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Let’s get you washed up and fed, yeah? We’ve a long morning ahead.”

He hadn’t been sleeping very well the past few nights, dreams repeating and driving him awake so often he might as well not even try anymore. So, when he watched the three shamans file in, each of them dipping low bows to both him and Wil, each of them smiling serenely, Dallin felt weariness creep in, muted but insistent.

This little conference was to be the result of two days of almost-continual arguing, defending and assuring, and he quite resented the fact that they hadn’t allowed time 402

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for him to talk to Wil about it privately first. Dallin could insist on it—they put up a good fight on some things, but they always acquiesced when their ‘Shaman’ put his foot down, as it were, and though it was convenient, it still made him want to hit someone. Who was he, after all?

And who were they to let him stroll in and take control, simply by virtue of legend and ancient law? And all right, so it wasn’t truly legend—he’d accepted the reality of what he was, what Wil was, as he’d sat stunned in that inn their first night out of Dudley—but how could these men just… just
hand
him Lind? Expect him to guide its fate and everyone’s in it?

Dallin turned to Wil, noted the shuttered gaze, the wary attention, and silently approved. As much as the simple acceptance annoyed him, he still wasn’t entirely sure there wasn’t some kind of trap lurking beneath it all. Calder, after all, had been one of these men before he’d cut away his Marks; how many of them thought as he did? How much of all this was simply information-gathering until all twelve could convene and vote on Wil’s fate?—with or without their Shaman’s consent. How much of that control they seemed so eager to hand Dallin was, in truth, control and how much of it was stalling?

He kept silent as they seated themselves on the stone floor, moving a bit slowly and cautiously, all of them, but surprisingly less rickety than Dallin would have expected from men of such advanced ages. Then again, doing what they did, immersing themselves daily in the power of this place, of Fæðme, good health and longevity were rather low on the shock scale.

Dallin shook his head. How was it that he could be remembering things he’d had no idea he’d even once known? And how could he have forgotten so profoundly that he hadn’t even known there was anything he
had
forgotten?

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“Forgive our eagerness, young Wil,” Thorne began,

“but we have waited so very long.” He gestured to his right, to a broad-faced man with a full beard of silver-gray and a shaggy mass of the same on his head. He was thick and swart, round-cheeked; a man who appeared to thoroughly enjoy his food. “May I present Æweweard Marden,” Thorne said, then indicated the man to his left. “Æweweard Siddell.” A scarecrow made of sticks, hair only just beginning to go iron beneath the gold, thin cheeks clean-shaven though cragged with obvious age; Thorne’s junior by only a few years, but age sat heavier on him than any of the Old Ones Dallin had met thus far.

Both men once again dipped their heads, hands laid over their breastbones in a gesture of deep respect. Marden reached into his tunic, withdrawing a thin, fine-wrought silver chain, a small, dagger-shaped drop of crystal quartz dangling from its end. Clear and flawless, it caught the light from the cave’s mouth and spattered prisms over the walls and Marden’s round face.

“A small gift,” he told Wil, extending it on the tips of his thick fingers. “You are full of questions. Used properly, this may help you find answers.”

Taken aback, Wil started to reach out but stopped before his fingers touched the stone. “And what is the proper way to use it?” he asked suspiciously.

Marden smiled, as though the question itself satisfied his own curiosity. “Why, whatever way you choose to use it, of course.”

Back to those same cryptic answers Dallin had been getting for two days now. He almost growled.

“It is also known to offer protection,” Thorne put in,

“and to aid one in…” He paused, thought about what he wanted to say. “Forging links,” he finally continued.

“Making difficult unions less difficult.” He nodded, encouraging. “Go on, then, lad. It’s all right.”

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Wil frowned, shot a glance over at Dallin then, when Dallin only shrugged, Wil leaned forward and allowed Marden to drop the chain over his head. He sat back, still frowning, but his fingers closed over the stone with a strange delicacy before cupping it lightly against his breastbone. It took a moment for Dallin to twig to the odd emotional jumble twisting in Wil’s expression.

No one’s ever given him a gift before. And he’s
scunnered.

Wil tried to speak—couldn’t. He cleared his throat.

“I don’t know what that means,” he whispered, peered down, watching his finger through the clear stone as it stroked slowly along the smooth line of it. Swallowing heavily, he looked up at Marden, a soft shimmer to his eyes, and nodded. “Thank you. It was very kind of you.”

Siddell was next, extending his bony hand, thin eyebrows raised encouragingly as Wil slowly held out his own, palm-up. “Sun and Moon,” Siddell said as he dropped a small, smooth charm into Wil’s hand.

Primitive-looking, though somehow more beautiful for it.

The shapes were vaguely male and female—the woman made of fiery gold sunstone; the man cool and opalescent moonstone. The Mother and the Father, Sun and Moon, fused together into one. Arms outstretched, one eternally reaching for the other, a forever-dance of intertwined love and faith. “Balance and harmony,” Siddell told Wil, closed his fingers over the charm and folded his own gnarled, blue-veined hand over Wil’s, gave it a pat. He smiled. “You feel it already.”

Wil frowned at his own hand and nodded slowly. “It feels… extraordinarily old, it’s been…” He closed his eyes, held it to his chest over the crystal at his breastbone. “Its dreams are so very deep, and… and
long
.” He opened his eyes, peered at Siddell, once again taken aback, almost to the point of anxiety. His hand stretched out, opened. “I 405

The Aisling Book Two Dream

can’t accept this—it must be thousands of years old. Time before Time. I can feel it.”

“Then I should think that you can indeed accept it, for it seems it belongs in the hand of one who knows it.”

Wil shook his head, his expression too close to distressed. A faint flush of shame lent light color to his cheeks. “You don’t understand. I
can’t
. It’s been touched by Her own hand.” He held it out to Dallin, near-panic.

“Here. You should have it. It isn’t for me, they’ve made a mistake, it should be in the hand of one who… who—”

“Who deserves it?” Dallin cut in softly. Wil only stared at him for a moment, then cut his glance away, dipped his head and pointed his eyes stubbornly at the floor. Dallin reached out, folding the charm into Wil’s hand as Siddell had done. He squeezed his own hand tight about Wil’s fist. “These men know all about you, Wil. They
know
, just as She does. If you think you need some sort of absolution, they’ll happily give it to you, so will She, but you’re the only one who thinks hiding from Her deserves retribution.”

“I’ve not been
hiding
,” Wil grated, angry, though it was low and a little too small.

“No?” Dallin kept his hand folded over Wil’s. He reached out with the other and slipped his arm over Wil’s shoulders. “I know a little bit about hiding,” he said, very quietly in Wil’s ear. “If I’d not hidden away so much of myself, I really might’ve hacked my way into the Guild when I had the chance all those years ago. I’ll always owe you a debt for that; I’ll always be sorry.” He gave Wil’s hand a light squeeze around the charm. “You hated Her and you loved Her at the same time, and both combined to keep Her from you, that’s all this is—not failure, not disloyalty, not weakness. You built up walls to survive, and you’ve forgotten how to let Her through them. That’s all right. She’s never stopped loving you because of it.

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She’s never stopped trying to help you, reach you. That’s why I’m here, remember?”

“For Her,” Wil whispered.

Dallin sighed, dipped his brow to rest against Wil’s temple. “You’re such a stroppy idiot sometimes.” He tugged at Wil’s hair to soften the sting of the rebuke. “For
you
, y’ daft dolt. You said you trusted me.”

“I

do
, I… it has nothing to do with—”

“Then trust my word.”

Wil shook his head, frustrated. “It doesn’t have anything to do with trusting
you
.”

“It will have,” Dallin assured him soberly. He nodded toward the three shamans, silently watching them, gazes keen and observant but benevolent. “They’re here to tell you what’s expected of the Aisling; I’m here to remind you that it’s all up to you. But you also need to know that…”

He trailed off, sighed. “We’ll get to that. Right now, trust me in this.” Again, he squeezed Wil’s hand around the charm. “You should have it. Accept it graciously, and let’s get this done.”

He withdrew his hand and sat back. Making his opinion clear, he hoped, but leaving it up to Wil.

Wil only sat there for a moment, slightly hunched, staring at his fisted hand. Slowly, like the petals of a reluctant flower unfurling, his fingers loosened, opened.

The little charm lying in his palm glowed iridescent in the combined light of the fire and daylight creeping in from outside. Coral-gold and irised-pearl, tatted in a perpetual stone embrace. He peered up at Siddell through his fringe, closed his hand over the charm again.

“Thank you,” he murmured. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to sound ungrateful. It’s beautiful, it’s more than…” He shook his head, bit his lip, said, “Thank you,” again, and went silent.

Siddell bowed his head with a smile, then turned a 407

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hard gaze on Dallin, measuring. Strangely, all of them were staring, and more at Dallin than at Wil. Perhaps he’d stepped outside their expectations for their Guardian again, as it seemed he was entirely too wont to do. He didn’t care now any more than he’d cared the other fifty times he’d done it.

He returned their stares evenly, with perhaps a slight touch of defiance bubbling beneath it. “Shall we get on?”

he asked mildly.

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