A Meeting At Corvallis

The scowl left Luanne's face, on which a smile looked more natural. She was a year or two younger
than her husband, her skin coffee-dark, blunt features a comely full-lipped melange of her Texan father's
African-Anglo heritage and her Tejano mother's mestizo blood. Faded and dusky blue, a small scar
between her brows marked her as one of the Brotherhood, the A-listers of the Bearkiller Outfit; her
husband had an identical brand from the same red-hot iron. Mauve silk ribbons fluttered along the outer
seams of her jacket, making her a little careful when she reached across one of the laden platters.
"It's just hard not to see Arminger, looking at his kid," she went on a little defensively.
"Well, it's important that we don't see only that," Juniper said, pouring her more dark, frothy beer
from a pitcher. "Since the Lord and Lady saw fit to put her in our hands … wait a moment."
She thought, looking inside herself, and then she sighed. "There's something I should have done some
time ago, but I hoped it wouldn't be necessary to get formal about it. I hate throwing my weight
around … oh, well, if it has to be done, it has to be done."
She sighed again, then rose to her feet and waited until the buzz of conversation died. A little way to
her left Chuck Barstow was looking at her quizzically; beside him was his wife Judy, with dawning
understanding in her dark eyes and handsome proud-nosed face. They'd been friends since they were
teenagers, and they'd discovered the Craft together.
Of course she'd know, Juniper thought. Well, my old friend, that's why I'm doing it, you being so
stubborn and all, and others taking their cue from you.
Aloud, she said: "You all know we've had a guest among us, a girl by the name of Mathilda."
Rudi was staring at her, delight in his dancing blue-green eyes. Mathilda was too, puzzled and a little
apprehensive.
"Mathilda was captured through no fault of her own, in fighting against her folk that we of the Clan
took on ourselves for reasons we thought good, and still do. And later her folk tried to take her back,
and in that fight some were killed, and some were hurt—my own son Rudi among them. Now, some here
have held that against her, and I was waiting for that to vanish through its own lack of sense and
unkindliness, but it hasn't altogether. And that diminishes my honor, and the honor of Clan Mackenzie. So
here and now, I say that while this girl is with us, she is fostern of mine, and is to be treated as if she
were a child of my blood, necessary precautions aside, until I unsay this word, or she leaves us and so
breaks it."
Juniper took a deep breath, and raised her hands in the V of power, palms out, closing her eyes and
feeling the current of it running through her, like a fire in the blood until the little hairs along her arms and
up her spine struggled to rise. When her green gaze flared open again her voice rolled high and clear
through the great space of the Hall, linking her to every soul like chains of fine silver light:
"And this I bind on every man and woman and child of this Clan, and I make it geasa to break
it. I bind you all, by the Dagda and Angus Og and Lugh of the Long Spear; by Macha and Edain
and the Threefold Morrigu; by the Maiden, the Mother and the Hag, and if any break it by word
or deed may the Mother's Earth open and swallow you … the Mother's ocean rise up and drown
you … and the heaven of stars which are the dust of Her feet fall and crush you and all that is
yours. This is my geasa, which I, Juniper Mackenzie, Her priestess, and Chief of the Clan by the
Clan's choice, lay upon you! So mote it be!"
An echoing silence fell, and lasted until she put her hands on her hips and spoke in a normal tone:
"And that is that!"
She sat again and drank, conscious of eyes rolling white as they looked at her, and mouths gaping. It
took a moment for the others to follow suit, but when the roar of conversation started up it was louder
than ever.
"Whoa," Luanne said quietly.
Her husband had blanched and was clutching at a crucifix beneath his shirt; sweat darkened the fine
linen a little, and gleamed on his forehead.
"Remind me never to piss you off that much, Juney!"
"I doubt you'll ever do it, so," Juniper said. "Now, where were we? Ah, yes, Mathilda, and her being
Arminger's only heir."