Page 25 of The Forgotten (Echoes from the Past #2)

TWENTY-THREE

Father Avery hurried down the street, eager to get as far away from Petra as possible.

Seeing her after all this time, and actually speaking to her, brought back memories he’d tried to suppress for twelve long years, and his soul was in turmoil.

Petra knew how much he resented being packed off to the seminary, but she never knew how much he’d really had to sacrifice.

It wasn’t just the emotional void of never having a family of his own or a woman to hold, but was much more than that.

As a priest, he wasn’t entitled to a single thought that wasn’t controlled by the Church.

His every hour was accounted for, his every action scrutinized.

He thought he found an outlet when he’d been invited to teach at Oxford; what he meant to tell Petra, but never got the chance, was that he’d left Oxford under a cloud.

Staying at Greyfriars Priory was not a choice, but a penance.

He’d been sent to the monks as a warning, and offered a glimpse into what his life would be if he failed to mend his ways.

Avery had great respect for the monks, and admired their dedication and lack of personal ambition, but that wasn’t the life he wanted for himself.

Spending his days behind the walls of the monastery, his every hour filled with either work or prayer was not an existence he could tolerate.

He’d been his happiest at Oxford, exposed to learned men and new ideas, surrounded by students, not only of theology, but of general knowledge—a knowledge he craved.

The world was changing, people’s ideas evolving, but he was eternally trapped in an institution that feared change and peddled ignorance and fear.

The monks at Greyfriars assumed that he was doing penance for an inappropriate relationship with a woman.

Thankfully, the bishop saw no reason to enlighten them as to the nature of Avery’s transgression, but it didn’t really matter.

Penance was penance, and locking Avery away from the world was the harshest punishment the bishop could think of.

Avery was by no means a prisoner at the priory, but he was on a short leash, his activities outside the walls of the monastery noted and reported to the bishop.

Bringing an afflicted child into the monastery as an apprentice scribe would draw scrutiny from above and raise questions about his relationship with the family.

His father was not the only one who knew of Avery’s devotion to Petra when he was a young man.

Questions would be asked. Judgments would be passed. He would be putting himself at risk.

Avery left the town behind and entered a lonely stretch of road that led to the priory.

The wind picked up. It howled and moaned, reminding him of that silly legend his mother always went on about, about the fair maiden who’d thrown her heart into the sea.

Today, he could almost believe that a woman’s cries carried on the wind.

Perhaps that woman was Petra. How could he deny her plea for help when he’d left her pregnant and alone, forced to fend for herself in a world where a woman was nothing more than the property of her father or husband.

Petra had been forced to marry in haste and submit to a man who treated her cruelly.

And their poor son. The boy suffered at the hands of his brutal stepfather, and it was Avery’s duty to help him make his way in the world.

Avery stopped, the wind whipping the skirts of his clerical robe as he stood in the middle of the road.

He had to see him. He had to see his son.

Despite his father’s handiwork, Avery had managed to leave a part of himself behind, and the thought made his heart soar.

He wasn’t just an empty vessel, a useless husk gutted by the Church; he was a father, and a man, and he had to help his boy.