Bevol's brows ascended. "I don't know of one. There's a Runeweave for the printing of books, of course, so the text is clear and the ink won't smudge or fade." He eyed the neatly scripted pages. "I don't suppose anyone has ever had need of such an inyx. The old books are journals, added to year upon year and the only copies are made wholesale. I doubt anyone has ever had a job quite like this one-extracting pieces of the text ...Why don't you invent your own Weave?"

"I?" Wyth nearly laughed. "I, invent a Runeweave?"

Bevol shrugged. "Why not? You're entitled. Heh! Quite literally. And if you want to be finished anytime soon ..."

Wyth followed his eyes to the stack of Holy Books and Osraed Treatises waiting to be read. "Yes. And I must be done soon." That was a troubling thought and made him raise his eyes to Bevol's, seeking some reassurance. He got none.

"Yes, I believe you must."

A Prentice scurried to present himself, then, and informed the Osraed Bevol that his presence was requested in the small audience chamber.

"It's the Ren Catahn, Master," said the boy awfully. "The Osraed Eadmund is already with him. I understand it's about the General Assembly of the Cyne's Council."

"Ah, yes. This is no surprise. Tell Eadmund I'll be there immediately." He turned back to Wyth. "Supper tonight, Wyth?"

Heat raced across Wyth's face, followed by an intense chill. Oh, yes! he thought. Oh, no! "I ... I don't know if ..." If what, you idiot?

Bevol was smiling at him. "She overwhelms?"

Wyth could only nod. "I don't know what to think of her. I don't know ... how to behave." He glanced about the library. "Does anyone else know who-?"

"No. You and I and Pov-Skeet. Gwynet, too, but Gwynet is too young, I think, to understand what that means."

"I empathize," Wyth murmured, then furrowed his brow in puzzlement. No, he was more than puzzled. "You mean none of the other Osraed know her?"

Bevol shook his head.

"But ... how can that be?"

Bevol shrugged. "It simply is. Supper?"

Wyth licked his lips. "Thank you ... yes. I'll come."

When Bevol had gone, Wyth tapped the lightbowl on his work table and watched the glow eddy and pulse. No one else knew. How could they not when she was a magnet? No, not a magnet-a crystal.

Someone rustled among the shelves behind him, breaking into his rumination. Flexing his fingers, he bent back to his work.

Osraed Bevol found the Ren Catahn Hillwild in the small annex to the Osraed council chamber, pacing before the tall windows and worrying the beaded sash of his leather shawl. He was a big man, blocking the instreaming sunlight and casting a long, broad shadow across the polished wooden floor. He turned at Bevol's footfall, sunlight glinting from the gold and silver filigree woven into his burgundy-black hair and beard, and flashing from the neat row of cuffs that bound a braided sidelock.

Bevol held out his arms in greeting. "Catahn! Your presence honors the place and cheers its people."

The Hillwild lord awarded him a wide smile, rendered especially brilliant by its dark frame of beard, and moved to smother him in a bear's embrace. "Bevol! God's Eyes, but it's good to see you! Pity we have not more pleasant things to discuss."

Bevol stepped back and glanced to where Osraed Eadmund sat at a small table, grimly shuffling papers. "Perhaps we should sit and discuss these unpleasant things-the quicker to deal with them."

The Osraed seated himself at the table, but Catahn's haunches had no more than grazed the velvet cushion before he was up again, pacing.

"Our Cyne ignores us," he said. "He stoppers his ears and blinkers his eyes and turns from his own mountains to look to someone else's seas and valleys. And if that were not enough, he insults us, slights us." He stopped pacing and faced the two Osraed. "He forgets himself, Chosen Ones. He forgets his duty to the Hillwild." He motioned at the roll of leather among the papers on the table. "We have inquiries, petitions, plaints which have waited months to be taken up in the Hall. Some of these issues have lain since last Assembly. And there, they were set aside as if they were of no consequence. The education of our children," he added, "is of consequence!"

Bevol pulled the leather scroll about so he could view its contents. He glanced at Eadmund. "Have you copied this?"

Eadmund shook his head. "I thought we should first discuss it. If there are modifications to be made-"

"Yes, yes, of course. Catahn, are you certain about this business with the Caraidin scouts?"

The big man nodded with a jingle of ornamentation. "There are no finer trackers than the Hillwild of Hrofceaster. They know how to read signs. The Cyne's men are scouting our villages, watching our holts."

"But to what end?" asked Eadmund. "Have you confronted them? Asked them what they're about?"

The Ren laughed, teeth flashing white in his dark face. "Oh, aye. Some've been faced off. They pose themselves as vagabonds, oddjobmen. Then off they go. And they dog us, going from village to village, from holt to holt. Watching." He gritted his teeth in a grimace; Bevol thought he even growled. "We do not like being watched."

"What do you suspect them of?" Bevol asked.

The Ren's queer amber eyes narrowed. "If the Cyne was not my own kinsman and covenanted ally, I would say they were assessing the strength of my fortifications, estimating my forces."

Eadmund's face went white. "Why should he-? Is there a chance they might not be the Cyne's men?"

In answer, Catahn Hillwild reached beneath his shawl and pulled out a pouch. Holding it upside-down, he let a piece of metal the size of an ambre fall to the table with a clatter.

Bevol picked it up and turned it in his hands.

"Sash clip," said Catahn.

"Yes, and bearing the emblem of the House of Malcuim," murmured Bevol. "Caraidin Guard."

"It might have been stolen," conjectured Eadmund. "Or perhaps the man who lost it is an ex-soldier."

"Aye, either thing might be possible," admitted Catahn. "But though they claim to be rough men, they speak a mighty fine tongue in private speech. And of their clothing, only their cloaks and tunics and boots are rough. I have it on good authority that what they wear close to their skin is fairer by far. Then there is the fact of their origins. My men have back-tracked several of their parties. They're coming up from the old outposts in the foothills."

"The outposts? But those have been empty for years," objected Eadmund. "Decades."

"Well, they're empty no longer. They're provisioned and they're populated."

"But flying no banners, I presume."

"No, Osraed Bevol. Not a scrap of cloth on any standard. But the forces are there and they crossed Feich land to get there. Now, as the Feich are a jealous lot, I would expect them to know when pack trains cross their lands and, as the Cyne's Durweard is a Feich, I would expect the Cyne to know what the Feich know."

"Gauging your strength," mused Bevol. "Why, I wonder? To know how many men he may call upon to raise an army?"

"Why would he not come straight about it and ask after our forces?"

Bevol raised his eyebrows. "Perhaps because he wants no one to know he plans to raise a fighting force?"

Catahn considered that. "Aye. He is talking cozy with the Deasach. Perhaps he doesn't trust them. Or perhaps it's the Hillwild he doesn't trust. I want to know the whichever of it, Osraed. My folk are nervous with this cat-footing. And they're angry on other counts, as well."

"Yes," said Bevol, glancing again at the petition. "I see the schools are not being kept up."

"Ah! The schools!" The Hillwild's face reddened. "That's the rawest of it, Osraed." He moved to perch on one corner of the chair opposite Bevol. "Two years have passed in which we have petitioned your Brothers of the Jewel for teachers, for books to fill our wisdom halls. None have come. They seem content to abandon us to ignorance."

"Surely-" began Eadmund, but a look from the Hillwild hushed him.

"Only the Meri remembered us last year, sending several of Her Chosen to us. But it is not enough. Our schoolrooms are crowded beyond their capacity. What teachers we have are unable to take in all the children, and some of the best of those sent to us afore time have been recalled to schools in Creiddylad and Lin-liath. Our Cleirachs have called upon the elder children to teach the younger, but some holts have no teachers at all. None. If their children will be taught, they must travel to a village or holt that has a school. And, to add salt to the wound, the Cyne has raised our Mercer taxes. Our petitions fall on deaf ears."

"A grave matter," Bevol agreed. He took a deep breath. "I think perhaps we, ourselves, must arrange for the Cleirachs you need. We have, also, Aelder Prentices who may be assigned as teachers. They are not full Cleirachs, but their knowledge should serve you well."

Eadmund uttered a cough of protest. "Osraed Bevol-forgive me, but-without the approval of the Hall and the Cyne-not to mention the Brothers of the Jewel-how can we presume ...I mean, it is their responsibility to assign Cleirachs to the schools."

"It is a responsibility they have obviously defaulted on. If they are not willing or able to undertake it, then we must. By the Meri's Kiss, we must. We will inform them of what we are doing, of course. And-of course-we must inquire why they are not doing it ...And why it never reached the floor of the Hall."

Eadmund shifted in his seat. "But should we not at least petition-"

"That is precisely what the Ren Catahn is doing, Eadmund-petitioning. But now the Hall will not hold session until only God and the Cyne know when. Our only other recourse is to remand these plaints to the Privy Council."

Eadmund wrinkled his nose and Catahn let out a bark of humorless laughter.

"And have them disappear!" said the Hillwild scathingly. "That's another issue, Osraed. The Privy Council no longer has Hillwild membership."

"What?" said Eadmund weakly. "Why not?"

"Ren Rhum was our appointee. You recall him, Osraed Bevol-he was from Alt-Reelig. Aye, well, his brother died and he took his family and went up home to bury him and set his affairs in order. At the end of a six-week, he was curried a missal from the Cyne and Council saying he was too long gone and had been replaced by an Eiric of the Saewode."

Bevol frowned. "And his second? Surely he had a hand-picked alternate?"

Catahn watched one huge hand flex and clench on the table top. "Luthai. Dead by drowning a month after Rhum left. Her family was sent home-they were lodged within Mertuile, so they had no recourse."

"Well, of course, they'd have had no reason to stay, would they?" asked Eadmund weakly.

Catahn gave the Osraed a look that drained any remaining color from his cheeks. "Funny thing, that. Her eldest son was love-bound to a daughter of the Eiric Cinge-a new member of the Assembly, as you may recall. The wedding has been cancelled. By order of the Privy Council, according to Luthai's widower. And that's the unseen, Osraed." Catahn poked the leather scroll with a stout finger. "You will not find, in our plaint, mention of all the Hillwild courtiers who have been 'excused' from their posts, nor of all the marriages between Caraidin and Hillwild that have been ... postponed. How may we petition about that?"

He hauled himself up from the table and paced back to the windows. "It galls me, Osraed. He seems bent to cut our ties, one by one. In the name of the Gwyr, how can he, when his own mother-aye, and his own grandmother-were Hillwild?"

Bevol sighed and sat back in his chair. Worse and worse. "We have already sent a message to Cyne Colfre," he told Catahn, "expressing our conviction of the dire need to convene the Hall before Harvest. We can only hope he will respond. Until then, we will send you such teachers and books as we can locate or spare. About the other matters, we can do nothing ... but pray."

"Is there no Weave you can perform, Osraed, that can unravel these matters?"

"Ah, we may look, Catahn, but we may not touch."

The Hillwild nodded. "Nor can we, without appearing disloyal to the House Malcuim. Aye, more bite to that beast-I am blood-bound to this Cyne of ours. There are times I wish I was not."

Wyth was preparing to mount his horse when his mother came riding up the estate road and into the front court of Arundel, hair flying, eyes a-light, cheeks flushed to rose. She startled him in more ways than one; just to see her look like that was a revelation. His memory provided him no picture of her that contained such life. Not even in his dreams had she ever seemed so vibrant.

He watched her pull up and dismount while, behind her, a second horse and rider galloped into the forecourt. It was the Eiric Iasgair-a widower some years younger than the Moireach. Wyth was startled anew at the keen interest in the other man's eyes as they followed her ... and at his own lack of jealousy.

The Moireach approached him, laughing, arms out. She embraced him and gave him a motherly peck on each cheek. "Wyth! You're not just coming in!"

"Just going out. Master Bevol has asked me to dine with him this evening at Gled."

A slight frown curled between her brows. "Then you won't be having supper with us?" She glanced back at her riding companion, now dismounting from a bay mare. "Aidan was so hoping to hear your Tell. He was in Tuine during Tell Fest."

"Some other time, perhaps, Mother. Master Bevol was most insistent."

The Moireach made a dismissive gesture. "Surely, you don't need to call him 'Master' anymore. After all, you're his equal now." She laughed charmingly for the Eiric's benefit, tossing him a winsome smile.

Wyth shuffled uncomfortably. "Mother, I may be an Osraed, but I doubt I shall ever be Bevol's equal."

"Nonsense, Wyth. You're newly chosen. Bevol-a-Gled is an old man. Besides, the Meri called you Her son. She drew you into Her waters. There's glory in that, Wyth," she added, smiling up at him and touching his cheek. "Your light shines so brightly ..."

He glanced uneasily at Eiric Iasgair, blood flushing his face. "Mother, please, I-"

"You're too humble by far. Everyone says so. Surely you don't have to bow and scrape and curry favor to Bevol-a-Gled."

Wyth tried not to feel the anger coiling in his heart. He pushed her hand gently away from his face. "I have never curried favor to any of the Osraed, but I owe Master Bevol all my respect. Besides, I need to consult with him about my work." He patted the thick portfolio tucked beneath his arm.

His mother glanced at it, new eagerness leaping in her eyes. She laid a hand on the polished leather. "Oh, do stay for supper. You can tell us all about your work."

Wyth felt his face flush yet again and wondered if he could possibly get any redder. "I'm sure the Eiric wouldn't be interested."

"Oh, but I would, Osraed Wyth." The other man assured him. "But please, don't trouble yourself on my account. I'll hear of it some other time-at your convenience, of course." He finished with a courtly bow of his head.

Wyth smiled, relieved. The courtesy was sincere. "Perhaps tomorrow evening, Eiric Iasgair-if that is convenient for you?"

"If the Moireach is amenable." He looked to Brighid Arundel.

She smiled, but beneath the smile seethed fierce frustration. Wyth felt it as heat beating against his face. He stepped back from the furnace.

"Of course," the Moireach said and laughed again, falsely. "And I'd forgotten you might have another reason to frequent Gled Manor." She turned coy eyes to the Eiric. "There's a girl there. A fair-haired cailin with blue eyes. One of Osraed Bevol's foundlings. I dare say she's the attraction at Gled, not some fusty old scholar."

Mention of Taminy as if she were no more than a village flirt was enough to stir Wyth's blood to rebellion. "Osraed Bevol is far from fusty, Mother," he said, moving quickly to mount his horse. "And Taminy ... Taminy's eyes are green."

The Moireach feigned surprise-no, not feigned, Wyth realized. Her surprise was quite real. "By the Kiss! It amazes me you recall their color at all. That tells a deep tale."

Wyth swung his leg over the saddle. "I have to go. I'll be late if I don't." There must be a Rune for keeping mothers at bay. "I look forward to our supper with pleasure, Eiric Iasgair. Until then. Good evening, Mother." He swooped to give her cheek a quick peck, then gathered up his horse and rode away.

"And who is this Taminy your son so is enamored of?" he heard the Eiric ask as the two led their horses toward the stable.

"Oh, some marsh bird Osraed Bevol loosed at Tell Fest. The local boys are agog. A great improvement over his last obsession. At least this one's not a Wicke."

Wyth willed his mount to a canter and got swiftly out of earshot.

During supper Wyth alternated between staring at Taminy and trying not to look at her at all. He had to concentrate to keep track of the conversation, made a fool of himself several times (he thought), and spoke in non-sequiturs.

When the meal was over, Gwynet and Skeet cleared the table while Wyth gathered up his portfolio with an eye to soliciting Osraed Bevol's help with his manuscript. But Bevol, begging his indulgence while he helped the youngsters with the dishes, disappeared, leaving Wyth alone in his study with Taminy and the suggestion that he show her his work.