Death and the Lady by Judith Tarr

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Sample Chapter
    “Quis est homo?”
“Mancipium mortis, transiens viator,
loci hospes.”
    —Alcuin of York
    “What is a man?”
“The slave of death, the guest of an inn,
a wayfarer passing.”
—Helen Waddell

1
    “Brother Alf! Brother Alfred!”
    It was meant to be a whisper, but it echoed through the
library. Brother Alfred looked up from his book, smiling a little as the novice
halted panting within an inch of the table. “What is it now, Jehan?” he asked.
“A rescue? The King himself come to drag you off to the wars?”
    Jehan groaned. “Heaven help us! I just spent an hour
explaining to Dom Morwin why I want to stay here and take vows. Father wrote to
him, you see, and said that if I had to be a monk, I’d join the Knights Templar
and not disgrace him completely.” Brother Alfred’s smile widened. “And what
said our good Abbot?”
    “That I’m a waste of good muscle.” Jehan sighed and hunched
his shoulders. It did little good; they were still as broad as the front gate.
“Brother Alf, can’t anybody but you see what’s under it all?”
    “Brother Osric says that you will make a tolerable
theologian.”
    “Did he? Well. He told me today that I was a blockhead, and
that I’d got to the point where he’d have to turn me over to you.”
    “In the same breath?”
    “Almost. But I’m forgetting. Dom Morwin wants to see you.”
    Brother Alfred closed his book. “And we’ve kept him waiting.
Someday, Jehan, we must both take vows of silence.”
    “I could use it. But you? Never. How could you teach?”
    “There are ways.” Just as Brother Alfred turned to go, he
paused. “Tomorrow, don’t go to the schoolroom. Meet me here.”
    Jehan’s whoop made no pretense of restraint.
    o0o
    There was a fire in the Abbot’s study, and the Abbot stood
in front of it, warming his hands. He did not turn when Brother Alfred entered,
but said, “The weather’s wild today.”
    The other sat in a chair nearby. “Fitting,” he remarked.
“You know what the hill-folk say: On the Day of the Dead, demons ride.”
    The Abbot crossed himself quickly, with a wry smile. “Oh, it
will be a night to conjure in.” He sat stiffly and sighed. “My bones feel it.
You know, Alf—suddenly I’m old.”
    There was a silence. Brother Alfred gazed into the fire,
seeing a pair of young novices, one small and slight and red as a fox, the other
tall and slender and very pale with hair like silver-gilt. They were very
industriously stealing apples from the orchard. His lips twitched.
    “What are you thinking of?” asked the Abbot.
    “Apple-stealing.”
    “Is that all? I was thinking of the time we changed the
labels on every bottle, jar, and box of medicine in the infirmary. We almost
killed old Brother Anselm when he took one of Brother Herbal’s clandestine
aphrodisiacs instead of the medicine he needed for his indigestion.”
    Brother Alfred laughed. "I remember that very well
indeed; after Dom Edwin’s caning, I couldn’t sit for a fortnight. And we had to
change the labels back again. In the end we knew Brother Herbal’s stores better
than he did himself.”
    “I can still remember. First shelf: dittany, fennel, tansy,
rue.... Was it really almost sixty years ago?”
    “Really.”
    “ Tempus fugit , with a vengeance.” Morwin ran his
hands through his hair. A little red still remained; the rest was rusty white.
“I’ve had my threescore years and ten, with three more for good measure. Time
to think