So Lark raced up the hill, and Foxbrush followed more slowly behind. The child flung herself into her parents’ arms, and her sisters and brother pulled at her clothes and hair, asking many questions, while Redman and the Eldest were silent in their joy.
Foxbrush hung back, hiding his hands behind his back, trying not to stare at that scene of happy reunion. But at length, Lark turned and pointed to him, saying, “Ma! Da! Foxbrush came to save me! He entered the darkness, and he found me!”
“Don’t speak of that darkness, child,” Sight-of-Day said quickly. Then she turned to Foxbrush, and her face, lined with many cares, was as lovely then as it must have been when she was a young and fresh maiden. “We owe you a great debt,” she said.
Foxbrush shook his head. “No, I did nothing. Lark is more the hero than I.”
“That isn’t so,” Lark protested, leaving the shelter of her mother’s embrace and hurrying to Foxbrush’s side. She reached out and took one of his hands, and the Eldest and Redman saw for the first time the ugly crippling. “He rescued me,” Lark said, holding that hand in both of hers, her eyes shining up at his face. “He entered the darkness, and he saved me.”
Redman looked down at Foxbrush’s feet. And he saw the Path as he had always seen it. And he saw, if only briefly, where it had led.
He met Foxbrush’s gaze and saw there suffering, but also hope and a budding, growing courage. Foxbrush, looking into that twisted, disfigured face, raised one of his twisted, disfigured hands in salute. He even smiled, though there was pain in the smile as he said, “It’s all about blood and love, Redman.”
“In the end,” Redman agreed. “In the end. And it is good.”
“It is good.”
Lark looked from her father to her friend. Suddenly her glad smile fell and tears sprang to her eyes. “You are leaving?” she asked.
Foxbrush, startled, looked down at her. He realized, though he had not known it himself, that she was right. “I . . . I am,” he said quietly. “I must.”
“But—” Lark broke off, bowing her head and fighting back the tears. “I thought you’d stay with us awhile. I thought I’d grow up, and then we would marry, and I’d teach you how to use the blow darts, and . . .” She stopped and quickly rubbed her eyes. “No. You must go. I understand.”
Then Foxbrush knelt and held her tight, long enough to seal the memory of that embrace in both their hearts. He stood at last, bowed to the Eldest, clasped hands with her husband, and gave each of the little redheaded children a solemn kiss upon the brow.
“Follow your Path with courage, Prince Foxbrush,” said Redman.
Foxbrush turned and started down the hill, his feet for the last time treading that dirt roadway as the eastern sunlight cast his shadow long.
“Don’t forget the wasps!” Lark called behind him.
“I won’t,” he assured her.
Another few paces, then:
“Clusters of six figs at least, and you need to replenish them!”
“I’ll remember,” said Foxbrush over his shoulder.
“Peel them at the stem, or you’ll get juice on your fingers!”
Foxbrush stopped and looked one last time at the family above, the Eldest and her husband standing with their arms around the daughter who was crying silently.
“Don’t worry, Lark,” Foxbrush said, feeling tears of his own on his cheeks. “I’ll never forget you.”
Daylily could not decide whether she stood in the Wood Between or the Near World. The sheltering trees overhung her head, and they were so thick that even the morning sunlight could not pierce through. She looked out from them to the village and the hill, and she watched Foxbrush as he made his good-byes.
Behind her, she felt the presence of the Prince of Farthestshore. But she dared not turn to face him.
“I never forget a promise!” Nidawi was saying, perhaps a little defensively. She stood with her arms crossed, the lights of her children hovering around her head. “But . . . but I don’t see why I have to do anything just now. A century or two won’t hurt anything.”
“You forget the effects of time on mortals, Nidawi,” said the Prince, his voice stern. “You must honor your promise to the King of Here and There.”
“Yes, but,” Nidawi whined, her pretty eyes lavender with pleading, “I’m not even certain who the King of Here and There is! He”—with a thumb jerk toward Foxbrush, approaching from a distance—“is the one who’ll wear the crown and all, but that one”—with another jerk at Daylily, standing quietly to one side—“claims to have actually killed my enemy. It’s all most perplexing!”
The Prince of Farthestshore smiled, but his voice was no less stern when he said, “Yours is not to reason the wherefores and hithertos. Yours is to honor your promise. Your enemy is dead. Now protect this nation from further Faerie invasion.”