Sickened, Deoris cried out, "And this you will confess to me?"

Slowly, Riveda nodded. "I know now that Demira was begotten and reared for this one purpose alone. Otherwise, why should I have stretched out my hand to save her from squalling to death on the city wall? I knew not what I did, not then. But is it not miraculous, you see, how all things fall together to have meaning? The girl is worthless for anything else—she made Karahama hate me, just by being born." And for the first time Deoris sensed a weak spot in the Adept's icy armor, but he went on swiftly, "But now you see how it all makes a part of the great pattern? I did not know when she was born, but Karahama's blood is one with yours, and so is Demira's, that strain of the Priest's Line, sensitive—and so even this unregarded nothing shall serve some part in the Great work."

"Do you care for nothing else?" Deoris looked at Riveda as if he were a stranger; at this moment he seemed as alien as if he had come from far beyond the unknown seas. This talk of patterns, as if he had planned that Demira should be born for this ... was he mad, then? Always Deoris had believed that the strangeness of his talk hid some great and lofty purpose which she was too young and ignorant to understand. But this, this she did understand for the corrupt madness it was, and of this he spoke as if it were more of the same high purpose. Was it all madness and illusion then, had she been dragged into insanity and corruption under the belief that she was the chosen of the great Adept? Her mouth was trembling; she fought not to break down.

Riveda's mouth curved in a brutal smile. "Why, you little fool, I believe you're jealous!"

Mutely, Deoris shook her head. She did not trust herself to speak. She turned away, but Riveda caught her arm with a strong hand. "Are you going to tell Demira this?" he demanded.

"To what purpose?" Deoris asked coldly, "To make her sick, as I am? No, I will keep your secret. Now take your hands from me!"

His eyes widened briefly, and his hand dropped to his side. "Deoris," he said in a more persuasive voice, "you have always understood me before."

Tears gathered at her eyelids. "Understood you? No, never. Nor have you been like this before! This is—sorcery, distortion—black magic!"

Riveda bit off his first answer unspoken, and only muttered, rather despondently, "Well, call me Black Magician then, and have done with it." Then, with the tenderness which was so rare, he drew her stiff and unresponsive form to him. "Deoris," he said, and it was like a plea, "you have always been my strength. Don't desert me now! Has Domaris so quickly turned you against me?"

She could not answer; she was fighting back tears.

"Deoris, the thing is done, and I stand by it. It is too late to crawl out of it now, and repentance would not undo it in any case. Perhaps it was—unwise; it may have been cruel. But it is done. Deoris, you are the only one I dare to trust: make Demira your care, Deoris, let her be your child. Her mother has long forsworn her, and I—I have no rights any more, if ever I did." He stopped, his face twisted. Lightly he touched the fearful scars hidden by her clothing; then his hands strayed gently to her waist, to touch the wooden links of the carved symbolic girdle with a curiously tentative gesture. He raised his eyes, and she saw in his face a painful look of question and fear which she did not yet understand as he murmured, "You do not yet know—the Gods save you, the Gods protect you all! I have forfeited their protection; I have been cruel to you—Deoris, help me! Help me, help me—"

And in a moment the melting of his icy reserve was complete—and with it fled all Deoris's anger. Choking, she flung her arms about him, saying half incoherently, "I will, Riveda, always—I will!"

Chapter Two: THE BLASPHEMY

I

Somewhere in the night the sound of a child's sudden shrill wailing shredded the silence into ribbons, and Deoris raised her head from the pillow, pressing her hands to her aching eyes. The room was filled with heavy blackness barred by shuttered moonlight. She was so used to the silence of the saji courts—she had been dreaming—then memory came back. She was not in the Grey Temple, nor even in Riveda's austere habitation, but in Domaris's home; it must be Micail crying . . .

She slid from the bed, and barefoot, crossed the narrow hall into her sister's room. At the sound of the opening door, Domaris raised her head; she was half-clad, her unbound hair a coppery mist streaming over the little boy who clung to her, still sobbing.

"Deoris, darling, did he wake you? I'm sorry." She stroked Micail's tangled curls as she rocked the child gently against her shoulder. "There now, there now, hush, hush you," she murmured.

Micail hiccoughed sleepily with the subsidence of his sobs. His head dropped onto Domaris's shoulder, then perked up momentarily. "De'ris," he murmured.

The younger girl came quickly to him. "Domaris, let me take Micail, he's too heavy for you to lift now," she rebuked softly. Domaris demurred, but gave the heavy child into her sister's arms. Deoris looked down at the drooping eyes, darkly blue, and the smudge of freckles across the turned-up nose.

"He will be very like ..." she murmured; but Domaris put out her hands as if to ward off a physical blow, and the younger woman swallowed Micon's name. "Where shall I put him?"

"Into my bed; I'll take him to sleep with me, and perhaps he will be quiet. I am sorry he woke you, Deoris. You look—so tired." Domaris gazed into her sister's face, pale and pinched, with a strange look of weary lethargy. "You are not well, Deoris."

"Well enough," said Deoris indifferently. "You worry too much. You're not in the best health yourself," she accused, suddenly frightened. With the eyes of a trained Healer-priestess, Deoris now saw what her self-absorption had hidden: how thin Domaris was in spite of her pregnancy; how the fine bones of her face grew sharp beneath the white skin, how swollen and blue the veins in her forehead were, and those in her thin white hands ...

Domaris shook her head, but the weight of her unborn child was heavy on her, and her drawn features betrayed the lie. She knew it and smiled, running her hands down her swollen sides with a resigned shrug. "Ill-will and pregnancy grow never less," she quoted lightly. "See—Micail's already asleep."

Deoris would not be distracted. "Where is Arvath?" she asked firmly.

Domaris sighed. "He is not here, he ..." Her thin face crimsoned, the color flooding into the neck of her shapeless robe. "Deoris, I—I have fulfilled my bargain now! Nor have I complained, nor stinted duty! Nor did I use what Elis . . ." She bit her lip savagely, and went on, "This will be the son he desires! And that should content him!"

Deoris, though she knew nothing of Mother Ysouda's warning, remembered her own; and intuition told her the rest. "He is cruel to you, Domaris?"

"The fault is mine, I think I have killed kindness in the man. Enough! I should not complain. But his love is like a punishment! I cannot endure it any more!" The color had receded from her face, leaving a deathly pallor.

Deoris mercifully turned away, bending to tuck a cover around Micail. "Why don't you let Elara take him nights?" she protested. "You'll get no sleep at all!"

Domaris smiled. "I would sleep still less if he were away from me," she said, and looked tenderly at her son. "Remember when I could not understand why Elis kept Lissa so close to her? Besides, Elara attends even me only in the days, now. Since her marriage I would have freed her entirely, but she says she will not leave me to a strange woman while I am like this." Her laugh was a tiny ghost of its normal self. "Her child will be born soon after mine! Even in that she serves me!"