Mortal Heart

It is all I can do not to go hunt the abbess down, and strangle her with my own hands. “What can we do? Can we send someone to help?”



She shakes her head. “There is nothing we can do that will not put her in greater danger, so now we must wait and pray.” She takes a deep breath, then sits on the stool across from me. “From the moment I was first sent out, nothing was as I had been prepared for. There was none of the black and white that the convent had used to paint the world for us. The people, the politics, the world itself, were much more nuanced, with who was right and who was wrong often simply a matter of where one stood.



“I still do not know if she purposefully withheld Duval’s identity from me when she sent me to court or if she thought I knew who he was. And Chancellor Crunard? Well, he is no longer chancellor. He now sits in a prison cell in the bowels of the palace at Guérande. Chancellor Crunard, the abbess’s liaison, had been feeding her false information for at least as far back as my first assignment, and possibly longer.”



I suddenly remember the abbess’s new habit of visiting the rookery to collect her own messages. Could that be why?



We are interrupted by a knock on the door, and two maids bustle in carrying trays of food, the smell causing my mouth to water as I realize just how long it’s been since I’ve eaten. While they set the food down on a small table, a third maid comes in carrying a dark blue gown. “Where shall I put this, my lady?”



“On the bed for now,” Ismae tells her, and once again I marvel at her composure and comportment.



When we are alone again, Ismae busies herself cutting bread from the loaf and slicing the cheese. She lifts her shoulders in an apologetic gesture. “So what you tell me does not surprise me. As I say, I have learned much here in the outside world, and very little of it makes me inclined to trust the abbess.” She sets the knife down, as if she has just made a decision. “Annith, I have come face to face with Mortain. I have seen Him as clearly as I see you now, and He spoke with me.”



Even as her words send me reeling, they also fill me with hope. Not wanting Ismae to see my tumultuous feelings, I stand and slip the gown the maid brought over my head. For years I had thought I was the only one of His daughters to have seen Him. Even though the vision might have been a childhood fancy, it still held out the alluring promise that I was the only one to whom He had shown Himself. But if others have seen Him, then that means my own vision does not consign me to the position of seeress. “What did He say?” I finally ask.



“That He loves us.” Her voice is soft and full of wonder. “No matter how we serve Him, the depth of His love, the fullness of His grace, is far bigger than anything we can imagine. Or, apparently,” she adds dryly, “the convent.”



Ismae’s words wrap themselves around my heart, reminding me of the god I serve and my love for Him. As if embarrassed by her own words, Ismae picks up her knife and returns to slicing the bread. “Do you know the nature of Matelaine’s assignment?” she asks. “Maybe some answers lie there.”



“I was not able to overhear that part of it. All I know is that her target was in Guérande.”



“Guérande?” Ismae looks up sharply. “When was she sent out?”



“At the end of January.”



Abandoning the bread, Ismae begins pacing, stroking her chin while she thinks—a gesture I have never seen her use before. “That makes no sense,” she says, stopping in front of the window. “By that time, the duchess and her party had left the city to go appeal to Marshal Rieux and Count d’Albret in Nantes and try and heal their break from her. The only person of any import left in the city was Chancellor Crunard, and surely he would have told her that—Oh!” Her head snaps up and she looks at me. “Chancellor Crunard.”



“If, as you suggested earlier, he was feeding the convent false information, mayhap that was why Matelaine was sent to him. But, Ismae, I am not convinced that Matelaine’s assignment was ordered by Mortain.”



“What do you mean?”



“I mean that Sister Vereda had been too ill to See anything of true import for weeks.”



“So you think the abbess ordered it of her own volition?”



“I fear so, yes. And from what you have told me, it makes even more sense now, for surely the abbess would want to punish someone who betrayed her.”



“Or else she wished to silence him so he could not reveal the depth of her involvement with him and his politics.”



Ismae’s words cut through me with the force of a spear, for I had not thought about such a large-scale betrayal on the part of the abbess—I had thought only of how she had betrayed her sacred duty to her charges. But this, this would go against the very principles of her office. I shake my head, as if I can dislodge the thought. “No,” I whisper. “That cannot be. She would not betray Mortain Himself.”



“Mayhap it does not sound so far-fetched to me because I do not know her as well as you do. However, I have learned much from Duval on how to look at people unencumbered by our feelings for them. These are naught but the same suspicions I would have of anyone in her position.” Ismae’s mouth twists in a wry smile.



“And rightly so,” I say, even though my heart is not in the words. I have known the abbess too long, known her when she was simply Sister Etienne, the nun who was kinder to me than most. She was one of the few decent people who inhabited my childhood; I am not sure if I can bear for her to turn into a true villain. Misguided, yes. Blinded by some emotion, yes. But to knowingly betray Mortain Himself? Unthinkable.



Sensing my distress, Ismae changes the subject. “But more importantly,” she says, “in the short term, we must try to anticipate her next move and do whatever we can to block it.”



“She will no doubt send me back to the convent, although I do not intend to go willingly.”



Ismae cocks her head, her eyes twinkling. “You would make her tie you to a cart?”



Unsmiling, I look up and meet her gaze. “I would.”



The twinkle fades from her eyes, and her lips purse slightly. “You have changed,” she says at last. “Far more than I would have guessed.”



While I do not know if she means her words as a compliment, I find that they please me all the same. “I have.”



“Well.” She pushes away from the window and comes to finish lacing up my gown for me. “We shall simply have to see to it that she does not send you packing.”



“How can we stop her?”



The grin that lights up Ismae’s face is full of cheerful disobedience. “I have been at court for months and serve as close attendant to the duchess. I have connections of my own now.” She gives one final tug upon the laces, then ties them off. “Do not worry. We will get to the bottom of this. For now, you should rest. Or go explore the palace, if you’d rather.”



“Thank you, I may do that.”



She gives me a quick kiss on the cheek, then hurries from the room.



I wish I could find the same confidence she has gotten hold of, for in truth, I cannot imagine what she plans will be so easy.



Aware of the exhaustion coursing through my limbs, I stretch out on the bed and try to get some much needed rest, but my mind is too full of all the possible disastrous futures that lie before me. Unbidden, my thoughts turn to Balthazaar and I am appalled to realize I miss him. No—I do not miss him. Or if I do, it is only in the same way I miss not having Sister Thomine handy for sparring practice. I enjoyed our banter. When I was with him, I did not have even the slightest inclination to mince my words or pretend to be something I was not, and that is incredibly freeing. That is what I enjoy. Nothing more.



With a sigh of frustration, I get up from the bed and begin pacing in front of the dwindling fire. It does nothing to lessen my restlessness. Now that I have experienced the sweet taste of rebellion, it chafes me to sit here in my chambers doing precisely what the abbess ordered me to.



I do not want to obey her orders anymore—not even in the simplest of ways. If she told me to leap out of the path of a rushing cart, I would be tempted to stay rooted to the spot, simply to defy her. No matter how exhausted I am, I cannot sit quietly in my room simply because she has ordered it. I grab my cloak, wrap it around my shoulders, and slip from the room.



Chapter Twenty-Five



I ACCOST THE FIRST SENTRY I find and ask if the palace has a chapel.



“The new chapel is in the north wing. If you follow this hallway—”



“You said new chapel. Does that mean there is an old one as well?” An older chapel is far more likely to honor the Nine.



The guard squints at me as if puzzled by my question. “Well, yes, my lady, but hardly anyone uses it anymore. And the new chapel is every bit as fine as the cathedral in town.”



I bow my head. “That may be true, but I am convent-raised and prefer to do my praying in more humble surroundings.”



He looks almost put out, as if I have somehow insulted him by declining to view his fine new chapel. However, in the end, he gives me the directions I seek, if a bit reluctantly.



The moment I step through the chapel doors, I can feel how very old it is. Close upon the sense of the chapel’s age comes the peace I have been hoping for. It descends upon me like gently falling snow, soft and cool, and I wish to roll in it in sheer gratitude. I know that when I look, I will find the nine niches just below the altar, because it is ever thus—when I am in Mortain’s presence, I find a peace and contentment I can find nowhere else.



The chapel is dimly lit by a handful of candles and much of the room is in shadow, but I appear to be the only one here. Moving forward, I sink gratefully onto one of the kneeling benches. My gaze goes immediately to the first niche, and I am pleased to find the small carving of Death residing there. But I am distracted by a small lump in the third recess, ­Arduinna’s niche. It is a small loaf or cake of some sort. The Arduinnites were correct—someone has made an offering, calling upon Arduinna’s protection here in Rennes. The duchess? Or perhaps it is some poor beleaguered maid who is beset by unwanted suitors.



I will puzzle that out later. For now, I allow myself to close my eyes. Before even a whisper of prayer can pass my lips, a vision of poor ­Matelaine’s face fills my mind. The sorrow and outrage I feel anew is like a kick to my chest.



It may have been my selfish desire to lead my own life that propelled me from the convent, but Matelaine’s fate has taken this far beyond my own differences and disagreements with the abbess and turned it into something far more serious.



I do not have a specific prayer I wish to recite to Mortain. I never do. It has always been my custom to simply open my heart to Him so He may see and know all that I am feeling—the good along with the bad, my grand thoughts as well as my small ones. I do that now, and peace washes through me, clearing me of my doubts and renewing my sense of purpose.



For all that I am physically strong and skilled, I have always doubted my own heart. How could I not? It is what the nuns trained us to do, part of the way they broke down our will so they could sort through the pieces like a broken jug and reshape it to their own needs. All of us have let them—but me more than most. Indeed, once I realized what they were attempting to do, I wrenched the task from their hands and set about it myself—all in my desire to be the best novitiate who had ever walked those halls.



That desire now seems a shallow one, something that I have been taught to want rather than something that sprang from my own heart.



I now realize I do not even know what it is that my own heart yearns for. Once that would have terrified me—to be so formless and shapeless—but now I find it freeing. I have removed the convent’s chosen desire from my heart, like plucking a long-embedded splinter from my flesh. I have rejected the path they told me Mortain wants of me. Instead of fear, I feel . . . hunger. Hunger to fill my heart once again, but this time with what I want. I now recognize that my wants are not selfish simply because they are mine. Indeed, many of my wants are worthy ones, even noble: justice for Matelaine, safety for the other girls, honesty from the abbess, and to restore the integrity of the convent.