7.
An Aftertaste of Victory
In spite of her exhaustion and dismay, Linden tried to keep moving. But she was numb with killing; too profoundly weary to consider what she did. She did not go in search of her friends. She did not ask what had become of them. Instead, trembling, she fell back on years of training and experience: triage, trauma, emergency care. Her depleted spirit she focused on the needs directly in front of her.
Mutely she asked Hyn to bear her among the nearest of the fallen Woodhelvennin.
Some were dead. She ignored them. And some were so close to death that no power of hers would save them. She ignored them as well. But when she found a toddler clutched in his mother’s arms, both savagely mauled, and both still clinging to life, she dropped down from Hyn’s back, knelt beside them, and reached far inside herself to uncover a few faint embers of resolve.
As much as she could, Linden gave herself to the woman and her child.
I am able to convey you to your son.
After a few moments of Earthpower, the woman opened her eyes, gazed about her with dumb incomprehension. The toddler recovered enough to wail.
Linden looked to Hyn again.
The mare stood over a man whose right leg had been nearly severed. Terrible chunks had been ripped from his sides. But he, too, clung to life. Staggering toward him, Linden blessed or cursed him with frail flames until he began to feel his own agony, and she believed that he might live. Then she let Hyn guide her to another breathing victim of the kresh.
As she moved, stumbling, she passed the body of a Master. His flesh was a killing field, torn and bitten almost beyond recognition. Dead wolves were piled around him, blood seeping from their corpses to mingle with his and stain the churned soil. They were his legacy of service to the Land.
Hyn indicated an old couple who had fled holding hands. After they had fallen, they had continued to clasp each other as though that touch might keep them alive. Linden heard blood in their breathing, saw long gashes in their limbs and torsos. She would have passed them by, convinced that they could not be saved; but Hyn seemed to insist. Obediently Linden braced the Staff between them and dripped fire into them like a transfusion. The world tilted around her while she waited for some sign that she had not failed.
She was not the woman she had once been, the healer who had rushed headlong into Berek Halfhand’s camp. Her battle under Melenkurion Skyweir had changed her. And here she had expended herself in bloodshed; drenched herself in it. She no longer knew what she meant when she called herself a physician.
Nevertheless the old man eventually lifted his head, coughing blood as he looked toward his companion. His wife? Linden did not know. But the woman stirred; tightened her grip on the old man’s hand. Seeing her move, feeling her grasp, he smiled as if he no longer feared the consequences of his wounds.
—to convey you—
Weakly Linden reached into her pocket for the twisted remains of Jeremiah’s red racecar. She closed her fingers on it, drew it out to look at it. Then she let the tilting earth lower her to the ground. Hardly conscious that she sat on a dying wolf, she peered at Jeremiah’s ruined toy. It was all that she had left of him; and her heart had become stone.
—to your son.
The Harrow had destroyed ur-viles and Waynhim. More had been killed by the Cavewights. The Sandgorgons may have slain still more as they rampaged among Roger’s army. She had made a promise to the Demondim-spawn. Now many of them were dead.
And the Harrow was gone.
The bullet hole in her shirt seemed a little thing, as trivial as the grass stains written on her jeans; but that small catastrophe had cost her both her life and her son. Around her, the price continued to mount.
There was movement nearby. The villagers wandered among the slain, haunted by death. Some of them searched for friends or families; lovers or elders or children. Others stumbled aimlessly, as though they had lost the meaning of their lives. Doubtless they had seen caesures before. They were acquainted with the depredations of kresh. But they knew nothing of calamities on this scale. The Masters had not prepared them—
Hyn nudged Linden, urging her to rise. There was work to be done. No one else could do it. But she had come to the end of herself. She stared at Jeremiah’s toy and made no attempt to stand.
Liand and Pahni found her there. Inspired by some impulse of sanity and simple care beyond her conception, they had gone to pick through the wreckage of First Woodhelven. Now they returned, bearing waterskins, some broken bread, and a small bundle of dried fruit. One of the waterskins held springwine.
While her friends watched, she drank both water and springwine greedily; ate bread until she felt strong enough to chew small bits of apple and fig. Such things could not relieve her deepest prostration, but they reduced her trembling and restored a measure of awareness.
I am able to convey you to your son.
When she regained her feet at last, she put away the racecar and resumed the labor that she had chosen for herself long ago.
Linden, find me.
She knew what Thomas Covenant and Jeremiah and the Land’s plight required of her; but those burdens would have to wait. Guided by Hyn, she walked between the fallen, weaving kind fire into their wounds and gently burning away their agony. And Liand and Pahni went with her, supporting her efforts with orcrest and powdered flakes of amanibhavam, or with springwine and water.
Anele still rested along Hrama’s neck, although he remained alert. His blind gaze regarded the Sandgorgons with apprehension. Yet he did not try to flee. Apparently he found the creatures less terrifying than a Fall.
Linden estimated that thirty or forty of the Woodhelvennin had been ripped down before she struck the kresh. A third of them were already dead: five or six more had passed beyond any succor except the solace of the last sleep. With Liand’s aid, and Pahni’s, she retrieved the rest from their worst wounds. Sepsis would be a serious problem later: the fangs and claws of the wolves had left filth in every hurt. But she spent her scant energies on only the most immediate damage. As she worked, she slowly recovered her concern for Mahrtiir, Bhapa, the Humbled, and their Ranyhyn. When she had done what she could for the villagers in a short time, with little strength, she asked Hyn to lead her to the companions whom she had abandoned.
Even Galt, Clyme, and Branl deserved more than she had done for them.
Along the way, she came upon the other Master who had warded First Woodhelven. His mangled left leg was only the most cruel of his many injuries. Nonetheless Linden found him limping among his charges, urging them to set aside their shock and attend to their fallen. Unable to stand or walk without support, he had improvised a crutch from a branch of the shattered banyan-grove. His pain was as vivid as the blood pulsing from his leg.
His name, he informed Linden, was Vernigil. Stolidly he acknowledged her intervention on behalf of the tree-dwellers. But when she offered to treat his hurts, he declined. His wounds were honorable. He meant to bear them honorably.
She was far too weary to protest. And she saw a certain logic in his refusal. Those Woodhelvennin who were able to understand what he had endured for them responded to the authority of his torn flesh.
Leaving the Master to live or die, Linden followed Hyn back toward the battlefield where she had last seen Bhapa, Mahrtiir, and the Humbled.
Vaguely she noticed that the Sandgorgons stood together on the far side of the carnage. Stave was with them: he faced them as if he could communicate with them. But she had no fortitude to spare for what passed between them.
Her vision was a blur of fatigue. Yet she needed to watch where she walked. The ground was littered with the corpses of Cavewights, their long limbs jutting at odd angles where the bones had been twisted or split. They baffled her senses: she might trip over them. And if she could not see, she would be unable to find those whom she sought.
Fortunately Pahni’s sight was keener; less bewildered by the ramifications of slaughter. Abruptly she
cried out in anguish. Racing ahead, she dropped to her knees amid the stench and confusion of the dead.
Liand hurried after her; but Linden could not hasten. She could only blink and stare, and try to find her way.
The Humbled waited near Pahni: they appeared to stand in attendance. Like Vernigil, they were all severely injured; cut and battered from scalp to shin. Runnels of blood flowed down their arms and legs. Yet they retained their wonted upright intransigence, as if neither pain nor death could touch them.
Now Linden saw four Ranyhyn there. She recognized Narunal. Bhanoryl, Mhornym, and Naybahn were less familiar to her, but she squinted at them until she was sure. They, too, were gravely wounded; almost staggering with blood loss. But they, too, seemed to stand in attendance, as though they had come to pay homage.
They would let Linden treat them, if the Humbled would not. But it was possible that neither the great horses nor the Haruchai absolutely required her aid. In their separate fashions, the Ranyhyn and the Masters were preternaturally hardy. They might survive as they were.
Then Linden reached the place where Pahni and Liand knelt over Mahrtiir, Bhapa, and Whrany. Pahni fought tears as she fumbled at her pouch of amanibhavam. Beside her, Liand’s face was pale with dismay. The orcrest rested, inert and forgotten, in his fist. He could find no use for its magic here.
Bhapa huddled on his knees between the Manethrall and Whrany, beating his forehead on the blood-raddled ground. He did not permit himself to howl or weep, and so he had no other outlet for his pain. Peering at him, Linden discerned that he had suffered less physical damage than the Humbled or the Ranyhyn. He had a few broken ribs, a few slashes and contusions. Infection would kill him eventually: his injuries themselves would not. And a poultice of amanibhavam might suffice to save him, if Linden’s stamina failed.
But Whrany was dead. The Ranyhyn’s head had been almost severed from his body. His blood drenched Bhapa. The Cord wore it as if it were a winding-sheet.
Mahrtiir still breathed. That was unfortunate. Death would have been a kinder fate.
He lay on his back, gasping at the dusty reek of bloodshed. In spite of his Ramen toughness, he writhed as though he knew that he should not move—and could not restrain himself. He had been cut and pierced as severely as the Humbled; as often as the Ranyhyn. But some weapon, possibly a spear, had struck him near his left temple and carried straight through the front of his skull, ripping away both of his eyes.
Only countless hours in County Hospital’s emergency room enabled Linden to study the Manethrall’s face until she was sure that the bones behind his eyes remained essentially intact; that this wound had not reached his brain.
Unable to efface her weakness, she strove to ignore it. With desperation and willpower, a kind of grieving rage, she fanned embers of Earthpower into unsteady flames and spilled them over Mahrtiir until he was laved in fire.
In some sense, Linden was still a physician. She could not behold his suffering and remain passive.
Please, she prayed, although there was no one who might have heeded her. Please.
Please don’t die.
Don’t hate me for not letting you die.
The Manethrall had chosen to accompany her because he chafed against the predictable and unambitious lives of his people. He had craved a tale which would deserve to be remembered among the Ramen. And he had supported her with complete fidelity.
This was the result. He might live, but he would never see again.
Exhaustion left her defenseless: she could not control the intensity of her health-sense. It was empathy transmogrified into excruciation. She saw every detail of his torn tissues—flesh and muscle, nerve and bone—as if it were replicated in her own body. She could have counted every ripped blood vessel, numbered every delicate channel of lymph and mucus. And she descried precisely how each tiny increment of damage could be repaired by Earthpower and Law.
She did not have the strength for the task. Even if she had been fresh and ready—even if she had not done so much killing—she could not have restored his eyes. There was nothing left of them. But everything that was possible for her, she did, and more. When she began to falter, she reached out to Liand, mutely asking for his aid. Instinctively he gave her what she needed. Summoning light from the orcrest, he gripped her hand so that the Sunstone was pressed between his palm and hers.
With that influx of power, she brought Mahrtiir back from agony and the borderlands of death.
His breathing grew quieter in spite of his pain. Now Linden was the one who gasped. As she released Liand’s hand, her surroundings seemed to turn themselves inside out, and she felt herself begin to fall.
But Bhapa surged to his feet and caught her in a fierce hug, ignoring his damaged ribs; staining her with Whrany’s blood as well as his own. “Ringthane,” he whispered, calling her away from collapse. “Mane and Tail, Ringthane! My life is yours. It was so before. Now it is yours utterly.” She heard weeping in his voice. “If the Manethrall and the Ranyhyn do not forbid it, I will accompany you into the depths of Gravin Threndor, or the inferno of Hotash Slay, or the bitter heart of the Sarangrave, and name myself blessed.”
She had no answer. She could bear neither his gratitude nor his sorrow. Mahrtiir would never see again. She had given the Manethrall a life of irredeemable darkness.
When Bhapa eased his embrace, she pulled away. “Amanibhavam,” she replied, panting raggedly. “Poultices. Bandages. Stop the bleeding.” Mahrtiir had too many other wounds, and she had tended none of them. “Then help the Ranyhyn.”
“Yes, Ringthane.” At once, Bhapa turned to obey.
Pahni had already set to work. Together the Cords mixed water with the crushed, dried blades of their potent grass to make a salve.
Helplessly Linden looked to Liand. Again he gave her what she needed. Supporting her with one arm, he lifted springwine to her lips. At the same time, he kept his orcrest alight. He may have hoped that the Sunstone’s eldritch possibilities would lend vitality to the springwine.
His instincts had not misled him. As she drank, Linden tasted something akin to Glimmermere’s lacustrine potency. If she could have bathed in the tarn, she might have been able to wash away the charnel stench of what she had done: the Cavewights burning like brittle sticks, the wolves scoured by sheets of flame—But Revelstone was too far away. She would find no healing there.
Nevertheless springwine and Liand’s considerate exertion brought her back from the brink of herself once more. Soon she was able to leave Mahrtiir and the Ranyhyn to the ministrations of Bhapa and Pahni. The Humbled she consigned to their stubbornness. First Woodhelven’s people needed more than she had done for them; far more.
There was a breeze blowing, some vagary of the undisturbed sunlight. Gently it carried the dust of battle and butchery away. But it could not shift the raw choleric stink of bloodshed, or the implications of Linden’s inadequacy.
Liand offered to accompany her. She told him to find clean cloth for bandages instead. She felt as laden with death as the dirt of Gallows Howe. If she were alone, she might finally find tears for everything that had been lost.
But before she could move past Galt, Branl, and Clyme toward the Woodhelvennin, Stave stopped her. Somehow she had failed to notice his approach.
“Chosen,” he said quietly. “you must accompany me.” Like Liand, Pahni, and Anele, he was unharmed. “The Sandgorgons require your attendance.”
Linden gestured vaguely. “I’m needed here.”
How was it possible that only those who had ridden with her against the kresh were whole?
Stave’s gaze held her. “Linden.”
His flat tone hinted at compassion. If he had ever used her given name before, she could not remember it.
“I’m not Linden.” She was dimly surprised to hear herself say those words aloud. “I’m not her anymore. Somebody else took my place under Melenkurion Skyweir.”
The Harrow wanted to trade Jeremiah for the Staff of Law and Coven
ant’s ring. Esmer and Roger would ensure that she had no opportunity to accept the Insequent’s offer.
“Nonetheless,” Stave stated inflexibly, “the Sandgorgons are insistent.” He was her only friend among the Haruchai. “They will accept no reply except yours. If you do not comply, they will turn against the Woodhelvennin.”
Of course, she thought. Perfect. Just what we need.
She was still expected to choose who would live and who would not.
“All right.” Abruptly she addressed the Humbled. “Before you bleed to death, you might as well make yourselves useful.” Her ire was not for them, but she made no attempt to stifle it. “Liand is looking for bandages. We need hot water. Lots of it.” Surely cook pots and fabric could be found among the ruins of First Woodhelven? “And get some hurtloam if you can. These poor people don’t know what it is. They can’t see it.”
Kevin’s Dirt had deprived them of health-sense. The Masters had deprived them of knowledge.
Clyme nodded. At once, he, Galt, and Branl limped away toward the shredded village. They looked like incarnations of pain: each step exacerbated their injuries. Yet they moved stolidly, undeterred by the cost of their actions.
Soon they were joined by a number of Woodhelvennin, sent by Vernigil to assist the Humbled.
For reasons of their own, Hyn, Rhohm, and Naharahn galloped off in the direction of the brook. They may have been thirsty.
Shaking her head, Linden let Stave take her to face the Sandgorgons.
They stood in a united cluster as if the six of them shared one mind. Apart from the wounds Roger had inflicted on them—rank burns and boils that had already begun to heal—they matched her memories of Nom. Interminable ages of the Great Desert’s iron sun had leached them of color, leaving their hides the distressed whiteness of albinos. They were shorter than Cavewights, but much more powerfully formed, bred to withstand the harshest extremes of sand and heat and gales. Their knees flexed backward, supported by the wide pads of their feet: they could traverse dunes and hardpan alike with tremendous speed.
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