The Dream Weavers by Barbara Erskine (books you have to read txt) 📕

The abbess’s lodgings were impressive. She had her own sleeping cell above the warming room, but there were other offices from where she ran the abbey with the help of her officials and it was there that she kept Ava, who had grown into a magnificent animal. Her long dark golden fur glossy from brushing, she stood level with her mistress’s hips. No one dared to query the abbess having a dog; on the contrary, many abbeys kept hunting animals and many a particular favourite managed to make its way into an abbot’s quarters. The first time she saw the guest, the dog Ava had growled and snarled at him and from then on she was banished from Eadburh’s presence and left in the care of the guest house almoner, who liked dogs.

The guest house was on the far side of the compound run by two lay brothers and three lay sisters who answered to her chamberlain. When Eadburh announced to him that her visitor would be lodged in the room next to hers, eyebrows were raised. ‘He brings messages from my cousin, the King of Mercia. He is an envoy and emissary from his father the King of Powys. It is only right that he have access to me at all times.’

It was after the bell had rung for lauds that he came to her each night, unpinning her veil, lifting the gold chain of her cross over her head and dropping it on her prayer desk, before pulling the gown from her shoulders. The silk shift slid easily from her body, still slim and youthful, and he took her into his arms and then into bed.

He had laughed when he saw the shift. ‘So, my lady abbess dresses like an empress under her habit, where no one can see; she does not espouse the rules of the Order and wear rough clothing next to her skin.’

She smiled. ‘I wear black.’

‘Because it suits you.’ He stroked her bare shoulder.

‘I want to come back with you,’ she whispered. ‘Back to your hills to see the dragons you promised me when we were young. I want to see the shrine of the hares.’

He buried his face between her breasts. ‘We will live our dream, I promise. We will walk the hills together and watch the sun set in the mists.’

Pushing him away at last she sat up, suddenly businesslike. ‘We will leave as soon as the weather improves.’ She was looking past him towards the windows. Behind the shutters the snow was falling heavily. ‘I will give orders for my dowry to be loaded into wagons and we will leave as soon as the roads are passable.’

‘Will the great Emperor Charles allow it?’

She frowned. ‘It is none of the emperor’s business. I will take only what is rightfully mine.’

‘And does that include the emperor’s dog?’

She smiled. ‘He gave Ava to me when she was a tiny puppy; she loves me and she will grow to tolerate you, my prince. If I love you, she will love you too. And we need her. There will be wolves and bears on the roads and footpads and wild boar in the forests. Ava is the best of guards.’

‘Then she will be our entourage. You forget,although I am still my father’s son, and a prince of royal blood, I gave up the royal estate when I became a monk. I didn’t bring an escort. I travelled alone as a pilgrim. I didn’t know if I would be able to find you.’ He had told her how he had thought her gone forever and she had told him how, long ago, her father had claimed her prince had died. She did not mention the baby that had never existed save in the lonely longing of her dreams. Why taunt him with more stories of what might have been?

He had dreamed of her often, he told her, murmuring his story, his lips on her hair, and sometimes in his dream he had seen her as a girl of eighteen again, but as she looked at him he had seen the gaze of someone else’s eyes and he had been filled with fear. He smiled as he pulled her close.

It was the story told by a strange woman of the forest who had come to see him one day, seeking his blessing, and telling him that his Eadburh might still be alive, that had led him to dream again of the golden girl he had loved and lost and led him to leave his own monastery in Meifod and follow her trail to find her here at last in the verdant fields and forests of the empire.

‘So, you followed your dream.’ She smiled, bending over him to kiss him again. Her hair, scented with rosemary and lavender, slipped from its heavy coils, veiling his face. They had both forgotten their vows to God; their only promises now were for one another. He knew she was bewitching him all over again. He surrendered willingly.

It was proving easy to make plans. As soon as spring unlocked the roads and tracks they would set out for a convent some miles away on a visit to the abbess there, then on towards the next religious house, and the next, heading always southwest towards the coast and the distant shores of Albion. Their needs would be few. She guessed she might have to abandon her dowry lest word of her imminent departure reach the emperor. She would say the wagons were loaded with gifts for the other houses of the order on her progress. It didn’t matter to her what she had to leave behind. She would be with Elise. The icy months of January and February passed and March arrived in a blast of rain and wind that at last unlocked the ice. The lovers watched as the snow banks began to melt and the days grew imperceptibly longer.

Eadburh could barely contain her excitement as she sat in the chapel, hearing