Lord Foul's Bane

by Stephen R. Donaldson

  Panting, Hellfire hellfire! Covenant pushed away from Prothall. Stiffly, he went close to the kneeling Giant. With a fierce effort that made him sound caustic in spite of his intent, he said, "Now somebody really ought to laugh at you." His jutting head was barely as high as the Giant's shoulder.

  For a moment, Foamfollower gave no sign of having heard. But then his shoulders slumped. With a slow exertion almost as though he were reluctant to stop torturing himself, he withdrew his hands. They were unharmed-for some reason, his flesh was impervious to flame-but the blood was gone from them; they looked as clean as if they had been scrubbed by exoneration.

  His fingers were still stiff with hurt, and he flexed them painfully before he turned his bloody face toward Covenant. As if he were appealing a condemnation, he met the Unbeliever's impacted gaze and asked, "Do you feel nothing?"

  "Feel?" Covenant groaned. "I'm a leper."

  "Not even for tiny Pietten? A child?"

  His appeal made Covenant want to throw his arms around the Giant, accept this terrible sympathy as some kind of answer to his dilemma. But he knew it was not enough, knew in the deepest marrow of his leprosy that it did not suffice. "We killed them too," he croaked. "I killed- I'm no different than they are."

  Abruptly he turned, walked away into the darkness to hide his shame. The battleground was a fit and proper place for him; his nostrils were numb to the stink of death. After a time, he stumbled, then. lay down among the dead, on blood surrounded by graves and pyres.

  Children! He was the cause of their screams and their agony. Foul had attacked the Woodhelven because of his white gold ring. Not again- I won't. His voice was empty of weeping.

  I will not do any more killing.

  EIGHTEEN: The Plains of Ra

  DESPITE the battleground-despite the acrid smoke of flame and flesh and power-despite the nearby trenches, where the dead were graved like lumps of charred agony, piled wearily into the earth like accumulated pain for which only the ground could now find use or surcease-despite his own inner torn and trampled ground-Covenant slept. For what was left of the night, the other survivors of the battle labored to bury or burn the various dead, but Covenant slept. Restless unconsciousness arose from within him like a perpetually enumerated VSE, and he spent his repose telling in dreams that rigid round: left arm shoulder to wrist, left hand palm and back, each finger, right arm, shirt, chest, left leg.

  He awoke to meet a dawn which wore the aspect of an uncomfortable tomb. Shuddering himself to his feet, he found that all the work of burying was done; each of the trenches was filled, covered with dirt, and planted with a sapling which Birinair had found somewhere. Now most of the warriors lay awkwardly on the ground, in fatigue searching themselves for some kind of strength. But Prothall and Mhoram were busy cooking a meal, and the Bloodguard were examining and readying the horses.

  A spate of disgust crossed Covenant's face-disgust that he had not done his share of the work. He looked at his robe; the samite was stiff and black with encrusted blood. Fit apparel for a leper, he thought, an outcast.

  He knew that it was past time for him to make a decision. He had to determine where he stood in his impossible dilemma. Propped on his staff in the sepulchral dawn, he felt that he had reached the end of his evasions. He had lost track of his self-protective habits, lost the choice of hiding his ring, lost even his tough boots-and he had shed blood. He had brought down doom on Soaring Woodhelven. He had been so preoccupied with his flight from madness that he had not faced the madness toward which his fleeing took him.

  He had to keep moving; he had learned that. But going on posed the same impenetrable problem. Participate, and go mad. Or refuse to participate, and go mad. He had to make a decision, -find bedrock somewhere and cling to it. He could not accept the Land- and could not deny it. He needed an answer. Without it, he would be trapped like Llaura-forced to the tune of Foul's glee to lose himself in order to avoid losing himself.

  Then Mhoram looked up from his stirring and saw the disgust and dismay on Covenant's face. Gently, the Lord said, "What troubles you, my friend?"

  For a moment, Covenant stared at Mhoram. The Lord looked as if he had become old overnight. The smoke and dirt of battle marked his face, accentuating the lines on his forehead and around his eyes like a sudden aggravation of wear and decay. His eyes seemed dulled by fatigue. But his lips retained their kindness, and his movements, though draped in such a rent and bloodied robe, were steady.

  Covenant flinched instinctively away from the tone in which Mhoram said, my friend. He could not afford to be anyone's friend. And he flinched away, too, from his impulse to ask what had caused Tamarantha's staff to become so violent in his hands. He feared the answer to that question. To cover his wincing, he turned roughly away, and went in search of Foamfollower.

  The Giant was sitting with his back to the last standing, extinguished fragment of Soaring Woodhelven. Grime and blood darkened his face; his skin had the color of a flaw in the heart of a tree. But the wound on his forehead dominated his appearance. Ripped flesh hung over his brows like a foliage of pain, and through the wound; drops of new blood seeped as if red thoughts were making their way from a crack in his skull. He had his right arm wrapped around his great jug of diamondraught, and his eyes followed Llaura as she tended little Pietten.

  Covenant approached the Giant; but before he could speak, Foamfollower said, "Have you considered them? Do you know what has been done to them?"

  The question raised black echoes in Covenant's mind. "I know about her."

  "And Pietten? Tiny Pietten? A child?"

  Covenant shrugged awkwardly.

  "Think, Unbeliever!" His voice was full, of swirling mists. "I am lost. You can understand."

  With an effort, Covenant replied, "The same thing. Just exactly what's been done to us. And to Llaura." A moment later he added mordantly, "And to the Cavewights." Foamfollower's eyes shied, and Covenant went on, "We're all going to destroy-whatever we want to preserve. The essence of Foul's method. Pietten is a present to us-an example of what we're going to do to the Land when we try to save it. Foul is that confident. And prophecies like that are self fulfilling."

  At this, Foamfollower stared at Covenant as if the Unbeliever had just laid a curse on him. Covenant tried to hold the Giant's eyes, but an unexpected shame made him drop his head. He looked at the power scorched grass. The burning of the grass was curious. Some patches did not look as wrong as others-apparently Lords-fire did less essential damage than the might of the ur-viles.

  After a moment, Foamfollower said, "You forget that there is a difference between a prophet and a seer. Seeing the future is not prophecy."

  Covenant did not want to think about it. To get away from the subject, he demanded, "Why didn't you get some of that hurtloam for your forehead?"

  This time, Foamfollower's eyes turned away. Distantly, he said, "There was none left." His hands opened and closed in a gesture of helplessness. "Others were dying. And others needed the hurtloam to save their arms or legs. And-" His voice stumbled momentarily. "And I thought tiny Pietten might be helped. He is only a child," he insisted, looking up suddenly with an appeal that Covenant could not understand. "But one of the Cavewights was dying slowly-in such pain." A new trickle of blood broke open in his forehead and began to drip from his brow. "Stone and Sea!" he moaned. "I could not endure it. Hearthrall Birinair kept aside a touch of hurtloam for me, from all the wounds to be treated. But I gave it to the Cavewight. Not to Pietten-to the Cavewight. Because of the pain."

  Abruptly, he put back his head and took a long pull of diamondraught. With the heel of his palm he wiped roughly at the blood on his brows.

  Covenant gazed intently at the Giant's wracked visage. Because he could find no other words for his sympathy, he asked, "How're your hands?"

  "My hands?" Foamfollower seemed momentarily confused, but then he remembered. "Ah, the caamora. My friend, I am a Giant," he explained. "No ordinary fire can harm me. But the pain-the pain
teaches many things." A flinch of self disgust crossed his lips. "It is said that the Giants are made of granite," he mumbled. "Do not be concerned for me."

  On an impulse, Covenant responded, "In parts of the world where I come from, there are little old ladies who sit by the side of the road pounding away all day on hunks of granite with little iron hammers. It takes a long time-but eventually they turn big pieces into little pieces."

  Foamfollower considered briefly before asking, "Is that prophecy, ur-Lord Covenant?"

  "Don't ask me. I wouldn't know a prophecy if it fell on me."

  "Nor would I," said Foamfollower. A dim smile tinged his mouth.

  Shortly, Lord Mhoram called the company to the meal he and Prothall had prepared. Through a haze of suppressed groans, the warriors pried themselves to their feet and moved toward the fire. Foamfollower lurched upright. He and Covenant followed Llaura and Pietten to get something to eat.

  The sight and smell of food suddenly brought Covenant's need for decision to a head. He was empty, hollow with hunger, but when he reached out to take some bread, he saw how his arm was befouled with blood and ashes. He had killed- The bread dropped from his fingers. This is all wrong, he murmured. Eating was a form of acquiescence-a submission to the physical actuality of the Land. He could not afford it.

  I've got to think.

  The emptiness in him ached with demands, but he refused them. He took a drink of springwine to clear his throat, then turned away from the fire with a gesture of rejection. The Lords and Foamfollower looked after him inquiringly, but made no comment.

  He needed to put himself to the test, discover an answer that would restore his ability to survive. With a grimace, he resolved to go hungry until he found what he required. Perhaps in hunger he would become lucid enough to solve the fundamental contradiction of his dilemma.

  All the abandoned weapons had been cleared from the glade, gathered into a pile. He went to it and searched until he found Atiaran's stone knife. Then, on an obscure impulse, he walked over to the horses to see if Dura had been injured. When he learned that she was unscathed, he felt a vague relief. He did not want under any circumstances to be forced to ride a Ranyhyn.

  A short time later, the warriors finished their meal. Wearily, they moved to take up the Quest again.

  As Covenant mounted Dura, he heard the Bloodguard whistle sharply for the Ranyhyn. The call seemed to hang in the air for a moment. Then, from various directions around the glade, the great horses came galloping-manes and tails flaring as if afire, hooves pounding in long, mighty, trip-rhythmed strides -nine star-browed chargers as swift and elemental as the life-pulse of the Land. Covenant could hear in their bold nickering the excitement of going home, toward the Plains of Ra.

  But the Questers who left dead Soaring Woodhelven that morning had little of the bold or home-going in their attitudes. Quaan's Eoman was now six warriors short, and the survivors were gaunt with weariness and battle. They seemed to carry their shadows in their faces as they rode north toward the Mithil River. The riderless horses they took with them to provide relief for the weaker mounts. Among them, Saltheart Foamfollower trudged as if he were carrying the weight of all the dead. In the crook of one arm he cradled Pietten, who had fallen asleep as soon as the sun cleared the eastern horizon. Llaura rode behind Lord

  Mhoram, gripping the sides of his robe. She appeared bent and frail behind his grim-set face and erect posture; but he shared with her an eroded expression, an air of inarticulate grief. Ahead of them moved Prothall, and his shoulders bespoke the same kind of inflexible will which Atiaran had used to make Covenant walk from Mithil Stonedown to the Soulsease River.

  Vaguely, Covenant wondered how much farther he would have to follow other people's choices. But he let the thought go and looked at the Bloodguard. They were the only members of the company who did not appear damaged by the battle. Their short robes hung in tatters; they were as filthy as anyone; one of their number had been killed, and several were injured. They had defended the Lords, especially Variol and Tamarantha, to the utmost; but the Bloodguard were unworn and undaunted, free of rue. Bannor rode his prancing, reinless Ranyhyn beside Covenant, and gazed about him with an impervious eye.

  The horses of the company could manage only a slow, stumbling walk, but even that frail pace brought the riders to the ford of the Mithil before noon. Leaving their mounts to drink or graze, all of them except the Bloodguard plunged into the stream. Scrubbing at themselves with fine sand from the river bottom, they washed the blood and grit and pain of death and long night into the wide current of the Mithil. Clear skin and eyes reappeared from under the smears of battle; minor un-hurtloamed wounds opened and bled clean; scraps of shredded clothing floated out of reach. Among them, Covenant beat his robe clean, rubbed and scratched stains from his flesh as if he were trying to rid himself of the effects of killing. And he drank quantities of water in an effort to appease the aching hollowness of his hunger.

  Then, when the warriors were done, they went to their horses to get new clothing from their saddlebags. After they had dressed and regained command of their weapons, they posted themselves as sentries while First Mark Tuvor and the Bloodguard bathed.

  The Bloodguard managed to enter and leave the

  river without splashing, and they washed noiselessly. In a few moments, they were dressed in new robes and mounted on the Ranyhyn. The Ranyhyn had refreshed themselves by crossing into Andelain and rolling on the grass while their riders bathed. Now the company was ready to travel. High Lord Prothall gave the signal, and - the company rode away eastward along the south bank of the river.

  The rest of the day was easy for the riders and their mounts. There was soft grass underhoof, clean water at one side, a tang of vitality in the air, and a nearby view of Andelain itself, which seemed to pulse with robust sap. The people of the Land drew healing from the ambience of the Hills. But the day was hard for Covenant. He was hungry, and the vital presence of Andelain only made him hungrier.

  He kept his gaze away from it as best he could, refusing the sight as he had refused food. His gaunt face was set in stern lines, and his eyes were hollow with determination. He followed a double path: his flesh rode Dura doggedly, keeping his position in the company; but in his mind, he wandered in chasms, and their dark, empty inanition hurt him.

  I will not.

  He wanted to survive.

  I am not.

  From time to time, aliantha lay directly in his path like a personal appeal from the Land, but he did not succumb.

  Covenant, he thought. Thomas Covenant. Unbeliever. Leper outcast unclean. When a pang from his hunger made him waver, he remembered Drool's bloody grip on his ring, and his resolve steadied.

  From time to time, Llaura looked at him with the death of Soaring Woodhelven in her eyes, but he only clenched himself harder and rode on.

  I won't do any more killing.

  He had to have some other answer.

  That night, he found that a change had come over his ring. Now all evidence that it resisted red encroachments was gone. His wedding band burned completely crimson under the dominion of the moon,

  flaming coldly on his hand as if in greedy response to Drool's power. The next morning, he began the day's riding like a man torn between opposing poles of insanity.

  But there was a foretaste of summer in the noon breeze. The air turned warm and redolent with the ripeness of the earth. The flowers had a confident bloom, and the birds sang languidly. Gradually, Covenant grew full of lassitude. Languor loosened the strings of his will. Only the habit of riding kept him on Dura's back; he became numb to such superficial considerations. He hardly noticed when the river began to curve northward away from the company, or when the hills began to climb higher. He moved blankly on the warm currents of the day. That night he slept deeply, dreamlessly, and the next day he rode on in numbness and unconcern.

  Waking slumber held him. It was a wilderland that he wandered unaware; he was in danger without knowing it
. Lassitude was the first step in an inexorable. logic, the law of leprosy. The next was gangrene, a stink of rotting live flesh so terrible that even some physicians could not bear it-a stench which ratified the outcasting of lepers in a way no mere compassion or unprejudice could oppose. But Covenant traveled his dream with his mind full of sleep.

  When he began to recover-early in the afternoon of the third day from Soaring Woodhelven, the eighteenth since the company had left Revelstone-he found himself looking over Morinmoss Forest. The company stood on the last hilltop before the land fell under the dark aegis of the trees.

  Morinmoss lay at the foot of the hill like a lapping sea; its edges gripped the hillsides as if the trees had clenched their roots in the slopes and refused to be driven back. The dark, various green of the Forest spread to the horizon north and east and south. It had a forbidding look; it seemed to defy the Quest to pass through it. High Lord Prothall stopped on the crest of the hill, and gazed for a long time over the Forest, weighing the time needed to ride around Morinmoss against the obscure dangers of the trees.

  Finally, he dismounted. He looked over the riders, and his eyes were full of potential anger as he spoke. "We will rest now. Then we will ride into Morinmoss, and will not stop until we have reached the far side -a journey of nearly a day and a night. During that ride, we must show neither blade nor spark. Hear you? All swords sheathed, all arrows quivered, all knives cloaked, all spear tips bound. And every spark or gleam of fire quenched. I will have no mistake. Morinmoss is wilder than Grimmerdhore-and none go unanxious into that wood. The trees have suffered for ages, and they do not forget their kinship with Garroting Deep. Pray that they do not - crush us all, regardless." He paused, scanning the company until he was sure that all understood him. Then he added more gently, "It is possible that there is still a Forestal in Morinmoss-though that knowledge has been lost since the Desecration."