"I had fire. Werewolves are afraid of fire."

She bridled at him. "I suppose you wonder why I helped. My being a witch and all. Well, I'll tell you. A little magic and some mild enchantments, those are all right with me. In my day I've done a lot of that. There is nothing wrong with it. Many times it helps. But I told you I had no real evil and I meant that. Werewolves are evil and I cannot abide them. Mean, downright vicious evil. There's no call for anyone to be that evil."

"There was a pack of them," said Duncan. "A lot of them. I never knew that werewolves ran in packs, although perhaps they do. You were telling me about the camp followers who trailed in the wake of the Harriers. Could that be what accounted for so large a pack?"

"It must be that. They must have come swarming in from all over Britain."

"And you heard the voice?"

She put her arms around herself, hugging tight and shivering.

"You knew the words? You recognized the language?"

"Not the words," she said, "but the language, yes. A word here and there. It's a very ancient tongue."

"How ancient?"

"That I cannot tell you, sir. Not in years or centuries. It goes deep back. Spoken before any human spoke, perhaps before there were such things as humans."

"Primordial," he said. "The words of primordial evil."

"I do not know."

It was on the tip of his tongue to ask how she recognized the language, but he did not ask the question. There was no need to distress her further. She had been honest in her answers, he was sure, and that was good enough.

Conrad came back. "Beauty is all right," he said. "Her leg's a little sore. We came out lucky."

The clearing was quiet. The humped bodies of the dead werewolves lay at the edge of the outer darkness.

"Perhaps," said Andrew, "we should bury them."

"You do not bury werewolves," Conrad said. "A stake through the heart, perhaps. Besides, we haven't any shovel."

"We'll do nothing," Duncan said. "We'll leave them where they are."

The chapel stood white in the flickering firelight. Duncan looked at the open door. The firelight did not reach deep enough into the interior to show the reversed crucifix and he was glad of that.

"I'll not sleep a wink this night," said Andrew.

"You had best," said Conrad roughly. "Come morning light, we have a long, hard day ahead. Do you think you can find that trail?"

Andrew shook his head in perplexity. "I am not sure. I seem all turned around. Nothing has looked right."

A wailing scream cut through the night, seeming to come from directly overhead, as if the screamer hung in the darkness over them.

"My God," yelped Andrew. "Not more. Not any more tonight." The scream came again, a moan and whimper in it. It was the sort of sound that squeezed the heart and made the blood run cold.

A calm voice spoke to them from just inside the firelit zone. "You have no reason to fear," it said. "That is only Nan, the banshee."

Duncan spun around to face the one who spoke. For a moment he did not recognize him. A little man with a cap that drooped, a pair of spindly legs, ears that were oversized.

"Snoopy," he said. "What are you doing here?"

"Hunting you," said Snoopy. "We've been hunting you for hours. Ever since Ghost told us he had lost track of you."

Ghost came fluttering down and beside him another figure, its darkness in contrast to the white of Ghost.

"It was pure happenstance," said Ghost, "that I ran into them."

"It was much more than happenstance," said Snoopy, "and you wouldn't understand. We have no time to explain."

Ghost floated lower until his white robe swept the ground. Nan, the banshee, settled down, hunched herself along the ground toward the fire. She was repulsive. Her deep-set eyes glittered at them from beneath her shaggy brows. Thick black hair flowed down her back almost to her waist. Her face was thin and hard.

"Faith," she said, "and you were hidden well. It took us long to find you."

"Madam," said Duncan, "we were in no wise hiding. We simply reached here and camped the night."

"And a fine place you picked," said Snoopy, walking up to them. "You know you cannot stay here."

"We intend to," Conrad told him. "We fought off a pack of werewolves. We can handle whatever else comes."

"We have been looking for you, goblin," said Andrew. "Why were you not at the church, where you said you'd be?"

"I've been out spreading word that you'll need some help. And the way you've been fumbling around, you will need all the help that we can give."

"You found little help," Andrew said snappishly. "One beaten-up old banshee."

"I'll have you know, you twerp," said Nan, the banshee, "that I can give you ace and spades and beat you at hands-down."

"There'll be others later on," said Snoopy calmly. "They'll be there when you need them most. And you know you can't stay here. No matter what you say, in your ignorance and arrogance, we have to get you somewhere else."

"We know," said Duncan, "that this is a pagan shrine."

"More than that," Snoopy told him. "Much more than that. A place that was sacred to Evil before there were any pagans who might worship Evil. Here, in the days of the first beginning, gathered beings that would shrivel up your tiny souls were you to catch even the smallest glimpse of them. You desecrate the ground. You befoul the place. They will not suffer that you stay here. The werewolves were the first. There will be others, not so easily beaten off as werewolves."

"But there is the chapel…"

"They suffered the chapel to be built. They watched it being built by arrogant and misunderstanding men, by stupid churchmen who should have known far better. They lurked in the shades and watched it going up and they bided their time and when that time came…"

"You can't frighten us," said Conrad.

"Perhaps we should be frightened," said Duncan. "Perhaps if we had good sense we would be."

"That is right," said Meg. "You should be."

"But you came along with us. You did not protest when we…"

"Where else is an old and crippled witch to go?"

"You could have flown off on your broomstick," said Conrad.

"I never had a broomstick. Nor did any other witch. That is only one of the many stupid stories…"

"We can't move until we get some rest," said Duncan. "Conrad and I could go on, but the witch is feeble and Andrew has walked the livelong day. He is worn out."

"I had the strength to kill a werewolf," the hermit pointed out.

"You mean it, don't you?" Conrad said to Snoopy. "You're not just shoving us around."

"He means it," said Nan, the banshee.

"We could put Andrew up on Daniel," Conrad said. "Let Beauty carry Meg. She weighs no more than a feather. The packs we could carry. Beauty, even with a sore leg, could carry Meg."

"Then," said Snoopy, "let us be about it."

"I plead with you," said Ghost. "Please do. If you stay here you'll join me in death by morning. And you might not have the good fortune that I had to become a ghost."