In the low, steady light of an oil lamp, the novice Durwin kept his vigil. He sat cross legged deep underground in a cave so vast that the little light only barely reached the tips of the teeth of the longest stalactites, the ceiling receding into an unnerving sky of starless black. The oil burned smooth so that no crackling flame interrupted the whispered prayers or the soft plink plink sound of water in the long process of carving and shaping the most intimate chambers of the earth. Durwin shivered, his simple shift doing little to protect his skin from the damp cold rock of the cavern. He was grateful for the cold, even miserable as it was, for without the chill he knew that in the long hours hidden from the light of day and the demands of the upper world, he would have succumbed to sleep before the coming of the God. He sighed the end of the prayer, having lost count of how many times he had whispered it into the dark, and watched the thin line of sweet, resin steeped smoke curl up into the air to mingle with the acrid scent of limestone. He breathed out a shuddering breath and the smoke twined about him instead and his eyes felt heavy and his limbs distantly numb with cold. A heavy sleep settled over him and in his dream the God visited him for the first time.

  He was cold in the dream, colder even than where his body slept in the cave, but there the world was all piercing blue brightness and the smell of iodine and the taste of salt. He was lying on his back atop a great rock in the middle of the sea until with a great and sudden roar there came a wave that crashed over him, plunging him deep into the water. He suddenly found himself bound as he tried to regain the surface and no amount of struggle was enough to bring him higher from where the water column held him. Struggle all he might, he could not sink, could not rise, but felt the water all around him in terror that gave way eventually to resignation . The sensation changed as he accepted it; the cold of the sea became caresses of a lover and a shower of silver veiled the coalescing face of the one who touched him, everywhere. In a sudden upswell, he felt himself pulled apart in a shower of silver and pearl, and reached for the one who had clung to him in the sea, but instead of a woman pressed against his body, his fingers found the soft white of a unicorn’s mane and he felt his body both man and no longer man, joined but no longer joined. Crying out with the pain and the relief of it, but unable to make a sound, he heard joyous laughter, male voice overlaid with female and bright in his ears as he bore himself away. That laughter echoed into the chamber of the cave as he woke gasping and sputtering where he lay. The lamp had burned low in the many hours since he had fallen asleep and his body was stiff and sore, but he could only feel the bubbling, expectant hope in his heart which even the foreknowledge of coming pain could do nothing to dampen. The unicorn dream had come upon him at last.

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  With the coming of the dream, Durwin long vigil and longer fast ended. He emerged from the mouth of the cave unsteady as a faun and blinking back the light of day to gratefully accept bits of lightly sweetened raisin bread and a steaming cup of wine offered by the Brothers, in faith if not in blood, who had kept watch over the entrance throughout his lonely ordeal. Or soon to be Brothers at least. The God to whom they dedicated their prayers and all their labors had shown him favor with the dream, but the purpose of it was to reveal his initiation, not to complete it. He would be cared for and deliberated over by wiser heads, then sent on his way alone again for the very last time of his life to meet the splitting of his soul, and so complete his dedication. It was a gift of the community to him to send him off prepared for his journey. Their hours spent in contemplation and prayer and deliberating over maps and supplies and the weaving of the marled green and ochre cloak that marked a man of the Abbey of the Golden Hill were all in service to the God as well as a hopeful welcome should he survive and goodbye should he not complete the journey alive. Most returned, but a few would not, for they were nearly men but still boys and folly and danger alike were not unknown to them. The God had been forthcoming with practical guidance in response to the blood the Abbot had offered from his own palm and the strand of hair Rusty brown hair his unicorn, Redhearte had offered, and this was assisted by the geographic knowledge of the Captains of the Companies. Soon Durwin was dressed for overland travel, wearing the cloak of the Abbey for the first time and went forth to where the God of the Hidden Name beckoned.