Sing Me Home by Lisa Ann Verge Read Free Book Online Page B

pardoner had the authority to forgive sins unconfessed—including yours.”
    Arnaud flushed an unhealthy shade of red. “Colin, do you hear what this wench is saying?”
    Colin lifted his head long enough for her to see the laughter he was trying to suppress.
    Aye, he would laugh at her. She supposed he had expected her to spend that coin on trifles—ribbons and braid and the like—or on oatcakes and meat. The fact that she’d promptly dumped every last farthing in the hands of a traveling pardoner meant nothing to him. Colin had no care for coins, for wealth, certainly not for comfort—the ugly blue lump on his forehead and the cut across his chin from last night’s fight proved that. But those coins meant pardon for the sinfulness of her straying thoughts. Better to have forgiveness for her soul than a little more meat in her belly.
    “It wasn’t all for me.” Maura eyed Arnaud in rueful challenge. “With the way you all drank and sang and sinned without end in that town last night, you should be grateful that prayers are being said for your souls.”
    “Oui, such a generous pardoner, such a strong man, such authority!”
    “Enough, Arnaud.” Colin grunted as the donkey finally pulled a hoof out of the mud. “Leave the lass be.”
    “Are you defending her?”
    Colin shrugged and then winced at the motion. Aye, he should wince, she thought. That cow-herder had thrown Colin over his shoulder as if the minstrel were nothing but a newborn calf. Still, Colin had fought with a ferocity that had shocked her. His teasing and laughter turned bitter when he stood across a village square eyeing a competitor. And he took each hammering blow of his opponent’s fists with a bark of amusement, as if he welcomed the hand that would make mincemeat of his face.
    She’d never seen a man welcome pain with such enthusiasm.
    “Since it was my mistake, I’ll give those coins back to you.” Colin staggered away from the donkey, shook his arm, and caught the purse that fell from his sleeve. He launched it toward Arnaud. “Go ahead, divide it among the troupe.”
    Arnaud snatched the pouch from the air. “This is your wrestling money.”
    “That it is.”
    “You’re missing the point,” Arnaud insisted. “The Abbess shouldn’t have given her own earnings away. She must follow the rules, or she can’t be in the troupe at all. Wait.” Arnaud eyeballed the pouch more closely. “This is the pouch you gave her .”
    “That it is.”
    Arnaud raised a brow. “You stole this back from the pardoner.”
    “The Abbess’s pardoner has a weakness for gambling.” Colin touched the lump on his forehead. “A weakness Maguire was more than happy to exploit.”
    Maura shuffled to a stop. Surely a pardoner wouldn’t hang about a tavern, talking to the likes of the Mudman. Surely a pardoner wouldn’t take the gift she’d given and gamble it away on a fight.
    Her thoughts tripped over one another. The pardoner had known all the prayers in Latin. He had a pouch full of parchments with waxed seals, and a relic from St. Michael in a silk bag hanging from his neck. How could it be that a man would proclaim himself a servant of God and then take that coin for his own sinful purposes?
    “Hah!” Arnaud slapped the Mudman on the back. “That’s my man, Maguire, taking back what’s rightfully ours.”
    She turned away from the minstrels and strode headlong up the road, far ahead of the plodding donkey, trying in vain to outrun her thoughts. The sisters had always warned her that the world was a sinful, dangerous place, but it kept revealing itself stranger and more treacherous than she’d ever imagined.
    One thing was becoming glaringly clear. In the convent, she’d been raised a fool.
    Colin slipped up behind her like a thief. She fixed her gaze on the mud sinking beneath her feet.
    “Maura—”
    “Don’t.” She couldn’t bear to hear apologies, soft explanations, pity.
    “All’s well that ends well,” he said. “You’re