Wander West, in Shadow

4.

It was early the next day, before they had even stopped for their midday meal, that they reached the outskirts of the village of Silverfish.

The first sign of life they saw was an old farmhouse, of white and brown brick and thatched roof, in the midst of a small field, surrounded by worn wooden fencing. But the field was overgrown with weeds, and the farmhouse itself was empty, nobody answering their knocks. When they looked in through the windows, the interior of the house was bare except for a kitchen table, nothing else within besides some dusty wooden floors.

“Abandoned,” Elyse murmured. “I wonder why.”

“Well, the Dolmec did say this village would be cursed,” Martim answered. He pushed on the door to the farmhouse, and with a squeal of rusted hinges, it opened, eddies of dust swirling in the golden light pouring through the windows.

“You mean you are bringing me to a cursed village, and you didn’t think to tell me?” Elyse snapped. Martim gave her a bashful look, then stepped inside the farmhouse, looking around for any sign of the inhabitants. But there were none.

They ate their meal there, some simple hardtack, and feeling uneasy, went on their way.

Their journey continued like this for a while, traveling down the overgrown cobblestone road, the forest around them occasionally broken by the appearance of a farmhouse, almost always barren and its field covered in wild growth. They spotted only one living soul before they entered the village proper – in the midst of a farm with an actively tilled field, filled with pumpkins and squash. In the middle of the field stood a woman in a rough, gray woolen dress, dirtied from her work, squat and broad. Strangely, over her head she had a rough burlap sack, with a few holes cut out for the eyes and mouth. She stood as they passed by, watching them, motionlessly. When they waved, she did not wave back.

They passed on.

Finally, as the sun had begun its journey downward towards the horizon, they reached the village proper, on the banks of a large, clear lake. A sign greeted them as they moved towards the cluster of buildings on the lake’s shores, swinging gently in the breeze, creaking as it did: It simply read “SILVERFISH”, with a painting of a peculiar fat fish beneath it, with a white belly and whiskers and a gleaming silver back. At least, it looked as if the fish had once been silver. It still glinted in some spots, but in most places the once bright paint had flaked away or faded.

Here, the buildings were made from the same tan and white bricks as the farmhouses in the countryside, but the roofs were made of wooden slats that looked as if they had once been brightly painted in a variety of colors, though as with everything else here, they were dull and worn now. As they moved through the town, they couldn’t help but notice that even here it looked like many of the buildings had been abandoned for years – houses and shops both. Only a few of the homes had smoke rising from their chimneys. There was, however, a pier that led out into the lake, and even a couple of small rowboats tied there. Two men, unpacking what looked to be a haul of that same silver fish they had seen on the town sign, were dragging heavy nets from these boats towards a series of barrels that stood on the landing.

They had begun walking towards the men, were about to call out to them, when someone cried out “Hey! Strangers!”

It was a woman, old but still with strength in her and meat on her bones, a tight bun of silver hair topping her head. Her skin was tanned and worn from long hours in the sun, and she wore a stout woolen dress that looked like it may have at one point been dyed pink, with a stained apron tied tightly around it. Her face was round and somewhat red; as if she had just been exerting herself. She stood in the entryway of a shop that had great bundles of plants hanging in the windows and a faded red roof. She glanced around furtively and waved them over, urgently. “You two practice the Art?” she whispered as they drew close. She barely waited for them to nod. “Get inside, get inside.”

Inside the shop was dimly lit, most of the light from outside blocked by the plants hanging in the windows. It was densely crowded with all manner of powder, flask and herb, strange multi-colored liquids sloshing in cloudy glass bottles. The shopkeep lit a candle as Elyse inspected these curiously, a great red one that already had wax spilling over onto the counter, with a stick she took from a small fireplace set into one wall in which something acrid bubbled in a pot. She muttered under her breath as she waved the flame on the stick dead, glancing back and forth between the two of them.

“Do you practice the Art?” Elyse asked curiously, when the woman did not speak, instead just choosing to busy herself behind the counter while she caught her breath.

The old woman cast a disapproving eye at Elyse, sniffing, apparently not liking the look of her. “No, but I have an eye for those who do,” she puffed. Finally she slammed her hands down on the counter, glaring at the both of them. “What are you doing here?”

Martimeos and Elyse glanced at each other. “I was told to come here by a Dolmec,” he answered.

The woman drew a sharp intake of breath with a hiss, shaking her head. “Best keep that to yourself,” she muttered, eyeing them suspiciously. “You two come into town talking about the Art and speaking with Dolmecs and someone is liable to swing an oar at your head. I’m Minerva, by the way. I serve as the apothecary for Silverfish.”

After the two had introduced themselves, Minerva sat down on a stool by the fireplace, stirring the bubbling mixture in the pot with a long-handled spoon. “Are those who practice the Art banned from Silverfish?” Martimeos asked.

“Banned? No. But more than a few folk around here want nothing to do with it. Others...they don’t care as much, but that won’t stop fists from flying.”

“Why? Does it have something to do with the curse?”

Minerva tapped her metal spoon against the edge of the pot and laid it down on the floor. “So, you’ve heard of that, have you? What do you know, exactly?”

“Naught but that a curse exists.”

Minerva crossed her arms across her chest and glared up at them. “I see. I’ll tell the tale, but pull up a stool. I don’t like talking up at people.”

She waited until the two of them had retrieved stools from behind the counter of the shop, low wooden ones, and joined her by the fireplace before speaking. Martim shifted uncomfortably as she talked; the stools were low enough that his long legs jutted up towards his chest.

“’Twas over ten years ago,” Minerva began, “When the first child disappeared. Not much was thought of it at first. The village figured that perhaps they had wandered off and drowned in the lake. A tragedy, surely, but nothing unusual. We searched, we mourned. But barely had we moved on when the second child disappeared, a few weeks later.

“That one, too, we didn’t think anything too strange was going on at first. Perhaps a new dangerous jumping spot had opened up in the lake that was treacherous. Perhaps some new odd currents, or some creature...we told our children to stop going by the lake. Sent out search parties again. And then a week later, a third child disappeared. That was when people began to panic.

“Now people were certain that the first two hadn’t merely gone missing. That someone was going around snatching children. And it only got worse when a few days later, the fourth disappeared. We drove away all the strangers in our town; damn near lynched one poor merchant. Anyone who wasn’t already a couple with child was considered suspicious. Homes and shops being broken into by mobs of parents; looking for any trace of their children. Meanwhile it seemed like every few days another child was going missing. Parents kept them in their house under lock and key, but it didn’t seem to matter. They’d wake up to empty beds, like their children had never even been there. They even raided my shop, some fool got them worked up saying I must be chopping up their children for potions. The nerve!” Minerva sighed, looking sadly into the fire. “Dark times.”

Martimeos and Elyse were quiet, absorbing all this. “But what does this have to do with the Art?” Martim asked, after a moment.

“I’m getting to that part,” Minerva snapped. “See, we used to have a wizard around here, name of Zeke. He didn’t live in town – lived in some ruins a few hours ride east. A bit severe, but a good man. Whenever there was a storm he’d come into town, and magic up the fallen trees off of roofs, or push the flood waters back...”

Martim whistled appreciatively. These were no mean feats of the Art. Zeke must have been well-learned.

“Anyway. When all this was happening, someone gets it in their head to talk to old Zeke. Maybe they thought he could help; maybe they wanted to accuse him too. But the rider we send out there comes back an hour later white as a sheet. He says he didn’t even make it to Zeke’s place. He says, out in the woods, he sees Zeke’s ghost, walking through the trees, and came back as soon as he saw it.

“Now things have been getting really bad. Nearly a dozen children gone missing by now. People are already starting to flee the village, unless their kids are next. But some of the parents – some who don’t have any more kids, or who have hopes of finding their missing ones – they’re getting desperate. They send out another party to talk to Zeke. This time, three young men, brave lads. This time, they don’t come back.

“You can normally make it to Zeke’s and back in less than a day. When it’s been three days, the town gets in a frenzy. Now they’re convinced that not only has Zeke – or Zeke’s ghost – killed those three young men, they’re convinced that he’s the one been taking their kids too. But it’s one thing to be angry at a wizard like Zeke, another thing entirely to go confront him. Nonetheless, a bunch of couples who had lost their only children – maybe ten folk in all – grab torch and sword and head up the way to Zeke’s place.

“Only one makes it back. Poor Cassie, and without her husband, and her face is all twisted and melted, and she’s deaf and dumb now so she can’t even tell us what happened. But that was it, that was the end. Now everyone who has children or is thinking about having children packs up and leaves. Even while they’re fleeing, children are still disappearing. All told, nearly two dozen gone. All that’s been left ever since are the childless, or those who had no hopes of having another. Been that way for years now. Until...” Minerva sighed once more, looking sadly into the fire for a moment before continuing.

“Years later, there was a couple in village who never thought they’d have children again. Thought they were too old. Until, miraculously, she got pregnant again. The Dahlsons. A beautiful little baby boy. Zeke, if it is him who does it, never took infants. Never any child under six, and only one over ten. We thought...maybe it had been years. Maybe if we had the whole town watch him day and night. We posted guards over his bed, never let him be more than ten feet from us….it was the first child the village had in years, everyone loved him. Well, Zeke must have gotten impatient or something, because he took the boy when he was just three years old. Just there one second, gone the next, in the blink of an eye. Everyone’s been especially on edge since that happened. Which is why,” she said, shaking a finger at Elyse and Martimeos, “It isn’t exactly a good idea for you two to go about advertising that you practice the Art.”

Martimeos mulled over this for a moment after Minerva had finished her tale. “How long ago did the boy disappear? Perhaps we could-”

But Minerva was already shaking her head. “You’re a good lad for thinking so. But no. He was taken about half a year ago. Whatever happens when these children get taken, it has certainly already happened.”

Martim sank into silence once more, pondering. “I have never heard of a ghost that takes children like that, though,” Elyse spoke up. “Are you sure that the first rider was not merely...seeing things? Could Zeke still be alive?”

“No, girl, I have seen his ghost myself since. Stay for a week and you can see it yourself. He comes close enough to be seen from the edge of town regularly. But if you are going to stay, we’re going to need to get your stories straight.” Minerva grabbed the spoon and began stirring the pot again. “Of course, it’s up to you.”

“Do you have any tobacco in your shop?” Martim asked suddenly. When Minerva frowned and nodded, he sat back, relaxing. “I don’t see why not. I would at least like to see the ghost.”

“Right.” Minerva rose with a pained grunt, leaving the spoon in the pot, brushing her hands together. “I have a guest room in the back of the shop. It is probably best if the two of you stay there.”

“Could we not stay in one of the empty houses?” Elyse asked, but Minerva shook her head.

“No, best not to. If you did, folk might get curious, come by knocking when the two of you are up to who-knows-what with the Art. This way the only way they can get to you is if I have warning they’re here first. You’d best tell your familiars to stick away from the village next time you see them, though. Folk will get suspicious with funny animals about. Follow me.”

Minerva led them behind the counter of the shop, into a narrow back hallway, muttering as she retrieved a key ring and unlocked a faded green door. The room she led them into was small, but not cramped, with two beds occupying the corners of the room, a vanity, and a large wooden closet. The floor was covered by a rug whose original color had long since dimmed to a sun-bleached yellow.

As Martimeos dropped his pack down onto one of the beds, the shopkeep considered the both of them. “You,” she said, pointing at Martimeos, “You could pass as a normal lad. But you...” here she pointed to Elyse and sniffed. Elyse sniffed back at her. “I don’t know about you. Did anyone see you coming in?”

“A woman, on one of the farms. She had a burlap sack over her head.” Martimeos replied, pulling out his tobacco pouch. He planned on getting that refilled tonight.

“That’ll be poor Cassie.” Minerva shook her head. “Ah well. She can’t speak to anyone about what she saw anyway.” She turned back to Elyse. “Right, girl, we’ll have to get you into a proper dress.”

“What’s not proper about this?” Elyse asked, picking at her rags. “I like this dress.”

“Don’t you argue with me while you’re under my roof,” Minerva snapped at her. “You don’t do as I say, you can risk the beatings if you like. I think I have some dresses in your size here. Ones left behind when young couples fled the village.”

“Fine,” Elyse sighed, and then she got up and lifted her dress above her head, revealing her pale slender form and nothing else beneath.

“Right, I think I’ll go grab that tobacco, shall I,” muttered Martimeos, scurrying from the room as Minerva gave a strangled cry of scandalized outrage. He hummed to himself as he searched the shelves of the shop, listening to the muffled shouts of the women from the other room.

“What do you think you’re doing, you harlot? I don’t care if you are lovers, you stay properly dressed in front of a man, at least when you’re in front of me!”

“Who says we’re lovers, old woman? What do you care who I get undressed in front of? ‘Tis just a body. You’d think it were a viper.”

“Right. I was going to give you some silk, but I think you deserve stiff wool. And let’s run a comb through that hair.”

Martimeos took his time filling his tobacco pouch, and then another backup one he had; and then he whistled jauntily as he he counted out coins one by one and laid them in a neat little stack by the counter, giving the apothecary a little extra for the use of her room. By the time he returned to the guest room, knocking on the door before entering, Elyse was sitting on one of the beds, frowning and plucking at a shapeless, gray woolen dress pulled over her. Her long, wild black hair was somewhat combed, at least, and tied with a blue ribbon into a loose ponytail about a foot above her waist. “This dress itches,” she complained.

“It’s not my fault you don’t wear any underclothes, you little savage,” Minerva huffed. She gave Martimeos a look of withering disapproval as he entered, but did not say anything further about Elyse’s cavalier attitude towards undressing in front of him. “Right. The story for you two is that you’re a young couple from Twin Lamps – we get some travelers coming from there every now and then, but nobody knows it well enough to ask questions – looking for a new home. You’re staying with me for now because the wife needs help with some womanly troubles.” Elyse snorted, earning another strong glare from Minerva. “I’ll tell no one but Ritter – that’s the innkeeper, and the closest thing we have to a mayor – the truth. He’s got a good enough head about him not to judge folk just because they practice the Art. He’ll want to know why I’m taking away what little custom he gets, anyway. No talk of Art, no working of Art in public, and you should be fine.” She huffed once more, her hands on her hips, staring at the both of them.

“Thank you for your hospitality, ma’am,” Martimeos said mildly. “And for the warning.”

Minerva’s gaze softened, she absentmindedly wiped down her apron. “’Tis nothing, really. Maybe someone with knowledge of the Art will be able to tell us more about what’s happened here, even if you can’t solve it. Not that it matters, I suppose. ‘Tis far too late for this village.” She shook her head, then turned towards the door. “I am locking up for the day. Keep whatever you do quiet.”

She closed the door behind her. Elyse and Martimeos listened to the sounds of her clattering about the shop for a few minutes, before the front door slammed shut as well. Elyse plucked at her dress sullenly.

“I like the ribbon,” Martim offered.

“The ribbon isn’t bad,” Elyse admitted, brushing her hair over her shoulder to look at the bright blue ribbon tied in it. Then she looked at him curiously. “What is your plan here, Martimeos?”

“Hmm?” Martimeos responded, distracted, busy packing tobacco into his pipe.

“You heard Minerva. It sounds like the damage of the curse has been done. Do you plan on risking yourself to try to break it?” She folded her arms across her chest. "'Twould be foolish to leap into danger for no reason."

Martim puffed on his pipe, blowing smoke out his nose. “The curse is the curse,” he mused. “I’d be inclined to help if there was any children to save, but it sounds as if they’re long dead. But whatever is going on, ghost or no, it sounds like there is a knowledgeable wizard’s lair out there. I think it’s worth a little risk to see that.”

“Hmm. I suppose.” She growled in frustration as she scratched at her chest. “That’s it. Turn around, I am changing back into my dress. Or don’t. I care not.”

Martimeos sighed and turned towards the wall as Elyse frantically scrambled at the heavy wool to claw it off her. When he turned back around, she was dressed again in her rags, though she had kept the ribbon in her hair. “At least we should have some time to work on our Art,” she mused.

“I don’t think that it’s a good idea to work on fire-starting indoors. Especially in an apothecary’s shop.”

“Probably not.” She waggled the ribbon in her hair at him. “Why don’t you work on trying to change this ribbon from blue to yellow?”

~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~

Their week’s stay in Silverfish was a bleak one. There was something that just felt unnatural about a village devoid of the laughter of children. Though it was not merely that which was lacking. All the villagers who remained were the childless, bereaved, or those who had never had children in the first place. A deep sorrow permeated the villagers; the sorrow of something gone that they would never get back, something they should have had that they were now too old to hope for once more. The worst of these were the Dahlsons, the couple who had most recently had their child snatched away. He was a lean fisherman of pepper-gray hair and a deep tan, and she was a a baker that worked at Ritter’s inn, a woman who once must have been a magnificent beauty but who now seemed faded and tired. Both of these barely talked to anyone, seeming half-dead.

Martimeos and Elyse both told their familiars to stay out of the sight of the villagers, and warned them against the nearby wizard’s lair – who knew what defenses might lie out that way – though Flit seemed certain that he could scout it out a bit from the air. And Cecil, though Elyse told him to stay away, nevertheless snuck by the docks from time to time in order to steal fish. Martimeos was amused, whenever he saw the Cecil slinking through the village, stealthily making his way down towards the lake in the shadows of houses and the empty streets; one might think the cat himself had a glamour, the way he managed to avoid being spotted by the villagers.

Elyse truly loathed the dress Minerva had given her, and so she rarely left their room in the apothecary shop. Which was just as well; it helped with their story that she required Minerva’s attentions. But it did leave Martimeos to do most of the exploring of the village.

It was very difficult to tell how large the village may once have been. Some time after it had been abandoned, a fire had swept through some of the empty homes; these still lay in blackened rubble, nobody having bothered to clear the debris, the ruins standing there for long enough that plant life had begun to grow on them. There were perhaps ten couples still living in the houses that still stood, and a smattering of single, childless villagers, including Ritter and Minerva.

Ritter himself turned out to be a lean, mostly bald man with a ring of thinning silver hair around his head, though he still carried himself as he had once obviously been – a soldier. He still kept a broadsword strapped to his belt, the only weapon besides Martimeos’ blade visible in the village. He ran an inn that, unlike most buildings here, had clearly been repainted recently; called Kingfisher inn, with a sign displaying a black cat with its paw on one of the town’s namesake silver fish. The cat – named King, no less – turned out to be real, though it was too fat and old to do much other than lounge around the inn nowadays, a great ball of ragged black fur sunning beneath one of the windows as Martimeos stepped inside.

The inn itself, though it was well equipped with eight bedrooms on the second floor, was barely used; it seemed its greatest use these days was as a meeting place for the villagers in the common room downstairs, which now held far too many tables for them all to ever be occupied. Ritter rarely bothered to stay behind the counter himself, with barely any customers around; and had no maids hired. If anyone ever wanted a meal, he cooked it himself, albeit poorly. Not that one had to be a good cook – the main fare of the village, the silver fish, was juicy and delicious, and had apparently once won trade and acclaim for the village from afar. He was a kind enough sort, despite the weapon at his side, and shared a love of tobacco with Martimeos. He seemed weary, and resigned to the fact that he would guide the village to its final days. On the side of the inn was a well-maintained stables, though they housed only one horse – the only one in the village – a plodding, gray mare named Bela.

Martim spent his days either in the apothecary's guest room with Elyse, practicing the Art, or outside scouting about the countryside, or taking practice swings with his sword at a target dummy made out of straw that Ritter dragged out of storage for him at his request. Martim was no expert swordsman, but he was capable enough, having had some practice – he knew enough not to cut himself, at least.

The villagers seemed polite enough; it seemed hard to believe that Minerva was concerned that they might get violent, should they learned that he practiced the Art. They asked him what he was doing there, and nodded sympathetically when he told them his wife was staying with Minerva for the time being while he looked for a new home with her. They all advised him against settling down in this town, telling him different varieties of the tale of the curse he had heard from the apothecary. Most were certain it had been Zeke, and some damned the Art in general because of it. Martimeos thought them fools at first – had Zeke not helped them in the past? But upon reflection, he realized that whatever help the wizard might have offered with repairing damage from storms and forcing back flood waters would have, of course, been gladly abandoned if it meant the villagers got to keep their children.

As the days wore on, Elyse became more and more frustrated with being cooped up. She began to grumble whenever Martimeos left her alone in the room, badgering Minerva for a look at her wares just to keep herself occupied, until finally she overcame her hatred of the dress and at the end of the week’s wait began appearing in public. But even then she stalked around the town in a dark mood, plucking and scratching at her clothes, sometimes so much that Martim worried that she was going to pull it off in the middle of the street. She got many questions from the women in the village about whether she was with child, or when she planned on having children, the villagers seeming eager to live their wrecked lives through her.

But finally, on the sixth day, Minerva told them that tonight that Zeke’s ghost should be visible in the woods a short walk from town. Ritter and herself would guide them there, she said; they would not have to worry about the other villagers, who preferred to stay as far away as possible from the specter. And so late at night, when most of the village was asleep, Ritter and Minerva met the both of them outside the apothecary shop. Minerva glared at Elyse when she saw the witch was wearing her rags and her hat; but Elyse just snapped that there was no way she could walk far in that scratchy bag of a dress.

They departed eastward from town, the light of a crescent moon illuminating their path. Here, the road was barely more than a dirt trail, and there did not seem to be any farms in this direction. The trees on either side of the road cast huge shadows across it, alternatively illuminating and hiding them as they walked along.

Once they were far enough from the village, Ritter cleared his throat. “So, how long have you two known each other?” he asked, his voice raspy from long years of smoke.

“Not long. A few days of travel together before we arrived here,” Martim answered. He heard a strangled sound from beside him and knew it came from Minerva, thinking about how Elyse had disrobed in front of him.

“You might say I knew him for a while longer than he knew me,” Elyse said slyly, smirking at the scandalized old woman.

“And the both of you practice the Art?”

“Yes. Though from what I hear, your Zeke was a good deal more experienced than either of us.”

“He did have no small skill,” Ritter mused. “Though much of his interest seemed in areas...not practical. I visited him about weekly before the….troubles began. I was lucky to understand even one word in ten of what he said, but the man enjoyed cards. He was….a friend. I never believed that even as a ghost Zeke might take those children, though you have to admit it was an awful odd coincidence. Maybe even if we don’t get those kids back, you two will clear his name.” He cast a sidelong look at Martim and cleared his throat. “Somehow.”

Martimeos and Elyse glanced at each other as they walked along. “What….do you mean by ‘not practical’?” Martim asked cautiously.

Ritter sighed, running a hand through where his hair might once have been. “Hard to say. Like I said, when he talked about his, ah, 'research'...I barely understood what he said. But he was set up in some real ancient ruins, and he was always obsessed with getting Outside. I take it you know what I mean by that.”

Elyse gave a small gasp, and Martim shook his head. Outside. The worlds outside the world, some reflections, some distortions, some so alien they could shatter a man’s mind. Sometimes, actions taken in the Outside could have consequences in this world – break a vase in an Outside world that was a close reflection of this one, and it might fall over and shatter in this world too. Other times, they had no connections. Sometimes time flowed faster, or slower, Outside. And always in the Outside – Outsiders. Strange, alien creatures that defied sense and logic. Dolmecs, it was said, originally came from Outside. It was a very learned wizard who could ever make his way there – and a very skilled or very foolish one who actually made the attempt.

Suddenly, they froze, as over the wind came a curious, lilting hum. It carried a strange rhythm, and seemed to fade in and out, as if echoing through a long tunnel. The sound made one's stomach turn - something about it plucked at the nerves, gave the feeling that there was something simply...not quite right, about the noise. But Martim, most of all, felt a dread in the pit of his stomach at that sound. He had heard it before. “There's old Zeke,” whispered Ritter, pulling them out of the road, directing them to the cover of the forest that lined it. “Look, up there, up the top of that hill.”

Martimeos looked, and he did not have to strain his eyes to spot him. Up a hill, perhaps two hundred feet from them, cresting it, was a spectral figure of a man that glowed with a dim blue light, shining between the trees, passing sometimes between them, sometimes through them. His form faded in and out, sometimes blurry, sometimes sharp, though his face seemed hidden in a perpetual blur. Even from this distance, it could be seen that he was wearing some finely woven robes that came down to his ankles, left open at the front to reveal crisply pressed pants and a ruffled shirt, and sharp boots. The discordant hum warbled, subtly menacing, ever-louder through the night.

But that wasn’t the strangest thing about him. What was strangest, was that he walked upside down, with his feet towards the sky, though not perfectly vertical - he hung crooked in the air, walking almost as if on an invisible ground suspended in the sky, at some angle to the actual earth beneath him.

“Don’t know why he’s upside down like that,” Ritter whispered, his eyes transfixed by the sight. “Think maybe it had something to with how he died.”

“I know why,” Martim replied, shaking his head.

Ritter, Minerva, and even Elyse looked at him in surprise. “Well, why, then?” Ritter asked, after a moment.

Martim narrowed his eyes, still tracking the spectral figure as it moved away, back deeper into the woods, its light fading over the crest of the hill. “He’s not a ghost,” he answered. “He’s not even dead. He’s a glimmerling.”