Dominion spread into enemy territories?

[NTJedi]

What has me curious about dominion spread is how sometimes my candles will appear on the other side of the map even tho I have no priests, special items or special units in those territories. In my current game I had two provinces far far away suddently have my candles yet no neighboring provinces were this way.
Also in another game I started near a corner of the map and grew to protect independent provinces deepest in the corner only later to discover enemy candles appearing. This second scenario could be sneaking enemy priests, but I don't understand the first scenario I explained.