priest," said Hennea tightly, sliding off the horse. "I was a fool. He sent me to get you to leave your daughter unprotected."
Seraph nodded. "I've come to that conclusion myself. Do you think they'd take her to the temple?"
"Yes."
"We'll leave Skew here," said Seraph. "He'll lose his footing on the cobbles in the steep parts. Lehr, can you find some place to secure him?"
"There'll be space by the woodshed," he said and took the horse.
Hennea stood a little crookedly, as if she were in pain. Seraph called a magelight and took a good look at Hennea's burnt arm.
"There are easier ways to break a geas," she said dryly.
"I was in a hurry," replied Hennea, her lips curving in a pale smile. "And I was angry."
"That's going to hurt," observed Seraph.
"It already does. I'm not going to be much help in any kind of fight; my concentration is gone. I can feed your magic, though."
"Good enough," Seraph said.
Lehr came back and Seraph turned and started up the road at a rapid walk. Jes and Lehr could probably run all the way to the temple, but she and Hennea would have to take it slower or they wouldn't be any good when they got there. She knew that Jes was with them by the clenching of her stomach, but she only caught a glimpse of him now and again out of the corner of her eye.
"Tell me about Volis," said Seraph. "Whatever you think will be useful."
"He's smarter than I thought he was, obviously. The other mages in the Secret Path respected his power - but he's young by solsenti standards and complex spells frustrate him. Because of that, he tends to use the Raven ring more than his own magic unless he's weaving an illusion."
They came to a steep bend in the road, and Hennea quit speaking until they were on flatter ground. "I told you that the wizards steal Orders and wear them. Usually as rings, but there are some stones set in earrings and necklaces. He told me that some of the rings are painful to use, and some of them don't work all the time. Most of the wizards can only use one ring at a time, but Volis has two he uses. The first one bears the Order of the Raven. With it he usually has an Owl, though I've seen him with a Hunter's ring a time or two as well. You'll know which one he wears when you see him, just look."
"How well does he bear the Orders?"
"About as you'd think," she said. "He seems to believe the Raven Order is just like his magic, except that he doesn't have to use rituals."
Seraph smiled in satisfaction. "Tell me, does he have a bad temper?"
As they got closer to the temple, Lehr stopped and bent down as if to touch the ground, but he pulled his hand back before it touched.
"What's this, Mother?" he asked.
"What?" Seraph stopped, too, but she didn't see anything.
"A taint," said Jes. He must have been close to Hennea because she gave a nervous squeak.
"What does it look like?"
"It looks as if a foul substance was spilled over the ground," said Lehr. "It smells bad, too."
"Shadowed," said Hennea in a small voice. "I'd wondered."
"It comes from the temple," said Jes. "It's darker there."
"It's really there?" asked Lehr. "Why can't you see it, Mother?"
"I don't know why Ravens can't see the Stalker's influence, or why Larks can't either," replied Seraph. "I can understand why the ancients didn't feel it necessary for Owls or Cormorants, but Larks and Ravens have to deal with shadowing."
"Unto each Order..." murmured Hennea.
" 'Are the powers so given' - yes, yes, I know. It is still stupid. So Volis is most likely shadowed." It was a very rare condition. Seraph had never dealt with someone who was shadowed, though her teacher had. He'd died before he taught her much about it because there was so much else to learn. She knew the Stalker needed some destructive feeling or act to gain influence and the amount of influence varied. The Shadowed had been different, her teacher said, because the Shadowed had invoked the Stalker's power and welcomed the shadowing.
"Let's go," she said. "We need to get to Rinnie."
They reached the temple finally, and Lehr tried the door.
"It's locked," he said. "Barred from the inside, I think."
Seraph said something short and guttural, a summoning she would not have remembered if she'd stopped to think about it, and the door blew apart,