That in mind, Feich rose stiffly, moved the candlesticks back to the fireplace mantle, doused the wretched incense and opened a window, letting in cold night air. Then he gathered up two of his personal guards (one was a Dearg, now, so as to send a strong political message), and went over to Ochanshrine.

Caime Cadder, he knew, was wont to worship at night when the holy Osraed were tucked away in their private chambers or dining in the Abbis refectory. Accordingly, he went to the Shrine proper and was not disappointed; Cadder was there in the bottom-most tier of seats, eyes rolled back into his head, lips moving soundlessly, hands folded obsequiously in his lap.

Feich's lip curled. Perhaps that had been his failing with the smoky red stone-he had not made himself look ridiculous enough. Leaving his guards to hover nearby, he moved to sit next to the cleirach, pinning him with a gaze as chill as the water in the belly of Ochan's sea cave.

As if he felt that chill, Caime Cadder shivered and opened his eyes. He all but leapt from his seat when he saw who sat beside him.

"Regent Feich! What-whatever are you-?"

"I have it," Feich said, patting a velvet pouch at his waist. "But I can't use it. You must show me how."

"I have something to show you," Catahn had said. The air around him shimmered and danced with antic.i.p.ation and Taminy, looking up at him from Wyth's ma.n.u.script, smiled.

"Show me? Show me what?"

"If you'd come with me . . . ?" Diffidently, he'd held out his hand. Taminy had taken it and allowed him to lead her from the room.

They had pa.s.sed through the heart of Hrofceaster and out again into a courtyard snug in the windless lee of the crags. It had been showered with sunshine the moment they stepped from the shelter of the fortress and she had been delighted with the play of light on the water of a spring-fed fountain-water cascading from the mountain face that rose steeply to form the rearward wall of the court. Twisted pines sat here and there in huge wooden pots amid hand-hewn benches; wild vine roses twined up walls that glittered with mica and quartz. A few brave blooms even dared the wintry day.

"It looks poor now, I know," Catahn had said. "But in spring-"

She hadn't let him finish the apology, but leapt to throw her arms around his neck and kiss his bearded cheek. "It's beautiful," she told him. "The most beautiful gift I've ever known. Thank you, Catahn."

A second kiss deepened the stain of red that hid beneath his beard. He had barely spoken to her as they sat together watching the Sun shift the shadows across the little court.

She sat now, blanketed, on one of the wooden benches in a small pool of sunshine-soon to disappear as the Sun traveled over the ramparts of Catahn's fortress. The roses were without bloom and nearly leafless, the conifers shivered in a chill breeze, but the Sun yet gave warmth and strewed diamonds in the spring's icy flow. The Ren's gift was beautiful and dear.

She had been in commune with Iseabal, ensconced now at Halig-liath, and mulled over what the girl's aislinn messages told her. The Gilleas had come to Nairne at her summons, had met with The Claeg and had been delivered his talisman. None had been more astonished than Aine-mac-Lorimer to discover that she was, in spirit, the key to that talisman.

Taminy afforded a smile for that. Her message had been well-received; The Gilleas had enlisted himself in her Cause and would travel with The Claeg to Creiddylad, but not before they visited the Jura, the Graegam, the Madaidh and the Skarf. With the strength of those Houses they would press Airleas's Regent to return Colfre's heir to the throne of Caraid-land.

She prayed for them every success, but knew that, ultimately, the Chieftains themselves must decide the fate of their Houses. She could only speak to their spirits, seek access to their souls. If they barred those doors in her face . . .

She looked up, sensing approach long before the heavy pinewood door in Hrofceaster's flank creaked to announce her visitor. She frowned. Odd, this visit, and unexpected.

"Such a marvel!" Deardru-an-Caerluel stopped in the middle of Taminy's courtyard before the fountain pool, her eyes on the cascade of water from the riven rock of Baenn-an-ratha. "A garden in the heart of Catahn's fortress. Eyslk told me of it, but I could not believe. I'd to see it with my own eyes before that." Those eyes moved to Taminy's face. "A gift from the Ren, she said."

Taminy nodded, smiling now, but still attempting to probe gentle fingers of sense into the older woman's mood. "He wanted me to have a bit of home. I'm looking forward to seeing the roses bloom again."

"He wants you . . . to make this your home, Lady. Those roses will not bloom until late spring."

Unease fluttered in Taminy's heart. Deardru was overfull of something that clearly distressed her. "Speak plainly, mam. Why have you come?"

The full lips twisted upward. "Your magic doesn't inform you? You're not the Wicke Eyslk believes you, then."

"I'm not a Wicke, nor does Eyslk believe me to be one. She knows what I am."

The Mistress-an-Caerluel turned to face her full on. "And you know what Catahn is. Yet you let him stay close to you."

"And this distresses you? Why?"

"I have told you why. Catahn is not what he seems to be. Perhaps your Gift has bewicked him, confused him, made him seem gentle and meek. He is neither. Catahn is a man of strong will and stronger desires. He sees what he wants and takes it and what he doesn't want, he puts aside-forever."

Taminy tried to fan warmth into her suddenly chill core. "You speak of your husband-Catahn's brother."

"I do. Catahn wanted . . ." Her lips thinned, tightened. ". . . what he knew was his brother's by right. And he did not care whose suffering he caused in having it."

Taminy looked over at the fountain, its water bubbling clean and cleansing from the ageless rock face. There was a message in that wonder of nature, but she was unable to fathom it. What had she said to Airleas-that strong emotion and the aidan combined with difficulty?

"I have not spoken of this to Catahn," she said. "I felt no need-"

Deardru laughed. "Liar."

Taminy glanced at her sharply. "I felt no need to confront him with accusations or humiliate him by insisting that he resolve my-"

The older woman's dark brows flung upward. "Your what, child? Your fears? Your distress?"

"My unease. I can't believe Catahn guilty of what you suggest."

"That he caused his brother's death."

Taminy nodded. "That he deliberately put his brother in harm's way. I can believe that you believe it. That, mam, is what distresses me."

"And it distresses me to see you-a young, innocent cailin-fast in the clutches of this man. A man I know to be guilty. Speak to Catahn-"

"Perhaps you should speak to him, mam."

She shook her head, dark hair a cloud on the folds of her woolen cloak. "I have spoken to him, child. Years ago. But you see, I have a child to think of. A family. To speak further would be unwise."

"You can't believe yourself in danger from Catahn." A statement of fact. Deardru-an-Caerluel did not believe herself in danger.

Still, she pretended, lowering her head and quivering as if near tears. "If he were to find me here, talking to you . . ."

Taminy rose. "Please, mam, let us stop this dance. You aren't afraid of Catahn, but you do hate him-that much is clear. I understand that you believe he has taken your dead husband's birth-right-"

Deardru's head jerked up, her eyes flashing. "He took more than that, Lady Taminy. Yes, let us now stop the dance. I'll tell you what Catahn Hageswode took from his brother-his place in my bed. It was me Catahn wanted, as he now wants you. And he had me, and fathered a child on me. Eyslk isn't Catahn's niece, she's his daughter."

It took all of Taminy's strength not to thrust her hands over her ears, not to cry the words that shouted in her head: Stop! Oh, stop! Take back these things! Unsay them! But they could not be taken back nor could what lay beneath them in Deardru-an-Caerluel's heart and mind-the memory of Catahn's overwhelming presence, the galling hatred at his later betrayal.

So Taminy forced different words to her lips: "Why do you tell me this? What is it you imagine I should do?"

Deardru moved to stand before her, to take her hands in a motherly grasp. "Osmaer you may be, Lady, but you are yet a child. I cannot help but look at you and see my own daughter- Catahn's daughter-not so much younger than you. Again, I look at you and see myself all those years ago. I cannot stand by and see your life played as mine was. You think he is a convert to your Cause." She shook her head. "He is a convert only to his own cause. As to what you should do-I think you must free yourself from his grasp. Escape this place."

"I'm not a prisoner here, mam, and Catahn befriends me in all sincerity."

"You forget who you deal with, child. A Hillwild. A Hageswode. The aidan is strong in these mountains, but nowhere is it stronger than in the men of that family. They could confound the Meri, Herself, with that guile."

Through their clasped hands, messages flowed. This is true, proclaimed one; that is not, whispered another. Which was which? Taminy, for all her attention to those messages, could not tell. Not now. Not here. Not under the barrage of Deardru-an-Caerluel's regard. She would need to put on Truth to determine the truth, but first, she must speak to Catahn.

She composed herself carefully, looked the older woman in the eye and said, "Thank you, mam, for your concern. I will speak to Catahn of this, if nothing else, for Eyslk's sake. Does she know . . . ?"

"That she's Catahn's child? No. I never told her. For her own sake, it's best she believes her 'Uncle' is a great man."

"I see." Taminy disengaged herself from Deardru's touch. "Please, I must excuse myself. Catahn is looking for me."

Deardru's face blanched, betraying real fear. "Then I must go. He must not find me here." She reached back momentarily to grasp Taminy's hand again. "Please, don't tell him of this visit. With your aidan, you might have gleaned this knowledge elsewhere. Please, Lady."

"I won't betray you," Taminy said and watched as the other woman bolted from the courtyard.

She looked back at the bench where she had sat. The spot of sunlight was gone. Reaching to the Meri for warmth, marshaling her composure, Taminy went to meet Catahn.

In the aislinn world of Catahn's aidan, Taminy's distress had sounded as loud as the fortress's alarm bell. He had no way to interpret its meaning or determine its source, he knew only that it was. Before he even knew where it had arisen, it was lidded.

He feared a physical attack on her, but couldn't imagine who might perpetrate such an attack. Then he thought that she must have received some disturbing news from Iseabal or Aine.

He searched the fortress from bottom to top, checking her favorite haunts, asking every waljan he encountered where their Mistress might be. It was Wyth Arundel-as ever, slaving over his ma.n.u.script- who said he thought Taminy might have gone up to her garden to meditate. Catahn was headed there when he saw her coming down the stairs from the upper reaches.

She hesitated when she saw him and there was no welcoming smile on her lips when their eyes met. Instead, she searched him inside-out while he, astounded, let his guard fall open and waited, daring to think nothing.

At last, he dared speak. "My Lady, what's happened? I felt . . ." He wasn't sure what he had felt, so the flow of words stopped.

She beckoned him to accompany her and he did, moving in silence beside her to her private rooms. He did not come here often, had never stayed more than a second or two. It seemed inappropriate for him to see the place where she slept and bathed, where she walked clothed for sleeping . . . or unclothed. He set a guard on his thoughts, afraid what they might betray.

Once inside, he stood uncertainly by the door while she moved to rouse the embers sleeping in her hearth. She seemed preoccupied, her movements stiff and tentative. The empty time gave him a chance to study himself as he stood there, waiting. He could almost laugh at what he saw; Ren Catahn Hageswode, Chieftain of the most powerful of the Hillwild clans reduced to a large, uncertain puddle by this lowland woman.

The smile that tugged at his lips ossified. No, not a woman, a girl. Not merely a girl, but Osmaer. The Meri's Essence, Firstborn of the Spirit, had resided in that pure form. She was a walking beam of light, compared to which he was a clot of filthy clay.

She turned to look at him, her green eyes filled with what he could only take as great sorrow.

Impulsively, he started forward. "Lady! Taminy! Please speak. You wither me with such looks."

She did speak, then, and the words that came out of her mouth struck him all but dead. "Desary is not your only child."

Somehow his dead husk produced a voice. "No."

Taminy nodded. "Eyslk is also your daughter. Out of your brother's widow, Deardru."

He closed his eyes. Dear G.o.d, surely he would be permitted to die now, but he doubted even that would provide escape from this. What must she think of him?

"Yes."

"Catahn, answer me plainly. Did you keep your brother up at Moidart in the hope that he would die?"

Eyes open now, Catahn, felt a roil of anger surge beneath his shame. There was only one place she could have heard that tell. His fists clenched hard on his growing rage.

"Deardru. Only she would have laid that blame at my feet. No, Taminy. I did not deal my brother into death's hands. I loved Raenulf, and were I not the village Father, I would have happily gone up to Moidart myself. I even offered-and I say this with shame-that I would ask one of our cousins to go in his stead. He refused. With him it was a matter of family honor, of duty to our southern kin. Only when he found his wife pregnant did he ask to return, and I agreed, gladly. I can only believe-and I've never understood this-that it was the will of G.o.d that he die before he could return home. Days, Lady. Mere days and he would have been home. Safe again with his wife and unborn child."

"With his child? You said Eyslk was your daughter."

Catahn's face reddened. "Eyslk is my daughter-I admit that-but the child Deardru carried then was Raenulf's, not mine. G.o.d take my soul if I would lie with my brother's wife while he lived." The anger turned another time, trying to unseat shame. "Deardru led you to think I coveted her and made her an adulteress. I did not. She was not. She was true to my brother's love as I was true to my wife's, until Raenulf died."

Taminy sat down on a couch near the hearth.

He sensed that, heard it rather than saw it, for he could not bear to look at her. He listened to the fire whispering in the hearth, the wind prodding the windows. In a moment, he began to fill the silence with words. They were difficult words, each a sliver of shame, extracted with pain.

"When news came to us that Raenulf had been killed, Deardru fell ill with grief. She lost the child she carried-their first child. It all but killed her. Desary was above a year old then, and Geatan was pregnant a second time. I think it was more than Deardru could stand to see our happiness. She came to me one day and begged me to father a child on her. She'd been deprived of bearing a child to the Hageswodes; she made it no secret that she thought I bore some fault for it. It seemed right to her that I should replace what she had lost. I was stunned mute."

His face burned now as it had burned then. Then, he had felt as if the Baenn-an-ratha had heaved beneath his feet-now it seemed to shudder like a sick dog.

"I could only believe she was grief-kissed. I bid her think what she was asking. When she pressed me, I told her what she wanted was unthinkable. I was husband to Geatan; it was Geatan I loved. I had no desire for Deardru-none. I tried to stay aloof from her-hard, as she lived at Hrofceaster-and, for her part, she reminded me constantly of her plight.

"Some months after, Geatan sickened. She lost our child and grief stole away her health. I lived in fear that I would lose her as well. For a while, it seemed she lingered between life and death. Deardru began to nurse her then, and was a great help-a great solace to us both. I thought she had forgotten her desire for a Hageswode child until one day Geatan . . ."

Possessed by a sudden nervous energy, he tugged at his heavy wool tunic, at his belt. He moved restively to the window.

"Geatan?" Taminy prompted him, her voice gentle.

He closed his eyes momentarily. Such was his shame, even that gentleness was brutal.

"Deardru had laid her case before my wife. My wife who, in her weakness, could not fulfill my desires. Spirit! My only true desire was for her health. But Geatan saw that Deardru was bereft, while she had a husband and a daughter and her own life, now mending. She saw a family obligation to be met. And she . . . saw that, in my own weakness, I now found Deardru appealing. She added her voice to Deardru's and begged me to give her a child."

He shook his head, making the silver bells woven into his hair sing. "Such a twist dance the mind does when it seeks to convince the heart a foul path is fair. Who was to be harmed? My own wife had given me leave, my daughter need never know. I was not unfaithful. Deardru needed what I had to give-a seed, nothing more. Pretty speeches, all, but what it came to was my own desire. Need, I called it, as Geatan had. I went to Deardru, burning beforehand, cold as ice, after. I was glad when she conceived. I didn't touch her after that.

"Soon, Geatan's health returned and I thought it was over. But Geatan's sickness had ended her childbearing days. She grieved a bit for it, but we were happy. We had Desary. We were a family. Not long after Eyslk's birth, Deardru came to me again and, again, asked me for a child. For my sake, she said. She knew Geatan could have no more babies; she offered for the sake of the Hageswodes. I refused. Again, she asked, and again I refused. She began to hound me, to speak to me of love and desire. I believed she saw my brother in me and that her grief had overpowered her. I felt pity for her, but when she tried to get to me once again through Geatan, I sent her from the fortress to live in the village."

"And she has never forgiven you."

"She has never forgiven me."

"This is your horrible, shameful secret?"

"There is more. When Desary was twelve, Geatan died." Dear G.o.d, he could still feel the shaft of bereavement. "It was a stupid thing-a fall from her horse. The village Healer was away at Lac-an-ghlo. On the night we buried her, Deardru came to me to offer comfort . . . and more. Perhaps I thought that in the dark I could pretend that Deardru was Geatan. Whatever the dance my mind did, I took Deardru into my bed. Once. Once was all. In the morning, she put to me the idea that I should marry her and acknowledge Eyslk as my own. She was already married to Garradh-an-Caerluel-had two sons by him-but for me, she would let them go. I put her out of Hrofceaster and have not spoken to her from that day to this."

"But you brought Eyslk here to be educated."

"Eyslk is my daughter. She shouldn't be punished for the manner of her birth; for her mother's willfulness and her father's weakness. I sometimes fear that there is a poison in Deardru. If I can keep that poison from infecting Eyslk . . ."

"Eyslk is a good child, sweet and bright and true. She doesn't carry her mother's poison. Nor do you."

"I carry my own."

"Poison? Weakness, you called it. Is it so evil to be weak? No one is entirely without weakness."

"You are."