Padrec laughed at the sour joke. "Even Taixali and Venicone, miserable as they are."

"Cannae believe that," Malgon denied, unconvinced.

"But turn about, Malgon, and see it from another side." Padrec invited him to consider his own wife as example. Guenloie had some Taixali blood but Chain heart and spirit. Now, were she cradle-left in a Taixali hut, would she not still be Guenfoie? The difference was the way of life and thought. Thus when different men be- lieved alike, they were brothers and sisters in that unifying faith. Privately, Padrec felt his argument a bit glib, but it led to an inspiration so simple he wondered how it eluded him until now. He took Drust's thinking-stick with its charred point and drew the a crude fish on the surface of a flat stone.

"Salmon, who lives in the water whose waves are marked on thy cheeks." Padrec drew a second Fish under the first. "And here is the first sign of Jesu, the sign in which his fhain gathered together."

They stared at the two identical figures.

"Except by signs, who knows the way of the stars or of God? Who can say but that I was sent to fhain or fhain to me that I should bring this magic in thy need? Does Cruaddan still ask who are the chosen?"

"Hear."

As always, when Dorelei made the slightest sound or move, the others deferred to her. She sat rigid on her stone. "Does fhain doubt even now that Mother and Lugh have heard thy gern?"

The triumph of the preacher is in the faith he creates.

The tragedy may lie in what he destroys to make it. Padrec was no more critical in this than Dorelei, but as he was a natural priest, she was innately a leader, young as she was and grasping at straws. But he proved her right: fish on fish was a clear victory on the stone. No one could doubt it now.

"Padrec be gift from Raven," Dorelei ruled.

93.

She watched her people settle down in their furs and blankets. More fatigued than any of them, Padrec was half asleep when he closed his eyes. Neniane breathed deeply on her side, one leg tucked between Bredei's. Maigon snored softly; Drust was dead to the world, Guenioie's head pillowed on his arm.

Dorelei whispered, "Cru?"

The finest among Prydn men was deep in sleep. So much for the Samhain stag this night, she thought. Just as well. Dorelei lay down beside him, yawning. She didn't believe she could be so tired, but even exhaustion was luxury this night. She could sleep without worry for once.

If not yet proven right in all, at least she was not wholly wrong.

Her dreams were not of Cru or Padrec but once again of Rainbow. Waking before morning, Dorelei tried to piece out the meaning and the remembered fragment of the song before it faded back into the realm of sleep.

Be not where btit only when . . .

i

WW P^IPD.

SIO^M.

^VS.

III.

The music of a soul is made of many songs, and not all of them can be sad. Even

Padrec, burning with God like a siege of holy indigestion, climbed out of the crannog the next morning to meet a world that reveled in its own beauty without bothering to define the source. The early sun, not yet bright enough to leach color from the day, heightened it to a drunken degree. Padrec grinned with a child's delight. This dish of , the world, with himself at the center, was the paint-board of God. From these hills and high meadows with their rich yellows and blues, subtle lavenders and infinite varieties of green, were the store of colors from which God illumi- nated the rest of the world. The hues of the morning stabbed their beauty into Padrec's eyes. The stone circle rose a little higher than their crag and looked new-made ; in the sparkling air. Below the line of scrubby fir trees to the east, a stream winked in the sunlight.

No tallfolk in sight. Where's the village?

Padrec smiled at the thought. He'd used the Prydn word for his own kind, not all that complimentary, since the word meant "stranger" and "suspicious" as well. But : the Taixali village was nowhere in sight. This could be the first morning after Mabh parted the land from the conti- nent, earth and sun reconciled and no one but Prydn to enjoy it.

Cru came around the other side of the crag, leading i his pony and swigging from a water bag. He offered it to

97.

98 Padrec; the fresh spring water was sweetened with the dark juice of crushed blackberries.

"I was looking for the Taixali village."

Cru pointed to a hill halfway between them and the western horizon. "There."

"That far?"

"That near." Cru's chiseled face closed about his thoughts as he glanced toward the higher crest and the meadows beyond, then into the west again. Padrec divined the thought.

"Better graze down below."

"If Taixali allow."

Dorelei called to them from the terrace as she led out her pony. She came on a few paces and then, as if impa- tient for the pleasure, bounded up the last few steps to spin around in her husband's embrace. Her mood was fresh as Padrec's, and she included him in it.

"See where Padrec walks without stick. Be well soon."

Dorelei took a long took about their portion of the world. Without fatigue the pure energy of youth and heaith glowed from her. All prospects looked better now.

To Padrec she seemed even younger, if that were possible.

She slapped Cru's rump and mounted her pony.

"Wifl ride, husband?"

For answer, Cru vaulted his own pony, gleaming with good spirits, and kicked it into a dead run down the western slope, Dorelei close behind. Padrec gasped at their wild plunge, but they took the last narrow iedge, cantered out onto a leveling of the slope, charging at each other and circling in play while their silvery laughter floated back to the priest. Rof bounded out from the terrace and leaped down after them, eager to be part of the game, lifting off the ground in great jumps, forelegs braced against the steep descent. One last extension of the long body and a rowf of joy, and Rof went hurtling at Dorelei, who wheeled about to welcome him to morning.

Padrec roared aloud at the comic sight. "Oh, no!" In his enthusiasm Rof bounded up ... up ... and landed neatly spraddled over the startled pony's shoulders; right in Dorelei's lap, while she tried to control the skittish mount and help the dog at the same time. Rof snorted, helpless as a beached whale. As Padrec watched, chuckling 99.

and shaking his head, horses and dog dashed toward the trees farther down the slope. Padrec telt a swell of affec- tion in his chest.

"Lord God, You must bless these people. They are only truants from Eden. Show me how to help them."

With a chorus of bteatings, the sheep surged out into the day, Drusl and Malgon urging them on with bare hands, bending to push or boot at a refractory rump here and there,

"Yah. Padrec!"

The woolly cloud of the flock swirled out from the terrace and along the hillside, Guenloie's husbands hurry- ing them with pebbles flung with marvelous accuracy, and at last came Guenloie, mounted and leading the other ponies. She called something to Drusl, who passed her his water bag. Padrec watched the exquisite feminine grace of the girl as she brushed back the hair still sleep-tangled about her cheeks, the arm lifted, the delicate head tilted back to drink. The white smile flashed from berry-stained lips.

Truants from Eden.

"Padrec?"

He turned to see Neniane behind him, her solemn little cat's face lightened with a tentauve smile. She held out the bowl of blackberries and milk still warm from the udder. Without considering it, Padrec reached to touch her cheek. "Hello, kitten."

"Dost call me small fox?"