"Oh lor'," breathed Beau. "If you fill but one of these sacks, I think I could treat the entire city to a cup of gwyn-thyme and silverroot tea, should absolutely everyone fall ill."
"The entire city?" asked Tip, his eyes wide.
"Aye, Tip. A little goes a long way."
They prepared to set out on the twelfth of the month, the day of the July moon, for as Tip had said, "It seems only fitting, since our entire mission for the golden mint seems governed by the phases of Elwydd's light."
Bright dawn of the twelfth came to a cloudless sky and, after a hearty breakfast, Tip and Bekki carried to the stables the goods for their journey, making repeated trips to do so. By midmorn the riding ponies were saddled and the pack animals laded and at last all was ready. Beau and Phais and Loric came from comforting the ill to say farewell.
"Now you take care, bucco," said Beau, "for as Bekki here says, there's Foul Folk yet afoot in Aven, to say nothing of those in the Grimwall."
"Wull, Beau, it's not me and Bekki I'm worried about but you instead… here as you are in a plague-ridden city."
"Oh, we'll be just fine, Tip," said Beau, turning to Phais, "won't we, now?"
Yet in that very moment the Dara's face blenched, and with a moan she fell to her knees, Loric collapsing beside her, the Alor covering his face in his hands and crying out in distress.
Phais reached out blindly, shock and agony and grief whelming her features, tears flooding her eyes, and with a cry of despair she fell back in a swoon.
"What is it? What is it?" cried Beau, springing forward, but Bekki was first to the Dara's side, indecision and anguish on his face. The Dwarf looked to Beau for aid and called out to the Warrow, yet what he said could not be heard above Loric's howl of torment.
And Tip on his knees in front of the Alor reached up and gently pulled Loric's hands away from his face… to reveal an aspect of bleak desolation as great choking sobs tore from Loric's very soul. And the Elf reached out and clasped the buccan to him and wept as if he were nought but a child.
And Dara Phais, though consciousness had fled her, wept tears of anguish as well.
Shaken, Loric and Phais gripped one another's hands, their lips yet drawn thin by distress.
"It was like… a death rede, oh, but different, so different," said Phais.
"A deathcry," said Loric, his features twisting once again into anguish with but the memory of it. "A deathcry of hundreds and hundreds."
"Pardon, Lord Loric," said Bekki. "Hundreds and hundreds of…?"
"Lian, Lord Bekki. Lian," said Loric, choking on his own words. "A wailing deathcry of hundreds upon hundreds of Lian, blowing like an icy wind through our very souls."
"What does it mean?" asked Beau. "What does such a dreadful thing mean?"
Phais looked at Loric, her eyes flooding once again with tears, and she said, "That a great disaster has occurred somewhere and countless of our kindred have perished."
Tip and Bekki decided to stay in Dendor that day to comfort their bereaved companions, though Phais and Loric asked not. Yet it was plain to see that their solace was needed, for both Lian would shed tears at erratic times, and a touch or a word or an embrace acted to ease the pain. Even Bekki gave comfort, though when he embraced Dara Phais, his own expression was one of distress, either that or entirely unreadable.
And none knew what had happed, yet when Beau speculated that it was Modru's doing, Phais shook her head and said, "Nay, my friend, something of this enormity can only be the work of Gyphon Himself."
In the midafternoon of that clear July day a thunderous boom rolled over the land below and across the sky above, echoing from building and wall, rattling dish and window and roof alike, jarring the city entire. Then it was gone, the air still once again. And all looked at one another in startlement and fear, yet none knew whence it came or its cause.
The following morning, pressed by their mission, Tip and Bekki again saddled two ponies and laded four others with goods. And saying farewell for a second time, they set out at last for Nordlake afar.
They rode out through the west gate, King Agron's pass letting them through, Captain Brud personally escorting them to the bridge, the wound on his face all but healed, leaving a long scar behind. And as they rode away, Tip turned and waved at Beau and Phais and Loric standing on the wall above, the Elves yet wan, yet pale.
"Take care, Tip," called Beau. "You, too, Bekki."
"You as well," shouted Tipperton back, "and we'll bring you some golden mint."
And then he turned and faced west, he and Bekki riding away, trailing four ponies after. West they rode and west, across the summer land, leaving behind three close friends in a quarantined city rife with a dark affliction.
Just past the noontide there came a rolling boom, knelling as would a diminished echo of the sound of the day before.
Tip looked at Bekki. "Did you hear that?"
"Aye, I did."
"Oh, Bekki, you don't suppose another disaster has occurred, do you?"
Bekki frowned and shook his head. "That I cannot say, Tipperton, for I am not an Elf."
And in the silent deeps of the night, as Tipperton stood midwatch, there came to his ears another faint boom, this one diminished even further. He fretted and wondered if he should waken Bekki, but in the end decided not, for neither could do aught regardless.
Chapter 15
At first I thought they were falling victim to the plague," said Tipperton, urging his pony around a tangle of brush, two pack ponies following. "Even though both Loric and Phais had said Elves don't fall ill to the dark scourge."
Bekki nodded but otherwise did not reply.
"It must be awful, this 'gift' of theirs-more like a curse if you ask me-to know when someone dies."
"This was not a 'Death Rede' sent from one Elf to another," said Bekki, "but a thing much worse: not a single 'someone' calling out in death, but hundreds and hundreds crying out instead."
Tipperton shivered, as if struck by a sudden chill. "Still, I would think it somehow connected to their gift… How horrible it must have been: like a ghastly wind blowing cold through the souls of all Elvenkind."
Bekki grunted, then said, "I cannot but think the thunderous sounds we heard-the first one and then the one after-are in some manner connected to the deaths of so many."
"Oh, Bekki, did I tell you I heard another just like it only fainter in the depths of the night?"
Bekki looked at Tip.
"Three or four candlemarks past mid of night, I would say," added Tip.
"Hmm, three rolling thunders in all." Brow furrowed, Bekki fell into thought, then said, "Mayhap as loud as was the first, mayhap the sound came to the walls of the world and was echoed back… Yes, that must be it, Tipperton, for it would account for each echo being less than the one before."
Tip shrugged, saying, "Or if the Elves are right and the world is truly a ball, a sphere, perhaps the noise circles all the way 'round and passes by again."
Bekki snorted in disbelief as on they rode, angling slightly north of west.
"Oh, Bekki, whether an echo from the walls of the world or the sound passing 'round the world, if we are right, it means there's not another disaster, or two or three, but the sound of the first knelling over and again."