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said, but she did not meet his eye.

"I still feel the same about you as I did on that day. That's the real reason I came home."

She turned and looked at him with anger in her eyes. "But you got married."

"And you became a nun."

"But how could you marry her - Silvia - if you loved me?"

"I thought I could forget you. But I never did. Then, when I thought I was dying, I realized I would never get over you."

Her anger vanished as quickly as it had appeared, and tears came to her eyes. "I know," she said, looking away.

"You feel the same."

"I never changed."

"Did you try?"

She met his eye. "There's a nun..."

"The pretty one who was with you in the hospital?"

"How did you guess?"

"She cried when she saw me. I wondered why."

Caris looked guilty, and Merthin guessed she was feeling the way he had felt when Silvia used to say: "You're thinking about your English girl."

"Mair is dear to me," Caris said. "And she loves me. But..."

"But you didn't forget me."

"No."

Merthin felt triumphant, but he tried not to let it show. "In that case," he said, "you should renounce your vows, leave the nunnery, and marry me."

"Leave the nunnery?"

"You'll need first to get a pardon for the witchcraft conviction, I realize that, but I'm sure it can be done - we'll bribe the bishop and the archbishop and even the pope if necessary. I can afford it."

She was not sure it would be as easy as he thought. But that was not her main problem. "It's not that I'm not tempted," she said. "But I promised Cecilia I would vindicate her faith in me... I have to help Mair take over as guest master... we need to build a new treasury... and I'm the only one who takes care of Old Julie properly..."

He was bewildered. "Is all that so important?"

"Of course it is!" she said angrily.

"I thought the nunnery was just old women saying prayers."

"And healing the sick, and feeding the poor, and managing thousands of acres of land. It's at least as important as building bridges and churches."

He had not anticipated this. She had always been sceptical of religious observance. She had gone into the nunnery under duress, when it was the only way to save her own life. But now she seemed to have grown to love her punishment. "You're like a prisoner who is reluctant to leave the dungeon, even when the door is opened wide," he said.

"The door isn't open wide. I would have to renounce my vows. Mother Cecilia-"

"We'll have to work on all these problems. Let's begin right away."

She looked miserable. "I'm not sure."

She was torn, he could see. It amazed him. "Is this you?" he said incredulously. "You used to hate the hypocrisy and falsehood that you saw in the priory. Lazy, greedy, dishonest, tyrannical-"

"That's still true of Godwyn and Philemon."

"Then leave."

"And do what?"

"Marry me, of course."

"Is that all?"

Once again he was bewildered. "It's all I want."

"No, it's not. You want to design palaces and castles. You want to build the tallest building in England."

"If you need someone to take care of..."

"What?"

"I've got a little girl. Her name is Lolla. She's three."

That seemed to settle Caris's mind. She sighed. "I'm a senior official in a convent of thirty-five nuns, ten novices and twenty-five employees, with a school and a hospital and a pharmacy - and you're asking me to throw all that up to nursemaid one little girl I've never met."

He gave up arguing. "All I know is that I love you and I want to be with you."

She laughed humourlessly. "If you had said that and nothing else, you might have talked me into it."

"I'm confused," he said. "Are you refusing me, or not?"

"I don't know," she said.

Chapter 55

Merthin lay awake much of the night. He was accustomed to bedding down in taverns, and the sounds Lolla made in her sleep only soothed him; but tonight he could not stop thinking about Caris. He was shocked by her reaction to his return. He realized, now, that he had never thought logically about how she would feel when he reappeared. He had indulged in unrealistic nightmares about how she might have changed, and in his heart he had hoped for a joyous reconciliation. Of course she had not forgotten him; but he could have figured out that she would not have spent nine years moping for him: she was not the type.

All