Shroud of Shadow by Gael Baudino

regarded her silently for a moment, then sighed. “Good morning,” she said politely.
    Omelda suddenly felt ashamed. “I'm acting . . . badly,” she said. She sat down hard on the grassy ground, hung her head. “I'm surprised that you want to . . . keep me around.”
    Natil lay, eyes unclosed, looking up at the sky. They were a few miles south of Maris, near the shore of the Bergren River. New as the morning was, a boat was nonetheless already passing downstream, the steersman alternately yawning, blowing on his hands, and grumbling a snatch of song. Closer was a stand of trees, half leafed. Birds were building nests. Singing, too.
    Benedicamus Domino.
    Omelda writhed in guilt. “Really, Natil: I'm sorry. Go back to sleep. I won't bother you again.”
    Natil's gaze flicked back to her. “Good morning.”
    Omelda looked up. There was kindness in the harper's eyes. “Good . . . good morning, Natil.”
    The harper nodded her approval. “And blessings upon you. The voices again?”
    Omelda dropped her head back down. In the convent, the deserved rebuke would have come quickly, but Natil seemed to have no rebukes in her save in response to comments that equated flesh and dung. Omelda, nonetheless, could not shake the feeling that she had transgressed. “Yes,” she nodded, “it's the voices.”
    Natil pushed herself up, sat, stretched in the manner of one who was not used to stretching: one arm at a time, as though inwardly remarking how strange a thing was morning stiffness.
    Mors Sanctorum ejus.
    The chant hemmed Omelda in, made her ask in spite of her guilt: “Can you . . . can you play now?”
    Natil shook her head. “The strings of my harp are cold and will take much tuning. What are you hearing?”
    With a shrug, Omelda started up the chant, her outward voice blending with her inner, obsessive choir: “ Si consurrexistis cum Christo— ”
    “Stop,” said the harper. “That is not the way I taught you to sing yesterday.”
    The chant thudded within Omelda's mind like a chronic headache. She wrinkled her nose. “There's not much to it. It's just a tonus with . . . a flex and a metrum. It's not really a melody.”
    “It is all melody,” said Natil. “Even the spoken word is melody. Sing properly.”
    Painfully, Omelda backed up to the beginning of the Short Lesson and began again, stressing the syllables in accordance with the cadence of speech, uttering the Latin not in monotonous, plodding rhythm, but lightly, conversationally.
    But when she reached the end, the chant went on within her, plodding along with severe cadence:
    Adjutorium nostrum in nomine Domini . . .
    Omelda hung her head. “It's no . . . good, Natil.”
    Natil was almost dispassionate. “It is a start. Does the chant in your head sound any different now?”
    “No.”
    Natil's dispassion crumbled, and she passed a hand over her face. “Dear Lady,” she murmured.
    Natil's invocation was a homely reminder of convent life. By Our Lady had been Dame Agnes's favorite exclamation in time of joy or trouble. In spite of the chant, Omelda smiled at the memory. “You like her, too?”
    Natil had apparently lost herself in thought. She looked up, almost startled. “Like? Who?”
    “Mary. The Virgin.” Omelda laughed as much as she could with that terrible vault of blue growing over her head and the chant ringing in her mind. “I used to talk to her. I always had the . . . feeling that she actually listened.”
    Unaccountably, Natil's eyes had misted. “She always listens. Always. Even . . .” The harper bent her head quickly, as though to hide tears. “Even now.”
    Omelda shrugged, feeling strange that someone like Natil had been so affected by a few words. “Oh, Natil,” she said, “Mary's supposed to hear everyone, all the time. Even someone . . .” She laughed again, heard the sob behind the sound. “. . . even someone like me. There's even a story about a nun who left her convent and ran away . . . just like me. When she finally