Brother Cadfael medieval mysteries
3) Monk's-hood
The winter of 1139 will disrupt Brother Cadfael's tranquil life in Shrewsbury, as raging civil war has sent refugees fleeing north from Worcester. Among them are two young orphans from a noble family and their companion, a young Benedictine nun. The trio, never reaching Shrewsbury, have disappeared somewhere in the wild countryside.
Cadfael feels afraid for these three lost lambs, but another call for help sends him to the Church of Saint Mary.
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On a spring evening in 1140 Shrewsbury, the midnight matins at the Benedictine abbey suddenly reverberate with an unholy sound—a hunt in full cry. Pursued by a drunken mob, the quarry is running for its life. When the frantic creature bursts in to claim sanctuary, Brother Cadfael finds himself fighting off armed townsmen to save a terrified young man.
Accused of robbery and murder is Liliwin, a wandering minstrel who performed
...Outside the pale of the Abbey of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, in September of the year of our Lord 1140, a priestly emissary for King Stephen has been reported missing. But inside the pale, what troubles Brother Cadfael is a proud, secretive nineteen-year-old novice.
Brother Cadfael has never seen two men more estranged than the Lord of Aspley and Meriet, the son he coldly delivers to the abbey to begin a religious vocation. Meriet, meek by day,
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In the year of our Lord 1141, civil war over England's throne leaves a legacy of violence—and the murder of a knight dear to Brother Cadfael. In the spring, a flood of pilgrims comes to the celebration of Saint Winifred at the Abbey, carrying with it many strange souls...and perhaps the knight's killer.
Brother Cadfael's shrewd eyes see all: the prosperous merchant who rings false; an angelic, lame boy and his beautiful, dowerless
...Christmas, AD 1141 Abbot Radulfus returns from London, bringing with him a priest for the vacant living of Holy Cross (known as the Foregate), a man of presence, scholarship and discipline, but neither humility nor the common touch. When he is found drowned in the mill-pond, suspicion is cast in many directions, not least towards a young man who came in the priest's train, sent to work in Brother Cadfael's garden. For he has little obvious priestly
...A late spring in 1142 has the monks of Shrewsbury Abbey dismayed, for there may be no roses by June 22. For three years, wealthy young widow Judith Perle has rented her house to the monks for the price of a single white rose each year, in honor of her late husband. When nature finally complies, a pious monk is sent to pay the rent—and found murdered beside the hacked rosebush.
Without a rose, the monks' rental contract becomes void,
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