The Wounded Land

Twelve: The Andelainian Hills

AS Thomas Covenant passed the venerable oak and began angling his way up into Andelain, he left a grieved and limping part of himself with Linden. He was still weak from the attack of the bees, and did not want to be alone. Unwillingly, almost unconsciously, he had come to depend on Linden's presence. He felt bound to her by many cords. Some of them he knew: her courage and support; her willingness to risk herself on his behalf. But others seemed to have no name. He felt almost physically linked to her without knowing why. Her refusal to accompany him made him afraid.

Part of his fear arose from the fear of his companions; he dreaded to learn that behind its beauty Andelain was secretly chancrous. But he had been a leper for too long, was too well acquainted with cunning disease; that kind of dread could only increase his determination. Most of his trepidation sprang from Linden's rejection, from what that decision might mean.

For most of his hopes revolved around her. Doubt eroded his previous victory in the Land. He could not shake the gnawing conviction that in choosing to buy Joan's safety he had sold himself to the Despiser, had given up the freedom on which efficacy against Despite depended; he had felt that knife strike his chest, and knew he might fail. The wild magic is no longer potent against me. Of your own volition you will give the white gold into my hand. But Linden was another question. She had been chosen by the old man who had once told him to Be true. In their summoning, Lord Foul had betrayed no knowledge of or desire for her presence. And since then she had showed herself capable of many things. Behind her self-severity, she was beautiful. How could he not place hope in such a woman?

But now her refusal of Andelain seemed to imply that his hope was based on quicksand, that her clenched will was an articulation of cowardice rather than courage.

He understood such things. He was a leper, and lepers were taught cowardice by every hurt in all the world. If anything, her decision increased his empathy for her. But he was alone; and he knew from long and brutal experience how little he could accomplish alone. Even the apotheosis of his former power against Lord Foul would have gone for nothing without the support and laughter of Saltheart Foamfollower.

So as he climbed into Andelain, he felt that he was walking into a bereavement, a loss of comradeship, of hope, perhaps of courage, from which he might never recover.

At the hillcrest, he paused to wave at his companions. But they did not reply; they were not looking at him. Their lack of response hurt him as if they had deliberately turned their backs.

But he was a man who had always been faithful to his griefs; and the Land had become a rending and immedicable sorrow to him. He went on into Andelain because he needed health, power, knowledge. So that he could try to restore what had been lost.

Soon, however, his mood changed. For this was Andelain, as precious to his memory as his dearest friendships in the Land. In this air-ether as crisp as sempiternal spring-he could not even see the sun's chrysoprastic aura; the sunshine contained nothing except an abundance of beauty. The grass unrolling under his feet was lush and beryl-green, freshly jewelled with dew. Woodlands extended north and east of him. Broad Gilden fondled the breeze with their wide gold leaves; stately elms fronted the azure of the sky like princes; willows as delicate as filigree beckoned to him, inviting him into their heart-healing shade. All about the hale trunks, flowers enriched the greensward: daisies and columbine and elegant forsythia in profusion. And over everything lay an atmosphere of pristine and vibrant loveliness, as if here and in no other place lived quintessential health, nature's pure gift to assuage the soul.

Munching aliantha as he passed, loping down long hillsides, bursting occasionally into wild leaps of pleasure, Thomas Covenant travelled swiftly into Andelain.

Gradually, he grew calmer, became more attuned to the taintless tranquillity of the Hills. Birds sang among the branches; small woodland animals darted through the trees. He did nothing to disturb them. And after he had walked for some distance, drinking in thirstily the roborant of Andelain, he returned his thoughts to his companions, to Hollian and Sunder. He felt sure now that the Hills were not cancerous, that they contained no secret and deadly ill. Such an idea had become inconceivable. But at the same time the intensity of what he saw and felt and loved increased his comprehension of the Stonedownors.

They were like lepers; all the people of the Land were like lepers. They were the victims of the Sunbane, victims of an ill for which there was no cure and no escape. Outcast from the beauty of the world. And under such conditions, the need to survive exacted harsh penalties. No thing under the sun was as perilous to a leper as his own yearning for the kind of life, companionship, hope, denied him by his disease. That susceptibility led to despair and self-contempt, to the conviction that the outcasting of the leper was just-condign punishment for an affliction which must have been deserved.

Seen in that way, Andelain was a riving vindication of the Sunbane. The Land was not like Andelain because the people of the Land merited retribution rather than loveliness. What else could they believe, and still endure the penury of their lives? Like so many lepers, they were driven to approve their own destitution. Therefore Sunder could not trust anything which was not ruled by the Sunbane. And Hollian believed that Andelain would destroy her. They had no choice.

No choice at all. Until they learned to believe that the Sunbane was not the whole truth of their lives. Until Covenant found an answer which could set them free.

He was prepared to spend everything he possessed, everything he was, to open the way for Sunder, and Hollian, and Linden to walk Andelain unafraid.

Through the day, he journeyed without rest. He did not need rest. The aliantha healed the effects of the venom, and the water in the cleanly streams made him feel as fresh as a newborn; and each new vista was itself a form of sustenance, vivid and delicious.

The sun set in splendour long before he was ready to stop. He could not stop. He went on, always north-eastward, until the gloaming became night, and the stars came smiling out of their celestial deeps to keep him company.

But the darkness was still young when he was halted by the sight of a faint yellow-orange light, flickering through the trees like a blade of fire. He did not seek to approach it; memories held him still. He stood hushed and reverent while the flame wandered toward him. And as it came, it made a fine clear tinkling sound, like the chime of delicate crystal.

Then it bobbed in the air before him, and he bowed low to it, for it was one of the Wraiths of Andelain-a flame no larger than his hand dancing upright as if the darkness were an invisible wick. Its movement matched his obeisance; and when it floated slowly away from him, he followed after it. Its lustre made his heart swell. Toward the Wraiths of Andelain he felt a keen grief which he would have given anything to relieve. At one time, scores of them had died because he had lacked the power to save them.

Soon this Wraith was joined by another-and then by still others-and then he was surrounded by dancing as he walked. The bright circle and high, light ringing of the flames guided him, so that he went on and on as if he knew his way until a slim sliver-moon rose above the eastern Hills.

Thus the Wraiths brought him to a tall knoll, bare of trees but opulently grassed. There the chiming faded into a stronger music. The very air became the song to which the stars measured out then-gavotte, and every blade of grass was a note in the harmony. It was a stern song behind its quietude, and it held a long sorrow which he understood. The Wraiths remained at the base of the knoll, forming a long ring around it; but the music carried him upward, toward the crest.

And then the song took on words, so distinct that they could never be forgotten. They were sad and resolute, and he might have wept at them if he had been less entranced.

'Andelain I hold and mould within my fragile spell,

While world's ruin ruins wood and wold.

Sap and bough are grief and grim to me, engrievement fell,

And petals fall without relief.

Astricken by my power's dearth,

I hold the glaive of Law against the Earth.

'Andelain I cherish dear within my mortal breast;

And faithful I withhold Despiser's wish.

But faithless is my ache for dreams and slumbering and rest,

And burdens make my courage break.

The Sunbane mocks my best reply,

And all about and in me beauties die.

'Andelain! I strive with need and loss, and ascertain

That the Despiser's might can rend and rive.

Each falter of my ancient heart is all the evil's gain;

And it appalls without relent.

I cannot spread my power more,

Though teary visions come of wail and gore.

'Oh, Andelain! Forgive! for I am doomed to fail this war.

I cannot bear to see you die-and live,

Foredoomed to bitterness and all the grey Despiser's lore.

But while I can I heed the call

Of green and tree; and for their worth,

I hold the glaive of Law against the Earth.'

Slowly through the music, Covenant beheld the singer.

The man was tall and strong, and robed all in whitest sendaline. In his hand, he held a gnarled tree limb as a staff. Melody crowned his head. Music flowed from the lines of his form in streams of phosphorescence. His song was the very stuff of power, and with it he cupped the night in the palm of his hand.

His face had neither eyes nor eye sockets. Though he had changed mightily in the ten years or thirty-five centuries since Covenant had last seen him, he did not appear to have aged at all.

An impulse to kneel swept through Covenant, but he refused it. He sensed that if he knelt now there would be no end to his need to prostrate himself. Instead, he stood quiet before the man's immense white music, and waited.

After a moment, the man hummed sternly, “Thomas Covenant, do you know me?”

Covenant met his eyeless gaze. “You're Hile Troy.”

“No.” The song was absolute. “I am Caer-Caveral, the Forestal of Andelain. In all the Land I am the last of my kind.”

“Yes,” Covenant said. “I remember. You saved my life at the Colossus of the Fall-after I came out of Morinmoss. I think you must have saved me in Morinmoss, too.”

“There is no Morinmoss.” Caer-Caveral's melody became bleakness and pain. “The Colossus has fallen.”

No Morinmoss? No forests? Covenant clenched himself, held the tears down. “What do you want from me? I'll do anything.”

The Forestal hummed for a moment without answering. Then he sang, “Thomas Covenant, have you beheld Andelain?”

“Yes.” Clenching himself. “I've seen it.”

“In all the Land, it is the last keep of the Law. With my strength, I hold its fabric unrent here. When I fail in the end-as fail I must, for I am yet Hile Troy withal, and the day comes when I must not refuse to sacrifice my power-there will be no restitution for the abysm of that loss. The Earth will pass into its last age, and nothing will redeem it.”

“I know.” With his jaws locked. “I know.”

“Thomas Covenant,” the tall man sang, “I require from you everything and nothing. I have not brought you here this night to ask, but to give. Behold!” A sweeping gesture of his staff scattered the grass with music; and there, through the melody like incarnations of song, Covenant saw them. Pale silver as if they were made of moonshine, though the moon had no such light, they stood before him. Caer-Caveral's streaming argence illumined them as if they had been created out of Forestal-fire.

Covenant's friends.

High Lord Mhoram, with the wise serenity of his eyes, and the crookedness of his smile.

Elena daughter of Lena and rape, herself a former High Lord, beautiful and passionate. Covenant's child; almost his lover,

Bannor of the Bloodguard, wearing poise and capability and the power of judgment which could never be wrested from him.

Saltheart Foamfollower, who towered over the others as he towered over all mortals in size, and humour, and purity of spirit.

Covenant stared at them through the music as if the sinews of his soul were fraying. A moan broke from his chest, and he went forward with his arms outstretched to embrace his friends.

“Hold!”

The Forestal's command froze Covenant before he could close the separation. Immobility filled all his muscles.

“You do not comprehend,” Caer-Caveral sang more kindly. “You cannot touch them, for they have no flesh. They are the Dead. The Law of Death has been broken, and cannot be made whole again. Your presence here has called them from their sleep, for all who enter Andelain encounter their Dead here.”

Cannot-? After all this time? Tears streamed down Covenant's cheeks; but when Caer-Caveral released him, he made no move toward the spectres. Almost choking on his loss, he said, “You're killing me. What do you want?”

“Ah, beloved,” Elena replied quickly, in the clear irrefusable voice which he remembered with such anguish, “this is not a time for grief. Our hearts are glad to behold you here. We have not come to cause you pain, but to bless you with our love. And to give you gifts, as the Law permits.”

“It is a word of truth,” added Mhoram. “Feel joy for us, for none could deny the joy we feel in you.”

“Mhoram,” Covenant wept, “Elena. Banner. Oh, Foamfollower!”

The Forestal's voice took on a rumble like the threat of thunder. “Thus it is that men and women find madness in Andelain. This must not be prolonged. Thomas Covenant, it is well that your companions did not accompany you. The man and woman of the Land would break at the sight of their Dead. And the woman of your world would raise grim shades here. We must give our gifts while mind and courage hold.”

“Gifts?” Covenant's voice shook with yearning. “Why-? How-?” He was so full of needs that he could not name them all.

“Ah, my friend, forgive us,” Mhoram said. “We may answer no questions. That is the Law.”

“As in the summoning of dead Kevin which broke the Law of Death,” interposed Elena, “the answers of the Dead rebound upon the questioner. We will not harm you with our answers, beloved.”

“And you require no answers.” Foamfollower was laughing in his gladness. “You are sufficient to every question.”

Foamfollower! Tears burned Covenant's face like blood. He was on his knees, though he could not remember kneeling.

“Enough,” the Forestal hummed. “Even now he falters.” Graceful and stately, he moved to Covenant's side. “Thomas Covenant, I will not name the thing you seek. But I will enable you to find it.” He touched Covenant's forehead with his staff. A white blaze of music ran through Covenant's mind. “The knowledge is within you, though you cannot see it. But when the time has come, you will find the means to unlock my gift.” As the song receded, it left nothing in its wake but a vague sense of potential.

Caer-Caveral stepped aside; and High Lord Mhoram came soundlessly forward. “Ur-Lord and Unbeliever,” he said gently, “my gift to you is counsel. When you have understood the Land's need, you must depart the Land, for the thing you seek is not within it. The one word of truth cannot be found otherwise. But I give you this caution: do not be deceived by the Land's need. The thing you seek is not what it appears to be. In the end, you must return to the Land.”

He withdrew before Covenant could ask him to say more.

Elena took the High Lord's place. “Beloved,” she said with a smile of deep affection, “it has befallen me to speak a hard thing to you. The truth is as you have feared it to be; the Land has lost its power to remedy your illness, for much great good has been undone by the Despiser. Therefore I rue that the woman your companion lacked heart to accompany you, for you have much to bear. But she must come to meet herself in her own time. Care for her, beloved, so that in the end she may heal us all.”

Then her voice grew sharper, carrying an echo of the feral hate which had led her to break the Law of Death. “This one other thing I say to you also. When the time is upon you, and you must confront the Despiser, he is to be found in Mount Thunder-in Kiril Threndor, where he has taken up his abode.”

Elena, Covenant moaned. You still haven't forgiven me, and you don't even know it.

A moment later, Bannor stood before him. The Bloodguard's Haruchai face was impassive, implacable. “Unbeliever, I have no gift for you,” he said without inflection. “But I say to you, Redeem my people. Their plight is an abomination. And they will serve you well.”

Then Foamfollower came forward; and Covenant saw that the Giant was not alone. “My dear friend,” said Foamfollower gaily, “to me has fallen the giving of a gift beyond price. Behold!”

He indicated his companion; and Covenant could tell at once that this figure was not one of the Dead. He wore a short grey tunic, and under it all his skin from head to foot was as black as the gaps between the stars. His form was perfectly shaped and strong; but his hair was black, his teeth and gums were black, his pupilless eyes were pure midnight. He held himself as if he were oblivious to the Dead and the Forestal and Covenant. His eyes gazed emptily, regarding nothing.

“He is Vain,” said Foamfollower, “the final spawn of the ur-viles.” Covenant flinched, remembering ur-viles. But the Giant went on, "He crowns all their generations of breeding. As your friend, I implore you: take him to be your companion. He will not please you, for he does not speak, and serves no purpose but his own. But that purpose is mighty, and greatly to be desired. His makers have ever been lore-wise, though tormented, and when it comes upon him he, at least, will not fail.

"I say that he serves no purpose but his own. Yet in order that you may accept him, the ur-viles have formed him in such a way that he may be commanded once. Once only, but I pray it may suffice. When your need is upon you, and there is no other help, say to him, 'Nekhrimah, Vain,' and he will obey.

“Thomas Covenant. My dear friend.” Foamfollower bent close to him, pleading with him. “In the name of Hotash Slay, where I was consumed and reborn, I beg you to accept this gift.”

Covenant could hardly refrain from throwing his arms around the Giant's neck. He had learned a deep dread of the ur-viles and all their works. But Foamfollower had been his friend, and had died for it. Thickly, he said, “Yes. All right.”

“I thank you,” the Giant breathed, and withdrew.

For a moment, there was silence. Wraith-light rose dimly, and the Dead stood like icons of past might and pain. Caer-Caveral's song took on the cadence of a threnody. Crimson tinged the flow of his phosphorescence. Covenant felt suddenly that his friends were about to depart. At once, his heart began to labour, aching for the words to tell them that he loved them.

The Forestal approached again; but High Lord Mhoram stayed him. “One word more,” Mhoram said to Covenant. “This must be spoken, though I risk much in saying it. My friend, the peril upon the Land is not what it was. Lord Foul works in new ways, seeking ruin, and his evil cannot be answered by any combat. He has said to you that you are his Enemy. Remember that he seeks always to mislead you. It boots nothing to avoid his snares, for they are ever beset with other snares, and life and death are too intimately intergrown to be severed from each other. But it is necessary to comprehend them, so that they may be mastered. When-' He hesitated momentarily. “When you have come to the crux, and have no other recourse, remember the paradox of white gold. There is hope in contradiction.”

Hope? Covenant cried. Mhoram! Don't you know I'm going to fail?

The next moment, Caer-Caveral's song came down firmly on the back of his neck, and he was asleep in the thick grass.

Thirteen: Demondim-Spawn

WHEN he awoke, his face itched as if the grass had grown into his beard, and his back was warm with mid-morning sun.

He raised his head. He was still atop the knoll where he had met Caer-Caveral and the Dead. Andelain lay around him, unfolded like a flower to the sun. But he observed the trees and sky abstractly; the Hills had temporarily lost their power over him. He was too full of ashes to be moved.

He remembered the previous night clearly. He remembered everything about it except the conviction of its reality.

But that lasted for only a moment. When he sat up, changed his range of sight, he saw Vain.

The Demondim-spawn made everything else certain.

He stood just as he had the night before, lightly poised and oblivious. Covenant was struck once again by Vain's physical perfection. His limbs were smooth and strong; his flesh bore no blemish; he might have been an idealized piece of statuary. He gave no sign that he was aware of Covenant's awakening, that he was cognizant of Covenant at all. His arms hung relaxed, with the elbows slightly crooked, as if he had been made for readiness but had not yet been brought to life. No respiration stirred his chest; his eyes neither blinked nor shifted.

Slowly, Covenant reviewed the other gifts he had been given. They were all obscure to him. But Vain's solidity conveyed a kind of reassurance. Covenant took his companion as a promise that the other gifts would prove to be equally substantial.

Seeking relief from his sense of loss, he rose to his feet, faced Vain. He considered the dark form briefly, then said, “Foamfollower says you don't talk. Is that true?”

Vain did not react. An ambiguous smile hung on his lips, but no expression altered the fathomless ebony of his orbs. He might as well have been blind

“All right,” Covenant muttered. “You don't speak. I hope the other things he said are true, too, I don't want to test it. I'm going to put off commanding you as long as I can. If those ur-viles lied-” He frowned, trying to penetrate the mystery of his companion; but no intuition came to his aid. “Maybe Linden can tell me something about you.” Vain's black gaze did not shift. After a moment, Covenant growled, “I also hope I don't get in the habit of talking to you. This is ridiculous.”

Feeling vaguely foolish, he glanced at the sun to ascertain his directions, then started down the knoll to begin the journey back to his Mends.

The Demondim-spawn followed a few paces behind him. Vain moved as if he had memorized his surroundings long ago, and no longer needed to take notice of them. In spite of his physical solidity, his steps made no sound, left no impression in the grass.

Covenant shrugged, and set off south-westward through the Hills of Andelain.

By noon, he had eaten enough aliantha to comprise a feast, and had begun to recover his joy. Andelain did far more for him than give comfort to his eyes and ears or provide solace for his loss. Lord Foul had deprived him of the most exquisite pleasure of his previous visit here-the ability to feel health like a palpable cynosure in every green and living thing about him. But the Hills seemed to understand his plight, and adjust their appeal to offer him what he could enjoy. The air was refulgent with gay birds. The grass cushioned his feet, so that his knees and thighs felt exuberant at every stride. Aliantha nourished him until all his muscles were suffused with vitality.

Thus Andelain transformed his grief, melded it into a granitic sense of purpose. He considered the hazards ahead of him without dread, and swore an implacable oath without fear or fury, an oath that Andelain would not fall while he still had breath or pulse to defend it.

In the middle of the afternoon, he came upon a stream running placidly over a bed of fine sand, and stopped to give himself a bath. He knew that he would not be able to rejoin his companions by nightfall, so he did not begrudge the time. Stripping off his clothes, he scrubbed himself from head to foot with sand until he began to feel clean for the first time in many days.

Vain stood beside the stream as if he had been rooted to that spot all his life. A mischievous impulse came over Covenant; without warning, he slapped a spray of water at the Demondim-spawn. Droplets gleamed on Vain's obsidian flesh and dripped away, but he betrayed no flicker of consciousness.

Hellfire, Covenant muttered. A touch of prescience darkened his mood. He began almost grimly to wash his clothes.

Soon he was on his way again, with Vain trailing behind him.

He had planned to continue walking until he reached the Mithil valley and his companions. But this night was the dark of the moon, and the stars did not give much light. As the last illumination of evening faded from the air, he decided to stop.

For a time, he had trouble sleeping. An innominate anxiety disturbed his rest. Vain held himself like an effigy of darkness, hinting at dangers. An ur-vile, Covenant growled. He could not trust an ur-vile. They, the Demondim-spawn, were one of the ancient races of the Land; and they had served Lord Foul for millennia. Covenant had been attacked time and again by the roynish creatures. Eyeless and bloodthirsty, they had devoured scores of Wraiths at a time when he had been empty of power. Now he could not believe that the ur-viles which had given Vain to Foamfollower had told the truth.

But the air and grass of Andelain were an elixir that answered his vague distress; and eventually he slept.

He was awake and travelling in the exultation of sunrise. Regret clouded his mood now; he did not want to leave Andelain. But he did not let that slow him. He was concerned for his companions.

Well before noon, he crested the last line of hills above the Mithil River.

He had reached the valley too far east; the old oak at the corner of Andelain was half a league or more away to his right. He moved briskly toward it along the crests, watching intently for a glimpse of his friends.

But when he neared the majestic tree, he could see no sign of Linden, Sunder, or Hollian.

He stopped, scanned the barren region across the Mithil for some sign of his companions. It was larger than he had realized. In his eagerness to enter Andelain, he had paid little attention to the area. Now he saw that the wrecked rock and dead shale spread some distance south through the hills, and perhaps a league west into the Plains. Nothing grew anywhere in that blasted region; it lay opposite him like a corpse of stone. But its edges were choked by the teeming verdure of the fertile sun. Two periods of fertility without a desert interval between them to clear the ground made the area look like a dead island under green siege.

But of Linden and the two Stonedownors there was no trace.

Covenant pelted down the hillside. He hit the water in a shallow dive, clawed the surface of the Mithil to the south bank. In moments, he stood on the spot where he had said farewell to Linden.

He remembered the place exactly, all the details matched his recollection, it was here, here-! “Linden!” His shout sounded small against the desolation of the rocks, disappeared without echo into the surrounding jungle. “Linden!”

He could find no evidence that she had been here, that he had ever had any companions at all.

The sun wore its green carcanet like a smirk of disdain. His mind went blank with dread for a moment. Curses he could not utter beat against his stupefaction. His companions were gone. He had left them, and in his absence something had happened to them. Another Rider? Without him to defend them-! What have I done? Pounding his fists dumbly at each other, he found himself staring into Vain's unreachable eyes.

The sight jarred him. “They were here!” he spat as if the Demondim-spawn had contradicted him-A shudder ran through him, became cold fury. He began to search the region, "They didn't abandon me. Something chased them off. Or they were captured. They weren't killed-or badly hurt. There's no blood."

He picked a tall pile of boulders and scrambled up it, regardless of his vertigo. Standing precariously atop the rocks, he looked across the River toward the Plains bordering Andelain. But the tangle of the monstrous vegetation was impenetrable; his companions could have been within hailing distance, and he would not have been able to see them. He turned, studied the wreckage south and west of him. That wilderland was rock-littered and chaotic enough to conceal a myriad perils.

“Linden!” he yelled. “Sunder! Hollian!”

His voice fell stricken to the ground. There was no answer.

He did not hesitate. A geas was upon him. He descended from the boulders, returned to the place where he had last seen Linden. As he moved, he gathered small stones. With them, he made an arrow on the rock, pointing toward the interior of the wilderland, so that, if his companions returned for him, they would know where he had gone. Then he set off along the line of his arrow.

Vain followed him like an embodied shadow.

Covenant moved rapidly, urgently. His gaze hunted the terrain like a VSE. He wanted to locate or fall prey to whatever was responsible for the disappearance of his Mends. When he knew the nature of the peril, he would know how to respond. So he made no attempt at stealth. He only kept his eyes alert, and went scuttling across the rocks and shale like a man bent on his own destruction.

He drove himself for a league through the ruins before he paused to reconsider his choice of directions. He was badly winded by his exertions; yet Vain stood nearby as if he had never stood anywhere else-indefatigable as stone. Cursing Vain's blankness or his own mortality, Covenant chose a leaning stone spire, and climbed it to gain a vantage on his surroundings.

From the spire, he saw the rims of a long canyon perhaps half a league due west of him. At once, he decided to turn toward it; it was the only prominent feature in the area.

He slid back down the spire too quickly. As he landed, he missed his balance and sprawled in front of Vain.

When he regained his feet, he and the Demondim-spawn were surrounded by four men.

They were taller than Stonedownors, slimmer. They wore rock-hued robes of a kind which Covenant had learned to associate with Woodhelvennin. But their raiment was ill-kempt. A fever of violence glazed their eyes. Three of them wielded long stone clubs; the fourth had a knife. They held their weapons menacingly, advanced together.

“Hellfire,” Covenant muttered. His hands made unconscious warding gestures. “Hell and blood.”

Vain gazed past the men as if they were trivial.

Malice knotted their faces. Covenant groaned. Did every human being in the Land want to kill him? But he was too angry to retreat. Hoping to take the Woodhelvennin by surprise, he snapped abruptly, “Where's Linden?”

The man nearest him gave a glint of recognition.

The next instant, one of them charged. Covenant flinched; but the others did not attack. The man sprang toward Vain. With his club, he levelled a smashing blow at Vain's skull.

The stone burst into slivers. The man cried out, backed away clutching his elbows.

Vain's head shifted as if he were nodding. He did not acknowledge the strike with so much as a blink of his black eyes. He was uninjured and oblivious.

Amazed uncertainty frightened the other men. A moment later, they started forward with the vehemence of fear.

Covenant had no time for astonishment. He had a purpose of his own, and did not intend to see it fail like this. Before the men had advanced two steps, he spread his arms and shouted, “Stop!” with all the ferocity of his passion.

His cry made the air ring. The men halted.

“Listen!” he rasped. “I'm not your enemy, and I don't intend to get beaten to death for my innocence!” The man with the knife waved it tentatively. Covenant jabbed a finger in his direction. “I mean it! If you want us, here we are. But you don't have to kill us.” He was trembling; but the sharp authority in his voice leashed his attackers.

The man who had recognized Linden's name hesitated, then revealed himself as the leader. “If you resist,” he said tautly, “all Stonemight Woodhelven will arise to slay you.”

Covenant let bitterness into his tone. “I wouldn't dream of resisting. You've got Linden. I want to go wherever she is.”

Angry and suspicious, the man tried to meet Covenant's glare, but could not. With his club, he pointed toward the canyon. “There.”

“There,” Covenant muttered. “Right.” Turning his back on the Woodhelvennin, he marched off in that direction.

The leader barked an order; and the man with the stunned arms hurried past Covenant. The man knew the rocks and nuns intimately; the path he chose was direct and well-worn. Sooner than he had expected, Covenant was led into a crevice which split the canyon-rim. The floor of the crevice descended steeply before it opened into its destination.

Covenant was surprised by the depth of the canyon. The place resembled a gullet; the rock of the upper edges looked like dark teeth silhouetted against the sky. Unforeseen dangers seemed to crouch, waiting, in the shadows of the walls. For a moment, he faltered. But his need to find his companions impelled him. As he was steered toward the dwellings of the Woodhelven, he studied everything he could see, searching for information, hope.

He was struck initially by the resemblance between the village and the men who had captured him. Stonemight Woodhelven was slovenly; its inhabitants were the first careless people he had met in the Land. The canyon floor around the houses was strewn with refuse; and the people wore their robes as if they had no interest in the appearance or even the wholeness of their apparel. Many of them looked dirty and ill-used, despite the fact that they were obviously well-fed. And the houses were in a similar condition. The wooden structures were fundamentally sound. Each stood on massive stilts for protection against the force of water which ran through the canyon during a sun of rain; and all had frames of logs as heavy as vigas. But the construction of the walls was sloppy, leaving gaps on all sides; and many of the door-ladders had broken rungs and twisted runners.

Covenant stared with, surprise and growing trepidation as he moved through the disorganized cluster of huts. How —? he wondered. How can people this careless survive the Sunbane?

Yet in other ways they did not appear careless. Their eyes smouldered with an odd combination of belligerence and fright as they regarded him. They reminded him strangely of Drool Rockworm, the Cavewight who had been ravaged almost to death by his lust for the Illearth Stone.

Covenant's captors took him to the largest and best-made of the houses. There, the leader called out, “Graveller!” After a few moments, a woman emerged and came down the ladder to face Covenant and Vain. She was tall, and moved with a blend of authority and desperation. Her robe was a vivid emerald colour-the first bright raiment Covenant had seen-and it was whole; but she wore it untidily. Her hah-lay in a frenzy of snarls. She had been weeping; her visage was dark and swollen, battered by tears.

He was vaguely confused to meet a Graveller in a Woodhelven. Formerly, the people of wood and stone had kept their lores separate. But he had already seen evidence that such distinctions of devotion no longer obtained. After Lord Foul's defeat, the villages must have had a long period of interaction and sharing. Therefore Crystal Stonedown had raised an eh-Brand who used wood, and Stonemight Woodhelven was led by a Graveller.

She addressed the leader of the captors. “Brannil?”

The man poked Covenant's shoulder. “Graveller,” he said in a tone of accusation, “this one spoke the name of the stranger, companion to the Stonedownors.” Grimly, he continued, “He is the Halfhand. He bears the white ring.”

She looked down at Covenant's hand. When her eyes returned to his face, they were savage. “By the Stonemight!” she snarled, “we will yet attain recompense.” Her head jerked a command. Turning away, she went toward her house.

Covenant was slow to respond. The woman's appearance-and the mention of his friends-had stunned him momentarily. But he shook himself alert, shouted after the Graveller, “Wait!”

She paused. Over her shoulder, she barked, “Brannil, has he shown power against you?”

“No, Graveller,” the man replied.

“Then he has none. If he resists you, strike him senseless.” Stiffly, she re-entered her dwelling and closed the door.

At once, hands grabbed Covenant's arms, dragged him toward another house, thrust him at the ladder. Unable to regain his balance, he fell against the rungs. Immediately, several men forced him up the ladder and through the doorway with such roughness that he had to catch himself on the far wall.

Vain followed him. No one had touched the Demondim-spawn. He climbed into the hut of his own accord, as if he were unwilling to be separated from Covenant.

The door slammed shut. It was tied with a length of vine.

Muttering, “Damnation,” Covenant sank down the wall to sit on the woven-wood floor and tried to think.

The single room was no better than a hovel. He could see through chinks in the walls and the floor. Some of the wood looked rotten with age. Anybody with strength or a knife could have broken out. But freedom was not precisely what he wanted. He wanted Linden, wanted to find Sunder and Hollian. And he had no knife. His resources of strength did not impress Mm.

For a moment, he considered invoking his one command from Vain, then rejected the idea. He was not that desperate yet. For some time, he studied the village through the gaps in the walls, watched the afternoon shadows lengthen toward evening in the canyon. But he saw nothing that answered any of his questions. The hovel oppressed him. He felt more like a prisoner-more ineffectual and doomed-than he had in Mithil Stonedown. A sense of impending panic constricted his heart. He found himself clenching his fists, glaring at Vain as if the Demondim-spawn's passivity were an offense to him.

His anger determined him. He checked through the front wall to be sure the two guards were still there. Then he carefully selected a place in the centre of the door where the wood looked weak, measured his distance from it, and kicked.

The house trembled. The wood let out a dull splitting noise.

The guards sprang around, faced the door.

Covenant kicked the spot again. Three old branches snapped, leaving a hole the size of his hand.

“Ware, prisoner!” shouted a guard. “You will be clubbed!”

Covenant answered with another kick. Splinters showed along one of the inner supports.

The guards hesitated, clearly reluctant to attempt opening the door while it was under assault.

Throwing his weight into the blow, Covenant hit again.

One guard poised himself at the foot of the ladder. The other sprinted toward the Graveller's dwelling.

Covenant grinned fiercely. He went on kicking at the door, but did not tire himself by expending much effort. When the Graveller arrived, he gave the wood one last blow and stopped.

At a command from the Graveller, a guard ascended the ladder. Watching Covenant warily through the hole, he untied the lashings, then sprang away to evade the door if Covenant kicked it again.

Covenant did not. He pushed the door aside with his hand and stood framed in the entryway to confront the Graveller. Before she could address him, he snapped, “I want to talk to you.”

She drew herself up haughtily. “Prisoner, I do not wish to speak with you.”

He overrode her. “I don't give a good goddamn what you wish. If you think I don't have power, you're sadly mistaken. Why else does the Clave want me dead?” Bluffing grimly, he rasped, “Ask your men what happened when they attacked my companion.”

The narrowing of her eyes revealed that she had already been apprised of Vain's apparent invulnerability.

“I'll make a deal with you,” he went on, denying her time to think. “I'm not afraid of you. But I don't want to hurt you. I can wait until you decide to release me yourself. If you'll answer some questions, I'll stop breaking this house down.”

Her eyes wandered momentarily, returned to his face. “You have no power.”

“Then what are you afraid of?”

She hesitated. He could see that she wanted to turn away; but his anger undermined her confidence. Apparently, her confidence had already taken heavy punishment from some other source. After a moment, she murmured thickly, “Ask.”

At once, he said, “You took three prisoners-a woman named Linden Avery and two Stonedownors. Where are they?”

The Graveller did not meet his gaze. Somehow, his question touched the cause of her distress. “They are gone.”

“Gone?” A lurch of dread staggered his heart. “What do you mean?” She did not reply. “Did you kill them?”

“No!” Her look was one of outraged hunger, the look of a predator robbed of its prey. "It was our right! The Stonedownors were enemies! Their blood was forfeit by right of capture. They possessed Sunstone and Iianar, also forfeit. And the blood of their companion was forfeit as well. The friend of enemies is also an enemy. It was our right.

“But we were reft of our right,” A corrupt whine wounded her voice. “The three fell to us in the first day of the fertile sun. And that same night came Santonin na-Mhoram-in on his Courser.” Her malignant grief was louder than shouting. "In the name of the

Clave, we were riven of that which was ours. Your companions are nothing, Halfhand. I acceded them to the Rider without compunction. They are gone to Revelstone, and I pray that their blood may rot within them."

Revelstone? Covenant groaned. Hellfire! The strength drained from his knees; he had to hold himself up on the doorframe.

But the Graveller was entranced by her own suffering, and did not notice him. “Yes, and rot the Clave as well,” she screamed. “The Clave and all who serve the na-Mhoram. For by Santonin we were riven also of the power to live. The Stonemight-!” Her teeth gnashed. “When I discover who betrayed our possession of the Stonemight to Santonin na-Mhoram-in, I will rend the beating heart from that body and crush it in my hands!”

Abruptly, she thrust her gaze, as violent as a lance, at Covenant. “I pray your white ring is such a periapt as the Riders say. That will be our recompense. With your ring, I will bargain for the return of the Stonemight. Yes, and more as well. Therefore make ready to die, Halfhand. In the dawn I will spill your life. It will give me joy.”

Fear and loss whirled through Covenant, deafening him to the Graveller's threat, choking his protests in his throat. He could grasp nothing clearly except the peril of his friends. Because he had insisted on going into Andelain-

The Graveller turned on her heel, strode away: he had to struggle to gasp after her, “When did they go?”

She did not reply. But one of the guards said warily, “At the rising of the second fertile sun.”

Damnation! Almost two days —! On a Courser! As the guards shoved him back into the hovel and retied the door, Covenant was thinking stupidly, I'll never catch up with them.

A sea of helplessness broke over him. He was imprisoned here while every degree of the sun, every heartbeat of time, carried his companions closer to death. Sunder had said that the Earth was a prison for a-Jeroth of the Seven Hells, but that was not true: it was a jail for him alone, Thomas Covenant the Incapable. If Stonemight Woodhelven had released him at this moment, he would not have been able to save his friends.

And the Woodhelven would not release him; that thought penetrated his dismay slowly. They intended to kill him. At dawn. To make use of his blood. He unclenched his fists, raised his head.

Looking through the walls, he saw that the canyon had already fallen into shadow. Sunset was near; evening approached like a leper's fate. Mad anguish urged him to hurl himself against the weakened door; but the futility of that action restrained him. In his fever for escape, for the power to redeem what he had done to his companions, he turned to his wedding band.

Huddling there against the wall in the gathering dusk, he considered everything he knew about wild magic, remembered everything that had ever given rise to white fire. But he found no hope. He had told Linden the truth: in all his past experience, every exertion of wild magic had been triggered by the proximity of some other power. His final confrontation with Lord Foul would have ended in failure and Desecration if the Despiser's own weapon, the Illearth Stone, had not been so mighty, had not raised such a potent response from the white gold.

Yet Linden had told him that in his delirium at Crystal Stonedown his ring had emitted light even before the Rider had put forth power. He clung to that idea. High Lord Mhoram had once said to him, You are the white gold. Perhaps the need for a trigger arose in him, in his own unresolved reluctance, rather than in the wild magic itself. If that were true-Covenant settled into a more comfortable position and composed his turmoil with an effort of will. Deliberately, he began to search his memory, his passions, his need, for the key which had unlocked wild magic in his battle with Lord Foul.

He remembered the completeness of his abjection, the extremity of his peril. He remembered vividly the cruelty with which the Despiser had wracked him, striving to compel the surrender of his ring. He remembered the glee with which Lord Foul had envisioned the Land as a cesspit of leprosy.

And he remembered the awakening of his rage for lepers, for victims and destitution. That passion-clear and pure beyond any fury he had ever felt-had carried him into the eye of the paradox, the place of power between conflicting impossibilities: impossible to believe the Land real; impossible to refuse the Land's need. Anchored by the contradiction itself, made strong by rage, he had faced Lord Foul, and had prevailed.

He remembered it all, re-experienced it with an intensity that wrung his heart. And from his intensity he fashioned a command for the wild magic-a command of fire.

The ring remained inert on the second finger of his half-hand. It was barely visible in the dimness.

Despair twisted his guts; but he repressed it, clenched his purpose in both hands like a strangles Trigger, he panted. Proximity. Bearing memory like an intaglio of flame in his mind, he rose to his feet and confronted the only external source of power available to him. Swinging his half-fist through a tight arc, he struck Vain in the stomach.

Pain shot through his hand; red bursts like exploding carbuncles staggered across his mind. But nothing happened. Vain did not even look at him. If the Demondim-spawn contained power, he held it at a depth Covenant could not reach.

“God damn it!” Covenant spat, clutching his damaged hand and shaking with useless ire. “Don't you understand? They're going to kill me!”

Vain did not move. His black features had already disappeared in the darkness.

“Damnation.” With an effort that made him want to weep, Covenant fought down his pointless urge to smash his hands against Vain. “Those ur-viles probably lied to Foamfollower. You're probably just going to stand there and watch them cut my throat.”

But sarcasm could not save him. His companions were in such peril because he had left them defenceless. And Foamfollower had been killed in the cataclysm of Covenant's struggle with the Illearth Stone. Foamfollower, who had done more to heal the Despiser's ill than any wild magic-killed because Covenant was too frail and extreme to find any other answer. He sank to the floor like a ruin overgrown with old guilt, and sat there dumbly repeating his last hope until exhaustion dragged him into slumber.

Twice he awakened, pulse hammering, heart aflame, from dreams of Linden wailing for him. After the second, he gave up sleep; he did not believe he could bear that nightmare a third time. Pacing around Vain, he kept vigil among his inadequacies until dawn.

Gradually, the eastern sky began to etiolate. The canyon walls detached themselves from the night, and were left behind like deposits of darkness. Covenant heard people moving outside the hut, and braced himself.

Feet came up the ladder; hands fumbled at the lashings.

When the vine dropped free, tie slammed his shoulder against the door, knocking the guard off the ladder. At once, he sprang to the ground, tried to flee.

But he had misjudged the height of the stilts. He landed awkwardly, plunged headlong into a knot of men beyond the foot of the ladder. Something struck the back of his head, triggering vertigo. He lost control of his limbs.

The men yanked him to his feet by the arms and hair. “You are fortunate the Graveller desires you wakeful,” one of them said. “Else I would teach your skull the hardness of my club.” Dizziness numbed Covenant's legs; the canyon seemed to suffer from nystagmus. The Woodhelvennin hauled him away like a collection of disarticulated bones.

They took him toward the north end of the canyon. Perhaps fifty or sixty paces beyond the last house, they stopped.

A vertical crack split the stone under his feet. Wedged into it was a heavy wooden post, nearly twice his height.

He groaned sickly and tried to resist. But he was helpless.

The men turned him so that he faced the village, then bound his arms behind the post. He made a feeble effort to kick at them; they promptly lashed his ankles as well.

When they were done, they left without a word.

As the vertigo faded, and his muscles began to recover, he gagged on nausea; but his guts were too empty to release anything.

The houses were virtually invisible, lost in the gloaming of the canyon. But after a moment he realized that the post had been placed with great care. A deep gap marked the eastern wall above him; and through it came a slash of dawn. He would be the first thing in Stonemight Woodhelven to receive the sun.

Moments passed. Sunlight descended like the blade of an axe toward his head.

Though he was protected by his boots, dread ached in his bones. His pulse seemed to beat behind his eyeballs.

The light touched his hair, his forehead, his face. While the Woodhelven lay in twilight, he experienced the sunrise like an annunciation. The sun wore a corona of light brown haze. A breath of arid heat blew across him.

Damnation, he muttered. Bloody damnation.

As the glare covered his mien, blinding him to the Woodhelven, a rain of sharp pebbles began to fall on him. Scores of people threw small stones at him.

He squeezed his eyes shut, bore the pain as best he could.

When the pebbles stopped, he looked up again and saw the Graveller approaching out of the darkness.

She held a long, iron knife, single-edged and hiltless. The black metal appeared baleful in her grasp. Her visage had not lost its misery; but it also wore a corrupt exaltation which he could not distinguish from madness.

Twenty paces or more behind the Graveller stood Vain, The Woodhelvennin had wrapped him in heavy vines, trying to restrain him; but he seemed unaware of his bonds. He held himself beyond reach as if he had come simply to watch Covenant die.

But Covenant had no time to think about Vain. The Graveller demanded his attention. “Now,” she rasped. “Recompense. I will shed your life, and your blood will raise water for the Woodhelven.” She glanced down at the narrow crevice, “And with your white ring we will buy back our Stonemight from the Clave.”

Clutching his dismally-rehearsed hope, Covenant asked, “Where's your orcrest?”

“Orcrest?” she returned suspiciously.

“Your Sunstone.”

“Ah,” she breathed, “Sunstone. The Rede speaks of such matters.” Bitterness twisted her face. “Sunstone is permitted-yet we were reft of our Stonemight. It is not just!” She eyed Covenant as if she were anticipating the taste of his blood. “I have no Sunstone, Halfhand.”

No Sunstone? Covenant gasped inwardly. He had hoped with that to ignite his ring. But the Graveller had no Sunstone. No Sunstone. The desert sun shone on him like the bright, hot flood which had borne him into the Land. Invisible vulture-wings beat about his head-heart strokes of insanity. He could barely thrust his voice through the noise. “How can-? I thought every Graveller needed a Sunstone.” He knew this was not true, but he wanted to make her talk, delay her. He had already been stabbed once: any similar blow would surely end him. “How else can you work the Sunbane?”

“It is arduous,” she admitted, though the hunger in her gaze did not blink. “I must make use of the Rede. The Rede!” Abruptly, she spat into the crack at her feet. “For generations Stonemight Woodhelven has had no need of such knowledge. From Graveller to Graveller the Stonemight has been handed down, and with it we made life! Without it, we must grope for survival as we may.”

The sun sent sweat trickling through Covenant's beard, down the middle of his back. His bonds cut off the circulation in his arms, tugged pain into his shoulders. He had to swallow several times to clear his throat. “What is it? The Stonemight?”

His question reached her. He saw at once that she could not refuse to talk about the Stonemight. A nausea of love or lust came into her face. She lowered her knife; her eyes lost their focus on him. “Stonemight,” she breathed ardently. “Ah, the Stonemight.” Her breasts tightened under her green robe as if she were remembering rapture. “It is power and glory, wealth and comfort. A stone of dearest emerald, alight with possibility and cold beyond the touch of any stone. That such might is contained in so small and lovely a periapt! For the Stonemight is no larger than my palm. It is flat, and sharp of edge, like a flake stricken from a larger stone. And it is admirable beyond price.”

She went on, unable to rein the rush of her entrancement. But Covenant lost her words in a flash of intuitive horror. Suddenly he was certain that the talisman she described was a fragment of the Illearth Stone.

That conviction blazed through him like appalled lightning. It explained so many things: the ruined condition of this region; the easiness of the Woodhelven's life; the gratuitous violence of the people; the Graveller's obsession. For the Illearth Stone was the very essence of corruption, a bane so malignant that he had been willing to sacrifice Foamfollower's life as well as his own in order to extirpate that evil from the Land. For a moment of dismay, he believed he had failed to destroy the Stone, that the Illearth Stone itself was the source of the Sunbane.

But then another explanation occurred to him. At one time, the Despiser had given each of his Ravers a piece of the Stone. One of these Ravers had marched to do battle against the Lords, and had been met here, at the southwest corner of Andelain-met and held for several days. Perhaps in that conflict a flake of the Raver's Stone had fallen undetected among the hills, and had remained there, exerting its spontaneous desecration, until some unhappy Woodhelvennin had stumbled across it.

But that did not matter now. A Rider had taken the Stonemight. To Revelstone. Suddenly, Covenant knew that he had to live, had to reach Revelstone. To complete the destruction of the Illearth Stone. So that his past pain and Foamfollower's death would not have been for nothing.

The Graveller was sobbing avidly, “May they rot!” She clenched the haft of her knife like a spike. “Be damned to interminable torment for bereaving me! I curse them from the depths of my heart and the abyss of my anguish!” She jerked the knife above her head. The blade glinted keen and evil in the desert sun. She had lost all awareness of Covenant; her gaze was bent inward on a savage vision of the Clave. “I will slay you all!”

Covenant's shout tore his throat. In horror and desperation, he yelled, “Nekhrimah, Vain! Save me.”

The Graveller paid no heed. With the whole force of her body, she drove her knife at his chest.

But Vain moved. While the blade arced through its swing, he shrugged his arms free of the bindings.

He was too far away, too late-

From a distance of twenty paces, he closed his fist.

Her arms froze in mid-plunge. The knife tip strained at the centre of Covenant's shirt; but she could not complete the blow.

He watched wildly as Vain approached the Graveller. With the back of his hand, Vain struck her. She crumpled. Blood burst from her mouth. As it ran, she twitched once, then lay still.

Vain ignored her. He gestured at the post, and the wood sprang into splinters. Covenant fell; but Vain caught him, set him on his feet.

Covenant allowed himself no time to think. Shedding splinters and vines, he picked up the knife, thrust it into his belt. His arms felt ferocious with the return of circulation. His heart laboured acutely. But he forced himself forward. He knew that if he did not keep moving he would collapse in an outrage of reaction. He strode among the paralyzed Woodhelvennin back into the village, and entered the first large house he reached.

His eyes took a moment to pierce the dimness. Then he made out the interior of the room. The things he sought hung on the walls: a woven-vine sack of bread, a leather pouch containing some kind of liquid. He had taken them before he noticed a woman sitting in one of the corners. She held herself small and still in an effort to protect the baby sucking at her breast. He unstopped the pouch and swallowed deeply. The liquid had a cloying taste, but it washed some of the gall from his throat. Roughly, he addressed the woman. “What is it?”

In a tiny voice, she answered, “Metheglin”

“Good.” He went to the door, then halted to rasp at her, “Listen to me. This world's going to change. Not just here-not just because you lost your bloody Stonemight. The whole Land is going to be different. You've got to learn to live like human beings. Without all this sick killing.”

As he left the house, the baby started crying.

Fourteen: Pursuit

HE moved brusquely among the stupefied Woodhelvennin. The baby's crying was like a spur in the air; the men and women began to shift, blink their eyes, glance around. In moments, they would recover enough to act. As he reached Vain, he muttered, “Come on. Let's get out of here,” and strode away toward the north end of the canyon.

Vain followed.

The sunrise lit Covenant's path. The canyon lay crookedly beyond him, and its rims began to draw together, narrowing until it was little more than a deep sheer ravine. He marched there without a backward look, clinched by the old intransigent stricture of his illness. His friends were already two days ahead of him, and travelling swiftly.

Shouts started to echo along the walls: anger, fear, loss. But he did not falter. Borne on the back of a Courser, Linden and the two Stonedownors might easily reach Revelstone ten days before him. He could conceive of no way to catch up with them in time to do them any good. But leprosy was also a form of despair for which there was no earthly cure; and he had learned to endure it, to make a life for himself in spite of it, by stationing himself in the eye of the paradox, affirming the acceptable humanity of all the contradictions-and by locking his soul in the most rigid possible discipline. The same resources enabled him to face the futile pursuit of his friends.

And he had one scant reason for hope. The Clave had decreed his death, not Linden's, Sunder's, Hollian's. Perhaps his companions would be spared, held hostage, so that they could be used against him. Like Joan. He clung to that thought, and strode down the narrowing canyon to the tight beat of his will.

The shouts rose to a crescendo, then stopped abruptly. In the frenzy of their loss, some of the Woodhelvennin set out after him. But he did not look back, did not alter his pace. The canyon was constricted enough now to prevent his pursuers from reaching him without first passing Vain. He trusted that the Demondim-spawn would prove too intimidating for the Woodhelvennin.

Moments later, he heard bare feet slapping stone, echoing. Apprehension knotted his shoulders. To ease himself, he attempted a bluff. “Vain!” he shouted without turning his head. “Kill the first one who tries to get past you!” His words danced between the walls like a threat of murder.

But the runners did not hesitate. They were like their Graveller, addicts of the Illearth Stone; violence was their only answer to loss. Their savage cries told Covenant that they were berserk.

The next instant, one of them screamed hideously. The others scrambled to a halt.

Covenant whirled.

Vain stood facing the Woodhelvennin-five of them, the nearest still ten paces away. That man knelt with his back arched and straining, black agony in his face. Vain clenched his fist toward the man. With a wrench, he burst the man's heart.

“Vain!” Covenant yelled. “Don't-! I didn't mean it!”

The next Woodhelvennin was fifteen paces away. Vain made a clawing gesture. The man's face, the whole front of his skull, tore open, spilling brains and gore across the stone.

“Vain!”

But Vain had not yet satisfied Covenant's command. Knees slightly bent, he confronted the three remaining men. Covenant howled at them to flee; but the berserkergang was on them, and they could not flee. Together, they hurled themselves at Vain.

He swept them into his embrace, and began to crush them with his arms.

Covenant leaped at Vain's back. “Stop!” He strove to pry Vain's head back, force him to ease his grip. “You don't have to do this!” But Vain was granite and unreachable. He squeezed until the men lost the power to scream, to breathe. Their ribs broke like wet twigs. Covenant pounded his fury at the Demondim-spawn; but Vain did not release the men until they were dead.

Then in panic Covenant saw a crowd of Woodhelvennin surging toward him. “No!” he cried, “get back!” and the echoes ran like terror down the canyon. But the people did not stop.

He could not think of anything else to do. He left Vain and fled. The only way he could prevent Vain from butchering more people was by saving himself, completing the command. Desperately, he dashed away, running like the virulence of his curses.

Soon the rims of the canyon closed above him, forming a tunnel. But the light behind him and the glow at the far end of the passage enabled him to keep up his pace. The loud reiteration of his boots deafened him to the sounds of pursuit.

When he cast a glance backward, he saw Vain there, matching his speed without effort.

After some distance, he reached sunlight in the dry riverbed of the Mithil. Panting raggedly, he halted, rested against the bank. As soon as he could muffle his respiration, he listened at the tunnel; but he heard nothing. Perhaps five corpses were enough to check the extremity of the Woodhelvennin. With rage fulminating in his heart, he swung on Vain.

“Listen to me,” he spat. “I don't care how bad it gets. If you ever do something like that again, I swear to God I'll take you back where I found you, and you and your whole bloody purpose can just rot!”

But the Demondim-spawn looked as blank as stone. He stood with his elbows slightly bent, his eyes unfocused, and betrayed no awareness of Covenant's existence.

“Sonofabitch,” Covenant muttered. Deliberately, he turned away from Vain. Gritting his will, he forced his anger into another channel, translated it into strength for what he had to do. Then he went to climb the north bank of the Mithil.

The sack of bread and the pouch of metheglin hampered him, making the ascent difficult; but when he gained the edge and stopped, he did not stop because he was tired. He was halted by the effect of the desert sun on the monstrous vegetation.

The River was dry. He had noticed that fact without pausing to consider it. But he considered it now. As far as he could see, grass as high as houses, shrubs the size of hillocks, forests of bracken, trees that pierced the sky-all had already been reduced to a necrotic grey sludge lying thigh-deep over every contour of the terrain.

The brown-clad sun melted every form of plant fiber, desiccated every drop of sap or juice, sublimated everything that grew. Every wood and green and fertile thing simply ran down itself like spilth, making one turgid puddle which the Sunbane sucked away as if the air were inhaling sludge. When he stepped into the muck in order to find out whether or not he could travel under these conditions, he was able to see the level of the viscid slop declining. It left a dead grey stain on his pants.

The muck sickened him. Involuntarily, he delayed. To clear his throat, he drank some of the metheglin, then chewed slowly at half a loaf of unleavened bread as he watched the sludge evaporate. But the pressure in him would not let him wait long. As the slop sank to the middle of his shins, he took a final swig of metheglin, stopped the pouch, and began slogging northwestward toward Revelstone, eleven score leagues distant.

The heat was tremendous. By mid-morning, the ground was bare and turning arid; the horizons had begun to shimmer, collapsing in on Covenant as if the desert sun shrank the world. Now there was nothing to hinder his progress across the waste of the Centre Plains-nothing except light as eviscerating as fire, and air which seemed to wrench the moisture from his flesh, and giddy heatwaves, and Sunbane.

He locked his face toward Revelstone, marched as if neither sun nor wilderland had the power to daunt him. But dust and dryness clogged his throat. By noon, he had emptied half his leather pouch. His shirt was dark with sweat. His forehead felt blistered, flushed by chills. The haze affected his balance, so that he stumbled even while his legs were still strong enough to be steady. And his strength did not last; the sun leeched it from him, despite his improvident consumption of bread and metheglin.

For a time, indecision clouded his mind. His only hope of gaining on Linden lay in travelling day and night without letup. If he acted rationally, journeyed only at night while the desert sun lasted, then the Rider's Courser would increase the distance between them every day. But he could not endure this pace. The hammer of the Sunbane was beating his endurance thinner and thinner; at confused moments, he felt translucent already.

When his brain became so giddy that he found himself wondering if he could ask Vain to carry him, he acknowledged his limitations. In a flinch of lucidity, he saw himself clinging to Vain's shoulders while the Demondim-spawn stood motionless under the sun because Covenant was not moving. Bitterly, he turned northeast toward Andelain.

He knew that the marge of Andelain ran roughly parallel to his direct path toward Revelstone; so in the Hills he would be able to stay near the route the Rider must have taken. Yet Andelain was enough out of his way to gall him. From the Hills he might not be able to catch sight of Linden and her companions, even if by some piece of good fortune the Rider was delayed; and the rumpled terrain of Andelain might slow him. But the choice was not one of speed: not under this sun. In Andelain he might at least reach the Soulsease River alive.

And perhaps, he thought, trying to encourage himself, perhaps even a Rider of the Clave could not travel swiftly through the various avatars of the Sunbane. Clenching that idea in his sore throat, he angled in the direction of the Hills.

With Vain striding impassively behind him, he crossed into lushness shortly before dusk. In his bitterness, he did not rejoice to be back within the Land's last bastion of health and Law; but the spring of the turf and the vitality of the aliantha affected him like rejoicing. Strength flowed back into his veins; his sight cleared; his raw mouth and throat began to heal. Through the gold-orange emblazonry of the sunset, he stiffened his pace and headed grimly along the skirts of the Hills.

All that night, he did not stop for more than scant moments at a time. Sustained by Andelain, his body bore the merciless demand of his will. The moon was too new to give him aid; but few trees grew along the edges of the Hills and, under an open sky, star-glister sufficed to light his way. Drinking metheglin and chewing bread for energy, he stalked the hillsides and the vales. When his pouch was empty, he discarded it. And at all times his gaze was turned westward, searching the Plains for any sign of a fire which might indicate, beyond hope or chance, that the Rider and his prisoners were still within reach. By dawn, he was twenty leagues from Stonemight Woodhelven, and still marching, as if by sheer stubbornness he had abrogated his mortality.

But he could not make himself immune to exhaustion. In spite of aliantha and clear spring water, bounteous grass and air as vital as an elixir, his exertions eroded him like leprosy. He had passed his limits, and travelled now on borrowed endurance-stamina wrested by plain intransigence from the ruinous usury of time. Eventually, he came to believe that the end was near, waiting to ambush him at the crest of every rise, at the bottom of every slope. Then his heart rose up in him and, because he was Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever, responsible beyond any exculpation for the outcome of his life, he began to run.

Staggering, stumbling at every third stride, he lumbered northwest, always northwest, within the marge of Andelain, and did not count the cost. Only one concession did he make to his wracked breathing and torn muscles: he ate treasure-berries from every aliantha he passed, and threw the seeds out into the wasteland. Throughout the day he ran, though by mid-afternoon his pace was no better than a walk; and throughout the day Vain followed, matching stride for stride with his own invulnerability the exhaustion which crumbled Covenant.

Shortly after dark, Covenant broke. He missed his footing, fell, and could not rise. His lungs shuddered for air, but he was not aware of them. Everything in his chest seemed numb, beyond help. He lay stunned until his pulse slowed to a limp and his lungs stopped shivering. Then he slept.

He was awakened near midnight by the touch of a cold hand on his soul. A chill that resembled regret more than fear ran through him. He jerked up his head.

Three silver forms like distilled moonlight stood before him. When he had squeezed the blur of prostration from his sight, he recognized them.

Lena, the woman he had raped.

Atiaran and Trell, her parents.

Trell-tall, bluff, mighty Trell-had been deeply hurt by the harm Covenant had done to Lena and by the damage Atiaran had inflicted on herself in her efforts to serve the Land by saving her daughter's rapist. But the crowning anguish of his life, the pain which had finally unbalanced his mind, had been dealt him by the love Elena Lena-daughter bore for Covenant.

Atiaran had sacrificed all her instincts, all her hard-won sense of rectitude, for Covenant's sake; she had believed him necessary to the Land's survival. But the implications of that self-injury had cost her her life in the end.

And Lena-ah, Lena! She had lived on for almost fifty years, serene in the mad belief that Covenant would return and marry her. And when he had returned-when she had learned that he was responsible for the death of Elena, that he was the cause of the immense torment of the Ranyhyn she adored-she had yet chosen to sacrifice herself in an attempt to save his life.

She did not appear before him in the loveliness of youth, but rather in the brittle caducity of age; and his worn heart cried out to her. He had paid every price he could find in an extravagant effort to rectify his wrongs; but he had never learned to shed the burden of remorse.

Trell, Atiaran, Lena. In each of their faces, he read a reproach as profound as human pain could make it. But when Lena spoke, she did not derogate him. “Thomas Covenant, you have stressed yourself beyond the ability of your body. If you sleep further, it may be that Andelain will spare you from death, but you will not awaken until a day has been lost. Perhaps your spirit has no bounds. Still you are not wise to punish yourself so. Arise! You must eat and move about, lest your flesh fail you.”

“It is truth,” Atiaran added severely. “You punish yourself for the plight of your companions. But such castigation is a doom which achieves itself. Appalling yourself thus, you ensure that you will fail to redeem your companions. And failure demonstrates your unworth. In punishing yourself, you come to merit punishment. This is Despite, Unbeliever. Arise and eat.”

Trell did not speak. But his mute stare was unarguable. Humbly, because of who they were, and because he recognized what they said, Covenant obeyed. His body wept in every joint and thew; but he could not refuse his Dead. Tears ran down his face as he understood that these three-people who in life had had more cause to hate him than anyone else-had come to him here in. order to help him.

Lena's arm pointed silver toward a nearby aliantha. “Eat every berry. If you falter, we will compel you.”

He obeyed, ate all the ripe fruit he could find in the darkness with his numb fingers. Then, tears cold on his cheeks, he set off once again in the direction of Revelstone with his Dead about him like a cortege.

At first, every step was a torment. But slowly he came to feel the wisdom of what his Dead required him to do. His heart grew gradually steadier; the ache of his breathing receded as his muscles loosened. None of the three spectres spoke again, and he had neither the temerity nor the stamina to address them. In silence, the meagre procession wound its argent, ghostly way along the border of Andelain. For a long time after his weeping stopped, Covenant went on shedding grief inwardly because his ills were irrevocable, and he could never redeem the misery he had given Trell, Atiaran, and Lena. Never.

Before dawn, they left him-turned abruptly away toward the centre of Andelain without allowing him an opportunity to thank them. This he understood; perhaps no gall would have been as bitter to them as the thanks of the Unbeliever. So he said nothing of his gratitude. He stood facing their departure like a salute, murmuring promises in his heart. When their silver had faded, he continued along the path of his purpose.

Dawn and a fresh, gay brook, which lay like music across his track, gave him new strength; he was able to amend his pace until it bore some resemblance to his earlier progress. With Vain always behind him like a detached shadow, he spent the third day of the desert sun travelling Andelain as swiftly as he could without risking another collapse.

That evening, he stopped soon after sunset, under the shelter of a hoary willow. He ate a few aliantha, finished the last of his bread, then spent some time seated with his back to the trunk. The tree stood high above the Plains, and he sat facing westward, studying the open expanse of the night without hope, almost without volition, because the plight of his companions did not allow him to relax.

The first blink of fire snatched him instantly to his feet.

The flame vanished as suddenly as it had appeared. But a moment later it recurred. This time, it caught. After several tentative flickers, it became steady.

It was due west of him.

In the darkness, he could not estimate the distance. And he knew logically that it could not be a sign of Linden and the Stonedownors; surely a Rider could travel farther than this on a Courser in five days. But he did not hesitate. Gesturing to Vain, he started down the hill.

The pressure within him mounted at every stride. As he crossed out of Andelain, he was moving at a lope. The fire promptly disappeared beyond a rise in the ground. But he had the direction firmly fixed in his mind. Across the Sunbane-ruined earth he went with alacrity and clenched breath, like a man eager to confront his doom.

He had covered half a league before he glimpsed the fire again. It lay beyond still another rise. But he was close enough now to see that it was large. As he ascended the second rise, he remembered caution and slowed his pace. Climbing the last way in a stealthy crouch, he carefully peered over the ridge.

There: the fire.

Holding his breath, he scanned the area around the blaze,

From the ridge, the ground sloped sharply, then swept away in a long shallow curve for several hundred feet before curling steeply upward to form a wide escarpment. In a place roughly opposite his position, the contour of the ground and the overhang of the escarpment combined to make a depression like a bowl half-buried on edge against the wall of the higher terrain.

The fire burned in this vertical concavity. The half bowl reflected much of the light, but the distance still obscured some details. He could barely see that the fire blazed in a long, narrow mound of wood. The mound lay aimed toward the heart of the bowl; and the fire had obviously been started at the end away from the escarpment, so that, as new wood caught flame, the blaze moved into the bowl. Half the length of the woodpile had already been consumed.

The surrounding area was deserted. Covenant descried no sign of whoever had contrived such a fire. Yet the arrangement was manifestly premeditated. Except for the hunger of the flames, an eerie silence lay over the Plains.

A figure snagged the corner of Covenant's vision. He turned, and saw Vain standing beside him. The Demondim-spawn made no attempt to conceal himself below the ridge.

“Idiot!” whispered Covenant fiercely. “Get down!”

Vain paid no attention. He regarded the fire with the same blind, ambiguous smile that he had worn while travelling through

Andelain. Or while killing the people of Stonemight Woodhelven. Covenant grabbed at his arm; but Vain was immovable.

Through his teeth, Covenant muttered, “Damn you, anyway. Someday you're going to be the death of me.”

When he looked back toward the fire, it had moved noticeably toward the escarpment, and the bowl was brighter. With a sudden rush of dismay, he saw that the mound of wood ended in a pile around an upright stake as tall and heavy as a man.

Someone or something was tied to the stake. Tied alive. The indistinct figure was struggling.

Hell and blood! Covenant instinctively recognized a trap. For a moment, he was paralyzed. He could not depart, leave that bound figure to burn. And he could not approach closer. An abominable purpose was at work here, malice designed to snare him-or someone else equally vulnerable. Someone else? That question had no answer. But as he gritted himself, trying to squeeze a decision out of his paralysis, he remembered Mhoram's words: It boots nothing to avoid his snares-

Abruptly, he rose to his feet. “Stay here,” he breathed at Vain. “No sense both of us getting into trouble.” Then he went down the slope and strode grimly toward the fire.

Vain followed as usual. Covenant could hardly keep from raging at the Demondim-spawn. But he did not stop.

As he neared the escarpment, the fire began to lick at the woodpile around the stake. He broke into a run. In moments, he was within the bowl and staring at the bait of the trap.

The creature hound to the stake was one of the Waynhim.

Like the ur-viles, the Waynhim were Demondim-spawn. Except for their grey skin and smaller stature, they resembled the ur-viles closely. Their hairless bodies had long trunks and short limbs, with the arms and legs matched in length so that the creatures could run on all fours as well as walk erect. Their pointed ears sat high on their bald skulls; then-mouths were like slits. And they had no eyes; they used scent instead of vision. Wide nostrils gaped in the centres of their faces.

As products of the Demondim, the Waynhim were lore-wise and cunning. But, unlike their black kindred, they had broken with Lord Foul after the Ritual of Desecration. Covenant had heard that the Waynhim as a race served the Land according to their private standards; but he had seen nothing more of them since his last stay at Revelstone, when a Waynhim had escaped from Foul's Creche to bring the Council word of Lord Foul's power.

The creature before Covenant now was in tremendous pain. Its skin was raw. Dark blood oozed from scores of lash-marks. One of its arms bent at an angle of agony, and its left ear had been ripped away. But it was conscious. Its head followed his approach, nostrils quivering. When he stopped to consider its situation, it strained toward him, begging for rescue.

“Hang on,” he rasped, though he did not know if the creature could understand him. “I'll get you out.” Fuming in outrage, he began to scatter the wood, kicking dead boughs and brush out of his way as he reached toward the stake.

But then the creature seemed to become aware of a new scent. Perhaps it caught the smell of his wedding ring. He knew that Demondim-spawn were capable of such perceptions. It burst into a fit of agitation, began barking in its harsh, guttural tongue. Urgency filled its voice. Covenant grasped none of its language; but he heard one word which sent a chill of apprehension down his spine. Again and again, the Waynhim barked, “Nekhrimah!”

Bloody hell! The creature was trying to give Vain some kind of command.

Covenant did not stop. The creature's desperation became his. Heaving wood aside, he cleared a path to the stake. At once, he snatched the Graveller's knife from his belt and began to slash the vines binding the Waynhim.

In a moment, the creature was free. Covenant helped it limp out of the woodpile. Immediately, the creature turned on Vain, emitted a stream of language like a curse. Then it grabbed Covenant's arm and tugged him away from the fire.

Southward.

“No.” He detached his arm with difficulty. Though the Waynhim probably could not comprehend him, he tried to explain. “I'm going north. I've got to get to Revelstone.”

The creature let out a muffled cry as if it knew the significance of that word Revelstone. With a swiftness which belied its injuries, it scuttled out of the bowl along the line of the escarpment. A moment later, it had vanished in the darkness.

Covenant's dread mounted. What had the Waynhim tried to tell him? It had infected him with a vivid sense of peril. But he did not intend to take even one step that increased the distance between him and Linden. His only alternative was to flee as quickly as possible. He turned back toward Vain.

The suddenness of the surprise froze him,

A man stood on the other side of the fire.

He had a ragged beard and frenzied eyes. In contrast, his lips wore a shy smile. “Let it be,” he said, nodding after the Waynhim. “We have no more need of it.” He moved slowly around the fire, drawing closer to Covenant and Vain. For all its surface nonchalance, his voice was edged with hysteria.

He reached Covenant's side of the blaze. A sharp intake of air hissed through Covenant's teeth.

The man was naked to the waist, and his torso was behung with salamanders. They grew out of him like excrescences. Their bodies twitched as he moved. Then: eyes glinted redly in the firelight, and their jaws snapped.

A victim of the Sunbane!

Remembering Marid, Covenant brandished his knife. “That's close enough,” he warned; but his voice shook, exposing his fear. “I don't want to hurt you.”

“No,” the man replied, “you do not wish to hurt me.” He grinned like a friendly gargoyle. “And I have no wish to hurt you.” His hands were clasped together in front of him as if they contained something precious. “I wish to give you a gift.”

Covenant groped for anger to master his fear. “You hurt that Waynhim. You were going to kill it. What's the matter with you? There isn't enough murder in the world-you have to add more?”

The man was not listening. He gazed at his hands with an expression of mad delight. “It is a wondrous gift.” He shuffled forward as if he did not know that he was moving. “No man but you can know the wonder of it.”

Covenant willed himself to retreat; but his feet remained rooted to the ground. The man exerted a horrific fascination. Covenant found himself staring involuntarily at those hands as if they truly held something wonderful.

“Behold,” the man whispered with gentle hysteria. Slowly, carefully, like a man unveiling treasure, he opened his hands.

A small furry spider sat on his palm.

Before Covenant could flinch, recoil, do anything to defend himself, the spider jumped.

It landed on his neck. As he slapped it away, he felt the tiny prick of its sting.

For an instant, a marvellous calm came over him. He watched unperturbed as the man moved forward as if he were swimming through the sudden thickness of the firelight. The sound of the blaze became woolly. Covenant hardly noticed when the man took away his knife. Vain gazed at him for no reason at all. With imponderable delicacy, the floor of the bowl began to tilt.

Then his heart gave a beat like the blow of a sledgehammer, and everything shattered. Flying shards of pain shredded his thoughts. His brain had time to form only two words: venom relapse. After that, his heart beat again; and he was conscious of nothing except one long raw howl.

For some time, he wandered lorn in a maze of anguish, gibbering for release. Pain was everywhere. He had no mind, only pain-no respiration that was not pain-no pulse which did not multiply pain. Agony swelled inside his right forearm. It hurt as if his limb were nothing but a bloody stump; but that harm was all of him, everything, his chest and bowels and head and on and on in an unbearable litany of pain. If he screamed, he did not hear it; he could not hear anything except pain and death.

Death was a dervish, vertigo, avalanche, sweeping him over the precipice of his futility. It was everything he had ever striven to redeem, every pointless anguish to which he had ever struggled to give meaning. It was unconsolable grief and ineradicable guilt and savage wrath; and it made a small clear space of lucidity in his head.

Clinging shipwrecked there, he opened his eyes.

Delirium befogged his sight; grey shapes gambolled incomprehensibly across his fever, threatening the last lucid piece of himself. But he repulsed the threat. Blinking as if the movement of his eyelids were an act of violence, he cleared his vision.

He was in the bowl, bound at the stake. Heaps of firewood lay around him. Flames danced at the edges of the pyre.

The bowl was full of figures dancing like flames. They capered around the space like ghouls. Cries of blood-lust sprang off the walls of the escarpment; voices shrill with cannibalism battered his ears. Men with chatoyant eyes and prehensile noses leered at him. Women with adder-breasts, fingers lined by fangs, flared past him like fragments of insanity, cackling for his life. Children with hideous facial deformities and tiger maws in their bellies puked frogs and obscenities.

Horror made him spin, tearing clarity from his grasp. His right arm blasted pain into his chest. Every nerve of that limb was etched in agony. For an instant, he almost drowned.

But then he caught sight of Vain.

The Demondim-spawn stood with his back to the Plains, regarding the fervid dancers as if they had been created for no other purpose than to amuse him. Slowly, his eyes shifted across the frenzy until they met Covenant's.

“Vain!” Covenant gasped as if he were choking on blood. “Help me!”

In response, Vain bared his teeth in a black grin.

At the sight, Covenant snapped. A white shriek of fury exploded from his chest. And with his shriek came a deflagration that destroyed the night.

Fifteen: “Because You Can See”

NO. Never again.

After Covenant had passed beyond the hillcrest in Andelain, Linden Avery sat down among the dead stones, and tried to recover her sense of who she was. A black mood was on her. She felt futile and bereft of life, as she had so often felt in recent years; all her efforts to rise above her parents had accomplished nothing. If Sunder or Hollian had spoken to her, she might have screamed, if she were able to summon the energy.

Now that she had made her decision, had struck a blow in defence of her difficult autonomy against Covenant's strange power to persuade her from herself, she was left with the consequences. She could not ignore them; the old and forever unassuaged barrenness around her did not permit them to be ignored. These dead hills climbed south and west of her, contradicting Andelain as if she had chosen death when she had been offered life.

And she was isolated by her blackness. Sunder and Hollian had found companionship in their mutual rejection of the Hills. Their lives had been so fundamentally shaped by the Sunbane that they could not question the discomfiture Andelain gave them. Perhaps they could not perceive that those lush trees and greenswards were healthy. Or that health was beautiful.

But Linden accepted the attitude of the Stonedownors. It was explicable in the context of the Sunbane. Her separateness from them did not dismay her.

The loss of Covenant dismayed her. She had made her decision, and he had walked out of her life as if he were taking all her strength and conviction with him. The light of the fertile sun had danced on the Mithil as he passed, burning about him like a recognition of his efficacy against the Land's doom. She had shared the utmost privacy of his life, and yet he had left her for Andelain. And the venom was still in him.

She would not have been more alone if he had riven her of all her reasons for living.

But she had made her decision. She had experienced Covenant's illness as if it were her own, and knew she could not have chosen otherwise. She preferred this lifeless waste of stone over the loveliness of Andelain because she understood it better, could more effectively seal herself against it. After her efforts to save Covenant, she had vowed that she would never again expose herself so intimately to anything, never again permit the Land-born sensitivity of her senses to threaten her independent identity. That vow was easier to keep when the perceptions against which she closed her heart were perceptions of ruin, of dead rock like the detritus of a cataclysm, rather than of clean wood, aromatic grasses, bountiful aliantha. In her private way, she shared Hollian's distrust. Andelain was far more seductive than the stone around her. She knew absolutely that she could not afford to be seduced.

Lost in her old darkness, with her eyes and ears closed as if she had nailed up shutters, barred doors, she did not understand Sunder's warning shout until too late. Suddenly, men with clubs and knives boiled out of hiding. They grappled with Sunder as he fought to raise his poniard, his Sunstone. Linden heard a flat thud as they stunned him, Hollian's arms were pinioned before her dirk could make itself felt. Linden leaped into motion; but she had no chance. A heavy blow staggered her. While she retched for breath, her arms were lashed behind her.

A moment later, brutal hands dragged her and her companions away from the River.

For a time while she gasped and stumbled, she could not hold up her defences. Her senses tasted the violence of the men, experiencing their roughness as if it were a form of ingrained lust. She felt the contorted desecration of the terrain. Involuntarily, she knew that she was being taken toward the source of the deadness, that these people were creatures of the same force which had killed this region. She had to shut her eyes, tie her mind in dire knots, to stifle her unwilling awareness of her straits.

Then the companions were manhandled down a narrow crevice into the canyon of Stonemight Woodhelven.

Linden had never seen a Woodhelven before, and the sight of it revolted her. The carelessly made homes, the slovenly people, the blood-eagerness of the Graveller-these things debased the arduous rectitude she had learned to see in people like Sunder and Hollian. But everything else paled when she caught her first glimpse of the Graveller's steaming, baleful green stone. It flooded her eyes with ill, stung her nostrils like virulent acid; it dwarfed every other power she had encountered, outshone everything except the Sunbane itself. That emerald chip was the source of the surrounding ruin, the cause of the imminent and uncaring wildness of the Woodhelvennin. Tears blinded her. Spasms clenched her mind like a desire to vomit. Yet she could not deafen herself to the Graveller's glee when that woman announced her intention to slay her captives the next morning.

Then Linden and the Stonedownors were impelled into a rude hut on stilts, and left to face death as best they could. She could not resist. She had reached a crisis of self-protection. This close to the Stonemight, she was always aware of it. Its emanations leeched at her heart, sucked her toward dissolution. Rocking against the wall to remind herself that she still existed, still possessed a separate physical identity, she repeated, No, never again. She iterated the words as if they were a litany against evil, and fought for preservation.

She needed an answer to Joan, to venom and Ravers, to the innominate power of the Stonemight. But the only answer she found was to huddle within herself and close her mind as if she were one of her parents, helpless to meet life, avid for death.

Yet when dawn came, the door of the hut was flung open, not by the Graveller or any of the Woodhelvennin, but by a Rider of the Clave. The fertile sun vivified his stark red robe, etched the outlines of his black rukh, made the stiff thrust of his beard look like a grave digger's spade. He was tall with authority and unshakably confident. “Come,” he said as if disobedience were impossible. “I am Santonin na-Mhoram-in. You are mine.” To Sunder's glower and Hollian's groan, he replied with a smile like the blade of a scimitar.

Outside, the Woodhelvennin stood moaning and pleading. The Graveller protested abjectly. But Santonin compelled her. Weeping, she surrendered her Stonemight. Another man delivered to him the Stonedownors' Sunstone, Iianar, knives.

Watching the transaction, Linden was unable to think anything except that Covenant would return from Andelain soon, and his companions would be gone. For one mad instant, Santonin's smile almost drew her to confess Covenant's existence; she wanted to keep him from falling into the hands of Stonemight Woodhelven. But Sunder and Hollian were silent; and their silence reminded her that the Clave desired Covenant's death. With the remnants of her will, she swallowed everything which might betray nun.

After that, her will was taken from her altogether. Under the green doom of the sun, Santonin na-Mhoram-in ignited his rukh. Coercion sprang from the blaze, seized possession of her soul. All choice left her. At his word, she mounted Santonin's Courser. The shred of her which remained watched Sunder and Hollian as they also obeyed. Then Santonin took them away from Stonemight Woodhelven. Away toward Revelstone.

His geas could not be broken. She contained nothing with which she might have resisted it. For days, she knew that she should attempt to escape, to fight. But she lacked the simple volition to lift her hands to her face or push her hair out of her eyes without Santonin's explicit instructions. Whenever he looked into her dumb gaze, he smiled as if her imposed docility pleased him, At times, he murmured names that meant nothing to her, as if he were mocking her: Windscour, Victuallin Tayne, Andelainscion. And yet he did not appear to be corrupt. Or she was not capable of perceiving his corruption.

Only once did his mastery fail. Shortly after sunrise on the first day of a desert sun, eight days after their departure from Stonemight Woodhelven, a silent shout unexpectedly thrilled the air, thrilled Linden's heart. Santonin's hold snapped like an overtight harpstring.

As if they had been straining at the leash for this moment, Sunder and Hollian grappled for the rukh. Linden clamped an arm-lock on Santonin, flung him to the ground, then broke away south-eastward in the direction of the shout.

But a moment later, she found herself wandering almost aimlessly back to Santonin's camp. Sunder and Hollian were packing the Rider's supplies. Santonin wore a fierce grin. The triangle of his rukh shone like blood and emerald. Soon he took his captives on toward Revelstone, as if nothing had happened.

Nothing had happened. Linden knew nothing, understood nothing, chose nothing. The Rider could have abused her in any way he desired. She might have felt nothing if he had elected to exercise a desire. But he did not. He seemed to have a clear sense of his own purpose. Only the anticipation in his eyes showed that his purpose was not kind.

After days of emptiness, Linden would have been glad for any purpose which could restore her to herself. Any purpose at all. Thomas Covenant had ceased to exist in her thoughts. Perhaps he had ceased to exist entirely. Perhaps he had never existed. Nothing was certain except that she needed Santonin's instructions in order to put food in her mouth.

Even the sight of Revelstone itself, the Keep of the na-Mhoram rising from the high jungle of a second fertile sun like a great stone ship, could not rouse her spirit. She was only distantly aware of what she was seeing. The gates opened to admit the Rider, closed behind his Courser, and meant nothing.

Santonin na-Mhoram-in was met by three or four other figures like himself; but they greeted him with respect, as if he had stature among them. They spoke to him, words which Linden could not understand. Then he commanded his prisoners to dismount.

Linden, Sunder, and Hollian obeyed in an immense, ill-lit hall. With Santonin striding before them, they walked the ways of the great Keep. Passages and chambers, stairs and junctions, passed unmarked, unremembered. Linden moved like a hollow vessel, unable to hold any impression of the ancient gut-rock. Santonin's path had no duration and no significance.

Yet his purpose remained. He brought his captives to a huge chamber like a pit in the floor of Revelstone. Its sloping sides were blurred and blunt, as if a former gallery or arena had been washed with lava. At its bottom stood a man in a deep ebony robe and a chasuble of crimson. He gripped a tall iron crozier topped with an open triangle. His hood was thrown back, exposing features which were also blurred and blunt in the torchlight.

His presence pierced Linden's remaining scrap of identity like a hot blade. Behind her passivity, she began to wail.

He was a Raver.

“Three fools,” he said in a voice like cold scoria. “I had hoped for four.”

Santonin and the Raver spoke together in alien, empty words. Santonin produced the Stonemight and handed it to the Raver. Emerald reflected in the Raver's eyes; an eloquent smile shaped the flesh of his lips. He closed his fist on the green chip, so that it plumed lush ferns of force. Linden's wail died of starvation in the poverty of her being.

Then the Rider stepped to one side, and the Raver faced the captives. His visage was a smear of ill across Linden's sight. He gazed at her directly, searched out the vestiges of her self, measured them, scorned them. “You I must not harm,” he said dully, almost regretfully. “Unharmed, you will commit all harm I could desire.” His eyes left her as if she were too paltry to merit further notice. “But these treachers are another matter.” He confronted Sunder and Hollian. “It signifies nothing if they are broken before they are shed.”

He held the Stonemight against his chest. Its steam curled up his face. Nostrils dilating, he breathed the steam as if it were a rare narcotic. “Where is Thomas Covenant?”

The Stonedownors did not react, could not react. Linden stood where she had been left, like a disregarded puppet. But her heart contracted in sudden terror.

The Raver made a slight gesture. Santonin muttered softly over his rukh. Abruptly, the geas holding Sunder and Hollian ended. They stumbled as if they had forgotten how to manage their limbs and jerked trembling erect. Fear glazed Sunder's eyes, as if he were beholding the dreadful font and master of his existence. Hollian covered her face like a frightened child.

“Where is Thomas Covenant?”

Animated by an impulse more deeply inbred than choice or reason, the Stonedownors struggled into motion and tried to flee.

The Raver let Hollian go. But with the Stonemight he put out a hand of force which caught Sunder by the neck. Hot emerald gripped him like a garrotte, snatched him to his knees.

Reft of her companion, Hollian stopped and swung around to face the Raver. Her raven hair spread about her head like wings.

The Raver knotted green ill at Sunder's throat. “Where is Thomas Covenant?”

Sunder's eyes were blind with fear and compulsion. They bulged in their sockets. But he did not answer. Locking his jaws, he held himself still.

The Raver's fingers tightened. “Speak.”

The muscles of Sunder's jaw pulled together, clenched as if he were trying to break his teeth, grind his voice into silence forever. As the force at his throat grew stronger, those muscles became distinct, rigid, etched against the darkness of his fear and strangulation. It seemed impossible that he could so grit his teeth without tearing the ligatures of his jaw. But he did not answer. Sweat seemed to burst from his pores like bone marrow squeezed through his skin. Yet his rictus held.

A frown of displeasure incused the Raver's forehead. “You will speak to me,” he soughed. “I will tear words from your soul, if need be.” His hand clinched the Stonemight as if he were covetous to use all its power. “Where is Thomas Covenant?”

“Dead.” Whimpers contorted Hollian's voice. Linden felt the lie in the core of her helplessness. “Lost.”

The Raver did not glance away from Sunder, did not release his garrotte. “How so?”

“In Andelain,” the eh-Brand panted. “He entered. We awaited him. He did not return.” To complete her he, she moaned, “Forgive me, Sunder.”

“And the white ring?”

“I know not. Lost. He did not return.”

Still the Raver gave no look or answer to Hollian. But he eased slightly his grasp on the Graveller. “Your refusal,” he breathed, “says to me that Thomas Covenant lives. If he is lost, why do you wish me to believe that he lives?”

Within the scraps of herself, Linden begged Sunder to support Hollian's lie, for his own sake as well as for Covenant's.

Slowly, the Graveller unlocked his jaw. Clarity moved behind the dullness of his eyes. Terribly through his knotted throat, he grated, “I wish you to fear.”

A faint smile like a promise of murder touched the Raver's lips. But, as with Santonin, the certainty of his purpose restrained him. To the Rider, he said, “Convey them to the hold.” Linden could not see whether he believed Hollian's lie. She could descry nothing but the loud wrong of the Raver's purpose.

With a few words, Santonin returned the Stonedownors to Linden's condition. Walking like wooden articulations of his will, his captives followed him dumbly out of the stone pit.

Again, they traversed halls which had no meaning, crossed thresholds that seemed to appear only to be forgotten. Soon they entered a cavern lined into the distance on both sides with iron doors. Small barred windows in the doors exposed each cell, but Linden was incapable of looking for any glimpse of other prisoners. Santonin locked away first Sunder, then Hollian. Farther down the row of doors, he sent Linden herself into a cell.

She stood, helpless and soul-naked, beside a rank straw pallet while he studied her as if he were considering the cost of his desires. Without warning, he quenched his rukh. His will vanished from her mind, leaving her too empty to hold herself upright. As she crumpled to the pallet, she heard him chuckling softly. Then the door clanged shut and bolts rasped into place. She was left alone in her cell as if it contained nothing except the louse-ridden pallet and the blank stone of the walls.

She huddled foetally on the straw, while time passed over her like the indifference of Revelstone's granite. She was a cracked gourd and could not refill herself. She was afraid to make the attempt, afraid even to think of making any attempt. Horror had burrowed into her soul. She desired nothing but silence and darkness, the peace of oblivion. But she could not achieve it. Caught in the limbo between revulsion and death, she crouched among her emptinesses, and waited for the contradictions of her dilemma to tear her apart.

Guards came and went, bringing her unsavoury food and stale water; but she could not muster enough of herself to notice them. She was deaf to the clashing of iron which marked the movements of the guards, the arrival or departure of prisoners. Iron meant nothing. There were no voices. She would have listened to voices. Her mind groped numbly for some image to preserve her sanity, some name or answer to reinvoke the identity she had lost. But she lost all names, all images. The cell held no answers.

Then there was a voice, a shout as if a prisoner had broken free. She heard it through her stupor, clung to it. Fighting the cramps of motionlessness, the rigidity of hunger and thirst, she crawled like a cripple toward the door.

Someone spoke in a flat tone. A voice unlike any she had heard before. She was so grateful for it that at first she hardly caught the words. She was clawing herself up toward the bars of her window when the words themselves penetrated her.

“Ur-Lord Thomas Covenant,” the voice was saying. “Unbeliever and white gold wielder, I salute you. You are remembered among the Haruchai,” The speaker was inflexible, denying his own need. “I am Brinn. Will you set us free?”

Covenant! She would have screamed the name, but her throat was too dry even to whisper.

The next instant, she heard the impact of iron on flesh. Covenant! A body slumped to the stone. Guards moved around it. Hauling herself to the window, she crushed her face against the bars and tried to see; but no one entered her range of vision. A moment later, feet made heavy by a burden moved out of the hold, leaving her lorn under a cairn of silence.

She wanted to sob; but even that was an improvement for her. She had been given a name to fill her emptiness. Covenant. Helplessness and hope. Covenant was still alive. He was here. He could save her. He did not know that she needed saving.

For a time which seemed long and full of anguish, she slumped against the door while her chest shook with dry sobs and her heart clung to the image of Thomas Covenant. He had smiled for Joan. He was vulnerable to everything, and yet he appeared indomitable. Surely the guards had not killed him?

Perhaps they had. Perhaps they had not. His name itself was hope to her. It gave her something to be, restored pieces of who she was. When exhaustion etiolated her sobbing, she crept to her water-bowl, drank it dry, then ate as much, of the rancid food as she could stomach. Afterward, she slept for a while.

But the next iron clanging yanked her awake. The bolts of her door were thrown back. Her heart yammered as she rolled from the pallet and lurched desperately to her feet. Covenant-?

Her door opened. The Raver entered her cell,

He seemed to have no features, no hands; wherever his robe bared his flesh, such potent emanations of ill lanced from him that she could not register his physical being. Wrong scorched the air between them, thrusting her back against the wall. He reeked of Marid, of the malice of bees. Of Joan. His breath filled the cell with gangrene and nausea. When he spoke, his voice seemed to rot in her ears.

“So it appears that your companions lied. I am astonished. I had thought all the people of the Land to be cravens and children. But no matter. The destruction of cravens and children is small pleasure. I prefer the folly of courage in my victims. Fortunately, the Unbeliever”- he sneered the name — “will not attempt your redemption. He is unwitting of your plight.”

She tried to squeeze herself into the stone, strove to escape through bluff granite. But her body, mortal and useless, trapped her in the Raver's stare. She could not shut her eyes to him. He burned along her nerves, etching himself into her, demeaning her soul with the intaglio of his ill.

“But he also,” continued the Raver in a tone like stagnant water, "is no great matter. Only his ring signifies. He will have no choice but to surrender it. Already he has sold himself, and no power under the Arch of Tune can prevent his despair.

“No, Linden Avery,” the Raver said without a pause. “Abandon all hope of Thomas Covenant. The principal doom of the Land is upon your shoulders.”

No! She had no defence against so much corruption. Night crowded around her, more cruel than any darkness-night as old as the pain of children, parents who sought to die. Never!

“You have been especially chosen for this desecration. You are being forged as iron is forged to achieve the ruin of the Earth.” His voice violated all her flesh. "You have been chosen, Linden Avery, because you can see. Because you are open to that which no other in the Land can discern, you are open to be forged. Through eyes and ears and touch, you are made to be what the Despiser requires. Descrying destruction, you will be driven to commit all destruction. I will relish that rain.

“Therefore I have forewarned you. So that you will know your peril, and be unable to evade it. So that as you strive to evade it, the Despiser may laugh in scorn and triumph.”

No. It was not possible. She was a doctor; she could not be forced to destroy. No power, no cunning, no malevolence, could unmake who she chose to be. Never! A rush of words surged up in her, burst from her as if she were babbling.

“You're sick. This is all sickness. It's just disease. You have some disease that rots your mind. Physiological insanity. A chemical imbalance of the brain. You don't know what you're saying. I don't believe in evil!”

“No?” The Raver was mildly amused. “Forsooth. That lie, at least, I must rectify.” He advanced on her like a tide of slaughter. “You have committed murder. Are you not evil?”

He spread his arms as if he meant to embrace her. He had no face, no hands. A bright hallucination at the sleeve of his robe stretched toward her, caressed her cheek.

Terror bloomed from the touch like a nightshade of the soul. Gelid ill froze her face, spread ice across her senses like the concatenation and fulfilment of all her instinctive revulsion. It flamed through her and became truth. The truth of Despite. Wrong suppurated over her features, festering her severity and beauty, corrupting who she was. The Sunbane shone in her flesh: desert, pestilence, the screaming of trees. She would have howled, but she had no voice.

She fled. There was no other defence. Within herself, she ran away. She closed her eyes, her ears, her mouth, closed the nerves of her skin, sealed every entrance to her mind. No. Horror gave her the power of paralysis. Never. Striking herself blind and deaf and numb, she sank into the darkness as if it were death, the ineluctable legacy of her birth.

Never again.

Sixteen: The Weird of the Waynhim

I won't!

Covenant fought to sit up, struggled against blankets that clogged his movements, hands that restrained him.

I'll never give it up!

Blindly, he wrestled for freedom. But a massive weakness fettered him where he lay. His right arm was pinned by a preterite memory of pain.

I don't care what you do to me!

And the grass under him was fragrant and soporific. The hands could not be refused. An uncertain blur of vision eased the darkness. The face bending over him was gentle and human.

“Rest, ring-wielder,” the man said kindly. “No harm will come upon you in this sanctuary. There will be time enough for urgency when you are somewhat better healed.”

The voice blunted his desperation. The analystic scent of the grass reassured and comforted him. His need to go after Linden mumbled past his lips, but he could no longer hear it.

The next time he awakened, he arrived at consciousness slowly, and all his senses came with him. When he opened his eyes, he was able to see. After blinking for a moment at the smooth dome of stone above him, he understood that he was underground. Though he lay on deep fresh grass, he could not mistake the fact that this spacious chamber had been carved out of the earth. The light came from braziers in the corners of the room.

The face he had seen earlier returned. The man smiled at him, helped him into a sitting position. “Have care, ring-wielder. You have been mortally ill. This weakness will be slow to depart.” The man placed a bowl of dark fluid in Covenant's hands and gently pressed him to drink. The liquid had a musty, alien flavour; but it steadied him as it went down into his emptiness.

He began to look around more closely. His bed was in the centre of the chamber, raised above the floor like a catafalque of grass. The native stone of the walls and dome had been meticulously smoothed and shaped. The ceiling was not high, but he would be able to stand erect. Low entryways marked opposite walls of the room. The braziers were made of unadorned grey stone and supported by iron tripods. The thick, black fluid in them burned without smoke.

When he turned his head far enough, he found Vain near him.

The Demondim-spawn stood with his arms hanging slightly bent. His lips wore a fault, ambiguous smile, and his eyes, black without pupil or iris, looked like the orbs of a blind man.

A quiver of revulsion shook Covenant. “Get-” His voice scraped his throat like a rusty knife. “Get him out of here.”

The man supported him with an arm around his back. “Perhaps it could be done,” he said, smiling wryly. “But great force would be required. Do you have cause to fear him?”

“He-” Covenant winced at chancrous memories: Sunbane victims dancing; Vain's grin. He had difficulty forcing words past the blade in his throat. “Refused to help me.” The thought of his own need made him tremble. “Get rid of him.”

“Ah, ring-wielder,” the man said with a frown, “such questions are not so blithely answered. There is much that I must tell you-and much I wish to be told.”

He faced Covenant; and Covenant observed him clearly for the first time. He had the dark hah-and stocky frame of a Stonedownor, though he wore nothing but a wide piece of leather belted around his waist. The softness of his brown eyes suggested sympathy; but his cheeks had been deeply cut by old grief, and the twitching of his mouth gave the impression that he was too well acquainted with fear and incomprehension. His skin had the distinctive pallor of a man who had once been richly tanned. Covenant felt an immediate surge of empathy for him.

“I am Hamako,” the man said. “My former name was one which the Waynhim could not utter, and I have foresworn it. The Waynhim name you ring-wielder in their tongue-and as ring-wielder you are well known to them. But I will gladly make use of any other name you desire.”

Covenant swallowed, took another drink from the bowl. “Covenant,” he said hoarsely. “I'm Thomas Covenant.”

The man accepted this with a nod. “Covenant.” Then he returned to the question of Vain. “For two days,” he said, “while you have lain in fever, the Waynhim have striven with the riddle of this Demondim-spawn. They have found purpose in him, but not harm. This is an astonishment to them, for they perceive clearly the hands of the ur-viles which made him, and they have no trust for ur-viles. Yet he is an embodiment of lore which the Waynhim comprehend. Only one question disturbs them.” Hamako paused as if reluctant to remind Covenant of past horrors. “When you freed dhraga Waynhim from fire, thus imperilling your own life, dhraga spoke the word of command to this Demondim-spawn, ordering him to preserve you. Why did he not obey?”

The dark fluid salved Covenant's throat, but he still sounded harsh. “I already used the command. He killed six people.”

“Ah,” said Hamako. He turned from Covenant, and called down one of the entryways in a barking tongue. Almost immediately, a Waynhim entered the chamber. The creature sniffed inquiringly in Covenant's direction, then began a rapid conversation with Hamako. Their voices had a roynish sound that grated on Covenant's nerves-he had too many horrid memories of ur-viles- but he suppressed his discomfort, tried not to think balefully of Vain. Shortly, the Waynhim trotted away as if it carried important information. Hamako returned his attention to Covenant.

The man's gaze was full of questions as he said, “Then you came not upon this Demondim-spawn by chance. He did not seek you out without your knowledge.”

Covenant shook his head.

“He was given to you,” Hamako continued, “by those who know his purpose. You comprehend him.”

“No. I mean, yes, he was given to me. I was told how to command him. I was told to trust him.” He scowled at the idea of Vain's trustworthiness. “But nothing else.”

Hamako searched for the right way to phrase his question. “May I ask-who was the giver?”

Covenant felt reluctant to answer directly. He did not distrust Hamako; he simply did not want to discuss his experience with his Dead. So tie replied gruffly, “I was in Andelain.”

“Ah, Andelain,” Hamako breathed. “The Dead.” He nodded in comprehension, but it did not relieve his awkwardness.

Abruptly, Covenant's intuition leaped. “You know what his purpose is.” He had often heard that the lore of the Waynhim was wide and subtle. “But you're not going to tell me.”

Bamako's mouth twitched painfully. “Covenant,” he said, pleading to be understood, “the Dead were your friends, were they not? Their concern for you is ancient and far-seeing. It is sooth-the Waynhim ken much, and guess more. Doubtless there are many questions to which they hold answers. But-”

Covenant interrupted him. “You know how to fight the Sunbane, and you're not going to tell me that either.”

His tone made Hamako wince. "Surely your Dead have given to you all which may be wisely told. Ah, Thomas Covenant! My heart yearns to share with you the lore of the Waynhim. But they have instructed me strictly to forbear. For many reasons.

“They are ever loath to impart knowledge where they cannot control the use to which their knowledge is placed. For the ring-wielder, perhaps they would waive such considerations. But they have not the vision of the Dead, and fear to transgress the strictures which have guided the gifts of the Dead. This is the paradox of lore, that it must be achieved rather than granted, else it misleads. This only I am permitted to say: were I to reveal the purpose of this Demondim-spawn, that revelation could well prevent the accomplishment of his purpose.” Bamako's face held a look of supplication. “That purpose is greatly desirable.”

“At any rate, the ur-viles desire it greatly.” Frustration and weakness made Covenant sarcastic. “Maybe these Waynhim aren't as different as you think.”

He emptied the bowl, then tried to get to his feet. But Hamako held him back. Covenant had touched anger in the man. Stiffly, Hamako said, “I owe life and health and use to the succour of the Waynhim. Aye, and many things more. I will not betray their wishes to ease your mind, ring-wielder though you are.”

Covenant thrust against Hamako's grasp, but could not break free. After an effort like palsy, he collapsed back on the grass. “You said two days,” he panted. Futility enfeebled him. Two more days! “I've got to go. I'm already too far behind.”

“You have been deeply harmed,” Hamako replied. “Your flesh will not yet bear you. What urgency drives you?”

Covenant repressed a querulous retort. He could not denigrate Hamako's refusal to answer crucial questions; he had done such things himself. When he had mastered his gall, he said, “Three friends of mine were kidnapped by a Rider. They're on their way to Revelstone. If I don't catch up with them in time, they'll be killed.”

Hamako absorbed this information, then called again for one of the Waynhim. Another rapid conversation took place. Hamako seemed to be stressing something, urging something; the responses of the Waynhim sounded thoughtful, unpersuaded. But the creature ended on a note which satisfied Hamako. As the Waynhim departed, he turned back to Covenant.

“Durhisitar will consult the Weird of the Waynhim,” the man said, “but I doubt not that aid will be granted. No Waynhim will forget the redemption of dhraga — or the peril of the trap which ensnared you. Rest now, and fear not. This rhysh will accord you power to pursue your companions.”

“How? What can they do?”

“The Waynhim are capable of much,” returned Hamako, urging Covenant to lie back. “Rest, I say. Hold only this much trust, and put care aside. It will be bitter to you if you are offered aid, and are too weak to avail yourself of it.”

Covenant could not resist. The grass exuded a somnolent air. His body was leaden with weariness; and the roborant he had drunk seemed to undermine his anxiety. He allowed Hamako to settle him upon the bed. But as the man prepared to leave, Covenant said distantly, “At least tell me how I ended up here. The last thing I remember”- he did not look at Vain — “I was as good as dead. How did you save me?”

Hamako sat on the edge of the bed. Once again, his countenance wore an awkward sympathy. “That I will relate,” he said. “But I must tell you openly that we did not save you.”

Covenant jerked up his head. “No?”

“Softly.” Hamako pushed him flat again. “There is no need for this concern.”

Grabbing the man's arms with both hands, Covenant pulled their faces together. “What the hell am I doing alive?”

“Covenant,” said Hamako with a dry smile, “how may I tell the tale if you are so upwrought?”

Slowly, Covenant released him. “All right.” Spectres crowded his head; but he forced himself to relax. “Tell it.”

“It came to pass thus,” the man said. "When dhraga Waynhim was set free by your hand, and learned that this Demondim-spawn would not obey the word of command, it desired you to share its flight. But it could not gain your comprehension. Therefore dhraga summoned all the haste which the harm to its body permitted, and sped to inform the rhysh of your plight. Dhraga had been made the bait of a snare. This snare-"

Covenant interrupted him. “What's a rhysh?”

"Ah, pardon me. For a score of turnings of the moon, I have heard no human voice but those warped by the Sunbane. I forget that you do not speak the Waynhim tongue.

“In our speech, the word rhysh means stead. It gives reference to a community of Waynhim. In all the Land, there are many hundred score Waynhim, but all live in rhysh of one or two score. Each rhysh is private unto itself-though I am told that communication exists between them. In the great war of Revelstone, nigh two score centuries past, five rhysh fought together against the ur-viles of the Despiser. But such sharing is rare. Each rhysh holds to itself and interprets the Weird in its own way. Long has this rhysh lived here, serving its own vision.”

Covenant wanted to ask the meaning of the term Weird; but he already regretted having halted Hamako's tale.

“The rhysh,” Hamako resumed, “was informed of your plight by dhraga. At once we set out to attempt your aid. But the distance was too great. When first dhraga was captured the decision was taken to make no rescue. It was bitter to all the rhysh to abandon one of its own. But we had cause to fear this snare. Long have we laboured all too near a strong number of those warped by the Sunbane.” Unexplained tears blurred his eyes. “Long have the ill souls that captured you striven to undo us. Therefore we believed the snare to be for us. Having no wish to slay or be slain, we abandoned dhraga to its doom.”

Covenant was struck by the closeness with which Hamako identified himself with the rhysh, and by the man's evident grief over the Sunbane victims. But he did not interrupt again.

“Also,” Hamako went on, suppressing his emotion, “for three days of desert sun prior to the setting of this snare, the Waynhim tasted Raver spoor.”

A Raver! Covenant groaned. Hellfire! That explained the trap. And the spider.

“Therefore we feared the snare deeply. But when we learned that the ring-wielder had fallen prey, we comprehended our error, and ran to succour you. But the distance,” he repeated, “was too great. We arrived only in time to behold the manner in which you redeemed yourself with wild magic.”

Redeemed-! An ache wrung Covenant's heart. No!

"Though your arm was terrible and black, your white ring spun a great fire. The bonds dropped from you. The wood was scattered. The Sunbane-warped were cast aside like chaff, and fled in terror. Rocks were riven from the escarpment. Only this Demondim-spawn stood scatheless amid the fire.

“The power ended as you fell. Perceiving your venom-ill, we bore you here, and the Waynhim tended you with all their cunning until your death receded from you. Here you are safe until your strength returns.”

Hamako fell silent. After studying Covenant for a moment, he rose to his feet and began to depart.

“The Raver?” Covenant gritted.

“All spoor of him is gone,” Hamako replied quietly. “I fear his purpose was accomplished.”

Or else he's afraid of me, Covenant rasped inwardly. He did not see Hamako leave the chamber. He was consumed by his thoughts. Damnation! First Marid, then the bees, now this. Each attack worse than the one before. And a Raver involved each time. Hell and blood! Why? Bile rose in him. Why else? Lord Foul did not want him dead, not if his ring might fall to a Raver. The Despiser wanted something entirely different. He wanted surrender, voluntary abdication. Therefore the purpose of these attacks lay in their effect on him, in the way they drew power from his delirium, violence over which he had no control.

No control!

Was Foul trying to scare him into giving up his ring?

God bloody damn it to hell! He had always felt an almost overwhelming distrust of power. In the past, he had reconciled himself to the might with which he had defeated Lord Foul only because he had refrained from making full use of it; rather than attempting to crush the Despiser utterly, he had withheld the final blow, though in so doing he had ensured that Lord Foul would rise to threaten the Land again. Deliberately, he had made himself culpable for Lord Foul's future ill. And he had chosen that course because the alternative was so much worse.

For he believed that Lord Foul was part of himself, an embodiment of the moral peril lurking for the outcast in the complex rage against being outcast, a leper's doom of Despite for everything including himself. Restraint was the only possible escape from such a doom. If he had allowed his power to rise unchecked, committed himself completely to wild magic in his battle against Lord Foul, he would have accomplished nothing but the feeding of his own inner Despiser. The part of him which judged, believed, affirmed, was the part which refrained. Utter power, boundless and unscrupulous rage, would have corrupted him, and he would have changed in one stroke from victim to victimizes He knew how easy it was for a man to become the thing he hated.

Therefore he profoundly feared his wild magic, his capacity for power and violence. And that was precisely the point of Foul's attack. The venom called up his might when he was beyond all restraint-called it up and increased it. In Mithil Stonedown, he had almost failed to light Sunder's orcrest; but two days ago he had apparently broken boulders. Without volition.

And still he did not know why. Perhaps in saving Joan, he had sold himself; perhaps he was no longer free. But no lack of freedom could force him to surrender. And every increase in his power improved his chances of besting the Despiser again.

His danger lay in the venom, the loss of restraint. But if he could avoid further relapses, learn control-He was a leper. Control and discipline were the tools of his life. Let Lord Foul consider that before he counted his victory.

With such thoughts, Covenant grew grim and calm. Slowly, the effects of his illness came over him. The scent of the grass soothed him like an anodyne. After a time, he slept.

When Hamako nudged him awake again, he had the impression that he had slept for a long time. Nothing in the chamber had changed; yet his instincts were sure. Groaning at the way everything conspired to increase the peril of his friends, he groped into a sitting position, “How many days have I lost now?”

Hamako placed a large bowl of the dark, musty liquid in Covenant's hands. “You have been among us for three days of the sun of pestilence,” he answered. “Dawn is not yet nigh, but I have awakened you because there is much I wish to show and say before you depart. Drink.”

Three days. Terrific! Dismally, Covenant took a deep swallow from the bowl.

But as the liquid passed into him, he recognized the improvement in his condition. He held the bowl steadily: his whole body felt stable. He looked up at Hamako. To satisfy his curiosity, he asked, “What is this stuff?”

“It is vitrim.” Hamako was smiling: he seemed pleased by what he saw in Covenant. “It resembles an essence of aliantha, but has been created by the lore of the Waynhim rather than drawn, from the aliantha itself.”

In a long draught, Covenant drained the bowl, and felt immediately more substantial. He returned the bowl, and rose to his feet. “When can I get started? I'm running out of excuses.”

“Soon after the sun's rising, you will renew your sojourn,” answered Hamako. “I assure you that you will hold your days among us in scant regret.” He handed the bowl to a Waynhim standing nearby and accepted a leather pouch like a wineskin. This he gave to Covenant. “Vitrim,” he said. “If you consume it prudently, you will require no other aliment for three days.”

Covenant acknowledged the gift with a nod and tied the pouch to his belt by its drawstring. As he did so, Hamako said, “Thomas Covenant, it pains me that we have refused to answer your most urgent questions. Therefore I desire you to comprehend the Weird of the Waynhim ere you depart. Then perhaps you will grasp my conviction that their wisdom must be trusted. Are you willing?”

Covenant faced Hamako with a rueful grimace. “Hamako, you saved my life. I may be a natural-born ingrate, but I can still appreciate the significance of not being dead. I'll try to understand anything you want to tell me.” Half involuntarily, he added, “Just don't take too long. If I don't do something soon, I won't be able to live with myself.”

“Then come,” Hamako said, and strode out of the chamber.

Covenant paused to tuck in his shirt, then followed.

As he stooped to pass through the entryway, he noted sourly that Vain was right behind him.

He found himself in a corridor, scrupulously delved out of native rock, where he could barely walk erect. The passage was long, and lit at intervals by small censers set into the walls. In them, a dark fluid burned warmly, without smoke.

After some distance, the passage branched, became a network of tunnels. As Covenant and Hamako passed, they began to meet Waynhim. Some went by in silence; others exchanged a few comments with Hamako in their roynish tongue; but all of them bowed to the ring-wielder.

Abruptly, the tunnel opened into an immense cavern. It was brightly-lit by vats of burning liquid. It appeared to be more than a hundred feet high and three times that across. At least a score of Waynhim were busily at work around the area.

With a thrill of astonishment, Covenant saw that the whole cavern was a garden.

Thick grass covered the floor. Flowerbeds lay everywhere, hedged by many different varieties of bushes. Trees-pairs of Gilden, oak, peach, sycamore, elm, apple, jacaranda, spruce, and others-stretched their limbs toward the vaulted ceiling. Vines and creepers grew up the walls.

The Waynhim were tending the plants. From plot to tree they moved, barking chants and wielding short iron staves; and dark droplets of power sprang from the metal, nourishing flowers and shrubs and vines like a distilled admixture of loam and sunshine.

The effect was incomparably strange. On the surface of the Land, the Sunbane made everything unnatural; nothing grew without violating the Law of its own being, nothing died without ruin. Yet here, where there was no sunlight, no free air, no pollinating insects, no age-nurtured soil, the garden of the Waynhim blossomed lush and lovely, as natural as if these plants had been born to fructify under a stone sky.

Covenant gazed about with undisguised wonder; but when he started to ask a question, Hamako gestured him silent, and led him into the garden.

Slowly, they walked among the flowers and trees. The murmurous chanting of the Waynhim filled the air; but none of the creatures spoke to each other or to Hamako; they were rapt in the concentration of their work. And in their concentration, Covenant caught a glimpse of the prodigious difficulty of the task they had set for themselves. To keep such a garden healthy underground must have required miracles of devotion and lore.

But Hamako had more to show. He guided Covenant and Vain to the far end of the cavern, into a new series of corridors. These angled steadily upward; and as he ascended, Covenant became aware of a growing annual smell. He had already guessed what he was about to see when Hamako entered another large cave, not as high as the garden, but equally broad.

It was a zoo. The Waynhim here were feeding hundreds of different animals. In small pens cunningly devised to resemble their natural dens and habitats lived pairs of badgers, foxes, hounds, marmosets, moles, raccoons, otters, rabbits, lynx, muskrats. And many of them had young.

The zoo was less successful than the garden. Animals without space to roam could not be healthy. But that problem paled beside the amazing fact that these creatures were alive at all. The Sunbane was fatal to animal life. The Waynhim preserved these species from complete extinction.

Once again, Hamako silenced Covenant's questions. They left the cave, and continued to work upward. They met no Waynhim in these tunnels. Soon their ascent became so pronounced that Covenant wondered just how deep in the Earth he had slept for three days. He felt a pang over the insensitivity of his senses; he missed the ability to gauge the rock weight above him, assess the nature of the vitrim, probe the spirits of his companions. That regret made him ache for Linden. She might have known whether or not he could trust Vain.

Then the passageway became a spiral stair which rose to a small round chamber. No egress was visible; but Hamako placed his hands against a section of the wall, barked several Waynhim words, and thrust outward. The stone divided along an unseen crack and opened.

Leaving the chamber, Covenant found himself under the stars. Along the eastern horizon, the heavens had begun to pale. Dawn was approaching. At the sight, he felt an unexpected reluctance to leave the safety and wonder of the Waynhim demesne. Grimly, he tightened his resolve. He did not look back when Hamako sealed the entrance behind him.

Vague in the darkness, Hamako led him through an impression of large, crouching shapes to a relatively open area. There he sat down, facing the east. As he joined Hamako, Covenant discovered that they were on a flat expanse of rock-protection against the first touch of the Sunbane.

Vain stood off to one side as if he neither knew nor cared about the need for such protection.

“Now I will speak,” Hamako said. His words went softly into the night. “Have no fear of the Sunbane-warped who sought your life. Never again will they enter this place. That much at least of mind and fear they retain.” His tone suggested that he held the area sacred to some private and inextinguishable sorrow.

Covenant settled himself to listen; and after a deep pause Hamako began.

“A vast gulf,” he breathed, a darker shape amid the dark crouching of the night, "lies between creatures that are born and those that are made. Born creatures, such as we are, do not suffer torment at the simple fact of physical form. Perhaps you desire keener sight, greater might of arm, but the embodiment of eyes and limbs is not anguish to you. You are born by Law to be as you are. Only a madman loathes the nature of his birth.

"It is far otherwise with the Waynhim. They were made-as the ur-viles were made-by deliberate act in the breeding dens of the Demondim. And the Demondim were themselves formed by lore rather than blood from the Viles who went before them. Thus the Waynhim are not creatures of law. They are entirely alien in the world. And they are unnaturally long of life. Some among this rhysh remember the Lords and the ancient glory of Revelstone. Some tell the tale of the five rhysh which fought before the gates of Revelstone in the great siege-and of the blue Lord who rode to their aid in folly and valour. But let that pass.

“The numbers of the Waynhim are only replenished because the ur-viles continue the work of their Demondim makers. Much breeding is yet done in the deeps of the Earth, and some are ur-viles, some Waynhim-and some are altogether new, enfleshed visions of lore and power. Such a one is your companion. A conscious making to accomplish a chosen aim.”

In the east, the sky slowly blanched. The last stars were fading. The shapes around Covenant and Hamako grew more distinct, modulating toward revelation.

"That is the Weird of all Demondim-spawn. Each Waynhim and ur-vile beholds itself and sees that it need not have been what it is. It is the fruit of choices it did not make. From this fact both Waynhim and ur-viles draw their divergent spirits. It has inspired in the ur-viles a quenchless loathing for their own forms and an overweening lust for perfection, for the power to create what they are not. Their passion is extreme, careless of costs. Therefore they have given millennia of service to the Despiser, for Lord Foul repays them with both knowledge and material for their breedings. Thus comes your companion.

"And therefore the Waynhim have been greatly astonished to find no ill in him. He is an-an apotheosis. In him, it appears that the ur-viles have at last transcended their unscrupuling violence and achieved perfection. He is the Weird of the ur-viles incarnate. More of him I may not say.

“But the spirit of the Waynhim is different entirely. They are not reckless of costs; from the great Desecration which Kevin Landwaster and Lord Foul conceived upon the Land, they learned a horror of such passions. They foresaw clearly the price the ur-viles paid, and will ever pay, for self-loathing, and they turned in another way. Sharing the Weird, they chose to meet it differently. To seek self-justification.”

Hamako shifted his position, turned more squarely toward the east.

"In the Waynhim tongue, Weird has several meanings. It is fate or destiny-but it is also choice, and is used to signify council or decision-making. It is a contradiction-fate and choice. A man may be fated to die, but no fate can determine whether he will die in courage or cowardice. The Waynhim choose the manner in which they meet their doom.

“In their loneness, they have chosen to serve the Law of which they do not partake. Each rhysh performs its own devoir. Thus the garden and the animals. In defiance of the Sunbane and all Lord Foul's ill, this rhysh seeks to preserve things which grow by Law from natural seed, in the form which they were born to hold. Should the end of Sunbane ever come, the Land's future will be assured of its natural life.”

Covenant listened with a tightness in his throat. He was moved by both the scantness and the nobility of what the Waynhim were doing. In the myriad square leagues which comprised the vast ruin of the Sunbane, one cavern of healthy plants was a paltry thing. And yet that cavern represented such commitment, such faith in the Land, that it became grandeur. He wanted to express his appreciation, but could find no adequate words. Nothing could ever be adequate except the repeal of the Sunbane, allowing the Waynhim to have the future they served. The fear that their self-consecration might prove futile in the end blurred his vision, made him cover his eyes with his hands.

When he looked up again, the sun was rising.

It came in pale brown across the Plains, a desert sun. Land features were lifted out of darkness as the night bled away. When he glanced about him, he saw that he was sitting in the centre of a wrecked Stonedown.

Houses lay in rubble; lone walls stood without ceilings to support; architraves sprawled like corpses; slabs of stone containing windows canted against each other. At first, he guessed that the village had been hit by an earthquake. But as the light grew stronger, he saw more clearly.

Ragged holes the size of his palm riddled all the stone as if a hail of vitriol had fallen on the village, chewing through the ceilings until they collapsed, tearing the walls into broken chunks, burning divots out of the hard ground. The place where he sat was pocked with acid marks. Every piece of rock in the area which had ever stood upright had been sieved into ruin.

“Hellfire!” he murmured weakly. “What happened here?”

Hamako had not moved; but his head was bowed. When he spoke, his tone said plainly that he was acutely familiar with the scene. “This also I desire to tell,” he sighed. “For this purpose I brought you here.”

Behind him, a hillock cracked and opened, revealing within it the chamber from which he and Covenant had left the underground corridors. Eight Waynhim filed into the sunrise, closing the entrance after them. But Hamako seemed unaware of them.

“This is During Stonedown, home of the Sunbane-warped who sought your life. They are my people.”

The Waynhim ranged themselves in a circle around Hamako and Covenant. After an initial glance, Covenant concentrated on Hamako. He wanted to hear what the man was saying.

“My people,” the former Stonedownor repeated. "A proud people-all of us. A score of turnings of the moon ago, we were hale and bold. Proud. It was a matter of great pride to us that we had chosen to defy the Clave.

“Mayhap you have heard of the way in which the Clave acquires blood. All submit to this annexation, as did we for many generations. But it was gall and abhorrence to us, and at last we arose in refusal. Ah, pride. The Rider departed from us, and During Stonedown fell under the na-Mhoram's Grim”

His voice shuddered. “It may be that you have no knowledge of such abominations. A fertile sun was upon us, and we were abroad from our homes, planting and reaping our sustenance — recking little of our peril. Then of a sudden the green of the sun became black-blackest ill-and a fell cloud ran from Revelstone toward During Stonedown, crossing against the wind.”

He clenched his hand over his face, gripping his forehead in an effort to control the pain of memory.

“Those who remained in their homes-infants, mothers, the injured and the infirm-perished as During Stonedown perished, in agony. All the rest were rendered homeless,”

The events he described were vivid to him, but he did not permit himself to dwell on them. With an effort of will, he continued, "Then despair came upon us. For a day and a night, we wandered the brokenness of our minds, heeding nothing. We had not the heart to heed. Thus the Sunbane took my people unprotected. They became as you have seen them.

“Yet I was spared. Stumbling alone in my loss-bemoaning the death of wife and daughter — I came by chance upon three of the Waynhim ere the sun rose. Seeing my plight, they compelled me to shelter.”

He raised his head, made an attempt to clear his throat of grief. “From that time, I have lived and worked among the rhysh, learning the tongue and lore and Weird of the Waynhim. ln heart and will, I have become one of them as much as a man may. But if that were the extent of my tale”- he glanced painfully at Covenant — “I would not have told it. I have another purpose.”

Abruptly, he stood and gazed around the gathered Waynhim. When Covenant joined him, he said, “Thomas Covenant, I say to you that I have become of the Waynhim. And they have welcomed me as kindred. More. They have made my loss a part of then-Weird. The Sunbane-warped live dire lives, committing all possible harm ere they die. In my name, this rhysh has taken upon itself the burden of my people. They are watched and warded-preserved from hurt, sustained in life-prevented from wreaking the damage of their wildness. For my sake, they are kept much as the animals are kept, both aided and controlled. Therefore they remain alive in such numbers. Therefore the rhysh was unwilling to redeem dhraga. And therefore”- he looked squarely at Covenant — “both rhysh and I are to blame for the harm you suffered.”

“No,” Covenant protested. “It wasn't your fault. You can't blame yourself for things you can't foresee.”

Hamako brushed this objection aside. “The Waynhim did not foresee their own creation. Yet the Weird remains.” But then, somehow, he managed a smile. “Ah, Covenant,” he said, “I do not speak for any love of blame. I desire only your comprehension.” He gestured around him. “The Waynhim have come to offer their aid in pursuit of your companions. I wish you to know what lies behind this offer, so that you may accept it in the spirit of its giving, and forgive us for what we have withheld from you.”

A surge of respect and empathy blurred Covenant's responses again. Because he had no other way to express what he felt, he.said formally, as Atiaran had taught him, “I thank you. The giving of this gift honours me. Accepting it, I return honour to the givers.” Then he added, “You've earned the right.”

Slowly, the strain faded from Hamako's smile. Without releasing Covenant's gaze, he spoke to the Waynhim; and they answered in a tone of readiness. One of them stepped forward, placed something in his hand. When Hamako raised his hand, Covenant saw that the object was a stone dirk.

He winced inwardly. But Hamako's smile was the smile of a friend. Seeing Covenant's uncertainty, the man said, “There is no harm for you in this. May I have your hand?”

Consciously repressing a tremor, Covenant extended his right hand, palm downward.

Hamako grasped his wrist, looked for a moment at the scars left by Joan's nails, then abruptly drew a cut across the veins.

Covenant flinched; but Hamako held him., did not permit him to withdraw.

His anxiety turned to amazement as he saw that the cut did not bleed. Its edges opened, but no blood came from the wound.

Dhraga approached. Its broken arm hung in a splint, but its other wounds were healing.

It raised its uninjured hand. Carefully, Hamako made an incision in the exposed palm. At once, dark blood swarmed down dhraga's forearm.

Without hesitation, the Waynhim reached out, placed its cut directly on Covenant's. Hot blood smeared the back of his hand.

At that instant, he became aware of the other Waynhim. They were chanting softly in the clear desert dawn. Simultaneously, strength rushed up his arm, kicked his heart like a burst of elation. He felt suddenly taller, more muscular. His vision seemed to expand, encompassing more of the terrain. He could easily have wrested free of Bamako's grasp. But he had no need to do so.

Dhraga lifted its hand away.

The bleeding had stopped. Its blood was being sucked into his cut.

Dhraga withdrew. Hamako gave the dirk to durhisitar. While durhisitar cut its palm just as dhraga's had been cut, Hamako said, “Soon the power will come to appear unbearable, but I ask you to bear it. Remain quiet until all the Waynhim have shared this giving. If the ritual is completed, you will have the strength you require for a day-perhaps two.”

Durhisitar put its cut upon Covenant's. More might surged into him. He felt abruptly giddy with energy, capable of anything, everything. His incision absorbed durhisitar's blood. When the creature stepped back, he could hardly hold himself still for the next Waynhim.

Only after the third infusion did he realize that he was receiving something more than power. Dhraga he had recognized by its injuries-but how had he known durhisitar? He had never looked closely at that particular Waynhim. Yet he had known it by name, just as he knew the third Waynhim, dhubha, and the fourth, vraith. He felt ecstatic with knowledge.

Drhami was fifth; ghohritsar, sixth. He was dancing with uncontainable might. Hamako's knuckles whitened; but his grip had the weight of a feather. Covenant had to leash himself firmly to keep from exploding free and cavorting around the ruins like a wild man. The range of his hearing had become so wide that he could hardly distinguish words spoken nearby.

Hamako was saying, “-remember your companions. Waste not this power. While it remains, stop for neither night nor doom.”

Ghramin.

Covenant felt as colossal as Gravin Threndor, as mighty as Fire-Lions. He felt that he could crush boulders in his arms, destroy Ravers with his hands.

Dhurng: eighth and last.

Hamako snatched back his hand as if the power in Covenant burned him. “Go now!” he cried. “Go for Land and Law, and may no malison prevail against you!”

Covenant threw back his head, gave a shout that seemed to echo for leagues:

“Linden!”

Swinging around to the north-west, he released the flood-fire of his given strength and erupted, running toward Revelstone like a coruscation in the air.

Seventeen: Blood-speed

THE sun ascended, brown-mantled and potent, sucking the moisture of life from the Land. Heat pressed down like the weight of all the sky. Bare ground was baked as hard as travertine. Loose dirt became dust and dust became powder until brown clogged the air and every surface gave off clouds like dead steam. Chimeras roamed the horizons, avatars of the Sunbane. The Centre Plains lay featureless and unaneled under the bale of that sun.

But Waynhim strength was glee in Covenant's veins. Running easily, swiftly, he could not have stopped, even by choice; his muscles thronged with power; gaiety exalted his heart; his speed was delicious to him. Without exertion, he ran like the Ranyhyn.

His progress he measured on a map in his mind-names of regions so dimly remembered that he could no longer identify when he had first heard them.

Across the wide wilderland of Windscour: eleven leagues. Through the ragged hills of Kurash Festillin: three leagues.

By noon he had settled into a long, fast stride, devouring distance as if his appetite for it were insatiable. Fortified by vitrim and power, he was immune to heat, dust, hallucination.

Yet Vain followed as if the Demondim-Spawn had been made for such swiftness. He ran the leagues lightly, and the ground seemed to leap from under his feet.

Along the breadth of Victuallin Tayne, where in ancient centuries great crops had flourished: ten leagues. Up the long stone rise of Greshas Slant to higher ground: two leagues. Around the dry hollow of Lake Pelluce in the centre of Andelainscion, olden fruiterer to the Land: five leagues.

Covenant moved like a dream of strength. He had no sense of time, of strides measured by sweat and effort. The Waynhim had borne the cost of this power for him, and he was free to run and run. When evening came upon him, he feared he would have to slacken his pace; but he did not. Stars burnished the crisp desert night, and the moon rose half full, shedding silver over the waste. Without hesitation or hindrance, he told out the dark in names.

Across the Centerpith Barrens: fourteen leagues. Down the Fields of Richloam, Sunbane-ruined treasure of the Plains: six leagues. Up through the jagged ridges of Emacrimma's Maw: three leagues. Along Boulder Fash, strewn with confusion like the wreckage of a mountain: ten leagues.

The night unfurled like an oriflamme: it snapped open over the Plains, and snapped away; and he went on running through the dawn. Outdistancing moon and stars, he caught the sunrise in the dry watercourse of the Soulsease River, fivescore leagues and more from Stonemight Woodhelven. Speed was as precious to him as a heart-gift. With Vain always at his back, he sipped vitrim and left the Soulsease behind, left the Centre Plains behind to run and run, northwest toward Revelstone.

Over the open flat of Riversward: five leagues. Through the fens of Graywightswath, which the desert sun made traversable: nine leagues. Up the rocks of the Bandsoil Bounds: three leagues.

Now the sun was overhead, and at last he came to the end of his exaltation. His eldritch strength did not fail-not yet-but he began to see that it would fail. The knowledge gave him a pang of loss. Consciously, he increased his pace, trying to squeeze as many leagues as possible from the gift of Bamako's rhysh.

Across the rolling width of Riddenstretch: twelve leagues.

Gradually his mortality returned. He had to exert effort now to maintain his speed. His throat ached on the dust.

Among the gentle hills, smooth as a soft-rumpled mantle, of Consecear Redoin: seven leagues.

As the last rays of sunset spread from the Westron Mountains, he went running out of the hills, stumbled and gasped-and the power was gone. He was mortal again. The air rasped his lungs as he heaved for breath.

For a while, he rested on the ground, lay panting until his respiration eased. Mutely, he searched Vain for some sign of fatigue; but the Demondim-spawn's black flesh was vague in the gloaming, and nothing could touch him. After a time, Covenant took two swallows from his dwindling vitrim, and started walking.

He did not know how much time he had gained; but it was enough to renew his hope. Were his companions two days ahead of him? Three? He could believe that the Clave might not harm them for two or three days. If he met no more delays -

He went briskly on his way, intending to walk through the night. He needed sleep; but his body felt less tired than it usually did after a hike of five leagues. Even his feet did not hurt. The power and the vitrim of the Waynhim had sustained him wondrously. With the sharpness of the air to keep him alert, he expected to cover some distance before he had to rest.

But within a league he caught sight of a fire burning off to the left ahead of him.

He could have bypassed it; he was far enough from it for that. But after a moment he shrugged grimly and started toward the fire. His involuntary hope that he had caught up with his friends demanded an answer. And if this light represented a menace, he did not want to put it behind him until he knew what it was.

Creeping over the hard uneven ground, he crouched forward until he could make out details.

The light came from a simple campfire. A few pieces of wood burned brightly. A bundle of faggots lay near three large sacks.

Across the fire sat a lone figure in a vivid red robe. The hood of the robe had been pushed back, revealing the lined face and grey-raddled hair of a middle-aged woman. Something black was draped around her neck.

She triggered an obscure memory in Covenant. He felt he had seen someone like her before, but could not recollect where or when. Then she moved her hands, and he saw that she held a short iron sceptre with an open triangle affixed to its end. Curses crowded against his teeth. He identified her from Linden's description of the Rider at Crystal Stonedown.

Gritting to himself, he began to withdraw. This Rider was not the one he wanted. The Graveller of Stonemight Woodhelven had indicated that Linden's abductor, Santonin na-Mhoram-in, was a man. And Covenant had no intention of risking himself against any Rider until no other choice remained. With all the stealth he could muster, he edged away from the light.

Suddenly, he heard a low snarl. A huge shape loomed out of the darkness, catching him between it and the fire. Growling threats, the shape advanced like the wall of a house.

Then a voice cut the night,

“Din!”

The Rider, She stood facing Covenant and Vain and the snarl. “Din!” she commanded. “Bring them to me!”

The shape continued to approach, forcing Covenant toward the campfire. As he entered the range of the light, he became gradually able to see the immense beast.

It had the face and fangs of a sabre-tooth, but its long body resembled that of a horse-a horse with shoulders as high as the top of his head, a back big enough to carry five or six people, and hair so shaggy that it hung to the creature's thighs. Its feet were hooved. From the back of each ankle grew a barbed spur as long as a swordthorn.

Its eyes were red with malice, and its snarl vibrated angrily. Covenant hastened to retreat as much as he could without moving too close to the Rider.

Vain followed calmly with his back to the beast.

“Halfhand!” the Rider barked in surprise. “I was sent to await you, but had no thought to meet with you so soon.” A moment later, she added, “Have no fear of Din. It is true-the Coursers are creatures of the Sunbane. But therefore they have no need of meat. And they are whelped in obedience. Din will lift neither fang nor spur against you without my command.”

Covenant put the fire between him and the woman. She was a short, square individual, with a blunt nose and a determined chin. Her hair was bound carelessly at the back of her neck as if she had no interest in the details of her appearance. But her gaze had the directness of long commitment. The black cloth hanging around her neck ritualized the front of her robe like a chasuble.

He distrusted her completely. But he preferred to take his chances with her rather than with her Courser. “Show me.” He cast a silent curse at the unsteadiness of his voice. “Send it away.”

She regarded him over the flames. “As you wish.” Without shifting her gaze, she said, “Begone, Din! Watch and ward.”

The beast gave a growl of disappointment. But it turned away and trotted out into the night

In an even tone, the Rider asked, “Does this content you?”

Covenant answered with a jerk of his knotted shoulders. “It takes orders from you.” He did not relax a jot of his wariness. “How content do you expect me to get?”

She considered him as if she had reason to fear him, and did not intend to show it. “You misdoubt me, Halfhand. Yet it appears to me that the right of misdoubt is mine.”

Harshly, he rasped, “How do you figure that?”

“In Crystal Stonedown you reft Sivit na-Mhoram-wist of his rightful claim, and nigh slew him. But I give you warning.” Her tone involuntarily betrayed her apprehension. “I am Memla na-Mhoram-in. If you seek my harm, I will not be so blithely dispatched.” Her hands gripped her rukh, though she did not raise it

He suppressed an angry denial. “Crystal Stonedown is just about a hundred and fifty leagues from here. How do you know what happened there?”

She hesitated momentarily, then decided to speak. “With the destruction of his rukh, Sivit was made helpless. But the fate of every rukh is known in Revelstone. Another Rider who chanced to be in that region was sent at once to his aid. Then that Rider spoke with his rukh to Revelstone, and the story was told. I knew of it before I was sent to await you.”

“Sent?” Covenant demanded, thinking, Be careful. One thing at a time. “Why? How did you know I was coming?”

“Where else but Revelstone would the Halfhand go with his white ring?” she replied steadily. “You fled Mithil Stonedown in the south, and appeared again at Crystal Stonedown. Your aim was clear. As for why I was sent-I am not alone. Seven of the Clave are scattered throughout this region, so that you would not find the Keep unforewarned. We were sent to escort you if you come as friend. And to give warning if you come as foe.”

Deliberately, Covenant let his anger show. “Don't lie to me. You were sent to kill me. Every village in the Land was told to kill me on sight. You people think I'm some kind of threat.”

She studied him over the jumping flames. “Are you not?”

“That depends. Whose side are you on? The Land's-or Lord Foul's?”

“Lord Foul? That name is unknown to me.”

“Then call him a-Jeroth. A-Jeroth of the Seven Hells.”

She stiffened. “Do you ask if I serve a-Jeroth? Have you come such a distance in the Land, and not learned that the Clave is dedicated entirely to the amelioration of the Sunbane? To accuse-”

He interrupted her like a blade. “Prove it.” He made a stabbing gesture at her rukh. “Put that thing down. Don't tell them I'm coming.”

She stood still, trapped by indecision.

“If you really serve the Land,” he went on, “you don't need to be afraid of me. But I've got no reason to trust you. Goddamn it, you've been trying to kill me! I don't care how much tougher you are than Sivit.” He brandished his ring, hoping she had no way of recognizing his incapacity. “I'll take you apart. Unless you give me some reason not to.”

Slowly, the Rider's shoulders sagged. In a tight voice, she said, “Very well.” Taking her sceptre by the triangle, she handed it past the fire to him.

He accepted it with his left hand to keep it away from his ring. A touch of relief eased some of his tension. He slipped the iron into his belt, then tugged at his beard to keep himself from becoming careless, and began to marshal his questions.

Before he could speak, Memla said, "Now I am helpless before you. I have placed myself in your hands. But I desire you to understand the Clave before you choose my doom. For generations, the soothreaders have foretold the coming of the Halfhand and the white ring. They saw it as an omen of destruction for the Clave-a destruction which only your death could prevent.

"Halfhand, we are the last bastion of power in the Land. All else has been undone by the Sunbane. Only our might, constant and vigilant, preserves any life from Landsdrop to the Westron Mountains. How can our destruction be anything other than heinous to the Land? Therefore we sought your death.

"But Sivit's tale held great meaning for Gibbon na-Mhoram. Your power was revealed to the Clave for the first time. The na-Mhoram took counsel for several days, and at last elected to dare his doom. Power such as yours, he declared, is rare and precious, and must be used rather than resisted. Better, he said, to strive for your aid, risking fulfilment of the soothreaders' word, than to lose the hope of your puissance. Therefore I do not seek your hurt, though Sivit did, to his cost,"

Covenant listened intently, yearning for the ability to hear whether or not she spoke the truth. Sunder and Hollian had taught him to fear the Clave. But he needed to reach Revelstone-and reach it in a way which would not increase the danger to his friends. He decided to attempt a truce with Memla.

“All right,” he said, moderating the harshness of his tone. “I'll accept that-for now. But there's something I want you to understand. I didn't lift a finger against Sivit until he attacked me.” He had no memory of the situation; but he felt no need to be scrupulously candid. Bluffing for his safety, he added, “He forced me. All I wanted was the eh-Brand.”

He expected her to ask why he wanted an eh-Brand. Her next sentence took him by surprise.

“Sivit reported that you appeared to be ill.”

A chill spattered down his spine. Careful, he warned himself. Be careful. “Sunbane-fever,” he replied with complex dishonesty. “I was just recovering.”

“Sivit reported,” she went on, “that you were accompanied by a man and a woman. The man was a Stonedownor, but the woman appeared to be a stranger to the Land.”

Covenant clenched himself, decided to chance the truth. “They were captured by a Rider. Santonin na-Mhoram-in. I've been chasing them for days.”

He hoped to surprise a revelation from her; but she responded with a frown, “Santonin? He has been absent from Revelstone for many days-but I think he has taken no captives.”

“He's got three,” rasped Covenant. “He can't be more than two days ahead of me.”

She considered for a moment, then shook her head. “No. Had he taken your companions, he would have spoken of it through his rukh to the Readers. I am na-Mhoram-in. Such knowledge would not be withheld from me.”

Her words gave him a sick sense of being out of his depth-caught in a web of falsehood with no possibility of extrication. Who is lying? The Graveller of Stonemight Woodhelven? Memla? Or Santonin, so that he could keep a fragment of the Illearth Stone for himself? His inability to discern the truth hurt Covenant like vertigo. But he fought to keep his visage flat, free of nausea. “Do you think I'm making this up?”

Memla was either a consummate prevaricator or a brave woman. She met his glare and said evenly, “I think you have told me nothing concerning your true companion.” With a nod, she indicated Vain.

The Demondim-spawn had not moved a muscle since he had first come to a halt near the fire.

“He and I made a deal,” Covenant retorted. “I don't talk about him, and he doesn't talk about me.”

Her eyes narrowed. Slowly, she said, “You are a mystery, Halfhand. You enter Crystal Stonedown with two companions. You reave Sivit of an eh-Brand. You show power. You escape. When you appear once more, swift beyond belief, your three companions are gone, replaced by this black enigma. And you demand to be trusted. Is it power which gives you such arrogance?”

Arrogance, is it? Covenant grated. I'll show you arrogance. Defiantly, he pulled the rukh from his belt, tossed it to her. “All right,” he snapped. “Talk to Revelstone. Tell them I'm coming. Tell them anybody who hurts my friends is going to answer for it!”

Startlement made her hesitate. She looked at the iron and back at him, debating rapidly with herself. Then she reached her decision. Reluctantly, she put the rukh away within her robe. Straightening her black chasuble, she sighed, “As you wish.” Her gaze hardened. “If your companions have indeed been taken to Revelstone, I will answer for their safety.”

Her decision softened his distrust. But he was still not satisfied. “Just one more thing,” he said in a quieter tone. “If Santonin was on his way to Revelstone while you were coming here, could he get past you without your knowing it?”

“Clearly,” she responded with a tired lift of her shoulders. "The Land is wide, and I am but one woman. Only the Readers know the place and state of every rukh. Though seven of us were sent to await you, a Rider could pass by unseen if he so chose. I rely on Din to watch and ward, but any Rider could command Din's silence, and I would be none the wiser. Thus if you desire to believe ill of Santonin, I cannot gainsay you.

“Please yourself,” she continued in a tone of fatigue. “I am no longer young, and mistrust wearies me. I must rest.” Bending like an old woman, she seated herself near the fire. “If you are wise, you will rest also. We are threescore leagues from Revelstone-and a Courser is no palanquin.”

Covenant gazed about him, considering his situation. He felt too tight-and too trapped-to rest. But he intended to remain with Memla. He wanted the speed of her mount. She was either honest or she was not; but he would probably not learn the truth until he reached Revelstone. After a moment, he, too, sat down. Absent-mindedly, he unbound the pouch of vitrim from his belt, and took a small swallow.

“Do you require food or water?” she asked. “I have both.” She gestured toward the sacks near her bundle of firewood.

He shook his head. “I've got enough for one more day.”

“Mistrust,” Reaching into a sack, she took out a blanket and spread it on the ground. With her back to Covenant, she lay down, pulled the blanket over her shoulders like a protection against his suspicions, and settled herself for sleep.

Covenant watched her through the declining flames. He was cold with a chill which had nothing to do with the night air. Memla na-Mhoram-in challenged too many of his assumptions. He hardly cared that she cast doubt on his distrust of the Clave; he would know how to regard the Clave when he learned more about the Sunbane. But her attack on his preconceptions about Linden and Santonin left nun sweating. Was Santonin some kind of rogue Rider? Was this a direct attempt by Lord Foul to lay hands on the ring? An attack similar to the possession of Joan? The lack of any answers made him groan.

If Linden were not at Revelstone, then he would need the Clave's help to locate Santonin. And he would have to pay for that help with cooperation and vulnerability.

Yanking at his beard as if he could pull wisdom from the skin of his face, he glared at Memla's back and groped for prescience. But he could not see past his fear that he might indeed be forced to surrender his ring.

No. Not that. Please. He gritted his teeth against his chill dread. The future was a leper's question, and he had been taught again and again that the answer lay in single-minded dedication to the exigencies of the present. But he had never been taught how to achieve single-mindedness, how to suppress his own complex self-contradictions.

Finally, he dozed. His slumber was fitful. The night was protracted by fragmentary nightmares of suicide-glimpses of a leper's self-abandonment that terrified him because they came so close to the facts of his fate, to the manner in which he had given himself up for Joan. Waking repeatedly, he strove to elude his dreams; but whenever he faded back toward unconsciousness, they renewed their ubiquitous grasp.

Some time before dawn, Memla roused herself. Muttering at the stiffness in her bones, she used a few faggots to restore the fire, then set a stoneware bowl Ml of water in the flames to heat. While the water warmed, she put her forehead in the dirt toward Revelstone and mumbled orisons in a language Covenant could not understand.

Vain ignored her as if he had been turned to stone.

When the water was hot enough, she used some of it to lave her hands, face, and neck. The rest she offered to Covenant. He accepted. After the night he had just spent, he needed to comfort himself somehow. While he performed what ablutions he could, she took food for breakfast from one of her sacks.

He declined her viands. True, she had done nothing to threaten him. But she was a Rider of the Clave. While he still had vitrim left, he was unwilling to risk her food. And also, he admitted to himself, he wanted to remind her of his distrust. He owed her at least that much candour.

She took his refusal sourly. “The night has not taught you grace,” she said. “We are four days from Revelstone, Halfhand. Perhaps you mean to live on air and dust when the liquid in your pouch fails.”

“I mean,” he articulated, “to trust you exactly as much as I have to, and no more.”

She scowled at his reply, but made no retort.

Soon dawn approached. Moving briskly now, Memla packed away her supplies. As soon as she had tied up her sacks, bound her bundles together by lengths of rope, she raised her head, and barked, “Din!”

Covenant heard the sound of hooves. A moment later, Memla's Courser came trotting out of the dusk.

She treated it with the confidence of long familiarity. Obeying her brusque gesture, Din lowered itself to its belly. At once, she began to load the beast, heaving her burdens across the middle of its back so that they hung balanced in pairs. Then, knotting her fingers in its long hair, she pulled herself up to perch near its shoulders.

Covenant hesitated to follow. He had always been uncomfortable around horses, in part because of their strength, in part because of their distance from the ground; and the Courser was larger and more dangerous than any horse. But he had no choice. When Memla snapped at him irritably, he took his courage in both hands, and heaved himself up behind her.

Din pitched to its feet. Covenant grabbed at the hair urgently to keep himself from falling. A spasm of vertigo made everything reel as Memla turned Din to face the sunrise.

The sun broke the horizon in brown heat. Almost at once, haze began to ripple the distance, distorting all the terrain. His memories of the aid the Waynhim had given him conflicted with his vertigo and with his surprise at Memla's immunity.

Answering his unspoken question, she said, “Din is a creature of the Sunbane. His body wards us as stone does.” Then she swung her beast in the direction of Revelstone.

Din's canter was unexpectedly smooth; and its hair gave Covenant a secure hold. He began to recover his poise. The ground still seemed fatally far away; but it no longer appeared to bristle with falling. Ahead of him, Memla sat cross-legged near the Courser's shoulders, trusting her hands to catch her whenever she was jostled off balance. After a while, he followed her example. Keeping both fists constantly clutched in Din's coat, he made himself as secure as he could.

Memla had not offered Vain a seat. She had apparently decided to treat him exactly as he treated her. But Vain did not need to be carried by any beast. He loped behind Dm effortlessly and gave no sign that he was in any way aware of what he was doing.

Covenant rode through the morning in silence, clinging to the Courser's back and sipping vitrim whenever the heat made him dizzy. But when Memla resumed their journey after a brief rest at noon, he felt a desire to make her talk. He wanted information; the wilderness of his ignorance threatened him. Stiffly, he asked her to explain the Rede of the Clave.

“The Rede!” she ejaculated over her shoulder. “Halfhand, the time before us is reckoned in days, not turnings of the moon.”

“Summarize,” he retorted. “If you don't want me dead, then you want my help. I need to know what I'm dealing with.”

She was silent.

Deliberately, he rasped, “In other words, you have been lying to me.”

Memla leaned abruptly forward, hawked and spat past Din's shoulder. But when she spoke, her tone was subdued, almost chastened. “The Rede is of great length and complexity, comprising all the accumulated knowledge of the Clave in reference to life in the Land, and to survival under the Sunbane. It is the task of the Riders to share this knowledge throughout the Land, so that Stonedown and Woodhelven may endure.”

Right, Covenant muttered. And to kidnap people for their blood.

“But little of this knowledge would have worth to you,” she went on. "You have sojourned scatheless under the Sunbane. What skills it to tell you of the Rede?

“Yet you desire comprehension. Halfhand, there is only one matter which the bearer of the white ring need understand. It is the triangle.” She took the rukh from her robe, showed it to him over her shoulder. “The Three Corners of Truth. The foundation of all our service.”

To the rhythm of Din's strides, she began to sing:

“Three the days of Sunbane's bale:

Three the Rede and sooth:

Three the words na-Mhoram spake:

Three the Corners of Truth.”

When she paused, he said, “What do you mean-'three the days'? Isn't the Sunbane accelerating? Didn't each sun formerly last for four or five days, or even more?”

“Yes,” she replied impatiently, "beyond doubt. But the soothreaders have ever foretold that the Clave would hold at three-that the generations-long increase of our power and the constant mounting of the Sunbane would meet and match at three days, producing balance. Thus we hope now that in some way we may contrive to tilt the balance to our side, sending the Sunbane toward decline. Therefore the na-Mhoram desires your aid.

“But I was speaking of the Three Corners of Truth,” she continued with asperity before Covenant could interrupt again. "This knowledge at least you do require. On these three facts the Clave stands, and every village lives.

"First, there is no power in Land or life comparable to the Sunbane. In might and efficacy, the Sunbane surpasses all other puissance utterly.

"Second, there is no mortal who can endure the Sunbane. Without great knowledge and cunning, none can hope to endure from one sun to the next. And without opposition to the Sunbane, all life is doomed. Swift or slow, the Sunbane will wreak entire ruin.

"Third, there is no power sufficient to oppose the Land's doom, except power which is drawn from the Sunbane itself. Its might must be reflected against it-No other hope exists. Therefore does the Clave shed the blood of the Land, for blood is the key to the Sunbane. If we do not unlock that power, there will be no end to our perishing.

“Hear you, Halfhand?” Memla demanded. “I doubt not that in your sojourn you have met much reviling of the Clave. Despite all our labour, Stonedown and Woodhelven must believe that we exact their blood for pleasure or self.” To Covenant's ears, her acidity was the gall of a woman who instinctively abhorred her conscious convictions. “Be not misled! The cost is sore to us. But we do not flinch from it because it is our sole means to preserve the Land. If you must cast blame, cast it upon a-Jeroth, who incurred the just wrath of the Master-and upon the ancient betrayers, Berek and his ilk, who leagued with a-Jeroth.”

Covenant wanted to protest. As soon as she mentioned Berek as a betrayer, her speech lost its persuasiveness. He had never known Berek Halfhand; the Lord-Fatherer was already a legend when Covenant had entered the Land. But his knowledge of the effects of Berek's life was nearly two score centuries more recent than Memla's. Any set of beliefs which counted Berek a betrayer was founded on a lie; and so any conclusions drawn from that foundation were false. But he kept his protest silent because he could conceive of no way to demonstrate its accuracy. No way short of victory over the Sunbane.

To spare himself a pointless argument, he said, “I'll reserve judgment on that for a while. In the meantime, satisfy my curiosity. I've got at least a dim notion of who a-Jeroth is. But what are the Seven Hells?”

Memla was muttering sourly to herself. He suspected that she resented his distrust precisely because it was echoed by a distrust within herself. But she answered brusquely, “They are rain, desert, pestilence, fertility, war, savagery, and darkness. But I believe that there is also an eighth. Blind hostility.”

After that, she rebuffed his efforts to engage her in any more talk.

When they halted for the night, he discarded his empty pouch and accepted food from her. And the next morning, he did what he could to help her prepare for the day's journey.

Sitting on Din, she faced the sunrise. It crested the horizon like a cynosure in green; and she shook her head. “A fertile sun,” she murmured. “A desert sun wreaks much ruin, and a sun of rain may be a thing of great difficulty. A sun of pestilence carries peril and abhorrence. But for those who must journey, no other sun is as arduous as the sun of fertility. Speak not to me under this sun, I adjure you. If my thoughts wander, our path will also wander.”

By the time they had covered half a league, new grass blanketed the ground. Young vines crawled visibly from place to place: bushes unfolded buds the colour of mint.

Memla raised her rukh. Uncapping the hollow sceptre, she decanted enough blood to smear her hands. Then she started chanting under her breath. A vermilion flame, pale and small in the sunlight, burned within the open triangle.

Under Din's hooves, the grass parted along a straight line stretching like a plumb toward Revelstone. Covenant watched the parting disappear into the distance. The line bared no ground; but everything nearby-grass, shrubs, incipient saplings-bent away from it as if an invisible serpent were sliding northwestward through the burgeoning vegetation.

Along the parting, Din cantered as if it were incapable of surprise.

Memla's chant became a low mumble. She rested the end of her rukh on Din's shoulders; but the triangle and the flame remained erect before her. At every change in the terrain, the verdure thickened, compressing whole seasons into fractions of the day. Yet her line remained open. Trees shunned it; copses parted as if they had been riven by an axe; bushes edging the line had no branches or leaves on that side.

When Covenant looked behind him, he saw no trace of the path; it closed the moment Memla's power passed. As a result, Vain had to fend for himself. But he did so with characteristic disinterest, slashing through grass and brush at a run, crashing thickets, tearing across briar patches which left no mark on his black skin. He could not have seemed less conscious of difficulty. Watching the Demondim-spawn, Covenant did not know which amazed him more: Memla's ability to create this path; or Vain's ability to travel at such speed without any path.

That night, Memla explained her line somewhat. Her rukh, she said, drew on the great Banefire in Revelstone, where the Clave did its work against the Sunbane, and the Readers tended the master-rukh. Only the power for the link to the master-rukh came from her; the rest she siphoned from the Banefire. So the making of her path demanded stern concentration, but did not exhaust her. And the nearer she drew to Revelstone, the easier her access to the Banefire became. Thus she was able to form her line again the next day, defying the resistance of huge trees, heather and bracken as high as Din's shoulders, grass like thickets and thickets like forests.

Yet Vain was able to match the Courser's pace. He met the sharper test of each new league as if no size or density of vegetation could ever estimate his limits. And the third day made no change. It intensified still more the extravagance of the verdure, but did not hamper the nonchalant ease with which he followed Din. Time and again, Covenant found himself craning his neck, watching Vain's progress and wondering at the sheer unconscious force it represented.

But as the afternoon passed, his thoughts turned from Vain, and he began to look ahead. The mammoth jungle concealed any landmarks the terrain might have offered, but he knew that Revelstone was near. All his anxiety, dread, and anticipation returned to him; and he fought to see through the thronging foliage as if only an early glimpse of the ancient Keep would forewarn him of the needs and hazards hidden there.

But he received no forewarning. Late in the afternoon, Memla's path started up a steep hillside. The vegetation suddenly ended on the rock of the foothills. Revelstone appeared before Covenant as if in that instant it had been unfurled from the storehouse of his most vivid memories.

The Courser had arrived athwart the great stone city, Giant-wrought millennia ago from the gutrock of the plateau. Out of the farthest west, mountains came striding eastward, then, two leagues away on Covenant's left, dropped sheer to the upland plateau, still a thousand feet and more above the foothills. The plateau narrowed to form a wedged promontory half a league in length; and into this promontory the ancient Giants had delved the immense and intricate habitation of Revelstone.

The whole cliff-face before Covenant was coigned and fortified, lined with abutments and balconies, punctuated by oriels, architraves, embrasures, from a level fifty or a hundred feet above the foothills to the rim of the plateau. On his left, Revelstone gradually faded into native rock; but on his right, it filled the promontory to the wedge-tip, where the watchtower guarded the massive gates of the Keep.

The tremendous and familiar size of the city made his heart ache with pride for the Giants he had loved-and with sharp grief, for those Giants had died in a body, slain by a Raver during the war against Lord Foul's Illearth Stone. He had once heard that there was a pattern graven into the walls of Revelstone, an organization of meaning too huge for un-Giantish minds to grasp; and now he would never have it explained to him.

But that was not all his grief. The sight of Revelstone recalled other people, friends and antagonists, whom he had hurt and lost: Trell Atiaran-mate; Hile Troy, who had sold his soul to a Forestal so that his army might survive; Saltheart Foamfollower; Elena. High Lord Mhoram. Then Covenant's sorrow turned to anger as he considered that Mhoram's name was being used by a Clave which willingly shed innocent blood.

His wrath tightened as he studied Revelstone itself. Mania's line ran to a point in the middle of the city; and from the plateau above that point sprang a prodigious vermeil beam, aimed toward the heart of the declining sun. It was like the Sunbane shaft of Sunder's orcrest; but its sheer size was staggering. Covenant gaped at it, unable to conceive the number of lives necessary to summon so much power. Revelstone had become a citadel of blood. He felt poignantly that it would never be clean again.

But then his gaze caught something in the west, a glitter of hope. There, halfway between Revelstone and the Westron Mountains, lay Furl Falls, where the overflow of Glimmermere came down the cliff to form the White River. And the Falls held water; tumbling spray caught the approaching sunset, and shone. The land had been eighteen days without a sun of rain, and six of them had been desert; yet the springs of Glimmermere had not failed.

Gripping anger and hope between his teeth, Covenant set himself to face whatever lay ahead.

Memla gave a sigh of accomplishment, and lowered her rukh. Turning Din's head with a muttered command, she sent the beast trotting toward the gates under the southeast face of the tower.

The watchtower was barely half the height of the plateau, and its upper reaches stood independent of the main Keep, joined only by wooden crosswalks. Covenant remembered that a courtyard lay open to the sky within the granite walls which sealed the base of the tower to the Keep; and the megalithic stone gates under the watchtower were repeated beyond the courtyard, so that Revelstone possessed a double defence for its only entrance. But as he approached the tower, he was shocked to see that the outer gates lay in rubble. Sometime in the distant past, Revelstone had needed its inner defence.

The abutments over the ruined gates were deserted, as were the fortifications and embrasures above it; the whole tower seemed empty. Perhaps it was no longer defensible. Perhaps the Clave saw no need to fear the entry of strangers. Or perhaps this air of desertion was a trap to catch the unwary.

Memla headed directly into the tunnel, which led to the courtyard; but Covenant slipped off Din's back, lowering himself by handholds of hair. She stopped, looked back at him in surprise. “Here is Revelstone,” she said. “Do you not wish to enter?”

“First things first.” His shoulders were tight with apprehension. “Send the na-Mhoram out here. I want him to tell me in person that I'll be safe.”

“He is the na-Mhoram!” she snapped indignantly. “He does not come or go according to the whims of others.”

“Good for him.” He controlled his tension with sarcasm. “The next time I have a whim, I'll keep that in mind.” She opened her mouth to retort. He cut her off. “I've already been taken prisoner twice. It's not going to happen to me again. I'm not going in there until I talk to the na-Mhoram.” On the spur of a sudden intuition, he added, “Tell him I understand the necessity of freedom as well as he does. He can't get what he wants by coercion. He's just going to have to cooperate.”

Memla glared at him for a moment, then muttered, “As you wish.” With a gruff command, she sent Din into the tunnel, leaving Covenant alone with Vain.

Covenant took hold of his anxiety, and waited. Across the peaks, the sun was setting in green and lavender; the shadow of Revelstone spread out over the monstrous verdure like an aegis of darkness. Watching the tower for signs of hostile intent, he observed that no pennons flew from its crown. None were needed: the hot red shaft of Sunbane-force marked Revelstone as the home of the Clave more surely than any oriflamme.

Unable to possess himself in patience, he growled to Vain, “I'm damned if I know what you want here. But I've got too many other problems. You'll have to take care of yourself.”

Vain did not respond. He seemed incapable of hearing.

Then Covenant saw movement in the tunnel. A short man wearing a stark black robe and a red chasuble came out past the ruined gates. He carried an iron crozier as tall as himself, with an open triangle at one end. He did not use the hood of his robe; his round face, bald head, and beardless cheeks were exposed. His visage was irenic, formed in a mould of habitual beatitude or boredom, as if he knew from experience that nothing in life could ruffle his composure. Only his eyes contradicted the hebetude of his mien. They were a piercing red.

“Halfhand,” he said dully. “Be welcome in Revelstone. I am Gibbon na-Mhoram,”

The simple blandness of the man's manner made Covenant uncomfortable. “Memla tells me I'm safe here,” he said. “How am I supposed to believe that, when you've been trying to kill me ever since I first set foot in the Land?”

“You represent great peril to us, Halfhand.” Gibbon spoke as if he were half asleep. “But I have come to believe that you also represent great promise. In the name of that promise, I accept the risk of the peril. The Land has need of every power. I have come to you alone so that you may see the truth of what I say. You are as safe among us as your own purposes permit.”

Covenant wanted to challenge that assertion; but he was not ready to hazard a test. He changed his tack. “Where's Santonin?”

Gibbon did not blink. "Memla na-Mhoram-in spoke to me of your belief that your companions have fallen into the hands of a Rider. I know nothing of this. Santonin has been long from Revelstone. We feel concern for him. His rukh is silent. Perhaps-if what you say of him is true-your companions have mastered him, and taken his rukh. I have already commanded the Riders who were sent to meet you to begin a search. If your companions are found, I assure you that we shall value their safety."

Covenant had no answer. He scowled at the na-Mhoram, and remained silent.

The man showed no uncertainty or confusion. He nodded toward Vain, and said, “Now I must ask you concerning your companion. His power is evident, but we do not comprehend him.”

“You see him,” Covenant muttered. “You know as much about him as I do.”

Gibbon permitted his gaze to widen. But he did not mention his incredulity. Instead, he said, “My knowledge of him is nothing. Therefore I will not permit him to enter Revelstone.”

Covenant shrugged. “Suit yourself. If you can keep him out, you're welcome.”

“That will be seen.” The na-Mhoram gestured toward the tunnel. “Will you accompany me?”

For one more moment, Covenant hesitated. Then he said, “I don't think I have much choice.”

Gibbon nodded ambiguously, acknowledging either Covenant's decision or his lack of options, and turned toward the tower.

Walking behind the na-Mhoram, Covenant entered the tunnel as if it were a gullet into peril. His shoulders hunched involuntarily against his fear that people might leap on him from the openings in the ceiling. But nothing attacked him. Amid the echoing of his footsteps, he passed through to the courtyard.

There he saw that the inner gates were intact. They were open only wide enough to admit the na-Mhoram. Members of the Clave stood guard on the fortifications over the entrance.

Motioning for Covenant to follow him, Gibbon slipped between the huge stone doors.

Hellfire, Covenant rasped, denying his trepidation. With Vain at his back, he moved forward.

The gates were poised like jaws. The instant he passed them, they closed with a hollow granite thud, sealing Vain outside.

There was no light. Revelstone crouched around Covenant, as dark as a prison.

Eighteen: Revelstone in Rain

“GIBBON!” Fear and ire lashed Covenant's voice.

“Ah, your pardon,” the na-Mhoram replied out of the darkness. “You desire light. A moment.”

Robes rustled around Covenant. He flung his arms wide to ward them off; but they did not assail him. Then he heard a word of command. Red flame burst from the triangle of a rukh. Other lights followed. In moments, the high, wide entry hall of Revelstone was garishly incarnadine.

“Your pardon,” Gibbon repeated. “Revelstone is a place of caution. The Clave is unjustly despised by many, as your own mistrust demonstrates. Therefore we admit strangers warily.”

Groping to recover his inner balance, Covenant grated, “Have you ever stopped to consider that maybe there's a reason why people don't like you?”

“Their mislike is natural,” said the na-Mhoram, unperturbed. “Their lives are fear from dawn to dusk, and they do not behold the fruit of our labour. How should they believe us when we say that without us they would perish? We do not resent this. But we take caution against it.”

Gibbon's explanation sounded dangerously plausible. Yet Covenant distrusted the na-Mhoram's lack of passion. Because he could think of no apt retort, he simply nodded when Gibbon asked, “Will you come?” At the na-Mhoram's side, he walked down the hall, flanked by members of the Clave carrying fires.

The hall was as large as a cavern; it had been formed by Giants to accommodate Giants. But Gibbon soon turned from it into a side passage, and began to ascend broad stairways toward the upper levels of the city. Revelstone was as complex as a maze because it had been laid out according to criteria known only to the long-dead Giants. However, it was familiar to Covenant; though he had not been here for ten of his years, he found that he knew his way. He took a grim satisfaction from the fact.

Loyal to the Keep he remembered, he followed Gibbon upward and away from the spine of Revelstone. Once the entry hall was well behind them, their way was lit by torches smoking in sconces along the walls. Before long, they entered a corridor marked at long intervals by granite doors with wooden handles. Opposite one of them stood a hooded figure wearing a red robe but no chasuble. When the na-Mhoram approached, the figure opened the door for him. Covenant took a moment to be sure the entrance had no hidden locks or bolts, then went in after Gibbon.

Beyond the door lay a suite of rooms: a central area containing stone chairs and a table; a bedroom to one side and a bathroom to the other; an outer balcony. On the table was a tray of food. Brands lit the suite, covering the air with a patina of smoke. Remembering the untrammelled fires of the Lords, Covenant began to marshal bitter questions for the na-Mhoram.

“You will have comfort here,” Gibbon said. “But if you are displeased, we will provide any quarters you require. Revelstone is larger than the Clave, and much unused.” Beckoning for the hooded figure beyond the doorway, he continued, “This is Akkasri na-Mhoram-cro. She will answer your wants. Speak to her of any lack or desire.” The hooded woman bowed without revealing her face or hands, and withdrew. “Halfhand, are you content?”

Content? Covenant wanted to snarl. Oh, sure! Where the goddamn bloody hell is Linden? But he repressed that impulse. He did not wish to betray how much his companions mattered to him. Instead, he said, “I'll be fine. As long as nobody tries to stick a knife into me-or lock my door-or poison my food.”

Gibbon's beatitude smothered every emotion. His eyes were as bland as their colour permitted. He regarded Covenant for a moment, then moved to the table. Slowly, he ate a bite from every dish on the tray-dried fruit, bread, stew-and washed them down with a swallow from the flask. Holding Covenant's gaze, he said, “Halfhand, this mistrust does not become you. I am moved to ask why you are here, when you expect such ill at our hands.”

That question Covenant was prepared to answer honestly. “Not counting what happened to my friends, I need information. I need to understand this Sunbane. So I need the Clave. The villagers I've met-” They had been too busy trying to kill him to answer questions. “They just survive. They don't understand. I want to know what causes the Sunbane. So I can fight it.”

Gibbon's red eyes glinted ambiguously. “Very well,” he replied in a tone that expressed no interest in what he heard or said. “As to fighting the Sunbane, I must ask you to wait until the morrow. The Clave rests at night. But the causes of the Sunbane are plain enough. It is the Master's wrath against the Land for the evil of past service to a-Jeroth.”

Covenant growled inwardly. That idea was either a lie or a cruel perversion. But he did not intend to argue metaphysics with Gibbon. “That isn't what I mean. I need something more practical. How is it done? How did it happen? How does it work?”

Gibbon's gaze did not waver. “Halfhand, if I possessed such knowledge, I would make use of it myself.”

Terrific. Covenant did not know whether to believe the na-Mhoram. A wave of emotional fatigue rolled over him. He began to see how hard it would be to glean the information he needed; and his courage quailed. He did not know the right questions. He simply nodded when Gibbon said, “You are weary. Eat, now. Sleep. Perhaps the morrow will bring new insight.”

But as Gibbon moved to the door, Covenant felt compelled to try once more. “Tell me. How come Glimmermere still has water?”

“We moderate the Sunbane,” the na-Mhoram answered with easy patience. “Therefore the Earth retains some vitality.” A blink of hesitation touched his eyes, vanished. “An old legend avers that a nameless periapt lies in the deeps of the lake, sustaining it against the Sunbane.”

Covenant nodded again. He knew of at least one thing, powerful or not, which lay at the bottom of Glimmermere.

Then Gibbon left the room, closing the door behind him, and Covenant was alone.

He remained still for a while, allowing his weakness to flow over him. Then he took a chair out onto the balcony, so that he could sit and think in the privacy of the night.

His balcony stood halfway up the south face of the Keep. A gibbous moon was rising, and he was able to descry the vast dark jumble of trees left by the fertile sun. Sitting with his feet braced against the rail of the balcony to appease his fear of heights, he ran his fingers through his tangled beard, and tried to come to grips with his dilemma.

He did not in fact anticipate a physical attempt upon his life. He had insisted on the necessity of freedom in order to remind the Clave that they would gain nothing by killing him; but the truth was that he accused the Clave of meditating murder primarily as a release for an entirely different dread.

He was afraid for Linden, poignantly afraid that his friends were in far more danger than he was. And this fear was aggravated by his helplessness. Where were they? Were Gibbon and Memla lying about Santonin? If so, how could he learn the truth? If not, what could he do? He felt crippled without Linden; he needed her perceptions. She would have been able to tell him whether or not Gibbon was honest.

Cursing the numbness of his leprosy, he asked the night why he of all people in the Land-Thomas Covenant, Unbeliever and white gold wielder, who had once mastered the Despiser in mortal combat-why he should feel so helpless. And the answer was that his self-knowledge, his fundamental confidence in what he was, was torn by doubt. His resources had become a contradiction. All the conscious extremity of his will was unable to call up one jot or tittle of power from his ring; yet when he was delirious, he exerted a feral might utterly beyond conscious control. Therefore he distrusted himself, and did not know what to do.

But to the question the night turned a deaf ear. Finally he abandoned the interrogation, and set about preparing for sleep.

In the bathroom., he stripped off his clothes, scrubbed both them and himself thoroughly, then draped them over chairbacks to dry. He felt vulnerable in his nakedness; but he accepted that risk by eating the food he had been given, drinking to the bottom the flask of metheglin. The mead added a physical drowsiness to his moral fatigue. When he investigated the bed, he found it comfortable and clean-smelling. Expecting nightmares, surprises, anguish, he crouched under the blankets, and slept.

He awoke to the sound of rain-torrents beating like the rush of a river against Revelstone's granite. The air of the bedroom felt moist; he had not closed off the balcony before going to bed. But for a time he did not move; he lay in the streaming susurration and let the sound carry him toward alertness.

When at last he rolled over onto his back and opened his eyes, he found Vain standing near the bed.

The Demondim-spawn bore himself as always-arms hanging slightly bent, stance relaxed, eyes focused on nothing.

“What the hell-?” Covenant jerked out of bed and hurried into the next room. Rain came slashing in from the balcony, drenching the floor. He braved the deluge, went outside to look for some indication of how Vain had reached him.

Through the downpour, he saw a huge tree bough leaning against the end of the balcony. The butt of the limb rested on another balcony thirty or forty feet below; apparently, Vain had climbed several hundred feet up the wall of Revelstone by scaling his bough to the lower abutments, then pulling it up behind him and using it to reach the next parapets, ascending by stages until he gained Covenant's room. How Vain had known the right room Covenant had no idea.

Scattering water, he rushed back into his suite and swung shut the balcony-door. Naked and dripping, he gaped at the Demondim-spawn, amazed by Vain's inexplicable capabilities. Then a grim grin twisted his mouth. “Good for you,” he rasped. “This will make them nervous.” Nervous people made mistakes.

Vain gazed vacuously past him like a deaf-mute. Covenant nodded sharply at his thoughts and started toward the bathroom to get a towel. But he was pulled to a halt by the sight of the livid raw patch running from the left side of Vain's head down his shoulder. He had been injured; his damaged skin oozed a black fluid as if he had been severely burned.

How-? Over the past days, Covenant had become so convinced of Vain's invulnerability that now he could not think. The Demondim-spawn could be hurt? Surely-But the next instant his astonishment disappeared in a flaring of comprehension. Vain had been attacked by the Clave-Riders testing the mysterious figure outside their gates. They had burned him. Perhaps he had not even deigned to defend himself.

But his mien betrayed no knowledge of pain. After a moment, Covenant went cursing into the bathroom and began to towel himself dry. Bastards! I'll bet he didn't lift a finger. Swiftly, he donned his clothes, though they were still somewhat damp. Striding to the door of his suite, he pushed it open.

Akkasri na-Mhoram-cro stood in the passage with a fresh tray of food at her feet. Covenant beckoned roughly to her. She picked up the tray and carried it into his suite.

He stopped her inside the doorway, took the new tray and handed her the old one, then dismissed her. He wanted her to have a chance to report Vain's presence to the na-Mhoram. It was a small revenge, but he took it. Her hood concealed her face, so that he could not see her reaction. But she left with alacrity.

Muttering darkly, he sat down to breakfast.

Shortly after he finished, there was a knock at his door. He thrust the slab of stone open, and was disappointed to find Akkasri alone outside.

“Halfhand,” she said in a muffled tone, “you have asked for knowledge concerning the Clave's resistance of the Sunbane. The na-Mhoram commands me to serve you. I will guide you to the place where our work is wrought and explain it as best I may.”

This was not what Covenant had expected. “Where's Gibbon?”

“The na-Mhoram,” replied Akkasri, stressing Gibbon's title, “has many duties. Though I am only na-Mhoram-cro, I can answer certain inquiries. Gibbon na-Mhoram will attend you, if I do not suffice to your need.”

Oh, hell, he growled. But he concealed his disconcertion. “We'll see. I've got a lot of questions.” He stepped out into the hallway, held the door open for Vain. “Let's go.”

At once, Akkasri moved off down the passage, ignoring Vain completely. This struck Covenant as unnatural; the Demondim-spawn was not easily discounted. Perhaps she had been told what to do? Then his revenge had not been wasted.

His nerves tightened. Striding at Akkasri's side, he began his search for comprehension by asking bluntly, “What's a na-Mhoram-cro?”

“Halfhand,” the woman said without giving him a glimpse of her face, “the na-Mhoram-cro are the novices of the Clave. We have been taught much, but have not yet mastered the rukh sufficiently to become Riders. When we have gained that skill, we will be na-Mhoram-wist. And with much experience and wisdom, some of us will advance to become the hands of the na-Mhoram himself, the na-Mhoram-in. Such is Memla, who bore you to Revelstone. She is greatly honoured for her courage and sagacity.”

“If you're a novice,” he demanded, “how much can you explain?”

“Only Gibbon na-Mhoram holds all the knowledge of the Clave.” Akkasri's tone was tinged with indignation. “But I am unskilled, not ignorant.”

“All right.” With Vain behind them, she led Covenant downward, tending generally toward the central depths of the Keep. “Tell me this. Where did the Clave come from?”

“Halfhand?”

“It hasn't been here forever. Other people used to live in Revelstone. What happened to them? How did the Clave get started? Who started it?”

“Ah.” She nodded. “That is a matter of legend. It is said that many and many generations ago, when the Sunbane first appeared in the sky, the Land was governed by a Council. This Council was decadent, and made no effort to meet the peril. Therefore precious time was lost before the coming of the Mhoram.”

Covenant began to recognize where she was taking him; this was the way to the sacred enclosure. He was faintly surprised by the general emptiness of the halls and passages. But he reflected that Revelstone was huge. Several thousand people could live in it without crowding each other.

“It is his vision which guides us now,” the na-Mhoram-cro was saying. "Seeing that the Council had fallen to the guile of a-Jeroth, he arose with those few who retained zeal and foresight, and drove out the treachers. Then began the long struggle of our lives to preserve the Land. From the Mhoram and his few has the Clave descended, generation after generation, na-Mhoram to na-Mhoram, seeking ever to consummate his opposition to the Sunbane.

“It is a slow work. We have been slow to master the skill and gain the numbers which we need-and slow as well to muster blood.” She said the word blood with perfect impersonality, as if it cost nothing. “But now we approach the fruition of our long dream. The Sunbane has reached a rhythm of three days-and we hold. We hold, Halfhand!” She claimed pride; but she spoke blandly, as if pride, too, were impersonal. As if she had been carefully groomed to answer Covenant's questions.

But he held his suspicion in abeyance. They walked one of the main hallways along the spine of the Keep; and ahead he could see the passage branching to circle left and right around the outer wall of the sacred enclosure, where the long-dead Lords had held their Vespers of self-consecration to the Land and to Peace.

As he drew closer, he observed that all the many doors, which were regularly spaced around the wall and large enough for Giants, were kept shut. The brief opening as a Rider came out of the enclosure revealed a glimpse of lurid red heat and muffled roaring inside.

The na-Mhoram-cro stopped before one of the doors, addressing Covenant. “Speech is difficult within this place.” He wanted to behold her face; she sounded as if she had evasive eyes. But her hood concealed her visage. If he had not seen Memla and Gibbon, he might have suspected that all the Clave were hiding some kind of deformity. “It is the hall of the Banefire and the master-rukh. When you have seen it, we will withdraw, and I will tell you concerning it.”

He nodded in spite of a sudden reluctance to see what the Clave had done to the sacred enclosure. When Akkasri opened the nearest door, he followed her into a flood of heat and noise.

The place blazed with garish fire. The enclosure was an immense cavity in the gut-rock of Revelstone, a cylinder on end, rising from below the level of the foothills more than halfway up the height of the Keep. From a dais on the floor, the Lords had spoken to the city. And in the walls were seven balconies circling the space, one directly above the next. There the people of Revelstone had stood to hear the Lords.

No more. Akkasri had brought Covenant to the fourth balcony; but even here, at least two hundred feet above the floor, he was painfully close to the fire.

It roared upward from a hollow where the dais had been, sprang yowling and raging almost as high as the place where he stood. Red flame clawed the air as if the very roots of the Keep were afire. The blast of heat half-blinded him; the fire seemed to scorch his cheeks, crisp his hair. He had to blink away a blur of tears before he could make out any details.

The first thing he saw was the master-rukh. It rested at three points on the rail of this balcony, a prodigious iron triangle. The centre of each arm glowed dull vermeil.

Two members of the Clave stood at each corner of the master-rukh. They seemed impervious to the heat. Their hands gripped the iron, concentrated on it as if the Banefire were a script which they could read by touch. Their faces shone ruddy and fanatical above the flames.

Clearly, this was the place from which the red shaft of Sunbane power leaped to the sun.

The doors at the base of the cavity and around the highest balcony were open, providing ventilation. In the lurid brilliance, Covenant saw the domed ceiling for the first time. Somehow, the Giants had contrived to carve it ornately. Bold figures strode the stone, depicting scenes from the early history of the Giants in the Land: welcome, gratitude, trust. But the fire made the images appear strangely distorted and malefic.

Grinding his teeth, he cast his gaze downward. A movement at the base of the fire caught his attention. He saw now that several troughs had been cut into the floor, feeding the hollow. A figure apparelled like the na-Mhoram-cro approached one of the troughs, carrying two heavy pails which were emptied into the trough. Dark fluid ran like the ichor of Revelstone into the hollow. Almost at once, the Banefire took on a richer texture, deepened toward the ruby hue of blood.

Covenant was suffocating on heat and inchoate passion. His heart struggled in his chest. Brushing past Akkasri and Vain, he hastened toward the nearest corner of the master-rukh.

The people there did not notice him; the deep roar of the flame covered the sound of his boots, and their concentration was intent. He jerked one of them by the shoulder, pulled the individual away from the iron. The person was taller than he-a figure of power and indignation.

Covenant yelled up at the hooded face, “Where's Santonin?”

A man's voice answered, barely audible through the howl of the Banefire. “I am a Reader, not a soothreader!”

Covenant gripped the man's robe. “What happened to him?”

“He has lost his rukh!” the Reader shouted back. “At the command of the na-Mhoram, we have searched for him diligently! If his rukh were destroyed-if he were slain with his rukh still in his hands-we would know of it. Every rukh answers to the master-rukh, unless it falls into ignorant hands. He would not choose to release his rukh. Therefore he has been overcome and bereft. Perhaps then he was slain. We cannot know!”

“Halfhand!” Akkasri clutched at Covenant's arm, urging Mm toward the door.

He let her draw him out of the sacred enclosure. He was dizzy with heat and blind wild hope. Maybe the Reader spoke the truth; maybe his friends had overpowered their captor; maybe they were safe! While the na-Mhoram-cro closed the door, he leaned against the outer wall and panted at the blessedly cool air.

Vain stood near him, as blank and attentive as ever.

Studying Covenant, Akkasri asked, “Shall we return to your chamber? Do you wish to rest?”

He shook his head. He did not want to expose that much of his hope. With an effort, he righted his reeling thoughts. “I'm fine.” His pulse contradicted him; but he trusted she could not perceive such things. “Just explain it. I've seen the master-rukh. Now tell me how it works. How you fight the Sunbane.”

“By drawing its power from it,” she answered simply. "If more water is taken from a lake than its springs provide, the lake will be emptied. Thus we resist the Sunbane.

“When the Mhoram first created the Banefire, it was a small thing, and accomplished little. But the Clave has increased it generation after generation, striving for the day when sufficient power would be consumed to halt the advance of the Sunbane.”

Covenant fumbled mentally, then asked, “What do you do with all this power? It's got to go somewhere.”

“Indeed. We have much use for power, to strengthen the Clave and continue our work. As you have learned, much is drawn by the Riders, so that they may ride and labour in ways no lone man or woman could achieve without a ruinous expenditure of blood. With other power are the Coursers wrought, so that the Sunbane will have no mastery over them. And more is consumed by the living of Revelstone. Crops are grown on the upland plateau — kine and goals nourished-looms and forges driven. In earlier generations, the Clave was hampered by need and paucity. But now we flourish, Halfhand. Unless some grave disaster falls upon us,” Akkasri said in a pointed tone, “we will not fail,”

“And you do it all by killing people,” he rasped. “Where do you get that much blood?”

She turned her head away in distaste for his question. “Doubtless you possess that knowledge,” she said stiffly. “If you desire further enlightenment, consult the na-Mhoram.”

“I will,” he promised. The state of the sacred enclosure reminded him that the Clave saw as evil a whole host of things which he knew to be good; and actions which they called good made his guts heave. “In the meantime, tell me what the na-Mhoram”- to irritate her, he used the title sardonically — “has in mind for me. He wants my help. What does he want me to do?”

This was obviously a question for which she had come prepared. Without hesitation, she said, “He desires to make of you a Reader.”

A Reader, he muttered to himself. Terrific.

“For several reasons,” she went on evenly. "The distinction between Reading and soothreading is narrow, but severe. Perhaps with your white ring the gap may be bridged, giving the Clave knowledge to guide its future. Also with your power, perhaps still more of the Sunbane may be consumed. Perhaps you may exert a mastery over the region around Revelstone, freeing it from the Sunbane. This is our hope. As you wielded more power, the Sunbane would grow weaker, permitting the expansion of your mastery, spreading safety farther out into the Land. Thus the work of generations might be compressed into one lifetime.

“It is a brave vision, Halfhand, worthy of any man or woman. A great saving of life and Land. For that reason Gibbon na-Mhoram rescinded the command of your death.”

But he was not persuaded. He only listened to her with half his mind. While she spoke, he became aware of an alteration in Vain. The Demondim-spawn no longer stood completely still. His head shifted from side to side, as if he heard a distant sound and sought to locate its source. His black orbs were focused. When Akkasri said, “Will you answer, Halfhand?” Covenant ignored her. He felt suddenly sure that Vain was about to do something. An obscure excitement pulled him away from the wall, poised him for whatever might happen.

Abruptly, Vain started away along the curving hall.

“Your companion!” the na-Mhoram-cro barked in surprise and agitation. “Where does he go?”

“Let's find out.” At once, Covenant strode after Vain.

The Demondim-spawn moved like a man with an impeccable knowledge of Revelstone. Paying no heed to Covenant and Akkasri, or to the people he passed, he traversed corridors and stairways, disused meeting halls and refectories; and at every opportunity he descended, working his way toward the roots of the Keep.

Akkasri's agitation increased at every descent. But, like Vain, Covenant had no attention to spare for her. Searching his memory, he tried to guess Vain's goal. He could not. Before long, Vain led him into passages he had never seen before. Torches became infrequent. At times, he could barely distinguish the black Demondim-spawn from the dimness.

Then, without warning, Vain arrived in a cul-de-sac lit only by light reflecting from some distance behind him. As Covenant and Akkasri caught up with him, he was staring at the end of the corridor as if the thing he desired were hidden beyond it.

“What is it?” Covenant did not expect Vain to reply; he spoke only to relieve his own tension. “What are you after?”

“Halfhand,” snapped the na-Mhoram-cro, “he is your companion.” She seemed afraid, unprepared for Vain's action. “You must control him. He must stop here.”

“Why?” Covenant drawled, trying to vex her into a lapse of caution, a revelation. “What's so special about this place?”

Her voice jumped. “It is forbidden!”

Vain faced the blind stone as if he were thinking. Then he stepped forward and touched the wall. For a long moment, his hands probed the surface.

His movements struck a chord in Covenant's memory. There was something familiar about what Vain was doing.

Familiar?

The next instant, Vain reached up to a spot on the wall above his head. Immediately, lines of red tracery appeared in the stone. They spread as if he had ignited an intaglio: in moments, red limned a wide doorway.

The door swung open, revealing a torch-lit passage.

Yes! Covenant shouted to himself. When he and Foamfollower had tried to enter Foul's Creche, the Giant had found and opened a similar door just as Vain had found and opened this one.

But what was that kind of door doing in Revelstone? Neither the Giants nor the Lords had ever used such entrances.

In a sudden rush of trepidation, he saw Akkasri's movement a moment too late to stop her. Swift with urgency, she snatched a rukh from under her robe and decanted blood onto her hands. Now fire sprang from the triangle; she began shouting words he could not understand.

Vain had already disappeared into the passage. Before the door could close itself again, Covenant sprinted after the Demondim-spawn.

This hall doubled back parallel to the one he had just left. It was well-lit. He could see that this place had not been part of the original Giant-work. Walls, floor, ceiling, all were too roughly formed. The Giants had never delved stone so carelessly. Leaping intuitively ahead of himself, he guessed that this tunnel had not been cut until after the passing of the Council, It had been made by the Clave for their own secret purposes.

Beyond him, a side corridor branched off to the left. Vain took this turning. Covenant followed rapidly.

In ten strides, the Demondim-spawn reached a massive iron door. It had been sealed with heavy bolts sunk deep into the stone, as if the Clave intended it to remain shut forever.

A faint pearly light marked the cracks around the metal.

Vain did not hesitate. He went to the door, found a place to wedge his fingers into the cracks. His back and shoulders tensed. Pressure squeezed new fluid from his bums.

Covenant heard running behind him, but did not turn away. His amazement tied him to Vain.

With a prodigious burst of strength, Vain tore the door from its moorings. Ringing like an anvil, it fell to the floor. In a wash of nacreous illumination, he stepped past the threshold.

Covenant followed like a man in a trance.

They entered a large chamber crammed with tables, walled to the ceiling with shelves. Hundreds of scrolls, caskets, pouches, periapts filled the shelves. The tables were piled high with staffs, swords, scores of talismans. The light came from three of the richest caskets, set high on the back wall, and from several objects on the tables. Dumb with astonishment, Covenant recognized the small chest which had once held the krill of Loric Vilesilencer. The chest was open and empty.

He gaped about him, unable to think, realize, understand.

A moment later, Akkasri and two people dressed like Riders raced into the chamber and leaped to a halt. They brandished flaming rukhs. “Touch nothing!” one of them barked.

Vain ignored them as if he had already forgotten they had the power to harm him. He moved to one of the far tables. There he found what he sought: two wide bands of dull grey iron.

Covenant identified them more by instinct than any distinctive feature.

The heels of the Staff of Law.

The Staff of Law, greatest tool of the Council of Lords, formed by Berek Halfhand from a branch of the One Tree. It was destroyed by wild magic when Lord Foul had forced dead Elena to wield it against the Land. Bannor had borne the heels back to Revelstone after the Despiser's defeat.

Before anyone could react, Vain donned the bands.

One he slipped over his right hand. It should have been too small; but it went past his knuckles without effort, and fitted snugly to his wrist.

The other he pulled onto his left foot. The iron seemed elastic. He drew it over his arch and heel easily, settled it tight about his ankle.

A Rider gasped. Akkasri and another woman faced Covenant. “Halfhand,” Akkasri's companion snapped, “this is upon your head. The Aumbrie of the Clave is forbidden to all. We will not tolerate such violation.”

Her tone brought Covenant back to himself. Dangers bristled in the air. Thinking rapidly, he said, “All the lore of the Lords-everything that used to belong to the Council. It's all here. It's all intact.”

“Much is intact,” Akkasri said rigidly. “The Council was decadent. Some was lost.”

Covenant hardly heard her. “The First and Second Wards.” He gestured toward the shining caskets. “The Third Ward? Did they find the Third Ward?” Foreseeing the Ritual of Desecration, Kevin Landwaster had hidden all his knowledge in Seven Wards to preserve it for future Councils; but during High Lord Mhoram's time, only the first two and the last had been found.

“Evidently,” a Rider retorted. “Little good it did them.”

“Then why”- Covenant put all his appalled amazement into his voice — “don't you use it?”

“It is lore for that which no longer exists.” The reply had the force of an indictment. “It has no value under the Sunbane.”

Oh, hell. Covenant could find no other words for his dismay. Hell and blood.

“Come!” The Rider's command cut like a lash. But it was not directed at Covenant. She and her companions had turned toward Vain. Then1 rukhs burned redly, summoning power.

Vain obeyed, moving as if he had remembered the source of his injury. Akkasri grabbed his arm, tried to pull the band from his wrist; but the metal was Iron and inflexible.

Gesturing with their rukhs, she and the Riders escorted Vain from the Aumbrie as if Covenant were not present.

He followed them. To his surprise, they herded Vain away from the hidden doorway.

They went some distance down the rough corridor. Then the passage turned sharply, and debouched into a huge hall lit by many torches. The air was grey with smoke.

With a stab of shock, Covenant realized that the hall was a dungeon.

Scores of bolted iron doors seriated both walls. In each, heavy bars guarded a small window. Half a thousand people could have been imprisoned here, and no one who lacked Vain's instincts or knowledge could ever have found them.

As Covenant stared about him, the implications of the Riders' anger burned into clarity in his mind. Gibbon had not intended him to know of this place.

How many other secrets were there in Revelstone?

One of the Riders hurried to a door and shot back the bolts. Within lay a cell barely wide enough to contain a straw pallet.

With their rukhs, Akkasri and the other Rider forced Vain toward the door.

He turned under the architrave. His captors flourished threats of fire; but he made no move against them. He aimed one look at Covenant. His black face wore an expression of appeal.

Covenant glared back, uncomprehending. Vain?

A gift beyond price, Foamfollower had said. No purpose but his own.

Then it was too late. The door clanged shut on Vain. The Rider thrust home the bolts.

Uselessly Covenant protested, What do you want from me?

The next instant, a brown arm reached between the window bars of a nearby cell. Fingers clawed the air, desperate for freedom.

The gesture galvanized Covenant. It was something he understood. He dashed toward that door.

A Rider shouted at him, forbidding him. He paid no heed.

As he gamed the door, the arm withdrew. A flat face pressed against the bars. Impassive eyes gazed out at him.

He almost lost his balance in horror. The prisoner was one of the Haruchai — one of Banner's people, who made their home high in the fastnesses of the Westron Mountains. He could not mistake the stern characteristic mien of the race that had formed the Bloodguard, could not mistake the resemblance to Banner, who had so often saved his life.

In Andelain, Banner's shade had said, Redeem my people. Their plight is an abomination.

Suppressing the tonal hit of his native tongue, the Haruchai said, “Ur-Lord Thomas Covenant, Unbeliever and white gold wielder, I salute you. You are remembered among the Haruchai.” The implacable rigour of his personality seemed incapable of supplication. “I am Brinn. Will you set us free?”

Then hot iron struck the back of Covenant's neck, and he stumbled like a cripple into darkness.

His unconsciousness was agony, and he could do nothing to assuage it. For a time as painful as frenzy, he lay deaf and blind. But gradually the darkness turned to rain. Torrents, muffled by granite, poured down walls, cascaded off eaves and parapets, rattled against oriels. The sound carried him back to himself. He became aware of the texture of blankets against his skin, aware of the deadness in his fingers and feet, the numbness of loss.

Remembering leprosy, he remembered everything, with an acuteness that made him press his face to the bed, knot his hands in the blanket under him. Vain. The Haruchai. The attack of the Riders.

That hidden door, which led to the Aumbrie, and the dungeon.

It was the same kind of door which the Despiser had formerly used in Foul's Creche. What was such a door doing in Revelstone?

A shudder ran through him. He rolled over, wincing at the movement. The back of his neck was stiff and sore. But the bones were intact, and the damage to his muscles did not seem permanent.

When he opened his eyes, he found Gibbon sitting beside his bed. The na-Mhoram's beatific face was tightened to express concern; but his red eyes held only peril.

A quick glance showed Covenant that he lay in the bedroom of his suite. He struggled to sit up. Sharp pains lanced through his back and shoulders; but the change of position enabled him to cast a glance at his right hand.

His ring was still there. Whatever else the Clave intended, they apparently did not intend to steal the white gold.

That steadied him. He looked at the na-Mhoram again, and made an intuitive decision not to raise the issue of the door. He had too many other dangers to consider.

“Doubtless,” Gibbon said with perfect blandness, “your neck gives you pain. It will pass. Swarte employed excessive force. I have reprimanded her.”

“How-?” The hurt seemed to cramp his voice. He could barely squeeze out a hoarse whisper. “How long have I been out?”

“It is now midday of the second day of rain.”

Damnation, Covenant groaned. At least one whole day. He tried to estimate how many people the Clave had killed in that period of time, but could not. Perhaps they had killed Brinn-He thrust the idea away.

“Akkasri,” he breathed, filling the name with accusation.

Gibbon nodded calmly. “Akkasri na-Mhoram-in.”

“You lied to me.”

The na-Mhoram's hebetude seemed impervious to offense. “Perhaps. My intent was not false. You came to Revelstone rife with hostility and suspicion. I sought means to allay your mistrust-and at the same time to ward against you if your purpose was evil. Therefore I informed you that Akkasri was of the na-Mhoram-cro. I desired to win your faith. In that I was not false. Guised as a na-Mhoram-cro, Akkasri could answer many questions without presenting to you the apparent threat of power. This I believed because of your treatment of Memla na-Mhoram-in. I regret that the outcome went amiss.”

This sounded plausible; but Covenant rejected it with a shake of his head. Immediately, a stab of soreness made him grimace. Muttering darkly to himself, he massaged his neck. Then he changed the subject, hoping to unsettle Gibbon. “What the hell are you doing with one of the Haruchai in your goddamn prison?”

But the na-Mhoram appeared immune to discomfiture. Folding his arms, he said, "I sought to withhold that knowledge from you. Already you believe that you have sufficient cause for mistrust. I desired that you should have no more such reasons until you learned to see the sovereign importance of our work."

Abruptly, Gibbon went in another direction. “Halfhand, did the Haruchai name you truly? Are you indeed ur-Lord Thomas Covenant, Unbeliever and white gold wielder?”

“What difference does that make?” growled Covenant.

“That name is mentioned often in the ancient legends. After the First Betrayer, Thomas Covenant was the greatest of all a-Jeroth's servants.”

“That's ridiculous.” This new distortion of the Land's history dismayed him. But he was determined to evade Gibbon's snare. “How could I possibly be that Thomas Covenant? Where I come from, the name's common. So are white gold rings.”

Gibbon gazed redly at him; but Covenant did not blink. A lie for a lie, he rasped. Finally, the na-Mhoram admitted, “You have not the look of such age.” Then he went on, "But I was speaking of the Haruchai.

“Halfhand, we have not one Haruchai in our hold. We have threescore and seven.”

Three-! Covenant could not keep the horror off his face.

“There.” Gibbon gestured at him. “I had cause to fear your response.”

“By God!” Covenant spat fiercely. “You ought to fear the Haruchai! Don't you know what you're dealing with?”

“I respect them entirely.” The na-Mhoram's dull calm was complete. “Their blood is potent and precious.”

They were my friends! Covenant could hardly refrain from shouting aloud. What in the name of all bloody hellfire and damnation do you think you're doing?

“Halfhand, you know that our work requires blood,” Gibbon continued reasonably. "As the Sunbane grows, the Banefire must grow to resist it. We are long beyond the time when the people of the Land could meet all our need.

“Five generations past, when Offin na-Mhoram led the Clave, he was faced with the defeat of our dream. He had neared the limit of what the Land could supply, and it did not suffice. I will not dwell on his despair. It is enough to say that at that time-by chance or mercy-the Haruchai came to our aid.”

He shrugged. "It is true that they did not intend the aid we found in them. Five came from the Westron Mountains in the name of their legends, seeking the Council. But Offin did not flinch his opportunity. He took the five captive.

“With the passage of time, five more came in search of their lost kindred. These also were captured. They were hardy and feral, but the power of the Banefire mastered them. And later more Haruchai came seeking the lost. First by five, then by ten, then by the score they came, with long lapses between. They are a stubborn people, and generation after generation they did not relent. Generation after generation, they were captured.” Covenant thought he saw a glint of amusement in Gibbon's red eyes. "As their numbers increased, so grew the Banefire. Thus not a one of them prevailed or escaped.

“Their most recent foray comprised five score-a veritable army in their sight.” Gibbon's blandness sounded like the serenity of a pure heart. “Threescore and seven remain.”

An abomination. The na-Mhoram's tale made Covenant ache for violence. He could hardly muffle his vehemence as he asked, “Is this supposed to convince me that you're my friend?”

“I do not seek your conviction here,” replied Gibbon. "I seek only to explain, so that you will comprehend why I sought to withhold this knowledge-and why Swarte struck you when you beheld the Haruchai, You must perceive the extent of our consecration to our task. We count any one life-or any score of lives-or any myriad-as nothing against the life of the Land. The Sunbane is an immense ill, and we must spend immensely to combat it.

“Also I desire you to understand that your aid — the service of your white ring — promises the redemption of the Land, the saving of many times many lives. Does our shedding distress you? Then aid us, so that the need for blood may be brought to an end. You cannot serve the Land in any other way.”

Covenant held Gibbon with a glare. Through his teeth, he breathed, “I knew the original Mhoram. The last time I was here, I made him choose between the hope of the Land and the life of one little girl. He chose the girl.” No words could articulate all the bile in his mouth. “You're worse than the Sunbane.”

He expected the na-Mhoram to retort; but Gibbon only blinked, and said, “Then it is sooth that you are the Unbeliever?”

“Yes!” Covenant snapped, casting subterfuge and safety aside. “And I'm not going to let you commit genocide on the Haruchai.”

“Ah.” Gibbon sighed, rising to his feet, “I feared that we would come to this,” He made a placating gesture. “I do not seek your harm. But I see only one means by which we may win your aid. I will ready the Clave for a soothtell. It will reveal the truth you covet. Lies will be exposed, hearts laid bare.”

He moved to the doorway. “Rest now, Halfhand. Eat-regain your strength. Walk where you wish. I ask only that you eschew the Aumbrie and the hold until that which stands between us has been resolved. I will send for you when the soothtell has been prepared.” Without waiting for an answer, he left the suite.

Soothtell, Covenant snarled. His inner voice sounded like a croak. By God, yes!

Ignoring the pain in his neck, he threw off the blankets and went to the next room in search of food.

There was a fresh tray on the table. The room had been closed against the rain, and the air reeked of smoke. Strangely certain now that the Clave would not try to poison or drug nun, he attacked the food, wolfing it down to appease his empty rage. But he did not touch the flask of metheglin; he did not want anything to dull his alertness, hamper his reflexes. He sensed that Gibbon's soothtell would be a crisis, and he meant to survive it.

He felt a compelling need to leave his suite and roam Revelstone, measuring his tension and resolve against the huge Keep. But he did not. Exerting a leper's discipline, he sat down in one of the chairs, stretched his legs to another, rested his sore neck on the chairback, and forced himself to be still. Muscle by muscle, he loosened his body, relaxed his forehead, softened his pulse, in an effort to achieve the concentration and poise he required in order to be ready.

Faces intruded on him: Linden, Sunder, Brinn. Brinn's visage was as absolute as Banner's. Linden's features were strained, not by severity or choice, but by fear. He closed his mind to them, so that his own passion would not blind him. Instead, he thought about the hidden door Vain had discovered.

He could sense the answer in him, mumbling toward clarity. But it was still blocked by his preconceptions. Yet its very nearness drew beads of trepidation-sweat from his face. He was not prepared for the mendacity it represented.

Mendacity. He reached out for that idea, tried to take hold of its implications. But the hands of his mind were half-hands, inadequate.

The knock at his door jerked him erect. A pang stung his neck; droplets of sweat spattered the floor.

Before he could leave his chair, the door sprang open. Memla burst into the room.

A tangle of grey-streaked hair framed her pale visage. She clutched her rukh as if she meant to strike him with it. But it held no flame. Her eyes were full of broken honesty.

“False!” she gasped. “They have been false to me!”

He lurched to confront her across the table.

She gaped momentarily for words, unable to compress the enormity of her indignation into mere speech. Then she broke out, “They are here! Santonin-your companions! All here!”

Covenant gripped the table to keep himself from falling.

“Two Stonedownors and a stranger. In the hold.” Passion obstructed her breathing. "Santonin I saw, where he did not expect to be seen. The na-Mhoram uttered direct falsehood to me!

“I challenged Santonin. He revealed the truth-why I and others were sent to meet you. Smirking! Not to escort you, no. To ensure that you did not catch him. He gained Revelstone on the second day of the fertile sun. One day before us!”

One day? Something in Covenant began to howl. One day?

“Had I not halted you-had you walked through the night-you might have come upon him before dawn. He passed near me.”

With an inchoate snarl, Covenant swung his arm, swept the tray from the table. Stoneware broke; metheglin splashed the floor. But the act steadied him. “Memla.” He had been unjust to her. He regained control of his limbs, his purpose; but he could not control his voice. “Take me to Gibbon.”

She stared at him. His demand took her aback. “You must flee. You are in peril.”

“Now.” He needed to move, begin, so that the trembling in his chest would not spread to his legs. “Take me to him now.”

She hesitated, then gave a fierce nod. “Yes. It is right,” Turning on her heel, she strode out of the room.

He surged after her in anguish and fury. Down toward the roots of Revelstone she guided him, along ways which he remembered. It was a long descent, but it seemed to pass swiftly. When she entered a familiar hall lit from its end by torches, he recognized the place where the Lords of the Council had had their private quarters.

The wide, round court beyond the hall both was and was not as he remembered it. The floor was burnished granite, as smooth as if it had been polished by ages of use and care. The ceiling rose far above the floor; and the walls were marked at intervals with coigns by which other levels of the Keep communicated with the dwellings spaced around the base of the cavity. These things accorded with his memory. But the light was altogether different. The Lords had not needed torches; the floor itself had shone with Earthpower. According to the old tales, the stone had been set aglow by Kevin Landwaster and the Staff of Law. But that illumination-so expressive of the warmth and fidelity of the Council-was gone now. The torches which replaced it seemed garish and unreliable by comparison.

But Covenant had neither time nor attention to spare for lost wonder. A score of the Clave stood around the centre of the floor. All held their rukhs ready; and the na-Mhoram's crozier dominated them. They had turned to the sound of Covenant's entrance. Their hoods concealed their faces.

Within their circle lay a stone slab like a catafalque. Heavy iron fetters chained a man to it.

One of the Haruchai.

When Covenant stalked ahead of Memla to approach the circle, he recognized Brinn.

“Halfhand,” the na-Mhoram said. For the first time, Covenant heard excitement in Gibbon's tone. “The soothtell is prepared. All your questions will be answered now.”

Nineteen: Soothtell

THE vibration of augury in the na-Mhoram's voice stopped Covenant. The high dome of the space was dark, untouched by the light of the torches; the Riders stood on the dead floor as if it were the bottom of an abyss. Behind the concealment of their hoods, they might have been ur-viles; only the pale flesh of their hands revealed that they were human as they poised their rukhs for fire. Santonin was probably among them. Stonemight Woodhelven's fragment of the Illearth Stone was probably hidden somewhere in this circle. Gibbon's tone told Covenant that the Clave had not gathered here to do him any benefit.

He came to a halt. Echoes of his rage repeated within him like another voice iterating ridicule. Instinctively, he clenched his half-fist around his wedding band. But he did not retreat. In a raw snarl, he demanded, “What the bloody hell have you done with my friends?”

“The soothtell will answer.” Gibbon was eager, hungry. “Do you choose to risk the truth?”

Brinn gazed at Covenant. His mien was impassive; but sweat sheened his forehead. Abruptly, he tensed against his fetters, straining with stubborn futility to break the chains.

Memla had not left the mouth of the hall. “Ware, Halfhand!” she warned in a whisper. “There is malice here.”

He felt the force of her warning. Brinn also was striving to warn him. For an instant, he hesitated. But the Haruchai had recognized him. Somehow, Brinn's people had preserved among them the tale of the Council and of the old wars against Corruption-the true tale, not a distorted version. And Covenant had met Bannor among his Dead in Andelain.

Gripping his self-control, he stepped into the circle, went to the catafalque. He rested a hand momentarily on Brinn's arm. Then he faced the na-Mhoram.

“Let him go.”

The na-Mhoram did not reply directly. Instead, he turned toward Memla. “Memla na-Mhoram-in,” he said, “you have no part in this soothtell. I desire you to depart.”

“No.” Her tone brandished outrage. “You have been false to him. He knows not what he chooses.”

“Nevertheless,” Gibbon began quietly, then lost his hebetude in a strident yell, “you will depart!”

For a moment, she refused. The air of the court was humid with conflicting intentions. Gibbon raised his crozier as if to strike at her. Finally, the combined repudiation of the circle was too strong for her. In deep bitterness, she said, "I gave promise to the Halfhand for the safety of his companions. It is greatly wrong that the na-Mhoram holds the word of a na-Mhoram-in in such slight trust." Turning on her heel, she strode away down the hall.

Gibbon dismissed her as if she had ceased to exist. Facing Covenant once again, he said, “There is no power without blood.” He seemed unable to suppress the acuity of his excitement. “And the soothtell requires power. Therefore this Haruchai. We will shed him to answer your questions.”

“No!” Covenant snapped. “You've killed enough of them already.”

“We must have blood,” the na-Mhoram said.

“Then kill one of your bloody Riders!” Covenant was white with fury. “I don't give a good goddamn what you do! Just leave the Haruchai alone!” _,

“As you wish.” Gibbon sounded triumphant.

“Ur-Lord!” Brinn shouted.

Covenant misread Brinn's warning. He sprang backward, away from the catafalque-into the hands of the Riders behind him. They grappled with him, caught his arms. Faster than he could defend himself, two knives flashed.

Blades slit both his wrists.

Two red lines slashed across his sight, across his soul. Blood spattered to the floor. The cuts were deep, deep enough to kill him slowly. Staring in horror, he sank to his knees. Pulsing rivulets marked his arms to the elbows. Blood dripped from his elbows, spreading his passion on the stone.

Around him, the Riders began to chant. Scarlet rose from their rukhs; the air became vermeil power.

He knelt helpless within the circle. The pain in his neck paralyzed him. A spike of utter trepidation had been driven through his spine, nailing him where he crouched. The outcry of his blood fell silently.

Gibbon advanced, black and exalted. With the tip of his crozier, he touched the growing pool, began to draw meticulous red lines around Covenant.

Covenant watched like an icon of desolation as the na-Mhoram enclosed him in a triangle of his blood.

The chanting became words he could not prevent himself from understanding.

"Power and blood, and blood and flame:

Soothtell visions without name:

Truth as deep as Revelstone,

Making time and passion known.

“Time begone, and space avaunt-

Nothing may the seeing daunt.

Blood uncovers every lie:

We will know the truth, or die.”

When Gibbon had completed the triangle, he stepped back and raised his iron. Flame blossomed thetic and incarnadine from its end.

And Covenant exploded into vision.

He lost none of his self-awareness. The fires around him became more lurid and compelling; his arms felt as heavy as millstones; the chant laboured like the thudding of his heart. But behind the walls he saw and the stone he knew, other sights reeled, other knowledge gyred, tearing at his mind.

At first, the vision was chaos, impenetrable. Images ruptured past the catafalque, the Riders, burst in and out of view so feverishly that he comprehended none of them. But when in anguish he surrendered to them, let them sweep him into the eye of their vertigo, some of them sprang toward clarity.

"Like three blows of a fist, he saw Linden, Sunder, Hollian. They were in the hold, in cells. Linden lay on her pallet in a stupor as pale as death.

The next instant, those images were erased. With a wrench that shook him to the marrow of his bones, the chaos gathered toward focus. The Staff of Law appeared before him. He saw places: Revelstone besieged by the armies of the Despiser; Foul's Creche crumbling into the Sea; Glimmermere opening its waters to accept the krill of Loric. He saw faces: dead Elena in ecstasy and horror; High Lord Mhoram wielding the krill to slay a Raver's body; Foamfollower laughing happily in the face of his own death. And behind it all he saw the Staff of Law. Through everything, implied by everything, the Staff. Destroyed by an involuntary deflagration of wild magic when dead Elena was forced to use it against the Land.

Kneeling there like a suicide in a triangle of blood, pinned to the stone by an iron pain, with his life oozing from his wrists, Covenant saw.

The Staff of Law. Destroyed.

The root of everything he needed to know.

For the Staff of Law had been formed by Berek Halfhand as a tool to serve and uphold the Law. He had fashioned the Staff from a limb of the One Tree as a way to wield Earthpower in defence of the health of the Land, in support of the natural order of life. And because Earthpower was the strength of mystery and spirit, the Staff became the thing it served. It was the Law; the Law was incarnate in the Staff. The tool and its purpose were one.

And the Staff had been destroyed.

That loss had weakened the very fiber of the Law. A crucial support was withdrawn, and the Law faltered.

From that seed grew both the Sunbane and the Clave.

They came into being together, gained mastery over the Land together, flourished together.

After the destruction of Foul's Creche, the Council of Lords had prospered in Revelstone for centuries. Led first by High Lord Mhoram, then by successors equally dedicated and idealistic, the Council had changed the thrust and tenor of its past service. Mhoram had learned that the Lore of the Seven Wards, the knowledge left behind by Kevin Landwaster, contained within it the capacity to be corrupted. Fearing a renewal of Desecration, he had turned his back on that Lore, thrown the krill into Glimmermere, and commenced a search for new ways to use and serve the Earthpower.

Guided by his decision, Councils for generations after him had used and served, performing wonders. Trothgard had been brought back to health. All the old forests — Grimmerdhore, Morinmoss, Garroting Deep, Giant Woods — had thrived to such an extent that Caerroil Wildwood, the Forestal of Garroting Deep, had believed his labour ended at last, and had passed away; and even the darkest trees had lost much of their enmity for the people of the Land. All the war-torn wastes along Landsdrop between Mount Thunder and the Colossus of the Fall had been restored to life. The perversity of Sarangrave Flat had been reduced; and much had been done to ease the ruin of the Spoiled Plains.

For a score of centuries, the Council served the Land's health in peace and fruitfulness. And at last the Lords began to believe that Lord Foul would never return, that Covenant had driven Despite utterly from the Earth. Paradise seemed to be within their grasp. Then in the confidence of peace, they looked back to High Lord Mhoram, and chose to change their names to mark the dawning of a new age. Their High Lord they christened the na-Mhoram; their Council they called the Clave. They saw no limit to the beauty they could achieve. They had no one to say to them that their accomplishments came far too easily.

For the Staff of Law had been destroyed. The Clave flourished in part because the old severity of the Law, the stringency which matched the price paid to the beauty of the thing purchased, had been weakened; and they did not know their peril.

Finding the Third Ward, they had looked no further for knowledge. Through the centuries, they had grown blind, and had lost the means to know that the man who had been named the na-Mhoram, who had transformed the Council in the Clave, was a Raver.

For when Covenant had defeated the Despiser, reduced him by wild magic and laughter to a poverty of spirit so complete that he could no longer remain corporeal, the Despiser had not died. Despite did not die. Fleeing the destruction of his Creche, he had hidden at the fringes of the one power potent enough to heal even him: the Earthpower itself.

And this was possible because the Staff had been destroyed. The Law which had limited him and resisted him since the creation of the earth had been weakened; and he was able to endure it while he conceived new strength, new being. And while he endured, he also corrupted. As he gained stature, the Law sickened.

The first result of this decay was to make the work of the Council more easy; but every increment strengthened Lord Foul, and all his might went to increase the infection. Slowly, he warped the Law to his will.

His Ravers shared his recovery; and he did not act overtly against the Land until samadhi Sheol had contrived his way into the Council, had begun its perversion, until several generations of na-Mhorams, each cunningly mastered by samadhi, had brought the Clave under Lord Foul's sway.

Slowly, the Oath of Peace was abandoned; slowly, the ideals of the Clave were altered. Therefore when the Clave made a secret door to its new hold and Aumbrie, it made one such as the Ravers had known in Foul's Creche. Slowly, the legends of Lord Foul were transmogrified into the tales of a-Jeroth, both to explain the Sunbane and to conceal Lord Foul's hand in it.

Labouring always in secret, so that the Clave at all times had many uncorrupted members-people like Memla, who believed the Raver's lies, and were therefore sincere in their service- samadhi Sheol fashioned a tool for the Despiser, ill enough to preach the shedding of blood, pure enough to be persuasive. Only then did Lord Foul let his work be seen.

For the Staff of Law had been destroyed, and his hands were on the reins of nature. By degrees, mounting gradually over centuries, he inflicted his abhorrence upon the Land, corrupting the Earthpower with Sunbane. This he was able to do because the Clave had been made incapable of conceiving any true defence. The Banefire was not a defence, had never been a defence. Rather, it was samadhi's means to commit further afflictions. The shedding of blood to invoke the Sunbane only made the Sunbane stronger. Thus Lord Foul caused the increase of the Sunbane without cost to himself.

And all this, Covenant saw as his blood deepened around his knees, had been done in preparation for one thing, the capstone and masterstroke of Lord Foul's mendacity: the summoning of white gold to the Land. Lord Foul desired possession of the wild magic; and he did to the Land what he had done to Joan, so that Covenant would have no final choice except surrender.

The loss of the Staff explained why Covenant's summoning had been so elaborate. In the past, such summons had always been an act of Law, performed by the holder of the Staff Only when he had been close to death from starvation and rattlesnake venom, and the Law of Death had been broken, had summoning been possible without the Staff. Therefore this time the Despiser had been forced to go to great lengths to take hold of Covenant. A specific location had been required, specific pain, a triangle of blood, freedom of choice and death. Had any of these conditions failed, the summoning would have failed, and Lord Foul would have been left to harm the Land, the Earth, without hope of achieving his final goal-the destruction of the Arch of Time. Only by destroying the Arch could he escape the prison of Time. Only with wild magic could he gain freedom and power to wage his hatred of the Creator across the absolute heavens of the cosmos.

But the summoning had not failed, and Covenant was dying. He understood now why Gibbon had driven Memla from the court. If she had shared this vision of the truth, her outrage might have led her to instigate a revolt among the uncorrupted Riders; for Gibbon, too, was a Raver.

He understood what had happened to the Colossus of the Fall, It had been an avatar of the ancient forests, erected on Landsdrop to defend against Ravers; and the Sunbane had destroyed the forests, unbinding the will of wood which had upheld for millennia that stone monolith.

He understood how Caer-Caveral had been driven to Andelain by the erosion of Morinmoss-and why the last of the Forestals was doomed to fail. At its root, the power of the Forestal was an expression of Law, just as Andelain was the quintessence of Law; and the Sunbane was a corruption Caer-Caveral could resist but not defeat.

He understood what had become of the Ranyhyn, the great horses, and of the Ramen who served them. Perceiving the ill of the Sunbane in its earliest appearances, both Ranyhyn and Ramen had simply fled the Land, sojourning south along the marge of the Sunbirth Sea in search of safer grasslands.

These things came to him in glimpses, flares of vision across the central fact of his situation. But there were also things he could not see: a dark space where Caer-Caveral had touched his mind; a blur that might have explained Vain's purpose; a blankness which concealed the reason why Linden was chosen. Loss gripped him: the ruin of the Land he loved; all the fathomless ill of the Sunbane and the Clave was his fault, his doing.

He had no answer for the logic of his guilt. The Staff of Law had been destroyed-and he had destroyed it. Wild magic had burst from his ring to save his life; power beyond all choice or mastery had riven the Staff, so that nothing remained but its heels. For such an act, he deserved to die. The lassitude of blood-loss seemed condign and admirable. His pulse shrank toward failure. He was culpable beyond any redemption and had no heart to go on living.

But a voice spoke in his mind:

Ur-Lord.

It was a voice without sound, a reaching of thought to thought.

It came from Brinn. He had never before heard the mind-speech of the Haruchai; but he recognized the speaker in the intensity of Brian's gaze. The power of the soothtell made possible things which could not otherwise have occurred.

Unbeliever. Thomas Covenant.

Unbeliever, he answered to himself. Yes. It's my fault. My responsibility.

You must fight.

The images before him whirled toward chaos again.

Responsible. Yes. On my head. He could not fight. How could any man hope to resist the Desecration of a world?

But guilt was the voice of the Clave, the Riders and the Raver who had committed such atrocities. Brinn strained against his bonds as if he would rupture his thews rather than accept failure. Linden still lay in the hold, unconscious or dead. And the Land-Oh, the Land! That it should die undefended!

Fight!

Somewhere deep within him, he found the strength for curses. Are you nothing but a leper? Even lepers don't have to surrender.

Visions reeled through the air. The scarlet light faded as Gibbon brought the soothtell to an end.

Stop! He still needed answers: how to fight the Sunbane; how to restore the Law; to understand the venom in him; to cure it. He groped frantically among the images, fought to bring what he needed into clarity.

But he could not. He could see nothing now but the gaping cuts in his wrists, the ooze of his blood growing dangerously slower. The Riders took the soothtell away from him before he gained the most crucial knowledge. They were reducing their power-No, they were not reducing it, they were changing it, translating it into something else.

Into coercion.

He could feel them now, a score of wills impending on the back of his neck, commanding him to abandon resistance, take off his ring and surrender it before he died. Telic red burned at him from all sides; every rukh was aflame with compulsion. Release the ring. Set it aside. Before you die. This, he knew, was not part of Lord Foul's intent. It was Gibbon's greed; samadhi Sheol wanted the white gold for himself.

The ring!

Brinn's mind-voice was barely audible:

Unbeliever! They will slay us all!

All, he thought desperately. Threescore and seven of the Haruchai. Vain, if they could. Sunder. Hollian. Linden.

The Land.

Release the ring!

No.

His denial was quiet and small, like the first ripple presaging a tsunami.

I will not permit this.

Extravagant fury and need gathered somewhere beyond the shores of his consciousness, piled upward like a mighty sea.

His mind was free now of everything except helplessness and determination. He knew he could not call up wild magic to save him. He required a trigger; but the Riders kept their power at his back, out of reach. At the same time, his need was absolute. Slashing his wrists was a slow way to kill him, but it would succeed unless he could stop the bleeding, defend himself.

He did not intend to die. Brinn had brought him back to himself. He was more than a leper. No abjections could force him to abide his doom. No. There were other answers to guilt. If he could not find them, he would create them out of the raw stuff of his being.

He was going to fight.

Now.

The tsunami broke. Wrath erupted in him like the madness of venom.

Fire and rage consumed all his pain. The triangle and the will of the Clave splintered and fell away.

A wind of passion blew through him. Wild argent exploded from his ring.

White blazed over his right fist. Acute incandescence covered his hand as if his flesh were power. Conflagration tore the red air.

Fear assailed the Clave. Riders cried out in confusion. Gibbon shouted commands.

For a moment, Covenant remained where he was. His ring flamed like one white torch among the vermeil rukhs. Deliberately, he drew power to his right wrist; shaping the fire with his will, he stopped the flow of blood, closed the knife wound. A flash of fire seared and sealed the cut. Then he turned the magic to his left wrist.

His concentration allowed Gibbon time to marshal a defence. Covenant could feel the Riders surging around him, mustering the Banefire to their rukhs. But he did not care. The venom in him counted no opposition, no cost. When his wrists were healed, he rose direly to his feet and stood erect like a man who had lost no blood and could not be touched.

His force staggered the atmosphere of the court. It blasted from his entire body as if his very bones were avid for fire.

Gibbon stood before him. The Raver wielded a crozier so fraught with heat and might that the iron screamed. A shaft of red malice howled at Covenant's heart.

Covenant quenched it with a shrug.

One of the Riders hurled a coruscating rukh at his back.

Wild magic evaporated the metal in mid-flight.

Then Covenant's wrath became ecstasy, savage beyond all restraint. In an instant of fury which shocked the very gutrock of Revelstone, his wild magic detonated.

Riders screamed, fell. Doors in the coigns above the floor burst from their hinges. The air sizzled like frying flesh.

Gibbon shouted orders Covenant could not hear, threw an arc of emerald across the court, then disappeared.

Under a moil of force, the floor began to shine like silver magma.

Somewhere amid the wreckage of the soothtell, he heard Lord Foul laughing.

The sound only strung his passion tighter.

When he looked about him, bodies lay everywhere. Only one Rider was left standing. The man's hood had been blown back, revealing contorted features and frantic eyes.

Intuitively, Covenant guessed that this was Santonin.

In his hands, he grasped a flake of stone which steamed like green ice, held it so that it pressed against his rukh. Pure emerald virulence raged outward.

The Illearth Stone.

Covenant had no limits, no control. A rave of force hurled Santonin against the far wall, scorched his raiment to ashes, blackened his bones.

The Stone rolled free, lay pulsing like a diseased heart on the bright floor.

Reaching out with flames, Covenant drew the Stone to himself. He clenched it in his half-hand. Foamfollower had died so that the Illearth Stone could be destroyed.

Destroyed I

A silent blast stunned the cavity; a green shriek devoured by argent. The Stone-flake vanished in steam and fury.

With a tremendous splitting noise, the floor cracked from wall to wall.

“Unbeliever!”

He could barely hear Brinn.

“Ur-Lord!”

He turned and peered through fire at the Haruchai.

“The prisoners!” Brinn barked. “The Clave holds your friends! Lives will be shed to strengthen the Banefire!”

The shout penetrated Covenant's mad rapture. He nodded. With a flick of his mind, he shattered Brinn's chains.

At once, Brinn sprang from the catafalque and dashed out of the cavity.

Covenant followed in flame.

At the end of the hall, the Haruchai launched himself against three Riders. Their rukhs burned. Covenant lashed argent at them, sent them sprawling, reduced their rukhs to scoria.

He and Brinn hastened away through the passages of Revelstone.

Brinn led; he knew how to find the hidden door to the hold. Shortly, he and Covenant reached the Raver-made entrance. Covenant summoned fire to break down the door; but before he could strike, Brinn slapped the proper spot in the invisible architrave. Limned in red tracery, the portal opened.

Five Riders waited within the tunnel. They were prepared to fight; but Brinn charged them with such abandon that their first blasts missed. In an instant, he had felled two of them. Covenant swept the other three aside, and followed Brinn, running toward the hold.

The dungeon had no other defenders; the Clave had not had time to organize more Riders. And if Gibbon were still alive, he might conceivably withdraw his forces rather than risk losses which would cripple the Clave. When Brinn and Covenant rushed into the hold and found it empty, Brinn immediately leaped to the nearest door and began to throw back the bolts,

But Covenant was rife with might, wild magic which demanded utterance. Thrusting Brinn aside, he unleashed an explosion that made the very granite of Revelstone stagger. With a shrill scream of metal, all the cell doors sprang from their moorings and clanged to the floor, ringing insanely.

At once, scores of Haruchai emerged, ready to fight. Ten of them raced to defend the entrance to the tunnel; the rest scattered toward other cells, searching for more prisoners.

Eight or nine people of the Land-Stonedownors and Woodhelvennin-appeared as if they were dazzled by the miracle of then: reprieve.

Vain left his cell slowly. When he saw Covenant, saw Covenant's passionate fire, his face stretched into a black grin, the grin of a man who recognized what Covenant was doing. The grin of a fiend.

Two Haruchai supported Sunder. The Graveller had a raw weal around his neck, as if he had been rescued from a gibbet, and he looked weak. He gaped at Covenant.

Hollian came, wan and frightened, from her cell. Her eyes flinched from Covenant as if she feared to know him. When she saw Sunder, she hastened to him and wrapped herself in his arms.

Covenant remained still, aching for Linden. Vain grinned like the sound of Lord Foul's laughter.

Then Brinn and another Haruchai bore Linden out into the hall. She lay limp in their arms, dead or unconscious, in sopor more compulsory than any sleep.

When Covenant saw her, he let out a howl which tore chunks from the ceiling and pulverized them until the air was full of fine powder.

He could not stop himself until Brinn yelled to him that she was alive.