Black as Night: A Fairy Tale Retold Read Online Free Page A

saw what seemed like half a dozen male faces peering down at her in the dim light. Two young faces stared at her from her feet. The rest looked over boxes and around bags. But there was something different about these faces. For a second, she thought it was an illusion, and then realized that it was real. But all of the faces had beards, and none of them seemed to have any hair on their heads.
    The sight was so odd that she forgot to be afraid for a second, and she almost smiled. The men continued to look at her, and she realized that they must be as startled as she was.
    “H—Hi,” she said, recovering her voice.
    “Uh—hi,” said the Hispanic one nearest her. Above him, a round red face creased into a smile and waved a hand.
    For a moment, there was an awkward silence. She was extremely conscious of being someplace she shouldn’t be. She had thought that this church was still abandoned. But it clearly wasn’t.
    “Sleep well?” asked the round red face, embellished by a long white beard and round gold-rimmed spectacles, making him look like Santa Claus.
    “Yes, thank you.” She protectively pulled the coats around herself, even though she was fully dressed. Her heart was still beating fast.
    “We were just surprised to find a guest in our vestibule. Sorry if we alarmed you,” the older man went on, his white beard twitching as he talked.
    “Oh—no, not really.” She tried to smile, and the man beamed back at her.
    “Relax,” he said. “We’re not skinheads. This is a friary.”
    “A friary?” she looked about her in bewilderment.
    Muffled laughter erupted in several places around the room. “Yes. Believe it or not, this ruin is now a religious house. We just moved here,” the Hispanic said.
    “Oh!” she murmured, turning red. Of course. A friary was a sort of monastery, and that’s what the church had been turned into. In her disoriented state, she had thought for an instant that a friary was some type of restaurant.
    “Yeah, it sort of looks more like a Rent-A-Storage,” the Hispanic one grinned at the others. “Not a bad idea for an apostolate. How about it, Father Francis?”
    The oldest friar, who seemed to be Father Francis, smiled grimly as the others chuckled. “I’m Father Francis. This is the friary of St. Giles. We’re Franciscan brothers in the Catholic Church.”
    “Oh!” she said. “I’m sorry—I really shouldn’t be here,” she murmured.
    “How did you get in?” Father Francis asked her.
    She gazed at him and swallowed. “I got lost last night. I was on the subway, and I—I got mugged.” Her voice caught at the memory, but she went on relentlessly, steadying her voice. “They took my purse, and I ran. They chased me, and I came here. I knew this place, before, when it was empty. I had a key—”
    “A key?” several voices asked at once. She put a hand to her neck and held the brass key on a gold chain, the one asset she had left.
    “Yes—I happened to have the key—I’m sorry, it’s a long story—” she said faintly. “I didn’t know anyone would be here or I wouldn’t have bothered you—”
    Thoughts were whirling in her brain. I’m in deep, deep trouble, and I don’t want to get anyone else in trouble with me. Not my family. Not these monks who are being so kind…
    II
    “You’ve had a very rough night, I can see,” Father Francis’s voice had lost its edge completely. “I’m sorry, but I’m glad you found your way here.”
    Brother Herman leaned down and gently touched her black head, his face all sorrow. “What’s your name?”
    She looked at his sympathetic face, and something flickered across her pale one—a spasm of shame or pain. Then she paused, and the edge of a smile touched her lips. “You can call me Nora.”
    “How about some breakfast, Nora?”
    “Yes—thank you.” Her voice recovered its stability and held onto it at last.
    The brothers helped her up out of the coats, pushing back some of the piles. Brother Leon saw now