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Tim clutched it before him and thought of Tree: the high street, the smithy with the burial parlor between it and the cemetery, the farms, the sawmill by the river, the Widow's cottage, and--most of all--his own plot and place. The dibbin rose higher, floated above the Dogan for several moments (as if deciding), then headed south along the track of the starkblast. It moved slowly at first, but when its shadow fell over the tangled, frost-rimed deadfalls that had lately been a million acres of virgin forest, it began to go faster.
A terrible thought came to Tim: what if the starkblast had rolled over Tree, freezing it solid and killing everyone, including Nell Ross? He turned to call his question back to Maerlyn, but Maerlyn was already gone. Tim saw him once more, but when that happened, Tim was an old man himself. And that is a story for another day.
The dibbin rose until the world below was spread out like a map. Yet the magic that had protected Tim and his furry bedmate from the storm still held, and although he could hear the last of the starkblast's cold breath whooshing all around him, he was perfectly warm. He sat crosslegged on his transport like a young prince of the Mohaine on an elephaunt, the Feather of Garuda held out before him. He felt like Garuda, soaring above a great tract of wildland that looked like a giant dress of a green so dark it was almost black. Yet a gray scar ran through it, as if the dress had been slashed to reveal a dirty underskirt beneath. The starkblast had ruined everything it had touched, although the forest as a whole was very little hurt. The lane of destruction was no more than forty wheels wide.
Yet forty wheels wide had been enough to lay waste to the Fagonard. The black swampwater had become yellowish-white cataracts of ice. The gray, knotted trees that had grown out of that water had all been knocked over. The tussocks were no longer green; now they looked like tangles of milky glass.
Run aground on one of them and lying on its side was the tribe's boat. Tim thought of Helmsman and Headman and all the others, and burst into bitter tears. If not for them, he would be lying frozen on one of those tussocks five hundred feet below. The people of the swamp had fed him, and they had gifted him with Daria, his good fairy. It was not fair, it was not fair, it was not fair. So cried his child's heart, and then his child's heart died a little. For that is also the way of the world.
Before leaving the swamp behind, he saw something else that hurt his heart: a large blackened patch where the ice had been melted. Sooty chunks of ice floated around a vast, plated corse lying on its side like the beached boat. It was the dragon that had spared him. Tim could imagine--aye, all too well--how she must have fought the cold with blasts of her fiery breath, but in the end the starkblast had taken her, as it had everything else in the Fagonard. It was now a place of frozen death.
Above the Ironwood Trail, the dibbin began to descend. Down and down it glided, and when it came to the Cosington-Marchly stub, it touched down. But before the wider sweep of the world was lost, Tim had observed the path of the starkblast, formerly dead south, bending to a course more westerly. And the damage seemed less, as if the storm had been starting to lift off. It gave him hope that the village had been spared.
He studied the dibbin thoughtfully, and then waved his hands over it. "Fold!" he said (feeling a trifle foolish). The dibbin did not, but when he bent to do the job himself, it flipped over once, then twice, then thrice, becoming smaller each time--but no thicker. In a matter of seconds it once more appeared to be nothing but a cotton napkin lying on the path. Not one you'd want to spread on your lap at dinner, though, for it had a bootprint square in the middle of it.
Tim put it in his pocket and began walking. And, when he reached the blossie groves (where most of the trees were still standing), he began to run.
He skirted the town, for he didn't want to waste even minutes answering questions. Few people would have had time for him, anyway. The starkblast had largely spared Tree, but he saw folk tending to livestock they'd managed to pull from flattened barns, and inspecting their fields for damage. The sawmill had been blown into Tree River. The pieces had floated away downstream, and nothing was left but the stone foundation.
He followed Stape Brook, as he had on the day when he had found the Covenant Man's magic wand. Their spring, which had been frozen, was already beginning to thaw, and although some of the blossie shingles had been ripped from the roof of the cottage, the building itself stood as firm as ever. It looked as though his mother had been left alone, for there were no wagons or mules out front. Tim understood that people would want to see to their own plots with such a storm as a starkblast coming, but it still made him angry. To leave a woman who was blind and beaten to the whims of a storm . . . that wasn't right. And it wasn't the way folk in Tree neighbored.
Someone took her to safety, he told himself. To the Gathering Hall, most likely.
Then he heard a bleat from the barn that didn't sound like either of their mules. Tim poked his head in, and smiled. The Widow Smack's little burro, Sunshine, was tethered to a post, munching hay.
Tim reached into his pocket and felt a moment's panic when he couldn't find the precious bottle. Then he discovered it hiding under the dibbin, and his heart eased. He climbed to the porch (the familiar creak of the third step making him feel like a boy in a dream), and eased the door open. The cottage was warm, for the Widow had made a good fire in the hearth, which was only now burning down to a thick bed of gray ash and rosy embers. She sat sleeping in his da's chair with her back to him and her face to the fire. Although he was wild to go to his mother, he paused long enough to slip off his boots. The Widow had come when there was no one else; she had built a fire to keep the cottage warm; even with the prospect of what looked like ruin for the whole village, she had not forgotten how to neighbor. Tim wouldn't have wakened her for anything.
He tiptoed to the bedroom door, which stood open. There in bed lay his mother, her hands clasped on the counterpane, her eyes staring sightlessly up at the ceiling.
"Mama?" Tim whispered.
For a moment she didn't stir, and Tim felt a cold shaft of fear. He thought, I'm too late. She's a-lying there dead.
Then Nell rose on her elbows, her hair cascading in a flood to the down pillow behind her, and looked toward him. Her face was wild with hope. "Tim? Is it you, or am I dreaming?"
"You're awake," he said.
And rushed to her.
Her arms enfolded him in a strong grip, and she covered his face with the heartfelt kisses that are only a mother's to give. "I thought you were killed! Oh, Tim! And when the storm came, I made sure of it, and I wanted to die myself. Where have you been? How could you break my heart so, you bad boy?" And then the kissing began again.
Tim gave himself over to it, smiling and rejoicing in the familiar clean smell of her, but then he remembered what Maerlyn had said: When thee gets home, what's the first thing thee'll do?
"Where have you been? Tell me!"
"I'll tell you everything, Mama, but first lie back and open your eyes wide.
As wide as you can."
"Why?" Her hands kept fluttering over his eyes and nose and mouth, as if to reassure herself that he was really here. The eyes Tim hoped to cure stared at him . . . and through him. They had begun to take on a milky look. "Why, Tim?"
He didn't want to say, in case the promised cure didn't work. He didn't believe Maerlyn would have lied--it was the Covenant Man who made lies his hobby--but he might have been mistaken.
Oh please, don't let him have been mistaken.
"Never mind. I've brought medicine, but there's only a little, so you must lie very still."
"I don't understand."
In her darkness, Nell thought what he said next might have come from the dead father rather than the living son. "Just know I've been far and dared much for what I hold. Now lie still!"
She did as he bade, looking up at him with her blind eyes. Her lips were trembling.
Tim's hands were, too. He commanded them to grow still, and for a wonder, they did. He took a deep breath, held it, and unscrewed the top of the precious bottle. He drew all there was into the dropper, which was little enough. The liquid didn't even fill half of the short, thin tube. He leaned over Nell.
"Still, Mama! Promise me, for it may burn."
"Still as can be," she whispered.
One drop in the left eye. "Does it?" he asked. "Does it burn?"
"No," said she. "Cool as a blessing. Put some in the other, will ya please."
Tim put a drop into the right eye, then sat back, biting his lip. Was the milkiness a little less, or was that only wishing?
"Can you see anything, Mama?"
"No, but . . ." Her breath caught. "There's light! Tim, there's light!"
She started to rise up on her elbows again, but Tim pressed her back. He put another drop in each eye. It would have to be enough, for the dropper was empty. A good thing, too, for when Nell shrieked, Tim dropped it on the floor.
"Mama? Mama! What is it?"
"I see thy face!" she cried, and put her hands on his cheeks. Now her eyes were filling with tears, but that did Tim very well, because now they were looking at him instead of through him. And they were as bright as they ever had been. "Oh, Tim, oh my dear, I see thy face, I see it very well !"
