Bertrice Small - A Memory of Love

"You have intelligence, Rhonwyn," Sister Rhan said the first time they came to study together. "Your intellect and reason will serve you far better in the long run than your body. That is how I held my lord's interest for so many years until he died."

"Then the gossip is true?" Rhonwyn was surprised to hear the nun admitting to what she had now been taught was a sin.

Sister Rhan laughed. "Aye, 'tis true, and I have never made a secret of it, my child. Once I loved and was loved. I was faithful to him as he was to me."

"But he had a wife," Rhonwyn said.

"Indeed he did, and a very good woman the lady Arlette was, too. She brought him excellent lands to add to his own and gave him healthy children whom she raised to be regardful and devout. He treated her with devotion and great respect, even as he did me. We each served a purpose in his life. When he died, his lady wife and I washed his body and sewed him into his shroud together. She is a benefactress of Mercy Abbey now."

"A man can love more than one woman, then, Rhonwyn said thoughtfully. "I did not know that. I thought once the choice was made and the vows spoken, a husband and wife cleaved to each other only."

"Ideally, but not always," Sister Rhan answered her. "But we are not here, my child, to discuss my past sins. You have mastered both Norman and Latin. You can read and write it as well, although sometimes you are impatient with your letters. Your housewifely skills are, at best, passable, but you do not shine in that venue. The abbess believes your mind can absorb more serious learning, and so she has sent you to me. We shall study together grammar, rhetoric, logic, music, arithmetic, and astronomy. I will help you to become a support to your husband, so even when he becomes bored with your young body, he will find your mind invaluable to him. You will find much satisfaction in aiding your lord for the betterment of your lives and the lives of the children you will have together, Rhonwyn."

"Then marital love doesn't last," the young girl observed.

"If there is love at all, and do not mistake lust for love," Sister Rhan warned her.

"What is the difference?" Rhonwyn demanded to know. "How shall I make the distinction?"

"Excellent! Excellent!" the nun approved. "You are thinking. The abbess was right to send you to me. Lust is when your bodies crave each other for no reason. The urge will be strong and fierce. Love, however, is an entirely different thing. Love is a powerful yearning not just for the body of the object of your affection, but for everything about him. You will be unhappy out of his sight. The mere sound of his voice will set your heart to racing. You will put his interests ahead of your own because you want him to be happy. Ideally he will feel the same about you. Just being held in his arms will bring you a warm contentment. Ah, my child, love is very difficult to explain. You will know it when it strikes you, and you will find that when you make love then, it is entirely different than just pure and unbridled lust."

"I know nothing of either marital love or lust," Rhonwyn said. "At Cythraul my brother and I were the fortress's children. Lately, however, young men newly come into our midst had tried to feel my breasts and kiss me. I beat them with my fists, and the others beat them afterward with rods for their temerity. Was what they attempted lust?"

The nun nodded. "It was. And you felt nothing toward them?"

"Nay," Rhonwyn replied vehemently. "They were pockmarked lads and nowhere near as skilled as I am with weapons. I think I must respect the man who uses my body and loves me."

"A wise decision, my child. Now, let me turn the subject to the matter of arithmetic. It is best you have some familiarity with computation and calculation. That way if your husband goes off to war, you will be able to be certain the steward doesn't cheat you. You know your numbers, I am told, so let us now begin." She held up two fingers on her right hand. "How many?" she asked.

"Two," Rhonwyn said.

"And now how many?" The nun revealed two fingers on her left hand.

"Two there as well," Rhonwyn said.

"But how many altogether?" Sister Rhan asked.

Rhonwyn quickly scanned the digits, counting mentally. "Four."

"That is correct, and that, my child, is called adding." She reached into a basket by the table where they sat and brought up a device with several rows of beads, which she set on the table. "This is called an abacus, Rhonwyn. Now watch." She slid two beads from one side of the instrument to the other. "Two and two more equal how many?"

"Four!"

"Take away one head. How many?"

"Three!"

"Excellent. That second calculation is called subtraction," Sister Rhan explained.

They quickly discovered that Rhonwyn had a talent for arithmetic. Each day she increased her knowledge until Sister Rhan assured the abbess that her niece would never be cheated by anyone. At least not where arithmetic was concerned. Grammar and logic appealed to the young girl, but while her handwriting improved markedly, Rhonwyn seemed to have no real talent for rhetoric, and she knew it.

"My brother would do well with it," she told her teacher. "He makes up stories and poems, and puts them to music that he sings in the hall of Cythraul. I think he will be a great bard one day."

Her time was growing shorter at Mercy Abbey, and her days, it seemed, were busy from dawn to dusk. Her two companions, Elen and Arlais, ended their trial as postulants and became novices. The three girls had never really become close, having different interests, but Rhonwyn was pleased that they were halfway to attaining their heart's desire. Rhonwyn, on the other hand, was suddenly beginning to consider her forthcoming marriage. She would not meet her husband-to-be until just before they married. Such a thing was not unusual, her aunt said.

Now, as well as increasing her education, Rhonwyn was being fitted for her wardrobe. Her father had brought fine materials indeed for his daughter, and Gwynllian could not complain at him for being niggardly in either his choices or the quantity. There were silks and velvets and brocades as well as linen and fine cottons. The fabrics were rich and colorful. Rhonwyn was shocked, however, to learn women did not wear braies beneath their gowns.

"I've worn mine all along since you put me in a gown," she told her aunt. "What is substituted to cover the bottom?"

"Ladies wear nought beneath their chemises," Gwynllian replied.

"Nothing?" The girl's eyes were wide.

"Your skirts will cover all, I assure you, Rhonwyn," the abbess said. "It is quite acceptable."

"I don't think it respectable" was the answer..

Gwynllian's lips twitched, but she managed to keep from chuckling. Her niece was more prudish than she would have expected of a girl raised in a fortress of men. Were it not for the child's continuing warlike tendencies, the abbess would have believed her a candidate for the nunnery, and not marriage. But Rhonwyn still rode daily outside the gates of the abbey, galloping along at a breakneck speed that had the porteress almost swooning at Rhonwyn's maneuvers.

On March the twentieth the abbey celebrated the feast of St. Cuthbert, who had been a bishop of Lindisfarne and whose fingernail paring now resided in its bejeweled gold box on the abbey's church altar. It was bruited about that the relic could cure a variety of minor illnesses, but as it was not a large memorial great miracles could not be expected of it. Rut the pilgrims came nonetheless to touch the gold box and pray to the saint. The abbey coffers grew at a modest but steady pace that day.

April first, the day marking Rhonwyn's sixteenth birthday, came, and Llywelyn ap Gruffydd appeared to reclaim his daughter. Her cool, elegant demeanor was slightly intimidating, but her manners were flawless. He was rather astounded to learn of all her accomplishments since her arrival at the abbey almost six months ago. He was equally appalled by the amount of baggage she would be leaving with, but accepted his sister's explanation on the matter and her dictate that he could not leave until the morrow.