“And who leads her?” Senara giggled. “Miellyn, you should not say such things.”
“Why not? Speaking the truth is usually considered to be a virtue,” Miellyn said stoutly, and Eilan was reminded of Caillean. Her grandfather’s treatment of the High Priestess seemed very different from the sovereignty that the Druid of her vision had proclaimed.
“I speak the truth as I see it; and when I see Lhiannon growing so feeble, I wonder —”
Miellyn did not finish her sentence, for at that moment the bear dropped to all fours and lumbered directly toward them. Senara shrieked and jumped away, but the crowd pressed in on every side. Eilan pulled back, stepping on a strange woman’s dress, and hearing it rip.
“Watch where you are stepping!” the stranger said peevishly. Eilan apologized, trying to make herself smaller, and at that moment the bear surged forward again, his leading rope coming loose as someone cried out in alarm. The whole crowd pressed backward and when Eilan recovered her balance Miellyn and Senara had disappeared in the crushing crowd.
It was the first time in years that Eilan had been alone. She had grown accustomed to the constant chaperonage of the Forest House. Now it occurred to her that the supervision had another purpose than propriety; the presence of her sisters had helped to keep people away both physically and psychically. Alone, the tumult of alien thoughts and emotions buffeted her like a strong wind. She tried to draw strength from the earth for protection, but the strange faces surrounding her filled her with confusion. How did Lhiannon stand walking among the people when she was already half-tranced and opened to the power of the gods? So hemmed in by the crowd and the press of strangers was she that she could see nothing familiar; not even the avenue of trees that led towards the Forest House, nor the mound from which they gave the Oracles.
Once she glimpsed through the crowd what looked like a familiar blue gown; but when she neared it, it was the cloak of a complete stranger. Another time she thought she spotted a group of priestesses; but there were four of them, and by the time it occurred to her that her companions could have met with some others from the Forest House and that they could all be looking for her they had disappeared in the press of strangers again. The temporary landscape of the fair seemed as strange to her as the Otherworld. This is ridiculous — shielding myself from other people’s emotions was the first thing they taught us! I should simply ask someone, she kept telling herself, but vulnerable as she was, she dared not speak to a stranger; for what would they think of a priestess who could not find the way back to her own dwelling place?
She moved through the crowds, trying to hold reasonless terror at bay. If she could just restore her defenses, she would ask someone in which direction the Forest House lay. Some day, no doubt, she would look back on this day with amusement, as an adventure. Only at the moment there could be no doubt that she was both lost and terrified.
A sudden movement of the crowd swept her almost off her feet; she lost her balance and collided with a man in a dark cloak. He murmured something, then started. “Eilan! Is it really you?” Strong hands seized her elbows and a familiar voice demanded, “Where did you come from?”
And Eilan looked up into the one face which of all the faces in the world she had least expected to see; the face of Gaius Macellius.
Wordless, she clung to him. He felt her trembling and pulled her closer. Abruptly the confusion around her was stilled by the circle of his arms.
“Eilan -” he repeated. “I did not dare dream I would find you here!”
But I did, thought Eilan dimly. When I woke this morning my first thought was that you were near; why did I not trust it?
His arms tightened around her; and in that moment she forgot all of Caillean’s words of warning, all her own misgivings and fears. She knew only that she was happy.