Fireflies

All Soul’s Day. According to the tradition, tonight is the day to remember the dead. And each one has a way to do it.

When I was a kid, while the other kids at the orphanage met at the main room to tell and listen to creepy stories about evil spirits, Evelyn and I used to stay in our trunks and just have a thought about our mum and dad, and wonder if they cared for us from wherever they might be. We would have lit a candle for them, but we weren’t allowed to use fire in our rooms.

Now that things have changed, this celebration makes me think we could actually do something to remember our loved ones. There are many we have lost, Kyle more than me, and I think he will want to, at least, spare a thought at them.

But when I suggest it to him, he just shows a stupid smile and says “Fireflies!”

I perk a brow. “Fireflies? What do you mean?”

“We can catch fireflies and fill flasks with them, then hang them in the porch, and release them in the morning. They do that for All Soul’s Day in Antiva”, he grins.

Catching bugs, of course. He loves that, and I guess he didn’t have a chance to do this since Darn is gone. My big, big child. I resist the temptation to mess his hair.

“All right” I give up. “We’ll go catching fireflies this evening”

And he seems so happy I can’t help but smile myself. So contagious.



Nelson opens the way, panting and barking and playing. He has grown up a lot in these months, but even if he looks like an adult dog, he’s still a puppy. I hope he won’t get lost, because I’m keeping an eye on Kyle, whose sense of direction is much worse than the cub’s, and needs more vigilance.

He’s delighted with the hunting, and I can see him jumping here and there, sometimes catching them in the bushes, sometimes in flight, like a cat, and he’s having so much fun I soon forget it is getting late and we’re too far from our home. Since here we don’t have the spooky spirit costume parades they celebrate in places like Antiva, at least we have a nicer way to spend the night than staying at home praying as the Chantry asks for this day.

I take a deep breath and smile. The night is cold, but clear, so we can see where we step. The stars shine bright in the sky and if any spirit has been attracted by the prayers, as some people say, they don’t seem to want to bother us. And of course, as soon as I keep my eyes off Kyle, he disappears.

I hear Nelson yapping, and I turn my head. “Where’s Kyle?”. The mabari tilts his head and whines. “Oh! You weren’t watching either?” I ask him, as if he could reply. “Awesome. He will be lost and I won’t see him until tomorrow morning”. Nelson lowers his ears, a bit ashamed, and I sigh. “All right, cub, It’s not your fault. Just help me find him with your nose, okay?”

And before I can say anything else, Nelson barks happily and rushes ahead, disappearing among the bushes. I try to follow him… but except from some noises which soon fade, I have no idea where he has gone.

Awesome.

Now it is me the one who is lost.



All right. Not exactly lost. I know I can find my way back home whenever I want to, but I’m not going back without Kyle and Nelson and I need to find them first, so instead of waiting for them there as a part of my brain tells me I should do, I start walking in the direction I saw Nelson disappearing. From time to time I hear noises here and there, so I try to follow them. After all it is late at night and, apart from man and dog, who else could have been making the bushes move?

And suddenly I see her.

She’s small, cute and blonde, and she reminds me of Grace, the human child Kyle, Darn and me saved that day from the monster spider. I almost step on her, but fortunately the night is so clear I can see her sitting calmly on the grass, playing with a worn out ragdoll, and even if she should be scared, she doesn’t seem so at all. I stop and look at her.

“What are you doing here, little one?”

She takes her eyes away from her doll and smiles at me with a charming, disarming smile. “Playing” she says. At first I though she was four or five, but now that I look at her eyes I think she’s older. Six, even more. Just she’s so small and delicate. It’s hard to believe she’s human.

“Isn’t it a bit late? Your parents will be worried if they realize you’re not at home”

She shrugs. “Mom and dad don’t care for me anymore”

I frown. How can her parents not be worried? I’m about to argue when I see the bruises. The right half of her face, almost hidden by her hair, has an ugly shade of purple. At first I had thought it was the shadows, but now I see it is probably due to a terrible blow.

So that’s the problem. Mistreated girl. My heart aches. Even if I’m not very fond on children, I can’t understand how someone can hurt a child, and much less their own parents. Then I remember my own past, and I have to admit it. What I consider normal it’s often not what the world considers normal itself.

“All right, honey… Maybe… we can find a place for you?” Damn it damn it damn it, I start to think. What am I going to do with this girl? I can’t send her back home but I can’t leave her in the woods. Wonderful.

The girl smiles again with her charming smile. “I have a secret place! Do you want me to show you?”. She gets up and reaches for my hand, and, confused, I let her do. I have to find Kyle, says a part of my brain, but another one struggles. I can’t leave this child alone. Let’s see that secret place, I think, and maybe if she’s safe there, I can go back to find Kyle.

“All right, honey”, I say, holding her hand and following her. Poor thing. Her hand is frozen. She must have been out longer than I thought. “Is it a safe place?”

She nods energically. “It’s where I hide from the monsters”

“Monsters?” I ask. I try to notice the places we’re walking through, so I can find my way back, but after a while I have the feeling we’re moving in circles, and I wonder how she finds the way. The place is becoming gloomier, and only the reflection of light of the moon and stars in the landscape allow my elven eyes to have a glimpse of where we are. Even the fireflies seem to have disappeared now. I’m starting to ponder if this girl knows exactly where she goes.

“The dark men. The shadows. They come for me at night. They scare me so much…” she says, and I feel her tiny hand tremble. She raises her cute face to look at me and I can read the plea in her eyes. “Will you… protect me?”

I’m about to ask her how it is that she is outside at night if she’s so scared of the monsters, but the only mention of shadows makes me shiver. I know what it is. I have had my own shadows haunting me for years. I swallow and nod. “I will protect you, sweetie”, I promise, and then I realize I don’t even know her name, so I ask her. I can’t spend all the time calling her “Honey”.

“Claudine” she says. Sounds Orlesian, I think. How weird. Orlesian names probably were popular some years ago, when Orlais dominated Ferelden, but not now. Though Ryan told me once there were Orlesian sympathizers near Highever, in Amaranthine. Maybe this girl’s family didn’t know the domination is over. It happens sometimes in isolated places… and this one seems isolated enough for me.

“Come. It is close”

She is right. We are leaving the woods, and as we walk outside, I can see a brook, running down a canyon under a stone bridge. At the other side of the river, the moonlight lets me guess the shapes of stone walls and rocks. Ruins. A perfect place for a girl to hide and play. But then, why don’t I like how they look?

And suddenly we hear the noise, almost at the same time. Behind us. The bushes moving, heavy steps. Claudine’s face distorts in a grimace of terror. “Chevaliers! They’re coming for us!!! Hurry, hurry up!” and she pulls my hand towards the bridge. Before I turn to look ahead I have a glimpse of a dark shape running towards us, a big, beastly thing, blurry as if it didn’t belong to this world, with one bright eye in the middle of its chest, and somehow it is that bright eye which scares me the most. It seems to move in slow motion, but no matter how fast we run, it is each time closer to us and I am about to scream with terror, but not a single sound can get out of my throat and I run and run because I know that once we cross the bridge, Claudine and me will be safe in her secret place and…

I trip, and I lose Claudine’s hand grip. She stops for a moment, her eyes wide. “No!! He will kill me again!!!” she screams, and I try to reach for her hand, like in slow motion, but the shadow is too close, and I just can say “Go! Don’t wait for me!”, before the one-eyed thing jumps over me and puts its hands around my neck…



I’m still struggling when I open my eyes and see Kyle’s concerned face while he’s hugging me. I stop moving and look at him confused, then I raise a hand to my neck and I realize I’m wearing his amulet against ghosts.

“Are you all right?”

I nod. “Claudine…” I mumble, suddenly remembering the little girl. “Where is she?”

“She’s back home, my love” he replies. “She’s back home”. But he’s not looking at me. He’s looking behind me, where the bridge and the ruins and the stones were, and I turn my head to look back. I shiver when I realize than if I had tried to cross that bridge, I would have fallen down to the brook, a fall which would have caused my death, because there was no way to cross it. Only the half at this side of the river stays there. The other one probably crumbled down ages ago…

And the walls and stones I mistook for some ruins… now look like gravestones.

Suddenly I understand. The danger wasn’t the monster. The danger was the spirit who was still running away from whatever killed her, dragging me with her curse. I’m grateful to the amulet, now I can see what living ones see.

And then I realize that, to put it around my neck, Kyle has had to take it off his… and that’s why he’s not looking at me. He’s looking at the graveyard, mesmerized.

I shake his shoulders. “Wake up, Kyle! Don’t look at them!!”

He slowly turns his face to me and smiles, takes a lock of hair from my eyes and kisses my forehead. “Don’t worry, love. They have no power over us there. I have this”. And he raises proud the jar full of fireflies he’s carrying in one hand.

“I… could have died…”, I mutter. “And you still worry about your fireflies!”.

Nelson interrupts me, whining and digging under one of the closest pillars of the broken bridge, and suddenly he takes something in his mouth. I get up, and walk a bit hesitantly towards him. I look at the thing and freeze.

It’s a torn, dirty and very, very old ragdoll. I feel all my hair up when I recognize it, and even more when I look down, to the place where Nelson found the doll.

On the ground, half buried, now I can see a small skull. Smashed on its right side. I remember a shade of purple in a little girl’s face and I cringe. “So she never made it”. She never crossed the bridge. She never… arrived to her safe place.

Taking the doll from the cub’s mouth, I toss it with all my strength to the other side of the bridge. Maybe her spirit will find peace if her toy is there. Nelson whines, but he makes no attempt to go after it. Then I grab Kyle’s arm and we start walking back home. He still holds with one hand the jar full of fireflies. I realize that’s probably what I thought it was the monster’s only eye, I think, and I laugh at my own stupidity. I mistook my Kyle for a monster!!!

“You still want to put them on the porch?” I ask him. He looks at the jar and nods.

“They say they keep spirits away”, he says. And this time, I believe it.

And Maker knows we need it tonight.