"Anything but a Woodbane," Morgan managed to tease. She herself was a full-blood Woodbane and knew firsthand the kind of prejudice most Wiccans had against her ancestral clan. "Right," said Hunter, his eyes still on her.

They were silent for a moment, each lost in their own thoughts. Then Hunter finally said, "Please tell me what's wrong. You feel weird."

He knows me too well, Morgan thought. Hunter was feeling her uneasiness, her sadness, her regret.

"Are you ill?"

Morgan shook her head and tucked a few bangs behind one ear. "No-I'm okay. It's just-I needed to see you. To talk to you."

"It's always too long between times," Hunter said. "Sometimes I go crazy with it."

Morgan looked into his eyes, saw the flare of passion and longing that made her throat close and her stomach flutter.

"Me too," Morgan said, seizing the opening. "But even though it's making us crazy, we seem to be able to see each other less and less."

"Too true," Hunter said, rubbing his hand over his chin and the days' worth of stubble there. "This has not been a good year for us."

"Well, it's been good for us separately," Morgan said. "You're practically running the New Charter yourself, setting up offices all over the world, working with the others on guidelines. What you're doing is incredibly important. It's going to change how witches interact with each other, with their communities…." She shook her head. The old council was now barely more than a symbolic tradition. Too many witches had objected to its increasingly autonomous and even secretive programs to search out witches who were misusing magickal power. In response to that, Hunter and a handful of other witches had created the New Charter. It was less a policing organization than a support system to rehabilitate errant witches without having their powers stripped. It now included improving witches' standings in their communities, education, public relations, help with historical research. Wicca was being pulled into the twenty-first century, thanks in large part to Hunter.