AN: I hope you like this, guys, it is bit of a departure from my horrid fluffs. Thanks so so much to my beta: Opacus, who is absolutely fabulous and if you want to write better USE HER. Please review.

The baron's campaign was over. The spilt blood was soaked up by the ground, the tents were being taken down and the soldiers were ready to march home, but Raistlin could not leave. Not without this mystery solved.

He had seen a woman,with pale skin and dark hair, one of the baron's healers who had been brought along on the campaign. She placed her hands on the chest of a wounded warrior (who would have certainly died of blood loss) and bowed her head in... prayer, perhaps? And the man's color had revived, his irregular breathing became even again. Neither ordinary medicine nor any magic he was aware of could have done that, but Raistlin remembered reading of the abilities of clerics from long ago. Of course, there had been no real clerics for ages, yet what other explanation was there? The question turned endless in his mind.

There had been no time to question this healer in the hot confusion of the healing tent; now Raistlin searched for her among the fringes of the camp containing the non-warriors; cooks, grooms and the like. Was that her? He had hardly glimpsed her face but she seemed faintly recognizable. Of course, a wizard in bright red robes robes with a staff does not fail to attract attention, and he felt the usual second glances as he walked towards the healer.

"May I speak with you?" Raistlin said, forgoing a greeting. It was only an answer to his burning curiosity that he wanted.

The woman looked up from tightening the straps on a trunk. The usual horrified fascination at his appearance does not appear in her face, but perhaps she has seen so many gruesome war injuries in the past few days that hourglass eyes hardly register. She nodded hesitantly and they moved a few yards away from the breaking camp.

As they stopped, Raistlin spoke. "How did you heal that man?" The question is blunt and caught her off guard.

"What man? I don't-" But under her denial there is a flash of panic.

"He was dying," Raistlin interjected, "A person can only lose so much blood and we were only waiting for him to die, but you laid your hands on him and he seemed to heal." Raistlin stared at her, "And I am asking, how did you do that?"

"You would not believe me," she replied flatly, but continued, "I was only a child. In my town there was an old woman, half mad but she would tell the most wonderful stories, and one day she told me about the old gods and the devoted men and women the gods would use to bestow their blessings on the people of Krynn."

"Those gods left us eons ago in the Cataclysm," he interrupted once more. Was she stalling or merely giving background?

The woman regarded him. "Do you really believe that, mage? You wear Lunitari's color, where do you think your magic comes from? Look at the stars," she said with a sweeping motion to the night skies. "The Valiant Warrior and the Dark Queen are still in our heavens. Perhaps, I thought, after hearing the woman's story, they are not gone, only... retreated. The greatest god in the story was Paladine and so I asked him to reveal himself to me. I was seven. Nothing happened, but some things you must do over and over before you get results."

She paused, remembering, and then continued, "Everyday for years I talked to this god and one day I felt a presence, like someone behind me. It was very faint but it was there. And I reasoned that if Paladine," she said the name with reverence, not as a casual exclamation, "had shown himself to me them there must be a reason. I realized that I had been given healing abilities and so I became a healer."

He has had much practice at lying and this is no newly spun story. But as if this revelation was not stunning enough, the woman asked, "What can I give you in exchange for your silence?"

"Silence!" He could not believe it. "Why should you want my silence?" Raistlin demanded. She would be an invaluable asset to any army. With her no one would fear their wounds, she would simply touch them and the sliced flesh, the broken bones, would knit back together. "Why have you done nothing with your power? You could bring back faith in the gods! People want miracles, you could provide them, and yet you work for a minor baron? Why?"

"But I have done something. I have saved lives, restored limbs." She countered. Her manner, so calm until now, seemed to harden. "Perhaps I could impress crowds, but who would follow me? I waited for years to feel anything, tell me, how would I instruct this new sect? Simply tell them to pray until they received a gift? Each healing takes faith; I must want and beg my god for it. And even then I cannot heal everything."

They are clear arguments, and before he had a chance to respond she seemed to tire of explanations because she inquired, "Have I answered to your satisfaction? Will you allow me to return to my duties? For, mage, my gift does not extend to packing my things."

The only cleric on Krynn for ages. How powerful an ally she could be! Raistlin thought before saying, "Yes, of course. I am sorry to have interrupted your duties, but please... all my life I have looked for the gods and any knowledge you have I would like to know. Where can I find you?"

If she had refused to answer him, it would not have mattered. He knew magical means of finding a person and it was not a large castle the baron had, but she did tell him. "My name is Crysania. If you want to see me, I work in the eastern side of the castle." She moved to go and then questioned asked, "And your name?"

"Raistlin Majere," he told her and she recognized the god's name.

It was twilight as he walked back across the camp, lost in thought. To find someone, a cleric, who knew of the gods. Not only knew but held their healing power inside her! What knowledge he could gain, and what power.

Raistlin offered a silent word of praise to any deities, red robes goddesses of magic, or otherwise that might be listening.