"We are all the gods' creatures, Madame Baristani," he said. "Magic exists in the world because the gods deemed it should be so. Would you despise a flower for its perfume? No? Then why would you despise the Fey for possessing the magic they were born to have?”

"You're from the south, aren't you, Father?”

He looked a bit surprised, but nodded. "Yes, from the Tivali Valley, near the Elvian border. I've spent more than a few years in and around the company of magical races, and on the whole I've always found them to be honorable and worthy folk.”

"Well, I'm from the north," she countered, "from Dolan near the Eld border. And I know for a fact that not all magics are good. Nor are all gods, for that matter.”

"I'll grant you that," he agreed. "The Shadow Lord is evil, as are his followers-but we're not talking about Shadowfolk. We're talking about the Fey, and they have always been noble creatures. Not perfect-no living creatures are-but they do strive to be good. They follow the Way of Light.”

"How do you know that, Father? No human has set foot in the Fading Lands in a thousand years. None of us know what goes on behind the Faering Mists.”

He rose to his feet and held out a hand to help her up as well. "I'm afraid I can't help you there, Madame Baristani. What I can do is offer you the use of the chapel's Solarus. It's not as grand as the one at the Cathedral, but I still find peace there when I am troubled.”

It wasn't the advice she'd hoped for, but it was apparently the best he had to offer. She followed him to the chapel's small Solarus and stepped inside. The door closed behind her, granting her privacy, and she moved to the altar at the center of the round room. Overhead, the mirrored ceiling and tiny dome set with numerous windows shone light down on the small statue of Adelis perched on the altar slab.

With a sigh, Lauriana knelt, bowed her head, and began to pray. For more than half a bell, she prayed. Sometimes kneeling, sometimes pacing, sometimes weeping, but the peace she sought was more elusive than smoke.

Father Celinor didn't understand. He'd never seen the ugly side of magic. Not even Sol, a northerner like herself, truly understood. He'd lived his early years in the sheltered town of Callowill while she'd grown up in Dolan, a small and unfortunately strategic logging hamlet nestled in the shadow of two great forests, Greatwood and the dark Verlaine.

Far too many fierce, magical battles of the Wars had been fought on Dolan's doorstep, and the terrible by-products of those clashes haunted Dolaners still. They knew firsthand the evils of magic. They suffered the attacks of lyrant, the vile, mutated descendants of long-tailed treecats corrupted by black Magery. They witnessed the horrors of children born with ungodly powers, and suffered the agony of giving them up for the good of the town because they knew a worse fate awaited them all if they did not.

Lauriana's own sister Bessinita, a normally laughing, sweet-natured child of two, had been abandoned in the dark shadows of the Verlaine after she'd thrown a fit of childish temper while playing with a neighbor's child. That fit had sparked a fire that burned down the neighbor's house, nearly killed the neighbor's wife, and left the neighbor's child badly scarred.

So when Lauriana had found Ellysetta sitting under that tree north of Norban so many years ago, she'd known exactly what it meant. She'd known she should just turn and walk away. But the child's cap of ringlets and big, solemn eyes had dredged up such tearful memories of sweet Bess that Lauriana couldn't bring herself to walk past.

She'd made a bargain with the Lord of Light. If He would keep the child's magic leashed, Lauriana would raise the little girl in the Way of Light and do everything in her power to ensure that the child never strayed from the Bright Path.

She'd asked Him for a sign, and a shaft of sunlight had broken through the canopy of trees and shone directly on the baby, illuminating her curls like a halo of gold and flame. That was when Lauriana knew she'd been meant to find this child, that she'd been meant to save her as she could not save her sister Bess.

She'd kept her side of the bargain. She'd raised Ellie in the church, loved her with all her heart, and taught her to fear and reject magic. And though it had been like driving knives into her own flesh, she'd even turned her precious child over to the exorcists when those evil childhood seizures seemed proof that darkness was winning its bid for Ellie's soul.

And now the sweet baby girl whose soul Lauriana had vowed to save, the daughter she'd raised in Light, was turning her back on all that her mother had taught her, lured by the beautiful illusion of the Fey.

Lauriana wanted to weep and scream and snatch her precious child out of harm's way, but she could not. King Dorian had declared Ellysetta to be the Fey king's bride, and there was nothing Lauriana could do about it. A woodcarver's wife could not flout the will of one king, let alone two. She had Lillis and Lorelle to think of, too.

"Please," she whispered, looking up at the shafts of sunlight shining in from the windows of the Solarus's tiny dome. "Please, help me. Show me how to protect her. Give me a sign.”

But this time, the Bright Lord remained silent.

Weary and full of despair, no less troubled than when she'd begun her prayers, she exited the Solarus. Father Celinor stood near the doorway, his blue eyes gentle and compassionate.

"She's a good girl, Madame Baristani," he said. "I don't think you have to worry about her losing her path among the Fey, no matter what the pamphleteers and rabble-rousers are claiming. Once tempers calm and people starting thinking again instead of reacting in fear to these dahl'reisen threats, they'll remember that the Fey are soldiers of the Light.”