‘He wants to be allowed to enter now, I think,’ Eudo said. ‘She’s telling us to return in the morning.’
The nun looked nervously up; the chaplain turned and saw us there, and straightaway raised his hands in what I took for a calming gesture. ‘Ic eom preost; ic hatte ?lfwold,’ he said, producing a wooden cross from his cloak pocket. ‘Me sende Willelm Malet, scirgerefa on Eoferwic.’
There was a moment of silence, before the nun repeated, ‘Willelm Malet?’ She turned to one of the other women, taller and more youthful in appearance. The two conversed in their own tongue before the younger one hurried away somewhere inside the compound.
‘Onbidath her,’ the round one said. She did not leave, but neither did she make any move to close the doors again, which I took for a good sign.
?lfwold nodded and breathed out a sigh as he sat back in his saddle.
‘What now?’ I asked him.
‘Now,’ he said, ‘we wait and see if they will let us in.’
As much as a quarter of the hour might have passed before the young nun returned. My horse began to grow restive, pawing the ground and tossing his head; I dismounted and paced about with reins in hand, rubbing his flank.
At last, however, the nun did come back. After exchanging a few words with the one bearing the lantern, the gates were drawn full open with a creaking of hinges, and slowly we led our mounts through.
‘Ne,’ the older one said, pointing towards the scabbard at my side. Her face was solemn. ‘Ge sceolon l?fan eower sweord her.’
‘You must leave your swords here,’ the chaplain warned.
In any other situation I might have protested, for I did not like to go anywhere unarmed, but I didn’t want to cause a stir here, in a place of God. At the very least, we would still have our knives, since they were as much for eating with as they were for fighting.
I nodded to the other knights as I unbuckled my sword-belt and held it out to her, and one by one they did the same. I watched closely as she carried them within the gatehouse. As she came out, she called to the other two who were behind us, and they began to close over the gates, before each taking an end of a long wooden bar and dropping it into place. For good or for ill, I was here now.
The older nun was already hustling ahead, waving for us to follow her across a gravelled yard to a stable building. We left our mounts there, together with our shields, and then she led us on foot up a wide cart-track towards the church and the long stone halls that I presumed were the living quarters. The fence and outer ditch enclosed a wide area, most of which was taken up with fields, from which even now sheep and cows were being herded. The smell of dung wafted on the breeze. Down by the riverbank, on the southern side of the enclosure, I saw the shadowy form of a mill with its wheel turning.
‘Where do you think she’s taking us?’ Eudo murmured.
‘Somewhere where there’ll be lots of women,’ Radulf answered, glancing at a group of nuns passing us in the other direction. ‘Young ones, too, with any luck.’
I stopped and turned on him. ‘You keep quiet,’ I said, pointing a gloved finger at his large nose. ‘Do you understand?’
He stared back at me in surprise. But I’d already had enough of his remarks on this journey.
‘This is a house of our Lord,’ I said to all of them. ‘As long as we’re here, we show nothing but respect.’
As I pulled away, I noticed the chaplain watching me. He said nothing but, before he turned around, I thought I saw the slightest of nods – of approval, maybe, though I could not be sure.
What Radulf had said made me wonder, though, for the nuns of Wiltune were clearly used to men visiting, or they wouldn’t have admitted us in the first place. Some houses were far stricter; in such places men would not be permitted to enter at all, except for pilgrims and the sick, and the priests who came to deliver Mass and hear confessions. Which meant the women here had decided to trust us, especially surprising considering that we were obviously men of war, and not of their own people either.
The sun disappeared below the tiled roof of the church ahead of us. Now that it was before us, it was all the more impressive. Each of its three towers were more than four storeys tall, while even the nave looked taller than six men. The glass in the windows was coloured with reds and greens, blues and even yellows, intricately arranged to show pictures of saints or angels, like nothing I’d ever seen.