I They claimed his spirit as theirs. Sometimes it seemed Dorelei was waiting something from him, but what? He was almost strong enough now to collect his thoughts and H Contemplate how to bring them the Word. Certainly no ; more fallow Field existed for it than these incestuous chil- dren of Cain, and yet where to begin? What handhold, ' 'what common starting point that Dorelei or the rest would understand?

I His legs were not yet healed. The continued pain ^fueled the flush of self-righteousness. Perhaps in her ig- ;norant way, Dorelei had a piece of truth. God had sent ; him to teach her pathetic people, to save them from the ; spiritual oblivion toward which they drifted. Their minis- E tered needs would hone his powers, as Drust's knife against ^the stone, toward the day he faced the Irish chiefs. Even Miliuc would see how the holy strength of Patricius '*dwarfed his own and confounded his shamans. All Ire- ,land would flock to him. His letters, models of modesty,

*.would impress Germanus by their lack of striving to that ffect. The word would go from Auxerre to Rome itself:

Jtin the west, in Ireland, there is a new province for Chnst carved piy Bishop Patricius whose footsteps led first through Pictiand and 'those fabulous folk known as Faerie . . .

He was tipsy with the notion of fame; yet as he bowed his head to pray with renewed inspiration, Padrec quelled ^the pride and tried to think only that God and Christ pmrned through him in their potency. When he had given thanks, he turned his fierce anger on the distant Venicone lnllage like a sleeping sow in the valley beyond. You thought J.JOU could blunt the sword of God? You?

64 But Meganius may have been right-that once. He wasn't quite ready. He would start here with the first small brick in his edifice to God. Savages they were, but not animals, as most people thought. Even giving Him the wrong name, they had a burning need for God. The dead child, the grain were only a message to their "parents."

Send food for ourselves and our flocks, or this death will take all of us.

Dorelei would come to understand. There was an unexpected sweetness in the prospect. He imagined the bright dawn of comprehension in that exquisite, intelli- gent face. He saw her standing humbly before him, head bowed (befitting, although she never did) and modestly dressed (for a change) to receive at last the truth from Father Patricius. He dressed her in the robes and role of the Magdaiene and was young enough not to wince at the indulgence. He saw Dorelei kneel to him, open to the Power that worked through him, and thought the deep flush of excitement and pleasure was pure holy purpose when it was predictably adulterated with simple love for the woman. Being more practical and much more obser- vant, Dorelei knew it earlier and more surely, but then women usually do.

Yet while he strained to change their lives, those lives began to color his own. He sensed a pattern to their existence beyond mere survival, even a music if he could catch the theme and put it to God's harmony. When Padrec's sight began to enlarge beyond his own purposes to contemplate theirs, it seemed to him that he knew them not at all.

Sometimes with sunset red beyond the rath entrance, they would fall silent as if by a single will, frozen on muscled haunches like Bredei and Artcois waiting for Hawk, their gaze on Gem-y-fhain.

"Did speak to Mother in dream last night," Dorelei announced.

Cru waited a proper space to show his respect. "What dream, Gern-y-fhain?"

"As before. As always. Dream of Rainbow."

If Padrec was perplexed, he was not alone. In the circle of stones. Dorelei pondered the other side of the 65.

same quandary without the aid of Padrec's dramatic ego- I rism. She weighed the wisdom of a decision snatched out of the air in a desperate moment. Did she read the sign J aright? Was it Lugh perched on the stone at dawn, or just ^ a scavenging bird attracted by carnon?

"Cannae turn back now, cannae send Padrec away.

c Fhain would nae trust me as gern. 0 Mother, send one of 'us child-wealth. Fhain would take that as a good sign.

Send something. Cannae understand this Padrec."

And what she did understand was impossible. He was not of Mother and Lugh but of a certain father-god of I whom Dorelei knew nothing. There seemed no place for a J mother or any woman at all. The abnormality, the heresy

I made her ears burn. Lugh might depart forever and Mother freeze over for good and all. No place even for a woman in his own life. He said men like himself should not marry. Most strange when he seemed male and vital in every way, comely and a rugged mountain dweller like herself. Dorelei had never seen hair so crisp or angry-red (Or skin that freckled about the forehead and the backs of "his hands. Freckles were new to her, Padrec's word when iahe asked him. She'd thought Mother was undecided what 'color to make him at first. He intrigued her. The idea was (Hot beyond possibility, especially in a fhain without chil- dren. Padrec might make a good second husband if he Icould change some of his silly notions about the world in :general and women in particular. Yes-a good strong body the man had, built to endure, perhaps even for the *delight of loving.

She forced her thoughts back to prayer and need.

;They must move soon to a new crannog for the winter. In i< Venicone hut she'd once admired an ornament of two glass cups connected by a thin tube. Sand ran from one cup to the other through the tube to mark what tallfblk ^called an hour. Dorelei's own instincts prompted her to move, but she measured by a different glass.

"Mother, if Padrec is to help us, show how. Must ride north with winter coming. Be wise? Be young and new .and . . . frightened, Mother Lead fhain as thee did Mabh.

Send me quickly thy wisdom. And some to Padrec, who could much use it."

66 The Venicone women gathering herbs on the hillside passed close enough to Dorelei for her to speak to them without raising her voice. Because she willed it so, they didn't see her at all. Through the magic taught by Gawse, she was so still as to be merely a nondescript patch on the heath.

Nothing but her eyes moved when the sound piped over the moor. The song she waited for, no other like it.

Dorelei saw the flash of yellow-green plumage as the finch drummed up into the sky. So her own glass turned. When Finch sang, fhain must think of winter. No sign was so reliable, but the Venicone women were deaf as they were blind; they'd be surprised once more when winter came early. They never learned.

Above Dorelei on the hill, Cru observed, "Five tens of days to snow, Padrec. Nae more."

Padrec squinted dubiously. "Will be early then."

"Dost hear Finch? Will start."

"The new crannog? Where?"

"Will be there."

"Where?"

"When do Find k. Padrec, dost tire me with asking."

Cru waved a bronze arm out over the valley and the world. "See? All answers. Need no asking."

"Those women down there, they walked right by Dorelei. Are they blind?"

"Yes," said Cru. "Like thee. But thy sight be opening to Mother."

Move they must and much to do. Sheepskin saddles were mended, new baskets woven from broad-bladed stalks, available food gathered. Blackberries bursting ripe now in the lowland thickets were marked by day and collected in sunset forays when tailfolk were safely inside. Guenloie and Neniane replenished their stores of herbs for tea and medicines. The men butchered those sheep too old or weak to make the journey and dried the meat. Most im- portant of all, their bronze scraps-broken knives and tools-were packed for travel along with the clay molds for new ones, while Padrec dug with Drust and Matgon into the chalk ridges for usable flints. Few orders needed to be given; each of them had prepared like this twice a 67.

1'year since they were old enough to run behind the ponies.

:It was their earliest memory.

Fhain ate well the last night before moving on, mut- :ton basted in its own juice and a gravy thickened with the iJast of their hoarded barley flour, and only when they were down to nibbling and picking did Padrec signal to Dorelei that he wished to speak. He chose his time care- fully, since ritual speaking was a precise custom. He must Usit cross-legged, hands loose across his knees but with his Jiback erect. Not the most comfortable position for a man 4 used to standing and moving when he preached. Padrec waited until it was clear Dorelei had no ritual speaking to ?take precedent.

:* "Would speak, Gern-y -fhain."

^ Dorelei looked up in hopeful surprise, then nodded.

;-They all turned expectantly to Padrec, as if they'd been awaiting for this. "Gern-y-fhain is wise," he began. "Truly thave I come from my God, even a shepherd Tike thee to iead fhain to Him."

^ "To Tir-Nan-Og," Dorelei murmured. "Do thee speak Eof it."

"But who will come unclean to his father or mother?"

Padrec impaled them all on his pitiless stare. He felt the power of God rising in him like a tide. "Who among thee is *without sin? Before thou canst come to thy Father, thee fmust be washed, yea, even in the blood of the lamb, for each of you lives in sin!"

He had their whole attention and alarm at his sudden vehemence. At the reference to lamb's blood, Bredei glanced bemusedty at the remains of the mutton.

"The Grace of God is not cheaply bought, sinners. 1 ^tell you it is a narrow door, a needle's eye-"

Drusl touched his knee in concern. "Dost ail, Padrec?"

"No, do not ail!" Padrec jerked away from the com- passionate hand, banging one of his ankles hard against a Stone. He gasped with the sudden pain that shattered his holy momentum. "Which of you . . ."

Clutching the throbbing ankle, he thought of the night the Venicones crippled him. They hadn't understood any more than fhain. He'd thought to build an edifice to God, with fine words about laying the first brick; yet, like an idiot carpenter, he was beginning with the arch of the

68 roof. He rubbed his ankle, seething, while fhain waited politely.

They must be led to Grace, not flogged to it. All right, Meganius. Nol the blood of the lamb; for now the gentle- ness. He looked up at Dorelei, wondering where to begin.

When he spoke he used the words and pictures that had meaning for them. For the First time in his priestly calling, without realizing it, Padrec spoke to his congregation, not at it. The result was less of a distortion than he would have thought. Dates and years had no meaning to them.

Their stones from the past began in a certain way; they would relate to no other.

"Was in the first days in a village like Venicone but far away. A girl named Mary was working in her father's rath wheii the Raven-spirit of God appeared to her and said: 'Woman, you bear the spirit of God in the flesh.

Blessed is the fruit of thy womb. The Son of God shall thee bear and he shall be called Jesu.' "