How can you rescue what you hold most dear, when to do so you must break your vows?
1363. When Mother Angelica, the old prioress at Northwick Priory, dies, many of the nuns presume Sister Rosa – formerly Johanna de Bohun, of Meonbridge – will take her place. But Sister Evangelina, Angelica’s niece, believes the position is hers by right, and one way or another she will ensure it is.
Rosa stands aside to avoid unseemly conflict, but is devastated when she sees how the new prioress is changing Northwick: from a place of humility and peace to one of indulgence and amusement, if only for the prioress and her favoured few. Rosa is terrified her beloved priory will be brought to ruin under Evangelina’s profligate and rapacious rule, but her vows of obedience make it impossible to rebel.
Meanwhile, in Meonbridge, John atte Wode, the bailiff, is also distraught by the happenings at Northwick. After years of advising the former prioress and Rosa on the management of their estates, Evangelina dismissed him, banning him from visiting Northwick again.
Yet, only months ago, he met Anabella, a young widow who fled to Northwick to escape her in-laws’ demands and threats, but is a reluctant novice nun. The attraction between John and Anabella was immediate and he hoped to encourage her to give up the priory and become his wife. But how can he possibly do that now?
Can John rescue his beloved Anabella from a future he is certain she no longer wants? And can Rosa overcome her scruples, rebel against Evangelina’s hateful regime, and return Northwick to the haven it once was?
Edgar scuttled across the courtyard towards the chapel, his dark hood pulled close about his face, to keep off the rain but also to defy detection. Not that anyone else was out of doors on this wild and wretched evening. Soon, the sisters would arrive for Compline – which he was, the Lord be praised, not obliged to attend – but of course they would take the night stairs from the dorter to the transept, and not have to face this foul weather. On evenings such as this, how he wished his lodgings were inside the priory and not across a dark, unevenly-cobbled courtyard.
He pushed open the heavy chapel door and slipped inside. Candles had been lit at Vespers, and he could move quickly across the nave towards the tiny chamber where he kept his vestments and sometimes composed his sermons. Evangelina used it too, as the priory’s sacrist, and it was here she had bid him come. Here, she said, they could find the privacy so rarely found inside the priory, as she wanted to discuss a matter of great importance.
The door of the little chamber was ajar, and a light flickered within. Eva was already here and she had lit one of his own precious candles. He pressed his lips together. Why could she not have chosen to meet him during the day?
He pushed the door open a little further and stepped into the room.
‘Ah, brother,’ said Evangelina, her eyebrow raised. ‘I thought perhaps you weren’t coming.’
Edgar breathed in deeply. ‘And why might you think that? You specified an hour after Vespers, and that is precisely now.’
She clicked her tongue, and pointed to the rickety stool he kept in a corner. She was settled in his chair, and evidently had no intention of vacating it. He decided not to quibble and, pulling the stool forward, eased himself onto it carefully.
‘Well,’ he said, ‘what do you wish to talk about? I trust it is important, to justify dragging me out here on such a noisome night.’
‘Of the utmost importance,’ she said, and leaned back against the cushion he had provided to give comfort to his own back. ‘Our aunt is close to death.’
‘I know,’ he said. ‘I attended her this afternoon. I warrant she has only a few days remaining.’ He never thought of Mother Angelica as his familial aunt, even though she was the older sister of his and Eva’s mother. Moreover, although he recognised Angelica’s gentleness and wisdom, he had never held her in particular affection. But she was the head of this priory, the priory where he was employed. Not that his aunt had either enabled, or approved of, his appointment…
‘And when she dies,’ continued Eva, with remarkable dispassion, ‘there’ll be an election…’
‘Of course. A new prioress. A position, I imagine, you presume is yours?’
‘It should be. It’s my birth right.’ Her voice rose slightly. ‘I’ve been waiting many years for this moment to arrive.’
‘The moment when our aunt dies?’
She puckered her lips. ‘Of course not, Edgar. I meant the moment when I have my chance to rule at Northwick.’
When Eva was first sent to Northwick, at the age of fifteen, it was assumed that, in due course, she would replace their aunt as prioress. The Godeffroys had been major benefactors of the priory since the end of the last century, and had exclusively provided the prioresses in all those intervening years. Angelica was probably forty when Eva came, and Eva might have expected to wait twenty years or so before her turn came. But, despite a period of frailty some years ago, Angelica had proved much more robust than any of her predecessors – or indeed than most people of her age. Thus, she had survived to eighty and was only now on her way to meet her maker, at a point when Eva was older than she might have hoped to be when her chance for power came.
‘What then is the problem?’ he said.
‘The election,’ she said with emphasis, then pouted. ‘Because, if there is an election, I shan’t win it.’
‘Whyever not? Do you have a rival?’
‘Of course I do! The blessed Sister Rosa…’ She spat out the name. ‘The favourite of the older nuns…’
Ah, yes, of course. Sister Rosa. When he was made priest-in-charge here ten years ago, Rosa had been at Northwick seven years, and was by then acting as an assistant to Mother Angelica. She had effectively become Angelica’s subprioress, though that was not a title she had been given or assumed. At the time, Angelica thought she herself was dying, but it turned out to be just some early symptoms of old age, an old age she then managed to prolong for another fifteen years. Rosa, meanwhile, blossomed into a cheerful, energetic, if deeply pious woman, whom everyone in the priory adored, apart of course from Eva. Edgar knew very well how much Eva resented Rosa’s seeming advancement, yet she seemed unable to lighten her own stern demeanour and win more favour with the other nuns.
Given her position, Sister Rosa would almost certainly stand in an election and, in Eva’s view, would win. He could not but agree with her. If he had a vote in such an election, he would not choose his sister. In striking contrast to Rosa – and indeed to their aunt – Eva was sour-faced, brusque and overbearing. It was most unlikely the nuns would choose her to replace the kindly and warm-hearted Angelica.
Thanks you so much for helping to promote Sister Rosa's Rebellion, and for sharing an excerpt. I do so appreciate your continuing support! Carolyn
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