Moonhawk’s words came back to her: too much training had gone before for her to continue without some ceremony.

“Priscilla,” she said meekly.

Again nothing happened. No repetition, no echo, no—She realized then she was a thief in Temple!

She ran with trepidation, furtively, until she found the locker that had been hers briefly but that had always been Moonhawk’s.

To stop a thief one uses locks. So had the wise women of Sintia done, and the sight of that silver-bright lock sent shivers of fear and indignation through Priscilla. what could she do now? She’d certainly starve, unable to get at what should be hers. And how dare they assume she stoop to stealing—

Incongruously, she laughed, and it was a true laugh despite everything, one that took in all the ironies—

She felt the sound of added laughter, distantly heard within her a voice new and thrilling—a male voice!

“You’ve a chance to survive then, haven’t you? It isn’t always easy, but girl, Look! It’s only a silver lock, all curled about with magic signs that’d burn the hands off any believer still shackled to their cow-eyed vision—”

Priscilla recoiled at that description—felt the distant voice pause—

“—Can’t argue with you now, dammit. She needs help for this trick of hers and I—Priscilla, get a pin or a nail.”

The voice felt different, even more distant—but Priscilla took one of Delana-who-was-Oatflower’s favorite stainless steel pins from her unkempt locker top and found herself in front of Moonhawk’s locker, lock held precisely thus—

Her hands pulled on the lock expertly as the pin searched within; she felt her muscles respond to minute ridges the pin struck, felt her wrist twist this way while the other hand pulled that way and the pin slammed home and—