Ellswys, the witch, took a knife from her backpack and covered her nose with the edge of her cloak again. She sniffed. One time is enough to find Farrow. Selwyn scurried around in the darkness—walking into a wall, risking the wrath of the souls of the dead that he tripped over or bumped into—less than a dozen paces from where the funeral procession had originally left him.

"Wait," Selwyn whispered in horror as he looked at Farrow's dangling arm. "He moved."

Selwyn sniffed again. She told Selwyn, "You smell bad. He definitely smelled like dead. ”

This did nothing to alleviate Selwyn's fears.

Seeing his face, Ellswis snapped impatiently, "He didn't move. ”

"I don't mean now." Selwyn was reluctant to come any closer. The magic light hovering over Elswys' head was so bright that it barely left a shadow, which was both fortunate and unfortunate. "But......" he pointed first to the body wrapped in the blanket and then to the arm wrapped in solitary pieces, for Farod had already begun to stiffen before the women of the village were ready to bury him. It was the last scene Selwyn saw, as the torch was taken away: Farrow curled up in a niche in the wall, his arm stretched out but now it hung down, still wrapped, the edges almost brushing the floor.

Did I break his arm? Selwyn thought in horror, remembering how he had walked into Farrow's body in the dark. Will Farrow's spirit be restless because of this?

Does Farrow's soul get angry about it?

Surely he wouldn't be as angry as the man who killed him, Selwyn assured himself. A person who has experienced murder will certainly not blame someone for accidentally breaking his arm.

Ellthwees shook his head at him, as if all his thoughts were written on his face. If she stood close enough, she might slap him again. She pressed the fabric of her cloak tighter against her nose, cut the seams sewn by the women of the village with her knife, and tucked Farod into the blanket She wrinkled at the sight of the two-day-old corpse, which made Selwyn think better than her. Then she picked up her dangling arm and crossed it over Farrow's chest, as if she also believed in propriety. "The body became stiff," she told Selwyn. She twisted her loose arm. Then they relaxed again. There's nothing to worry about here, it's just that in another day the body will start leaking and that's when we want to leave. ”

Except, Selwyn thought squeamishly, she seemed to have more experience with corpses than anyone else.

She leaned over to cut off a strand of Farod's light brown hair and wrapped it in another piece of unbleached wool cloth in her backpack. With that, she carefully put the blanket back under Farrow, just as a mother covers her sleeping child.

"I'm finished here," she told Selwin, "unless you want to steal some knives, rings, or other items that these people are buried with." ”

"No," Selwyn assured her warmly. But then, for the first time, it occurred to him that perhaps not all of her advice was worth taking seriously. "No," he repeated more calmly.

She did smile.

"Come on." She swept the lamp away from a palm's width above her head, letting it land on her palm again. "Your service to me begins now. You'll start by carrying my backpack on your back. ”

"Elsweiss," he shouted. Considering the huge difference in their ages, this seems all too familiar given the power she has. But he wasn't sure what to call a witch. Apparently not my lady. Your uncleanness? But she gave Ellswis the name, whether it was really her name or not.

She turned to look at him, the look on her face not seeming to be annoyed by his familiarity, but a warning that she was ready—and willing to deal harshly—with any nonsense he might have orchestrated.

He speaks very quickly. "I'm worried about my family."

She looked around the tomb. "Are they there?" But her tone was one of suspicion.

"No," he said hurriedly, before she became too distrustful of anything she said to him. "But they know I'm here."

Elsweith apparently didn't see the connection. She motioned for him to continue, gesturing with her hand for the light to follow, looking dizzying.

"They won't realize you've ......," he hesitated, then said, "rescued," she snorted. He took a deep breath. "They won't know you saved me." He walked away in a daze, distraught.

"Then they'll have a surprise in a year, won't they?" The tone in which she said suggested that she wasn't entirely convinced that this would be the case.

Selwyn spoke quickly as she had begun to turn around. "But my father...... I was worried about my father. Fear that he might do something hasty and stupid. He might try to rescue me himself, or go after Bowdoin, and he sentenced me to such a fate. Then they might do the same to him, or simply kill him. ”

She looked at him blankly.