Against All Things Ending (The Last Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, Book 3)

Part Two
025 “Only the damned”



1.
Those Who Endure—
026
Holding Linden against him, Thomas Covenant sat leaning on a boulder half buried in the sandy bottom of a shallow gully. Most of the terrain around him looked barren, stripped of vegetation by thirst and ancient misuse. But a few stunted trees, twisted as cripples, still gripped the edges of the gully. Here and there, tufts of bitter grass clung to some scant source of moisture. He hoped for aliantha, but he had not seen any.
His mind was still full of shrieks and fire and torrents: his heart was woe. Whenever he looked at Linden’s slack face, he saw Elena’s unassoiled horror, pursued by She Who Must Not Be Named. He did not know how to lament for his daughter.
In the east beyond the rim of the gully, the sun was rising. When it ascended high enough, he would have to move; use the boulder for shade. But this patch of sand would lie in shadow a little longer. While he could, he remained where he sat, gently stroking Linden’s hair.
It was filthy, soiled with sweat and grime and dust. She had been through too much—And in her present condition, she could not care for herself at all. But the state of her hair made no difference to him. His hands were too numb to feel it.
Only one night had passed since she had restored him to life, maimed him with mortality, and roused the Worm of the World’s End. How much time remained until the Worm brought its hunger here, to feed on the ichor in the depths of Melenkurion Skyweir? Four days? Six? It was not enough.
If it is not forbidden, it will have Earthpower.
If someone had asked him why he sat in that position, caressing her hair when his own nerves were dead and he had no way of knowing whether she felt his touch, he might have said that he was praying.
As soon as the Ardent had brought the company here from the Lost Deep, Covenant had claimed Linden from Stave. Neither the former Master nor any of Linden’s friends had objected when he had seated himself spread-legged against the boulder so that he could hold her, curled into herself and unconscious, against his chest. Then he had lifted the chain holding his ring over his head, and had settled it around her neck.
The Humbled had expressed their disapproval; but he told them, “I never wanted all that power. When I died, I finally succeeded at giving it away.” He had tried to surrender it several times before then, and had been refused. “I don’t want it back. Not like this.”
Most of his companions were weary beyond bearing. None of them argued with him. The Staff of Law they placed on the sand near Linden so that she could reach it if Covenant managed to rouse her. Then they stumbled away to rest.
He recognized where he was. Of course he did. The shock of his reincarnation had not cost him simple things like his knowledge of the Land’s geography. He did not need to turn his head and peer past the edge of the boulder to confirm that the jagged cliff of Landsdrop jutted high into the dawn less than half a league away.
Instead of returning the company to Andelain, the Ardent had deposited them on the Lower Land, between Landsdrop and the dour fens and seepage of Sarangrave Flat. The foothills of Mount Thunder—and the dark throat of the Defiles Course—were at least sixty or sixty-five leagues to the northwest. At that distance, the mountain itself was no longer visible.
Vaguely Covenant wondered whether the waters that fed the Defiles Course and Lifeswallower and most of the Sarangrave had been completely cut off. Likely there were other springs within Gravin Threndor, streams that joined the polluted Soulsease beyond its deepest subterranean lakes. And in any case, the Great Swamp and Sarangrave Flat would not soon empty their rank life-blood into the Sunbirth Sea. The Worm of the World’s End would find its way to Melenkurion Skyweir long before the vast demesne of the lurker began to run dry.
He wanted to ask the Ardent why the compelled Insequent had delivered the company here. But he could wait. The Ardent had been profligate with his given strength. The exertion of translating everyone except the Demondim-spawn out of Mount Thunder’s depths had left him chalk-faced and trembling. As soon as he had set his charges down in the dry streambed, he had wrapped his garments around his whole body, swaddled himself until even his face was covered. Then he had collapsed where he stood.
Covenant let him rest. The Ardent had earned it. And Covenant could guess at one or two explanations for the Insequent’s choice. Kevin’s Dirt did not impend over the Lower Land. Kastenessen—or moksha Raver—had foreseen no need to cast the brume eastward. Here Linden, Liand, and the Ramen would retain their natural percipience. And the Staff would be stronger.
In addition, the Ardent had placed the whole bulk of Mount Thunder between the company and both the skurj and the Sandgorgons. Speaking of the Sandgorgons, Esmer had said, Already they have begun the slaughter of Salva Gildenbourne. And he had promised worse—But the threat they posed was not immediate: they were too far away. Kastenessen could send his skurj more quickly, but even those monsters would need time to travel through so much earth.
The Ardent had given Covenant and Linden and their friends the necessary gift of a respite.
Still they had no defense against the Worm of the World’s End. Perhaps no defense was possible.
And the problem of Roger remained. Even now, he summons an army of Cavewights to join his efforts—If he knew where the Ardent had taken Jeremiah, he might be able to muster an attack more swiftly than Kastenessen could. Certainly he would do everything in his considerable power to recapture Jeremiah and the croyel. They were his portal to eternity.
But Covenant did not dwell on such concerns. Though she hardly moved, except to breathe, Linden held his attention.
He saw echoes of Joan in her aggrieved face. The small muscles at the corners of her closed eyes winced occasionally, implying pains which she could not escape. Because of him, Elena had been consumed by She Who Must Not Be Named. Reminders of his ex-wife seemed to demand more from him than did the last crisis of the Earth. Her efforts to destroy his hands demonstrated that she was a burden which he could not refuse.
Therefore he would need Loric’s krill. If he confronted Joan without some potent weapon, she would incinerate him. But the krill was also needed here. It alone controlled the croyel. Freed, the creature would escape in an instant, taking Jeremiah with it—and killing everyone it could.
Restoring Covenant to life, Linden had sacrificed the Earth. He refused to sacrifice both her and her son merely to ease his own responsibilities.
Torn within himself, he stroked her hair, and prayed, and waited.
Apart from Clyme, Branl, and Stave, who watched the horizons from the rims of the gully, and Galt, who had accepted the task of restraining the croyel and Jeremiah so that Rime Coldspray could rest, Mahrtiir was the only member of the company still standing. Earlier he had sent out his Cords to scout the terrain and search for water in spite of their weariness. They had not yet returned; and everyone else had stretched out on the sand to sleep while they could. Now, alone, the Manethrall faced the east as though he expected the touch of the sunrise on his eyeless face to offer him an obscure revelation.
Fortunately Stormpast Galesend had not neglected to remove her cataphract and set it out as a cradle for Anele: protected by stone armor, he slept like the Giants. And Liand slept as well. His efforts with his orcrest so soon after Linden had healed him had exhausted even his youth and Stonedownor stamina.
Stoic as a plinth of brown marble, Galt held Loric’s dagger against the throat of the croyel. The blade prevented the fatal creature’s teeth from reaching Jeremiah’s neck; prevented the croyel from feeding. But Covenant could not tell whether the succubus was growing weaker. He knew only that Jeremiah looked like a rag doll, boneless and beaten. The boy’s muddy, disfocused gaze was as empty as an unfilled grave.
From Jeremiah’s back, the croyel’s bitter eyes studied Liand’s supine form. The creature’s gaze conveyed the impression that the croyel craved Liand’s death.
At intervals, Mahrtiir glanced toward Jeremiah and the croyel; regarded them with senses other than sight. Then he resumed his examination of the east as if he awaited an epiphany.
When the sun gilded his forehead, however, and warmed the begrimed bandage that still covered his eye sockets, he shrugged slightly. Stiff with disappointment, he turned to face Covenant and Linden.
“There is an old tale among the Ramen,” he began brusquely, “concerning Hile Troy. He was a stranger to the Land, as you know, and eyeless from birth. According to the tale, the Land’s sun gifted him with true sight in spite of his blindness.
“Here Kevin’s Dirt does not corrupt the light. For that reason, I permitted myself to imagine that my vision might be restored.” He had contributed nothing to the company’s escape from the Lost Deep and the bane. Clearly his uselessness galled him. “But my hope was delusion. I am Ramen. We are given no gifts except those of service to the Ranyhyn.”
Covenant expected him to add that even that service would be denied him if he returned to his people. Without sight, he would not be considered worthy of the great horses. Instead, however, he changed the subject.
“The Cords will soon return, bearing word of water. The season’s rains have been abundant. Our old tales inform us that there are few springs in this region—and fewer still which do not draw some venom from the earth. Battles have been fought between Sarangrave Flat and Landsdrop. Many of the Land’s defenders have perished here—aye, and many of Fangthane’s servants also. Their blood and magicks stain this ground across the millennia.
“However, this watercourse was formed by rains gathering from the Upper Land. If the stream does not run here, it will flow nearby. We will be able to quench our thirst, though we appear to lack aliantha, and have no other sustenance.”
Covenant nodded. His own thirst was real enough, but he felt sure that it was trivial compared to the deprivation suffered by the Giants and the Ramen, Liand and Anele; Linden herself. They were able to sleep only because their exhaustion was greater than their need for water.
But he did not know why the Manethrall was talking to him; telling him things that he already understood. Stroking Linden’s hair tenderly, he waited for Mahrtiir to continue.
After a moment, the Manethrall nodded toward the southeast. “A caesure moves there. I had thought that the absence of Kevin’s Dirt would diminish the virulence of such evils. Yet its emanations”—he lifted a hand to his face—“suggest that its force is enhanced.”
He was probably right. Long before Lord Foul fashioned and occupied Ridjeck Thome, an insidious miasma had hung over portions of the Lower Land. Baleful creatures had arisen from the corrupt waters pouring out of Mount Thunder. The lurker of the Sarangrave had come to life in the effluvium of bitter theurgies. And the Ravers had taken form among the malign spirits of the region. Interdicted by the Colossus of the Fall, they had spread much of their harm south and east toward the Despiser’s eventual seat. Over time, they had done such damage that those lands had come to be named the Spoiled Plains.
Covenant could well believe that caesures flourished across the Lower Land, fed by a history of wrongness. Especially south of Mount Thunder—
“Is it coming this way?” he asked the Manethrall.
Mahrtiir shook his head. “At present, it tends northward, delivering havoc among the sloughs and mires of Sarangrave Flat.”
“Then don’t worry about it.” Briefly Covenant remembered the Spoiled Plains as they had once been, before they were tainted. Then the rubble of his recollections shifted, and the memory was gone. “We have more urgent problems.”
The movement of his hands indicated Linden’s apparent catatonia; but he was thinking of Joan. He no longer knew with any certainty where turiya Raver had hidden her. That memory, unfortunately, was gone as well. But he could guess.
Mahrtiir’s manner sharpened. More harshly, he replied, “I have not forgotten the Ringthane’s plight, or that of her son. Indeed, her spirit appears broken by all that she has endured.” His tone was bile. “Nor do I discount our own peril. I have neither aid nor counsel to offer. I speak merely to hear myself and know that I remain among the living.”
The fierce lines of his face suggested that he would have preferred death.
Covenant sighed to himself. There was so much pain all around him; and he could relieve none of it.
“Don’t underestimate Linden,” he said gruffly. “Too many people make that mistake.” Including Sunder and Hollian, who should have known better. “Hell, even she does it. She’s come back before. Give her time. She’ll find her way again.”
If his numb touch gave her any comfort or aid, it lay beneath the surface, hidden.
The Manethrall confronted Covenant squarely. “I do not fear for her, Timewarden. I fear you.”
Covenant waited. He was not surprised: he feared himself. His new humanity had too many flaws.
“I acknowledge,” Mahrtiir continued, “that you are mysterious to me. You surpass my comprehension. For that reason, among others, my fealty belongs to the Ringthane rather than to you.”
Covenant started to say, I know, but Mahrtiir did not pause.
“Nonetheless I am able to grasp that the spectre of High Lord Elena has been devoured by She Who Must Not Be Named.”
“Yes.”
“She is your daughter.”
Covenant ached with memories like old wounds. His grief rose like keening. But he kept it to himself. “Yes.”
“The deed of her undoing was yours. Do not protest to me that you merely requested Anele’s sanity and service. I will not hear you. I grant that you did not or could not foresee what would follow.” The Manethrall seemed to bite down on each word, restraining an impulse to shout. “Still the deed was yours.”
Covenant faced Mahrtiir as steadily as he could. “Yes.”
Like an indictment, Mahrtiir proclaimed, “The Waynhim teach that ‘Good cannot be accomplished by evil means.’ I do not fault you for removing the krill from Andelain. You enabled the capture of the Ringthane’s son. Nor do I question your valor. Your hands are proof enough that you do not fear to bear the cost of your choices. But for millennia, from the moment of her conception until her last fall beneath Gravin Threndor, you have brought only ruin upon your daughter. Upon your daughter, Timewarden.
“Therefore I fear you.”
Because he ached, Covenant objected, “We’re still alive—”
The Manethrall cut him off. “By evil means. Do you name the expenditure of your daughter good? The Ringthane would not do so. Nor would she sacrifice her son for any purpose.”
“No, she wouldn’t,” Covenant admitted. “I wouldn’t either. He’s still alive.
“But,” he insisted, “I did not know what was going to happen.” He needed to be clear about this. He already had more burdens than he could carry. “Sunder and Hollian picked Elena. I didn’t.
“And I’m not done.”
“Not done?” Mahrtiir barked a humorless laugh. “Do you intend to confront She Who Must Not Be Named again, for High Lord Elena’s sake?”
“Don’t put it past me,” Covenant growled. Linden’s weight against his chest was an accusation that he did not mean to deny. Her soiled shirt, plucked and torn, had endured as much as his old T-shirt and jeans. In his time, he, too, had worn stains that should have guided him. “I’ve done more harm than I can stand. I always have. But we’re still alive. That means we still have a chance.” More quietly, he finished, “I still have a chance.”
Abruptly Branl jumped down from the edge of the gully to approach Covenant and Mahrtiir. “We will hear no more of this, Manethrall,” he stated in a tone like polished obsidian. A threat—The loyalty of the Humbled ran deep. “You are unjust, both to the Unbeliever and to the Dead.”
Mahrtiir’s bandage emphasized his scowl. “How so?” He seemed to need conflicts. His sense of his own uselessness required an outlet.
“That the crime of High Lord Elena’s conception was costly to her,” answered Branl, “cannot be denied. Yet the ur-Lord may not be held accountable for the use which she made of her life. The fault of her chosen deeds cannot be excused by the circumstance of her birth and parentage. She elected to summon Kevin Landwaster from his rightful place among the Dead. The ur-Lord did not. Her subsequent enslavement by Corruption ensued from her own folly, not from any choice or desire of the Unbeliever’s.
“That her spirit has not served Corruption from that time to this was the ur-Lord’s gift to her. Aided by powers invoked by a Forestal from the Colossus of the Fall, he ended her thrall when she was unable to free herself.”
Covenant had not forgotten his physical life. He remembered that he had released Elena by destroying the original Staff of Law. If he had not done so, she would have killed him. But in turn, that act of desperation had facilitated Lord Foul’s return to strength and the horrors of the Sunbane.
Apparently evil could be accomplished by good—or at least necessary—means.
The Manethrall’s jaws worked, chewing possible retorts. Before he decided on a response, however, Covenant told Branl, “No. Mahrtiir is right. Elena doesn’t deserve more torment. We all make choices, and none of us can guess how they’ll turn out. But we have to live with the consequences anyway. I didn’t know what would happen when I asked Anele to speak to the Dead, but that doesn’t make me any less responsible.”
“And did the Dead not choose?” countered Branl. “Did Elena Law-Breaker herself not choose?”
Covenant nodded. “They did. She did. And she paid for it. She’s paying for it right now. But that doesn’t change what I did. I asked for help. My part in this doesn’t go away just because I didn’t choose the kind of help I got.”
As Covenant spoke, Mahrtiir sagged. His anger became an air of recognition and defeat. He remained silent while Branl searched for a weakness in Covenant’s reasoning. But when Branl found none, the Manethrall said unsteadily, “I cry your pardon, Timewarden. I am answered. The judgments of these self-maimed Haruchai do not sway me. But I discern now that I have misdirected my ire.
“In sooth, I have no cause to accuse you. I do so only because the Lost Deep has deprived me of myself. I have learned that I am naught, unfit to serve either the Ringthane or the Ranyhyn. Such knowledge is bitter to me. I do not bear it with grace.”
I know, Covenant thought sadly. Mahrtiir’s pain was only one of many needs for which Covenant had no anodyne.
Branl looked at the blinded man; raised an eyebrow in inquiry. After a moment, he said, “We do not comprehend. How is it that any mere place can diminish a Manethrall of the Ramen? You are who and what you are, unlessened in strength, forethought, or valor by the loss of ordinary sight. Nor have you been diminished by impenetrable stone or ancient banes. To think otherwise is to heed the blandishments of Corruption.”
In a motion too fluid for Covenant to follow, Mahrtiir’s fighting garrote appeared in his hands. Through his teeth, he asked, “Do you accuse me, sleepless one? Do you deem that my perception of myself betrays this company, or the Ringthane, or the Land?”
Anticipating a provocative rejoinder from Branl, Covenant groaned.
However, Branl answered flatly, “I have not said so. Nor was that my meaning. You are a Manethrall of the Ramen. For their devotion to the Ranyhyn, the Manethralls have been esteemed by every Haruchai since the time of the Bloodguard. Though you revile our Mastery, you cannot question my word. If any accusation stands between us, it arises from within you, not from any judgment of the Humbled, or of the Masters.”
In spite of his numbness, Covenant continued stroking Linden’s hair. “He’s telling the truth, Mahrtiir. You know that. He’s Haruchai. He doesn’t lie.
“I understand feeling useless. But I’ve been weaker than you are. When I first came to the Land, I clung to the idea I was helpless. I counted on it. I didn’t want to carry the load that comes with being able to stand for something. It took me a long time to get over needing to believe I’m weak.”
He had learned that only the damned can be saved.
“Of course,” he conceded, “I had help. A lot of help.” Atiaran. Mhoram. Bannor. Saltheart Foamfollower. Triock. Even Lena, whom he had raped and abandoned. “But so do you. And you still have a long way to go.” Covenant had said that once before, although he no longer remembered why. “You still have to come back.”
The muscles of Mahrtiir’s jaw knotted. Cords of tension defined his neck. As if he were delivering or receiving a blow, he rasped, “Master, I find that I must cry your pardon also. If joy is in the ears that hear, as the Giants avow, not in the mouth that speaks, then blame and rue must likewise be found in the ears that hear. Condemning the Masters for their judgments, I have vaunted myself worthy to judge them. The fault is mine.”
Branl considered the Manethrall briefly. His mien revealed nothing as he acknowledged Mahrtiir’s apology with a bow.
Mahrtiir faced Covenant again. “If I am granted an occasion to heed your counsel, Timewarden, I will do so.”
Then he walked away as if he hoped to conceal his self-recrimination by turning his back.
With a delicate Haruchai shrug, Branl rejoined Clyme and Stave on the rim of the gully, standing guard.
For a few moments, Covenant studied the strict set of the Manethrall’s shoulders. He ached for Mahrtiir: hell, he ached for everybody. Maybe, he mused sourly, it was a good thing that most of his former memories lay in ruins. Maybe it was crucial. If he could have remembered why he had spoken to Mahrtiir on the plateau of Revelstone—or to Liand, or to Pahni and Bhapa—he might not be able to resist the impulse to explain himself. Doubtless Mahrtiir would be comforted to hear that he still had an important role to play. But the knowledge would shape his decisions, affect everything about him. Directly or indirectly, it would affect the whole company. And Covenant would be responsible for the change. Linden and her friends would be guided by insights which they should not have been able to glean, except by their own efforts. In effect, they would no longer be truly free.
But Covenant had been spared by his imposed mortality, for good or ill. He was in no danger of saying too much—
Hellfire, he muttered in silence. No wonder only people like Roger and creatures like the croyel wanted to be gods. The sheer impotence of that state would appall a chunk of basalt—if the basalt happened to care about anything except itself. Absolute power was as bad as powerlessness for anybody who valued someone else’s peace or happiness or even survival. The Creator could only make or destroy worlds: he could not rule them, nurture them, assist them. He was simply too strong to express himself within the constraints of Time.
By that standard, forgetfulness was Covenant’s only real hope. No matter how badly he wanted to remember, he needed his specific form of ignorance; absolutely required it. Nothing less would prevent him from violating the necessity of freedom.
By slow degrees, sunshine crested the rim of the gully. It reached Covenant’s face: a touch that might be a curse in this desiccated region. Still in shadow, the Giants slumbered among the sand and stones and sparse grass of the gully-bottom. Liand and Anele slept. Galt gripped Jeremiah’s shoulder, holding the krill at the croyel’s throat. The boy stood as if he were too vacant to feel thirst or fatigue. The croyel’s mouth moved, perhaps yearning for Jeremiah’s neck, perhaps shaping some invocation or summons. Above the rest of the company, Stave and Galt’s comrades stood like statues, carved and voiceless.
Covenant shifted so that his eyes avoided the sun. Soon he would have to move Linden into the shade of the boulder. But shade was not water. It would not shield her for long.
She had been through too much: Covenant understood that. And when she found her way back to consciousness, she would judge herself harshly for her temporary escape. She would believe that she had failed her son and her friends and the Land. But he knew better. Her absence was the opposite of failure. Like Jeremiah in the aftermath of his maiming by fire and Despite, she had found a way to survive when every other form of continuance had become unendurable.
And Covenant grasped a truth that she might not recognize, even though she had experienced it before. When she returned to herself, like a butterfly she would unfurl different strengths than those which she had possessed earlier. She would be an altered woman. Even she might not know what she had become.
It was conceivable that her sense of inadequacy would shape her into an empty vessel fit only to be filled with despair. But he refused to believe that of her.
I do not fear for her, Timewarden.
In this, as in other things, Covenant sided with Mahrtiir.
Avoiding the direct stare of the sun, he watched Linden’s face for signs that she might be ready to awaken.
She looked ashen and abused, almost drained of blood. The fine lines of her features had become a kind of gauntness. At intervals, the muscles at the corners of her eyes were plucked by pains too intimate for his ordinary sight to interpret. Beneath their lids, her eyes flinched from side to side, wincing at nightmares. Occasionally her fingers twitched as though she sought to grasp her Staff. Her lips shaped words or whimpers like pleas for which he had no answer.
The longer she remained unconscious, the more she would be changed by the experience of hiding among her dreams.
The sun heated his cheek. When he blinked, his eyes felt raw, abraded by the effects of convulsions and rank minerals deep under Gravin Threndor. Dehydration blurred his vision. He thought that the time had come to move. Then he thought that he would wait for Bhapa and Pahni a little longer. Linden lay like a millstone against his chest; but he was reluctant to disturb her.
Hardly aware that he had reached a decision, he began to talk. Bowing his head, he murmured her name softly. Almost whispering, he tried to find words that would reach her.
“I love you, Linden,” he said like a sigh. “Do you know that? So much time has passed, you might find it hard to imagine. But it’s true. I’ve spent three and a half thousand years remembering how much you mean to me—and wishing I’d done a better job of telling you.
“That’s why I kept trying to warn or advise you, when I should have kept my damn mouth shut. I didn’t know how else to tell you I love you. If you’ve made mistakes—which I do not believe—you can’t blame yourself. You only made them because I couldn’t leave you alone.”
Above him, Stave, Clyme, and Branl stood with their backs to the gully, facing Landsdrop and the more distant vistas of Sarangrave Flat. They may have wished to grant Covenant the illusion of privacy. Guiding Jeremiah by the shoulder, Galt turned the boy and the croyel away so that Covenant would not be distracted by Jeremiah’s emptiness and the creature’s malevolence.
Apparently the Humbled and the former Master understood what Covenant was trying to do.
“Linden,” he went on, “I think you can hear me.” He kept his voice low to mask his sorrow and regret. “I think that because you’re like Jeremiah right now, and he can hear me. The croyel isn’t the only one listening. But that’s not all. I think he’s always heard you. Nothing you ever said to him was wasted.
“That’s one reason I believe he doesn’t serve Lord Foul. He’s been listening to you. You gave him a life that wasn’t all pain. It was also years of your care and devotion. You showed him he wasn’t alone even though he couldn’t tell you he was listening.
“Sure, Lord Foul got to him first. The Despiser marked him in that bonfire. But Jeremiah is like all the rest of us. He’s more than the sum of his hurts. One damaged hand doesn’t make him anybody’s property. And after that, you claimed him. You claimed him in the only way that matters, by loving him the whole time. Whatever Lord Foul has done to him since is too late. I believe that. Someday you’ll believe it, too. You’ve already taught him the difference between love and Despite.”
Some of the Giants slept restlessly, fighting old battles in their dreams, or fleeing beyond exhaustion in the deep places of the world. Rime Coldspray snorted defiance or desperation softly through her teeth. Cirrus Kindwind clutched the stump of her severed arm until her knuckles whitened and the thews stood out on her hand. But none of the Swordmainnir seemed likely to awaken.
“And since then—” Covenant tried to speak more strongly, and found that he could not. His throat was too dry, and lamentations filled his chest. “Hellfire, Linden. When I told you to do something they don’t expect, I didn’t know you were going to surprise me so often.”
He did not want her to hear his grief. She would hold herself accountable for it.
“It’s quite a list, the things you’ve accomplished that should have been impossible. I don’t know if you realize just what you’ve done, or how hard it was, or how many different forces were trying to stop you. I could start with escaping Mithil Stonedown and the kresh to find the Ramen, or risking a caesure to look for your Staff, or finding a way to bring the Demondim with you when you escaped the past.” He could have started with the imponderable use of wild magic by which she had saved herself and Anele from the collapse of Kevin’s Watch; but he no longer knew how she had achieved that feat. “But you won’t take credit for any of that. You’ll say you didn’t do it on your own, you had help, you couldn’t have done it alone.
“Well, I’m not going to argue with you. Of course you had help. We’ve all had help. It doesn’t diminish what you’ve done.”
The rising sun had reached her face. Her head rested against his chest in a way that allowed the light to strike her troubled eyes, although their lids were closed and clenched. Hoping to ease her, he cupped one hand to provide a patch of shade.
“But think about it, Linden. We only have Jeremiah now because you broke the construct hiding him. Nobody helped you with that. Nobody else could have saved Liand,” whose fate seemed to thicken around him as he slept. “And I only have hands I can still use because you healed them. For that alone, I’m so grateful I don’t know how to contain it.”
Everything that he required of himself while life remained in his body depended on his ability to grip and hold.
Gradually a low breeze began to blow, drawn by the warmed cliff of Landsdrop. It cooled the mounting pressure of the sun; but it could not ease his thirst. His voice had become an effortful scrape of sound. His tongue felt stupid in his mouth, and sand seemed to clog his attempts to swallow.
“But you didn’t stop there. You’re the reason we survived She Who Must Not Be Named.”
With his peripheral vision, he saw that Stave had turned to study him. The Humbled had set aside the pretense that they were not listening.
They wanted to know what he meant.
He was thinking of Elena, agonized and frantic. She was his daughter by rape; and he had not stopped her from drinking the Blood of the Earth, even though he had suspected that her intentions were distorted or dangerous. Now her pain had been consumed by the bane’s larger and more rabid torment—
—because Linden had not granted her the compassion which Kevin Landwaster had received from his forefathers.
He wanted to tell Linden that she had done the right thing.—something they don’t expect. Something no one could have expected. In effect, she had rubbed salt in Elena’s wounds. She had left Elena’s anguish so fresh and naked that She Who Must Not Be Named had been unable to ignore it.
He wanted to say that sometimes good came from cruel means.
But he could not. The words hurt too much. And they would not help Linden forgive herself. Certainly they did not ease his own remorse.
Yet he believed that they were important. Saying that good could not be accomplished by evil means implied a definition of evil which excluded Linden’s particular desperation.
Nevertheless he did not speak of Elena. He did not wish the Haruchai to hear him. They would judge him as well as Linden in the same way that they judged themselves. Instead he murmured, faltering, “You’ve saved us in more ways than I can count. None of us would still be alive without you.”
Then he was finished. He had nothing more to say, and very little strength. She would wake, or she would not. Either way, the choice was hers.
Lifting his head, he saw Stave nod before resuming his watch on the horizons. Perhaps the former Master approved. Or perhaps his nod merely acknowledged that Covenant had tried.
027
Later Covenant asked Stave to help him move Linden back into the shade of the boulder. He was too weak to shift her gently by himself. As Stave complied, however, the former Master remarked that the Manethrall’s Cords were returning.
“They appear stronger. I deem that they have found water.”
Covenant did not know how much longer he could wait. Like his concern for Linden, his thirst had become a kind of fever, so hot that it parched his thoughts.
Muttering to himself, he moved as far into the boulder’s shade as he could while Stave lifted Linden. Then he accepted her again, settled her against his chest.
Through the haze in his eyes, he saw the Cords approaching, accompanied now by their Manethrall. Pahni and Bhapa had been gone for what felt like a long time. They must have walked far. He could not imagine where he, or the Ardent, or even the Giants would find the stamina to do the same.
While Covenant tried to believe that he was capable of walking at all, Clyme said brusquely, “Stave.”
With a small shrug for the affront of being commanded aloud, Stave returned to the rim of the watercourse. At the same time, Clyme and Branl leapt down to greet the Ramen. As soon as the Cords announced their success, Clyme said, “If it can be done, this company must be spared further exertion. We will endeavor to bring water here.”
“We have no vessels,” Mahrtiir observed.
“And we have seen no aliantha,” added Bhapa.
Clyme ignored the Cord. “We will contrive a means,” he told Mahrtiir. With one hand, he gestured at Anele sleeping cupped in Galesend’s cataphract. “Shaped as it is, the armor of the Giants will serve. We need only rouse one of the Swordmainnir.”
“It is stone,” the Manethrall objected. “Its weight alone—”
Branl cut him off. “We do not ask this of you, Manethrall. We will bear the burden. Stave will stand watch in our stead.”
Mahrtiir hesitated for a moment, as if he doubted even the great strength of the Haruchai. Then he nodded. “Cord Bhapa and I will accompany you. When Cord Pahni has bestirred the Ironhand, she will join her wariness to Stave’s.”
Pahni obeyed promptly. Casting a worried glance at Liand, she knelt beside Rime Coldspray. From a small pouch at her waist, she took a little amanibhavam. After rubbing the dried leaves between her fingers, she held them to Coldspray’s nose.
Covenant had once eaten raw amanibhavam: an act of madness which may nonetheless have saved his life.
Coldspray snorted at the smell, twisted away as though it stung her nostrils. A moment later, she raised her head, blinking at the film of fatigue and thirst in her eyes.
Satisfied, Pahni climbed out of the gully toward Stave.
“Ironhand,” Clyme stated, “we require your armor to carry water.”
Coldspray regarded him with an air of stupefaction. Briefly she struggled to understand him. Then she managed a nod. Fumbling, she undid the bindings of her cataphract. When that was done, she rolled across the sand until she left the breastplate and back of her armor behind.
Freed from the heavy stone, she labored unsteadily to her feet and watched as Clyme and Branl each stooped to lift half of her cataphract. Seeing that they were equal to the task, she took a small stone flask—diamondraught—from a slot or notch in her breastplate and drank the last of its contents: a few drops. Then she tucked the flask under her belt and stumbled toward Frostheart Grueburn. Without making any effort to wake her comrade, she knelt to release the clasps of Grueburn’s armor.
By increments, she succeeded at rolling Grueburn to one side.
Grueburn opened her eyes, peered at Coldspray. A frown knotted her features as she fought to moisten her mouth. “Ironhand,” she rasped painfully. “What—?”
“Rest if you must,” Coldspray replied, hoarse with thirst. “If you are able to do so, arise and aid me. We must make use of your cataphract as basins for water.”
Grueburn shook her head, staring dully. “Able?” she croaked. “Have I not named myself the mightiest of the Swordmainnir? If you are indeed able to carry water, surely I can do no less.”
Goading herself with Giantish curses, Frostheart Grueburn began to climb upright. When she had found a measure of balance, she, too, retrieved her flask and poured her last drops of diamondraught into her mouth.
Covenant saw their heavy muscles tremble as Coldspray and Grueburn picked up Grueburn’s armor; and he almost slipped. Images tugged at him: Saltheart Foamfollower bearing him into the unendurable magma of Hotash Slay; Grimmand Honninscrave straining to contain samadhi Sheol. His memories spanned too much time. And he had too many lives on his conscience. Linden’s destitution against his chest was only one burden among a clamoring host.
“Hang on,” he murmured, speaking to himself as much as to her. “It won’t be long now. We’ll have water soon.”
Somehow the Ironhand and Grueburn stood in spite of stone and exhaustion. They looked weaker than Branl and Clyme, but they managed to support the shaped rock of Grueburn’s cataphract.
“Now,” Coldspray panted to Mahrtiir. “Ere this tattered mimicry of vigor fails us.”
The Manethrall turned quickly toward Covenant; bowed like a promise. Then he wheeled away. Guided by Bhapa, he led Clyme and Branl, Coldspray and Grueburn away along the gully. Both Swordmainnir tottered as though they were about to fall; but they did not. From some deep reserve of indomitability, they drew the resolve to stay on their feet and walk.
Covenant watched them go with a pang in his heart, as if he had failed them—although he could not have said how. His sense of disappointment in himself seemed to have no name.
He had certainly failed Linden.
For a time, he forgot to stroke her hair. His shoulders slumped, resting his incomplete hands on the sand. Like his memories, their stiffness threatened to drag him into the fissures of the past. But then he muttered, “Hellfire,” and forced himself to lift his arms again.
The sensations of touching her were denied to him. Only the repetitive gentleness of caresses comforted him. But he knew how badly he had hurt her, both by his silence among the Dead and by his recurring absences. He knew that he would surely hurt her again. And he knew what he had done to Elena. He did not seek solace for himself.
Other people needed consolation more than he did.
028
He could not measure time. He was not yet attuned to mundane circadian increments—or he was too badly dehydrated. The sun moved: the shadow of the boulder dwindled. Landsdrop seemed to shrink as the angle of the light changed. But such things did not tell him how long Mahrtiir and the others had been gone, or when they might come back.
The season was still spring: he remembered that. Nevertheless the sun’s heat leaned down on him until he forgot that he had been drenched only a few hours earlier. It made Linden heavier. The day was going to be hot. Too hot—
More and more as haze blurred his sight, he saw Landsdrop as a barrier. A forbidding—Unattainable. It made him think that he would never see the Upper Land again.
His desire to walk in Andelain once more before the world ended was a new kind of ache, unforeseen and immedicable. He had no anodyne for any of his woes.
When Galt said firmly, “Ur-Lord, the others return. They bear water,” Covenant needed a moment to understand him.
Peering down the gully, Covenant eventually made out six figures, four of them small. Their shapes wavered and bled, as uncertain as hallucinations dissolving in the sun’s glare. But they became more solid as they approached. Walking with slow care, they took on definition until he could believe that they were real.
Clyme, Branl, and two Giants. Mahrtiir and Bhapa.
Covenant leaned forward in anticipation, but Linden did not awaken.
Clearly the two Swordmainnir had gained much by drinking their fill. Their movements were steady, articulating their stubborn vitality. Nevertheless the Humbled carried their laden basins almost as easily.
The halves of the cataphracts were large enough to hold substantial quantities of water.
Abruptly the croyel said, “That isn’t going to help you.” Jeremiah’s voice was harsh with scorn. “This isn’t over. The Ardent hasn’t done you any favors. Drink as much as you want. Congratulate yourselves for staying alive. It won’t make any difference. That fat Insequent isn’t as smart as he thinks.”
A frown creased Linden’s forehead. The croyel’s words in her son’s mouth appeared to trouble her. The muscles at the corners of her eyes flinched more urgently. Still she did not rouse.
“Be silent, creature,” Galt replied. “Do you fancy that I will scruple to sever your foul head from its body? This youth whom you torment has no worth to me. And in her present state, Linden Avery cannot plead for him. It will not grieve me to cause your death.”
Covenant wondered whether Galt would carry out his threat. Fortunately the croyel did not test the Master.
Stepping among the sprawled forms of the company, Manethrall Mahrtiir said as if his blindness gave him the right to command, “Offer drink to the Insequent. We are in sore need of his powers.” Plainly he had quenched his own thirst and become stronger. But he could not appease his sense of futility, or his resentment of it. “If any diamondraught remains, grant it to the Ringthane. Her plight demands water, but while she remains as she is, she will drink little. Mayhap the greater potency of diamondraught will succor her.”
“Aye,” assented the Ironhand. The strain of her burden showed in her voice, in spite of her nascent recovery. With elaborate care, she set down her half of Grueburn’s armor. Then she went to where Latebirth lay snoring: a husky sound in the back of Latebirth’s throat, distressed and uneven. Coldspray opened Latebirth’s cataphract, lifted the breastplate aside, and took Latebirth’s flask. However, a quick shake of the flask told Coldspray that it was empty. Dropping the wrought stone in vexation, she moved to search Onyx Stonemage.
At the same time, Grueburn carried her vessel to the Ardent’s side; Clyme placed his near Latebirth; and Branl approached Covenant. Only Branl’s slow caution as he lowered Coldspray’s breastplate to the sand betrayed that the armor and its weight of water were heavy for him.
Bhapa had already left the watercourse to join Pahni. Now Stave descended to stand over Covenant. Extending his arms, he said, “You must drink, Timewarden. I will hold the Chosen.”
Through his thirst and eagerness, Covenant thought that he heard an undercurrent of concern in the former Master’s tone.
But Covenant did not move. The debris of effort and mute rue filled his throat. He had difficulty speaking. “Linden first. I can’t—After what she’s been through.”
He had told her to find him. What had he expected her to do? Passively accept his silence?
“Ur-Lord,” Branl began, then stopped as the Ironhand walked toward him holding Stonemage’s flask.
“Here is diamondraught,” Coldspray said. “Mere drops remain, I fear. But it is distilled for Giants, and Linden Giantfriend is human. Perchance mere drops will suffice.”
Stupid with thirst, Covenant stared at Coldspray. For a moment, he did not understand why she seemed to be waiting for him; why Branl and Stave were waiting. Then he realized that he was holding Linden with her cheek propped on his shoulder. She could not drink in that position.
“You’re right,” he croaked to Stave. “You’d better take her.”
At once, Stave stooped to Linden. Frowning slightly around the scar of his lost eye, he lifted her in the cradle of his arms so her head tilted back enough to open her mouth.
Covenant felt her absence from his chest like a bereavement. Instead of moving to drink from Branl’s basin, he watched as Coldspray unstopped Stonemage’s flask and shook half a dozen amber drops past Linden’s lips.
Linden appeared to swallow autonomically. She gave no sign that she felt the effects of the liquor.
“I can’t see into her,” Covenant rasped. He was a leper: he had no health-sense. “What’s happening? Is it helping her?”
The Ironhand scowled like a wince. “Linden Giantfriend baffles discernment. As do you, Timewarden, and also her son. Diamondraught is a sovereign roborant. I will trust that it aids her. But I detect no sign of awakening.”
Both Stave and Branl nodded in agreement.
Indicating the flask, Coldspray added, “Doubtless water will provide some further benison.”
Covenant thought that he said, Good idea. But he could not be sure. He had too many memories. Long ago, Atiaran had told him, You are closed to me—I do not see you. Others had made similar comments. I do not know whether you are well or ill.
Ill, of course, he had answered with a bitterness which Lena’s mother had not deserved. I’m a leper.
She had quoted an ancient song.

“And he who wields white wild magic gold
is a paradox—
for he is everything and nothing,
hero and fool,
potent, helpless—
and with the one word of truth or treachery,
he will save or damn the Earth
because he is mad and sane,
cold and passionate,
lost and found.”
Beyond question, he felt mad and sane. Increasingly bewildered. He had surrendered his ring, and did not mean to take it back. In one form or another, his leprosy defined him.
He was slipping—
But Branl had gripped him by the shoulders. Irresistibly the Humbled drew him to his knees beside Coldspray’s cataphract.
Thirst and water anchored Covenant. Plunging his whole face into the basin, he drank as long as he could hold his breath.
When he pulled himself back, with water streaming down his cheeks onto his shirt and cooling in the breeze, he felt that he had been baptized; made new in some ineffable fashion. His mouth and throat had been washed clean. None of his griefs or regrets or responsibilities had passed from him. But he could bear them.
And he was not alone. As he mustered the strength to stand, he found that all of the Giants were stirring. They drank sparingly: the company’s supply of water was small for women of their size. Yet they drank enough to ease their weakness. Those who still carried any diamondraught swallowed it, little though it was. The others allowed Frostheart Grueburn to encourage them by rubbing their arms and shoulders.
Awakened, Liand followed Covenant’s example until the blur of prostration faded from his eyes. Then he labored awkwardly to his feet and peered at Linden, scrutinizing her to convince himself that she was physically unharmed. Briefly he watched Coldspray tilt water from Latebirth’s flask down Linden’s throat. His open nature concealed none of his apprehension.
A moment later, however, he shook himself and turned away. Summoning a fraught smile, he waved reassurance at Pahni. When she waved back, he paused to confirm that his Sunstone had been returned to the pouch at his waist. Then he began to look for a manageable ascent so that he could join the young Cord.
As Stormpast Galesend nudged Anele, Covenant warned her, “Keep him on that armor. I don’t know enough about him.” He had forgotten too much. “This sand—It used to be stone. Maybe it’s safe. Or maybe it’ll show Kastenessen where we are.”
In any case, Kastenessen was not the only dire being who might notice or enter the old man if he stood on sand baked dry.
“Indeed, Timewarden,” Galesend agreed. “Having borne him so far, and at such cost, I have grown fond of our Anele. There is valor concealed within his derangement. I pray that the day will come when the same may be said of Longwrath.”
Holding Anele in place, she tugged her armor across the gully-bottom toward the nearest water. Fortunately he did not try to jerk free, in spite of his eagerness to drink. Weakened as she was, she might not have been able to control him. But he seemed content to sit in his cradle and let her pull him along.
The Ardent had been the first to thrust his face into a basin; but he was among the last to struggle upright. For a while, he simply stood, unfurling his ribbands tentatively; studying his damaged raiment. The flesh of his face sagged, and depletions more profound than thirst dulled his gaze.
Eventually, however, he mustered a semblance of resolve. Tottering on his wrapped legs, he came effortfully toward Covenant and Linden, Coldspray and Stave and Branl.
He may have meant to bow, but he managed only a dip of his head. Some of his ribbands trailed like exhaustion across the sand as he braced himself to speak.
“A pitiful end to my former pride,” he began. “Doubtless I should name myself gratified. While the Earth endures, no other Insequent will assert that their deeds have equaled mine, or that they have witnessed the wonders which I have beheld. In all sooth, however, I am mortified. Aye, mortified, and also grieved. My many fears and insufficiencies have proven costly. As I near my end, my life comes to naught but this, that you and your companions endure to meet further trials without my aid. In itself, it is a fine accomplishment. Oh, assuredly both fine and fitting. I must crave your pardon that I am not gladdened by it.”
Covenant stared. He was about to say, You saved our lives. What more do your people want from you? But the Ardent continued without pausing.
“Here our paths part, Timewarden, though there remains one service which I hope to perform for you, should the Insequent consent to prolong my life. When I have gathered myself, I will depart, praying that I will return, albeit briefly.”
In sudden alarm, Covenant protested, “Wait a minute. Don’t go anywhere. We have too much to talk about.” Inwardly he winced whenever someone called him Timewarden. He had too many titles. They were prophecies which he could not fulfill.
But the Ardent had just said, As I near my end—What the hell was going on? What had Covenant missed?
Temporizing as he tried to gather his scattered thoughts, he asked, “Are you going to abandon us? Now?” While Linden remained unconscious; irreducibly vulnerable? “When we haven’t even started looking for a way to resist the Worm?” She had swallowed some of the water that Coldspray had given her. The rest had spilled from the corners of her mouth. Beneath their lids, her eyes continued their nightmare dance. “Have you actually completed your geas? Is that all your people care about? Imposing scruples on the Harrow and making sure he kept his promises? Is that all you care about?”
The Ardent fluttered his hands uncomfortably. “Timewarden, no. But as you are not Insequent, you cannot be aware that the various oracular visions of my people have been rendered meaningless. On one matter, those who possess the knowledge to scry have been in accord. As one, they have foreseen that the lady’s fate is writ in water. Thus it transpired that when she and the ur-viles released floods within Gravin Threndor, all auguries were washed away.”
While Covenant and Coldspray studied him, the Ardent explained, “Electing to unite their strengths, the Insequent foresaw many eventualities, but the Harrow’s death was not among them. Nor was the lady’s deed. For his death, there is a cost which need not concern you. Her valor is another matter. Unleashing torrents, she has altered the course of every heuristic effort. The outcome of both—of the lady’s extremity as of the Harrow’s passing—is that I have no further purpose at your side, or at hers.
“By my weakness on behalf of the Insequent, the most necessary stricture of our lives has been violated. Now the fate of all things has become undecipherable. The Insequent will not intrude themselves when every road has been made fluid and they have no knowledge to guide them.”
“How?” Covenant scowled in bafflement. The sun seemed to have become suddenly hotter. Sweat stood on his forehead as if he were straining every muscle. “I don’t understand. You’re saying the last thing Linden did before she collapsed changed everything? How is that possible?”
The Ardent lifted begrimed bands of fabric in a shrug. “I know not. The Insequent know not. We know only that some uncertainty too profound for our interpretation has been wrought. You sail uncharted seas, Timewarden. In this, the last crisis of the Earth, I can no longer stand at your side.”
“Stone and Sea!” the Ironhand rasped. “These are riddles, Insequent. You mock our incomprehension. Do you conceive that we will content ourselves with chaff when the Earth’s last crisis, as you have named it, demands true knowledge?”
“Giant,” replied the Ardent mildly, “I expect neither content nor discontent. With respect, assuredly—with grave respect, finding worth in all that you have done—I merely request recognition that I am honest. I proffer no true knowledge because I possess none. The auguries of the Insequent have been swept aside. Therefore the counsels of your own hearts must suffice to chart your courses.”
“Thus,” Branl stated, “wisdom comes at last to the Insequent.” To Covenant and Coldspray, he added, “We have misliked his presence from the first. We will not grieve his departure.”
Covenant stifled an impulse to reprimand the Humbled. The Ardent’s efforts on the company’s behalf were beyond aspersion. But the Unbeliever had too many questions. He was beginning to suspect—
Grinding his teeth, he commanded the Ardent, “Then tell me. Why here? Why didn’t you take us to the Upper Land? That’s where most of our enemies are. What’s the point of bringing us here?”
“Aye,” assented Rime Coldspray. “This region is unknown to us. The tales of the Giants of the Search do not speak of it. We cannot estimate its perils. It obscures our purposes.”
“The Lower Land is known to the Humbled,” Branl stated flatly. “We will estimate its perils.” His manner dared Coldspray to contradict him.
Stave nodded in confirmation.
But the Ardent brushed past interruptions. “Ah, Timewarden.” For a moment, regret colored his weariness. “Do you wish me to concede that I have failed you as I failed the Harrow? Alas, that is to some extent sooth. It was my wish to convey you a number of leagues farther.”
“Why?” Covenant insisted.
“Sadly,” the Insequent continued, “my strength did not equal my intent. Also the powers of the croyel opposed me, hampering my endeavors.” Uncoiling a few ribbands, he gestured around him. “Yet this region has virtues which you will assuredly discern.
“First, you are spared the diminishment of Kevin’s Dirt. To you, Timewarden, this is a gift of small import. Nonetheless true discernment has great worth to your companions.
“Second, I have attained for you an interval of safety, brief though it may be. Both upon the Upper Land and within Gravin Threndor, it is to the north and west that your foes have gathered their ferocity. Here they cannot immediately fall upon you. They must first bypass Mount Thunder and traverse some three score leagues. You are foolhardy, Timewarden, but you are also wise. In your present straits, you will not disdain any respite.”
In that, Covenant knew, the Ardent was right. But the absence of Kevin’s Dirt was counter-balanced by the difficulties of the terrain; by the comparative scarcity of water and the complete lack of food. If his companions were forced to forage near the Sarangrave—
Linden’s condition, and his inability to relieve her, goaded Covenant to anger. Yet his ire was wasted here, unless he directed it at himself: a defense against mourning. With an effort, he softened the edges of his voice.
“You said you were trying to go farther. You must have a reason. If you can’t tell us anything else, you ought to be able to tell us why. What would we gain if you’d succeeded?”
The Ardent sighed lugubriously. “To that question, Timewarden, you must provide your own reply. Have I not said that I am unable to guide you? As the Dead were silent in precious Andelain—as you yourself were silent—so must I be silent now.”
Before Covenant could object, the Insequent added, “I may observe, however, that caesures flourish in abundance across the Spoiled Plains. Betimes they afflict Horrim Carabal, that wight which is known to you as the lurker of the Sarangrave. Thus the marshes and wetlands of Sarangrave Flat are provoked to heights of menace without precedent in the ages of the Lower Land.”
Covenant groaned to himself; but he was not surprised. The Ardent spoke of things which he should have been able to remember. Indirectly the Ardent may have been trying to prod his memories. You need the ring, Covenant had told Linden in the Verge of Wandering. It feeds the caesures.
If Falls flourished “in abundance” on the Lower Land, there might be more than one explanation.
“This lurker is named in our tales,” growled the Ironhand. “The Giants of the Search encountered its might. Speak of this, Insequent, if you will reveal naught else. Does the lurker threaten us now? Is that evil able to extend its many arms across the barrenness of this region?”
The Ardent studied Covenant, apparently waiting for his permission to answer Coldspray. When Covenant said nothing, however, the acolyte of the Mahdoubt turned to the Ironhand.
“Assuredly it cannot. Horrim Carabal is a creature of waters and swamplands, and of the bitter effluence of Gravin Threndor’s banes. Its demesne is vast, yet it is bound by its enlivening poisons. The lurker may inhabit any of Sarangrave Flat’s currents or stagnancies. Nonetheless its might is greatest among the snares and chimeras of Lifeswallower, and it has revealed no theurgy to reach beyond its borders.”
If his reply eased Coldspray’s mind, her mien did not show it. Nevertheless she bowed to him somberly. “Never doubt our gratitude, Insequent. We have given scant thanks for your labors, but that is solely because we are worn and afraid, knowing that our own fate is now written in water. If ever we are granted opportunity to speak of you in full, as Giants do, our tale will make plain what is in our hearts. For the present, I name you ‘Rockbrother’ in friendship and homage. While we live, no iota of your valor and service will be forgotten.”
The Ardent bowed, exhibiting his raiment like war-torn pennons; hiding his face. His posture seemed to suggest that he might weep.
Linden needed the krill to restrain the croyel.
Without Loric’s blade, Covenant was helpless.
Grimly he shook off the confusion of his memories. They were too damaged to be useful.
“Oh, hell,” he muttered to the Ardent as though he had no cause to share the Ironhand’s gratitude. “Let’s pretend I understand what we’re doing here. Your auguries must be good for something. Otherwise we wouldn’t still be alive. But we have a more immediate problem.
“Can you help Linden? Can you reach her? I don’t know what she’s doing to herself. Maybe she’s healing. Or maybe she thinks she failed, and she torturing—” The thought choked him for a moment. “I’m afraid the longer she stays like this, the worse it’s going to be when she wakes up.” If she woke at all. “Can you help her find her way back?”
“That reply, also,” sighed the Ardent, “you must discover within yourself.” His tone was wan with fatigue or sorrow. “The lady has gone beyond my ken. I can neither aid nor counsel you.” He hesitated, then offered as if he were forcing himself, “I perceive only that her need for death is great. Or perchance the need is her son’s. But do I speak of her death, or of her son’s? Does her plight, or his, require the deaths of others? Such matters have become fluid. Every current alters them. I am able to appease none of your fears.
“If I do not depart, Timewarden, I cannot return.”
Deliberately he took a step backward, trying to forestall protests or interference.
But Covenant strode in pursuit. “Stop! We aren’t done.”
Long ago, Linden had told him about her parents: he already knew enough about her need for death—or for an answer to it. Nevertheless the Ardent had left too many hints in the air.
“Timewarden?” The Insequent’s eyes glistened in his flushed face.
“None of this is as simple as you make it sound,” Covenant rasped. “You have something at stake, something you don’t want to talk about. You said you’re nearing your end.”—my life comes to naught but this—“You’ve done everything for us, more than we could have hoped for, but there’s something else going on for you. Something about the Harrow.” For his death, there is a cost which need not concern you. “I want to know what that is. If you’ve doomed yourself somehow, don’t you think we have a right to understand what your help is costing you?”
The Ardent squirmed. “You inquire into private matters, Timewarden. They are my burden, not yours. I wish to bear them with some semblance of dignity.”
“In that case,” Covenant retorted, “you have a misplaced sense of dignity. We aren’t dead yet. Someday these Giants hope to tell your tale. Hellfire, I want to be able to tell it myself. If that day ever comes, we owe it to you to tell the truth.”
The beribboned man scanned the sides of the gully as if he were looking for an escape. “You search me, Timewarden, to my great discomfiture. And I say again that I cannot return if I do not depart.” Then, hesitantly, his gaze met Covenant’s. “Yet I must acknowledge my shame. My fault cannot be pardoned if I do not speak of it.
“Briefly, then.”
Bracing himself on strips of fabric, the Ardent began.
“When our seers and oracles had cast their auguries, and had conceived of their geas concerning the Harrow’s purpose, they saw at once that their course was perilous. I have cited the reasoning by which my people justified their intent. But that reasoning was flawed. Oh, assuredly. It rested upon a specious distinction between mere imposition and true interference, a distinction too readily effaced by events.
“To lessen the peril, therefore, the geas was made twofold, first to impose the lady’s interpretation of his oath upon the Harrow, and thereafter to assist in the fruition of his designs. By such aid, the Insequent hoped to appease or counteract any violation of the most necessary stricture of our lives.
“Yet even then, none consented to undertake the task. The hazard of interference was deemed too great. The most valorous and mighty among us declined to shoulder such jeopardy. Therefore I claimed it in their stead.”
The Ardent sighed. “I am young as the ages of Insequent are counted, blithe and self-satisfied withal, as you have assuredly observed. But you have also noted that I am timorous. In my hunger for the singular and unprecedented, I have heretofore eschewed all things which affrighted me. Thus I had no apt conception of my danger, or of yours, or of the sorrow which might ensue from my choice. Instead I rejoiced in my acquired stature among the Insequent.
“I am an acolyte of the Mahdoubt,” he explained as he had in Andelain, pleading to be understood—or perhaps to be forgiven. “My intent was kindly. My particular greed is ever unsatisfied. And being young, I was complacent in my ignorance. I claimed the will of the Insequent without regard to its cost.
“Yet I did not complete my task. I failed my geas and you and the wide Earth. Lost among the entrancements of the Viles, and appalled by the horrors of the Lost Deep, I left the Harrow to confront his foes without my aid. Thus I permitted his death and the defeat of his designs. By timidity and weakness, I created true interference from the sophistry of imposition.
“Now I must meet the doom which I have wrought for myself. When the last powers of my people are withdrawn from me, I will pass away, leaving naught to vindicate my life except your continuance among the living.”
Oh, hell! Shaken, Covenant tried to find a response. He had guessed—But he had also hoped that he was wrong.
Weakly he protested, “It doesn’t have to be this way.”
“Indeed?” The Ardent fluttered his clothes in disbelief. “How not, Timewarden?”
Covenant scrambled to muster an argument. “If your people can keep you alive for one more service, they can keep you alive indefinitely. Tell them we need you. Tell them we aren’t going to survive without you. Damnation! Tell them they aren’t going to survive if you don’t help us. The whole Earth—”
“Timewarden.” Gently the Ardent reproved Covenant. “That also is sophistry. Have I not spoken of fate and water? The Insequent will not credit such an avowal. I myself do not.
“Our strictures are necessary to us. Without them, we cannot be who we are.”
Before anyone else had a chance to object, the Ardent swirled his apparel and vanished as if he had been disincarnated.
—the doom which I have wrought—
At some point in the distant past, Covenant had heard someone say, There is no doom so black or deep that courage and clear sight may not find another truth beyond it. But he could not imagine what that truth might be.
029
After the Ardent’s departure, Covenant found himself thinking obsessively about water.—writ in water.—currents and stagnancies—The basins of armor did not suffice. They could not. Only the Ironhand, Grueburn, and the Ramen had been able to drink directly from the stream, wherever it was. Like Covenant and—presumably—Linden, the others remained raw with thirst.
He tried to distract himself by remembering as much as he could about the lurker, Sarangrave Flat, and the Spoiled Plains. But he flinched away when his efforts led him to Kurash Qwellinir and Hotash Slay; to the ruins of Foul’s Creche. He was not ready, and had no power.
Water was life.
It was also erosion. Terrible storms. Downpours and floods with the force to rive mountains. Tidal waves.
And in the pellucid refreshment of Glimmermere: baptism.
Aching, Covenant wished that the Ardent had been able to take him there. With Linden. So that she might return from her suffering to something clean and Earthpowerful; redolent of love.
Wishing accomplished nothing.
Fortunately Manethrall Mahrtiir was more pragmatic. When he had assayed the company for a while, he announced, “We also must depart. Though this terrain is tainted, the stream which the Cords found is fresh from the rains of spring. And the distance is not great. It seems far only because we are weak. There we may sate our thirst entirely, and bathe, and rest. When we have done so, mayhap we will be better able to confront the conundrum of our straits.”
“Aye,” said Rime Coldspray. “The Manethrall counsels wisely, as he has ever done. I regret that we”—she gestured around at her comrades—“are too much wearied to bear any burdens but ourselves. Nonetheless the stream is goodly, as the Manethrall has said, and plentiful. Also its environs will afford us a measure of shade.”
Covenant nodded. He had nothing else to suggest. Nothing at all.
But Stave looked up at Coldspray. “What of Anele? You have not witnessed the hurts which he endures—or which he inflicts—when he is possessed. On barren ground, he becomes the receptacle and expression of Kastenessen’s fury. He cannot walk to the stream. We cannot ask it of him.”
Coldspray looked away. “The Humbled—”
“He fears them,” Stave stated. “He will not willingly suffer their touch.”
As if to confirm Stave’s assertion, Anele cowered; covered his head with his arms; moaned through his teeth.
The Ironhand sighed. “Then I will carry him, if the Masters will consent to bear my armor.”
Branl agreed without hesitation. He, Galt, and Clyme knew as much as Stave did about the dangers that crowded around Anele when he stood on any surface except stone.
“In that case,” Covenant said vaguely, “we should get started.” The sun seemed unnaturally hot; unfamiliar to his nerves. “I sweat too much. I need more water.”
He wanted to carry Linden himself. He yearned to hold her, protect her—and had no desire to shirk his responsibility for what she had undergone. But he did not have the strength. Stave could have taken her to the stream at a run: Covenant would probably collapse under her within a hundred steps.
Around him, the Giants readied themselves. Coldspray lifted Anele from Stormpast Galesend’s cataphract, supported him as gently as she could. Frostheart Grueburn helped Galesend don her armor: then Galesend helped Grueburn. At Mahrtiir’s command, Bhapa, Pahni, and Liand positioned themselves to watch the horizons while Clyme and Branl accepted the weight of Coldspray’s stone. Gripping the krill, Galt impelled Jeremiah into motion.
Covenant took Linden’s blackened Staff for himself. He could not use it, and did not mean to try. But he could support himself with it. It might keep him on his feet. And he hoped that its inherent participation in Earthpower and Law might lessen the likelihood that he would stumble into a mental crevasse.
Arduously the company began to move.
030
For a time, they trudged across an uneven flatland like an ancient flood-plain long desiccated: bleached soil streaked with ochre and dun, crystalline white and hints of verdigris, veins the color of rust; small hillocks and the remains of creek-beds; lonely interruptions of harsh grass. Gradually the breeze mounted until it raised delicate plumes of dust like feathers from the heels of Covenant’s boots, the feet and sandals of his companions. That was a blessing and a curse. Cooling his face, it increased his loss of moisture. By degrees, his vision blurred until he could no longer identify Coldspray’s and Grueburn’s earlier trail.
But then the Ironhand indicated a line of low hills sculpted by ages of wind and the hard use of armies until they resembled the contorted bones of titans. There, she explained, lay the barrier which had turned the stream from its former course. Among those hills, running crookedly along shallow valleys like furrows plowed by a drunkard, was the stream: water in abundance.
“In another season, mayhap,” she added hoarsely, “the flow from the Upper Land would not suffice for our needs. But the rains have been bountiful, as we observed during our pursuit of Longwrath. Hereafter we will doubtless fear many things. For the present, however, we need no longer fear thirst.”
Covenant may have nodded. Or not: he was not paying attention. Instead he kept his gaze fixed on Stave’s back as if he expected to see the former Master’s shoulders slump; see Stave drop Linden—
Stupid, he muttered to himself. If necessary, Stave would keep on walking until the world ended. Reflexively, however, Covenant gauged his companions by the standard of his own weakness; and so he dreaded the worst.
Water, he insisted in silence. Water was the answer. How? He did not know. Perhaps he had not truly understood anything since Esmer had allowed the company to escape from She Who Must Not Be Named. Nevertheless he chose to believe in water. Hell, he had to believe in something. Didn’t he?
If he could not save Linden, he would not be able to save anyone.
But Bhapa and Pahni had served their companions well. When the Cords had located the stream, they had also scouted an easy route through the hills. Although Covenant and some of the Giants stumbled occasionally as they ascended from the plain, they did not lose their footing.
Above them, Liand and the Cords scrambled from crest to crest, keeping watch. Liand stayed to the left, the south. More skilled than he, Bhapa and Pahni studied the north: the direction from which any threat was likely to come.
Coldspray carried Anele with her teeth set and defiance in her gait, daring the old man to become too heavy for her. A few paces ahead of her, Jeremiah trudged upward, Galt’s hand on his shoulder and the croyel’s cruelty on his back. The boy’s steps were as unsteady as Covenant’s, but Jeremiah gave no sign of flagging. As long as the creature dreamed of rescue, its host could probably out-walk everyone except the Haruchai.
A gradual descent. Another rise. Twisted by the shape of the hills, bursts of dust as transient as wraiths skirled around the legs of the company. Here and there, stubborn granite and weary bits of sandstone protruded through their cloaks of dirt, grit, and shale.
“Soon,” Coldspray panted through her teeth. “Soon.” But no one responded.
Whenever Covenant shambled into a stretch of shade, gloom thickened around him as if his eyes were failing. Courage, he thought. Clear sight. Ha! Such things were figments: he could no longer recall them. Yet he did not allow himself to fall behind Stave. Linden needed him. Or she would need him eventually. Or she would need her Staff. Weakness was only weakness, after all: he remembered that. It was as human as thirst, and as compulsory. But it was nothing more. Like pain, it could be endured.
If he did not intend to endure, why was he here at all?
There may have been more climbing, more descents. He had lost track. Voices carried along the eddying breeze like the distant cries of ghosts. Then he found himself standing in a gap like a rounded trough between hills pale with age. Through a smear of dehydration, he gazed down at the stream.
Under the wide sky and the sunlight, it looked like chrism.
A short way below him, the current hastened around a curve in a small canyon, muttering irritably against the rock wall on its far side. Here the watercourse was little more than a ravine, but wide enough to leave a swath of ground like a shore within the stream’s curve. Where the trough leaned down to the water, opening its arms as though to embrace the current, lay a wide expanse of sand interrupted by weather-softened boulders.
Impelled by the pressure of the sun, Covenant descended as if he were falling.
Stave and Linden were ahead of him. Coldspray and Anele. Galt with Jeremiah. Mahrtiir. Two other Giants. At a word from the Manethrall, Liand scrambled down the hillside, abandoning for the moment his watch on the south. But Covenant regarded none of them. Stiff-kneed and ungainly, he dropped Linden’s Staff on the sand, stumbled to the water’s edge, and lurched into the stream as if his legs had eroded under him.
How had he been reduced to this? How much of himself had he lost?
Golden boy with feet of clay
Plunging face-first into the Upper Land’s runoff, he drank. To his parched nerves, the water tasted as pure as rain. It felt like bliss.
Let me help you on your way.
When he needed air, he found the sand and stone of the streambed, pushed himself upright. Anointed with relief, he gasped words that made no sense. They may have been promises or prophecies—or castigations. Splashing in the current, he scrubbed at his arms, his face, his hair; washed away as much strain as he could.
A proper push will take you far—
Then he ducked his head and drank again. The Land’s rich blessings had found him even here.
But what a clumsy lad you are!
Water was the answer. It was. He did not understand it, but he was sure.
Finally he raised his head, wiped streams from his eyes, and took stock of the company.
As far as he could tell, Liand and most of the Giants had already swallowed their fill. Branl had assumed the Cords’ watch so that they could rejoin their Manethrall. Now Galesend accepted Anele from Coldspray, freeing the Ironhand to drink again. With flasks empty of diamondraught, Halewhole Bluntfist supplied Anele while Latebirth tilted Jeremiah’s head back and poured water into his slack mouth. In spite of his dissociation, Jeremiah gulped eagerly. When Latebirth refilled her vessel, he drained it again. Clearly the croyel’s magicks did not meet all of his body’s needs.
Of course, Covenant thought as he studied the boy. Why else had Jeremiah required the attendance of the skest? The croyel’s power to keep him alive had limits.
Finally Covenant turned his attention to Linden.
She still hung, dream-ridden and whimpering, in the cradle of Stave’s arms. Near the water’s edge, the former Master stood as if he were prepared to bear the cost of her mortality until the end of Time. But his fidelity would not save her: Covenant was sure of that. Like her son, she would remain lost within herself until someone or something intervened.
That was Covenant’s task. He could not ask anyone else to attempt it for him. He was alive because of her.
If he did not act soon, her nightmares might claim her permanently.
Sodden and dripping, he sloshed out of the stream. Strange that he was still weak. He had forgotten too much about being human—His flesh needed time to recover from its ordeals. It trembled for rest and food.
But he did not believe that Linden could afford to wait.
Facing Stave with water in his eyes, he said, “Let me take her.”
The Haruchai cocked an eyebrow. “Ur-Lord?”
Quickly Rime Coldspray stepped forward. “Is this wise? What is your intent, Covenant Timewarden?”
Clyme drew closer. He may have thought that Covenant wanted or needed his support.
Covenant did not glance up at the Ironhand. “I’m going to carry her downstream,” he told Stave. “Out of sight.” Beyond a bulge in the hillside that looked too rugged for his wan strength. “I should be alone with her when I wake her up. She won’t like having an audience.”
He was confident of that. But he also desired privacy for his own sake. What he had in mind would be hurtful enough without witnesses. And no doubt Stave would stop him, if no one else reacted swiftly enough.
“Ha!” grunted Coldspray. “Sadly I fear that your weakened frame is unequal to the task. I foresee falling and broken limbs. No doubt inadvertently, you may both meet harm.”
“I know that,” Covenant retorted. “But I can’t reach her unless we’re alone. I need that.” I love her. “So does she.” With more ire than assurance, he added, “When I’ve brought her back,” if he succeeded, “she’ll tell you I did the right thing.”
Surely she hated where she was? Loathed and feared it?
“Then,” suggested the Ironhand, “permit Stave to bear her to a place of your choosing. There he will part from you, that you may do what you must.”
Covenant braced himself to accept this compromise; but Stave said without hesitation, “I will not.”
Ignoring the apprehension around him, Covenant looked at no one except the former Master. “Are you sure? How far are you willing to go with this? Are you ready to say you don’t trust me? After everything your people and I have been through together? Hellfire, Stave! She needs me. I have to be alone with her.”
Stave met Covenant’s glare. “Nonetheless.” Nothing in the Haruchai’s mien hinted that he could be moved. “I stand with the Chosen. Come good or ill, boon or bane, I will not forsake her.”
“Stave,” Mahrtiir interposed quietly. His tone did not imply a reprimand. “There is no test of devotion here. The first Ringthane’s desires do not lessen you. The question is one of weakness, not of intent. I, too, deem that his strength does not suffice to bear her. Yet it is certain that she must be restored to us. If he seeks to be alone with her, where is the hurt? You do not forsake her if you assist him to strive for her return as he sees fit.”
“Nonetheless,” Stave repeated.
Cursing to himself, Covenant offered, “Pahni can come with us. She can watch from a distance.” He might be able to bear his shame and chagrin if he believed that the young Cord was too far away to interfere. “She’ll call for help if Linden needs it.”
Roughly he asserted, “It would be better if you just let me take her.”
He knew that Coldspray and Mahrtiir were right. He was not strong enough. But the struggle to carry Linden over the rocks would be of use to him. It would prepare him—
Flatly Clyme averred, “The Humbled stand with the Unbeliever, as we have declared. If you oppose him, Stave, we will counter you. We will bear Linden Avery in your stead, enforcing the ur-Lord’s seclusion with her.”
“No, you won’t,” Covenant snapped immediately. Wheeling away from Stave, he raised his maimed fists at the Humbled. “Bloody damnation! We’re not going to fight about this. There’s too much at stake, and we’re all needed.”
Clyme’s straight stare gave nothing; surrendered nothing. But he did not contradict the Unbeliever.
Trembling, Covenant turned back to Stave. “You trust me,” he said as steadily as he could, “or you don’t. I respect that. I don’t like it, but I respect it. If you can’t leave me alone with her, we’ll just have to wait for her to wake up on her own.”
Liand had approached until he reached the Manethrall’s side. There he clasped Pahni’s hand. “Stave,” he said like a plea. “I comprehend nothing here. I grasp only that you are Linden’s friend, entirely true to her. For her sake, will you not relent?
“Both she and Thomas Covenant are closed to me. Yet I believe that there is love between them. She did not draw him back from death merely because he was silent before her, or because she feared for her son, or because she considered herself inadequate to the Land’s doom. She restored him to life and the living for this reason also, that she loves him. Can you not conceive that his wish to restore her in turn is no less loving—and no less needful?”
Stave held Covenant’s gaze like a challenge. “And if he has other motives as well, as she did? What then, Stonedownor?”
“Stone and Sea!” muttered the Ironhand. “You judge too severely, Haruchai.” Her tone was heavy with impatience. “All who live have other motives as well. Of a certainty, my comrades and I do. We do not serve Linden Giantfriend alone—or Covenant Timewarden with her. In addition, we seek the meaning of our own lives. We wish to measure ourselves against the perils of these times. For the survival of our kind, also, we must strive against ruin with our whole hearts. And we have not forgotten Lostson Longwrath. We crave some reply to his pain.
“I do not doubt that something similar may be said of the Ramen. The Stonedownor’s heart is conflicted within him, though his loves are as pure as any. And the old man, whom we have learned to cherish, is a snake’s nest of disturbed motives.
“Therefore Giants seek to tell tales fully. We desire to scant no portion of the rich complication of lives and hearts. Joy is in the ears that hear, not in the mouth that speaks.”
With her fists on her hips, Coldspray asked, “For this reason, Stave, I urge you to examine yourself. I cast no shadow upon your lealty. It is as untrammeled as the sun. But is it not also plausible that your present contention lies, not between you and Covenant Timewarden, but rather between you and these Humbled? Having been spurned by them, do you not now spurn them in his person?”
Several of the Swordmainnir murmured their agreement. In contrast, Mahrtiir scowled as if he were vexed on Stave’s behalf. Bhapa studied the stream, concealing his opinion. Liand and Pahni held each other tensely.
But Covenant sagged as though he had been defeated. He had not intended to subject Stave to this. Concentrating on Linden’s plight and his own rue, he had not considered that his need to be alone with her would test the former Master. And he knew the strict pride of the Haruchai too well.
Like Linden, apparently, he could not endeavor to accomplish good without questionable means.
Stave’s countenance revealed nothing. The scar where he had lost his left eye seemed to preclude any expression. When he spoke, his reply took Covenant by surprise.
“You gauge me justly, Giant. I do not recant my concern. I mislike it that the ur-Lord does not name the nature of his intent. How will he retrieve the Chosen from her travails? He does not say.
“Yet I acknowledge that I’m prideful, though I have been taught much regarding humility. And I have learned that pride is a false guide. I will accede to the ur-Lord’s wishes. If the Humbled perceive my consent as submission—” He shrugged, lifting Linden slightly. “They are Masters, misled by mistaken devoir.”
A sigh of relief breathed among the gathered companions. For a moment, Covenant felt unaccountably weaker, as if the sun had already begun to leech the fluid from his veins. Nevertheless he forced himself to respond as if he trusted himself.
“In that case,” he said hoarsely, “we should go now. The sooner the better. I don’t know what’s happening to her in there, but it scares me.”
Stave’s nod seemed to imply an unbegrudged bow.
The Manethrall cleared his throat. “Cord Pahni, when the first Ringthane has found a place which satisfies his purpose, you will do as he instructs. Until then, you will watch over his weakness. No harm can befall Linden Avery in Stave’s arms, but Thomas Covenant is vulnerable to misstep. Your first task is to ward him.”
Pahni cast a troubled glance at Liand; but she did not hesitate. “As you command, Manethrall.”
At last, Covenant remembered that he was no longer holding Linden’s Staff. Awkwardly he reclaimed it from the sand. “In case she needs it,” he explained to no one in particular. Then he told Stave and Pahni, “Let’s go. I’m not getting any stronger.”
He would need a certain kind of weakness: the kind that inspired desperation.
Turning downstream, he started toward the hillside bulging with rocks which blocked the eastward watercourse from view.
As both Pahni and Stave joined him, the Giants parted to let them pass. Stave bore Linden with familiar ease. Some dark emotion cast a shadow across Pahni’s features, but she did not allow it to interfere with her attentiveness.
As Covenant neared the first rise, he heard Anele’s voice. Instinctively he turned his head; saw Anele sitting in the basin of Stormpast Galesend’s breastplate. With one hand, the old man stroked the inner surface of the armor. The other he brushed back and forth through the sand, making trails like glyphs or sigils.
Pronouncing each word distinctly, Anele said, “This stone does not recall Linden Avery, Chosen Earthfriend. Yet Anele does. The world will not see her like again.”
The old man’s words followed Covenant like a prediction of failure as he began clambering along the hillside.—not see her like again. If he failed to rouse Linden, he would make a prophet of Anele.
Distracted, he stumbled; might have fallen. But Pahni caught his arm. After a moment like imminent panic, he remembered the importance of paying attention to where he was and what he did; of watching where he set his feet, being ready to use his hands. As he worked his way among the rocks, he reverted to the neglected disciplines of his disease, the care required by leprosy.
His eyes told him that some of the stones had been weathered smooth while others remained rough and jagged; hazardous. His hands did not. He could not be confident of his grip when he tried to secure his balance on a rock, or on Linden’s Staff. Among the obstacles of the slope, he saw patches of dirt parched to the hue of straw; slides of shale so old that they had forgotten their original colors. Gradually his life contracted until it contained little except places to put his feet and hands. He hardly noticed Stave’s progress above him on the hillside, Pahni’s watchfulness, the gentle twisting of the breeze, or the vexed mutter of the stream.
For a time, he did not think about Linden or fear.
Laboring, he crested the first rise. As he started down the far side, the rest of the company fell out of sight behind him. Beyond this slope, the next hill looked easier. Already he felt weak enough for any amount of desperation. Nonetheless he was not ready.
Perhaps he would never be ready: not for this. Beyond the shallower climb of the second hillside, past the second writhe of the watercourse, he found what he sought. Below him, the stream curved into and then away from a narrow scallop of sand at the foot of an empty arroyo. And as the current ran onward, it was constricted between bluff facets of granite. There, where the flow tumbled against stone, it had spent long ages of runoff gnawing at its bed until it had formed a pool of deeper water.
From his position above the stream, the pool’s depth made the water look dark; almost bottomless. It might have been a well that reached into the heart of the Lower Land.
Ah, hell, he thought. Bloody damnation. But he did not stop. Supported by Pahni and the Staff of Law, he accompanied Stave down to the sand at the stream’s edge.
Golden boy with feet of clay.
Chary of hesitation, he dropped the Staff unceremoniously and turned to scan the northern ridgeline. After a moment, he spotted a squat boulder the size of a hut propped against the horizon.
“That big rock,” he told Pahni. His voice rasped in his throat. “You can watch from there.” For her sake, he added, “Trust your instincts. If you think we need help, call Stave.”
She was Ramen; but Stave was Haruchai. He would respond more swiftly.
Doubt and determination flitted like spectres across the background of the Cord’s gaze. “I will abide by your desires,” she replied, “as my Manethrall has commanded.” Then her expression sharpened. “And I will heed the counsels of my heart.”
At once, she spun away and began to ascend the hillside. Lithe and graceful, she appeared to glide upward in spite of her weariness.
Now, Covenant ordered himself. Now or never. Do it.
If he became any weaker, he would fall on his face.
Extending his arms, he faced Stave. “Out of sight,” he said like a man who could hardly stand. “Behind Pahni’s boulder, if you want. With your senses, you’ll probably know what happens as soon as she does. But I want you to wait until she warns you. Trust me as long as you can. Or trust her.
“You can’t care about Linden any more than I do. And you don’t need her as badly.”
Stave regarded him. “You believe that the Cord will call out. You are certain that I will sense peril.”
Covenant met Stave’s gaze, and held out his arms, and said nothing further.
After a moment, Stave surrendered Linden to Covenant’s unsteady clasp. Without pausing, the former Master turned and strode after Pahni. Like her, he seemed to move more effortlessly than Covenant could imagine.
Apparently he trusted Covenant that far. At least as far as the boulder. Perhaps his Haruchai intransigence would unbend enough to let Covenant succeed or fail.
Trembling with strain, Covenant watched Stave and Pahni mount the slope. Ignoring his frailty, he stood where he was until the Cord reached the boulder he had indicated; until Stave disappeared behind it. Then, one small wrenched step at a time, Covenant started toward the stream.
His feet were numb: he could not feel his way. Instead he simply assumed that the sand shelved down gradually. Relying on blind luck or the Land’s providence, he lurched into the current.
As directly as he could, he headed toward the pool of deeper water. The well—
Fortune blessed him. His boots did not begin to strike unseen rocks until the stream had accepted a portion of Linden’s weight. With that assistance, he was able to keep his balance when he stumbled.
He did not look at her face. If he allowed himself to gaze upon her helplessness now, to regard the loved lines of her nose and mouth, the fraught tension of her brow, he feared that his resolve would crumble. The taut dance of her eyes behind their lids would unman him. He would lock his knees, stop moving, call for help, and weep.
Clenching his teeth until his jaws ached, he kept his eyes straight ahead and walked deeper.
As soon as the water reached his biceps, and he guessed that the streambed was about to drop away, he released Linden’s legs. Clamped his hand over her mouth. Pinched her nose with his truncated fingers.
Took a deep breath and dropped with her into the darkness.
When she finally began to struggle for air, he did not let her go.