"Burns..."

"Would be lost in hell? One moment of belief. Mark how all spirits, good and ill, hover about—aye, thee believe that. Tred on the evil as I did upon the pride of Naiton. Believe."

A rush of sun-sparkling water as Dorelei pulled the hand from the trough and held it high. The red mark of the evil was fading even as the drops rolled from the palm and wrist.

"Now," Dorelei exulted. "Who will be reborn in Jesu?"

Padrec wondered: She did it, not me. Without my help or blessing. God worked through her. The moment of uncertainty drowned in enthusiasm. He loves me no more than Dorelei. Truly there y s more to existence than I knew. "Glory to God, Alleluia!" Padrec shouted. "Come forth, all of you."

"Yah! for the Shepherd and a's fhain!" cried Drust.

"Yah!"

"Jesu!"

A few hung back afraid, but others surged forward,

needing no encouragement. The brown hands stretched out to touch Dorelei, Padrec, Bruidda, and the magical Chi-Rho, strong enough to put down iron. In the babble and excitement, Bruidda looked into Dorelei's face and saw the new hardness beneath the triumph.

4 'What be this we do, sister? What dost bring us to?" But Dorelei had accepted God's leaven of triumph for her grief. "Jesu treds upon a's enemies! Who will ride south with the flocks of Jesu and Salmon?"

Dorelei stalked through the singing, cheering Prydn, Padrec at her side. Where they walked, the people made way, the sun itself made way for them, and their shadows stretched long and longer across the light on the hill, tall as the Chi-Rho itself. They heard no sound but praise and saw only where their own proud images marked the earth.

Fhains moving together: it was unheard of, but new magic swept old reasons before it. In the warm early autumn, even before Finch's song was heard, the flocks swirled south like an avalanche to Cnoch-nan-ainneal, where Dorelei first found Padrec. They settled not only on the hill but spilled down into the lowland pastures of the apprehensive Venicones, their raths not sodded over but bright-painted as Rainbow. In the flush of the enthusiastic numbers that followed, Padrec did not separate his success from God's. In honest moments, he felt more Alexander than Apostle.

Entering on the easier part of her pregnancy, between the early sickness and the late awkwardness, Dorelei bloomed, basking in the deference paid her by the Prydn who joined the rade south. They placed their hands on her belly in respect, and when the courtesies were done, she asked the question that never left her.

"A man of Salmon fhain, Cruaddan. Who has seen him?"

None at all. Cru had vanished.

For Vaco, the Venicone elder who once cast Padrec forth to die on the hill, this was the worst time to have

such compounded troubles shadow his house. A Faerie rade was ill wind any time, a migration of this size plain ominous. They drove their long-horned sheep down into his pastures with mere show of asking permission. What could he do against such numbers, and every cursed one of them mounted and armed and the unkillable Christ-man with them? That one was tougher than Vaco thought; not only throve among Faerie, he led them now, he and his Faerie queen clanking with the treasure they wore. To Vaco's clear logic, the man was incomprehensible: preaching chastity, yet married now. Should have died but didn't. His hair was red—well, perhaps he was favored of Lugh Sun despite his muddled views.

To curdle the milk thoroughly, were not the Romans themselves in his village, thick as flies and friendly as lions pausing among lambs, talking alliance, a new war and bargaining for Venicone recruits?

Vaco had to be a generous and courteous host. He preferred Romans at a distance. Close up they were stif-fish, too sure of themselves and brusque—no nonsense, get on with it, that was their way. And their tribune! Vaco had sons older than this presumptuous brat who wore his hair so short and his face so clean-shaven he looked like a picked chicken. His name—almost as long as the boy himself—was Ambrosius Aurelianus. Tribune, mind you, an important son of an important Somebody, very high in the Parisi court. Vaco had older sons, but none of them nearly so self-assured in negotiation, nor so quick to brush aside the traditional courtesies of business transaction with his damned Roman know-it-all. Well, let him talk. He'd get courtesy but no recruits. He wasn't respectful.

Vaco felt truly beleaguered. A fly-swarm of Roman and Faerie. Had he known of Pharaoh, he would have commiserated. They'd be everywhere, so small, so many of them, a man would need a dozen eyes to keep them from stealing him blind. . . .

Not so. They came to his village in a great singing parade behind the red-haired priest and the queen, car-

oling on flower-decked ponies, and the sight of them was both awesome and laughable, a strain on the eyes. The brevity of their clothing and the breathtaking riches they wore like children's beads! When they trooped through the open stockade gate, they scattered gold coins, flashing in the sunlight, to the pop-eyed women and children, who scampered about to retrieve them all.

44 We follow the sign of Jesu," Dorelei called to them. 44 His law be to love and give. We share our wealth that thee know us thy brothers and sisters."

Waiting with his aides beside Vaco and his blue-painted brethren, Ambrosius marveled at the visible wealth among these people whose very existence, until now, had been mostly fable to him. The red-bearded man beside the pregnant queen swung down from his saddle—an Army mount, if Ambrosius was any judge— and strode energetically to Vaco, a fortune in gold and jewels dangling over his grimy hide vest.

44 May the sun be at your back, Elder. Perhaps now Vaco will believe in the strength of my God, who once again comes in peace."

44 Well," Vaco countered circumspectly, 44 at least I will listen as carefully as before. Your gods are strong for you."

lie understood and forgave the doubting Thomas. Then so must I. Ave, Tribune!" Padrec thrust out his hand to the young officer. 4 T am Father Patricius."

Ambrosius grasped the offered arm. 44 Av£, Father. Ambrosius Aurelianus Nuncio from Prince Marchudd."

44 From Eburacum?" Padrec brightened. 44 Then you would know Bishop Meganius."

4 To some extent."

44 His grace is well* 7 "

"Wise in the prince's council/' Ambrosius remembered the benign presence who listened much and spoke little, and then to great effect. 44 And worrying over his peacocks

44 Ah . . . yes. Forgive me," Padrec confessed, 4 Tve hardly written Latin this year and spoken it not at all

outside of prayer. What news of—oh. A moment, sir." Quickly Padrec stepped to Dorelei's side, where she'd planted herself before Vaco and his brothers in a cool appraisal.

"Be Dorelei Mabh, Vaco. Do give thy people Rainbow-gift to show our love. Will borrow not a stone from thy land. So let be peace between us."

Vaco peered down at the tiny woman. "It is familiar that you are."

"Have summered on the fell before," Dorelei allowed in a noncommittal tone. "And my blood sometimes."

"Gern-y-fhain is held in that Hand which upholds me," Padrec prompted. "Give us welcome, and I will tell your people once more of my God, this time in words that will not offend the dignity of Venicones. Am-brosius, this is Dorelei Mabh, to whom I am priest and second husband."

... I could only be polite and reach down for her little overdecorated paw (Ambrosius wrote to Mar-chudd), and she and Patricius alike fragrant as their sheep when the wind was wrong. Their wealth is unquestionable, most of it visible as Tri-malchio's, rattling about loud enough to give one a headache. The woman Dorelei has enormous prestige among these creatures, Patricius is more demigod than priest, and both act like it. To win them to his side, Patricius has gone to theirs— marriage, ritual scars, the lot—with thumping success. The Faerie are Christian with a vengeance, literal believers in the Word. The Venicones are evasive anent my arguments for an alliance and recruits. Under the rose, I would much rather enlist the Faerie, who seem quicker mettle; not only superb archers but the finest horsemen and women one could find, though they ride ponies stunted as themselves. Better mounted and trained, they

would make excellent alae. Knowing my lord's views on cavalry, I won't press the point. They are, of course, utter savages and shameless as animals. "Queen" Dorelei goes about bare as a concubine under her jewelry, the swelling of her pregnant belly displayed as a mark of pride. Animals, but loyal as good dogs under a trusted master .. .

4 "Interesting," Ambrosius noted to Padrec as they ambled toward the stockade from the garish tents on Cnoch-nan-ainneal. "You say the Mass in their dialect."

44 I know it's wrong." Indeed, the practice troubled Padrec's sense of orthodoxy more than his marriage. 44 But they must understand it. The Transubstantiation is very literal magic to them. That and certain other passages I leave in Latin, when they receive the Body and Blood."

44 Like a Druid."

4 "You might say, yes. They have a deep need for magic. The sense of reality is quite different from ours, and there is no linear sense of time. Like Dronnarron."

Ambrosius, fairly fluent in the northern dialects, didn't recognize the word or the weird inflections the priest gave it. 4 'What's that, Pictish?"

4 'Older," Padrec told him. 44 God knows how much older. No Gaelic root at all. It means the Green Time, or the Good Time That Was. This island was theirs alone before Abraham brought Isaac down from the mountain."

The tribune's sense of history was totally Roman: fact at the center but myth about the edges. 44 Really. The Dobunni bards always said it was the sons of Troy who colonized Britain."