"How is it"_it whispered_"that you come here? Not one, but two musicians? Have you not heard of me, of what I am, of what I will do to you?"
Robin felt the pressure of magic all around her, as the Ghost tried to fill her with fear and make her flee. But the fear failed to touch her; she sensed only the power, and not the emotion the Ghost sought to use against her. So it did not know she had broken its spell!
Time to enlighten it.
"Of course we have heard of you!" she said, clearly and calmly. "The whole world has heard of you! Listen _"
Her fingers picked out the introduction to "The Skull Hill Ghost." And she began to sing.
I sit here on a rock, and curse my stupid, bragging tongue,
And curse my pride that would not let me back down from a boast
And wonder where my wits went, when I took that challenge up
And swore that I would go and fiddle for the Skull Hill Ghost!
As she sang, she exerted a little magic of her own; warm and loving magic, Bardic Magic and Gypsy magic and the magic of one true lover for another. She sent it, not at the Ghost, but at Kestrel, all of it aimed at breaking the spell of fear that held Jonny imprisoned in his icy silence as she had been imprisoned a moment before.
The warmth must have reached him, for as she reached the chorus, he shook himself, and suddenly his harp joined the jaunty chords of her gittern as his voice joined hers in harmony.
I'll play you high, I'll play you low
For I'm a wizard with my bow
For music is my weapon and my art_
And every note I fling will strike your heart!
That was a change from the original wording of Rune's contest-song; more of a metaphor for the life-and-death battle she had waged to save herself from the Ghost and a life of grim poverty than the original chorus had been.
Robin continued in the "Rune" persona, with Kestrel coming in with the Ghost's first line_in a cunning imitation of the Ghost's own voice.
"Give me reason why I shouldn't kill you, girl!"
She watched her audience of one as closely as she had ever watched any audience; had she seen the spirit start with surprise at hearing his own words?
She responded as Rune.
"I've come to fiddle for you, sir _"
Kestrel came in_and again, his voice was not a booming and spectral one, as Wren usually sang the part, but in that deliberate imitation of the Ghost's true disembodied whisper.