Rowena finished marking day three hundred eighty-nine. The weather remained fine, far too warm for the time of year. The people in the village were beginning to remark on it. Rowena didn�t see how fine weather could be any sort of bad omen, but these rustics saw dark magic in everything from the turning of the leaves to the birth of a calf.

Were they ever to divine what she was, to learn her secret, things would be difficult. She did not imagine they would understand Gwyn�s motives in sheltering her. It was not her own safety for which she feared it was that of Gwyn, Taren and her little cousins. There was precious little the villagers could do to harm Rowena, but they could get to her through her family.

Her family? Almost against her will, Rowena had come to think of them as such. They were good and honest and unprejudiced. Gwyn took a witch - better to be the devil himself in this land than a witch! � into her house and raised her as a daughter. Such selflessness and courage abided in few.

Lying in her spot beneath the rowan tree, Rowena could easily have dozed. Just as she�d begun to drift, something caught her eye. A basket was floating upriver, against the current. Rowena saw that she had to get to it before the villagers assumed it was an evil portent or some such nonsense.

Kicking off her shoes, she dove in. Swimming strongly in river water, icy cold though the weather was still warm, she reached the basket and drew it to her. The heavy material of her blue dress dragged down her limbs and she struggled with the unwieldy package. Towing it like a drowning victim, she headed back for shore.

Only when she�d collapsed on the bank did she bother to look inside. She gasped. There in the watertight basket, like Moses in the rushes, was a child. A little girl, no more than three or four, regarded her with very blue eyes.

Rowena pulled the little girl from the basket. Clasping the child to her wet chest, the basket dangling from her free hand, Rowena sprinted toward home.

"Gwyn! Gwyn!" she cried, bursting through the door of tumbled-down cottage.

"What is it, child?" The apple-cheeked woman looked up from the fire, wiping her hands on her skirt.

Rowena stopped dead in the doorway, sopping wet, the child still quietly clinging to her.

"I-I found her. In the river," she panted.

Gwyn exclaimed and rushed forward, taking the little girl from Rowena�s arms.

"Oh, Rowena child. You�ll take ill." She ushered Rowena toward the fire with a free hand. "Get those wet things off. I�ll see to the babe."

Once dry and warm again, Rowena ventured out to see Gwyn and the little girl. "How on earth, Rowena?" Gwyn shook her head. "I just can�t imagine it. Of all the luck for you to have seen her."

Rowena was becoming more and more certain that it had not, in fact, been luck. But she remained silent and did not share her suspicions with Gwyn.

Cordelia, Margred and Seren immediately claimed the little girl as their newest pet and played with her by the fire until evening.

Taren came into the house looking tired and scorched. He started at the sight of the child.

"Gwyn, my love, I know I�ve been away a bit lately, but I�ve not missed that much have I?"

Gwyn laughed at him and kissed his cheek, before unfolding the tale of Rowena�s rescue of the little girl from the river.

Taren shook his head. "Perhaps we should call her Moses then. Eh, Rowena?"

Rowena laughed. "That is what I thought when I found her. Though I�m no Pharaoh�s daughter."

"Let�s have a look, then."

Gwyn brought out the watertight basket and laid it on the floor, while Taren balanced the newest addition to the family on his knee.

Looking through the basket they discovered richly embroidered trappings. The language was unfamiliar. Danish? Dutch? Swedish, perhaps. Rowena couldn�t tell. She could read Greek and Latin, and some of the older languages of magic. But these words eluded her.

"I think, perhaps, it�s the unfortunate child�s surname," Gwyn said. "Huufelpuf." She tested the word aloud. "Yes. I think perhaps it is."

"She must have been of good family. These are very richly made," Taren said.

"No matter how good, they still were forced to flee somehow," Rowena said bitterly. "I wonder what happened to her parents."

"Now, child," Gwyn said worriedly. "You don�t know that."

Rowena looked Gwyn in the eye. "Would you place one of your children in a basket and set her adrift if you were in any less than mortal peril?" Gwyn didn�t answer.

"I only wonder how she came to us." Taren scratched his head, poking at the seaweed caught in the basket�s lattices. "By all rights the babe should have drowned." He looked at Rowena. "Unless, of course, there�s something, er, special to her."

"She�s too young. I can�t tell." Rowena shook her head. "But you�re likely right. I don�t think it any accident that I was the one to find her." Gwyn held up a lady�s handkerchief. It was very fine and embroidered with scrolling initials.

An engraved silver locket fell out of the handkerchief. Taren bent to retrieve it. A sudden tingling on the back of her neck made Rowena cry out, "No!" Taren looked at her in surprise.

"Don�t touch it," Rowena said. She knelt on the floor, cupping a hand over the necklace careful not to touch it. Magic radiated off the metal like heat. Rowena began to mumble an amateurish incantation. It had been so long since she�d felt free to practice any magic; it was like finally walking about after a long illness, like breathing fresh air after being in prison. Gradually, the spell began to subside. Rowena felt triumphant. Not only had she successfully neutralized the enchantment, it had been what she expected it to be.

"So that�s how she made it so far. I thought so."

"What is it, Rowena? What was wrong with the necklace?"

She smiled at the two. "It�s a powerful charm. Had you touched it you might have ended up halfway across the world. They must have used it to send her to us." She folded the handkerchief around the locket and picked it up gingerly. "It should be quite ordinary now. Only be careful." She handed it to Gwyn.

Gwyn turned it over and over in the candlelight, making out the inscription. �Helga.� It was more likely the name of the child�s mother. But Gwyn resolved that it should be the little girl�s name from that day forward.

~curious about the meanings of the tarot cards in the images for each series? find out why the tarot card for raven of cairo is "the fool" here~

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