Valley of Dry Bones Read Online Free PDF Page B

three words were chiseled in shallow, crude lettering.
    Ora pro me.
    In obedience to that supplication, Prioress Eleanor fell to her knees in the thick undergrowth, reverently folded her hands, and began to pray.
    In the distance, mews cried out to each other, odd and amusing with their shrill, querulous ways. Insects buzzed and clicked in soothing rhythm close by. When her prayers were finally ended, Eleanor kept her eyes shut. A sighing breeze brushed against her cheeks.
    “Ah, Prior Theobald,” she whispered to the sunken grave in front of her. “After the term of my vow ends, I shall continue to pray for the relief of your soul. When I do so, I remember how quickly we forsake humility and charity, called a greater virtue than faith, and cling to sinful arrogance. How often have I assumed that I knew best? How often do any of us fail to beg for enlightenment before we condemn out of ignorance? Thus do we blind ourselves to our own wickedness by assuming we know better than God.”
    She opened her eyes and glanced to her left. Just outside the hallowed ground, so close against the wall that it might almost seem to beg for entry, lay another grave: small, unmarked, and covered with noxious weeds.
    Brother Simeon was buried there, a tortured man in life whose cries from Hell she often thought she heard, especially when icy winds from the north pushed black storms across the sea.
    Prayers for the damned were useless, as Eleanor well knew. Nonetheless, she did sometimes beg God to grant some small mercy to the dead monk. No matter how wicked Simeon had been, she found pity in her heart for the boy who had become such a man. Although God might ignore her pleas, her woman’s soul felt better for having made them.
    “Despite your failings,” Eleanor said, turning her attention back to the grave of the man who had been prior when she first arrived, “you were humble enough about your sins. When you begged to be buried, face to the ground, outside the church with the common monks, many here were outraged. They cried out that a prior must be buried in the chapter house, on his back and prepared to rise with the virtuous on the Day of Judgement. Despite their roaring, I honored your plea with one difference. Although you may have been a weak man, your heart longed for God and was never cruel. For this reason, I ordered that your head must face the church altar. May my successor find me worthy of the same mercy when my soul flies to His judgement.”
    Her prayers finished, Eleanor leaned back on her heels and let her thoughts return to worldly problems.
    The rumbling of the mill wheel now grew louder, drowning out melodic birdsong and humming insects. Even the grass looked more wilted in the summer heat than it had but a moment ago.
    The prioress sighed, then gazed beyond the cemetery wall to where the new guest quarters had been constructed. At least she was confident all was well there. By now, the lay brothers should have curried the company’s horses and would feed them when the beasts had cooled down from their long day’s journey. The guests of rank had jugs of wine for refreshment. As for the company’s armed escort, those men had been sent to lodge in the nearby village inn.
    Signy, who inherited the business after her uncle died from a virulent winter fever, had continued his practice of providing good food and drink for reasonable cost. Although the young woman now draped herself in simple, dark robes to mourn her uncle’s death, she could not hide her beauty. Even after the guards discovered that her virtue was as stunning as her face, Eleanor knew they would be far happier in Signy’s care than they would be in any priory.
    Calmer now, Eleanor stood and turned away from the grave of Prior Andrew’s predecessor. “I have overreacted to the arrival of Father Eliduc,” she firmly admonished herself. “Considering the rank of his lord, his inclusion in this mission should not have caused me either undue fear or