"Yes," Tremayne answered, not lying. He had been in Sanctuary, though there was no mistress; if Varian dared show his face in the city, he would realize that the laws there prohibited any male wizard from so much as touching a female, with or without power, unless she was his legal wife. And since none of the male wizards in Atlantia had ever married, all the women of Sanctuary were completely off-limits to them. But few males of power ventured inside the walls of Sanctuary, and few atop these mountains knew or cared what laws prevailed there.

Tremayne knew the laws well. He had spent much of his time these last months exploring the city, taking extreme care to give no offense and wearing the mark of power without either shame or arrogance. He had learned a great deal.

Varian shook his head almost pityingly. "You're too damned choosy, Tremayne, that's your trouble. And a fool to keep your bitch in the city. Her place is here, warming your bed. Is she breeding yet?"

"No," Tremayne replied. Again no lie. She was not pregnant, the woman he wanted; at least she showed no sign of it. And he had hardly gotten close enough to be responsible if she were. She had proven elusive; he hadn't been able to find her since that brief meeting more than a week ago that had struck him with such numbing force, he still felt shock when he thought about it.

"My Lord?" Ginny's voice was almost a wail, bereft.

"She's ready for another ride," Varian said to his house guest with a wide smile, and turned away to stride back along the terrace.

Tremayne didn't linger to hear the noisy coupling. He descended through the gardens rather than returning to the house. It would be dawn before he reached the valley floor, but he was restless and, more than anything, had to get away from his uncle's house.

Thoughts of the lady pushed every other aside, and he felt again that strange, wrenching -shock inside himself. He didn't know if she was a wizard or powerless; their meeting had so affected him that he had been blind to even that most basic of questions. He knew only that he wanted her. She had been slight and rather fragile, but not childlike; hers had been the ripening body of a young woman. Golden hair escaping the net into which she had carelessly bundled it, wide blue eyes in a heart-shaped, delicately lovely face. The grace of a young doe. The innate wariness of a woman of Atlantia.

He didn't know who she was. Or what she was. But he knew he had to find her.

It was past dawn when Tremayne reached the valley floor and took the road to Sanctuary. The Curtain was dispersing as the first rays of the morning sun reached over the mountaintops. And it had been many long hours of torment since Roxanne's final, hopeless cry had echoed through the forest beside the road. If he glanced to the left, he might see something like a pile of soiled laundry against the base of a tree no more than thirty feet away.

He didn't look.

Seattle-1984

It was his home. She knew that, although where her certainty came from was a mystery to her. like the inner tug that had drawn her across the country to find him, the knowledge seemed instinctive, beyond words or reason. She didn't even know his name. But she knew what he was. He was what she wanted to be, needed to be, what all her instincts insisted she had to be, and only he could teach her what she needed to learn.

Until this moment she had never doubted that he would accept her as his pupil. At sixteen she was passing through that stage of development experienced by humans twice in their lifetimes, a stage marked by total self-absorption and the unshakable certainty that the entire universe revolves around oneself. It occurred in infancy and in adolescence, but rarely ever again, unless one was utterly unconscious of reality. Those traits had given her the confidence she had needed to cross the country alone with no more than a ragged backpack and a few dollars.

But they deserted her now, as she stood at the wrought-iron gates and stared up at the secluded old Victorian house. The rain beat down on her, and lightning flashed in the stormy sky, illuminating the turrets and gables of the house; there were few lighted windows, and those were dim rather than welcoming.

It looked like the home of a wizard.

She almost ran, abruptly conscious of her aloneness. But then she squared her thin shoulders, shoved open the gate, and walked steadily to the front door. Ignoring the bell, she used the brass knocker to rap sharply. The knocker was fashioned in the shape of an owl, the creature that symbolized wisdom, a familiar of wizards throughout fiction.

She didn't know about feet.

Her hand was shaking, and she gave it a fierce frown as she rapped the knocker once more against the solid door. She barely had time to release the knocker before the door was pulled open.

Tall and physically powerful, he had slightly shaggy raven hair and black eyes that burned with an inner fire. For long moments he surveyed the dripping, ragged girl on his doorstep with lofty disdain, while all of her determination melted away to nothing. Then he caught her collar with one elegant hand, much as he might have grasped a stray cat, and yanked her into the well-lit entrance hall. He studied her with daunting sternness.

What he saw was an almost painfully thin girl who looked much younger than her sixteen years. Her threadbare clothing was soaked; her short, tangled hair was so wet that only a hint of its normal vibrant red color was apparent; and her small face, all angles and seemingly filled with huge eyes, was white and pinched. She was no more attractive than a stray? mongrel pup.

"Well?"

The vast poise of sixteen years deserted the girl as he barked the one word in her ear. She gulped. "I… I want to be a wizard," she managed finally, defiantly.

"Why?"

She was soaked to the skin, tired and hungry, and she possessed a temper that had more than once gotten her into trouble. Her green eyes snapping, she glared up into his handsome, expressionless face, and her voice lost all its timidity.

"I will be a wizard! If you won't teach me, I'll find someone who will. I can summon fire already-a little-and I can feel the power inside me. All I need is a teacher, and I'll be great one day-"

He lifted her clear off the floor and shook her briefly, effortlessly, inducing silence with no magic at all. "The first lesson an Apprentice must learn," he told her calmly, "is to never-ever-shout at a Master."

He casually released her, conjured a bundle of clothing out of thin air, and handed it to her. Then he waved a hand negligently and sent her floating up the dark stairs toward a bathroom.

And so it began.