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Assembly?”
    “I
have also been visited by visions,” announced Ealad-hach and, with his somber,
elegant bass, drew the attention of the entire seven man Council. “I would
speak of them now, if you please. They are pertinent.”
    When
all had consented, he rose and circled the Triumvirate’s long table to stand at
the center of the room—a place where light and shadow struggled and found,
each, its own level. Sun from the high windows dappled his green robe, making
him appear to be clothed in a sylvan sward.
    A tree , thought Bevol. An oak—knotted of
thought, rooted in habit, covered with lichen. They do not bend, these knotty
old oaks.
    “My
aislinn was crystalline,” said the deep, ringing voice—crystalline, itself. “The
images, fearfully clear. They had nothing to do with Cyne Colfre. They were not
of murals or of the drinking of Holy Water or even of chasms. They were of
Meredydd-a-Lagan.”
    “Meredydd!”
exclaimed Osraed Kynan and the slightly elder Eadmund echoed.
    Bevol
gazed at the table top, noticing how fine was the grain. Ealad-hach, in turn,
gazed at him.
    “They
were visions of a monstrous heresy,” he finished dramatically.
    Bevol
nearly applauded the performance, but restrained himself. “Describe them to us,
Ealad. We cannot interpret what we haven’t seen.”
    “ You saw.” It was an accusation delivered
to Bevol on the tip of a finger that trembled with emotion.
    Fear,
Bevol thought, though Ealad-hach was holding it severely in check behind a
shield of anger. He spread his hands, palms up. “Tell us what I saw.”
    “I’ll
do better. I will Weave it for you.” He paced the invisible perimeter of a
circle, etched in the pattern of dark and light by the tapping of his feet. He
stopped where he had begun the circuit. “She awaited the Meri, as woman was
never intended to do. She waited in the darkness for the Light. And the Light
came ...” From the tips of his outstretched fingers, colors flew and danced
into the circle, becoming a shore with a lone occupant, and waters suffused
with emerald and spangled with bits of fire.
    Calach
gasped and Tynedale breathed out sibilantly.
    Ealad-hach
divined the reason for their excitement immediately. “Oh, yes, she came! She
came and drew the heretic into the water ... to drown.”
    “You
suppose,” murmured Bevol and the woven image wavered like smoke.
    Ealad-hach
pitched it more fuel. “She walked beneath the waves and was sucked from sight.
And then, the most puzzling, horrific image of all—a girl rose from the waves,
shedding light as a bather sheds water. She came from the waves naked, and
stood, laughing, on the shore, flaunting herself.”
    “Meredydd?”
asked Calach in a whisper, squinting at the misty face. For the image of the
girl was watery, vaporous, and dark.
    “No.
Not Meredydd. Another, older cailin. A girl with pale hair and eyes like the
sea.”
    “Pale
hair?” repeated Tynedale. “What are you saying? Gwynet-a-Blaecdel has pale
hair, surely you don’t think this is her.” He waved a meaty hand at the
ambivalent form.
    “It
was not her. She’s a child. This was a young woman. A stranger to me.” The
figure lengthened, but showed no more solidity.
    “Who
then?”
    “Not
who, I think, but what. Woman, she was, and Wicke. The Cwen of Wicke, my
aislinn self knew her to be.”
    “Knew
her to be,” echoed Bevol, sounding faintly amused.
    “Without
doubt.”
    “I
had thought,” said Bevol quietly, “that you were at a loss to interpret this
vision. That you were waiting for Wyth to come home so that he could give the
Tell.”
    “I
still intend that he should do so. But I was moved to speak here and now.” He
glared at his peer. “I do not question the promptings of the Meri.” Within the
half-light circle, the aislinn folded in on itself and disappeared.
    “No,
no, of course not.”
    “If,”
said Calach, “the figure in the vision is symbolic of all women, do you take
this to mean that we must expel