Read Online The Way Between the Worlds by Alys Clare - Free Book Online Page B

Lord Jesus and his awesome father, but when trouble came, as it invariably did, in the form of sick children, barren wives, fields that did not produce crops and animals that failed to thrive, the people placed their trust in the old beliefs, and who could blame them?
    This Father Clement would keep his eyes and his ears constantly open for what he would see as the devil’s work. He was the priest of Chatteris Abbey, where you’d imagine there would be little in the way of heretical murmuring. Among the nuns, that was  . . .
    Suddenly, I knew why Hrype had been so careful not to let the two of us go into the abbey in our normal guises. It had been for his own sake, of course, for he was pursuing Father Clement and would not wish to be recognized. But it had been just as much, if not more, for my sake: I visited my sister whenever it was permitted, and we always talked non-stop for the duration of our allotted time. She would tell me about her life in the abbey – which, incidentally, she loved, or had done till her best friend was murdered – and then I’d answer all her eager questions concerning the family, the village and my healing work with Edild. And, on my last visit, I revealed to her some of the milder topics on which I was receiving instruction from Hrype and Gurdyman.
    I would have trusted Elfritha with my life, and I did not suspect for an instant that she would have told her priest what her younger sister was up to. But what if someone had overheard? Usually, we walked together out of doors in the cloister when I visited, but the last time it had been very wet and we’d sat with the other nuns and their visitors in the parlour. It was unlikely but, I had to admit, possible that our quiet words had attracted the attention of someone else – a nun or one of the relatives – and that, in an excess of religious zeal, they had told Father Clement.
    If that was true, then I could be in danger.
    As I walked along the quayside towards the abbey and the settlement around it, I wondered what would happen if I was right and Father Clement really was eager to find me. The problem was that to many churchmen, anyone whose religious beliefs differed in the smallest degree from their own was guilty of heresy. Once someone had set him or herself apart in this way, other accusations often followed. When life was cruel, it was natural to want to put the blame on someone, and sooner or later the cry would go up that the misfortune had happened because a witch had uttered a curse. Much of Edild’s and my work as healers consisted of providing charms and remedies for people who believed they had been cursed. Neither of us truly believed this was possible, but Edild’s view was that to prescribe a ‘magic’ rabbit’s foot or a mild herbal concoction would do no harm. Quite the opposite, in fact; we usually found that the cure was effective simply because the patient believed it would be.
    We were on the fringes of Christian society, my aunt and I. So, come to think of it, were Gurdyman and Hrype, but they were inconspicuous compared to a pair of village healers, and, anyway, I reckoned they could both look after themselves. My fear, when I made myself face it, was that I would be the subject of Father Clement’s attention simply because, although I dutifully went to church from time to time, I also practised what he would call pagan rites. If he was as fanatical as Hrype believed, then undoubtedly he would see me as a heretic. At best, I might have to do several years’ penance. At worst – and I knew there were precedents – I could be put to death.
    The sensible thing would be to quietly get off the island and go back to Aelf Fen or Gurdyman’s house, then avoid Chatteris Abbey until either the fire went out of Father Clement’s belly or he went away again. Don’t think I wasn’t tempted: of course I was. But I knew that if I slunk away, the dreams would go on tormenting me and, for all that I now knew it