Heaven's Fire by Patricia Ryan Page A

looked at each other, and then she said, “Good-bye, Master Fairfax.”
    She walked to the front door, adjusted her hood, and stepped into the driving rain.
    “Wait!” Rainulf crossed to the door in two long strides and pulled her back into the church.
    She looked startled. “Is something wrong?”
    “No. Yes. It’s not safe, you staying at Osney. I don’t like it. You need proper lodgings.”
    She wiped the rain from her face with the edge of her mantle. “Proper lodgings cost money. I hope to be earning some soon, but in the meantime—”
    “Come home with me.”
    She blinked at him.
    “For a decent meal,” he hastily added. “How long has it been since you’ve had one?”
    She smiled a little self-consciously. “Too long. But I couldn’t trouble you after everything—”
    “It’s no trouble. And while you’re eating, I’ll set my mind to the problem of your lodgings.”
    She nodded slowly, then smiled her extraordinary smile; it was as if the dusky church had just been flooded with heavenly light. “All right.”
    *   *   *
    Corliss paused in the middle of muddy St. John Street and stared up at the building to which Rainulf Fairfax had led her—a massive two-story stone edifice that loomed darkly against the night sky, dwarfing the adjacent timber houses. Shielding her eyes against the rain, she could make out a long row of large, arched windows on each of the two floors; warm, inviting light glowed around the edges of their closed shutters. Smoke drifted from a chimney on the far left side of the shingled roof.
    There were two doorways at street level. Master Fairfax opened the one on the right and motioned her to precede him up a steep, narrow staircase.
    “Where does the other door lead?” she asked as she climbed the stairs.
    “To my lecture hall, which is half below ground. It’s where I teach smaller groups.”
    That he had his own lecture hall here came as a surprise to Corliss. But even more of a surprise was what she found when she got to the second floor. She had expected a corridor leading to a number of apartments, one of which would be the magister’s. Instead, she found herself in one long rectangular hall with a high, vaulted ceiling and whitewashed walls, majestic in size but sparsely appointed. To the right, a leather curtain spanned the width of the space, so it was clearly even larger than it first appeared.
    A savory aroma made her mouth water. Her gaze sought out the cavernous fireplace on the far left wall, in which an iron cauldron hung over a sputtering fire. Fish stew, if she had to guess, with plenty of wine and spices and leeks—a good Lenten supper. She hadn’t eaten since yesterday and felt hungry, exhausted, and soaked to the bone. Thank God she’d finally get to sit down in a warm place and partake of a decent meal!
    In front of the hearth stood a table, at which two black-robed scholars sat before tankards of ale and soggy trenchers of snowy white bread with thick crusts. “Hello, Master Fairfax!” called the sandy-haired one, laughing. He and his companion, a pleasant-looking youth with dark, cropped hair, greeted the teacher in slightly slurred French.
    Master Fairfax tossed his bag in a corner. “Corliss, these drunken mongrels are Thomas and Brad, two of my most leechlike students.”
    She cleared her throat and tried to speak in a low pitch. “Pleased to meet you.”
    “I don’t believe I’ve seen you before, Corliss,” said Brad, the dark one. His English accent pleased her; he was a Saxon, like her. “What do you study?”
    Corliss hesitated. “I... I came to Oxford to work, not to study.” She set her satchel on the rush-covered floor, retrieved her Biblia Pauperum , and handed it to Brad. “I’m an illuminator.”
    The young men praised her workmanship, and she flushed with pride. “You must go to Catte Street,” Thomas said. “That’s where the booksellers and scribes and such have their shops.”
    “I know,” she said, taking