Passage - Lois McMaster Bujold [172]
Bo’s fever grew worse that night, and Dag gave ground reinforcements till he nearly passed out. But in the mid-morning, the fever broke. Dag fell wordlessly into his own bed, awakening in the afternoon with an incipient cold, his first in years. Happily Barr and Remo were both able to help with that, a familiar task for patrollers on search patterns in all weathers, and Dag—with another cup of oats silently proffered by Fawn—fended it off with no worse effects than a sore throat and slight sniffle.
Dag had the Fetch stop at the last Lakewalker ferry camp on the north bank of the Grace just long enough for him to deliver his letter to the patrol courier there, turn over the effects of the murdered Lakewalker couple for possible identification, and give a very truncated account of the late doings up in Crooked Elbow to the shocked camp captain. He did not linger.
They came to the Confluence in the late afternoon of the following day. Dag, Berry, and Whit were on the sweeps. Dag having now no need to beg—or attempt to beg—a knife, Berry was just as happy not to have to struggle to pull in the Fetch at the big Lakewalker camp that occupied the point, though Barr and Remo climbed to the roof to stare at the many tents to be seen amongst the trees, and at the wharf boats and goods-sheds maintained along the shore by the Lakewalkers themselves.
Fawn joined them as the Fetch swung past the point and the Gray River could at last be seen. She shaded her eyes with her hand, her lips parted in an unimpaired world-wonder that eased Dag’s heart. The waters of the two great streams did not at once mingle, but ran along side by side for some miles, clear-brown and opaque.
“The Gray really is gray!” said Fawn.
“Yep,” said Dag. “It drains the whole of the Western Levels. It’s well-wooded along here, but about a hundred miles due west, depending, the trees fail and the blight gradually starts. It’s said that after the first great malice war, the blight reached the river here, and the whole Gray was dead from the poison, but it’s long since come alive again. I find that a pretty encouraging tale, myself.”
The westering sun was playing hide-and-seek behind cold blue-gray clouds with glowing edges that filled the sky from horizon to horizon. “I think that’s the widest sky I ever did see,” Fawn said. “Is it because the land’s so level out here?”
“Uh-huh,” said Berry.
“And I thought Raintree was flat!” Whit marveled.
“It’s beautiful. In a severe sort of way. Never seen a sky like that at home.” Fawn turned completely around, drinking in all that her eyes could hold. “That’s a thing to come see, all right.”
In a maternal spirit, she dragged Hod outside to share the sight; he gaped gratifyingly, but, rubbing his red nose, soon went back inside to hug the hearth. Despite the chilly wind, Fawn sat at Dag’s feet for the next half-hour, watching for when the two streams would at last become indistinguishable. During the stretches when they had merely to ship their oars and float on, Whit and Berry doubled up boat cloaks, guarding each other from the blustery discomfort.
Dag found himself thinking, I’m so glad we brought Whit. He wished the boy all good speed and fortune in his courtship, because he thought Fawn must warmly welcome such a tent-sister. And my tent-sister too, how unexpected! The most important thing about quests, he decided, was not in finding what you went looking for, but in finding what you never could have imagined before you ventured forth.
Keep that in mind, old patroller.
As the year slid toward