“I will go back with you” Hafgan began.

“It is not necessary.”

“Please, allow me to serve you.”

The old druid shook his head gently. “Your place is here with the boy. Stay. You will see me again before Samhain.” He drew a breath deep into his lungs. “Ahh, the air off the sea makes a man hungry.”

Hafgan took his arm and they started through the caer. “We will eat and you can rest.”

“Rest?” said Cormach. “Soon I will have my rest. I would rather talk to you, Hafgan, if you would oblige an old man by listening.”

CHAPTER SIX

Charis did not know whether avallach was in Kellios or whether he was away on yet another campaign of his endless war against Nestor and Seithenin. She was prepared to accept either situation: to confront her father at once, or to wait patiently until he returned. She was not, however, prepared for the spectacle that greeted her.

Since meeting with Throm she had been nervous and ill-at-ease. Not because he forecast the destruction of the world- that was too fantastic to comprehend-but because she feared that she would not be allowed to see her home again. This, as the miles stretched on and on, had become an obsession for her, and she hoped with each passing moment that she would not come too late.

But as the carriage rolled down the lowering hills to the dish-shaped harbor, Charis glimpsed the Isle of Apples floating serenely above its orchards across the bay. She sighed, feeling both pleasure and a little disappointment in the familiar sight. Nothing has changed, she mused. It is all exactly as it was the day I left.

This thought, comforting in its way, also produced a flat pang of disappointment. Something ought to have changed; I have been away seven years! she thought and realized that she had vaguely expected her home to have changed as much as she had in that time.

All the way up the long avenue from the harbor to the palace, Charis imagined her seven-year exile to have been in vain. She would walk into the great hall and Avallach would be standing there still: arms folded across his chest, eyes hard, chin outthrust like a. granite cliff, his scowl dark and fierce, hiding the thunder about to break. And she would hear his voice, echoing across the polished floor, bridging the distance between them. It would be as if she had only stepped from the room a moment ago. Nothing would have changed.

Even that might have been preferable to the scene which met her eyes as she made her way through a dim, filthy corridor toward the great cedar doors whose luster had been allowed to dull beneath a gray patina of dust. The palace was all but deserted. Upon her arrival she had been greeted by a young seneschal who was not at all certain who she was, then conducted without ceremony to the great hall. “Go find An-nubi,” she ordered as the seneschal stood looking on in a dilemma of confusion and indecision. “Tell him Charis has returned.”

The youth stumbled over himself in his eflfort to escape. Charis picked up the present she had brought for her father and turned back to the door, her haed trembling on the braided cord. She pulled; the huge panel opened without a sound and she entered the darkened hall. Even though it was bright daylight outside, the hall was steeped in twilight.

At first she thought the seneschal had led her astray and that Avallach was not there. She was just turning away when she heard a voice. “Who is it?” The voice was a raw, rasping whisper.

She turned and walked slowly to the center of the enormous room. “Father?”

From the dais at one end of the room came a dry cough. Charis stopped and looked toward the dais. There at the foot of the throne sat Avallach, leaning back against the footrest, legs splayed out before him. His eyes glittered back at her from the shadows.

“Eh?” he said. The utterance brought a fit of coughing that doubled him over.

“Father, it is me, Charis,” she said, coming closer.

The king raised his head and peered at her, then climbed slowly to his feet and came toward her, walking in a strange, halting gait. She saw that he was leaning on a crutch. “Have you brought my medicine?” he called as he came, his voice grating over the words.

“It is Charis,” she said again. “Your daughter… I have come home.” She stared at the ruin of her father in horror.

“Charis?” Avallach lurched closer. His hair hung in lank, ropy strands; his flesh was pale as parchment, his eyes weak and watery.

Charis wanted to run to him, to take him in her arms. But the shock of seeing him so changed kept her rooted to the spot.

“So you have come back.” Avallach lurched closer, breathing heavily, cold sweat glazing his brow.

“Father, what has happened? Where is everyone? You are ill; you should be in bed.”

“You should not have come.” He gasped with the exertion of walking across the floor.

“I had to come,” she said. “I had to come back to see you. I have been away so long. I wanted…”

“-should not have come,” Avallach repeated. He lifted his head and shouted, “Lile! My medicine!” The words echoed in the empty hall.

“I brought you something,” said Charis, remembering the present. She lifted the long, thin shape wrapped in oiled leather and lay it across his hands as he balanced on the crutch.

Avallach eyed the object without interest. “What is it?”

“Let me open it for you,” she said and began loosening the strips. Bright silver flashed under her hands and in a moment the wrap fell away to reveal a fine sword, its elegant length tapering to an imperial point. The hilt was fiery ori-chalcum inset with rubies and emeralds-the eyes of two crested serpents whose entwined bodies formed the grip. It lay across Avallach’s palms, glimmering with cold fire.

The blade was decorated with an intricate filigree and engraved with the legend Take Me Up on one side and Cast Me Aside on the other.

“You mock me with your gift, girl,” said Avallach. He thrust the sword back at her and turned away.

“No, please, I did not mean to”

“Lile!” the king roared again. “My medicine!”

Presently the door opened and a young woman hurried in.

She bore a silver tumbler on a tray and a long white cloth on her arm. “Your medicine, my hus” she began. She stopped so suddenly when she saw Charis that she almost sent the tumbler toppling from the tray. “What are you doing here?”

“I am Charis. I have returned.” She stared at the young woman-pale and slender, with large, dark, almost luminous eyes and long hair that spilled in a dark cascade to the base of her spine. Lile was not much older than Charis herself.

“I know who you are,” Lile replied. She stepped cautiously between Avallach and Charis and offered the king the tray. He seized the tumbler and lifted it to his lips, drinking noisily. “There, yes,” she told him, “drink it all.” When he finished, Avallach dropped the tumbler back onto the tray, and Lile dabbed his chin with the cloth as one would a forgetful child.

“Charis,” Avallach said, grinning stupidly, “did you not know I was remarried?”

“How should I know?” she replied, still looking at the dark-haired woman. “No one told me.”

“I thought you might have heard,” said Avallach.

“We’ve been married three years,” added Lile quickly. “We have a daughter.”

“Oh,” Charis replied. She fought down her roiling emotions and asked, “Where are my brothers? Where is Guistan, Eoinn, and Kian and Maildun?”

“Where I shall be when I have healed,” growled Avallach. “Fighting!” He coughed again and Lile blotted his chin with the cloth.

“I see,” said Charis. “And Annubi?”

“Oh, around… somewhere.” Avallach waved his hand absently. He was looking at his young wife Wearily with cloudy and unfocused eyes. Was the medicine a narcotic?