D Cornish - The Lamplighter

There must have been water about, despite the arid soil and thirsty plants, for as they walked the young lighter could hear frogs croaking, creaking and ponging at every hand; it might have been a friendly chorus, but the uneasy threwd, amplified by the fetid eastern breeze, turned the amphibious music sinister. Sometimes they would stop, leaving an eerie hush that set Rossamund anxiously searching for a lurker.

Untroubled, Sequecious pushed effortlessly through a thicket and the young lighters followed in the wake the great man's girth made, unhindered by stem or twig. They were in the stand of swamp oaks at last, a dim grove that soughed uneasily in the wind.

Clearly pooped by the effort of the short walk, the cook puffed, "Yee find out yonder, boyo," pointing to the farthest end of the modest wood. "An' yee, girly, go between." He indicated the middle ground to an unhappy-looking Threnody. "I am being right hereabouts. Look in between th' roots an' under tha leaves an' be putting thrumcops in these an' I bring them back to pot when full, tank yee," he concluded, giving the two an old post-bag each.

Barely comprehending the cook's odd talk but following his intention, Rossamund went to his designated end of the trees, his footfalls gritty on the dry, spongy mat of needles that kept the thicket floor clear of weeds and other choking grasses. Threnody walked a little ahead of him. He could hear her muttering, "I've been in the hands of the best sectifactors in the land and they have me out here looking for toadstools." Without another word she turned aside at an arbitrary place and began looking about the ground with little conviction, toeing here and there among roots.

Rossamund moved deeper into the grove.

Wings whirring, a sparrow alighted suddenly on an over-arching branch.With a sharp turn in his innards, Rossamund had the odd, almost threwdish sense that this was the same bird that had flown up to the doorsill of the carriage when the post-lentum was waiting at Cothallow. He stopped, hands on hips, and stared at the remarkable, persistent bird, which swiveled its head, observing him cannily in return.

"Hallo," Rossamund said softly, "has the Sparrowling sent you?"

The sparrow chirruped loudly.

Was that a reply?

The tiny bird chirped again and shot away, Rossamund losing sight of it in the thick foliage. Cautiously he followed its path until he came to a small dell whose entire opposite flank was overrun by a large boxthorn crowding the roots of several tall swamp oaks. A loud chattering sparrow-song sang from within.

Rossamund froze, looking left, looking right, but nothing untoward appeared. He glanced behind and could just make out the massive white bulk of Sequecious clambering about the farther end of the woods. Threnody was not visible, though Rossamund thought he could hear her foraging a short way off. Keeping an eye out, he crouched on his haunches and began to carefully poke and rake among the needles and dry soil along the lip of the dell, prospecting for the round fungus with distinct white spots. Somewhere in the treetops, doves softly cooed… cuh-coo-hoo-oo, cuh-coo-hoo-oo… in the hissing quiet. Becoming engrossed in the search, Rossamund worked his way from tree to tree, half filling his bag in quick time. It was only very gradually that he became alert to creeping movements nearby, a sound different from the constant susurrus of the needle-leaves, a sly stepping on needly ground. He first thought it was Threnody, but the subtle sounds were from the entirely opposite direction. Without putting down the sack, the young lighter eased his free hand into his salumanticum.

A dark shape sneaked into view, creeping around the side of the boxthorn, a small figure, mottled and unexpectedly familiar… Was it? Surely not! It couldn't be… Yet it was! Shuffling on the opposite side of the small dell was Freckle. There before him was the glamgorn who had comforted him in the hold of the Hogshead, one hundred and fifty miles and over two months away. For a shocked breath they simply looked at each other.

"Freckle?" Rossamund hissed, remembering himself and looking quickly about, too startled to fuss with greetings. "You can't be here! There's half a platoon of lighters in that cothouse back there." He pointed over his shoulder at the shadowy tower. "Many of them, watching us!"

"No, no, no, little once-weepy Rossamund, it is you that cannot stay, and stay you can't," the little fellow said musically, hopping from one foot to the other, deep yellow eyes catching the meager, dappled light brilliantly. These eyes were limpid and anxious-wide, and Freckle's cheeky, once-happy face was now drawn with worry and fatigue. "Not here. Not with these people who don't know yet what they ought never to know. I have come and you must get away with me."

"What do…? But how…?" Rossamund wanted to dash over and hug Freckle, but this would be the action of an outramorine-the worst kind of sedorner. Indeed, Freckle himself proved keen to keep a little space between them.

"I kept a good long look and I saw you and I followed you and I waited," the little barky-skinned bogle said quick and low, "and sometimes Cinnamon would do the following and the waiting for this one while I went on other ways."

Cinnamon has been watching too? Rossamund could not quite fathom what he was hearing.

"I have watched you learning all the dividing, conquering ways with your friends who would not be friends if they knew. Come along now, now come along," Freckle said, waving with his hand. "You saved me so I save you.The Sparrowling will have you and keep you, just as he ought.You belong nowhere, but it is safer for you to be with him. He-"

"Rossamund?" came a soft, too-familiar voice. "Wh-what are you doing with that-that thing?"

Threnody! "Ah-I-" He looked back. There she was, picking through the underbrush, looking deeply anxious. She was staring with stark intensity at Freckle, and even as she came, the girl put her hand to her forehead.

"Threnody, no!" Rossamund cried and was instantly overwhelmed with her ill-practiced scathing, which drove him to his hands and knees. "Threnody… no…" Gritting teeth, Rossamund forced himself to clarity, growling under his breath as he struggled to sit and reach into his salumanticum for something to-to stop Threnody from hurting Freckle! — but it did not matter, for the clever little glamgorn was already clean away.Threnody sprang after it, sending again, running wildly past the boxthorn and into the net of low branches through which Freckle had first come. Her hat was sent flying as she crashed through the growth, falling at Rossamund's feet. He heard her flailing about fruitlessly, feeling the frequent edges of her scantly managed witting.

Rossamund had seen Freckle avoid a fulgar, and now the glamgorn had eluded a wit-albeit an unskilled one.

Forcing herself back through the thickly interleaved branches Threnody returned, the clinging stems tangling with her hair.With a prolonged and angry grunt she pushed clear, yet something remained behind: her lustrous black curls.They were now a knotted mass weighing down several snaring twigs. For an awful breath Rossamund thought the wicked undergrowth had wrenched her hair from her very scalp. With another shock he realized it was actually a wig. She had lost her hair from witting after all.

The girl stood in the clearing, blinking and pale, caught in a confusion of shame and fear and doggedness, her now bald head part hidden beneath white bindings.

"Haven't you ever seen a wit without her hair before?" she said darkly as she snatched her wig back from the twiggy snare, bringing most of it with her.

Utterly astounded and perplexed, Rossamund said nothing.

Sequecious came rolling over, rubicund face dribbling sweat.