"Oh?"
"Aye. 'Twas after the Felling of the Nine. For seasons I was advisor unto High King Bleys. When word came of the slaughter of the Eld Trees, I was enraged, yet at the time there was a Kistanian blockade to deal with in the Avagon Sea. When they had been defeated, I asked leave to join the Lian of Darda Galion in teaching the Rupt a lesson. King Bleys and a platoon of Kingsguards rode with me. We fared unto the Grimwall north of Drimmen-deeve, for that was where the retribution was at that time. We joined up with Coron Aldor's warband, and just afterward the company came to a stronghold of Spaunen, and we confronted their leader, their cham, and showed him the remains of the despoilers. Foolishly, he decided to fight. Afterward they told me that I had slain twelve with my bow, yet I remember but one or two."
"You were too busy nocking and aiming and loosing, right?"
"Exactly so, Sir Tipperton. I was too busy to see. I have since learned 'tis common to disremember much in the rage of battle."
Tip took up his bow and appeared to examine it in the starlight. But then he shuddered. "I do remember the one I hit in the throat. But none of the others, Lady Phais. None of the others."
Phais reached out and briefly hugged the Waerling unto her.
Again a quietness fell between the two, and somewhere an owl hooted, to be answered by another afar.
" 'Twas there I met Alor Loric," said Phais at last.
"There? In battle?"
"In the Company of Retribution."
"Company of Retri-? Oh, you mean in the Elven company going after the Rupt."
"When I first met him, I knew I loved him. Yet he was with another."
"With another," Tipperton echoed, but he asked no question.
Even so, Phais answered. "Ilora was her name… at the time a Bard like thee. The common ground between the twain faded, and so they went separate ways: she to follow her heart to the bell ringers in the temples of the distant east; he to learn about horses on the Steppes of Jord.
" 'Twas after his time in Jord, five hundred summers past, he came unto Arden Vale, where we met again. Then did he find that our two hearts beat as one, though I knew it all along."
Tip sighed. "I wish I could find the one of my heart." "Mayhap thou wilt, Sir Tipperton. Mayhap thou wilt." They sat awhile longer, listening for the owls, but the raptors had fallen silent and only the soft-stirring air and the chirrup of springtime crickets was heard. At last Phais said, "Thy watch has come to an end, Sir Tipperton. 'Tis time thou wert abed."
Tip sighed and stood, and started away, only to have Phais call after him: "Know this, my friend: of the five arrows thou didst loose, I but saw the flight of three, and of those three, all hit the mark."
Just after dawn Tip was awakened by a drizzling mist, and as the day grew, so did the rain, and so did the wind. Huddled under their cloaks, Beau behind Tip on the lone packhorse, through the strengthening downpour they rode into the vast cleft known as Gunar Slot, cutting through the Grimwall Mountains, connecting the land of Rell to the realm of Gunar. Here it was that the Grimwall Mountains changed course: running away westerly on one side of the Slot, curving to the north on the other.
And all that day into the teeth of the storm they rode through the great rift, ranging in breadth from seven miles at its narrowest to seventeen at its widest. And the walls of the mountains to either side rose sheer, as if cloven by a great axe. Trees lined the floor for many miles, though now and again long stretches of barren stone frowned at the riders from one side or the other or both. The road they followed, the Gap Road, would run for nearly seventy-five miles through the Gunar Slot ere debouching into Gunar, and so, a third of the way through, the four camped well off the road and within a stand of woods in the great notch that night.
And still the rain fell.
And still the wind blew, channelled up the cleft by high stone to either side.
Loric built a lean-to as Phais tended the horses, but the scant shelter did little to ward away swirling showers from the blowing rain.
It rained the next day as well, though not steadily. Even so, at times water poured from the skies, while at other times only a glum overcast greeted the eye.
"Lor', but I wish we had ponies," said Beau during one of the lulls in the rain.
"Or even another horse," said Tip. "Oh, not that I mind riding with you, Beau, but should the Foul Folk jump us again, well, I'll just hamper your slinging."
"We'll hamper each other, bucco," said Beau. "And you're right, another horse would do. Too bad the one I was riding took one of those black arrows."
"Oh, is that what happened?"
"Yar. The arrow went in right behind the shoulder."
"Heart shot, he was?"
Beau nodded. "Looks that way. Must have been struck just as we broke through the line. I think he ran another twenty strides or so before he collapsed, though to tell the truth, I was too busy loading and slinging to know."
"You, too? Oh, Beau, so was I-loading and loosing, that is. And I don't know how many I hit-Phais says that it's common not to know-but I seem to recall one or two."
Beau expelled a breath. "I remember the Hlok I slew at the last. Loric says altogether we killed perhaps a dozen, and from what he said, I think it was mostly your arrows and my bullets that did the job."
"Adon," breathed Tip. "Quite a bloody pair, we two, eh?"
"Oh, Tip, don't say that."
With these words chill rain began falling from the grey skies above.
That eve they camped among thickset trees well off the road.
"Another day should see us out of this slot," said Loric as he shared out jerky and mian.
"Is there a town somewhere near after that?" asked Beau. "I'd like to sleep in a bed, if you please, and have a warm bath."
"Aye. Stede lies a league or so beyond. 'Tis but a hamlet now, yet once was a town of import when trade flowed into and out of Rell."
"Yes, but will they have an inn?"
Loric smiled. "Mayhap, wee one. Mayhap."
"If not," added Phais, "then surely one of the villagers will put us up."
"Well, I'd like an ale, myself," said Tip. "After a bath and before a bed."
"I am hoping we can replace the horse," said Loric. "And take on some additional supplies. We lost much when the steed was slain."
"Yes, yes, a horse, but after the bath and the ale and the bed, if you don't mind," said Beau.
Once again the skies opened up and rain came tumbling down.
All the next day it continued to mizzle, fine mist blowing through the slot.
"Lor'," said Beau, "even if we don't get a bed and a bath and an ale, just to get out of this drizzle will be enough."
"Aye," agreed Tip, "I'll be glad to simply get before a fire."
"With hot tea," added Beau.
"And soup," appended Tip.
"Or stew," amended Beau.
"Anything warm," said Tip as the chill wet wind swirled 'round.
"Lor'," breathed Beau. "What happened?"
Afoot, they stood looking at charred ruins in the glum light of the dismal late day, the hamlet entirely destroyed, the blackened wood sodden with three days of rain, ashes washed to slag. Only here and there did stone chimneys stand, though some stood broken, as if deliberately shattered, and still others lay scattered across the ground.
The horses snorted as if something foul filled their nostrils, and Loric and Phais spoke words to soothe them.
Loric squatted on the wet ground and took up a burnt split of wood and smelled it and plucked a bit of char and rubbed blackness 'tween thumb and forefinger. He looked at Phais and shrugged, saying, "I cannot say when this misfortune befell, for the rain has washed away the day of the burning."