"I want to see that horse right away," Maria said excitedly, as soon as her awareness returned to her physical body. She did not move, though. She and Silvas were still sitting in the center of an active pentagram, and she dared not cross any of its lines until it had been deactivated.
"Yes, I'm curious myself," Silvas admitted. They got to their feet, carefully, and went through the final spells to shut down the mechanisms and defenses of the pentagram.
"We also need to check with the others," Silvas said when they stepped out of the crystal pentagram. Satin and Velvet came to nuzzle against them, and to be petted-their usual "fee" for sitting as sentries. "I do that after any Council, as quickly as may be. There are dangers. We have to be certain that none of our counselors have taken harm."
"Yes, we should see each of them," Maria agreed, "even though none has taken harm this time." While she was speaking, Maria had reached out to touch the minds of each of the others, with Silvas's mind linked to her own. It seemed to take no time at all, yet each of the counselors was able to assure them of his well-being.
"That is new," Silvas admitted when it was over. "But, yes, we'll go to each of them."
"We'll find Bay and Bosc together, calming Camiss," Maria said. "And I think that Braf will come to us before we can go to him."
"Once we've seen to our counselors, I don't think we should long delay our attempt to speak with Mikel," Silvas said as they left the workroom. "We need to ask about the isolation of this valley, and try to learn how much hostility we face from the other gods. Barreth isn't the only one with a hot hatred of us, and we need to know what allies he might count on. Still, I'm not certain that I can force the contact if Mikel resists."
"The habit is old. He shouldn't be come to the point of resisting contact from you yet," Maria said.
After the Council both preferred open speech to the more direct, but silent, communication between minds. They spoke of things that they really did not need to mention again, to have the comfort of spoken words.
As soon as Silvas opened the door leading from the keep out into the courtyard, they could hear loud whinnying coming from the direction of the mews. Satin and Velvet stopped in the doorway, choosing not to go out to confront a nervous horse.
"That must be Camiss," Silvas said with a chuckle. "She's not yet calmed to her new home."
"Riding a wild horse will be a new adventure for me," Maria said. "The pony I sometimes rode on my father's estate was so old and docile that I could outrun her on foot."
"Camiss won't be wild long. Bay and Bosc will tame her almost before we get there."
The white mare was almost exactly the same size as Bay, close to eight feet tall at the withers. She wore no harness yet when Silvas rounded the corner of the keep and saw her in the flesh for the first time. Camiss was cantering skittishly around the bailey, with Bay remaining close, confining her movements, turning her as he willed. Bosc stood near the gate to Bay's stall, watching anxiously, but not burdening Bay with unnecessary advice.
Maria and Silvas went to join Bosc, careful to stay well clear of the two large horses. Silvas beamed a spell of calming at the mare, but there was little visible evidence that it did any good.
"A beautiful horse is Camiss," Bosc said when Silvas and Maria reached him. "Such a pure white I've never seen in a horse."
Silvas chuckled. "It's been an age since I saw Bay sweat so."
"He'll have an appetite an' then some," Bosc allowed. "An' so will she. Camiss has the look of a five-year-old, not that our years have much sway where she came from."
"The two of them will eat as much as a half-dozen normal horses," Maria said. "My father would blanch at the cost."
"I think we can afford it," Silvas said.
Camiss started to slow down. Her exertions were beginning to tell. Bay moved her this way and that, forcing her to do his will.
"We've a good saddle maker here, my lady," Bosc said. " 'Twill take a few days for him to make a proper kit for Camiss. Betwixt times, I've a spare set of tack for Bay that will fit her."
"Thank you, Bosc," Maria said. "I'm sure it will be perfect."
Suddenly, Camiss stopped, planting her feet. She stood firm, not responding at all to Bay's continuing pressures. After a few minutes, Bay backed off and stared at her for a moment, then walked over to the others.
"I've done my part," Bay said. "It's up to folk with two feet to finish the job."
"I'll see to her training, my lady," Bosc said quickly.
Maria beamed a warm smile at him. "Thank you, Bosc, but I think that may not be necessary. Let's see."
Maria walked slowly out into the center of the courtyard, circling around so that she came at Camiss from directly ahead. She spoke soothingly to the horse, but at the same time she reached out with her mind to gentle her. This was not the spell of calming that Silvas might have used, but something more direct, an exercise of pure power deftly couched as emotional suasion. A few feet from Camiss's nose, Maria extended her right hand. The horse did not try to flee, did not make any threatening gestures to keep Maria away. After a moment, Camiss stepped forward and nuzzled Maria's hand with her muzzle. Then Maria stroked Camiss's head from between the eyes down to the nostrils, talking all the while.
"We're going to be great friends, aren't we?" Maria said finally, still in a coaxing tone of voice. She scratched Camiss under the mouth, then moved back along her left side, one hand always on the horse.
"Now, I think it's time to see how we'll work together."
Maria wrapped her left hand in Camiss's long mane and leaped up onto her back, skirts askew. Camiss showed no discomfort or panic. She did not rear or whinny.
"Now, a soft turn around the courtyard," Maria said, and the horse seemed to understand her-either the words, or the mental images that Maria projected with them. They started with a sedate walk. After a moment, Camiss moved first into a trot and then into a gentle canter, moving counterclockwise around the side courtyard.
"She has a way with Camiss," Bosc said softly.
"Yes, but a way of power," Bay said, in case Bosc had missed the deeper ways. Bosc did not often look for such things.
"Still, a gentle way," Silvas said, his eyes glued to Maria and her new mount. "Any other would have been harder on the animal, and less certain. Maria's touch is perfect in this."
For ten minutes, Maria rode Camiss in gentle laps around the portion of the bailey that was visible from where Bay and the others stood. Then Maria took Camiss around into the front section of the bailey, and finally out the gate. They were not gone long. Maria let Camiss stretch out into a gallop for a couple of minutes, down the road almost to the village, and then back, then slowed her to a walk and brought her back within the Seven Towers and to the group standing in front of the mews.
After she dismounted, Maria hugged Camiss's neck, though it took a mighty stretch on her part, and cooperation on the part of the horse.
"She is perfect, Bay," Maria said, her face a trifle flushed from the ride and from excitement. "Absolutely perfect."
Bay acknowledged the implied compliment only with a nod.
"I'll see to Camiss now, mistress," Bosc said. He spoke to the horse in a mixed collection of words and guttural sounds.
"And we have work to do yet," Silvas said, reinforcing the words with a thought directed privately at Maria. "Bay, Bosc, you might well be on your guard for a time. We're going to attempt to contact Mikel. There may be some sort of immediate response. Braf, you'll want to put your men on alert as well."
"Aye, lord." Braf had joined the group at the mews while Maria was off with Camiss. "I've already set the patrols to check on this veil that seals us off from the world. They'll be leaving within minutes."
"Perhaps you'd better hold them until after Maria and I make contact with Mikel," Silvas said. "I'll let you know when."
"Aye, lord. Then I'd best hurry myself before they get gone."
– |"Do we use the pentagram?" Maria asked as she and Silvas entered the keep. Satin and Velvet were sitting in the foyer. They fell into step behind Maria and Silvas.
"No, that would give the wrong impression. Mikel might think that we feel weak or uncertain. I think that either the library or the small sitting room would be appropriate."
"The sitting room, then. The books and scrolls in the library might make it seem that we were lost in a desperate hunt for information."
Silvas nodded. "You have it exactly. Mikel is certainly not one to be overwhelmed by the wealth the library represents, and he will judge the setting with more care than we might."
They went through the great hall to the tapestry that concealed the back stairs up to their living quarters. Early preparations for the evening meal had already begun in the great hall.
"We'll dine down here tonight?" Maria suggested before they reached the stairs. "After we've completed our work?"
"Yes, that's a good idea," Silvas said. "After all of the changes, our people have seen too little of us."
Except in mourning, Maria amended, and Silvas nodded. He caught the eye of one of the servants working among the tables, then pointed to himself and Maria, then at the head table. The servant bobbed her head and hurried off toward the kitchens.
"I'll tell Koshka as well," Maria said.
When they reached the small sitting room, Maria looked around quickly, to see if there was anything that needed doing before they made their attempt to contact Mikel. The setting needed to be just so. And it was, at least to her thinking. Koshka brought a tray with wine and cheese. Maria told him that she and Silvas would be dining in the great hall.
"We may be a trifle delayed. I don't know for certain," Silvas added. "We'll try not to be too late."
"Aye, lord. I'll see to the arrangements." Koshka scurried from the room.
"We'll sit on the sofa," Silvas said. "With you at my right hand. Wine poured."
"And sampled," Maria added, earning a quick laugh.
The cats settled themselves at either end of the sofa, going through their own rituals, stretching and curling until they had found exactly the positions they wanted, then grooming themselves while they waited for whatever was to happen.
Maria sat and sampled the wine in front of her. Silvas had no more than sat at her side when their plans were interrupted.
A quick flash of emerald light suffused the room and disappeared, lasting only long enough to alert Silvas and Maria-and to annoy the cats, who got to their feet, ready to spring toward any enemy who dared to attack.
As suddenly, Gioia was standing in the room, facing the sofa. She wore a long shirt over tight trousers and soft-skinned shoes, all in forest tones of green and brown. She also wore a cap with a single pheasant's feather sticking up from it. She carried a longbow, strung, over her right shoulder, and a quiver of arrows over her left shoulder.
Maria leaned back quickly, unable to completely hide the way that Gioia's materialization had surprised her. Velvet and Satin growled so softly that it was scarcely audible to Silvas even though he was listening for the reaction of the cats. The fur also rose on their backs. Silvas was somewhat more collected. He had been reaching for his goblet when the light flashed. He paused for only an instant, to calm the cats, then took his drink of wine.
"Welcome to our home," he said calmly. "Will you have a bit of refreshment with us?"
Gioia stared at Silvas, not moving a muscle, for well over a minute without speaking. She glanced briefly at Maria then, before returning her attention to the wizard.
"You have nothing here that I want," she said.
"A seat?" Silvas gestured at a chair.
"I prefer to remain standing."
Silvas shrugged and took another drink. Maria also sipped at her wine, then took a small chunk of cheese and chewed on that while she studied Gioia. The hunter goddess looked as if she were in the bloom of young womanhood, perhaps only a few years older than Maria. Her garb showed off her firm figure as clearly as if she had been naked. Her skin was tanned but did not appear particularly dry or weathered. Her dark hair was confined by the peaked cap and by a gold band that collected the rest in back. Maria noted that Gioia's ears seemed unusually small, and as delicately formed as if they were made of porcelain.
"To what do we owe the pleasure of this visit?" Silvas asked, keeping his voice studiously polite, almost inviting.
"Curiosity," Gioia said. "I wanted a better look at you. I find myself unable to answer a simple question."
"Which question is that?" Silvas asked.
"What sort of mortal could possibly affect my sister so that she would give him such a foolish gift? How could she so lose awareness of her birthright to waste so much time on such as you?"
"That's two questions," Silvas said. "But the questions are related. I'm not certain that I have the answers you seek, though. Your questions are bound up with one I posed to myself while we were in your brother's house. 'How could Carillia have possibly managed to rise above the pettiness and bickering of her brothers and sisters to turn out so good and kind?' "
Gioia's cheeks rippled as she struggled to hold back an angry riposte.
"There is another thing that you seem to be forgetting," Silvas said. "Carillia didn't will her divinity merely to me, but to Maria as well, and she could hardly have been affected by Maria in any way that she might have been affected by me. They had barely met."
Gioia gave Maria a direct stare. Maria met it with serenity. Though she felt nervous enough inside, she would not let it show.
"The daughter of Sir Eustace Devry?" Gioia said, looking at Maria but clearly speaking to Silvas. "Surely you are not foolish enough to think that my sister planned this! This country girl?"
"I must differ with you, on many counts," Silvas said, his voice drawing Gioia's eyes back to his own. "She most clearly planned it. And my opinion on this has a much firmer basis of knowledge than your own. You did say that you came here because you couldn't understand why Carillia chose to spend so much of her life with me, or why she gave us the gift she did as she died."
"You prize that gift too highly, magician," Gioia said. "Other mortals have tasted of divinity. The squalid quarters of the Shining City are filled with demigods and their get. Some were awarded their status for favors rendered." Gioia looked back and forth between Silvas and Maria. "Most often sexual. Others are the children of gods and demigods, or of gods and mortal women." She stared again at Silvas, leaning forward for emphasis. "Gods and mortal women," she repeated. "After all, no mortal man could possibly be strong enough in his seed to impregnate a goddess. Did Carillia ever bear you a child?" The sweetness of her tones in that last question only added to its bitter cast.
"Children are a rare gift to any wizard, no matter who his consort, or how many of them he has. If there is any penalty involved, it is that of his calling, not his mate."
"It matters not to me how you deceive yourself," Gioia said. "Nor will it long matter to you. While other demigods are well tolerated among us-our children and our favorites-you two are bastards of a particularly low sort. Revolting mutant beasts. It will not be long before you join your Carillia and the others who fell in the recent battle. It depends on how badly my brethren want this new sport."
With another flash of emerald light, Gioia was gone.