between her small palms. "Have had footish thoughts, said foolish things. Nae more. Would open mv flesh and spill the Taixali blood from it. Would nae go again to a's stinking village."

"Yah," Malgon agreed. "Wife will slay apart from them."

Now that they were knit again, Dorelei pressed the advantage with further good sense. "Fhain women will not go among them, but men alone and only if a must. And if a's women come to fhain for magic, will set a dear price on it."

Cru touched Dorelei's arm where the inflammation was darkening like an old burn. She shook him away in tacit disapproval: it should not be mentioned, but Bredei did and spoke.

"Was foul of Naiton. A has nae magic but that."

"But that enough," Neniane murmured. "Be Lugh Sun still angry with Mother that a does keep fhain under such a curse?"

"Gods can be wrong," Artcois ventured. "Even jealous."

"Nae, not Padrec's Father-God," Drust protested. "What god stronger? Did part the sea and slay firstborn in every rath of Egypt-land."

"Was thee in Egypt to see?" Cru challenged. "Nae, only that Padrec did say, and a's well gone."

"Gone," Dorelei sealed it. Drust prudently let it drop but couldn't resist a parting shoe. "Padrec be a good heart.

Will miss him."

They all would. Padrec's absence was more palpable than his presence. Dorelei realized they'd all grown used to the gentle, fussy, incomprehensible self of Padrec as part of their lives, but she couldn't bend in this. She couldn't clearly see where his teaching would lead them, nor would Padrec see how she must be sure in that. He would move on, go home. She could not.

When they drove the flocks out to the high pasture, the sky looked ominous, clear blue in the west but an edge of mackerel clouds sliding toward them from the east with a dirty gray smudge behind them. Glad to be exonerated, Guenloie and her husbands jumped to the tasks that Dorelei set out for them. The men went to pasture the sheep, Guenloie descended the west slope to the woods for hys-

138 sop to make poultice for Drusl's arm and to gather lale mushrooms for the supper pot- Dorelei sent Neniane after her, more for mending than needed help.

"Go with thy cousin, sister. A's had a hard lesson."

Artcois and Bredei passed Cru on their way to hunt, grinning.

"Dorelei be wise." Artcois said.

"Aye, did think much on it last night."

The brothers smiled sivly, brimming with fun. "True,"

said Bredei. "Did hear thee both thinking last mght."

"Aye, brother; and see where a did use Cru's back to ponder."

They circled Cru, gravely inspecting every small mark until he shoved them awav and slipped into his vest. Bredei assisted him as it he were aged and infirm. Artcois shook his head.

"Be content as husband to second daughter. Do not have the strength lor a gern."

"Die in a year," his brother agreed. "Less."

The time lor Joking was over; Cru tired of them.

"Thee were not marked with Blackbar. Go hunt and be done."

That was the thing they could not fight, no matter how high their courage. Dorelei could forgive Guenloie and send Padrec away, but the mark on her arm was burned deep in all of them. Stronger than his bronze knife and his arrows, Blackbar had defeated them since the time Lugh gave it to tallfolk. He could not give in to his tear, being a man. but Dorelei must show more strength than all of them. If his love restored that strength, Dorelei could claw Cru's flesh to the white bone.

The second thought was natural to him. Where is she?

As his mind framed the question, he tried to remem- ber. He knew when Dorelei wanted to be alone, but there might be Taixali about, all the more confident since filthy Naiton laid the Blackbar on Dorelei. Cru took the slope in strides and hops on the steeper grade, loping toward the trees.

The darkening sky matched her mood. Dorelei stood by a stunted oak overshadowed by taller firs and brooded out over the glen to the west. Somewhere below her, 139.

Neniane and Guenloie moved silently about their gather- ing. Dorelei shivered and pulled the cloak about her, feeling guilty when she saw Cru coming through the trees.

She loved him without question, almost without begin- ning, since she couldn't remember a time when they weren't together. Yet last night was the first time in all their seasons when she lay m Cru's arms and thought of some- one else.

Good thai he u gone. If he stayed, the fight would come sooner or later, whether he came to my bed or nut.

How could she love what she didn't understand? Some things took more living than thinking about, and Padrec had changed for the better since they found him in the ring of stones. But it was good she sent him away. Differ- ence was one thing, defiance another, and if she felt a loss-well, Gawse must have sacrificed much for like reasons.

She hoped her husband brought no new problems;

she couldn't cope with them now. "Aye, Cru?"

"Did think not to leave thee alone."

When she felt his arms around her, Dorelei shut her eyes tight against the loneliness even Cru could not drive away, and was a traitor.

They were not long together by the tree when Guenloie hailed them from a thicket, broke into sight, and sprinted up the wooded slope, Neniane hurrying behind.

"Aye, aye. Thy baskets will spill out. What is't?"

Neniane pointed back down the slope to the moving figure blurred by thicket bul climbing toward them. "Padrec comes back."

Then the horse broke out into the open and Padrec called to her. "Gern-y-fhain, would speak with thee."

"Were sent, away!" She hurled it back with more force than needed. "May not come back- Will not."

Still he came on, holding a brightly colored stick in his hand. When Cru saw what it was, he nocked an arrow to his bow and drew on the priest. "Slop, tallfolk man."

Padrec halted the horse. "Do not call me that, Cru.

It's not a name I'd wear."

"Say that and yet bring Blackbar to- curse us again?"

Cru's bow was steady on Padrec's chest. "Will kill thee, Padrec."

140 Padrec held up the arrowhead on its fragment of painted shaft, retrieved from near the rock he'd Hung it against the day before. "I'm glad you didn't send Guenloie away."

"Yah, Padrec." Guenloie ventured a tentative smile, wary of the evil in his hand.

"Thee cannae come back." Doretei took a few paces toward him, placing herself between the evil and her folk.

"Will nae mock us so. What dost want?"

"My place, Gern-y-fhain. My people."

"Be nae thy folk."