"Then it is well she is here for you to remind her of the rest." His gaze shifted to the sleeping pair."Though I doubt if Lavrans appreciates your methods. I would not have thought him susceptible to bewitchment."

"I'm not the one who has him bewitched." It was a partial truth, but still truth. He had been an easy mark this night. She had tested him a few times over the years with a little of this, a little of that, and had always found him unassailable. He'd caught her once trying a bit of glamour and voice on him, and had given her a smile that had chilled her to the bone. She'd been much more careful from then on.

Something or someone had softened his cynic's heart, though, and made him vulnerable. Her coin would be on someone named Ceridwen ab Arawn. A shame, really. Madron had always found his lack of faith in humanity one of his most endearing qualities, for it kept her on the edge, wondering if he would ever be proven wrong, if his heart would ever open with even the narrowest of cracks. Now it had happened.

There had been no fanfare, no beating of drums, no falling stars-only a woman accidentally crossing his path.

"He does seem taken with the maid," Rhuddlan said, echoing her thoughts with far too much presumption in his voice for her peace of mind.

"Why are you here?" she asked. "Moira usually brings Edmee home." It had never done her any good to be subtle with Rhuddlan, or to be patient. 'Twas far better to know his game from the start.

"You will need my help before morning, to get them back to Wydehaw," was all he said, but she felt his reasoning fell short of the mark.

"And?" she prompted.

He looked at her from across the width of the cottage, his eyes alight with a mischief it seemed the Quicken-tree never outgrew. "I would trust you with my life, Moriath, but no further than that."

Aye, she would trust him with her life too, but no further. So she was to be watched. Well, she thought, let him watch.

"Bring more wood in for the fire," she said, disguising her acquiescence with a command, and her unease with an imperious manner. 'Twas never easy for her to be with him, especially alone. No one called her Moriath anymore, except for Rhuddlan. Her own daughter knew her as Madron. She'd.changed her name to sever any ties between her and the twins after she'd left them in the religious houses, and so that she could live near Wydehaw without her father's past marking her or people connecting her with Merioneth. But through Rhuddlan she was connected, to Merioneth, to the Quicken-tree, to the past and to the future and to love.

When all was ready and her uninvited guest situated where he could observe without interfering, she crossed over to the cupboard and reached up to its topmost shelf. From there she withdrew an earthenware jar.

"Hadyn draig," Rhuddlan murmured. Dragon seed. She knew he had a similar jar himself, one crosshatched with ochre and woad and sealed with beeswax.

"The scent will remind her of her last night at Carn Merioneth, of the place where I found her and Mychael in the caves."

"Will also remind her of the water track," Rhuddlan said. She turned to face him, her brows furrowed. "You smeltpryfthis evening beneath the falls? As far south as this?"

He nodded and leaned forward in the chair, his elbows resting on the intricately carved arms, his fingers laced together. The Quicken-tree cloth moved with the sheen and fluidity of water over his broad shoulders and across his chest. "The fragrance was rich on the track, though it lasted but a moment.

'Twas what brought me to Deri so soon in the year, the scentof pryf."

She'd wondered why he'd been so early into Wroneu and able to waylay Dain and Ceridwen. Moira had been in the oak grove since the end of Nuin, but the others hadn't been expected until Beltaine. She kept her musings to herself as she picked up a small ritual blade, an athame, from one of the cupboard's shelves and incised the beeswax.

"You, too, must have been feeling the turmoil in the north this last year," he said, "especially since Ngetal."

"Aye." She had felt the stirrings deep in the earth, and she'd felt the crude power of the one calling to the children of Ddrei Goch and Ddrei Glas-too crude to be of Rhuddlan's making, she'd decided after much deliberation-and had wondered if 'twas just thepryfthemselves rousing into action that had made the timing of Caradoc's summons auspicious. Now she was unsure. "But there can be no caller we do not know. Gwrnach knew naught ofpryf, the fool, and I cannot believe it is his son, the one they call the Boar of Balor. I remember him as a youth, loud and boisterous, and lacking in any subtlety that would have hinted at influence in these matters."

"When first it happened, I thought it was you." Rhuddlan looked at her through eyes made evermore bright by the dark woad across his face. "Would have gone hard with you, Moriath, if I'd found that to be true."

"No less hard than on you, if what I had first thought was true," she warned him. "Now and again a stranger has stumbled onto a threadofmystery and at-tempted to follow it to Merioneth. You know yourself they cannot fully understand on their own, and without understanding, naught but danger and death awaits them beyond the Canolbarth." She brought the jar to her nose and sniffed. A smile curved her mouth. "This should do the trick."

"No tricks," Rhuddlan said, pinning her with his gaze. "We have waited for Rhiannon's daughter to become a woman and free the dragon spawn, because Nemeton's daughter told us 'twas the best way to reclaim what we lost when Carn Merioneth fell. But Ceridwen ab Arawn is not as her mother was, even Moira will tell you this, and now someone else summons thepryffrom their sleep. There are those who feel we made a fool's bargain."

"Her lineage goes all the way to Anglesey, to a Magus Druid Priestess." She dismissed his concern with a wave of her hand, crossing in front of him on her way to the hearth. "None other than one such as she can bring thepryfup from the deep, no matter how they may make the serpents squirm."

Rhuddlan was not so easily dissuaded. "We head north this night. Let us take her with us and soon enough I can tell you if she can hold her place in the gates of time. I will even put Lavrans by her side to better her chances."

"Dain is not Nemeton," she said coldly, liking not the turn of the conversation. She would countenance no union between Dain and the maid, least of all as part of the sacred trinity of man and woman-whotruly were one-tylwyth teg, and the cosmos.

"Neither are you Nemeton," Rhuddlan replied. "We need a key, and many of the Quicken-tree think Lavrans is the key to breaking the seal on the maze, especially if he has the maid's help."

"Then you have made him into something he is not." Anger sharpened her voice, an anger born of fear.

She and the Quicken-tree needed each other. They could not win if they were at cross purposes. "Dain is a charlatan. He plays at being a sorcerer. He plays at knowing magic. The villagers and castle folk of Wydehaw take great pleasure in believing in his charms, but his conjuring is no more than masterful trickery. He knows this and would be the first to tell you it is so."

"And I tell you he has the gift of deep sight that the maid lacks. I would end this exile, Moriath, and see Yr Is-ddwfn once more."

Madron bit back a rejoinder. She and Rhuddlan always argued. They had been arguing for fifteen years, ever since she'd left him for the last time. "There is more at stake here than the opening of the maze," she said with forced calm. "What good is opening it if you can't hold it? And you can't hold it without also holding Carn Merioneth, a matter easily accomplished by a marriage the Prince of Gwynedd himself has sanctioned, and near impossible to accomplish any other way. Or would you go to the west and abandon all who are here?"

"I would not abandon man. 'Tis the duty of thetylwyth tegto be the bridge 'tween men and their gods.

But with the maze open, we would have thepryfon our side."

"To what end?" she asked, finally shocked out of her feigned calm. "They are not battering rams or war-horses." Whatever in the world was he thinking? "You cannot do battle withpryf, nor with Ddrei Goch and Ddrei Glas. They are not there to serve us. We are here to protect and serve them."

"And we are none of us here to serve Welsh princes and English lords. Yet you would do both before you would serve me." His face grew harsh in the firelight, reminding her of all that was unfinished between them.

"I owe you much, Rhuddlan-"

"As much as you owe the damned Sheriff of Hay-on-Wye?" he demanded, pointing at the toothed and clawed bearskin. - "He gets naught from me but potions."

"And I get naught but cold gratitude."

She turned away in frustration and set about her business. In truth, her gratitude was not cold, at least not nearly cold enough. He had been her first man, her only man. Though others had tried to win her favors-or steal them, as had been the case with the lord of Carn Merioneth-none but Rhuddlan had ever held her heart. He tempted her so, but within that temptation lay her destruction. To be Rhuddlan's woman was to not be her own, a price she would not pay.

"After Ceridwen is married," she said, keeping her voice steady, "we will have a ceremony in the caves and all will be set aright. You will be a keeper of dragons once more."

"And you?" "I?" Using the tip of the athame blade, she withdrew a small amount of fine black powder from the jar and cast it over the flames. Blue-and-white smoke roiled up and turned in upon itself. "I will become what my father was, a watcher of the doorway of time."

Ceridwen smelled sweet, rich earth and felt warmth rolling over her body in waves. Her world had turned into one of blue-and-white mists, but it seemed not to matter. Moisture in the air beaded on her skin and tasted of salt.

"She rouses," a man said, and his voice was clear like spring winds.

A woman's voice came to her next. "Welcome, daughter of Rhiannon. Daughter of Teleri, daughter of Mair..."

She turned toward the warmth of the fair sounds and let the lilting music caress her skin, let the melodies of the names slip into her veins.

"Daughter of Nessa, daughter of Esyllt..."

A face formed in the mist, one of soft curves, green eyes, and long, flowing auburn hair. White arms trailing diaphanous wisps of violet cloth reached for her through the fog, beckoning. Moriath. Ceridwen smiled. She was safe with Moriath.

"Daughter of Heledd, daughter of Celemon..."

The face grew old, the eyes became wise, and all disappeared. Another face took its place, a face formed in fire with devouring flames for hair and a terrifying fury upon its features. Ceridwen felt the heat grow unbearable, felt her heart beat faster. The fire-woman loomed larger, her hair burning holes in the fog and licking at the sky.

"Daughter of Arianrod..."

Then it began to rain. The fury was washed away and the fire-woman's own tears extinguished her flames. Out of the tears a water-woman was born, her hair like a cool running river, her eyes like the ocean below the waves, calm and untouched by the storms passing through time.

Time.

"Daughter of Don, Mother Goddess of us all, called Danu, Dana of the light, Domnu of darkness, she who has the earth as her womb and the sun as her heart. She whose tides pull with the moon, whose limbs spread wide to hold the stars. We are all children of the one who came before. Listen, child, to your mother."

Earth.

Deeper than she'd ever been, and lost. The hushed sounds of continuous movement drew her onward, down and down, through tunnels bored smooth. Ahead of her, a cavern entrance glowed with a grayish-green light. She approached the opening with a sense of wonder in her heart and an elusive wordplaying upon her lips. She tried to speak the word, to make a sound... asoft sound from inside, and though her mouth formed the word, she couldn't hear the soft sound. Yet a veil was pulled aside, and she looked into the cavern. All was well in thepryfnest, and she knew that as butterflies gave birth to caterpillars, dragons first gave birth topryf.There were always morepryfthan dragons, for they were the makers and keepers of the tunnels. Farther along the tunnel, much farther, another cavern appeared, and with the shape of the word in and upon her mouth, she looked inside to find the dragon nest empty.

'Twas time to call them home.

Deeper still, the smell of brine cut through the richpryfscent. With the sea smell came the sound of thundering waves, of water ebbing and flowing, ever on the move in the sweeping curves of currents, and upon the shore of Mor Sarjf, the subterranean ocean, were the bones of her childhood, dragon bones.

"Thrice they come upon the land, to be born, to spawn, and to die."

The words were her mother's and clear in her mind. The knowledge was hers. This was what Rhiannon's child had been born to do: to call the dragons home to spawn and later to die, and to send the young dragons out to the deep beyond, where the rolling of their mighty bodies would churn the tides and keep the Moon coming back to the Sun, and the seasons of the Earth turning one upon the other.

She made to leave, to return to the blue-white mists, when the sound of a voice raised in full battle cry drew her head around. She looked to the caves carved deep into the cliffs lining the shore. A man stood there, the wind blowing long strands of his hair across his face like a mask. A bright sword with a hilt of braided silver and gold flashed in his hand. He glanced once in her direction, meeting her gaze across the shingle beach, and she saw the warrior's promise in his eyes, equal parts of courage and despair. She tried to go to him, but the fog rolled in from the open sea and swirled around him, until he was gone.

The loss tore at her heart. Tears coursed down her cheeky and pooled in the corner of her mouth. Salt water.

"Moriath, stop," Rhuddlan ordered.

"She but cries, elf-man."

"I do not speak for Ceridwen's sake. Look to Dain." He liked not what he saw in Lavrans's face.

Beneath the younger man's eyelids, his eyes were' twitching in a dream state too wild to be naught but a nightmare. His color had grown pale, his breathing ragged.

Dain had long since passed the subterranean ocean and was now so deep into the earth he felt its molten core, the hot center of it. Sweat ran down his face, under his arms, down his legs and the center of his back, salty sweat. Everything was darkness in the abyss, yet he could discern shapes.

Concern drew Madron's eyebrows together as she leaned forward and rested her palm on Dain's forehead. His dream flowed into her through the pores of her skin, silent and intense, a dark place with unbearable heat and danger circling all around.

Sweet gods, she knew where he was, just as she knew he should not be there. She started to remove her hand and bring him back, but as the tips of her fingers grazed his brow, another image came to her, a fleeting, tortured image of the mage's past: a full moon night on an unsettled sea and a black tent hidden among mountains of sand; a candle; a brazier of coals, the heavy, cloying scent of a dangerous distillation.

Three men, a bargain made, a deed done. She jerked her hand away.

"Get water," she said to Rhuddlan, scooting her footstool around to better face Dain. With methodical efficiency, and despite trembling fingers, she unlaced his gambeson. She would save him from the abyss, and then she would try to forget what else she'd seen just as surely as he tried to forget what he'd done-and what had been done to him.

The walls of the tunnels were curved, bulging, and moving with a soft hissing sound. They were alive.

How long had he been there? Eternity, a time beyond memory. There had been a woman once upon an ocean's shore, but he had lost her long ago.

"He should have only slept, nothing more," Madron muttered, working quickly to strip him down to his braies. "Nothing more." The gambeson came off, followed by his tunic.

When she removed his shirt, she stopped short, able to do naught but stare.

A blue-black tattoo encircled his upper arm with the interlocking curves of an ancient Celtic design.

Other signs adorned him above the tore.

"Who marked him thus?" she asked Rhuddlan.

"I did. Two years back," Rhuddlan said, lowering a bucket by her feet. " 'Twas what he wanted."

"To what purpose?"

"He did not say."

He wouldn't, she thought. With her gaze, she followed the sinuous lines coloring Dain's skin. He had chosen a most painful way to remember the mysteries of her father's tower, by use of woad worked with a needle. A Druid symbol for the Sun was there above the tore, and waxing and waning moons-disconcertingly similar to the scars on Ceridwen's shoulder-and between the moons was a sign she did not recognize. More of a map it was than a symbol, being made of many parts strung together with lines. She reached out and traced the strange icon with her fingertip.

A gust of hot wind-ah, sweet breath-traveled up from the opening at Dain's feet, the wormhole. The scent was a lure, meant to entice him closer to the edge. The living wall behind him heaved and groaned, adding its own persuasion.

"Damned, swivingplace," he swore. Why was he there?

He'd thought to save a woman, the answer came, and to do it with a sword. He looked down at the weapon in his hand. All was darkness, yet he could see the keen, gleaming edge of the blade. He'd thought to save her with his courage, his love, and his steel.

'Twould not be enough. Her salvation would cost his life.

Madron removed her fingers from Dain's tattoo and took the damp cloth Rhuddlan offered for cooling the mage's fevered brow. She woyld do what she could to protect him from the dark place, which meant protecting him from Rhuddlan. When his temperature had dropped, she wrung out the cloth again and handed it to the Quicken-tree man. "Wipe him down once more. I will bring them out of their sleep, andyou may take them back to Wydehaw. Ceridwen now has the knowledge she needs. When the time comes, she'll know what she must do."

"And Lavrans?" he asked.

She got up from the footstool, making room for Rhuddlan to take her place. "I know naught what the sorcerer dreams," she lied. "I intended nothing for him."

"Yet he dreams."

"I did not say he wasn't adept. Like all of his kind, his intuition exceeds his intellect, and in his case that is a considerable achievement, as you would know if you've ever played chess with him." She bent and chose two fresh evergreen boughs out of a basket on the floor, and set them into the fire. The scent would wash thepryfsmell from the air, creating a path for her two sleepers to follow. When Rhuddlan took them to Wydehaw, the night wind would do the rest, chasing the last of their dreams from their minds.

" 'Tis not uncommon," she went on, "for a person to be drawn into the sleep of another, though usually only when there is a strong bond between them."

Rhuddlan smiled to himself. Lavrans and the maid were bound, whether Moriath recognized the ties or not, bound by the magic that had always pulled a man and a woman together. For himself, he would see those ties wrapped ever more securely around the pair, until where one began and the other left off would be no more than a matter of pure conjecture. Ceridwen's bloodlines ran true enough for his needs, even if her art did not.

He shifted his gaze to the warrior by the maid's side. As for Lavrans, Moriath was right to fear him, for the Dane would be the one to take her father's place at the gates of time.

Chapter 13.

Wine, Dain thought, groaning. He would never drink Madron's again, posset or not. His head pounded.

Pain flashed in sporadic bursts behind his eyes. He felt like he'd been wrung out to his very soul, and his face was cold. The rest of him was warm, though, pleasantly warm, surprisingly warm.