A spectral dog had appeared by the side of the road, one whose face looked uncommonly familiar. It struck a point, tail making a straight line through its backbone and nose toward the south.
" 'Tis back, Wizard!" Fadecourt danced aside.
Puck appeared on Matt's shoulder, the gleam of battle in his eye. "Shall I, Lord Matthew?"
"No!" Matt yelped. "I owe you too much already! I'll handle this myself, thank you!
The ghost dog gave a faint yelp and disappeared.
"Okay." Matt relaxed. "Now, why do you suppose...?"
A will-o'-the-wisp formed ten feet in front of them.
It danced ahead, swerving off toward the south. An enchanting melody came from it, blending pipes, harps, and viols. Yverne's eyes glazed; she slid down off Narlh's back and began to move toward the light.
"No way!" The dracogriff swung his head around in a half circle, pushing her back. Yverne came to her senses with a start. "Oh! 'Tis quite compelling."
"Shall I now, Wizard?" Puck asked.
"Not until I run out of spells." Matt peered closely at the ball of light. It could have been his imagination, but he could have sworn he could see the ghost's features inside the glow...
The will-o'-the-wisp faded.
"It will be back anon," Puck informed Matt.
"Anon or a monk, I'll banish it again!" Matt turned back toward his friends. "If I should, that is."
Fadecourt stared at him, scandalized. "Wherefore might you
But Yverne was nodding. "I ken your thought, Lord Matthew. What harm has this ghost done us, after all?"
"None, really." Matt nodded. "Except for scaring you, of course—and he might not have meant to do that."
"Aye," she said. "I was overwrought, or I might not have fled. Yet even so, he did bring me to you, where I found sanctuary and protection from mine enemies."
"Could be he had good intentions. And he did warn us off from that forest—which, if the trouble we had outside it is any indication, would have been an adventure we might not have survived."
Fadecourt nodded, a reflective look on his face. "And he did afright our enemies, when we were beset..."
"You guys trying to say the spook might be on our side?" Narlh growled.
"Seems possible."
Yverne gasped, looking over Matt's head
"Don't tell me—I can guess." Matt turned slowly, to see the ghost drifting before him, looking distinctly hopeful. "Listening, were you?"
The ghost nodded brightly.
"You can hear, but you can't talk?"
The ghost shook his head, then nodded it again.
"Look," Matt said, "if you can moan, you can talk. Try again."
The ghost opened its mouth, slowly forming a word—but all Matt could hear was a vagrant sigh, like a breeze blowing past. He shook his head sadly. "No go. But I might be able to read your lips, if..."
He let it go. The ghost was clearly talking, but his mouth was only opening and closing, forming an O each time—one of the constraints of ghosts in this universe, apparently.
Matt sighed and shook his head. "Let's try sign language again."
"While you do," Fadecourt interrupted, "pardon us if we set up camp."
"Huh? Oh, sure, go right ahead." Matt sat down on a nearby stump, not really registering what Fadecourt had said. He had a new puzzle to work on, and everything else became unimportant. "Okay. Now—hold up one finger for every word you're trying to get across."
The ghost held up ten fingers, then closed his fists, opened them to all ten again—then again, and again, and again..."Let's try for something a little shorter," Matt said.
An hour later, Fadecourt finally dragged him away to dinner. Matt had established that the ghost didn't know what "syllable" meant, nor "preposition" nor "article," and that the notion of an infinitive was enough to make him split. He had been able to get across the idea of "little words," but the ghost seemed to have radically different ideas as to what "little" meant. Matt tossed in his metaphorical towel, gave the ghost an apologetic smile as he took the bowl Yverne handed him, and turned his attention to dinner, deciding that maybe there was some point in learning grammar, after all.
But the ghost was persistent; it hung around all through Matt's watch, pantomiming and trying to make Matt understand—with absolutely no success, try as Matt might. He stuck around while Matt was asleep, too, apparently, because he was still there when they woke up.
"Your companion awaits," Fadecourt told him as he cracked partridge eggs onto a hot, flat stone. "Are not ghosts banished by daylight?"
Matt looked up; the ghost was only an outline, barely visible at all. "I guess the sun just outshines them."
"If they wish to stay at all." Puck pointed. "Seest you not that he is in pain?"
Matt looked as sharply as he could, then shook his head. "No. I can't see it that well. How come you can?"
Puck shrugged. "An affinity of spirits. Believe me, he doth suffer—not greatly, though constantly."
"What's he wanna stick around that badly for?" Narlh wondered.
"He wants to tell us something, that's for sure." Matt shook his head, seized with a sudden pang of sympathy. "I'm sorry, ghost. What we have here is a real failure to communicate."
The outline of the ghost's shoulders slumped, and slowly, what little they could see of it faded away.
"Poor guy." Matt sighed.
"Yet 'tis better than his suffering to no purpose," Yverne said.
"I suppose so." Matt sighed "Well, time to stir up the coals. Any journey bread left?"
"We never had any," Narlh snorted.
"Remind me to find some wild wheat to grind" Matt sat down by the fire. "Well, I've had plain eggs before, but I've never been gladder of them."
Fadecourt handed him a bowl. "Dine well."
"Hope so." Matt took out his dagger and tried to spoon scrambled egg into his mouth, being very careful of the point.
"You do realize," Puck said, "that you do owe me for another favor."
Matt swallowed hard, then swung to face the manikin in the sun shaft. "What favor?"
"Telling you that the ghost was in pain."
Matt's lips formed a "no" as he gave the elf a dirty look. "I didn't ask for that."
"Asking matters not," Puck said with airy nonchalance. "The favor is all."
"Uh-uh." Matt shook his head. "Not kosher. I won't buy it"
"Bought or not, 'tis registered." Puck gave him a sly grin.. "After all, who is't who does register what is owed me? Only me!"
Matt turned purple. "So who do you think you are? The arbiter of..."
He noticed that Puck had suddenly stiffened, looking past his shoulder. It could be a trick—he looked up at Yverne and Fadecourt. They, too, were staring past him.
"Wizard," Narlh rumbled.
Matt spun—and saw the ghost, as solid as he'd been the night before, smiling and beckoning. Beside him danced a spark, so bright that it hurt the eyes.
Then the spark disappeared, and the ghost instantly faded to ordinary translucence—but that foggy view was a huge improvement over his being a mere shell of his former self.
"What witchery is this?" Fadecourt asked—and Puck, for once, could only say, " 'Tis a spirit of another sort!"