One Tree (26 page)

At that, Linden thought she would surely break. She had already endured too much. In Brinn’s eyes, she saw her flight from Covenant during his venom-relapse returning to impugn her. And Brinn also knew that she had declined to protect Covenant from Infelice’s machinations. The First had not omitted that fact from her tale. For a moment, Linden could not speak through the culpability which clogged her throat.

But the past was unalterable; and for the present no one had the right to judge her. Brinn could not see Covenant deeply enough to judge her. Covenant’s plight was hers to assess—and to meet as she saw fit. Gritting her control so hard that it ached in the bones of her skull, she said, “Not here. Not now. What’s happened to him is like amnesia. There’s a chance it’ll heal itself. But even if it doesn’t—even if I have to do something about it—I’m not going to take the risk here. Where the
Elohim
can tamper with anything.” And Vain might be running out of time. “If I’m not completely careful—” She faltered as she remembered the darkness behind his eyes. “I might extinguish what’s left.”

Brinn did not blink. His stare said flatly that this argument was just another refusal, as unworthy of Covenant as all the others. Despairingly, Linden turned back to the First.

“I know what I’m doing. Maybe I’ve already failed too often. Maybe none of you can trust me. But I’m not losing my mind.” In her ears, her insistence sounded like the frail pleading of a child. “We’ve got to get out of here. Go back to the ship. Leave.” With all her determination, she refrained from shouting, Don’t you understand? That’s the only way we can help Vain! “We’ve got to do it now.”

The First debated within herself. Both Honninscrave and Seadreamer looked studiously elsewhere, unwilling to take sides in this conflict. But Pitchwife watched Linden as if he were remembering Mistweave. And when the First spoke, he smiled like the lighting of a candle in a dark room.

Dourly she said, “Very well. I accept your command in this. Though I can fathom little concerning you, you are the Chosen. And I have seen evidence of strange strength in you, when strength was least looked for. We will return to Starfare’s Gem.”

Abruptly she addressed the
Haruchai
. “I make no claim upon your choosing. But I ask you to accompany us. Vain lies beyond your reach. And the Giantfriend and the Chosen require every aid.”

Brinn cocked his head slightly as if he were listening to a silent consultation. Then he said, “Our service was given to the ur-Lord—and to Linden Avery in the ur-Lord’s name. Though we mislike that Vain should be abandoned, we will not gainsay you.”

That Vain should be abandoned
. Linden groaned. Every word the
Haruchai
uttered laid another crime to her charge. More blood on her hands, though she had taken an oath to save every life she could. Maybe Brinn was right. Maybe her decision was just another denial. Or worse.
Are you not evil
?

But she was suddenly too weak to say anything else. The sunlight blurred her sight like sweat. When Cail offered her his arm, she accepted it because she had no choice. She felt unable to support
herself. As she joined her companions moving along the River Callowwail toward Woodenwold and the anchorage of Starfare’s Gem, she was half-blind with sunlight and frailty, and with the extremity of her need to be right.

The
maidan
seemed to stretch out forever ahead of her. Only the cumulative rush of the River marked the expanse, promising that the grass was not like
Elemesnedene
, not featureless and unending, Cail’s assistance was bitter and necessary to her. She could not comprehend the gentleness of his aid. Perhaps it was this quality of the
Haruchai
which had driven Kevin Landwaster to the Ritual of Desecration; for how could he have sustained his self-respect when he had such beings as the Bloodguard to serve him?

The Callowwail reflected blue in turbulent pieces back at the sky. She clung to her own self-respect by considering images of Vain, seeking to remember everything he had done. He had remained passive when the demented Coursers had driven him into a quagmire in Sarangrave Flat. And yet he had found a way to rejoin the company. And surely he had chosen to hazard
Elemesnedene
for his own secret reasons?

Slowly her sight cleared. Now she could see the splendid autumn of Woodenwold rising before her. Soon she and her companions would be among the trees. Soon—

The sudden fierce clanging of the bells staggered her. Except for Cail’s grasp, she would have fallen. The
Elohim
had been silent since her expulsion from the
clachan
; but now the bells were outraged and desperate in her mind, clamoring woe and fury.

Pitchwife came to her, helped Cail uphold her. “Chosen?” he asked softly, urgently. “What harms you?” His tone reflected the stricken pallor of her countenance.

“It’s Vain,” she panted through the silent clangor. Her voice sounded too thin and detached to have come from her. “He’s trying to escape.”

The next instant, a concussion like a thunderclap buffeted the company. The cloudless sky darkened; powers blasting against each other dimmed the sun. A long tremor like the opening howl of an earthquake ran through the ground.

Giants yelled. Fighting to keep their balance, the
Haruchai
circled defensively around Linden and Covenant.

As she looked back toward the fountainhead of the Callowwail, Linden saw that the water was on fire.

Burning and blazing, a hot surge of power spread flames down the current. Its leading edge spat out fury like the open door of a furnace. On either side of the swift fire, the
maidan
rippled and flowed as though it were evaporating.

In the heart of the heat, Linden descried a dark figure swimming.

Vain!

He struggled down the Callowwail as if he were beset by acid. His strokes were frantic—and growing weaker every moment. The flames tore at his flesh, rent his black essence. He appeared to be dissolving in the fiery current.

“Help him!” Vain’s need snatched Linden to a shout. “They’re killing him!”

The
Haruchai
reacted without hesitation. Their doubt of her did not hamper their gift for action. Springing forward, Ceer and Hergrom dove straight into the River and the crux of the flames.

For an instant, she feared that they would be consumed. But the fire did not touch them. It burned to the pitch of Vain’s ebon being and left their flesh unharmed.

As the
Haruchai
reached him, he threw his arms around their necks; and at once the erosion of his strength seemed to pause as if he drew sustenance from them. Gathering himself suddenly, he thrust them beneath the surface. With a concentrated effort, he cocked himself, braced his feet on their shoulders. From that base, he leaped out of the Callowwail.

The flames tried to follow; but now they ran off his sleek skin like water, fraying in the sunlight. He had escaped their direct grasp. And the sun poured its light into him like an aliment. Over all the
maidan
, the air was dim with preternatural twilight; but on Vain the sun shed its full strength, reversing the dissolution which the
Elohim
had wrought against him. Spreading his arms, he turned his black eyes upward and let the light restore him to himself.

The bells rang out keen loss, wild threats, but did no more damage.

In the River, the power faded toward failure. Ceer and Hergrom broke the surface together, unscathed, and climbed the bank to stand with the rest of the company, watching Vain.

Slowly the Demondim-spawn lowered his arms; and as he did so, midday returned to the
maidan
. In a moment, he stood as he had always stood, balanced between relaxation and readiness, with a faint, undirected smile on his lips. He seemed as uncognizant as ever of the company, blind to assistance or rescue.

“Your pardon,” said the First to Linden in quiet wonder. “I had given too little thought to the compulsion which drives him to follow you.”

Linden remained still, held by vindication and relief. She did not know whether Vain followed herself or Covenant—and did not care. For once, she had been right.

But the company could not stay where it was. Many of the bells had faded back into silence, receding with the flames. However, others were too angry to retreat; and the threat they conveyed impelled her to say, “Come on. Some of them want to try again. They might not let us leave.”

Honninscrave looked at her sharply. “Not?” His glad memories of the
Elohim
had already suffered too much diminution. But he was a Giant and knew how to fight. “Stone and Sea!” he swore, “they will not prevent us. If we must, we will swim from the
Raw
, towing Starfare’s Gem after us.”

The First gave him a nod of approval, then said, “Still the Chosen speaks truly. We must depart.” At once, she swept Covenant into her arms and set off at a lope toward Woodenwold.

Before Linden could try to follow, Seadreamer picked her up, carried her away along the verge of the Callowwail. Cail and Ceer ran at his sides. Brinn and Hergrom dashed ahead to join the First. Eager for his ship, Honninscrave sped past them. Pitchwife’s deformed back hindered him, but he was able to match the pace the First set.

Behind them, Vain trotted lightly, like a man who had been running all his life.

Into Woodenwold they went as if, like Linden, they could hear bells hallooing on their heels. But the threats did not materialize into action. Perhaps
Elohim
like Daphin were able to dissuade those who shared Chant’s way of thinking. And the distance passed swiftly. The companions devoured the stretch of trees between them and their ship as if they were hungry for hope.

Then they crossed into the shadow of the Rawedge Rim, and Woodenwold became abruptly gray and ire-bitten about them. The dire mountains appeared to reave the trees of autumn and calm. But Linden
held up her courage, for she knew the lagoon was near. When Seadreamer bore her between the looming walls of the valley, she saw Starfare’s Gem still at rest on the flat surface of the water, with its stone spars raised like defiance against the twilight and the mountains, The longboat remained where the company had left it.

Honninscrave began shouting orders at Sevinhand before he and Seadreamer had rowed the company halfway to the
dromond
. His commands rebounded from the high cliffs; and the echoes seemed to lift Giants into the rigging. By the time Linden had scrambled up the moire-marked side of the Giantship, gained the afterdeck, the unfurled canvas was stirring. A wind ran westward among the mountains.

Giants hurried to raise the longboat, hoist the anchors. Honninscrave sprang to the wheeldeck, barking instructions as he moved. Swiftly Starfare’s Gem awakened. With a bustle of activity and a lift of its prow, the
dromond
caught the wind, settled against its sails, and began sliding lightly down the gauntlet of the
Raw
.

Before Starfare’s Gem had passed halfway to the open Sea, the wind became a stiff blow like a shout from the Rawedge Rim. It drove the
dromond
as if the
Elohim
in their wrath were determined to expel the quest for all time from their demesne. But Honninscrave did not let the wind have his vessel. The cliffs and turns of the
Raw
became darker, more bitter and hazardous, as the afternoon waned. Therefore he shortened sail, held the Giantship to a careful pace. The company did not reach the end of the gullet until nearly sunset.

There Starfare’s Gem stumbled into a long fight to keep itself off the rocks of the coast. The exhalation of the
Raw
conflicted with the prevailing wind along the littoral; and they pulled the
dromond
into a maze of turbulence. Tacking in flurries, struggling to run one guess ahead of the next shift, Honninscrave and his crew labored back and forth against the southern promontory of the
Raw
.

Twilight quickly darkened into night, turning the rocky verge to a blackness marked only by the sea’s phosphorescence and the wan light of the stars; for there was no moon. To Linden, who had lost track of the days, the absence of the moon felt ominous and chilling. She could have believed that the
Elohim
had stricken it from the heavens in retribution. In the dark, she saw no way for the quest to win free of the moiling winds. Every shift seemed sharper than the one before, and every other tack carried the
dromond
closer to the ragged and fatal bluffs.

But Honninscrave was a cunning reader of air currents, and at last he found the path which ran toward the safety of the open sea. Slipping free of the last toils of the
Elohim
, Starfare’s Gem went south.

For the rest of the night, the littoral loomed against the port horizon. But the next morning, Honninscrave angled a few points farther west of south, and the headland began to sink into the Sea. During the afternoon, another promontory briefly raised its head. But after that nothing remained to be seen in any direction except the sunlight rolling in brocade across the long green ocean.

While they had fled through and away from the
Raw
, the Giants had held themselves clenched against the winds and the unknown purposes of the
Elohim
, tending the ship, springing to the Master’s commands, with a tense and unwonted silence. But now their mood eased as Honninscrave allowed himself to relax and the ship sailed confidently into a perfect evening. At dusk, they gathered to hear the tale of
Elemesnedene
, which Pitchwife told with the full flourish and passion which the Giants loved. And Honninscrave described in detail what he had learned about the location of the One Tree. With the exact map of the stars to guide the quest, any possibility of failure appeared to fade. Slowly Starfare’s Gem regained much of its familiar good cheer.

Linden was glad for that easement. The Giants had earned it, and she watched it with a physician’s unselfish approval. But she did not share it. Covenant’s condition outweighed the instinct for hope which she absorbed empathically from the Giants.