Two Ghost's Salvation - Section 02

The story continues, as two young girls find their power by becoming ghosts, then spirit guides. This is their origin-story...Barely escaping discovery by soldiers from a nearby dukedom, Sal and Jude's dad starts training them to survive in the forest. While gathering herbs in a clearing, Sal and Jude find they can communicate to the animals. But find something else - their mother's ghost can appear to them. They can see and hear her voice in their mind.One morning their dad returns early. He tells them he has seen soldiers forcing local village men to build a road access road through a ravine - that will let them the army find their hut in the forest...Excerpt:One day Da was late coming home. When he didarrive, he came through one of the other paths and had no game withhim. He put out the fire and had us get into the storage space belowthe floor. Most cabins in this day were simply dirt floors. Walls ofcabins in the woods were often mud and woven wicker. Ours was an oldhunting hut, abandoned years ago. It was made with trimmed logs, andchinked with mud and grasses against the weather. On its back wall,there was an opening just big enough for Da to squeeze through. Thisled to a small dugout area that had its own roof. We storedvegetables and meat here, as the temperature was the same all yearlong and never froze.This is where Da had us go that day. He opened thedugout door wide and put all our food and toys with us then hescattered dirt all around our table and shelves. When we tried to askhim, he shushed us and said we were going to practice waiting forwild game. We had to be very, very quiet for a long time. He climbed in with us, and we watched from thathole in the wall, waiting.Soon we heard the thumping of heavy boots comingup the path toward our front door.They kicked the door open. Men covered inleather and shiny metal came in our little hut, shouting to eachother until one made them all be quiet. He was wearing more colorsthan the rest and so seemed to be in charge. Da could understand whatthey were saying. And he quietly put the cover over that hole, theone that looked like part of the log wall. He sat with his back tothat cover and braced his feet against the other side of the dugout.We now sat in complete darkness and silence. Andwaited while we listened. More men came into the little hut and were talkingfor awhile. Da told us later that someone had said it looked likesome bandits had been using the hut as to hide out in. The man in thecolors was talking about burning it down.But then the men all got very quiet. And we heard a woman singing. She was singing anold song, one we hadn't heard before. Soon the men were trying toget out of the hut all at once. Maybe the song was to get them tofind her. Both Jude and I tried to get out, but Da just held us closeand pushed against the back wall of the dugout to keep us all inside.And we kept quiet.Then we heard horses whinny and scream, then thesound of them galloping away. We heard men who were shouting loudlygo after them, clanking in their metal and squeaking in theirleather.Da didn't let us go for a very long time afterthat...