Lord Foul's Bane

Twelve: Revelstone

THE pressure against his left cheek began slowly to wear his skin raw, and the pain nagged him up off the bottom of his slumber. Turbulence rushed under his head, as if he were pillowed on shoals. He laboured his way out of sleep. Then his cheek was jolted twice in rapid succession, and his resting place heaved. Pushing himself up, he smacked his head on a thwart of the boat. Pain throbbed in his skull. He gripped the thwart, swung himself away from the rib which had been rubbing his cheek, and sat up to look over the gunwales.

He found that the situation of the boat had changed radically. No shade or line or resonance of Andelainian richness remained in the surrounding terrain. On the northeast, the river was edged by a high, bluff rock wall. And to the west spread a grey and barren plain, a crippled wilderness like a vast battleground where more than men-had been slain, where the fire that scorched and the blood that drenched had blighted the ground's ability to revitalize itself, bloom again-an uneven despoiled lowland marked only by the scrub trees clinging to life along the river which poured into the Soulsease a few hundred yards ahead of the boat. The eastering wind carried an old burnt odour, and behind it lay the fetid memory of a crime.

Already, the river joining ahead troubled the Soulsease-knotted its current, stained its clarity with flinty mud-and Covenant had to grip the gunwales to keep his balance as the pitching of the boat increased.

Foamfollower held the boat in the centre of the river, away from the turmoil against the northeast rock wall. Covenant glanced back at the Giant. He was standing in the stern-feet widely braced, tiller clamped under his right arm. At Covenant's glance, he called over the mounting clash of the rivers, “Trothgard lies ahead! Here we turn north-the White River! The Grey comes from the west!” His voice had a strident edge to it, as if he had been singing as strongly as he could all night; but after a moment he sang out a fragment of a different song:

For we will not rest—

not turn aside,

lost faith,

or fail—

until the Grey flows Blue,

and Rill and Maerl are as new and clean

as ancient Llurallin.

The heaving of the river mounted steadily. Covenant stood in the bottom of the boat-bracing himself against one of the thwarts, gripping the gunwale-and watched the forced commingling of the clean and tainted waters. Then Foamfollower shouted, “One hundred leagues to the Westron Mountains Guards Gap and the high spring of the Llurallin and one hundred fifty southwest to the Last Hills and Garroting Deep! We are seventy from Lord's Keep!”

Abruptly, the river's moiling growl sprang louder, smothered the Giant's voice. An unexpected lash of the current caught the boat and tore its prow to the right, bringing it broadside to the stream. Spray slapped Covenant as the boat heeled over; instinctively, he threw his weight onto the left gunwale.

The neat instant, he heard a snatch of Foamfollower's plainsong, and felt power thrumming deeply along the keel. Slowly, the boat righted itself, swung into the current again.

But the near-disaster had carried them dangerously close to the northeast wall. The boat trembled with energy as Foamfollower worked it gradually back into the steadier water flowing below the main force of the Grey's current. Then the sensation of power faded from the keel.

“Your pardon!” the Giant shouted. “I am losing my seamanship!” His voice was raw with strain.

Covenant's knuckles were white from clenching the gunwales. As he bounced with the pitch of the boat, he remembered, There is only one good answer to death.

One good answer, he thought. This isn't it.

Perhaps it would be better if the boat capsized, tatter if he drowned-better if he did not carry Lord Foul's message halfhanded and beringed to Revelstone. He was not a hero. He could not satisfy such expectations.

“Now the crossing!” Foamfollower called. “We must pass the Grey to go on north. There is no great danger-except that I am weary. And the rivers are high.”

This time, Covenant turned and looked closely at the Giant. He saw now that Saltheart Foamfollower was suffering. His cheeks were sunken, hollowed as if something had gouged the geniality out of his face; and his cavernous eyes burned with taut, febrile volition. Weary? Covenant thought. More like exhausted. He lurched awkwardly from thwart to thwart until he reached the Giant. His eyes were no higher than Foamfollower's waist. He tipped his head back to shout, “I'll steer! You rest!”

A smile flickered on the Giant's lips. “I thank you. But no-you are not ready. I am strong enough. But please lift the diamondraught to me.”

Covenant opened the food sack and put his hands on the leather jug. Its weight and suppleness made it unwieldy for him, and the tossing of the boat unbalanced him. He simply could not lift the jug. But after a moment he got his arms under it. With a groan of exertion, he heaved it upward.

Foamfollower caught the neck of the jug neatly in his left hand. “Thank you, my friend,” he said with a ragged grin. Raising the jug to his mouth, he disregarded the perils of the current for a moment to drink deeply. Then he put down the jug and swung the boat toward the mouth of the Grey River.

Another surge of power throbbed through the craft. As it hit the main force of the Grey, Foamfollower turned downstream and angled across the flow. Energy quivered in the floorboards. In a smooth manoeuvre, Foamfollower reached the north side of the current, pivoted upstream with the backwash along the wall, and let it sling him into the untroubled White. Once he had rounded the northward curve, the roar of the joining began to drop swiftly behind the boat.

A moment later, the throb of power faded again. Sighing heavily, Foamfollower wiped the sweat from his face. His shoulders sagged, and his head bowed. With laboured slowness, he lowered the tiller, and at last dropped into the stern of the boat. “Ah, my friend,” he groaned, “even Giants are not made to do such things.”

Covenant moved to the centre of the boat and took a seat in the bottom, leaning against one of the sides. From that position, he could not see over the gunwales, but he was not at present curious about the terrain. He had other concerns. One of them was Foamfollower's condition. He did not know how the Giant had become so exhausted.

He tried to approach the question indirectly by saying, “That was neatly done. How did you do it? You didn't tell me what powers this thing.” And he frowned at the tactless sound of his voice.

“Ask for some other story,” Foamfollower sighed wearily. “That one is nearly as long as the history of the Land. I have no heart to teach you the meaning of life here.”

“You don't know any short stories,” responded Covenant.

At this, the Giant managed a wan smile. “Ah, that is true enough. Well, I will make it brief for you. But then you must promise to tell a story for me-something rare, that I will never guess for myself. I will need that, my friend.”

Covenant agreed with a nod, and Foamfollower said, “Well. Eat, and I will talk.”

Vaguely surprised at how hungry he was, Covenant tackled the contents of Foamfollower's sack. He munched meat and cheese rapidly, satisfied his thirst with tangerines. And while he ate, the Giant began in a voice flat with fatigue: "The time of Damelon Giantfriend came to an end in the Land before my people had finished the making of Coercri, their home in Seareach. They carved Lord's Keep, as men call it, out of the mountain's heart before they laboured on their own Lord-given land, and Loric was High Lord when Coercri was done. Then my forebearers turned their attention outward-to the Sunbirth Sea, and to the friendship of the Land.

“Now, both lillianrill and rhadhamaerl desired to study the lore of the Giants, and the time of High Lord Loric Vilesilencer was one of great growth for the lillianrill. To help in this growth, it was necessary for the Giants to make many sojourns to Lord's Keep” — he broke into a quiet chant, singing for a while as if in invocation of the old grandeur of Giantish reverence-"to mighty Revelstone. This was well, for it kept Revelstone bright in their eyes.

"But the Giants are not great lovers of walking no more so then than now. So my forebearers bethought them of the rivers which flow from the Westron Mountains to the Sea, and decided to build boats. Well, boats cannot come here from the Sea, as you may know-Landsdrop, on which stands Gravin Threndor, blocks the way. And no one, Giant or otherwise, would willingly sail the Defiles Course from Lifeswallower, the Great Swamp. So the Giants built docks on the Soulsease, upriver from Gravin Threndor and the narrows now called Treacher's Gorge. There they kept such boats as this-there, and at Lord's Keep at the foot of Furl Falls, so that at least two hundred leagues of the journey might be on the water which we love.

“In this journeying, Loric and the lillianrill desired to be of aid to the Giants. Out of their power they crafted Gildenlode-a strong wood which they named lor-liarill- and from this wood they made rudders and keels for our riverboats. And it was the promise of the Old Lords that, when their omens of hope for us came to pass, then Gildenlode would help us.

“Ah, enough,” Foamfollower sighed abruptly. “In short, it is I who impel this craft.” He lifted his hand from the tiller, and immediately the boat began to lose headway. “Or rather it is I who call out the power of the Gildenlode. There is life and power in the Earth-in stone and wood and water and earth. But life in them is somewhat hidden-somewhat slumberous. Both knowledge and strength are needed yes, and potent vital songs-to awaken them.” He grasped the tiller again, and the boat moved forward once more.

“So I am weary,” he breathed. “I have not rested since the night before we met.” His tone reminded Covenant of Trell's fatigue after the Gravelingas had healed the broken pot. “For two days and two nights I have not allowed the Gildenlode to stop or slow, though my bones are weak with the expense.” To the surprise in Covenant's face, he added, “Yes, my friend-you slept for two nights and a day. From the west of Andelain across the Centre Plains to the marge of Trothgard, more than a hundred leagues.” After a pause, he concluded, “Diamondraught does such things to humans. But you had need of rest.”

For a moment, Covenant sat silent, staring at the floorboards as if he were looking for a place to hit them. His mouth twisted sourly when he raised his head and said, “So now I'm rested. Can I help?”

Foamfollower did not reply immediately. Behind the buttress of his forehead, he seemed to weigh his various uncertainties before he muttered, “Stone and Sea! Of course you can. And yet the very fact of asking shows that you cannot. Some unwillingness or ignorance prevents.”

Covenant understood. He could hear dark wings, see slaughtered Wraiths. Wild magic! he groaned. Heroism! This is unsufferable. With a jerk of his head, he knocked transitions aside and asked roughly, “Do you want my ring?”

“Want?” Foamfollower croaked, looking as if he felt he should laugh but did not have the heart for it. “Want?” His voice quavered painfully, as if he were confessing to some kind of aberration. "Do not use such a word, my friend. Wanting is natural, and may succeed or fail without wrong. Say covet, rather. To covet is to desire something which should not be given. Yes, I covet your un-Earth, wild magic, peace-ending white gold:

There is wild magic graven in every rock,

contained for white gold to unleash or control-

I admit the desire. But do not tempt me. Power has a way of revenging itself upon its usurpers. I would not accept this ring if you offered it to me."

“But you do know how to use it?” Covenant enquired dully, half dazed by his inchoate fear of the answer.

This time Foamfollower did laugh. His humour was emaciated, a mere wisp of its former self, but it was clean and gay. “Ah, bravely said, my friend. So covetousness collapses of its own folly. No, I do not know. If the wild magic may not be called up by the simple decision of use, then I do not understand it at all. Giants do not have such lore. We have always acted for ourselves-though we gladly use such tools as Gildenlode. Well, I am rewarded for unworthy thoughts. Your pardon, Thomas Covenant.”

Covenant nodded mutely, as if he had been given an unexpected reprieve. He did not want to know how wild magic worked; he did not want to believe in it in any way. Simply carrying it around was dangerous. He covered it with his right hand and gazed dumbly, helplessly, at the Giant.

After a moment, Foamfollower's fatigue quenched his humour. His eyes dimmed, and his respiration sighed wearily between his slack lips. He sagged on the tiller as if laughing had cost him vital energy. “Now, my friend,” he breathed. “My courage is nearly spent. I need your story.”

Story? Covenant thought. I don't have any stories. I burned them.

He had burned them-both his new novel and his best-seller. They had been so complacent, so abjectly blind to the perils of leprosy, which lurked secretive and unpredictable behind every physical or moral existence-and so unaware of their own sightlessness. They were carrion-like himself, like himself-fit only for flames. What story could he tell now?

But he had to keep moving, act, survive. Surely he had known that before he had become the victim of dreams. Had he not learned it at the leprosarium, in putrefaction and vomit? Yes, yes! Survive! And yet this dream expected power of him, expected him to put an end to slaughter-Images flashed through him like splinters of vertigo, mirror shards: Joan, police car, Drool's Laval eyes. He reeled as if he were falling.

To conceal his sudden distress, he moved away from Foamfollower, went to sit in the prow facing north. “A story,” he said thickly. In fact, he did know one story-one story in all its grim and motley disguises. He sorted quickly, vividly, until he found one which suited the other things he need to articulate. “I'll tell you a story. A true story.”

He gripped the gunwales, fought down his dizziness.

“It's a story about culture shock. Do you know what culture shock is?” Foamfollower did not reply. "Never mind. I'll tell you about it. Culture shock is what happens when you take a man out of his own world and put him down in a place where the assumptions, the the standards of being a person-are so different that he can't possibly understand them. He isn't built that way. If he's-facile- he can pretend to be someone

else until he gets back to his own world. Or he can just collapse and let himself be rebuilt however. There's no other way.

"I'll give you an example. While I was at the leprosarium, the doctors talked about a man-a leper-like me. Outcast. He was a classic case. He came from another country-where leprosy is a lot more common-he must have picked up the bacillus there as a child, and years later when he had a wife and three kids of his own and was living in another country, he suddenly lost the nerves in his toes and started to go blind.

"Well, if he had stayed in his own country, he would have been-The disease is common-it would have been recognized early. As soon as it was recognized, he-and his wife-and his kids-and everything he owned-and his house-and his animals-and his close relatives-they would have all been declared unclean. His property and house and animals would have been burned to the ground. And he and his wife and his kids and his close relatives would have been sent away to live in the most abject poverty in a village with other people who had the same disease. He would have spent the rest of his life there-without treatment-without hope-while hideous deformity gnawed his arms and legs and face-until he and his wife and his kids and his close relatives all died of gangrene.

"Do you think that's cruel? Let me tell you what did happen to the man. As soon as he recognized his disease, he went to his doctor. His doctor sent him to the leprosarium-alone- without his family-where the spread of the disease was arrested. He was treated, given medicine and training-rehabilitated. Then he was sent home to live a `normal' life with his wife and kids. How nice. There was only one problem. He couldn't handle it.

"To start with, his neighbours gave him a hard time. Oh, at first they didn't know he was sick-they weren't familiar with leprosy, didn't recognize it-but the local newspaper printed a story on him, so that everyone in town knew he was the leper. They shunned him, hated him because they didn't know what to do about him. Then he began to have trouble keeping up his self-treatments. His home country didn't have medicine and leper's therapy-in his bones he believed that such things were magic, that once his disease was arrested he was cured, pardoned-given a stay of something worse than execution. But, to and behold! When he stops taking care of himself, the numbness starts to spread again. Then comes the clincher. Suddenly he finds that behind his back-while he wasn't even looking, much less alert he has been cut off from his family. They don't share his trouble-far from it. They want to get rid of him, go back to living the way they were before.

“So they pack him off to the leprosarium again. But after getting on the plane-they didn't have planes in his home country, either-he goes into the bathroom as if he had been disinherited without anyone ever telling him why and slits his wrists.”

He gaped wide-eyed at his own narration. He would have been willing, eager, to weep for the man if he had been able to do so without sacrificing his own defences. But he could not weep. Instead, he swallowed thickly, and let his momentum carry him on again.

"And I'll tell you something else about culture shock. Every world has its own ways of committing suicide, and it is a lot easier to kill yourself using methods that you're not accustomed to. I could never slit my wrists. I've read too much about it-talked about it too much. It's too vivid. I would throw up. But I could go to that man's world and sip belladonna tea without nausea. Because I don't know enough about it. There's something vague about it, something obscure-something not quite fatal.

“So that poor man in the bathroom sat there for over an hour, just letting his lifeblood run into the sink. He didn't try to get help until all of a sudden, finally, he realized that he was going to die just as dead as if he had sipped belladonna tea. Then he tried to open the door-but he was too weak. And he didn't know how to push the button to get help. They eventually found him in this grotesque position on the floor with his fingers broken, as if he-as if he had tried to crawl under the door. He-”

He could not go on. Grief choked him into silence, and he sat still for a time, while water lamented dimly past the prow. He felt sick, desperate for survival; he could not submit to these seductions. Then Foamfollower's voice reached him. Softly, the Giant said, “Is this why you abandoned the telling of stories?”

Covenant sprang up, whirled in instant rage. “This Land of yours is trying to kill me!” he spat fiercely. “It-you're pressuring me into suicide! White gold! — Berek! — Wraiths! You're doing things to me that I can't handle. I'm not that kind of person-I don't live in that kind of world. All these-seductions! Hell and blood! I'm a leper! Don't you understand that?”

For a long moment, Foamfollower met Covenant's dot gaze, and the sympathy in the Giant's eyes stopped his outburst. He stood glaring with his fingers Jawed while Foamfollower regarded him sadly, wearily. He could see that the Giant did not understand; leprosy was a word that seemed to have no meaning in the Land. “Come on,” he said with an ache. “Laugh about it. Joy is in the ears that hear.”

But then Foamfollower showed that he did understand something. He reached into his jerkin and drew oat a leather packet, which he unfolded to produce a large sheet of supple hide. “Here,” he said, “you will see much of this before you are done with the Land. It is clingor. The Giants brought it to the Land long ages ago-but I will spare us both the effort of telling.” He tore a small square from the comer of the sheet and handed the piece to Covenant. It was sticky on both sides, but transferred easily from hand to hand, and left no residue of glue behind. “Trust it. Place your ring upon that piece and hide it under your raiment. No one will know that you bear a talisman of wild magic.”

Covenant grasped at the idea. Tugging his ring from his finger, he placed it on the square of clingor. It stuck firmly; he could not shake the ring loose, but he could peel the clingor away without difficulty. Nodding sharply to himself, he placed his ring on the leather, then opened his shirt and pressed the clingor to the centre of his chest. It held there, gave him no discomfort. Rapidly, as if to seize an opportunity before it passed, he rebuttoned his shirt. To his surprise, he seemed to feel the weight of the ring on his heart, but he resolved to ignore it.

Carefully, Foamfollower refolded the clingor, replaced it within his jerkin. Then he studied Covenant again briefly. Covenant tried to smile in response, express his gratitude, but his face seemed only capable of snarls. At last, he turned away, reseated himself in the prow to watch the boat's progress and absorb what Foamfollower had done for him.

After musing for a time, he remembered Atiaran's stone knife. It made possible a self-discipline that he sorely needed. He leaned over the side of the boat to wet his face, then took up the knife and painstakingly shaved his whiskers. The beard was eight days old, but the keen, slick blade slid smoothly over his cheeks and down his neck, and he did a passable job of shaving without cutting himself. But he was out of practice, no longer accustomed to the risk; the prospect of blood made his heart tremble. Then he began to see how urgently he needed to return to his real world, needed to recover himself before he altogether lost his ability to survive as a leper.

Later that day came rain, a light drizzle which spattered the surface of the river, whorling the sky mirror into myriad pieces. The drops brushed his face like spray, seeped slowly into his clothes until he was as soaked and uncomfortable as if he had been drenched. But he endured it in a grey, dull reverie, thinking about what he gained and lost by hiding his ring.

At last, the day ended. Darkness dripped into the air as if the rain were simply becoming blacker, and in the twilight Covenant and Foamfollower ate their supper glumly. The Giant was almost too weak to feed himself, but with Covenant's help he managed a decent meal, drank a great quantity of diamondraught.

Then they returned to their respective silences. Covenant was glad for the dusk; it spared him the sight of Foamfollower's exhaustion. Unwilling to lie down on the damp floorboards, he huddled cold and wet against the side of the boat and tried to relax, sleep.

After a time, Foamfollower began to chant faintly:

Stone and Sea are deep in life,

two unalterable symbols of the world:

permanence at rest, and permanence in motion;

participants in the Power that remains.

He seemed to gather strength from the song, arid with it he impelled the boat steadily against the current, drove northward as if there were no fatigue that could make him falter.

Finally, the rain stopped; the cloud cover slowly broke open. But Covenant and Foamfollower found no relief in the clear sky. Over the horizon, the red moon stood like a blot, an imputation of evil, on the outraged background of the stars. It turned the surrounding terrain into a dank bloodscape, full of crimson and evanescent forms like uncomprehended murders. And from the light came a putrid emanation, as if the Land were illumined by a bane. Then Foamfollower's plainsong sounded dishearteningly frail, futile, and the stars themselves seemed to shrink away from the moon's course.

But dawn brought a sunlight-washed day unriven by any taint or memory of taint. When Covenant raised himself to look around, he saw mountains directly to the north. They spread away westward, where the tallest of them were still snow-crested; but the range ended abruptly at a point in line with the White River. Already the mountains seemed near at hand.

“Ten leagues,” Foamfollower whispered hoarsely. “Half a day against this current.”

The Giant's appearance filled Covenant with sharp dismay. Dull-eyed and slack-lipped, Foamfollower looked like a corpse of himself. His beard seemed greyer, as if he had aged several years overnight, and a trail of spittle he was helpless to control ran from the corner of his mouth. The pulse in his temples limped raggedly. But his grip on the tiller was as hard as a gnarled knot of wood, and the boat ploughed stiffly up the briskening river.

Covenant moved to the stern to try to be of help. He wiped the Giant's lips, then held up the jug of diamondraught so that Foamfollower could drink. The fragments of a smile cracked the Giant's lips, and he breathed, “Stone and Sea. It is no easy thing to be your friend. Tell your next ferryman to take you downstream. Destinations are for stronger souls than mine.”

“Nonsense,” said Covenant gruffly. “They're going to make up songs about you for this. Don't you think it's worth it?”

Foamfollower tried to respond, but the effort made him cough violently, and he had to retreat into himself, concentrate the fading fire of his spirit on the clench of his fist and the progress of the boat.

“That's all right,” Covenant said softly. “Everyone who helps me ends up exhausted-one way or another. If I were a poet, I would make up your song myself.” Cursing silently at his helplessness, he fed the Giant sections of tangerine until there was no fruit left. As he looked at Foamfollower, the tall being shriven of everything except the power to endure, self-divested, for reasons Covenant could not comprehend, of every quality of humour or even dignity as if they were mere appurtenances, he felt irrationally in debt to Foamfollower, as if he had been sold-behind his back and with blithe unregard for his consent-into the usury of his only friend. “Everyone who helps me,” he muttered again. He found the prices the people of the Land were willing to pay for him appalling.

Finally he was no longer able to stand the sight. He returned to the bow, where he stared at the looming mountains with deserted eyes and grumbled, I didn't ask for this.

Do I hate myself so much? he demanded. But his only answer was the rattle of Foamfollower's breathing.

Half the morning passed that way, measured in butchered hunks out of the impenetrable circumstance of time by the rasp of Foamfollower's respiration. Around the boat the terrain stiffened, as if preparing itself for a leap into the sky. The hills grew higher and more ragged, gradually leaving behind the heather and banyan trees of the plains for a stiffer scrub grass and a few scattered cedars. And ahead the mountains stood taller beyond the hills with every curve of the river. Now Covenant could see that the east end of the range dropped steeply to a plateau like a stair into the mountains-a plateau perhaps two or three thousand feet high that ended in a straight cliff to the foothills. From the plateau came a waterfall, and some effect of the light on the rock made the cascade gleam pale blue as it tumbled. Furl Falls, Covenant said to himself. In spite of the rattle of Foamfollower's breathing, he felt a stirring in his heart, as if he were drawing near to something grand.

But the drawing near lost its swiftness steadily. As the White wound between the hills, it narrowed; and as a result, the current grew increasingly stiff. The Giant seemed to have passed the end of his endurance. His respiration sounded stertorous enough to strangle him at any time; he moved the boat hardly faster than a walk. Covenant did not see how they could cover the last leagues.

He studied the riverbanks for a place to land the boat; he intended somehow to make the Giant take the boat to shore. But while he was still looking, he heard a low rumble in the air like the running of horses. What the hell-? A vision of ur-viles flared in his mind. He snatched up his staff from the bottom of the boat and clenched it, trying to control the sudden drum of his trepidation.

The next moment, like a breaking wave over the crest of a hill upstream and east from the boat, came cantering a score of horses bearing riders. The riders were human, men and women. The instant they saw the boat, one of them shouted, and the group broke into a gallop, sweeping down the hill to rein in at the edge of the river.

The riders looked like warriors. They wore high, soft-soled boots over black leggings, black sleeveless shirts covered by breastplates moulded of-a yellow metal, and yellow headbands. A short sword hung from each belt, a bow and quiver of arrows from each back. Scanning them rapidly, Covenant saw the characteristic features of both Woodhelvennin and Stonedownor; some were tall and fair, light-eyed and slim, and others, square, dark, and muscular.

As soon as their horses were stopped, the riders slapped their right fists in unison to their hearts, then extended their arms, palms forward, in the gesture of welcome. A man distinguished by a black diagonal line across his breastplate shouted over the water, “Hail, Rockbrother! Welcome and honour and fealty to you and to your people! I am Quaan, Warhaft of the Third Eoman of the Warward of Lord's Keep!” He paused for a reply, and when Covenant said nothing, he went on in a more cautious tone, “Lord Mhoram sent us. He saw that important matters were moving on the river today. We are come as escort.”

Covenant looked at Foamfollower, but what he saw only convinced him that the Giant was past knowing what happened around him. He slumped in the stern, deaf and blind to everything except his failing effort to drive the boat. Covenant turned back toward the Eoman and called out, “Help us! He's dying!”

Quaan stiffened, then sprang into action. He snapped an order, and the next instant he and two other riders plunged their horses into the river. The two others headed directly for the west bank, but Quaan guided his horse to intercept the boat. The mustang swam powerfully, as if such work were part of its training. Quaan soon neared the boat. At the last moment, he stood up on his mount's back and vaulted easily over the gunwales. On command, his horse started back toward the east bank.

Momentarily, Quaan measured Covenant with his eyes, and Covenant saw in his thick black hair, broad shoulders, and transparent face that he was a Stonedownor. Then the Warhaft moved toward Foamfollower. He gripped the Giant's shoulders and shook them, barking words which Covenant could not understand.

At first, Foamfollower did not respond. He sat sightless, transfixed, with his hand clamped like a death grip onto the tiller. But slowly Quaan's voice seemed to penetrate him. The cords of his neck trembled as he lifted his head, tortuously brought his eyes into focus on Quaan. Then, with a groan that seemed to spring from the very marrow of his bones, he released the tiller and fell over sideways.

The craft immediately lost headway, began drifting back down river. But by this time the two other riders were ready on the west bank. Quaan stepped past Covenant into the bow of the boat, and when he was in position, one of the two riders threw the end of a long line to him. He caught it neatly and looped it over the prow. It stuck where he put it; it was not rope, but clingor. At once, he turned toward the east bank. Another line reached him, and he attached it also to the prow. The lines pulled taut; the boat stopped drifting. Then Quaan waved his arm, and the riders began moving along the banks, pulling the boat upstream.

As soon as he understood what was being done, Covenant turned back to Foamfollower. The Giant lay where he had fallen, and his breathing was shallow, irregular. Covenant groped momentarily for some way to help, then lifted the leather jug and poured a quantity of diamondraught over Foamfollower's head. The liquid ran into his mouth; he sputtered at it, swallowed heavily. Then he took a deep, rattling breath, and his eyes slitted open. Covenant held the jug to his lips, and after drinking from it, he stretched out flat in the bottom of the boat. At once, he fell into deep sleep.

In relief, Covenant murmured over him, “Now that's a fine way to end a song-`and then he went to sleep.' What good is being a hero if you don't stay awake until you get congratulated?”

He felt suddenly tired, as if the Giant's exhaustion had drained his own strength, and sighing he sat down on one of the thwarts to watch their progress up the river, while Quaan went to the stern to take the tiller. For a while, Covenant ignored Quaan's scrutiny. But finally he gathered enough energy to say, “He's Saltheart Foamfollower, a-a legate from the Seareach Giants. He hasn't rested since he picked me up in the centre of Andelain-three days ago.” He saw comprehension of Foamfollower's plight spread across Quaan's face. Then he turned his attention to the passing terrain.

The towing horses kept up a good pace against the White's tightening current. Their riders deftly managed the variations of the riverbanks, trading haulers and slackening one rope or the other whenever necessary. As they moved north, the soil became rockier, and the scrub grass gave way to bracken. Gilden trees spread their broad boughs and leaves more and more thickly over the foothills, and the sunlight made the gold foliage glow warmly. Ahead, the plateau now appeared nearly a league wide, and on its west the mountains stood erect as if they were upright in pride.

By noon, Covenant could hear the roar of the great falls, and he guessed that they were close to Revelstone, though the high foothills now blocked most of his view. The roaring approached steadily. Soon the boat passed under a wide bridge. And a short time later, the riders rounded a last curve, drew the boat into a lake at the foot of Furl Falls.

The lake was round and rough in shape, wide, edged along its whole western side by Gilden and pine. It stood at the base of the cliff-more than two thousand feet of sheer precipice-and the blue water came thundering down into it from the plateau like the loud heart's-blood of the mountains. In the lake, the water was as clean and cool as rain-washed ether, and Covenant could see clearly the depths of its bouldered bottom.

Knotted jacarandas with delicate blue flowers clustered on the wet rocks at the base of the falls, but most of the lake's eastern shore was clear of trees. There stood two large piers and several smaller loading docks. At one pier rested a boat much like the one Covenant rode in, and smaller craft-skiffs and rafts-were tied to the docks. Under Quaan's guidance, the riders pulled the boat up to one of the piers, where two of the Eoman made it fast. Then the Warhaft gently awakened Foamfollower.

The Giant came out of his sleep with difficulty, but when he pried his eyes open they were calm, unhaggard, though he looked as weak as if his bones were made of sandstone. With help from Quaan and Covenant, he climbed into a sitting position. There he rested, looking dazedly about him as if he wondered where his strength had gone.

After a time, he said thinly to Quaan, “Your pardon, r Warhaft. I am-a little tired.”

“I see you,” Quaan murmured. “Do not be concerned. Revelstone is near.”

For a moment, Foamfollower frowned in perplexity as he tried to remember what had happened to him. Then a look of recollection tensed his face. “Send riders,” he breathed urgently. “Gather the Lords. There must be a Council.”

Quaan smiled. “Times change, Rockbrother. The newest Lord, Mhoram son of Variol, is a seer and oracle. Ten days ago he sent riders to the Loresraat, and to High Lord Prothall in the north. All will be at the Keep tonight.”

“That is well,” the Giant sighed. “These are shadowed times. Terrible purposes are abroad.”

“So we have seen,” responded Quaan grimly. “But Saltheart Foamfollower has hastened enough. I will send the fame of your brave journey ahead to the Keep. They will provide a litter to bear you, if you desire it.”

Foamfollower shook his head, and Quaan vaulted up to the pier to give orders to one of his Eoman. The Giant looked at Covenant and smiled faintly. “Stone and Sea, my friend,” he said, “did I not say that I would bring you here swiftly?”

That smile touched Covenant's heart like a clasp of affection. Thickly, he replied, “Next time take it easier. I can't stand-watching- Do you always keep promises-this way?”

“Your messages are urgent. How could I do otherwise?”

From his leper's perspective, Covenant countered, “Nothing's that urgent. What good does anything do you if you kill yourself in the process?”

For a moment, Foamfollower did not respond. He braced a heavy hand on Covenant's shoulder, and heaved himself, tottering, to his feet. Then he said as if he were answering Covenant's question, “Come. We must see Revelstone.”

Willing hands helped him onto the pier, and shortly he was standing on the shore of the lake. Despite the toll of his exertion, he dwarfed even the men and women on horseback. And as Covenant joined him, he introduced his passenger with a gesture like an according of dominion. “Eoman of the Warward, this is my friend, Thomas Covenant, Unbeliever and message-bearer to the Council of Lords. He partakes of many strange knowledges, but he does not know the Land. Ward him well, for the sake of friendship, and for the semblance which he bears of Berek Heartthew, Earthfriend and Lord-Fatherer.”

In response, Quaan gave, Covenant the salute of welcome. “I offer you the greetings of Lord's Keep, Giant-wrought Revelstone,” he said. “Be welcome in the Land-welcome and true.”

Covenant returned the gesture brusquely, but did not speak, and a moment later Foamfollower said to

Quaan, “Let us go. My eyes are hungry to behold the great work of my forebearers.”

The Warhaft nodded, spoke to his command. At once, two riders galloped away to the east, and two more took positions on either side of the Giant so that he could support himself on the backs of their horses. Another warrior, a young, fair-haired Woodhelvennin woman, offered Covenant a ride behind her. For the first time, he noticed that the saddles of the Eoman were nothing but clingor, neither horned nor padded, forming broad seats and tapering on either side into stirrup loops. It would be like riding a blanket glued to both horse and rider. But though Joan had taught him the rudiments of riding, he had never overcome his essential distrust of horses. He refused the offer. He got his staff from the boat and took a place beside one of the horses supporting Foamfollower, and the Eoman started away from the lake with the two travellers.

They passed around one foothill on the south side, and joined the road from the bridge below the lake. Eastward, the road worked almost straight up the side of a traverse ridge. The steepness of the climb made Foamfollower stumble several times, and he was barely strong enough to catch himself on the horses. But when he had laboured up the ridge, he stopped, lifted up his head, spread his arms wide, and began to laugh. “There, my friend. Does that not answer you?” His voice was weak, but gay with refreshed joy.

Ahead over a few lower hills was Lord's Keep.

The sight caught Covenant by surprise, almost took his breath away. Revelstone was a masterwork. It stood in granite permanence like an enactment of eternity, a timeless achievement formed of mere lasting rock by some pure, supreme Giantish participation in skill.

Covenant agreed that Revelstone was too short a same for it.

The eastern end of the plateau was finished by a broad shaft of rock, half as high as the plateau and separate from it except at the base, the first several hundred feet. This shaft had been hollowed into a tower which guarded the sole entrance to the Keep, and circles of windows rose up past the abutments to the fortified crown. But most of Lord's Keep was carved into the mountain gut-rock under the plateau.

A surprising distance from the tower, the entire cliff face had been worked by the old Giants-sheered and crafted into a vertical outer wall for the city, which, Covenant later learned, filled this whole, wedge-shaped promontory of the plateau. The wall was intricately laboured-lined and coigned and serried with regular and irregular groups of windows, balconies, buttresses-orieled and parapeted-wrought in a prolific and seemingly spontaneous multitude of details which appeared to be on the verge of crystallizing into a pattern. But light flashed and danced on the polished cliff face, and the wealth of variation in the work overwhelmed Covenant's senses, so that he could not grasp whatever pattern might be there.

But with his new eyes he could see the thick, bustling, communal life of the city. It shone from behind the wall as if the rock were almost translucent, almost lit from within like a chiaroscuro by the life-force of its thousands of inhabitants. The sight made the whole Keep swirl before him. Though he looked at it from a distance, and could encompass it all Furl Falls roaring on one side and the expanse of the plains reclining on the other-he felt that the old Giants had outdone him. Here was a work worthy of pilgrimages, ordeals. He was not surprised to hear Foamfollower whisper like a vestal, “Ah, Revelstone! Lord's Keep! Here the Unhomed surpass their loss.”

The Eoman responded in litany:

Giant-troth Revelstone, ancient ward—

Heart and door of Earthfriend's main:

Preserve the true with Power's sword,

Thou ages-Keeper, mountain-reign!

Then the riders started forward again. Foamfollower and Covenant moved in wonder toward the looming walls, and the distance passed swiftly, unmarked except by the beat of their uplifted hearts.

The road ran parallel to the cliff to its eastern edge, then turned up toward the tall doors in the southeast base of the tower. The gates-a mighty slab of rock on either side-were open in the free welcome of peace; but they were notched and bevelled and balanced so that they could swing shut and interlock, closing like teeth. The entrance they guarded was large enough for the whole Eoman to ride in abreast.

As they approached the gates, Covenant saw a blue flag flying high on the crown of the tower-an azure oriflamme only a shade lighter than the clear sky. Beneath it was a smaller flag, a red pennant the colour of the bloody moon and Drool's eyes. Seeing the direction of Covenant's gaze, the woman near him said, “Do you know the colours? The blue is High Lord's Furl, the standard of the Lords. It signifies their Oath and guidance to the peoples of the Land. And the red is the sign of our present peril. It will fly there while the danger lasts.”

Covenant nodded without taking his eyes off the Keep. But after a moment he looked away from the flags down toward the entrance to Revelstone. The opening looked like a cave that plunged straight into the mountain, but he could see sunlight beyond it.

Three sentries stood in an abutment over the gates. Their appearance caught Covenant's attention; they did not resemble the riders of the Warward. They were like Stonedownors in size and build, but they were flat-faced and brown-skinned, with curly hair cropped short. They wore short ochre tunics belted in blue that appeared to be made of vellum, and their lower legs and feet were bare. Simply standing casual and unarmed on the abutment, they bore themselves with an almost feline balance and alertness; they seemed ready to do battle at an instant's notice.

When his Eoman was within call of the gate, Quaan shouted to the sentries; “Hail! First Mark Tuvor! How is it that the Bloodguard have become guest welcomers?”

The foremost of the sentries responded in a voice that sounded foreign, awkward, as if the speaker were accustomed to a language utterly unlike the speech of the Land. “Giants and message-bearers have come together to the Keep.”

“Well, Bloodguard,” Quaan returned in a tone of camaraderie, “learn your duties. The Giant is Saltheart Foamfollower, legate from Seareach to the Council of Lords. And the man, the message-bearer, is Thomas Covenant, Unbeliever and stranger to the Land. Are their places ready?”

“The orders are given. Bannor and Korik await.”

Quaan waved in acknowledgment. With his warriors, he rode into the stone throat of Lord's Keep.