The Widow's Tale (Sister Frevisse Medieval Mysteries Book 14) by Margaret Frazer Page A

and blindfolded, loosed only to be hurried into some place for each night. Milisent warned her that the people wherever they stayed were told she was a madwoman, that crying out for help would do her no good, would only get her gagged at night, too. Afraid of that, Cristiana kept silent. She never saw Laurence or Colles but during the days heard them and Milisent talking as they rode. They were careful, though, never to be near enough for her to hear what they were saying and the guards must have been forbidden to talk at all. No one betrayed where they were or where they were going, and the first day and second must have been overcast because she had not even sunwarmth on one side of the litter or the other to tell her the direction they traveled. But none of the towns through which they passed were big enough to be London, nor did they cross a river large enough to be the Thames, and if they had gone east, surely they would have reached the coast in less than three days. So they were set north or west. Or northwest or southwest. Or . . .
    At some point and time Cristiana gave up even that wondering. Numb with fear and despair, she curled into a corner of her mind and stayed there, accepting there was nothing she could do to help herself and nothing she could do to help Mary and Jane. There was nothing she could do except cease to feel and think, and she did; let herself be bound and unbound and told what to do without thinking to resist. When there was nothing to be done, all she could do was nothing.
    It was the third night, when she had been bound to yet another bed but Milisent was still up, that Laurence came into their room. Neither he nor Milisent looked the worse for their journey. In truth, he looked so sleek with satisfaction that Cristiana stirred enough out of her numbness to remember how much she loathed him as he crossed the room, stood staring down at her, and said to Milisent, “You’ll have to make her presentable tomorrow. We want them to think she’s been cared for.”
    “She’ll be presentable,” Milisent said impatiently. “There’ll be no cause to complain against us.”
    Laurence went on considering Cristiana. She read his look and went rigid even before he put out a hand and stroked her, deliberate and slow, the length of her body from throat to hips, saying, “A waste, in a way, to put you into a nunnery unused. Edward seemed to enjoy you so much.”
    Milisent laughed. “Take her. Who’s to know?”
    In worse terror than any until now, Cristiana stared up into Laurence’s face through the long and horrible moment before he took his hand away from her, turned away with, “I think I can do without Edward’s leavings,” and left the room.
    It was in the morning while roughly combing out Cristiana’s tangled and matted hair, untended these three nights, that Milisent told her, “It’s a nunnery we’re taking you to. They’ll be told there that you’re a wanton widow, so debased and shameless in-dishonoring your husband’s name that your priest and bishop and lord have agreed you should be kept away from your children and in penitential prison until such time as priest and bishop and lord see fit to bid us take you into our care again or set you free.”
    Cristiana fumbled for words of protest.
    Milisent jerked on her hair, silencing her. “We have a warrant that authorizes us to put you away, and another letter from an abbot that assures the nuns that they are to take you in strict charge and keep you for as long as need be.” Teeth set against the pain of her pulled hair, Cristiana forced out, “Where?”
    “So far away from anywhere you know that there’s no chance anyone will find you or that you’ll find your way home again. Not with the watch that will be set on you.” Milisent finished with her, and Cristiana was gagged and blindfolded and tied into the horse-litter yet again; but in the afternoon the litter stopped long enough for one of the men to take off the gag and