In my experience, humans are all too fallible.’” It is not the saint I doubt, demoiselle, only the humans who interpret His wishes. Indeed, to suggest such a thing reeks of blasphemy to me.’ ‘I do not see how they can, milord, since their hand is guided by the saint Himself. ‘A mistake?’ My cheeks grow hot at the suggestion. “Doesn’t it worry you, that you understand nothing of how they make their decisions? What if they make a mistake?
(So to speak.)īut a worm of doubt seeks its way into Ismae via the noble Duval. The Chancellor of Brittany, Viscount Crunard, also advises the Abbess on his theories of who has been naughty and who has been nice, and the Abbess in turn gives Ismae the bird. But there are so many enemies around, it’s difficult figuring out who is a traitor and who is loyal. She is also charged with the duty to slay enemies named to her by the Abbess via carrier raven. Ismae is sent to Anne’s court to follow Anne’s half-brother (and chief advisor) Duval around and see if she thereby gets any insight into who is undermining the Duchess. It turns out that Mortain supports the Duchess against the French. Serving Him is my only purpose in this life…” I walk in His dark shadow and do His bidding. The catch is, the nuns in the abbey decide what it is that Mortain is asking.
Mortain, she and the other novitiates are trained to be instruments of Death, which means, as the Abbess explains to Ismae, that she will learn “more ways to kill a man than you imagined possible.” The Abbess asks Ismae to swear to obey Mortain in anything he asks of her. She is shunned by all in her village, and escapes to the convent to be among those who will accept her. Ismae bears a scar on her back that identifies her as having been sired by Death himself. Mortain is God of Death, and the convent is dedicated to serving him. The story pivots around the real Duchess Anne of Brittany, her fictional half-brother Gavriel Duval, and the fictional novitiate of the fictional Convent of St. Whatever it’s called, Grave Mercy is based on 15th Century facts, with some paranormal and fairy tale tropes thrown into the mix. I don’t know the proper name for this hybrid genre – historical fiction plus fantasy and science fiction – but this mix has been used to good effect by some excellent writers including Stephen King and Neal Stephenson, to name just two.
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