"Lor'," said Beau, "but I think I'll never purge that sight from my mind."
"I don't ever want to forget what I've seen," gritted Tip. "They should pay for what they did, and if ever it is in my power to avenge those souls, then so shall I do."
"Thou dost sound as one of them, Tipperton," said Phais, "so like the Chabbains, I mean."
"Unh?" grunted Tip, startled.
"Retribution: it drives their lives. Gyphon and His agents see to it."
"Are you saying that evil deeds should go unpunished?"
"Nay, Tipperton. Yet thou must take care thou dost not fall into the same set of mind as they. Hatred must not drive thy life, else it will consume thy spirit, thy very soul."
"But what about those you slew because of the Felling of the Nine? Wasn't that retribution?"
Phais's eyes widened, and she glanced at Loric, and he said, "Aye, it was. There are times when just retribution need be extracted."
"Well then, I think this is one of those times."
Phais sighed and nodded in agreement, then said, "Nevertheless, Tipperton, let not hatred consume thee."
A silence fell upon the campsite, and remote stars wheeled in spangled heavens above.
At last Beau said, "Tip, if I get killed in this venture of ours, see to it that I get a proper burial. I mean"-he shuddered-"I don't want crows pecking out my eyes, kites rending my face, vultures tearing at my guts, all squabbling over my remains."
"Don't worry, bucco, you're not going to die," said Tip.
"But if I should…"
Tip threw an arm about his friend. "All right. I promise."
"Good," said Beau.
They sat in morose silence a moment more; then Beau looked up through the leaves at the stars and said, "If by chance I should die, think only this of me: that in some corner of a foreign field in a foreign land is a place that forever will be the Boskydells."
"Oh, Beau, don't say such a thing," said Tipperton. "I'm sure one day you'll be in your beloved Boskydells again."
Beau looked 'round at Tip and sighed. "We can only hope, Tip. We can only hope. -But, say, you're coming too, aren't you? To the Boskydells, that is. There's plenty of need for millers." Tipperton glanced at his lute. "What about bards?"
"Them too, Tip. Them too."
The following morn they set out again northeasterly, aiming for the place where the River Nith plunged over the Great Escarpment and down into the Cauldron, some two hundred eighty miles away in all. Yet they had gone no more than a mile or so than they espied more tendrils of smoke rising into the sky ahead. Beau gasped. "Oh, my, is it another burning town?" "Nay, Beau, these are campfires," replied Loric. "But whether those of friend or foe, that I cannot say." Cautiously they moved forward, though swinging wide to the left, for should it be foe they would need give wide berth and pass beyond.
" Tis foe," hissed Loric.
The camp lay nearly two miles away.
Even so, both Tip and Beau could see the site held men like those who had passed in yesterday's cavalcade.
"Three flags fly," said Phais, "-nay, four: Hyree, Chabba, Kistan, and Modru's ring of fire."
"We must gauge how many are encamped," said Loric. "And take word with us to Wood's-heart."
Beau looked up across at Loric. "Wood's-heart?"
"The Lian strongholt in Darda Galion," replied the Alor.
"But the encampment goes to the other side of the hill," said Tip.
Phais pointed off at a rise in the land. "I'll move around and count from there."
Tip glanced at the Dara. "I'll go with you."
Loric raised an eyebrow, but Phais nodded in agreement.
They spent nearly all day observing, as cavalcades came and went, and now and again in the far distance black smoke would rise into the sky.
"They're burning farmsteads," said Phais.
Tip made a fist and pounded the ground in rage.
When night fell, at a far distance they began slowly arcing 'round the large campsite, seeking to pass it by, for it held nearly two thousand men in all, or so they judged. Now and again they would crouch down in the grass, for returning raiders would pass nearby on their way back to camp.
The camp was yet in sight when dawn came.
"We must rest," said Phais, cocking an eye at Loric, then looking casually at the flagging Waerlinga.
And so they spent a second day hidden within the grass atop a long low mound, alternately keeping watch and dozing throughout the flight of the sun.
And this day, too, cavalcades came and went.
That night they finally got free from sight of the camp, and yet leaving no trace of their passage they walked most of the next day, too, before stopping in the afternoon.
They rested well that night and the following day resumed their northeastward trek.
"How far have we come these past days of edging through the grass?" asked Beau, slipping his feet carefully among the tall blades.
"Twelve leagues or so," said Loric, glancing at the sun.
Tip sighed. "That's only ten or twelve miles a day. At this rate it'll take us two or three fortnights to reach Darda Galion instead of just one."
"On the morrow we'll pick up the pace," said Loric, "for we are enough away from the campsites of the raiders and their cavalcades that the chances of them cutting our track is remote."
"I say," said Beau, "what we should have done is steal some horses from that camp."
Phais smiled. "Horses know not how to hide their tracks, Beau. Yet could we have taken two or three swift steeds, we would have raced them across these plains, tracks or no."
The next day they set out at a swift pace, no longer trying to hide their wake. Even so, the grass was hardy, and Loric judged that in less than a day it would spring back to fullness and only a well-practiced eye would discern their passage-"… unlikely from the back of a moving steed."
Over the next several days they fared northeasterly, their progress slowed by the need to be vigilant and the need to hide, for often a cavalcade would be seen coursing afar, or at times a single horseman with two runners afoot crossing the plain, and the comrades would crouch down and watch, remaining still so as to keep from being seen.
And distant trails of smoke wreathed up into the sky.
And they came across another burned town, this but a small hamlet, and all things that had lived were slain. And they passed it by, pressing on toward the Great Escarpment and Darda Galion above.
"Why don't we rest by day and move by night," asked Tip at a stop, "when there's less chance of being seen?"
Phais looked at Loric and her mouth split into a great grin.
And so they fared at night thereafter.
And the dark of the moon came and went.
Yet the days were growing long and the nights short, and even though they made good progress under the stars, still when the sun came early and stayed late, their pauses between treks grew longer.
"We'll move through part of the day as well," said Loric. "Else as you once declared, Tipperton, it will take more than several fortnights to reach our goal."
And so in the days thereafter, they continued until mid-morn, and rested well through the heart of the day, and set out again in midafternoon.
"It looks like a burnt farmstead," said Beau.
Tip glanced at the sun, gauging it to be four hands from setting. "Our provisions are low," he said. "Let's go see can we find anything to take with us."
Down into the swale they went and past a destroyed corral, rounding the burnt hulk of a byre. Of a sudden Tip stopped, for there, bloated, maggots writhing just under the skin, lay the corpse of a woman, though the only way of knowing it was a female was by the clothing she wore. She was clutching the corpse of a child, bloated and infested too, skin swollen and ready to burst.
And the stench was unbearable.
Tipperton turned and vomited, and Beau sank to his knees in dismay, his eyes wide, his hands pressed to his mouth.
"Oh, Adon, what is it we see?" whispered Beau.
"Death," said Loric.
"War," amended Phais.
And soon they moved onward, striding into the grass again.
***
Rain fell down and down, and lightning stalked across the plains. And during the three days of the violent storm, little progress was made.
Streams became raging torrents, and often they would have to walk far ere they found a place to cross, and these dangerous to the Waerlinga as small as they were. Yet with Loric and Phais's help, across the roiling waters they went.
And when the skies finally cleared, they were far afield of their chosen path. Yet once again across the plains they went, now and then espying riding Hyrinians or running Chabbains or both and hiding whenever they did. And still they had to take wide detours to cross 'round waters yet wild.
And they ran out of food.
"We need to take a day to hunt, to forage, while we yet have the strength," said Loric. "Else we'll be too weak to reach our goal."
"On the morrow, then," said Phais, "we hunt."
The buccen strode back into the camp together.
"I feathered a fat marmot," said Tip, raising his bow in his left hand and the arrow-pierced burrower in his right.
"And I brought down a rabbit," said Beau, canting his head toward the long-legged, long-eared hare slung over his shoulder.
"Stealthy Waerlinga," said Loric, smiling at Phais, then turning back to the buccen. "We garnered nought from any of our snares."
"Even so," said Phais, "there are these." And she held up a bundle of wild leeks.
Loric looked at the fare. "With careful rationing, two days, I would say, then we must hunt again."
"Huah!" snorted Beau, pausing to look leftward as his companions strode on. "So that's the Great Escarpment, eh?"
In the far distance, low on the rim of the world and lit aslant by the rising sun, stood a long upjut of land, running from horizon to horizon west to east.
"Aye," replied Loric, striding past the buccan, " 'tis the Great Escarpment, her steeps well warded by Lian Guardians, for above stands Darda Galion."
Beau shook his head. "Well, it doesn't look so great to me," he said, trotting after the others.
"How far away is it?" asked Tipperton, trailing behind Phais.
"Some fourteen leagues," replied Loric.
"Fourteen leagues!" blurted Beau, catching up to Tipperton again. "Forty-two miles?"
"Aye."
"Hmm," mused Tipperton. "Then it must be rather tall."
"Aye. Two hundred fathoms in places, though east of the Argon it dwindles to the level of the land on which the Greatwood stands."
Beau shaded his eyes and peered again. "Two hundred fathoms, four hundred yards, twelve hundred feet: that's quite high. Hmm, perhaps it is rather great after all." He glanced at Loric. "When will we reach it?"
Loric pointed straight ahead northeasterly. "Vanil Falls and the Cauldron lie mayhap thirty leagues afar. Can we maintain a goodly pace, and given that we yet need a day or two along the way to hunt for food, mayhap we'll be there in a fiveday or seven."
Tipperton sighed and strode on.
The following day, Year's Long Day, they went another five miles before the sun set, and they continued walking under the stars and a gibbous waxing moon. Yet at the mid of night and by the argent light of the westering moon, Loric and Phais and Tip and Beau trod out the Elven rite of Summerday in the tall green grass of Valon.
Step… pause… shift… pause… glide… pause… step. Phais chanting, Loric singing, step… pause… step…
The moon had fallen considerably when they took up the trek again, and they walked until dawn and a bit after ere stopping for the day.
During the hunt the next day they brought down no game, Beau missing the only quarry seen, a ring-necked pheasant that had taken to wing at his very feet.
Yet Phais managed to find double handfuls of small root vegetables she named nepe but which both buccen knew as rutabaga, though these were wild and immature.
"Lor'," said Beau, taking another bite and making a sour face, "but I didn't think I'd be eating young raw turnips out here in the open plain. Regardless, this one meal a day isn't to my liking, for my stomach is touching my backbone, and so raw or not, wild or not, these'll do."
Tip, chewing, looked at his friend through watering eyes. "A bit tart, though, wouldn't you say?"
Loric laughed, then sobered. "We will have to hunt again, if not on the morrow, then certainly the day after."
Tip swallowed and looked at the Great Escarpment, yet some distance off to their left. "Are you certain that we're drawing closer to our goal, Loric? I mean, we seem to be getting no nearer."
Loric peered northeastward. "Another twenty or twenty-five leagues, my friend, will find us ascending the Long Stair next to Vanil Falls."
Beau took another bite of the pungent fleshy root, then said 'round the mouthful, "Well I for one will be glad to be shed of these plains, what with riders and runners about."
After resting throughout the long day, they took up the trek again in the eve and walked through the night. The following morn they made camp in a small grove.
"Lor', but I'm famished," said Beau, "and thinking of eating grass."
"We need to hunt and forage once more," said Loric. "Else we'll not have the strength for the climb when we do reach the Cauldron."
"But first we should rest," said Phais. "Then hunt."
They bedded down, all but the one on watch, and slept through the heart of the day, but in midafternoon they set out in separate directions to forage: Beau with his sling, Tip with his bow, and Phais and Loric running the line of snares they had set while the Waerlinga had slumbered.
Tip found another set of burrows and settled down to watch, his back against a nearby mound, an arrow set to string. Yet worn as he was, he dozed in the afternoon light.
The sun had reached the horizon when a sound startled him awake, and he looked up to see "Yaahhh!" shouted the spear-bearing Chabbain, leaping at the Warrow, spear stabbing forward even as the shrieking buccan desperately rolled aside, his arrow lost to his grasp.
Shnk! the blade of the weapon knifed into the soil, only to be jerked free and plunged again at Tip.
But Tipperton had gained his feet, and he darted aside, the spear catching nought but Elven cloak, the cloth sliding across the blade and away.
"Maut!" sissed the Chabbain, whirling after the fleeing Warrow.
Tipperton ran toward the thicket, and Thkk! the spear flew past him to bury itself in the sod.
And all in one motion Tip stabbed to a halt and spun while snatching an arrow from his quiver and set it to string and drew and loosed, impaling the rushing Chabbain square through the heart, the dark man to tumble dead at the buccan's feet.
And Tipperton heard another shout and looked up to see a second Chabbain running at him with raised spear in hand, while a Hyrinian on horseback thundered after.
Calmly, Tip nocked a second arrow to string and loosed, and even as it flew, he set the third shaft to his bow.
"Ungh!" grunted the Chabbain, and looked in surprise at the feathered shaft that sprang full-blown from his chest even as he pitched to the ground.
Now the horseman hauled back on the reins, the animal squealing in pain as the rider sawed the steed about.
Sssss… Tipperton's third arrow whispered through the air to slam into the Hyrinian's side, the stricken man yawl-ing in pain, yet spurring away.
With sword in hand, Loric burst forth from the woods behind the buccan, Phais on his heels, her weapon drawn as well, as Tipperton snatched another arrow from his quiver and whirled about, ready to slay whoever was coming at his back; yet when he saw it was Loric and Phais, he spun back toward the bolting rider and aimed and loosed, but this shaft flew beyond the fleeting Hyrinian, now distant and drawing away.
Loric ran past the Waerling and after the galloping steed, running as if to catch the racing hor
se now flying across the plain, clots of dirt and sod flinging up from its hooves. Yet the horse was too swift and Loric quickly fell behind, the Elf stopping after sprinting a hundred paces or so.
Tipperton was shaking when Phais came to his side, and suddenly the strength went out of the buccan's legs and he fell to his knees gasping.
"I couldn't-he almost-they nearly-"
"Shhh, shhh," shushed Phais, kneeling beside Tip and drawing him to her.
Beau came running from the thicket, his sling in hand, and his face twisted into anguish when he saw Phais down on the ground holding Tip. "Oh, my. Oh, my," he groaned. Then: "I'll get my medical satchel," he called, and spun back toward their campsite.
But Phais called out, "No need, Sir Beau, for none here are wounded." Then she whispered, "Except perhaps in heart."
Beau turned and rushed to the Dara's side.
On the way back, Loric stopped at the distant slain Chabbain and rolled the corpse over. Then he walked past the huddle of Tip and Phais and Beau to the dead Chabbain nearby, and with a thuck! he pulled Tip's arrow free, wiping the shaft and blade clean of blood on the tall waving grass.
"I went to sleep. I went to sleep," whispered Tip, "and it nearly proved our undoing."
Arrow in hand, Loric came to stand at their side. Phais looked up at him. "We will have little time," said the Alor.
Phais glanced at the running horseman afar and nodded.
"Little time?" asked Beau.
Loric canted his head toward the distant Hyrinian. "He will bring others. We must run."
Tip drew in a shuddering breath. "It's all my fault-"
Phais clutched him hard by the shoulders. "Nay, Sir Tipperton. 'Tis not the fault of any here."
"But I fell aslee-"
"They were tracking us, I ween," growled Loric. He held out the arrow to Tip. "The other was broken when the Chabbain fell."
Tip took a deep breath and then exhaled, and reached out to accept the arrow. He stood and shoved the missile into his quiver and gazed at the fleeing Hyrinian, now disappearing beyond a distant roll in the land. "How far to safety?" he asked, looking at Loric.
Loric gazed at the Great Escarpment rising in the distant sky, the length of its face mostly enshadowed in the setting sun. "Ten leagues, mayhap fifteen."
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