Bekki's hand strayed to the small axe at his belt. "Let us wait and see."
Tip grinned but remained silent.
On the eighth morning after arriving at the unnamed ford, Tip and Bekki crossed over, the slow-moving water belly high on the ponies. Yet no steed was swept from its feet, much to Bekki's relief.
As they rode away from the northern bank, Tip looked back across the river. "Making a raft, how hard can it be? Mighty hard, if you want my opinion."
"Especially with nought but a handaxe," growled Bekki.
Up and out from the river valley they rode, up through the river border forest and toward the Grimwalls glimpsed now and then through the woodland, the mighty range towering in the distance, their peaks snowcapped.
And still the days were glum and chill, the sun weak, as if autumn had come, even though it was but early August.
"Do you think there's dust yet in the sky, Bekki, shielding us from Adon's warmth?"
"The air is always sharp nigh the Grimwall, Tipperton, though it seems more so these days."
Onward they rode, and toward evening it began to rain down in the foothills where they were, though high in the mountains snow fell instead.
A sevenday after crossing the ford they came to a large lake embraced in the arms of the mountains. Its waters were cloudy blue and wide; its distant shore fetched up against a steep rise in the land some thirty miles afar.
"Nordlake," grunted Bekki, his breath blowing white in the chill air.
"Home of the Vattenvidunder, eh?" said Tip, peering at the broad expanse.
Bekki merely snorted.
"All right," said Tip, "where is this set of cliffs holding the gwynthyme?"
Bekki pointed. Past the far side of the lake and up the slope of land, a stone massif on a mountain flank rose sheer. Vertical it was, and tall, and topped by a broad ledge, or so Bekki had said. Beyond the ledge the mountain rose again "Two or three days yon, if indeed it is gwyn-thyme growing in the crevices."
"Lor', Bekki, we're not going to have to climb up that, are we?"
Bekki laughed. "Nay, Tipperton. The face of that great bluff is more than a mile high, a mile or so up to the shelf above, where we will set camp among the wide stretch of aspens. A trail leads upward the ponies can manage, and that is how we will get there. Nay, we will not climb up that sheer face, but dangle downward instead, hanging on ropes and rock-nails."
A mile? A mile high? Even from this distance Tip could tell that the face they would be on was straight up and down. His stomach squinched and his heart thudded deep in his chest, and he wondered if he could force himself to dangle on nought but a spindly rope down that vertical stone.
Onward they rode, and that night they camped beside the waters of Nordlake.
Under a glum sky the next morning, when filling the waterskins Bekki said, "Huah, the lake was clearer some years back when last I saw it, but cloudy now."
"Perhaps the dust fell here, too," said Tip.
"Aye, that must be it."
On they rode and on, following the shoreline of the great lake, the mountains ahead seeming to draw no closer. Once again they spent a night along the shore.
The next day they rode in among the foothills north of the lake, the vertical massif in the distance ahead seeming to grow taller, its stone grey and brown, the grey matching the grey of the sky above.
As they topped a hill, Tip halted his pony and peered long and finally called to Bekki, "I say, isn't that something pale yellow way high? Or is it tan stone instead?"
Bekki stopped his steed and shaded his eyes and finally said, "Yellow, I ween."
"Flowers, do you think? Gwynthyme blossoms?"
Bekki shrugged.
"Oh, I do hope so," said Tip, "for if it is, then there's a great crop up there."
Bekki grunted and replied, "Pray to Elwydd it is gwynthyme and not yellow oxeye daisies."
That evening they camped at the foot of the trail leading toward the top of the mile-high cliff. The length of the perpendicular bluff itself ran to the east for perhaps ten miles and towered into the sky; sheer it was, with long vertical ripples running down the drop of the stone face, now glowing bloodred in the setting sun.
Tip peered at the vast expanse and shuddered, but whether from fear of what was to come or from the chill air, he could not say.
It was raining the next morning as they twisted and turned up the narrow trail, Bekki riding in the lead, two pack ponies trailing, then Tipperton came after on his steed with two pack ponies following him as well. At times they dismounted and took to foot to give the ponies a breather, and at other times they stopped altogether, giving all a rest. But soon they would continue onward, climbing the steep, winding trail; and the higher they gained, the sheerer the drop to the right, and the closer to the left fared Tip, his heart racing at the thought of the fall but a pace or so away.
Yet at last nigh the noontide, the rain stopped just as they came to the top of the bluff and into an aspen woodland, the green leaves trembling and dripping water in the drift of cold air sliding down from the white mountain slopes far above, where more snow had fallen instead of rain.
"Let us ride onward," said Bekki, "five miles or so, to the midpoint atop the massif, to my campsite of old. Then we will look for the golden flowers."
"All right," said Tip, his breath coming easy now that he was surrounded by trees on all sides.
Tip forced himself to the lip of the stone and peered downward, only to quickly draw back. "There's nothing there but a long fall."
Bekki, standing on the very brim, leaned over and looked down as well. "It has an overhang, Tipperton. You have to look inward. And, ah, there are flowers. Leftward."
Tip stepped toward the edge and flopped down on his belly and pulled himself forward to peer beyond the lip. You can do this, bucco. Just remember, a thirty-foot fall will kill you just as dead as a fall of a mile or so, and you've been well beyond thirty feet before. The only difference being, at this height you'll get to scream much longer on the way down.
His heart hammering, Tip looked leftward. There in the near distance he could see pale yellow blossoms nodding in the chill air. Farther beyond he could see another patch, and several even farther. Tip looked to the right, and yellow flowers nodded there, too. "Oh my, Bekki, what a wondrous trove you have found."
"Growing in the cracks like I said," muttered Bekki. Then he looked at Tip, his eyes widening in surprise to see the buccan lying at the lip on his stomach as if he were afraid of heights. Shaking his head, Bekki grunted, then said, "Come, Tipperton, let us climb down and see if these are gwynthyme blossoms or are oxeye daisies instead."
"They're not oxeye daisies," said Tipperton above the long drop, his voice tight with tension. "Daisies have yellow centers, but their petals are white, and these petals are yellow."
"Well, some other all-yellow flower then," said Bekki. "Marigolds or some such."
Tip slid back from the lip and stood. "Marigolds grow in swamps, or so I've heard, and not in stone cracks along mountain faces."
"Regardless!" snapped Bekki, striding off to the left.
"Look, Bekki," said Tip, running after, "you just happened to pick the only two flowers I know anything about. Oh, and roses. It's not as if I'm an expert. Oh, clover, too. -And bluebells, and yellow-eyed violets and…"
Bekki stopped along the brim and looked down and inward. "Here they are," he growled, then turned to Tip. "Have you the sketch?"
Tip patted his jacket pocket.
"Good," said Bekki, surveying the stone. "I'll fetch one, and then we'll see."
"I'll get the ropes and rock-nails and such," said Tip, turning to go back to the camp.
"They won't be needed," said Bekki, and he clambered over the brim to begin free-climbing down.