Caewen was quick about setting camp. The boy helped collect firewood, draw water from the stream, and then watched the fire once it was lit. He stared into the changeful leap and dance of flames, gazed upwards as embers rose and spun. As Caewen settled into cooking something to eat, the boy felt something unfamiliar. A contentedness. He felt almost ready to drowse off where he was sitting–despite the hard pebbly ground–and his head did nod a few times. It had been a long day.
He was shaken awake–suddenly and rudely– by an eerie, distant cry. It was the sound of a woman keening, just the same as they had heard earlier in the day. The cry was soon joined by other voices, all stretched out in a sorrowful choir.
They listened in silence. The boy looked up into the dark trees that lined the valley walls, worried that a much closer voice might rise up to meet that song. Dapplegrim twitched his ears and sniffed the air. Caewen unconsciously laid fingers on her sword, and left them there, motionless, poised.
After the voices fell away, Caewen said, “I think they know we’re here somewhere. They’re looking for us.” She drew her fingertips off the sword, then began to dig around in one of her bags. “I think it might be best if we root out a little more of what is to be known about them.”
“Are you doing what I think you are doing?” said Dapplegrim.
“I am.”
“You oughtn’t work spells around here. There are too many watchful things in these hills. Weird-working will only draw more attention. Your little game with the king’s idol was bad enough. Hur. There’s no need to throw oil on the fire.”
She laughed, softly. “If only we were dealing with fire, and not things that feel so cold and deathly.” A slow shake of her head. “I’ll be quick. It’s only a bit of petty-charming, anyway.” She smiled a foxish smile. “Nothing too unsubtle. I’m not a complete fool.”
The boy was trying to understand their conversation as best he could. Finally, he said, “You’re more than a herb-mistress, aren’t you? You’re talking about witcheries.” He had grown up on stories of warlocks and witch-people, and he had always been terrified of them. Everyone knew that the four prince-cousins of the Sorthelands were witch-lords, and they had many sorcerers in their employ and many spellswords in their ranks.
Caewen though just smiled and shook her head. “I’ve picked up a few tricks, folk-magics and whatnot. I wouldn’t call myself a witch any more than I’d call myself a lord of wild demons because I’m friends with Dapplegrim.” She fished out a yellow-grey candle, leaned closer to the fire, lit it and then used hot drops of the melting wax to mount it on a nearby bit of rock. She spent some time arranging a dozen river pebbles that had little bits of writing on them. She placed these on the ground around the candle, and kept changing her mind, moving one, then another. Every now and then she looked up, as if she were trying to copy a constellation from the sky–though if this were what she was doing, the boy did not recognise the arrangement of stars. It took her a long time to be satisfied that they were set down correctly. Once done, she took a pinch of something from a little satchel and threw this into the candle: the powder streaked and twirled like smoke as she threw it, then made the candle flare and burn blood red momentarily.
“Dapplegrim,” whispered Caewen to the candle. It grew brighter for a moment, then diminished back to its normal light. “The child who travels with us.” The candle did the same thing, growing bright for a moment and reducing, though it flickered a bit too, as if struggling. “Hmm. That’s interesting. It did have trouble with you.” She looked at the boy, and he wondered if she had just learned something new about him. In that moment, he was just a little afraid of her. But she said nothing more about him, and continued instead: “My own self.” The candle again flared and grew dim. Now she paused a while before saying, “The white women in the hills.” The candle snuffed out immediately.
“That’s not good,” said Dapplegrim. Despite his misgivings, he was watching closely. “Though, I suppose it is no surprise, is it? Hurm.”
“Why?” said the boy. “What does that mean?”
“It’s a care-thinking charm,” said Caewen. “I’m putting it to a strange use. Usually, a village witch would work this charm if you wanted to know about a loved one who was far away. It can tell you if a person is alive and well… or not. If the person is hale the candle burns brightly. If the person is sick, the candle grows dim and gutters, but doesn’t go out. If they are dead, well, then the candle goes out.”
“So the lady we saw on the ridge. She’s dead? She is a ghaist?”
Dapplegrim performed his rolling sort of shrug. “I could’ve told you that. Hur.”
Caewen ignored him. “A dead spirit. Or something of that ilk. There are all manner of ways a dead soul can return to the living world: broken oath, sorcery, curse or unfulfilled task or pledge. The murdered and those who die in accidents sometimes remain as shades until their appointed hour of natural death passes. In ancient ages there were even some magicians who cast spells on themselves and turned themselves into a sort of living dead thing: witching-warths and hexing-litches, though I don’t know if any such half-dead horrors still stir themselves to life now. Those spells are forgotten, I think. Or, at least, so I hope.”
“But the white woman we saw, and the others we heard, they’re some manner of ghaist?”
She nodded. “So it would seem.”
“Brightness of Day, protect us,” said the boy, and he curled his shoulders, and edged closer to the fire. “Queen of Day, breath sweetly upon us.”
“Don’t worry. I can put a charm on the fire to keep dead things from coming near.”
“But you shouldn’t. Hur. You perform too much magic without anything to draw on. It’s dangerous. You’ll end up a cold little ghost yourself, Caewen.” His tail swished, angrily. “Mark my words.”
“I will not.” She rolled her eyes. “Anyone would think you were an old woman, worrying at the fireside with her knitting.”
They stared at each other then, across the fire and a little uncomfortably.
The boy ventured to ask, “Can you raise spells to ward off the dead while we ride? They come out in the daytime, too.”
She shook her head. “I’m afraid not. We don’t have any easy way to carry a fire while riding–I’ve only a few candles and the flame isn’t bright enough besides. I can’t do much to protect us tomorrow, but I can keep the dead away tonight.”
“Hur. Hurm. Sooner or later you will attract the eyes of something much worse than ghosts if you keep working charms. And a ward against the dead is no ‘petty-charm’, either. Anyone who has an ear for magic will hear it from a mile off. We’re better off keeping watch, and you can work your spells only if it is absolutely needed. Hur. I don’t need to sleep, remember? I’ll guard. You get some rest.”
She thought about this and said, “I suppose you’re right.” She collected the candle and the stones. “Alright: dinner now, then to bed. We’ll want to be up early for a good start. Just be sure to wake us if you see a ghost, Dapple.” She smiled as if she thought that was somehow funny.
The boy wondered how he would ever sleep.