“And why do you ask another’s name when you have no true name of your own?”

“He said he might have use of me,” said Roric, trying with an effort to keep the edge out of his voice. It was no use becoming angry with a Weaver.

“And that use might be-?” When Roric said nothing more, the Weaver’s hand disappeared again into the shapeless robes and emerged this time with a piece of string. Fingers moved quickly as the string took shape, first a series of loops, then triangles and diamonds, finally a web so dense it looked as though it must contain much more string than when the Weaver had begun.

“Tangled,” came the voice at last, neither man’s nor woman’s. The Weaver always said that. “Lives are tangled here. The change, the upheaval, may be closer than anyone thought, and some beneath the sun may be sought to withhold it, or even to hurry it.”

“I gave you my best knife for a clear answer,” said Roric testily. “I’m not burning an offering to influence the future-not that I’m sure that often works. I’m asking you something that has already happened.”

“What has happened,” said the Weaver enigmatically, “depends so much on your perspective. Who has appeared, and what he seeks, depends on whether he seeks a man without a name or a man with a mighty father.”

“And which one do you think you’re talking to?” asked Roric fiercely.

“It might also depend on which the Wanderers could use most readily…” The light and shadow from the fire accentuated all the Weaver’s deep facial lines.

“So it was a Wanderer!” The Weaver did not reply, which Roric took as assent. He stared unseeing for a moment into the fire. “Such a thing has never happened to my certain knowledge to any I know,” he said at last, very quietly, “only to those of the old tales.”

“And are there not Weavers as well in the old tales?”

Roric did not answer but cocked his head as though listening to the high voices of the bats outside. “He never did tell me what he wanted,” he said after a minute, “but if he wants me it’s because I was nearly an outcast when he spoke to me. Does that mean- Does that mean the Wanderers have reasons of their own for hiding from me who I am?”