Jenny: Half Sunk, A Shattered Visage Lies

The Guttersnipe sank a little further, letting the bitter cold water flow over her. Cold! and the images of the flaming beeches turning the iron-grey water hot with colour. The robins erupted from the burnside and flew away. Frip barked at them and ran down the bank.

"The way I see it," the Guttersnipe said thoughtfully, "is that your father has left as near a piece of himself as he could, in that harp of yours. I've heard you play. I've heard Caleb play." She did not dare to mention Gwenhywfar, who could play like no other and spin the lives of dead men into gold brilliance before one's enchanted eyes. "And as far as I can see, not being a player myself, there is something of the harper in the harping, no matter who plays the song. If you play your father's songs, they are his notes, a little piece of his mind. And sometimes people rub off on things." She drew her necklace out of the water, cupping the horse and the ring in her palm. "I don't really know how, but you can own a thing, and you can love a thing, and you can die and, oh, be dead for ages. But somehow that thing remembers that you owned it, that you loved it. And in a way, you're still there."

She moved to the rock and hoisted herself up in a spray of water, crouching by Domitia with one leg tucked beneath her, one splayed over the edge of the stone, hair flung back in a damp mass, looking like an odd, large human frog. "You have your ceremony," she said. "We won't stop you. We're understanding folk, even if we don't understand - just so long as it isn't ignorant and stupid, we let things happen as they come. And if you need anything," she added with a small smile, hoping Domitia would forgive her for her unavoidable lack of sympathy, "be sure to ask. This is your home now. We're your folk."