Beau burst into tears, and Tipperton turned and stared in the direction of the cavalcade, hatred burning in his gaze.
Phais took in a deep breath and sighed. "Come. There's nought we can do here."
And they passed beyond the place that now was no longer a town.
They found a rare stand of trees and set camp among them that eve, where they built a small fire and brewed tea.
"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.