Two Ghost's Salvation

In the days when people were owned by the land,two young girls found their power by becoming ghosts, then spiritguides.This is their origin-story...Their Dad had to raise them by himself, as Motherdied shortly after birthing them. But as a spirit, she remained onEarth to watch over them. Sal and Jude could see her, and knew theirDad could feel her presence.The King's soldiers have visited the forest andfound their hut, only to be chased away by a specter. These three make improvements to their hut to makeit harder to find, or to find the entrance they use. And learn toleave no trace as they move about the forest, even in snow.In Spring, the Captain and his troops returned,forcing nearby villagers to make a crossing into the ravine that willenable wagons to bring a hunting party.Their Dad starts training Sal andJude to hide themselves in the forest as they hunt and forage forfood. What they find in their training is unexpected...Excerpt:When the morning light finally came, the overcastsky matched the mood of the soldiers. The captain was probably thefirst up, and got busy kicking and rousing his men into some sort ofaction. He found that no one had died. Several were burned, but noone burned badly.Their wagons had been destroyed. Their horsescould probably be recovered from the peasants (who weren't allowedto own horses.) Their tents might be able to be salvaged. There wasno food, there was no firewood. The captain found his officers and made themdisentangle their next in command, who had to find their juniors, andso on down the line. Finally, he mustered them all together. One of his officers took a small group of men intothe nearest town to get the horses rounded up and returned. Another officer's group was organized to get thetents recovered, folded properly, and stacked for transport.A third officer's group was to clean the groundsand salvage anything of value. The trash, especially any bottles,were to be buried in the center of the camp. On top of this spot,they were to make a bonfire of anything too damaged to be repaired.The captain walked to the edge of the ravine andstared out into it. He waited for reports from his officers whentheir actions were completed. By the time the first officer and their horsesreturned, the other actions were also completed. At that, the captain had the men lead the horsesdown into the ravine and then back up, saddle and ride around theentire encampment. Then repeated this many times. At last they rode off. Later that day, a single wagon arrived, with asmall handful of men to load up the tents and return them to thesoldier's headquarters. And it was quiet on the land again...