It wasn’t the advice she’d hoped for, but it was apparently thebest he had to offer. She followed him to the chapel’s small Solarus and stepped inside. The door closed behind her, granting her privacy, and she moved to the altar at the center of the round room. Overhead, the mirrored ceiling and tiny dome set with numerous windows shone light down on the small statue of Adelis perched on the altar slab.
With a sigh, Lauriana knelt, bowed her head, and began to pray. For more than half a bell, she prayed. Sometimes kneeling, sometimes pacing, sometimes weeping, but the peace she sought was more elusive than smoke.
Father Celinor didn’t understand. He’d never seen the ugly side of magic. Not even Sol, a northerner like herself, truly understood. He’d lived his early years in the sheltered town of Callowill while she’d grown up in Dolan, a small and unfortunately strategic logging hamlet nestled in the shadow of two great forests, Greatwood and the dark Verlaine.
Far too many fierce, magical battles of the Wars had been fought on Dolan’s doorstep, and the terrible by-products of those clashes haunted Dolaners still. They knew firsthand the evils of magic. They suffered the attacks of lyrant, the vile, mutated descendants of long-tailed treecats corrupted by black Magery. They witnessed the horrors of children born with ungodly powers, and suffered the agony of giving them up for the good of the town because they knew a worse fate awaited them all if they did not.
Lauriana’s own sister Bessinita, a normally laughing, sweet-natured child of two, had been abandoned in the dark shadows of the Verlaine after she’d thrown a fit of childish temper while playing with a neighbor’s child. That fit had sparked a fire that burned down the neighbor’s house, nearly killed the neighbor’s wife, and left the neighbor’s child badly scarred.
So when Lauriana had found Ellysetta sitting under that tree north of Norban so many years ago, she’d known exactly what it meant. She’d known she should just turn and walk away. But the child’s cap of ringlets and big, solemn eyes had dredged up suchtearful memories of sweet Bess that Lauriana couldn’t bring herself to walk past.
She’d made a bargain with the Lord of Light. If He would keep the child’s magic leashed, Lauriana would raise the little girl in the Way of Light and do everything in her power to ensure that the child never strayed from the Bright Path.
She’d asked Him for a sign, and a shaft of sunlight had broken through the canopy of trees and shone directly on the baby, illuminating her curls like a halo of gold and flame. That was when Lauriana knew she’d been meant to find this child, that she’d been meant to save her as she could not save her sister Bess.
She’d kept her side of the bargain. She’d raised Ellie in the church, loved her with all her heart, and taught her to fear and reject magic. And though it had been like driving knives into her own flesh, she’d even turned her precious child over to the exorcists when those evil childhood seizures seemed proof that darkness was winning its bid for Ellie’s soul.
And now the sweet baby girl whose soul Lauriana had vowed to save, the daughter she’d raised in Light, was turning her back on all that her mother had taught her, lured by the beautiful illusion of the Fey.
Lauriana wanted to weep and scream and snatch her precious child out of harm’s way, but she could not. King Dorian had declared Ellysetta to be the Fey king’s bride, and there was nothing Lauriana could do about it. A woodcarver’s wife could not flout the will of one king, let alone two. She had Lillis and Lorelle to think of, too.
“Please,” she whispered, looking up at the shafts of sunlight shining in from the windows of the Solarus’s tiny dome. “Please, help me. Show me how to protect her. Give me a sign.”
But this time, the Bright Lord remained silent.
Weary and full of despair, no less troubled than when she’d begun her prayers, she exited the Solarus. Father Celinor stood near the doorway, his blue eyes gentle and compassionate.
“She’s a good girl, Madame Baristani,” he said. “I don’t think you have to worry about her losing her path among the Fey, no matter what the pamphleteers and rabble-rousers are claiming. Once tempers calm and people starting thinking again instead of reacting in fear to thesedahl’reisenthreats, they’ll remember that the Fey are soldiers of the Light.”
“I hope you’re right, Father,” Lauriana murmured.
He patted her hand. “Trust the Bright Lord to protect the souls in his keeping.”
She nodded with obedience but no sincerity and took her leave. Outside on the street, her doubts and fears rose up again, and she went about her errands in a cloud of despair, desperate to find a way to save Ellie but helpless to know how to go about it. She even, gods help her, considered approaching the Brethren of Radiance, but the moment she came within sight of their wild, wailing followers, she turned and fled. Desperate she might be, but not desperate enough to trade magic for madness.
All the while, the Shadow Seer’s warning rang hauntingly in her ears:Save her, mother. Only you can save her.
When she left Maestra Binchi’s shop on Queen’s Street after finishing the final fitting of her gown for the wedding, she broke down into helpless tears. She’d just tried on the most beautiful gown she’d ever worn, custom-tailored for her by the country’s leading Maestra of fashion. It should have been one of the giddiest, most exciting experiences of her life, a prelude to the even happier event of her oldest daughter’s nuptial celebration. Instead, as she’d stood there, draped in exquisite, costly silks, all she could think was,Will I dance in silk and jewels while I send my daughter to her doom?
A familiar voice called her name, “Madame Baristani?”
She looked up, scrubbing her tears away with the palms of her hands. Selianne was standing on the sidewalk, not far from Maestra Binchi’s shop door. She carried a bag filled with parcels and was watching Lauriana with a worried expression.
“Madame Baristani, are you all right?”
“Oh, Selianne.” She began to weep again. Here was someone who shared both Lauriana’s love for Ellie and her fear of the Fey. Here was someone she could talk to, someone who would understand. “No, kitling, I don’t think I am all right.”
Selianne stepped closer and slipped a comforting arm around Lauriana’s shoulders. “Come with me, Madame Baristani.” She glanced around at the storefronts surrounding them. “There’s Narra’s tea shop. Why don’t we share a nice pot of tea, and you can tell me what’s troubling you.”
Two bells later, Lauriana knelt beside Selianne and Ellysetta at the altar in the Grand Cathedral of Light, her head bowed in prayer, sneaking glances at Greatfather Tivrest. For the first time in days, she felt a glimmer of hope.
“I think you should speak to the archbishop,” Selianne had suggested after Lauriana poured out her litany of fears in Narra’s tea shop. “He’s a sensible man, and a godly one. He’s even powerful enough in the church to challenge King Dorian to protect the souls in his care. Talk to him. Tell him everything you’ve told me. I’d be surprised if he can’t help.”
Now, looking at him as he stood at the altar, stern and strong in his faith, she knew Selianne was right.
The archbishop was no blind admirer of the Fey like Celinor, nor a wild-eyed fanatic like the Fey-hating Brethren of Radiance. He was a sensible, orthodox man, a disciplined soldier of the Light, and a noble as powerful as any in King Dorian’s court.
If any man could help her save Ellie, Greatfather Tivrest could.
