[mark12_30]

The sun rose. The grass, young and tender, now grew thick around the dancers' ankles. Summer daisies, lupines, and columbines grew amidst the winter niphredil and elanor. Honeysuckle-bearing tendrils wove across the banks of the stream; mint blossomed amidst daffodils and yarrow; the air was thick with fragrance. Ravion, watching, could not choose the season; the laughter of the dancers made him smile, but it was the humming of the bees that summoned his first tear. Soon, sparrows and swallows swooped and sang, whippoorwills and owls and nightingales serenaded, but the clearest was the cry of the lark. It pierced his heart. Ravion pressed his eyes against Mellonin's neck, gathered her as close as he could, and wept in earnest.

Raefindan stepped forward, and laid his hand on Ravion's head; Ravion shook as he wept, burrowing into Mellonin's shaggy dark hair, drawing his knees up, tightening into a block of racking grief. Raefindan stood stock still, and waited. The dance wove, now further, now closer, and suddenly splashing through the stream, circled around Erebemlin, Nimrodel, Mellondu, Mellonin, Ravion, and Raefindan. The laughter surrounded them, the song flowed through them, the fragrance caressed them, and in time, as the dance grew wilder, Ravion's storm fell quiet. Raefindan released him, Ravion drew one deep shuddering breath, and another, and another, and raised his face to gaze at Mellonin. She sat up in his arms, and together they stood. Ravion looked about him, saw all that was made new, and peace flooded through him in waves. He stood in the heart of stillness as the dance whirled around them, and knew that his past was gone.