"I object to that," said Bertran de Talair, entering the room from the door behind her. "I did not underestimate Blaise. I might possibly have judged your charms to be rather more distracting then they seem to be of late."
"I know your lute," Blaise said briefly. "I may not think much of your music, but I know the instrument." He was making an effort to keep his composure. He wasn't really looking at Bertran, either, because another woman, very tall, had walked in behind the duke. This one had grey in her dark hair and she was blind and there was a white owl on her shoulder. The last time he'd seen her was on an island in the sea when she'd told him the secrets of his own heart in the night dark of a forest.
"You might at least have tried," Bertran went on plaintively, addressing Ariane. "I'm minded to renege on our wager. You were about as seductive as a wet goat in a cave."
"Spare us a recitation of your preferences," Ariane replied sweetly.
It was the High Priestess of Rian, her blank eye sockets turned unerringly to where Blaise had risen from his chair, who told him the thing he most needed to know, as de Talair threw back his head in laughter.
"The wounded coran will live. He should be completely recovered after the shoulder injury heals."
"That cannot be," Blaise said, his mind clamping shut in denial. "There was syvaren on that arrow."
"And he owes you his life for telling them as much by the river," the priestess went on gravely. She was robed in a gown grey as the streaks in her hair. Her skin was darkened and roughened by sun and wind and the salt of the sea, a complete contrast to Ariane's alabaster smoothness. "They brought him to me in the temple here, and because I knew what this was and because it happened tonight, I was able to deal with it."
"You can't, though. You can't cure a man poisoned by syvaren. No surgeon in the world can do that."
She permitted herself the small, superior smile he remembered. "That last is true, at any rate. Nor could I have done so if too much time has passed and if I had not been in a consecrated place. It is also Midsummer Eve. You should have cause to remember, Northerner, that the goddess's servants can do things you might not expect when we are centred in her mysteries."
"We burn women in Gorhaut when they traffic in the magic of darkness." He wasn't sure why he'd said that, but he did indeed recall the apprehension he'd felt on the island, the pulsing of the forest floor beneath his feet, and something of that was coming back now. He was also remembering, as through a tunnel of smoke and years, the first witch-burning he'd ever seen. His father had pronounced the excoriation and had had both his young sons stand by him and watch.
The High Priestess of Rian was no longer smiling. "Fear makes men label women's power an act of darkness. Only fear. Consider the price of that: no woman would have dared try to save Valery of Talair if that arrow had been loosed in Gorhaut." She paused, as if waiting for a response, as a tutor with her charge. Blaise said nothing, keeping his face as impassive as he could. The owl flapped its wings suddenly but settled again on the priestess's shoulder. In a different tone she said, "I bring greetings for you from Luth of Baude, who now serves Rian with dignity on her Island."
Blaise grimaced at the recollection. "Luth couldn't serve a flask of ale with dignity," he said, anger and confusion overcoming him.
"You do not mean that, you are only unsettled. You might also be surprised at what any man may do when he, too, feels centred in his own being." The reproach was mild enough, but Blaise felt, as he had before with this woman, that there were meanings beneath the surface of her words, that she was speaking to a part of him that no one should have been able to address.
The very old woman who had burned on the Garsenc lands all those years ago had been pitiful more than anything else. A village neighbour had accused her at the year end godmoot of witching a cow so its milk would dry. Galbert had decided to make an example of the case. Every year, sometimes more often, such a course was needful, he had said to his sons.
The cow's milk had been unchanged even after the witch had died with her white hair blazing. Blaise had made a point of going back to the village, after, and asking about that. Something had sickened in him then, and did so again whenever the memory came back. He recalled, a memory thick and oppressive, his father's heavy hand on his shoulder at the burning, as Galbert made sure his recalcitrant younger child would not shame him by turning away. There had been no darkness, no secret, dangerous power in the terrified woman screaming until she choked among black smoke and the tongues of flame and the smell of burning flesh. Somehow Blaise had known it even then.
But there was magic in the High Priestess of Rian. He had felt it on that island. She had known about Rosala. That, in itself, was an almost impossible thing to deal with, or forget. And as for the poison tonight: Bertran was here laughing, had been gleefully wagering with Ariane de Car-enzu. Valery could not be dead. Even with syvaren on the arrow.
Something clenched and hurtful in Blaise, that had been present since he'd seen the white-and-black shaft fly, began to loosen its grip inside him. Rudel Correze, he thought abruptly, was going to be a profoundly disconcerted man one day not far from now. A part of him wanted to smile at that, but instead Blaise found himself sinking back down into his chair and reaching for his wine. He cradled the silver goblet in both hands without drinking. He was going to have to be careful now, he thought, looking at the two women and the man. Extremely careful.
"How much power do you have?" he asked, keeping his voice even, looking at the blind woman. She was still standing behind the divan.
And unexpectedly—she was always unsettling him, it seemed—the priestess laughed. "What? Would you have a dissertation now on the Natural, Celestial and Ceremonial powers, with a subsidiary digression on the three Principal Harmonies? You think I am a lecturer at the university, perhaps? You haven't even offered me a fee, Northerner!"
Blaise flushed at the mockery. But even as the High Priestess ended, laughing still, Ariane de Carenzu's cool voice interceded, precise and sharp as a stiletto between the ribs. "However captivating the issue raised might be, I am afraid the furthering of your education will have to be delayed a short while. You might recall that I have a question proposed first. You declined to answer until you knew who was behind the door. That was fair enough. Now you know. I would be grateful for a reply."
What happened after you left the river? she had asked. The offered question and the heart of danger in this room tonight. Bertran de Talair stopped his restless pacing. He had picked up a crystal from one of the tables and held it now in one hand, turning it this way and that, accepting and diffusing candlelight, but his blue eyes were steady on Blaise's as he waited.
Blaise turned—as he seemed always to be turning—back to the High Priestess in her rough grey robe. Quietly, he said, "If you know my mind, as you seemed to when last we met, you can answer all such questions for them, can't you." He said it flatly; it was not a question.
Her expression, oddly, grew gentler, as if he'd sounded an unexpected chord. She shook her head. "I also told you that night that our powers are less than our desires would have them be, and they grow weaker when we are farther from the hearthstones of Rian. On the goddess's Island I could read some things in your heart and in your history, largely to do with love and hate, you will remember. I said I could tell your future. That was a lie. Nor can I read your mind right now. If you have things to tell us you will have to tell them yourself."