“And you will demonstrate that you are mistress of the skills we have taught you, and that the Goddess is willing to accept you? You will understand that I cannot describe it – indeed they say that for each candidate the ordeal is different, so even if my oath did not forbid it I could tell you nothing more.”
Eilan suppressed a shiver of anxiety. Living in the House of Maidens she had heard rumors of candidates who had failed and been sent away, or worse still, disappeared. “I understand, and I am willing,” she said quietly.
“So be it, then,” said Caillean, In Her name I now welcome you as a candidate priestess.” She kissed Eilan on the cheek; and Eilan remembered that one of the younger priestesses had done this when first she came to the Forest House. For a moment the two kisses blurred; she blinked, dizzied by the sense that she was repeating a moment she had lived many times before.
“At the full moon before Samaine, then, you shall speak your vows in the presence of the priestesses. Lhiannon and your grandfather will be greatly pleased.”
Eilan stared at her. She was certainly not doing this for their sake! Caillean had asked her to choose, but had her decision in fact
been molded by her family’s expectations and perhaps other forces dimly hovering in the shadows beyond perception.
“Caillean —” she whispered, reaching out to the priestess. “If I vow myself to the Goddess, it will not be because I am the daughter and granddaughter of Druids, or even because I will never see Gaius again. There has to be something more.”
Caillean looked at her. “When we first met it seemed to me you had a destiny among us,” she said slowly. “I feel it even more strongly now. But I cannot guarantee that you will be happy, child.”
“I do not expect to be —” Eilan caught her breath on a sob. “So long as there is some reason, some purpose, in it all!”
Caillean sighed and held out her arms, and Eilan leaned against her, feeling the tightness in her throat ease as the other woman stroked her hair.
“There is always a reason, my dear, though it may be long before we understand it – that is all the comfort I can offer you. If the Goddess does not know what She is doing, what meaning is there in the world?”
“It is enough,” whispered Eilan, hearing the other woman’s heart beating, steady and slow, beneath her ear. “If I also have your love.”
“You do . . .” Caillean’s voice was almost too low to be heard. “I love you as Lhiannon has loved me . . .”
The full moon looked down from the heavens like a watchful eye, as if Arianrhod had personally decided to observe the ceremonies. As the chanting of the priestesses who had brought her here faded to silence, an inner chill pebbled Eilan’s arms, though the night was warm. Had she been hoping for rain? It would have made no difference; if the Druids had allowed the weather to affect their rituals they would not have had much of a religion. She knew she should be glad that the skies had chosen to bless her initiation, but the moonlight made her uneasy.
At least the brightness should make it easier to follow the path, and all the priestesses had asked was that she walk through the forest back to the temple, which did not seem a great ordeal. Eager for it to be done, Eilan hurried into the shadows beneath the trees, away from the moon’s implacable gaze.
She had been walking for scarcely the time it takes to spin a yard of thread when she realized that she was lost.
Controlling her breathing, Eilan turned. This, she supposed, must be the first test of her training, to see if she could use her inner senses to find her way. She drew on the steady power of the earth beneath her – that, at least, had not changed. The energies of moon and stars sang above, and as she opened herself to become the pillar that linked them, breathing out and in regular rhythm until she knew herself to be at the center of the universe, the fear went away.