Brida

"How do I go about experiencing it, then?"

"It's a simple enough formula, and like all simple things, its results are far more complex than all the complicated rituals I've taught you so far."

Wicca came over to Brida, grasped her shoulders, and looked into her eyes.

"This is the formula: use your five senses at all times. If they all come together at the moment of orgasm, you will be accepted for Initiation."

I came to apologize," Brida said.

They were in the same place where they had met before, near the rocks on the right-hand side of the mountain, from where you could see the valley below.

"Sometimes I think one thing and do another," she went on. "But if you've ever felt love, you'll know how painful it is to suffer for love."

"Yes, I know," replied the Magus. It was the first time he had made any comment on his private life.

"You were right about the point of light. It's not really that important. Now I've discovered that the search can be as interesting as actually finding what you're looking for."

"As long as you can overcome your fear."

"That's true."

And Brida was pleased to know that even he, with all his knowledge, still felt fear.

They spent the afternoon walking through the snow-covered forest. They talked about plants, about the landscape, and about the ways in which the spiders in that region wove their webs. At one point, they met a shepherd leading his sheep back home.

"Hello, Santiago!" cried the Magus. Then he turned to her:

"God has a special fondness for shepherds. They are people accustomed to nature, silence, patience. They possess all the necessary virtues to commune with the Universe."

Up until then, they hadn't discussed such matters at all, and Brida didn't want to anticipate the moment. She brought the conversation back to her life and to what was going on in the world. Her sixth sense told her to avoid mentioning Lorens. She didn't know what was going on, nor did she know why the Magus was being so attentive, but she needed to keep that flame alight. An accursed power, Wicca had called it. She had an objective, and this was her one means of attaining it.

They passed a few sheep, whose feet left strange prints in the snow. This time there was no shepherd, but the sheep seemed to know where to go and what they were looking for. The Magus stood for a long time watching the sheep, as if he were studying some great secret from the Tradition of the Sun, one that Brida could not understand.

As the light began to fade, so did the feeling of terror and respect that always gripped her when she was with him. For the first time, she felt calm and confident by his side, perhaps because she didn't need to demonstrate her gifts. She had heard the Voice, and her entry into the world of those other men and women was now simply a matter of time. She, too, belonged to the path of mysteries, and from the moment that she heard the Voice, the man beside her had become part of her Universe.

She felt like grasping his hands and asking him to show her some aspect of the Tradition of the Sun, just as she used to ask Lorens to talk to her about the ancient stars. It was a way of saying that they were seeing the same thing, albeit from different angles.

Something was telling her that he needed this, and it wasn't the mysterious Voice of the Tradition of the Moon, but the restless, sometimes foolish voice of her heart. A voice she didn't often listen to, since it always led her along paths she couldn't understand.

But emotions were, indeed, wild horses, and they demanded to be heard. Brida let them run free for a while until they grew tired. Her emotions were telling her how good it would be that afternoon if she were in love with him, because when you were in love, you were capable of learning everything and of knowing things you had never dared even to think, because love was the key to understanding all of the mysteries.

She ran through various amorous scenarios involving the Magus before she finally regained control. Then she said to herself that she could never love a man like him, because he understood the Universe, and all human feelings look small when viewed from a distance.

They reached the ruins of an old monastic church. The Magus sat down on one of the many piles of carved stone scattered on the ground, and Brida cleared the snow off a broad windowsill.

"It must be good to live here, spend all day in the forest, and then go home to sleep in a nice warm house," she said.

"Yes, it is good. I know the songs of all the different birds and I can read God's signs. I've learned the Traditions of the Sun and the Moon."

"But I'm alone," he felt like adding. "And there's no point in understanding the entire Universe if you're alone."

There, perched on the windowsill, was his Other Half. He could see the point of light above her left shoulder, and he regretted ever having learned the two Traditions, because had it not been for the point of light he might not have fallen in love with her.

"She's intelligent. She sensed the danger early, and now wants to know nothing more about points of light," he thought.

"I heard the Voice. Wicca really is an excellent teacher."

It was the first time that afternoon that she'd brought up the subject of magic.