could quickly curtail the action. But Kathalin didn’t have a mind to run, at least not yet. She wanted to find the Mother Prioress first, a woman who went by the name of Mother Benedicta.
The first big dormitory-like room they came to was called the Refectory where the sick were usually housed, but at the moment it only had a few frightened nuns huddled in it and no Mother Prioress, so they continued on through chambers with names like the Warming Room and the Day Room. Continuing through the cloister to see that the Welsh had, indeed, torn the place apart in their search for possessions of value, they came to a room called the Prioress’ Seat and, following the peculiar sounds of banging, found the woman locked up in a small wardrobe.
The Mother Prioress, a tall and rather wide woman, was very glad to see Kathalin but very puzzled to see the enormous knight accompanying her. Even when Gates explained who he was, the Prioress was still not entirely accepting of him. She was more interested in the state of her priory than in the big English knight, which didn’t help her attitude in the least, not even with Kathalin told the woman that it was the English knights who had saved them from the Welsh.
Gates stood by while Kathalin followed the flustered Mother Prioress around, collecting the nuns and wards and servants, and even a few children, and gathering them all together in the sanctuary to count heads and offer prayers for their safety and health. He even stood by while they prayed, standing in the back of the cavernous sanctuary that smelled of dirt and heavily-fatted incense, and he was eventually joined by Stephan who informed him that they had forty-four Welsh prisoners as a result of the raid.
Gates certainly hadn’t expected the burden of prisoners when he’d come to collect Kathalin de Lara but that was exactly what he found himself with, and his frustration began to surface. Mostly, it was centered around Kathalin and the fact that she seemed to find the need for very long prayers on this day.
As he watched the entire priory pray, keeping an eye on Kathalin’s dark head, Gates told Stephan to take the Welsh to Ludlow Castle, only a couple of miles away, where they could better handle the prisoners. Gates, however, didn’t go himself; he wanted to remain close to the source of his increasing frustration because something told him not to let Kathalin out of his sight.
It was an instinct that proved to be correct. When prayers were over and the Mother Prioress informed him that Kathalin was not allowed to leave with him because she had been granted sanctuary on the basis of escaping parental abuse and a genuine desire to serve God, Gates unhappily carried out his orders down to the letter and extracted Kathalin de Lara from St. Milburga’s Priory by force.
In the end, he did what he hadn’t wanted to do - he ended up carrying a struggling woman, bound hand and foot, out of the only home she had ever known.
CHAPTER THREE
Hate.
Kathalin wasn’t familiar with the feeling much but she knew that every time she looked at Gates de Wolfe, that was exactly what she felt.
Hate.
Any man who could so coldly and callously pull her from her home was a man to be hated. He’d dragged her out of St. Milburga’s as the Mother Prioress wailed, creating a truly chaotic and distressing situation, and the knight had kept her bound and seated in front of him as they made their way north through snow-white landscape and freezing winds that knocked the snow from the trees. As they had traveled along, they could hear the clumps of snow hitting the wet, slushy road around them.
He had shown his true character as he’d pulled her from the priory, a man of brutality and cruelty. Kathalin prayed that one of the snow clumps would fly off the tree and hit de Wolfe in the head as punishment for his actions, unfamiliar feelings of vengeance and hate filling her for what he had done. She should have felt
The first big dormitory-like room they came to was called the Refectory where the sick were usually housed, but at the moment it only had a few frightened nuns huddled in it and no Mother Prioress, so they continued on through chambers with names like the Warming Room and the Day Room. Continuing through the cloister to see that the Welsh had, indeed, torn the place apart in their search for possessions of value, they came to a room called the Prioress’ Seat and, following the peculiar sounds of banging, found the woman locked up in a small wardrobe.
The Mother Prioress, a tall and rather wide woman, was very glad to see Kathalin but very puzzled to see the enormous knight accompanying her. Even when Gates explained who he was, the Prioress was still not entirely accepting of him. She was more interested in the state of her priory than in the big English knight, which didn’t help her attitude in the least, not even with Kathalin told the woman that it was the English knights who had saved them from the Welsh.
Gates stood by while Kathalin followed the flustered Mother Prioress around, collecting the nuns and wards and servants, and even a few children, and gathering them all together in the sanctuary to count heads and offer prayers for their safety and health. He even stood by while they prayed, standing in the back of the cavernous sanctuary that smelled of dirt and heavily-fatted incense, and he was eventually joined by Stephan who informed him that they had forty-four Welsh prisoners as a result of the raid.
Gates certainly hadn’t expected the burden of prisoners when he’d come to collect Kathalin de Lara but that was exactly what he found himself with, and his frustration began to surface. Mostly, it was centered around Kathalin and the fact that she seemed to find the need for very long prayers on this day.
As he watched the entire priory pray, keeping an eye on Kathalin’s dark head, Gates told Stephan to take the Welsh to Ludlow Castle, only a couple of miles away, where they could better handle the prisoners. Gates, however, didn’t go himself; he wanted to remain close to the source of his increasing frustration because something told him not to let Kathalin out of his sight.
It was an instinct that proved to be correct. When prayers were over and the Mother Prioress informed him that Kathalin was not allowed to leave with him because she had been granted sanctuary on the basis of escaping parental abuse and a genuine desire to serve God, Gates unhappily carried out his orders down to the letter and extracted Kathalin de Lara from St. Milburga’s Priory by force.
In the end, he did what he hadn’t wanted to do - he ended up carrying a struggling woman, bound hand and foot, out of the only home she had ever known.
CHAPTER THREE
Hate.
Kathalin wasn’t familiar with the feeling much but she knew that every time she looked at Gates de Wolfe, that was exactly what she felt.
Hate.
Any man who could so coldly and callously pull her from her home was a man to be hated. He’d dragged her out of St. Milburga’s as the Mother Prioress wailed, creating a truly chaotic and distressing situation, and the knight had kept her bound and seated in front of him as they made their way north through snow-white landscape and freezing winds that knocked the snow from the trees. As they had traveled along, they could hear the clumps of snow hitting the wet, slushy road around them.
He had shown his true character as he’d pulled her from the priory, a man of brutality and cruelty. Kathalin prayed that one of the snow clumps would fly off the tree and hit de Wolfe in the head as punishment for his actions, unfamiliar feelings of vengeance and hate filling her for what he had done. She should have felt
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