Friends in the River

Birds chirped from the abandoned chapel’s window. A yawning Agnes woke up and rubbed her eyelids.

With eyes still closed, she felt her way forward with her hands as she walked to rinse her face in the deconsecrated baptismal font. After she had dried her face with fresh linens, she noticed a note had been slipped under the chapel door.

Agnes was still half asleep when the curtain was drawn and Abbess Elinor stood behind the iron grille.

“You wished to see me,” Agnes said through another yawn.

Abbess Elinor nodded.

“Is it business pertaining to the tavern?” Agnes asked.

“Not at all. Expenses continue to rise, but so do your earnings. So, all in all, better than was expected under these extraordinary circumstances."

Agnes bowed.

“And still, our Lord continues to call upon you, Agnes. A special request.”

”What is it?” she asked then.

“Pestilence shows little regard for our holy orders or solemn places. Now the brothers at the monastery have become afflicted.”

”Plague… in the monastery?”

”Yes. And as so there are no priests to offer last rites to our dying at Eatonbury. Although, as nuns, we are not called to administer Extreme Unction, the presence of a sister can be a source of comfort.”

”You mean, visit sick houses?” She asked then. “Provided my knight can accompany me as he is sworn to, I fear no plague.”

”Your knight?” Elinor asked.

”Uh…” she realized then. “I…misspoke. I’m still asleep.”

”I realize what is being asked of you. And you won’t go alone. One of the physicians awaits you at the apothecary. From there he will escort you. He understands this is not to become the practice. But one very rare exception.”

Agnes didn’t say another word and simply nodded.

Agatha, Margaret and Magdalene walked Agnes only as far as the halfway point outside the village wall. Exactly at the point where the track widened into the walled entrance of Eatonbury, the tall black figure was already waiting in the grayish light of morning.

Sister Agatha stopped first and stepped in front of Agnes.

”No further,” she said. “Not with that one.”

Sister Margaret crossed herself.

“Sweet Mother Mary. I’ve never seen one this close before. The hideous beak…”

”Like he crawled out of my worst nightmare,” Sister Magdalene finished.

”Yes. From the charnel pit. Where the darkest specters can be found…”

”Although…” Sister Magdalene touched her chin. “He does carry himself well, though. Even elegant, I dare say.”

”Elegant?!” Sister Agatha gasped.

”It’s the gloves, I think,” said Sister Magdalene.

”Now that you mention it, I see it too,” Sister Margaret said then. “A quiet dignity…”

Agnes rolled her eyes.

”We leave her here because the abbess commanded it, not because this creature is safe,” said Agatha.

”Settle down, all of you. It’s only Lorenzo,” Agnes sighed. “You can leave me here.”

Sister Agatha knelt in front of Agnes.

”This is an outrageous request. You are sure of this, little sister?”

Agnes nodded.

”That one? I can handle him,” Agnes said then.

With this, all three sisters drew their veils closer and began to walk back towards the convent. Agatha made sure her look of contempt was less than subtle. Agnes and Lorenzo were left alone in the empty, windy track, at least twenty paces between them.

Agnes would not give him the courtesy of a glance, while Lorenzo kept his gaze low, focused on the mud.

”I trust you’ve been well,” he said then.

”Let’s get this over with,” Agnes said then, lowering the veil in front of her face.

Lorenzo nodded.

”This way.”

They crossed the plague-marked doors in silence. The tanner himself met them at the threshold, face hollowed by another sleepless night. He led them up the tattered stairs and effusively thanked the little sister for coming.

Nailed-shut windows kept the room airless and in almost total darkness. An emaciated elderly woman was barely visible lying on a low pallet, her breathing now shallow under her exposed sternum, the buboes under her arms looked swollen and taut.

As Agnes quietly lit various candles, Lorenzo set down his satchel and lined his medical instruments in one meticulous row. The treatment pastes and oils he also lined according to textures: from solids to liquids to resins, down to finely crushed powders.

But Agnes, the veil covering her face, had no job to do in that regard, so she took care to sit close to the woman and hold her hand while she read a few prayers and readings in Latin. She then invoked the holy arrows that pierced Saint Sebastian, the martyr.

The woman’s breathing remained steady as Lorenzo rolled up the patient’s sleeves back so could cleanse the wounds with clean linens soaked in vinegar. Agnes then took out her small book of hours while Lorenzo finished the dressings.

“Will you give her something…?” Agnes asked then, once he was done. “To help her sleep peacefully?”

”I have poppy syrup,” Lorenzo said.

“You were not scared to go inside,” Lorenzo said once they both stood in front of the tanner’s door after the visit.

”Why would I be scared?” Agnes said then, still looking at the door.

Lorenzo regarded her for a second.

”Edgar is ashamed,” he declared.

“Is it just her?” Agnes asked, ignoring his assertion.

”…Today, yes.”

”Then walk me back to the abbey.”

Lorenzo looked down and then nodded.

Once beyond the walls, Agnes wandered far ahead, having somehow forgotten her anger, and began to playfully frolic around a flowery field.

“You are slow today,” she remarked from afar. “Most of the time you’re in a hurry. Very annoying.”

”It’s my day off,” he said hoarsely.

”A day off…?” Agnes questioned, half dancing.

”Edgar owed me so he’s taking my patients. This woman is an acquaintance…and you’re not supposed to wander off,” Lorenzo called out, before he dropped down to sit on the ground. “I just…. I just need a moment.”

Agnes looked back and observed that Lorenzo appeared exhausted. He was barely keeping upright.

She walked over to him and hovered, eclipsing the sunlight.

”Did you take the old lady’s poppy syrup?”

Lorenzo dropped on his back over the soft pasture grass and Agnes’s little hovering face was the last sight he saw before the eyes behind the glass closed.

“No…”

The soft gentle light of the sun continued to glow over the opaque barrier on his closed eyelids as Lorenzo fell in and out of slumber to the soft song of birds. Agnes’s small voice, too, drifted in and out of relevance. As did faint glimpses of her frolicking among the flowers and wandering ever closer to the river’s edge.

Lorenzo would open and close his eyes just enough to catch her gathering up her habit skirts so she could walk barefoot on the edge of the water, mumbling nonstop.

Although Lorenzo did not once hear another voice, Agnes continued with an imaginary conversation, absolutely unbothered.

”…I don’t know about you, but I always prefer peonies. Unlike roses, peonies always seem like they want to be friends…”

Lorenzo sat up.

Agnes waved at him when she noticed.

”You’re awake finally.”

"Don't get so close to the edge of the river, Agnes,” Lorenzo said, rubbing the crick in his neck.

”I’m talking to my new friend! Look! And there’s a kelpie!” Agnes said, pointing to the edge of the river.

“A kelpie…?” he mumbled.

Begrudgingly, Lorenzo stretched his tired back, stood up, and walked towards where Agnes continued to twirl with flowers and splash while still having a conversation with her unseen friend in the river.

Yet, as he grew closer, he noticed Agnes’s smile began to fade, while her eyes still remained on the bubbling surface.

”Lorenzo…? Lorenzo?”

When, at last, Lorenzo gazed down, he saw the face of a beautiful pale girl, just below the surface of the water. Submerged. And pinned by the reeds.

”What….Why is she so quiet?” Agnes asked, growing upset.

Lorenzo immediately picked up Agnes, but she twisted around to gaze down again at the macabre sight, right before hiding her face in the crook of his cloak.

“Come away,” Lorenzo whispered, holding the back of her head protectively. “Come away, dearest.”

✨✨✨

They moved in silence the rest of the way as Lorenzo carried Agnes on his back.

She still hid her face against the oiled leather of his cloak even as the sunlight reached them both through the branches of the trees.

“Do you think she drowned?” Agnes asked, her voice muffled.

”She did not drown,” Lorenzo declared after a pause. “The kelpie you saw… there was a horse a short distance from where she was found.”

”How did they end up in the river?”

”I don’t know. But I’m going to find out,” Lorenzo said.

”Is that what you’ll do after you leave me here?”

”Yes,” he said.

And then he stopped walking. The walls of the convent were rising above them, but he didn’t move another step.

“Last night…” Lorenzo began. “She came to see me.”

Agnes said nothing.

Lorenzo drew one breath.

”Duessa.”

Agnes kept her face hidden in the leather.

“Agnes?”

Nothing.

”Agnes.”

Her voice was muffled.

”Hm?”

Lorenzo gently moved her, but she still stuck close to the leather, so he had to pull her away from him until she was, once again, dangling from his hand.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Lorenzo asked her directly.

Still, she would not answer him.

“Well, it didn’t work. Do you hear?,” Lorenzo said. ”The butcher died.”

”Alaric told me,” Agnes replied softly.

”It doesn’t work,” Lorenzo said.

”That’s not what that means!” Agnes argued.

”One died, one lived. What do you call that?”

”I am working on it!” she said then.

”Working on it?” Lorenzo asked, tightening his grip. ”Who are you?!”

But Agnes didn’t move immediately.

She was still hanged there, while the veil still covered part of her face.

Then, very slowly, she simply smiled.

”I am the omitted ingredient,” Agnes said.