He obeyed, a thing that Aine might have found smugly pleasing under other circ.u.mstances. She focused her attention on the heavily barred door with its mechanical lock. She'd never tried to manipulate a lock before. In theory, it should be like manipulating any physical object. The only problem was, she had no idea what the inner mechanism of the lock looked like. She could not visualize the metal gears, or tumblers or whatever lay within. So, she prodded and poked with aislinn fingers, her tongue caught between her teeth, listening to Saefren's labored breathing in the darkness.

The lock defied her every attempt to open it. Finally, with her head pounding and sweat chilling her body, she gave up in complete frustration.

"I can't do this," she admitted. "The mechanism is too complicated."

There was a moment of silence from within the cell, then Saefren's strangled voice said, "Then you'll . . . have to . . . leave me here."

Aine laid her forehead against the bars and fought a moment of impotent rage. First Iseabal, now Saefren. "Never say you can't," she murmured and got to her feet. "If I can't open the door, then we need to get the gaoler to open it. And the collar as well."

"How?"

"Cry out. Pretend you're choking."

"I am choking," he returned wryly.

"Feich doesn't want you dead. If the gaoler thinks you're choking . . ."

"Then . . . what?"

Aine grinned fiercely in the dark. "You'll see . . . I hope. Just start yelling."

He did as told, giving a convincing portrayal of a man on the verge of suffocating. So convincing was he that the cloaked Aine cringed and covered her ears.

In short order, torch light spilled onto the corridor floor and two men appeared, keys and torch in hand. Aine all but held her breath as they took quick stock of the prisoner's red face and heaving chest.

He's choking to death, Aine suggested, hoping it might help.

The chief gaoler, a Malcuim regular, slipped the key into the lock and opened the cell door. Inside, he moved to check the collar.

"Bring the torch in, Olery," he demanded when his shadow fell across the clasp.

His partner did as commanded, squeezing into the narrow s.p.a.ce behind him and flattening himself against the wall to his mate's right, arm raised to throw torchlight onto the collar. Smoke from the fiery wand curled along the ceiling making both men wheeze.

The gaoler took up another key and fitted it to the collar's lock.

"You Claeg are a whiney lot," he observed, giving the panting Saefren a cruel shake. "I'd let you choke, if it was me calling the plan. You've caused the Malcuim House a d.a.m.n lot of grief over time, but you're worth something to Regent Feich, so I suppose I've got to let you out of this collar, eh?"

"Oh, just do it!" muttered the other guard-a Dearg. "My arm's set to fall off."

The key turned, the iron band sprang open, Saefren sagged dramatically to his knees and the torch went out. In the chaos after, Aine draped her Cloakweave over Saefren and silently begged him to recall which way the door was. There was a mad scramble, thuds, a yelp of pain and the sound of a body falling heavily to the straw-covered stone.

A moment later, Aine felt someone brush by her on hands and knees, saw the faint shimmer of aislinn energy, and reached out a hand to grasp Saefren's shoulder as he scurried by. With the other hand, she pulled the cell door to and was gratified to hear the lock spring shut. Wordlessly, she dragged Saefren to his feet and hurried him out of the corridor.

He stopped her as they were crossing the anteroom. "What about the others?" he whispered, just making himself heard over the shouts of the captive gaolers. "There are other Taminists here in the next corridor."

"No time. When they find their keys-" The sharp clink of metal was followed by the feel of a ring and rods being pressed into her hand.

"I'm not entirely useless," Saefren told her.

"If we free them, they may be killed trying to escape. I can't cloak them all."

"Can't, Aine Red? Can't? I didn't think you knew the word. If we leave them here, they'll surely be killed."

They freed every prisoner in the Mertuile gaol block. And Aine did cloak them through lamplit halls and dark, past guards and guests and gatekeepers. She did not think about those left behind until she and Saefren and their two dozen or so charges were safe on the dark wharves above Saltbridge.

Later, as they took secret pa.s.sage upriver in boats piloted by the father and brothers of a Carehouse Aelder Prentice, her mind and heart flew to them-Abbod Ladhar, whose secret dungeon they could not find, and Iseabal, whose own body now served as a prison. Sitting at the rail, staring sightlessly over the black flow of the Halig-tyne, Aine did not even realize tears were falling till a hand brushed them from her cheek. She blinked and looked up into Saefren Claeg's face.

"For Iseabal?" he asked and she nodded. He crouched next to her at the rail. "She told you the Meri would take care of her, you said."

Again, she nodded.

"Then it seems to me you must believe her." He put a hand on her shoulder, its warmth melting through the fog-damp layers of her clothing. "Have faith, Aine."

He have the shoulder a squeeze, then turned his eyes out to the river.

She followed suit, wondering a little that he should be consoling her with advice on faith.

"Oh, and thank you," he murmured, eyes still on the water.

"Welcome," she whispered and laid her head wearily on the rail.

Sleep. Dear G.o.d, but he wanted sleep. Long ago he'd ceased to feel his legs and feet and the water had spread through his clothing like oil through a wick, chilling him to the marrow. What parts of him were not numb ached horribly.

When the water had risen to his chest he had been forced to stand. His legs had barely held him then; his sodden clothing freighted him down, the chains he wore tugged at him, there was no wall for him to lean against. It had been almost a relief when the water level reached his chest a second time-it had at least buoyed him up somewhat.

Now he sat as the icy liquid fled, knowing he could not survive another high tide. He had prayed much, wondered if the Taminists had had sufficient time to escape or hide, and strove to make his peace with G.o.d. He could now admit he did not understand all that had transpired since Taminy-a-Cuinn had been brought to Creiddylad. He now realized he had been swept along on the currents of events he could in no way control-like this insidious, freezing tide he was powerless to stop from sucking the life out of him. What a petty conceit to think he was master of his fate or anyone else's. He was not.

He pondered his own actions, realizing he had been at least in part responsible for Daimhin Feich's rise to power.

Responsible, too, perhaps, for Cyne Colfre's death. A death he now suspected had been at Feich's hand. He wondered if, in warning Fhada of Feich's intention to raid Carehouse, he had paid on his debt of sin or added to it.

"Do you doubt that choice, Ladhar?"

He looked up. The Osraed Bevol sat, not three feet away, perched, it seemed, on a jag of native rock-or perched above it in the ether. He shimmered within an Eibhilin veil, his Meri Kiss bright as the first evening star. And what surprised Ladhar most of all was his own lack of surprise at seeing him.

"Ah, Shade, so you now haunt this spot, do you?"

"No more than you do."

"I'm chained here by these." Ladhar raised his wrist manacles, rattling the chains that anch.o.r.ed him to the floor. "What binds you here?" He glanced around, uneasily, certain the receding water would reveal Bevol's mouldering corpse.

"My body? You won't find it. It's gone the way of all flotsam." The spirit, if that's what it was, inclined its head toward the outer wall of the dungeon. "Well, there may be a few bits left. The grating down below is a bit clogged in places."

Ladhar blanched, though he doubted he could become much more bloodless. "This is the effect of exposure, I suppose," he murmured, "or hunger. Perhaps both."

"You are what binds me here, as you put it," Bevol told him. "You're still uncertain that what you did for Fhada and his companions was the Meri's will and pleasure."

"Surely you understand my uncertainty."

"I do. But be consoled, Ladhar. It was what you were purposed to do. It was a great act of compa.s.sion and faith."

Ladhar's shivers were soul deep now and had nothing to do with the cold. "On your word, I'm to accept this? On the say so of an apostate's ghost, I'm to believe that aiding Taminy-a-Cuinn and her brood of heretics is my Mistress' pleasure? And what, further-that Taminy is . . . the Sign of the Meri among us?"

"Not on my word, brother. On the word of the water." A spectral hand gestured at the smooth, dark expanse between them-a surface in which he cast no reflection, gleaming though he seemed to be.

Before Ladhar could respond-dear Meri, but his brain was slow-the ghostly Bevol was gone.

The word of the water? Ladhar shivered, yawned and peered down into the gla.s.sy flood. His own face peered up at him from the briny mirror. A face lit by its own light-an emerald star fixed at the center of its ample brow.

He marveled. It was decades since it had been so bright. He recalled the words of the Taminist girl whose life he had spared-that she had known the Taminist Osraed by their Meri Kisses.

"Like your own, sir," she'd said, "but golden."

Something warm and moist trickled down his cheek. He pressed numb fingers to his brow and remembered mornings he had looked in the mirror and barely been able to see it. He took a deep, pain-wracked breath.

"A benediction?" he asked the darkness. "Am I absolved?"

The tide sucked at him, gurgled among the rocks, hissed through the grating. When he had despaired of an answer, Bevol's voice came to him again: "Sleep, Ladhar. You've earned your rest."

"At dawn?" Ruadh wasn't sure he'd heard his cousin right. He blinked at him blearily and shivered in the cold of his room. "That's only hours away."

"I'm well aware," Daimhin told him. "I said dawn-I meant dawn. I trust you'll be fit enough to lead your men?"

"Yes, of course, I'll be fit. But . . . you can't have heard from Sorn Saba yet."

"We've no time and no choice, Ruadh. Ladhar is dead and that mewling cleirach hasn't been able to find the Stone at Ochanshrine, so I must a.s.sume the Taminists have it and it's on its way to Hrofceaster. I've lost Claeg-obviously through Taminist Weavings-and my pretty guest's Eibhilin powers seem to have dried up. We've no recourse but to go to El-Deasach."

"But the Banarigh-"

"Has either said 'yes' or 'no.' If it's 'yes,' we get on the trail with her reinforcements that much faster. If it's 'no,' then I can personally change her mind."

Ruadh grimaced. "So certain, are you?"

"I'm certain I've nothing to gain by hanging about here, waiting for the spring thaw. We ride to El-Deasach."

"What of Creiddylad?"

"It will be held well enough by a minimum force. We'll leave most of the Malcuim men, about half the Dearg, and enough of our own to hold Mertuile. Put your best lieutenant in charge of the garrison here. Elder Maslin will be in residence, so he'll likely want some of his own men about as well." Daimhin quirked an eyebrow at his cousin. "Does that meet with your approval, Marschal?"

"Aye. Seems logical enough." Truth to tell, Ruadh was glad not to have had to think it out for himself.

"But . . . ?"

"I only wonder if . . ." Ruadh was reluctant to voice his thoughts. "I wonder if you shouldn't seek some compromise with the Taminists. Bring Airleas Malcuim home on their-"

"No compromise!" Daimhin smote the table where Ruadh sat huddled in his night clothes. "The Osmaer will be mine! Both the woman and her namesake."

Ruadh winced and rubbed his temples. "And when they are yours?"

Daimhin straightened and moved to warm his hands at the meager blaze in the chamber hearth. "I've been giving that much thought. It occurs to me that I might consolidate my hold on Mertuile if I were to marry the widowed Cwen."

Ruadh shook his head . . . slowly. "You think Toireasa will have you?"

"I think," Daimhin said, fingering Bloodheart's leather pouch, "she will be enchanted with the idea."

"I've heard she's barren."

"Taminy has healed worse conditions."

"You have been giving this thought, haven't you? Of course, once your heir is of educable age, I suppose Airleas Malcuim's life will be worthless."

Daimhin smiled at him over one shoulder. "I haven't thought quite that far ahead," he said, then let the smile fall. "See to it that your men are ready to march at dawn."

Chapter 18.

And when my lovers ask you about Me, then know that I am near. I hear the prayer of those that cry to Me. Let them hear My Voice and trust in Me. And let them be led aright.

-Osraed Ochan

Book of the Covenant #99

Today Airleas's solitary walk fetched him up in Airdasheen again, gazing around at the snow-covered roofs of the clutter of houses and tiny shops. There were no streets as such in the village, but only narrow avenues paved with slate or granite block that converged on a central village circle. In the warmer seasons there was an open air market here; now there was only a large patch of snow much used by the village children.

Airleas watched them cavort among the drifts, building them up and exploding them gleefully in turns. They glanced at him cautiously, never full on, making him feel alien. He turned away, breathing deeply of the frosty, smoke-laden air and caught a whiff of something baking. The aroma drew him across the village circle to the Backstere's shop, the carefree laughter of the children following him.

The shop was warm and smelled of cinnamon and nutmeg and apples and . . . He gave up trying to catalogue the smells and drank in the wonderful, if limited, array of buns and breads and little cakes.

From behind a long table in the center of the front room, the Backstere smiled at his visitor. "Fresh cinnamon baps today, lad," he said.