surely they both knew: Under the circumstances, her father’s nobility did not matter at all.

  “Priests and monks, I mean.”

  Amazed and dismayed by her disapproval, he glanced outside for observers and whispered, “I’m not really here because I wanted to be a monk. I’m here to be a scribe.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  Suddenly annoyed by her barely concealed contempt, he showed her some of his own. “You wouldn’t understand.”

  “Just as you don’t understand the oak,” she retorted. “Are you going to show me where to empty this, or shall I toss it on you?” She lifted the chamber pot toward him.

  He backed away quickly. She laughed. He spun to leave, not caring if she followed or not.

  “Don’t be angry,” she said, scurrying behind. “I was only teasing.”

  When he didn’t relent, she added, “You know how to read, then? And write? I wish I could. I saw a book once.”

  “Just once?” Aidan sneered, trying without much success to mimic her earlier disdain. It didn’t come naturally to him, and the ugly sound of it reminded him how ungodly he was being.

  “You’ve seen many, I guess,” she said. “I haven’t. Only the one. I’ll never forget. ’Twas beautiful, like wondrous stitching without thread.”

  The complete absence of contempt from her voice confused him. She switched from angry to earnest too quickly for him to keep up. He slowed, belatedly remembering that a monk should not show undue haste.

  “My fa—I mean, Lord Donagh showed me,” she added, falling in alongside him. “When I was a little girl. Sometimes he was kind to me then.”

  When she wasn’t sharpening her tongue on him, Aidan wanted to cup her in his hands like a lost bird. He shoved that feeling aside, sure it couldn’t be trusted.

  “He showed you a kindness by bringing you here instead of fettering you in the stocks,” he said quietly. He did not look over, though he could feel her eyes on him.

  “You know about that?”

  Aidan lifted one shoulder and dropped it.

  “He did not do it for kindness. He doesn’t want me soiling his honor.”

  “You’re hardly his only bastard.”

  “I wish you wouldn’t call me that,” she murmured, then added, more firmly, “I’m the only one caught swindling pilgrims. And my mother and uncle won’t let him give me away as a concubine, thankfully, so any value I might have had to him has been lost. I’m an embarrassment on both counts. But he cannot seem to resist my mother’s favors. Nor she his.”

  Aidan ignored the bitterness in her voice. It sprang from hazardous topics he would prefer to avoid, since they might be overheard. Instead of replying directly, he waved her around a corner and said, “Splinters of the Cross, was it not? Why did you do that?”

  “Because I thought I could,” she said, casting him a world-wise glance. “The pilgrims have silver, and they’re not shy of parting with it. How else are we supposed to come by our bread? My uncle spent his youth as a slave; he can barely provide for himself. And his lordship brings gifts for my mother now and again, but there are plenty of days in between.”

  That, Aidan thought, might explain the costly fabric covering her thin body. Her mother must have struggled to feed herself and her daughter, since no man would dare to look twice at any mistress Lord Donagh saw regularly.

  “A share of his wealth is due you,” he said. “The judge will uphold that.”

  “When he dies,” she retorted. “Or certainly not before I marry. Until then, are my mother and I supposed to eat stones? I’m not a thief. It seemed easier to cozen the pilgrims.”

  Aidan answered only with sympathetic silence. Her position didn’t excuse her crime, but it did help explain it. And he had encountered enough silly pilgrims at the abbey to understand her disdain. Some would sin with one hand and, with the other, pay for prayers or the right to touch relics they thought would absolve them.

  “I want my wood fragments back,” she added firmly. “Your abbot still has them, I guess. Can you get them for me?”

  “I doubt it. What difference does it make?”

  She eyed him, an answer almost visible on her lips. Apparently deciding she couldn’t trust him that far, she set her jaw.

  “I just want them. They may not come from the Holy Land, but they’re special to me.”

  Intrigued, Aidan didn’t consider his words carefully enough. “You shouldn’t have been selling them, then.” He regretted the comment even before she threw him a narrow-eyed glare.

  “I will ask,” he added, shrugging. “Don’t be surprised if the answer is no.”

  He held his breath while she dumped her pot into the stinking cesspool. They moved as quickly as they could back across the compound to replace her chamber pot. Aidan found it easier to speak to her once they’d again reached the shelter and shadows of buildings.
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  “Would you like to see another book?” he asked, after a moment.

  The eager light in her eyes gave him a rush of warmth he couldn’t admit, even to himself. He was sure it must be sinful.

  He knew better than to try to take her to the scriptorium; even he was not allowed to interrupt the scribes’ devotions. But he’d been instructed to show her the High Cross, after all, where the abbey’s neighbors and pilgrims met to celebrate Mass. On the way, they could pass by the chapel.

  The stone building was empty, as Aidan had hoped. Worship eight times a day left even the most devout with little will to visit between the Divine Hours, unless to do penance. One wizened monk guarded the relics most of the time, of course, but Aidan knew that he often made a leisurely visit to the privy about now. The shuffling fellow had returned several times to find Aidan admiring books, and he’d only shooed the novice away with a toothless smile. Aidan hoped his patience, if needed at all, would stretch a bit farther.

  At the chapel’s doorway, Aidan shushed Lana and warned her not to set even a toe inside. Then he slipped alone to the altar, where he knelt, crossed himself, and whispered a heartfelt prayer before rising again. A Gospels lay on the altar before him. The nearby lectern held a Book of Hours and a missal as well. None were the abbey’s finest, by any means; those were too valuable for daily use. But Aidan had inspected these volumes before, and even the worst earned his respect.

  He brought the Book of Hours back to the doorway. After reminding her not to touch it, Aidan held the book for Lana to see and turned a few pages to show the illumination on several. He kept his ears tuned for footsteps.

  “I can’t believe you can read this,” she breathed. “Or write it.” She graced him with a look of open admiration.