This time in full awareness she could savor it, the softness and hardness, the strong young hands and the surprising gentleness behind his bold approach. She laughed in delight at the unexpected pleasure, fully open to him, sensing his enjoyment as her own. She had never been so happy in her life. Spent, they lay, limbs twined, caressing each other in a pleasant fatigue.

At last, in the growing light, he sighed.

"They will be coming for me soon," he said, "and there is much more of this-I am to be taken somewhere and given a sword, and many other things." He sat up and smiled at her. "And I would like to wash, and have clothes befitting a civilized man, and free myself of all this blood and blue dye ... how everything passes! Last night I did not even know I was all smeared with blood-look, you too are covered with the stag's blood where I lay on you-"

"I think when they come for me, they will bathe me and give me fresh garments," she said, "and you too, in a running stream."

He sighed with a gentle, boyish melancholy. His voice was breaking, an uncertain baritone; how could he be so young, this young giant who had fought the King Stag and killed him with his flint knife?

"I do not suppose I will ever meet you again," he said, "for you are a priestess and dedicated to the Goddess. But I want to say this to you-" and he leaned down and kissed her between her breasts. "You were the very first. No matter how many women I may have, for all my life I will always remember you and love you and bless you. I promise you that."

There were tears on his cheek. Morgaine reached for her garment and tenderly dried the tears, cradling his head against her.

At the gesture he seemed to stop breathing.

"Your voice," he whispered, "and what you just did-why do I seem to know you? Is it because you are the Goddess, and in her all women are the same? No-" He stiffened, raised himself, took her face between his hands. In the growing light she saw the boyish features strengthened into the lines of a man. Still only half aware of why she seemed to know him, she heard his hoarse cry. "Morgaine! You are Morgaine! Morgaine, my sister! Ah, God, Mary Virgin, what have we done?"

She put her hands up to her eyes, slowly. "My brother," she whispered. "Ah, Goddess! Brother! Gwydion-"

"Arthur," he muttered.

She held him tight, and after a moment he sobbed, still holding her. "No wonder it seemed to me that I have known you since before the world was made," he said, weeping. "I have always loved you, and this-ah, God, what have we done-"

"Don't cry," she said, helplessly, "don't cry. We are in the hands of her who brought us here. It doesn't matter. We are not brother and sister here, we are man and woman before the Goddess, no more."

And I never knew you again. My brother, my baby, the one who lay on my breast like a little child. Morgaine, Morgaine, I told you to take care of the baby, as she went away and left us, and he cried himself to sleep in my arms. And I did not know.

"It's all right," she said again, rocking him, "don't cry, my brother, my beloved, my little one, don't cry, it's all right."

But even as she soothed him, despair beat at her.

Why did you do this to us? Great Mother, Lady, why?

And she did not know whether she was calling to Viviane, or to the Goddess.

16

All the long road to Avalon, Morgaine lay in her litter, her head throbbing, and that question beating in her mind: Why? She was exhausted after the three days of fasting and the long day of ritual. She knew vaguely that the night's feasting and lovemaking had been intended to release that force, and they would have done so, returning her to normal, except for the morning's shock.

She knew herself well enough to know that when the shock and exhaustion wore off, they would be followed by rage, and she wished that she could reach Viviane before the rage exploded, while she could still maintain some semblance of calm.

They took the Lake route this time, and she was allowed, at her own earnest request, to walk a part of the way; she was no longer the ritually shielded Maiden of the ceremony, but only one of the priestess attendants of the Lady of the Lake. Returning with the barge across the Lake, she was asked to summon the mists for the making of the gateway to Avalon; she rose to do so almost perfunctorily, so much had she come to take this Mystery for granted as a part of her life.

Yet as she raised her arms for the summoning, she had a sudden, paralyzing moment of doubt. The change within her seemed so great, did she still retain the force to make the gateway? So great was her rebellion that for an instant she hesitated, and the men in the boat looked at her in polite concern. She felt pierced by their eyes, and by a moment of intense shame, as if all that had befallen her the night before must somehow be printed on her face in the language of lust. The sound of church bells rang out quietly over the Lake, and suddenly Morgaine was back in childhood, listening to Father Columba speaking earnestly of chastity as the greatest; approach to the holiness of Mary, Mother of God, who by miracle had borne her Son without even a momentary stain of the world's sin. Even at the time, Morgaine had thought, What great nonsense that is, how could any woman bear a child without knowing a man? But at the sound of the holy bells, something within her seemed to crumple and fold itself away, and she felt tears suddenly streaming down her face.

"Lady, are you ill?"

She shook her head, saying firmly, "No, I felt faint for a moment." She drew a deep breath. Arthur was not in the boat-no, of course not, he had been taken by the Merlin on the Hidden Way. The Goddess is One- Mary the Virgin, the Great Mother, the Huntress ... and I have a part in Her greatness. She made a banishing gesture and raised her arms again, swiftly drawing down the curtain of the mist through which they would reach Avalon.

Night was falling, but, although Morgaine was hungry and weary, she made her way at once toward the Lady's house. But at the door, a priestess stopped her when she would have entered.

"The Lady can see no one at present."

"Nonsense," Morgaine said, feeling the beginnings of anger through the merciful numbness and hoping it would hold until she had confronted Viviane. "I am her kinswoman; ask if I may come to her."

The priestess went away and quickly returned, saying, "The Lady said: 'Tell Morgaine to go at once to the House of Maidens, and I will speak to her when the proper time comes.' "

For a moment, anger surged in Morgaine so great that she came near to shoving the woman out of the way and forcing herself into Viviane's house. But awe still held her. She did not know what the penalty would be for a priestess who defied her sworn obedience, but through her flooding anger, a small, cold rational voice told her that she really did not want to find out this way. She drew a long breath, composing her face into the proper demeanor for a priestess, bowed obediently, and went away. The tears she had forced back, hearing church bells on the Lake, were beginning to break through, and for a moment she wished, wearily, that she could let them come. Now at long last, alone in the House of Maidens, in her own quiet room, she could weep if she must; but the tears would not come, only bafflement and pain and the anger which she had no way to express. It was as if her entire body and soul were locked into one great knot of anguish.

IT WAS TEN DAYS before Viviane sent for her; the full moon that had shone on the triumph of the Horned One had dwindled in the sky to a sickly dying splinter. By the time one of the young priestesses brought a message that Viviane required her presence, Morgaine had given way to smoldering anger.