Verdigris Ravine Ghost

S'ari; the priestess felt her presence first, like the rising of the sun. It was a slow creeping warmth, a familiar light to chase the shadows away. Candle stirred at the sound of her voice, whining faintly.

She would help, surely. She would make the pain stop. Except it was already fading, all of it. It should have felt like relief. It should have, but all Candle could feel was an inexplicable dread.

I'm dying, she thought with a sudden crystal clarity, a calm that belied the panic surging through her. Or perhaps not calm but acceptance. She was afraid but she was so tired of being afraid, so tired of fighting against her own fear.

Then —

She heard her name and the fading light in her flared. Zoug. Candle struggled to lift herself. She abandoned the effort when he fell upon her with the heavy press of his paws, yelping a little in protest. And for a moment she felt betrayed; for a moment she could not understand why he did this, why he was hurting her — !

But she trusted him. She tried to listen. Stay; and what had Zoug ever asked of her but this? All that belonged to her, Candle owed to him. Home; language; family; he'd brought these things to her, or perhaps her to them. And some part of her had been waiting, hoping that he might ask something in return, if only to show that he needed her in some way.

He asked that she stay.

How could she do anything else?

Candle whined again, plaintive this time. W-wo - wo - olf... She managed in her whispersoft way. F-f-fo...llow me-e. She began to cry. H-hu - urts. And she did not want to stay, she did not want to suffer this way. But Zoug had asked, and S'ari had promised, and she did not want to but she would.