Clare held a whispered conversation with Finn, telling him more about how elves can feel the souls of places. I ignored them, pushed down my consciousness's awareness of Paen standing so close by, and cleared my mind.
Normally it takes me several minutes to calm my thoughts enough to be able to hear the voice of the house, but this location, being founded so strongly in the beyond, took no time before it started talking to me.
Or rather, the men did.
"Whoa," I said, my eyes opening a few seconds after I'd closed them. Surrounding us was a ring of men, their numbers growing as I stared at them.
"Sam?" Paen asked, a faint frown between his brows. "What is it?"
I looked around at the men, a good twenty or so of them ranging in age from early teens to late sixties, all of them dressed in ragged tunics, grubby bits of plaid worn wrapped around their waists, each armed with a huge, massive sword. "I think I just met the residents of Dunstan Moor. Hello, gentlemen."
One of the men stepped forward and said something in a language I didn't understand.
"Ghosts?" Paen asked.
"That would be my guess. Unfortunately, we don't seem to speak the same language. Do either of you speak old Scottish?"
"It would be Gaelic, and I am reasonably proficient in it."
"Good," I said, taking his hand. It was warm and strong and sent little excited chills down me at the feel of it. "You can translate, then."
"Translate? Translate what?"
I opened my mind to him, willing him to see through my eyes. He jerked away at the touch of my mind. "What do you think you're doing?" His voice was low enough that only I could hear it, but it was rife with indignation.
I'm trying to let you see the ghosts. Mom used to do this with Dad whenever he wanted to see elf stuff. She said she just merged consciousness with him, and he could see things she saw.
"You are not a full elf, and I am not your father."
We can do the mind-speak thing. I think it's probably a given we can do other things, as well.
"I don't want to - "
Afraid? I interrupted.
"No, of course not."
Then merge up, handsome. The ghosts are waiting.
He gave me a long, unreadable look before I felt the tentative presence of him in my mind. I smiled to myself over his reluctance to admit what was pretty clear to me...
"Stop that," he growled.
... and turned my attention to the ghostly figures who stood around us.
Paen felt a moment of surprise that quickly melted into active curiosity.
"There are more than I expected." He pursed his lips a little as he looked at the ring of ghosts around us. "Do you normally see ghosts when you talk to houses?"
"Ooh, she found ghosts," Clare said, scooting closer to Finn. "Isn't this exciting?"
"It's something, all right," Finn answered, a comical expression of disbelief and amusement on his face.
"Not normally, no," I told Paen. "It's especially rare at night, when I'm not at my best, power-wise. Sometimes you'll find one if it has an extremely strong tie to the location. But this place is kind of special. The ground is practically steeped in blood. I'm guessing that's given these ghosts the powers to make it through to me even late at night."
"Yes, Dunstan Moor is one of the bloodiest battlefields in Scottish history. It makes Culloden look like a virtual playground. Er... can you talk to them?"
"She's going to talk to the ghosts now," Clare said to Finn, sotto voce, but not nearly quiet enough.