"You will follow me most nearly," he said sternly.

Becca inclined her head. "As you will. If this place is as dangerous as you tell me-what should I do, if we become separated?"

Altimere bent upon her a look so grave she felt her heart chill in her chest.

"If we become separated, it will be because I have failed you. Should that occur, give Rosamunde her head, and trust to your power-and luck."

"Luck," Becca repeated, dully, and looked up, amazed to hear Altimere laugh.

"Luck is often discounted, even among the Fey, yet undeniably it is a power, capricious and uncontrolled as it may be. It bestows its patronage as it will, for no reason that can be discerned. So, yes, if you should become lost in the keleigh, trust to luck, Rebecca Beauvelley."

"Very well," she said slowly. "I will do so, if we are separated Before we go on, I wonder if you will tell me-what force created that-the keleigh?"

Altimere was amused, she could feel it, but he answered her seriously enough.

"Why, the Fey created it, of course. Who else would have had the power, or the need?"

He leaned over and placed his hand briefly over her left, where it rested on the pommel.

"We will go slowly. Do not fall. Do not for any reason dismount. Do not speak, and in no wise answer, if something should speak to you. Do you understand me?"

Becca took a breath and met his eyes firmly. "I do."

He smiled. "Bold heart," he murmured, awaking an echo of a voice that-but, there it was gone, dissolved in the warmth of Altimere's regard.

"Now," he said, and gave his horse the office. That gentleman moved forward delicately, as if he knew what awaited him around the bend, as of course, Becca recalled, he did.

"We must," Becca murmured. "Don't fail me, lady."

Her horse sighed, ears straightened, and she moved forward, docile and wary, 'round the curve and into the unknown.

"Names and business." The guard on the door was one of the Sea Wise, grizzled hair braided with fessel sh.e.l.ls, boat-hook in her belt. Corded brown arms were crossed over her breast in what one might take for an att.i.tude of careless insolence.

If one were a fool.

Meri met her pale, canny eyes. "Meripen Vanglelauf, at the command of the Engenium."

He had meant to speak mildly, but the twitch at the corner of the guard's firm mouth told him he had missed the mark. She only nodded, though, and looked past him to his companion.

"Ganat Ubelauf, Healer and Wood Wise. I bear a message from the chyarch of Ospreydale to Sian, Engenium of Sea Hold."

Oh, indeed? thought Meri.

"You bear something else, Healer. I can smell it from here."

"A jewel which the lady desired to be returned to her with all speed." Ganat's voice was frankly acidic, which made a startling contrast to his usual light-spoken mode. Before Meri could decide whether he preferred it, the guard spoke a soft word, and the salt-wood door behind her swung open.

"Susel?" the guard asked, without turning her head.

A younger edition of herself strolled out, and paused to survey them out of fog-colored eyes, her thumbs hooked in her belt.

"Captain?"

"Escort these worthy Wood Wise to the receiving hall. They are here for the Engenium."

Susel nodded slightly, then jerked her head in the general direction of Meri and Ganat. "Follow," she said and swung about, never looking to see if they obeyed.

"Best keep close," the door guard added. "It's a tricksy route and we don't have a lot of time to rescue lost Wanderers."

Ganat stepped forward, placing his boot heels with such firmness that the stone floor rang, and echoed off the stone walls.

Meri, who had been fostered at Sea Hold, frowned in protest of the unnecessary racket; after all, it was easier to walk silent on stone than it was among the trees. Moving considerably more quietly, he came up to the other Wood Wise.

"I thought you'd said you'd been here before," he said, hoping to leach some of the man's palpable nervousness. "And that the food was good."

Ganat sighed and slanted a sheepish glance at him. "Oh, aye. I've been here before, though as little as I might. Say that I don't care to be enclosed by stone, and excuse me for ill-temper."

"There's nothing to excuse," Meri said honestly. "Well I recall, when first I came here, how difficult it was to reconcile myself to living inside the land, rather than atop it." He tipped his head. "One does become acclimated." Of course, he added to himself, it did help one's acceptance of an unnatural order to be able to feel the staunch regard the stone treasured for all those it guarded. This chill and echoing emptiness was . . . disquieting.

"I doubt I'll be here long enough to become acclimated," Ganat said wryly; "therefore, I had best reconcile myself to accept discomfort with good grace."

The hallway branched and their escort bore to the left-toward the sea. They were not bound for the Engenium's formal audience room, then. Meri tried to decide if that was good or bad.

He was still undecided when the guard struck the bell outside of a door that, in Velpion's day, had opened into a small parlor where messengers had been put to await the Engenium's summons.

The guard paused, head tipped to one side, then bent forward and opened the door, waving the two of them through.

"The Engenium will see you now," she said, with the perfectly blank face the Sea Wise showed to those who were considered outsiders, or enemies.

Meri felt a cold draft run his backbone, and touched the elitch branch thrust through his belt. Then, as Ganat had not yet moved, he stepped across the threshold.

The room was still small, but it was no longer merely a bare rock cave with the simple table and chair that only a messenger exhausted from his ride might find comfort in. Now, there was a window in the far wall, opening over the sea, allowing the last rays of the setting sun in to fill the s.p.a.ce with rich light, waking glints of silver and gold from the depths of the stone.

A woman stood before the window, turning as they entered. She moved toward them, 'round the desk set by the window, threading her way through a clutter of chairs made out of canvas in the way of the Sea Wise.

She wore the sharkskin leggings and wide-sleeved shirt of a captain of the Sea Wise, her skin was the color of alabaster that had been left to soak in strong tea, her features angular and thin.

A leather cord caught her tawny hair at her nape, and another bound her brow. Her eyes were blue-green, and extremely clear. They widened slightly as they met his, and she pressed her thin lips together.

His little cousin Sian, all grown up.

Meri folded his arms, boots braced against the stone floor, noting a spot of warmth where the elitch wand nestled against his side, and a spot of coldness where the fear lay in the bottom of his belly.

Abruptly, Sian turned her head, and strode forward, her attention now fixed on poor Ganat.

"Wood Wise, you have a message for me from the chyarch?" She held out an imperious hand.

Ganat considered that hand for a moment, sighed and raised his eyes to her face.

"Most gracious Engenium, the chyarch asks merely that the next time you have urgent need of one of those under her care, you send more reason, and less force."

He reached into the pocket of his vest, withdrew the fessel sh.e.l.l on its cord, and placed it, gently, on the outstretched palm.

"The chyarch also sends, Lady Sian, that this charm would have slain its intended recipient, had he been forced to carry it so far."

If Sian was angry, or abashed, or bored, one did not, Meri thought critically, learn it from her face. Her fingers were another matter, as they closed hard around the charm, the fist dropping to her side.

"I am grateful to the chyarch for her care of my cousin," she said, her voice cool and pleasant. "Will you be returning to Ospreydale, Ranger Ganat?"

"Lady, my path now lies toward my own wood, from which I have been absent too long."

"I understand," she said calmly. "Before you go, allow me to thank you personally for your escort, and to offer you a meal, and a bed for the evening."

Ganat hesitated, threw Meri a glance overfull of some meaning he could not read, and bowed, deeply.

"You are kind, lady, but I hunger for the voices of my own trees. The moon is bright enough to light me along a path I know so well. By your leave, I will continue onward."

Sian inclined her head. "Certainly. Walk safely across our land, Ranger."

Behind Ganat the door opened and the guard Susel stepped within. Sian moved her hand.

"Escort the Wood Wise to the gate, first stopping at the kitchen so that he may replenish his supplies."

"Yes, Engenium." The guard gave the casual nod which is a high mark of respect among the Sea Folk.

Ganat bowed once more. "Lady," he murmured. Straightening, he gave Meri a smile that was not the best he had from the man during their journey, though it was perhaps the most earnest.

"Rest safe, brother, and heal among kin," he said softly. "Send word through the trees, when you're able."

Meri's eye stung. He reached out and gripped the other's arm above the elbow.

"Walk canny, Ranger," he said.

"And you." Ganat turned and followed Susel out of the room.

The door closed, leaving Meri alone with his cousin.

For the moment, however, she seemed to have forgotten his existence. She raised her fisted hand, opening the fingers one-by-one, and stood staring at the charm nestled in her palm as if she had never seen such a thing before.

Abruptly she spun on her heel, casting the charm down on the desk, and swung back, her eyes on his face, her own showing a tinge of pink along high cheeks.

"You cannot think I sent that thing to you!"

Oh, thought Meri, could he not?

"As of this moment," he observed, "I am free to think what I might." He raised an eyebrow, unable to resist. "Though that, of course, may speedily change."

"Oh!" She spun away from him and stamped over to the window, staring out over the sea with her arms folded tightly across her chest.

Meri sighed, walked over to one of the canvas chairs and sat himself down to wait while the Engenium of Sea Hold grappled with her temper.

There had been a time when Sian could not have risen to rule. Connected by blood to the Queen as she was, yet that blood was mixed, as was Meri's own. His, however, was a simple admixture of Wood and Sea Wise. Sian was Sea Wise, well enough-but her mother had been High Fey, of one of the lesser houses. The Queen's mother proceeded from that same lesser house, which was, to hear any of the full remaining of the Elder Houses tell the tale, an abomination.

Meri had been born after the war, and had never known a domain under the proper rule of the Elder Fey, nor had he much patience for those arguments which were firmly based upon purity of blood. In his experience, ability counted-and the present Queen, upstart house or no, had no equal in state craft. She could lead, she did lead, and so she ought to lead.

His cousin Sian, however . . .

She whirled away from the window and came to where he sat, falling to her knees beside his chair. The face she raised for his scrutiny was damp with tears.

"Cousin, let us call truce until you are rested at least. Hostilities may commence tomorrow after breakfast. But for the moment, allow me to see you! It has been so long . . ."

She raised a hand to his face, her fingers tracing the thin scar across his left cheek, then the long one that slanted up from the patch, across his forehead, and into his hair.

"They said you were . . . terribly wounded," she whispered.

"Those are the least of what they did," he answered, his voice rough.

"I would not have had it happen," Sian murmured. "And to see you thus, after you have been asleep so long! Your kest . . ." She looked down, extended a hand and touched the elitch branch at his belt, setting the leaves to whispering.

"The chyarch," he said, striving for a mild tone-"and Healer Ganat, also-suggest that I may wish to retire to Vanglewood."

Sian shook her head. "I think it is perhaps best that you stay here."

"What-" he began, but she put her fingers over his lips.

"Tomorrow," she said. "Now that you are home, tomorrow is soon enough. For tonight, let us feed you and settle you into your rooms." She moved her fingers and rose, holding her hand down as if to help him rise.

Or as a gesture of peace.

Sighing, Meri put his hand in hers and came, slowly, to his feet.

Chapter Eighteen.

Over the years Becca had learned not to permit herself to startle suddenly. Not only would such movement set her sister to nattering about fidgety invalids but it would also, depending on circ.u.mstance, serve to spill the tea, or tear the roots or leaf of a growing thing, or distort the pattern of thread-count or lead to any number of unhandy outcomes. Treasures to guard . . . well! Of late, her isolation and social invisibility had oft been her greatest treasure.

And so she rode with that will-not-to-startle foremost in her thoughts, then, feeling a slight reprieve from the oppression about her, she mindfully wrapped that will about her like an over-large shawl, covering herself, and her saddlebags with the precious journals, seeds, and herb kit, over Rosamunde's back and croup, and mentally sealed it with the strongest brooch she could imagine, with a pin almost as long as a dagger.

Sensible or not, the sealing of that imaginary shawl settled her and drew a backward, arched-eyebrow glance from the not-quite imperturbable gentleman who led them into ruin. His expression was that of surprise, perhaps, or merely distraction.

The bend in the road was much further than she had supposed. The air grew heavy; breathless. Rosamunde's paces felt mis-paced until Becca realized that the steps were solid-but the sounds were odd.