'She's beginning to say words, love.'
'Lark, my Lark,' breathed Tipperton. Then he looked at Rynna. 'When?'
'She was born a year ago tomorrow, and I could not have asked for a finer birthday gift than her sire coming home.'
'Home?' Tip looked about at the bower, then smiled back down at the wee child.
'Anywhere we three are, Tipperton,' replied Rynna.
Lark squealed and reached up a tiny hand, striving to clutch Tip's nose, and then she struggled and fussed, and Tip shifted her to a more upright position against his chest.
Lark then seized a button on Tip's jacket, thoroughly fascinated by its roundness.
Tip grinned, but then frowned. 'Say, love, she hasn't been here all alone, has she?'
'Of course not, Tip,' said Rynna, glancing 'round, 'though just where Prym or Melli have gotten to… Well, no doubt one or the other is-'
A shadow darkened the doorway, and an eld damman bearing an armful of clean white cloths hurried into the bower. Her face gladdened upon seeing Rynna returned, and she one-arm embraced the young damman, saying, 'Rynna, Rynna, you are back and safe. And oh my, but these Big Men on horses, well, did they ever give me a start, coming into the glade as they did. But I saw the Fox Riders were with them and Nix, too, and so I ran down to greet him, this armful of nappies and all.' She turned to Tipperton. 'He's my bucco, you know. -Nix I mean.'
Rynna grinned. 'Aunt Melli, this is my buccaran, Tipperton.'
'Lark's da? Him that went off to foreign lands? Oh, how wonderful.' Melli stepped forward and would have embraced Tip, but for the tot in his arms, and so she settled for a kiss on his cheek.
'Now you two rest, for Nix told me of the Gargon and all-as if I didn't see that horrible thing's head bobbing about on a pike-and I'll make a bit of breakfast.' She turned to Tip. 'Will hot tea and a rasher or two along with some eggs do? -And a crust of bread, of course.'
'Oh, Melli, the crust alone would do,' said Tip, 'but tea and eggs and a couple of rashers, I cannot think of aught better.'
Lark held her arms out to be taken by Melli and gurgled her approval as well.
As darkness fell, Beau arose from his pallet in Farly's hut and stepped out into the woods to relieve himself. As he came back, he could see movement across the glade. His eyes flew wide, and he rubbed them in disbelief, for the far end of the canted field was now covered entirely with mounds, each some eight or ten feet high and twice as wide at the base, each hillock veiled with a strawlike yellowish grass, or what seemed to be grass… and they were moving, these mounds, moving westerly, small creatures and Fox Riders faring alongside, heading in the direction where stood the aggregate of Stones, and farther off the eaves of the forest and the open wold beyond.
With his heart thudding, Beau watched in wonder and recalled when last he'd seen mounds like these: it was when he and Tip and Loric and Phais had ridden north through the Blackwood nearly two years ago. I told Tip then I saw one of them move, and now here they march across Black-wood like an army off to battle. Beau wondered whether he should go waken Tip… or Rynna… or Nix or Farly, but in the end decided not. Long he watched as the Living Mounds crossed the distant sward, and when the last of the massive column passed in among the trees to disappear from view, Beau went back into the hut and lay down on his pallet.
Sleep was a long time coming.
In the middle of the night with moonlight glowing down through the doorway, as Tip and Rynna slept soundly, Lark, using the edge of her withy-woven bassinet, pulled up and stood and jiggled. Just outside, a tall creature- seeming nought but entangled twigs and tendrils and greenery-turned and stooped and entered the bower, and paused to look down on the two lovers dreaming in one another's arms, and then it took up the restless wee youngling and crooned it to sleep as well.
And Tynvyr passed by the bower woven of saplings and paused to listen to Prym's singing, the voice of the Vred Tre rustling like leaves in the wind.
Chapter 28
The Fox Riders report that the Foul Folk have fled from Eryn Ford,' said Nix.
Sitting on the ground, Rynna paused in her fletching of arrows and squinted up at Nix. 'Fled?'
'Aye. She says, they ran away when they saw the Liv Vols coming across the wold.'
Tip shifted Lark to his other knee. 'Liv Vols?'
'Uh, Living Mounds,' replied Nix.
'See!' exclaimed Beau, turning to Tip. 'I told you.'
'Are the Spawn gone for good?' asked Melli.
Nix shrugged and looked toward Rynna.
'I don't think so, Melli,' replied Rynna, returning to her fletching. 'Although they fled the field, still they seem to be here for a purpose, though just what that could be…'
'We thought it might be to keep the Hidden Ones from joining the Free Folk,' said Tip, 'keep them trapped in the woods, so to speak.'
Rynna shook her head and set the arrow aside and took up another shaft. 'I don't think so, Tip. Although the Hidden Ones are deadly, nearly invincible, within their dardas, out in the open they are quite vulnerable, almost ineffective, and that's why they will not join any alliance outside of their own domain.'
'But didn't the Rcks and such run from them just now?' asked Beau. '-Or rather, last night? And that was out in the open.'
'Aye, but the maggot-folk had just suffered a calamity among Eio Wa Suk, and mayhap they thought another disaster was upon them.'
Lark, losing her fascination with Tip, wriggled free and, stepping on unsteady feet over the uneven ground, she toddled to Rynna's side and plopped down and took up a feather to taste. As Tip scooted over and slipped it from Lark's fingers and used it to tickle the dammsel's nose, he asked, 'Did you not say the Gargon had recently come to their ranks?'
Rynna nodded. 'Within the sevenday.'
Tipperton grinned at Lark, but his words to the others held an ominous note. 'Then it seems to me as if Modru is expecting something rather momentous along this flank and wanted the Gargon to stop it.'
Beau looked at Linde. 'Perhaps that monster was brought here to stop the Jordians.'
Linde glanced at Sten and then back at Beau and slowly shook her head. 'I think not, for we are, or were, just a brigade. Why spend a Gargon to deal with such a small force?'
Beau shrugged, a pensive look on his face. 'I dunno, yet I do think Tip is right: something is brewing, else I'll eat my hat.'
Tip laughed.
'What?' said Beau.
'You don't have a hat, bucco.'
Lark squealed as if she agreed, and that set them all to laughing.
In that moment, Tynvyr came striding up the slope, her black-footed red fox following. She and Rynna spoke for long moments, then Tynvyr leapt astraddle the fox and rode down and away.
Rynna turned to Linde. 'Tynvyr says that with the ford abandoned, now is the time for the Vanadurin to go if you yet aim for Pellar, though you are welcome to stay within the woodland. She believes it will be a few days ere the Spawn regain their courage to come once more to the eaves of Darda Erynian or those of Darda Stor.'
Linde raised an eyebrow. 'Darda Stor?'
'The Greatwood to the south.'
'Oh.'
'What about our slain?' asked Sten. 'Are we to leave them lying afield?'
An unspoken question on her lips, Linde looked at Rynna.
'Tynvyr says the Fey have kept their word,' answered Rynna.
In the mead north of the ford, ninety-seven Vanadurin ahorse and five Warrows on ponies rode past
