A tall figure led the way like an old grey wolf heading the hunt, while the pack poured up the passage-way betwixt the towering walls, finding no swords to stem their progress. They climbed the fifty steps that wound in the rock to the main mass above, scrambling, shouting, plucking at each other’s belts. Soon they were under the second arch and within the heart of Holy Guard.
In the chapel Joan the Abbess had been keeping the vigil of St. Margradel with six nuns and six novices. Two lamps hung from the wooden roof, flinging vague streams of light into the gloom. The Abbess knelt on the stone steps before the altar, with the women crouching in cramped reverence at her feet. A single taper burnt before the rough wooden cross whose beams were linked by a crown of thorns.
Overhead the wind screamed, and the rain drove in through the crazy latticing upon the floor. The tide was full below, and they could hear the thunder of the waves upon the rock. Holy Guard was overarched by darkness and all the turbulent passion-throes of the world.
The trumpet’s cry had passed unheard by those within the chapel: the rush of many feet had merged into the vaster clamour of the storm. A pikestaff smote the chapel door. The rusty latch clashed, the door swung in on its sea-rotted hinges, the arch of gloom was filled with hissing torches, smoke, and the gleaming bodies of armed men. Joan the Abbess started to her feet, stood with her back to the altar, her crucifix upraised. The nuns and novices, some standing, some crouching on their knees, huddled back towards her like fledgelings beneath a mother’s wing.
Silence held for a moment, save for the blustering of the wind and the hiss of the rain on the burning torches. Joan the Abbess was no coward; her eyes were fixed questioningly upon the armed men at the door. Since they made no sign of entering the chapel, she still held her cross on high and challenged them from the altar.
“Who are ye who break the peace of Holy Guard?”
There was some stir in the crowd without the door, and the torches plunged forward, their smoke rolling to the roof. A tall man in a green cloak, with a sable hood shadowing his face, had pushed through the soldiery with drawn sword. His men stood with crossed spears before the door, while he faced the Abbess under the flaring lamps.
The woman still held her cross on high.
“Who are ye who trouble Holy Guard?”
The man in the green cloak answered her.