"Do you want the Osraed Bevol here?"

"He's no doubt returned home. There's no need to call him back."

"You don't want your champion present? I find that odd."

"If my actions have brought this accusation upon me, it's my responsibility to face it, not Osraed Bevol's."

How calm she was. How composed. Any normal teenaged girl would be in tears now ... if she was innocent. He glanced at the Cirkemaster's daughter. Already her eyes were filling with fearful tears and her hands, clasped over her companion's arm, shook.

"Will you witness this?" he asked the group of young people. They nodded-eagerly, he thought. Good. Let them see this creature reveal herself. He raised his eyes, looking down the aisle over the head of the Spenser's girl. "And you, Osraed Saxan, will you witness the test of this cailin?"

Iseabal turned to her father, her eyes spilling tears. "Please, father, make him stop this. He wants to hurt Taminy."

"If Taminy is innocent," Ealad-hach observed, "then she need have no fear of hurt."

The Cirkemaster clenched his fists and thrust them into the pockets of his robe. "I can't see what you hope to prove, Osraed Ealad-hach. Osraed Wyth has given us news that makes the Art a noble pursuit for our cailin."

"This is true-the Art is noble. But there are dark inyx that are not part of the Art; there are dark Runes that are not to be woven."

"And how shall you prove that Taminy has woven such dark Runes?"

Ealad-hach allowed himself a grim smile. He dropped the runebag to the floor before the Sanctuary door and gestured toward the front of the Sanctuary. "Come to the altar and we shall see."

Once at the altar, he had Brys place Taminy, seated, upon the great, carved stone, while the witnesses fanned out below her. Then he reached into his belt pouch and brought forth the crystal there. He held it so that light struck it, shattering in its perfect facets.

"This is the crystal given to the Osraed Lin-a-Ruminea upon his Farewelling. Have you heard of this Osraed, cailin?"

She surprised him. "Yes," she said. "It was the Osraed Lin who advised Cyne Thearl in the time the histories call the Emerald Cusp."

Ealad-hach did not let his surprise show. "Lin-a-Ruminea was a man of surpassing wisdom and absolute purity. This is the crystal he wove with. It's name is Gwyr-pure-and it is said to be one of the purest stones in existence. A pure stone, as you may know, will not suffer itself to be used for the impure weavings of the wicked. Which is why," he added, "the sinful have never been able to raise the power enjoyed by the innocent."

He thrust the crystal nearly into Taminy's face. "Take this crystal, cailin. Let us see what it tells us about you."

She reached up her hands without hesitation and took the stone, holding it before her eyes. For a moment, nothing happened, causing feet to shuffle and eyes to trade secret glances, then the core of the crystal caught fire. Light erupted from it in a blinding cascade-streamers of flame like the fire shows of Farewelling reached up and out, harmlessly passing the stunned watchers, arcing to the limit imposed by the stone walls. The walls, themselves, began to glow then, as if the light, liquid, poured over them, coating the cold stone. The Eibhilin beams moved as if alive, weaving themselves into an intricate awning that wheeled over the awed and stupefied. The awning contracted slowly into a blazing web that held Taminy and the crystal within.

Osraed Ealad-hach clutched at his racing heart, barely able to take in what he was seeing, able only to cry mutely that it could not be. That this woman could not manipulate the Eibhilin energies through a pure stone. What did it mean? His mind flailed for an answer and found none.

He panicked. He must have time to think. He must wrench the crystal from her hands. Yes, it would at least make him seem to be in control of this trial. He willed his hands to move, but they would not. It was an ordeal of will just to press his lungs and throat into service.

He shrieked. "Stop!"

The web of light dissolved into a billion tiny points of incandescence, a glittering powder that settled to the Sanctuary floor, pulsed, and melted like snow before sun. Ealad-hach's heart and bowels trembled. He did not want to lift his eyes again, to see her mocking him, but he must. Control was necessary. He looked up quickly to catch her expression. So far from mocking, was it, he could almost imagine he saw wide-eyed, open-mouthed amazement there.

The girl shook herself, then, blinked as if waking, and proffered him the crystal. He took it gingerly, speechless. It scalded his fingers and he nearly dropped it before juggling it into a fold of his robe.

While he fumbled, Taminy slipped from the altar stone, bid the watchers daeges-eage and left the Sanctuary, stepping lightly over the discarded runebag. Ealad-hach turned to watch her, by now unsurprised that it did not cause her to hesitate.

There was a hush in his soul. A cold, dark silence. The stone was pure. He knew it was. He knew the impure could not handle it, could not use it. His startled mind reached into the quivering shadows and thrust forward the thought that the girl might be innocent. Perhaps he was looking for his Cwen Wicke in the wrong place, or perhaps there was no Cwen Wicke and his aislinn was, as Wyth had suggested, a portent of good rather than evil. What then? What if Taminy-a-Gled possessed nothing but a strong natural Gift?

From a place where time had stopped, Ealad-hach confronted the idea of Taminy's innocence. He closed his eyes and beheld her again, bathed in radiance, dripping it, shedding it like ... like the woman in his aislinn, the woman who rose from the Sea, laughing. He fought the mad desire to swoon under the sudden weight of his certitude-Taminy and that woman were one and the same; the Cwen Wicke of his nightmares had put on flesh.

The Osraed Lealbhallain let himself be awestruck, again, at the grand beauty of the Cyne's Cirke. The long nave, with its vaulted ceiling, looked to him like the rib cage of some giant, ossified Eibhilin beast who had lain down here and slept the ages away that men and women might have a place to worship. Light from windows set high on the flanks of the peaked roof poured down the walls in a myriad hues and tumbled across the floor. He could almost hear the bubbling froth of light.

The appointments, too, were magnificent-the huge, carved and polished doors with their copper, silver and brass trims and fittings; the raised dais of dark wood, polished by the feet and knees of Osraed, royalty and other penitent worshippers; the altar stone, a-glitter with crystalline fragments from Ochan's Cave; behind it, a standard bearing a great star of gold and crystal-symbol of the Meri's presence.

Of all things here, that altar stone was the constant. It had not been renewed or refurbished since its placement there by Cyne Kieran, called the Dark, in response to a prophecy that made him fearful of wedding at Halig-liath or Ochanshrine. It was Cyne Saeward who enlarged the Cirke from those original, relatively humble beginnings, and who retiled the floors, replaced the paneling and added the largest of the windows. Since then, no major changes had been made.

Colfre's alterations, Fhada had told him, lay concealed behind a great tapestry that hung just beyond the altar. Leal couldn't imagine what changes the Cyne believed justified the tariffs he was levying against local merchants. Surely nothing, Lealbhallain thought, could increase the grandeur of the place or enhance its sense of history.

He heard the wind-bells, then, from their aerie above the altar, and realized the Sanctuary had all but filled with worshippers. Beside him, Osraed Fhada, who had been lost in his own meditations, stirred and glanced around.

"Ah," he said, "the Cyne."

Leal turned to glance up the broad central aisle. It was, indeed, the Cyne and, with him, an entire entourage. Before him a pair of boys carried the standards of the House Malcuim and Colfre's personal crest-a dove bearing in its beak a wild sea-rose. Thereafter came the Cyne's Durweard, Daimhin Feich, followed by the Cyne himself and the Cwen Toireasa, both borne on thrones of gilt wood. Behind them, on a smaller throne, was the young Riagan, Airleas.

Leal ogled. He had worshipped at Ochanshrine these weeks past in the small seaside chapel called Wyncirke. Only this Cirke-dag had an invitation from Mertuile brought him and Fhada to Cyne's Cirke. He had never imagined this pageantry; down the broad central aisle the Royal Family was borne, followed by a troupe of court Eiric, Ministers and Osraed. The less impressive members of the congregation merely watched.

Osraed Fhada leaned close to Lealbhallain. "The first alteration our Cyne made here was to have the great aisle made greater that he and his Cwen might travel it enthroned."

Leal watched, as he was intended to, while the courtiers found themselves seats in the front row-cordoned off for them, Fhada said. The thrones continued on, to be set upon the altar itself, flanking the great stone. The standards, too, were placed there, one to each side of the golden staff which held the Meri's effigy.

Leal glanced sideways at Fhada. The older Osraed's face was flushed and his jaw set. He shook his head. "Sacrilege," he murmured. "Placing himself on the same altar as the Meri's Star."

Leal faced front again as the Cyne's Cirkemaster took his place at the altar stone and began the devotions. The worship was traditional; there were readings from the Corah and the Book of the Meri interspersed with congregational lays and stunning chants from the Cirke chorus, accompanied by fine musicians on fiddle, pipe and drum. It was, in all, a glorious worship, and Leal lost himself in the weave of sunlight, incense and song until the final prayers had been offered. Then, when traditionally the Cirkemaster would offer a blessing or commend some thought for the personal meditation of the worshippers, he instead placed an ornate wooden box upon the altar stone.

Leal recognized the motif upon its carved panels and a chill coursed up his spine. The Cyne rose then, to place himself, kneeling, before the altar stone. Whereupon, the Cirkemaster opened the box and removed from it a chalice. Water lapped gently at the sides of the cut crystal bowl while skillfully channeled sunlight leapt from the facets and raced like wildfire along the curves of the graceful stem.

The Star Chalice. A relic beneath which a war had once been fought. A ceremonial goblet created for the ascension of Cynes and Osraed. A vessel which Osraed Lealbhallain's lips had touched but once, upon his arrival at Ochanshrine. That sacred vessel was now lifted up before the crowd while the Osraed of Cyne's Cirke intoned the words usually reserved for coronations.

"Behold, Caraid-land. Behold your Cyne-Colfre, son of Ciarda of the House of Malcuim."

He gave the Chalice into the Cyne's hands and watched expressionlessly as Colfre raised it to his lips and sipped from it a draught of water taken from the place were the Halig-tyne and the Sea commingled.

Lealbhallain's senses halted. His lungs recalled on their own how to breathe, but he could no longer feel them. The Universe lay between his eyes and the Chalice and the beatific expression on Cyne Colfre's face.

Colfre opened his mouth and cried, "Ecstasy, O Meri! Your Voice is ecstasy! How beautiful to the ears is Your Song. I am moved! I am moved to tell of troubled and uncertain times. There are changes upon us, people of Caraid-land. Great and puzzling changes. The order of things is challenged!"

In the swell of murmurs that surrounded this pronouncement, Lealbhallain shook his head. Of course there were changes. They were in a Cusp. There were always changes in a Cusp. Why was the Cyne putting on the pretense of prophesying?

Rise.

Leal heard the word as clearly as if it had been shouted in his ear. No, he more than heard it-he felt it vibrate his frame.

Rise.

He rose.

To the altar.

He left his seat and slid out into the central aisle. Answering a prompting only he could hear, he moved toward the Cyne, amazed at his own audacity. He felt men leap to approach him, but none touched him or impeded his progress in any way. In a heartbeat he was face to face with the Cyne.

As Colfre, his eyes rolled blissfully back into his head, opened his mouth to speak again, Lealbhallain took the Chalice from his hands and held it aloft. In some fiery confluence of sun and crystal, a shaft of light caught the stone set in the heart of the Meri's Star and leapt from there to the Chalice. The bowl filled with glory, exciting in the congregation cries of astonishment.

Over the flurry of reaction, Lealbhallain heard himself say, "The Meri speaks through the mouths of Her Chosen. The Meri is known through the Counsel of the Divine. 'No man among you knows the changes I have wrought.' These are the words of the Meri."

He lowered the Chalice then, and, looking his Cyne squarely in the eye, took a sip of its contents. Salt and sweet. The warm wash of flavor embraced his tongue-the meeting place of the Halig-tyne and the Sea. He rolled the liquid in his mouth before swallowing it. Then, he handed the Chalice to the Cirkemaster.

"Return it to its place, Osraed," he said, then turned and left the Sanctuary.

Fhada met him at the doors. The older Osraed said nothing at first, preferring to watch him from the corner of one eye as they strode the Cirke's broad plaza toward the Cyne's Way. When his eyes touched the spires of Mertuile rising above the Way's nether end, Fhada's silence broke.

"What have you done, Osraed? And what, in the Meri's fair Name, prompted you to do it?"

"She prompted me." Leal's limbs shook with a sudden trembling realization of what he had just done. Adrenaline washed through his core, freezing him.

"She? The Meri, you mean?" Fhada's eyes seized his. "She spoke to you? You heard Her? There-in the Cirke?"

"She bid me rise, then She-She simply moved me."

"And the words?"

And the words. Leal grasped the links of his prayer chain, his eyes on Mertuile's massive landward flank. "Were not mine."

"Cyne Colfre won't know that. He will lay blame on you. Dear God, how will he interpret this?"

"To his advantage."

Fhada stopped and stared at him. "Those were not your words, either, I think."

"No, I suppose not. These are. What difference does it make how the Cyne interprets my actions? If my words are from the Meri, She has already taken his interpretation into account. And his reaction." Leal took a deep breath. "Yes. The Meri's will cannot be thwarted. Regardless of what may happen to me, Her will is served."

Fhada shook his head. "You shame me, Leal."

Leal was aghast. "What? No, Osraed Fhada. Don't say that."

Fhada laid a hand on his shoulder. "Let me speak. You shame me by being what I should be-what I should have been. Perhaps, even could have been. Cirke-dag after Cirke-dag I have sat in that Sanctuary watching the Cyne mold the worship to his own will. First the aisle and the thrones-they were set below the altar at first, you know, creeping closer with time until finally they appeared upon the altar itself. And the standards preceded them, growing taller by degrees until, as you saw, they fall just short of the Meri's standard. And to watch him drink from the Chalice-!" He shook his head. "He was to drink from that cup once in his life. Once, only, as he stood before the Stone to receive the Circlet of his office. And I, Fhada, sat and watched those things and did nothing."

"The Meri did not expect-"

"She did expect, Lealbhallain. Once, I could feel Her. Then. Now, there is only a guilty niggle. But even then-damn me!-even then, I resisted. And do you know why?"

"No, sir."

"Because men I respected told me to. Oh, I am not excusing myself, no. I merely want you to understand how I let myself be led astray-how I rationalized my inaction." He made a disgusted face. "The Osraed Ladhar said it. The Abbod, himself. 'Question these promptings, boy. They test you.' If you cannot trust the Abbod, I reasoned, who can you trust?"

Leal licked his lips, stunned to sweat by the implications of Fhada's words. "Osraed Ladhar is still Abbod."

"Indeed. He's aged now, certainly, but powerful."

Powerful. Fhada did not mean that, Leal knew, as once he had naively defined power.

"What did he tell you?"

Fhada began walking again, slowly now, into the shadow of Mertuile. "When I went to him with my first great tremulous dilemma, he told me I was being tested. He instructed me to question the Voice I heard, to resist it, to seek to understand its dark origins. He said there were portents of great calamity in the future of Caraid-land. He said my testing was surely a part of that."

"Did he know-?"

Fhada shrugged. "How can I know what he knew?"

"What did you feel?"

"That he had the means to be certain of the Voice I heard and Its message, but did not use it. I told myself that was because he did not need to use it. He had seen portents; that was enough. I wanted to believe he was certain of what he told me. I couldn't contemplate anything else then."

"And now?"

"Now, I accept that we were both wrong-Osraed Ladhar for dissuading me, and I for letting him."

Leal's body wanted to fold in on itself. A vacuum existed where his heart had been. "Perhaps ... perhaps you were not wrong. Perhaps I am being tested too."

"Perhaps you are, but you are passing your test, where I failed mine."

Leal laid a desperate hand on the other man's arm. "No! You're too young a man to give yourself up. The Meri still speaks to you, I know She does."

Fhada disengaged himself, gently. "Don't trust me, Leal. Don't see in me what is no longer there. What was, perhaps, never there to begin with."

"It's there, Fhada," Leal said, as they took the turn away from Mertuile toward the Care House. "And I'm not the only one who sees it."

CHAPTER 11.

Do you imagine that the secrets of your souls are hidden? Know with certainty that what you have concealed in your hearts is as clear as day to the Spirit. That it remains hidden is pure mercy.

- Utterances of Osraed Wyth

Verse 13