The girl looked up without surprise. She had dark skin, a lovely smile, and radiant eyes. She was very pretty, but seemed far too young for her calling. She couldn’t have been more than sixteen. “Blessings of the full moon,” she greeted Giogi.
“Blessings of the full moon,” he responded. “I’m looking for Mother Lleddew.”
“Are you sure you’re not looking for your heart’s desire?” the girl asked with a grin.
“What?” Giogi replied with confusion.
“You did just climb Selûne’s Stair by the full moon,” the girl pointed out.
“Well, yes, I did,” Giogi admitted. “All I really wanted, though, was to see Mother Lleddew.”
“She’s on a night-stalk,” the girl said. “I’m here to watch over the temple until she returns.”
Giogi sighed with frustration. A night-stalk was a sacred ritual practiced by devout worshipers of Selûne. Lleddew would be walking in solitary communion with her goddess until the moon set. Suddenly Giogi remembered the lacedon attack. “Look, I don’t mean to alarm you, but there were evil things out in the woods tonight. You shouldn’t be alone here, and Mother Lleddew shouldn’t be walking alone out there.”
The girl smiled with amusement as she stood and drifted toward him. She shimmered like a moonbeam when she moved, and her hair glittered like a cascade of water. “You are the one in danger, Giogioni,” she said earnestly. “You can speak with Mother Lleddew tomorrow, after noon. For now, though, I think I’d better send you home.”
“I can’t leave you alone here,” the nobleman argued.
“Kneel,” the girl directed him, “so I can have a look at that cut on your head.”
Giogi obeyed, curious to see if so young an acolyte really had power to heal his wound.
The girl bent over Giogi and kissed his forehead.
The fire in his head flared momentarily, then subsided completely. Giogi swayed dizzily, then looked up, relieved of all discomfort. “That was wonder—” The noble halted in midsentence. His head spun around in confusion and dripped water all about the Calimshan carpeting.
He knelt in his own bedroom before a roaring fire.
“I must be dreaming,” said Giogi, “or hallucinating because of my head wound.”
The nobleman pinched and shook himself, but he didn’t wake to find himself dying of exposure on the side of Spring Hill. He was still in his own bedroom. The bedclothes held the family coat of arms, a green wyvern on a yellow field. The portrait over the fireplace was of his mother and father. The indigo seashells he’d brought from Westgate lay strewn about the dresser. “It must be my room,” he said.
Still confused, he muttered to himself as he stripped off his soaked clothing. “First I was there, and now I’m here. She kissed me, and I appeared here. I didn’t know acolytes could do that, but if she wasn’t an acolyte, what was she doing in the temple in an acolyte’s gown, telling me when I could see Mother Lleddew? And how did she know my name?”
Giogi slid into bed beneath the covers. He lay there wondering if he hadn’t just dreamed all about Spring Hill, Selûne’s Stair, the lacedons, the crescent-marked bear, and the girl acolyte. When the chill had worn off his flesh, he slid out of bed again and padded over to the pile of wet clothing.
Giogi shook his head as he pulled a robe on. He slipped from his bedroom, tiptoed down the hall to the red room, and knocked softly on the door. He had to share his story with someone.
“Mistress Cat?” he whispered. When no one answered, he knocked again.
“Whuzzah? Come in,” a sleepy voice called out. Giogi opened the door.
The red room was well furnished, but Thomas kept it empty of personal items, like a room at an inn. The red velvet hangings and the oaken bed, dresser, chair, and chest were all new and sturdy—not an heirloom in the lot. The guest room belonged to no one, which is how it felt to those who stayed in it.
By the light from the lamp flickering on the dresser, Giogi could see Cat curled up in one corner of the bed, the blankets all wrapped tightly around her. Her coppery hair was strewn over the pillows. Her robes lay draped over the chair before the fireside.
Cat sat up in the bed, looking drowsy but lovely. “I asked Thomas to wake me when you returned,” she said, pushing her hair out of her face.
“Um, he doesn’t know I’m back yet. I fell in the Immer Stream and a bear saved me from lacedons, and then this lovely girl kissed me and teleported me here.”
Tying a sheet around her body, Cat slid out from under the covers and walked to the doorway, where Giogi stood. She put a hand to his forehead, her brow knit with concern. “You don’t have a fever,” she said after a moment.
“I’m fine, really. You know, your hand is so nice and warm.”
Cat smiled and said, “Perhaps you ought to lie down, anyway.” She took Giogi by the arm and steered him back to his own room.
Giogi, babbling on, let himself be led. “You know, the guardian said that I’d been kissed by Selûne. I think she’s just done it again, Selûne that is, through one of her priestesses. You see, the kiss cured the scratch the lacedons gave me, which was nice, the kiss, not the cut, I mean. It also brought me home, though, which was strange but nice, too.”
“Here we go,” Cat said, steering him into his own room.
“But still, it’s rather disturbing to be kissed by Selûne,” Giogi said with a sigh, “since it is one of those things the guardian is always making a fuss about. I know I’m going to dream tonight about all those things—death cry of prey, and so on. Aunt Dorath says she just ignored the dreams, but I don’t see how she could,” Giogi said with annoyed disbelief.
“Lie down, Master Giogioni,” Cat ordered, pressing him down on the bed. “You can rest and talk.” As he lay back on his bed, Cat fluffed up his pillows and propped them behind him.
“Did you find anyone who knew about the spur?” Cat asked lightly, seating herself at the foot of the bed.
“Well, Aunt Dorath knows something, but she won’t tell me what. She’s being absurdly stubborn. I get the idea she wants to carry her secret to the grave. I talked with Sudacar. He didn’t know about the spur, but he knew a lot about my father.” Giogi’s eyes shone when he asked the mage, “Did you know my father was a hero? Not just an adventurer, but a real hero? I went on a mission for the crown, but it’s not really the same as adventuring. It must be interesting being an adventurer.”
“Why don’t you try it and find out?” Cat asked with a smile.
“Oh, I couldn’t. It’s just not done. Aunt Dorath would have kittens,” the nobleman explained.
“But your father did it,” Cat pointed out.
“He must have been very brave,” Giogi said, shaking his head slowly as if to deny he had that much courage.
“To go out into the wilderness or to defy your Aunt Dorath?” Cat asked with a chuckle.
Giogi laughed, too. “Both,” he said.
“What could your aunt do?” Cat asked. “Cut off your money?”
“No. I have my own money,” Giogi explained. “Aunt Dorath is family, though. I can’t just ignore her.”
“But if you were off adventuring, she couldn’t bother you,” Cat said slyly.
“But she would pounce on me whenever I returned to Immersea,” Giogi retorted.
“Then don’t ever return,” Cat suggested.
“Never return?” Giogi said with shock. “Immersea’s my home. I couldn’t stay away.” Giogi’s face fell in disappointment as he realized he’d just talked himself out of a dream. He justified his inaction further by saying, “Besides, I wouldn’t know how I should go about adventuring. Not the first thing. Do you have to register for it or something?”
Cat laughed. Brushing her hand through her hair, she slid up the bed so that she sat much closer to Giogi. “First thing you should do is try to look the part. Hold still,” she ordered.