along with an aptitude for more traditional, manipulative magic. If the
combination did not, of itself, destroy the unfortunate’s soul, then mage-kind
and priest-kind would unite until that destruction was accomplished.
Yet Molin knew that Illyra had seen the truth. Pieces of memory fell into place:
childhood-times when he had been subtly set apart from his peers; youth-times
when he had relied on his own instincts and not Vashanka’s guidance to complete
his audacious strategies; adult-times when his superiors had conspired to send
him to this truly godforsaken place; and now-times when he consorted with mages
and gods and felt the fate of Sanctuary on his shoulders.
No amount of retrospective relief, however, could compensate for the anxiety
Illyra had planted within him. He had relied on his intuition, had come to trust
it completely, but what he called his intuition was his mother’s witch-blood
legacy. He did not merely sense the distinctions between probable and
improbable-he shaped them. Worse, now that he was conscious of his heritage, it
could erupt, destroying him and everything that depended on him, at any moment.
He walked through the cold sunlight looking for salvation-knowing that his
impulsive searches were an exercise of the power he feared. Still, his mind did
not betray him; his priest-self could accept the path intuition revealed:
Randal, the Hazard-mage become Stepson. The magician’s freedom would be the
byproduct of Molin’s other strategies, and for that freedom a priest might