She knew that she was adopted, of course—the records of Anchor were more likely to trip them up than hide them in their scheme if they had pretended otherwise—but believed that her parents had died in the conflicts raging back at that time. Nor did Spirit look anything like either Kasdi or Matson; that had been a part of it, too, as any enemy might well look at Kasdi’s native land and her large family there in its search for things to use against her.

Spirit had grown into a young woman now, and it was a shock to see her these days. Olive-skinned and curvaceous, well-built as Kasdi herself never was, with a beautiful face and long, black hair and huge, soft brown eyes, she was the heartthrob of every teen-age boy in Anchor Logh.

Sister Kasdi ached every time she thought of Spirit, which was all the time she wasn’t preoccupied with matters of duty. She was proud of her daughter in every way, for Spirit was also exceptionally bright and at least shared her real mother’s love for animals and nature, but there was much guilt there, too. Although Spirit had been well brought up in an atmosphere and surroundings not unlike her mother’s, the girl had been raised by others. Although she had kept close track of her daughter’s progress, she’d really had no input into anything not genetic in her only child’s upbringing. Oh, she’d visited Spirit when she could, under the guise of a priestess who was a cousin of her late mother’s, but that was about it.

She was lost in such thought when she suddenly became aware of a throat clearing and snapped out of it for a while. Sister Karla, the administrative priestess for the level, stood there looking apologetic. “Sorry I must disturb you, Sister, but the wizard Mervyn is here to see you.”

Kasdi brightened a bit. “Send him in! And don’t hesitate to disturb me. It is not good when I think too much.”

The priestess frowned a moment in puzzlement, then turned and walked back out the door.