flowing below and the slash of sky overhead, and then they clattered on across and into the Spindlethorn tunnel beyond.
Three more miles they rode within, but at last they emerged into the sunlight at the far side. The countryside lying before them was one of rolling farmland, and the road they followed ran on to the west, cresting a rise to disappear only to be seen again topping the crest beyond.
'We've arrived,' said Beau joyfully. Expansively he flourished his hand in a wide sweep and inhaled a great draught of air, reveling in the smell of the land: forest and field and clean-running streams and fertile soil above all. 'This, my friends, is the Boskydells, the best place in all the world.'
It was the last day of October, with a high blue sky overhead.
On they rode and in the evening they came to the village of Greenfields, and after an enquiry, they put up in the Happy Otter Inn, for the eld buccan they had asked said it brewed the best beer in all of Eastdell, which immediately started a quarrel with another eld buccan who favored the brew at the Green Frog, west aways in Tillok. Leaving the two eld buccen disputing one another, they rode to the western edge of town where the Happy Otter stood, Gorth Cotter, proprietor.
The beer was splendid.
The next morning on they continued west along the Crossland Road, reaching the town of Raffin and riding a bit beyond, to turn down a long dirt lane and come at last to Aunt Rose's farm, for although she was years passed away, Beau yet thought of this stead as the farm of his Aunt Rose.
The place was quite grown over in weeds and such, having been unlived in for several years now, and the house itself quite weathered; a small goat shed out back leaned precariously, all but ready to fall. Yet the apple trees were quite hale and burgeoning with crop, and the soil of the fields was fertile-dark.
Beau looked at the others and said, 'With a bit of painting and yard and field work and other such, well, that should fix it right up.'
On a chill day in November, Tip swung the scythe and sliced through another swath of dried weeds, while Beau raked the cuttings into a great pile. And as he raked, weed dust and dried pollen flew, and of a sudden Beau inhaled sharply and then loudly sneezed.
Tipperton paused and looked at the sky and so very soberly said, 'Careful, Beau, you just might destroy the moon.'
As Lark sat in the yard, her ear pressed to the trunk of an apple tree and her eyes wide as if hearing some twiggy secret, and as Melli rattled about in the kitchen, Linnet and Rynna sat on the porch, each sipping a good hot cup of tea. And they looked at one another and wondered why their buccarans, along the fence line, were laughing like a pair of loons.
EPILOGUE
Concerning Beau and Tip, they remained closemouthed about their wartime adventures, but everyone in the Bosky knew that they had been singular heroes of that war, for why else would Elves and Dwarves and even the High King come to see them. Why, it was even told that Stone Giants were seen emerging from the earth nigh the place where Tipperton and Rynna lived, but others pooh-poohed the notion, for who could believe such? Too, it was said that Silver Wolves were seen running across the fields of East-dell, nigh Beau's place near Raffin-or so they did tell.
Some years after the Great War, a Wizard named Delgar came through the Boskydells specifically to see Beau Darby, mainly to congratulate him on finding the cure for the plague. It seems that Beau's red medical journal had been a gift from this Mage a number of years past, when Beau had been but a stripling. What else they might have said to one another remains unknown to this day.
Someone noted a peculiar thing about Tipperton and his wartime experiences: whenever anyone spoke of Drag-onships and Fjordlanders, Tipperton would seem to withdraw, as if suffering from some hidden guilt concerning those men of the north, as if he were somehow responsible for the deaths of some in the war; ah, but who could put credence to such speculation? Besides, even if some Fjordlanders did die as a result of some act of Tipperton's, surely their deaths were inadvertent, wouldn't you say?
Tipperton never did take up the trade of a miller again, but instead became a bard, travelling with Rynna and Lark throughout the Seven Dells, and occasionally to other lands.
Too, it is said that Tipperton mastered the Elven rite celebrating the turning of the seasons-chant and song and steps-and passed the knowledge on to his descendants. Yet neither he nor those who followed knew the secret potency of the ritual; yet even had they known, still they knew not when or where on Mithgar they should sing and step and chant, knew neither the time nor place to loose the power hidden within. Perhaps one day Warrowkind would finally learn the arcane truth…
Tipperton and Rynna and their subsequent brood took up residence outside of Eastpoint near the Spindlethorn, some tell that they did so on the insistence of Lark.
Speaking of Lark, she became even a more renowned bard than either her sire or dam, for no instrument defied her touch, the music to flow, her voice as sweet as her namesakes-the very larks themselves. Yet there was an air of mystery about this beautiful dammen, for it is said she spoke Twyll, Common, Fey, Sylva, and a strange language like the rustle of leaves in the wind. Too, it is said that she had a mysterious power over plants and trees, for her gardens were the wonder of all, and some even claim she could walk untouched through the Thornwall itself, but most discounted this wild rumor, for everyone knew that even birds and voles and other small creatures found it difficult to pass among the thickset thorns. Too, it is also said that a strange tall being, twigs and leaves and tendrils, would at times be seen in the night in Lark's company, but that was just wild rumor, too.
Both Tip and Beau, as well as Rynna and Linnet, lived long and useful lives, Tip and Rynna as bards bringing joy to the world, Beau and Linnet as healers bringing health to the sick.
As to others, this is known:
Bekki ruled Mineholt North for many a long year, and though he never married, other Chakka named their sons after him. Nearly four millennia following the time of this telling, one of these Chakka named Bekki, a Bekki of the Red Hills holt, sired a son named Brega… but that is another tale.
As to Linde, she and King Loden of Dael did marry, and she bore Loden a son, Garret, and when Garret was but nine, Loden was slain- by raiders in Garia while on a trade mission. Linde led the campaign which destroyed the raiders, and a fiercer warrior the realm had never seen, and thereafter she was known as the Warrior Queen of Riamon. Until Garret came into his majority, Linde ruled the land; Garret was crowned king on his fifteenth birthday, but ever did the realm remember the beneficent rule of the fierce Warrior Queen Linde.
After the war, once more did Aravan return to the Dalgor Fens and long did he search for the Silver Sword. Yet he failed to find that token of power therein, and given the vision of Galarun's Death Rede, and Coron Eiron's description thereof, Aravan began a search for the yellow-eyed man who mayhap took the blade. For millennia upon millennia did he seek without success, but then an Impossible Child was born…
As far as anyone knows, Phais and Loric yet live.
Water poured into H?l's Crucible for weeks; water flowed from the northern and eastern and southern seas into the Weston Ocean and through the Straits of Kistan into the Avagon Sea and thence into H?l's Crucible, all oceans of Mithgar sinking a bit to do so, diminishing to fill the vast gullet of that deep rift. Long, too, did the land of H?l's Crucible, though drowned, jolt and judder and quake, great gouts of steam exploding upward, and at times even fire, and it came to be known as H?l's Ocean by some and as H?l's Sea by others.
For years this ocean was restless, gas and vapors blowing upward from the depths and across the water, slaying ships' crews at times, at other times thinning the water as would a great cloud of bubbles thin the sea, and ships caught in these upsurges sank from sight never to be seen again; some said it was the ghost of a Dragon reaching up to drag ships down. The sailors themselves claimed it was the work of all the ghosts of the dead under the sea, for oft would witchfire come with these surges, or come with these terrible fogs, the poisonous vapors claiming the lives of any unlucky enough to be caught in the dreadful mists.
Too, the land about shivered and shook and sank; the craggy hills vanished downward; H?l's Ocean spread wide.
Rivers changed course-the Ironwater and the Storcha-to flow into the H?l's Sea. Some said the quaking and
