The knight spoke the castle's name aloud, but there was no inflection in his voi ce.

Just as his face though streaked with marks from his helm and splattered with another man's blood bore no expression. It could have belonged to an effigy on a t omb. He stared a long time at the keep with its frail speck of light. When at last he turned away, it was with a savage, parting promise... . Rhuddlan, you will be mine. Behind the shuttered window where a light still burned, a young woman cradled a bowl in her palms. It was fashioned of gold and rimmed with a band of pearls, an d for a moment, as she held it, the vessel seemed to glow softly and pulse in he r hands. But though she calmed her mind and peered into the bowl's luminescent d epths, she beheld only water and a shimmering reflection of the cresset lamps sw inging on the wall above her head. A rough voice barked in her ear. "Do you see anything yet?" Arianna jerked, slopping water onto her rose silk bliaut. She set the bowl down onto a nearby chest with a clatter, and wiped at the growing wet stain on her sk irt. Tossing a fat brown braid over her shoulder, she glared at her brother. "God's death. Nothing is likely to happen with you peering at me like a nervous priest in an alchemist's shop. As if you expected to see brimstone come curling out my ears at any moment." "What I expect is for you to tell me what I need to know." He spun away from her , then turned back, flinging out his arm and pointing a stiff finger in her face . "You wear the seer's torque around your neck, yet you are next to useless when it comes to seeing anything." Unconsciously, Arianna touched the ancient collar that encircled her throat. It was of bronze two twisted snakes, their heads meeting in the center with flicking tongues and staring emerald eyes and in that moment it felt as if they were strang ling her. But she tilted up her chin and matched her brother's anger with her ow n. "And what of you, Ceidro? You wear a man's sword around your waist, yet I don 't see you acting the part of a man on this night." A dark flush spread over Ceidro's cheeks. Hunching his shoulders, he turned away from her, and Arianna regretted her hasty words. She went to him and laid her p alm against his rigid back. "I tried, Ceidro. But you know it doesn't work that way. The visions never come on command." Ceidro said nothing. Nor did he turn around. Arianna fought back another urge to shout at him. She didn't want to argue with her brother. It was frustration tha t caused them to snap at one another. Frustration and fear. Ceidro knew well the visions had never once come when summoned. And when they did appear, rare and u nexpected, they often left her feeling ill and terrified, having revealed things she'd soon er not know. But her brother, too, was afraid. He wanted her to look into the fu ture and tell him whether he would prevail in the battle he had to fight on the morrow. She forced him to turn and meet her eyes. She tried a smile. "It's the cursed Gw ynedd temper. But we shouldn't be fighting one another. Not now." Ceidro retrieved the bowl and thrust it at her. "Then try again."