Vincent van Gogh The Yellow House

Vincent van Gogh The Yellow HouseLeonardo da Vinci Virgin of the RocksLeonardo da Vinci St John the Baptist
She was on firmer ground with witches, because she'd trailed off with Granny to visit a couple of villages' witches further along the hills, and anyway witches figured largely in Ramtop folklore. Witches were cunning, she recalled, and usually very old, or at least they tried to look old, and they did and organic magics and some of them had beards. They were also, without exception, women.
There was some fundamental problem in all that which she couldn't quite resolve. Why wouldn't....
Cern hand stopped in mid-prod, much to his surprise.
"I didn't want to anyway," he muttered to hide his confusion. "It's only an old stick."
"Is it true you can do spells?" asked Gulta. "We heard Granny say you could."
"We listened at the door," added Cern.and Gulta hurtled down the path and came to a pushing, shoving halt under the tree. They peered up at their sister with a mixture of fascination and scorn. Witches and wizards were objects of awe, but sisters weren't. Somehow, knowing your own sister was learning to be a witch sort of devalued the whole profession. "You can't really do spells," said Cern. "Can you?" "Course you can't," said Gulta. "What's this stick?" Esk had left the staff leaning against the tree. Cern prodded it cautiously. "I don't want you to touch it," said Esk hurriedly. "Please. It's mine." Cern normally had all the sensitivity of a ballbearing, but his