The Moon Hills are a stretch of the route Tiuri and Piak travel during the search for a murderer and on their return journey. The narrative gives no detailed map of the hills, but places them along a road linking a nighttime pursuit, a castle stop, and Ingewel. Their two crossings contrast sharply: the first belongs to uncertainty and pursuit; the later one takes place in sunshine, after the mission has been completed.

Setting and Route

The hills appear as a landscape to be crossed rather than as a settled place with named inhabitants. After the events surrounding the murdered messenger, the travelers continue toward the end of the Moon Hills with Warmin and three of his men accompanying them. They set out again at half past four and ride quickly, without delay or further adventure. The moon is high when they see the Castle of the White Moon on a distant hill; Warmin identifies it as the home of Sir Iwijn and says they can stay there.

On the return journey, the route is retraced in a different light. Tiuri and Piak spend their first night outdoors and their second at the Castle of the White Moon. The following day they ride through the Moon Hills in sunshine, reaching Ingewel late. There they return their horses to the innkeeper. The narrative’s attention to the repeated route makes the hills a recognizable stage in the journey without supplying a fuller geographical description.

The Search in the Hills

Earlier, after the travelers find the messenger dead, Tiuri, Warmin, and the others try to locate the killer. They follow a trail of trampled grass until it disappears into a stream, then search across the hills. The pursuit yields no arrest: they find nobody, and late in the night they come back to the road not far from where they began. The landscape frustrates straightforward tracking, turning a visible trail into a hunt that may as well be a chase after shadows.

The failure to find the killer does not lessen the urgency of the scene. Warmin insists that the dead man cannot be left there and that the murderer must be caught, if not that night then the next day. He proposes that news be sent to Dangria and the king, or at least to Ingewel, the nearest place where a messenger can be found. He also suggests that Sir Andomaar’s soldiers could help search, since the killer might have fled to Ingewel. Tiuri agrees that the response is needed but says he and Piak cannot wait; they must continue on their mission.

Clues and Narrative Significance

The hills’ place in the search becomes more significant when Warmin and Imin recount what happened at the toll crossing. A stranger had asked whether a dark-haired, light-eyed youth had crossed the bridge, then claimed that the person he sought was a friend from Dangria. When Warmin mentioned the Dangria messenger, the stranger reacted with alarm and hurried across the bridge. Tiuri recognizes the man as Slupor and concludes that Slupor had killed the messenger while mistakenly pursuing someone else. The hills belong to the failed physical search, while the account from the toll supplies the clue that makes the killer’s identity intelligible.

The return across the Moon Hills offers a measured contrast to that night of uncertainty. The earlier search ends without its quarry; the later crossing is uneventful, in sunshine, and leads Tiuri and Piak toward Ingewel and the homeward leg of their journey. In this way the hills recur not as a destination, but as a route marked by the difference between pursuing an unresolved danger and passing through after the central mission has been fulfilled.