Thomas Covenant 02: The Illearth War

by Stephen R. Donaldson

  “Still we fought,” he concluded. “At last we are here. But half the Bloodguard and eight of the Eoward were slain. And the horses have passed the end of their strength. Many will never bear riders again, and all need long days of rest. The battle which remains must be met afoot.”

  When he finished, he returned to his place in the circle. His courage was evident, but as he moved, his square shoulders seemed already to be carrying all the weight they could bear. And because Troy could find no words for his respect and gratitude, he said nothing. Silently he nodded to First Haft Amorine.

  She described briefly the last few days of the Warward’s march, then she reported on the present condition of the army. “Water and aliantha are not plentiful here, beyond Doom’s Retreat. The Warward carries food which may be stretched for five days or six—no more. The warriors themselves are sorely damaged by their march. Even the uninjured are crippled by exhaustion. Great numbers have wounds about their feet and shoulders—wounds which do not heal. Threescore of the weakest died during our last run to the Retreat. Many more will die if the Warward does not rest now.”

  Her words made Troy groan inwardly; they were full of unintended reproaches. He was the Warmark. He had promised victory again and again to people who trusted him. And now— He felt a sharp desire to berate himself, tell the Hafts just how badly he had miscalculated. But before he could begin, Lord Callindrill spoke. The wounded Lord was supported by two Bloodguard, but he was able to make his weak voice heard.

  “I must speak of the power which Hiltmark Quaan did not name. I still do not comprehend how the Despiser gained mastery over a Giant—it surpasses my understanding. But Fleshharrower is in truth a Giant, and he is possessed of a great power. He bears with him a fragment of the Illearth Stone.”

  Lord Mhoram nodded painfully. “Alas, my friends,” he said, “this is a dark time for all the Land. Danger and death beset us on every hand, and ill defies all defense. Hear me. I know how this Giant—this Fleshharrower—has been turned against us. It is accomplished through the combined might of the Stone and the Ravers. Either alone would not suffice—the Giants are strong and sure. But together—! Who in the Land could hope to endure? Therefore the Giant carries a fragment of the Illearth Stone, so that the Despiser’s power will remain upon him, and the Raver will possess an added weapon. Melenkurion abatha! This is a great evil.”

  For a moment, he stood silent as if in dismay, and distress filled the Hafts as they tasted the magnitude of the ill he described. But then he drew himself up, and his eyes flashed around the circle. “Yet it is always thus with the Despiser. Let not the knowledge of this evil blind you or weaken you. Lord Foul seeks to turn all the good of the Land to harm and corruption. Our task is clear. We must find the strength to turn harm and corruption to good. For that reason we fight. If we falter now, we become like Fleshharrower—unwilling enemies of the Land.”

  His stern words steadied the Hafts, helped them to recover their resolve. However, before he or Troy could continue, Lord Verement said harshly, “What of the Giants, Mhoram? What of the mission? How many other souls have already been lost to the Despiser?”

  Verement had entered the circle across from Troy while Lord Callindrill had been speaking. The clouds on Troy’s sight prevented him from seeing Verement’s expression, but when the Lord spoke his voice was raw with bitterness. “Answer, Mhoram. Seer and oracle! Is Hyrim dead also? Do any Giants yet live?”

  Troy felt Verement’s bitterness as an attack on the Warward, and he used words like whips to strike back. “That isn’t our concern. There’s nothing we can do about it. We’re stuck here—we’re going to live or die here! It doesn’t matter what’s happening anywhere else.” In his heart, he felt that he was betraying the Giants, but he had no choice. “All we can do is fight! Do you hear me?”

  “I hear you.” Lord Verement fell silent as if he understood Troy’s vehemence, and the Warmark seized his chance to change the subject.

  “All right,” he said to the whole circle. “At least now we know where we stand. Now I’ll tell you what we’re going to do about it. I have a plan, and with Lord Mhoram’s help I’m going to make it work.”

  Bracing himself, he said bluntly, “We’re going to leave here. Fleshharrower and his army probably won’t arrive before midday tomorrow. By that time, we will be long gone.”

  The Hafts gaped and blinked momentarily as they realized that he was ordering another march. Then several of them groaned aloud, and others recoiled as if he had struck them. Even Quaan winced openly. Troy wanted to rush into explanations, but he contained himself until Amorine stepped forward and protested, “Warmark, why will your former plan not suffice? The warriors have given their utmost to gain Doom’s Retreat as you commanded. Why must we leave?”

  “Because Foul’s army is too goddamn big!” He did not want to shout, but for a while he could not stop himself. “We’ve killed ten thousand kresh and a couple thousand ur-viles. But the rest of that army is still out there! It’s not three times bigger than we are—or even five times bigger! Fleshharrower has twenty times our numbers, twenty! I’ve seen them.” With an effort, he caught hold of his pointless fury, jerked it down. “My old plan was a good one while it lasted,” he went on. “But it just didn’t take into account that Foul’s army might be so big. Now there’s only two things that can happen. If that Giant sends his army in here just ten or twenty thousand at a time, the fight is going to last for weeks. But we’ve only got food for six days—we’ll starve to death in here. And if he cuts through in one big blast, he’ll get control of both ends of the Retreat. Then we’ll be trapped, and he can pick us off in his own good time.

  “Now listen to me!” he shouted again at the chagrined Hafts. “I’m not going to let us get slaughtered as long as there is anything I can do to stop it—anything at all! And there is one thing, just one! I’ve got one more trick to play in this game, and I’m going to play it if I have to carry every one of you on my back!”

  He glared around the circle, trying to fill his eyeless stare with authority, command, some kind of power that would make the Warward obey him. “We will march at dawn tomorrow.”

  Darkness shrouded his sight, but in the firelight he could see Quaan’s face. The old veteran was wrestling with himself, struggling to find the strength for this new demand. He closed his eyes briefly, and all the Hafts waited for him as if he had their courage in his hands, to uphold or deny as he saw fit. When he opened his eyes, his face seemed to sag with fatigue. But his voice was steady.

  “Warmark, where will we march?”

  “West for now,” Troy replied quickly, “toward those old ruins. It won’t be too bad. If we handle things right, we can go slower than we have so far.”

  “Will you tell us your plan?”

  “No.” Troy was tempted to say, If I tell you, you’ll be so horrified that you’ll never follow me. But instead he added, “I want to keep it to myself for a while get it ready. You’ll just have to trust me.” He sounded to himself like a man falling out of a tree, shouting to the people above him as he fell that he would catch them.

  “Warmark,” Quaan said stiffly, “you know that I will always trust you. We all trust you.”

  “Yes, I know,” Troy sighed. A sudden weariness flooded over him, and he could barely hear his own voice. He had already fallen a long way since he had left Revelstone. Miscalculations denuded his ideas of all their vitality, divested them of their power to save. He wondered how many other things he would have torn from him before this war was done. A long moment passed before he could find enough energy to say, “There’s one more thing. It’s got to be done—we don’t have any choice anymore. We’ve got to leave some people behind. To try to hold the Retreat make Fleshharrower think we’re still here-slow him down. It’ll be suicide, so we’ll need volunteers. Two or three Eoward should be enough to make it work.”

  Quaan and Amorine took this stolidly; they were warriors, familiar with this kind of thinking. But
before Troy could say anything else, Lord Verement sprang into the circle. “No!” he barked, striking the ground with his staff. “None will be left behind. I forbid it!”

  Now Troy could see him clearly. His lean face looked as sharp as if it had been taken to a grindstone, and his eyes flamed keenly. Troy’s throat felt abruptly bone-dry. With difficulty, he said, “Lord Verement, I’m sorry. I’ve got no choice. This march’ll kill the warriors unless they can go more slowly. So somebody has got to gain them time.”

  “Then I will do it!” Verement’s tone was raw. “I will hold Doom’s Retreat. It is a fit place for me.”

  “You can’t,” Troy objected, almost stammering. “I can’t let you. I’ll need you with me.” Unable to bear the force of Verement’s gaze, he turned to Lord Mhoram for help.

  “Warmark Troy speaks truly,” Mhoram said carefully. “Death will not heal your grief. And you will be sorely needed in the days ahead. You must come with us.”

  “By the Seven!” Verement cried. “Do you not hear me? I have said that I will remain! Shetra my wife is lost! She whom I loved with all my strength, and yet did not love enough. Melenkurion! Do not speak to me of cannot or must! I will remain. No warriors will be left behind.”

  Mhoram cut in, “Lord Verement, do you believe that you are able to defeat Fleshharrower?”

  But Verement did not reply to that question. “Heal Callindrill,” he said harshly. “I will require you both. And call the Bloodguard from the Plains. I start at dawn.” Then he swung away, and stalked out of the circle into the night.

  His departure left Troy bewildered and exhausted. He felt that the burden of the Warward already clung to his shoulders, bent his back so that he moved as if he were decrepit. His confused fatigue made him unfit for speeches, and he dismissed the Hafts abruptly. As he did so, he felt that he was failing them—that they needed him to lead them, give them a strong figure around which they could rally. But he had no strength. He went to his blankets as if he hoped that some kind of fortitude would come to him in a dream.

  He sank at once into exhaustion, and slept until sleep was no longer possible for him—until the sunrise above the mountains filled his brain with shapes and colors. When he arose, he discovered that he had slept through all the noise of the Warward as it broke camp and began its march. Already the last Eoward were shambling away from Doom’s Retreat. They trudged as if they were maimed into the dry, heat pale land of the Southron Wastes.

  Cursing dully at his weakness, he grabbed a few bites of the food Ruel offered him, then hurried away toward the Retreat.

  There he found Callindrill and Mhoram, with a small group of Bloodguard. On either side of the defile’s southern end, the Lords had climbed as high as they could up the scree into the jumbled boulders piled against the canyon walls. From these positions, they plied their staffs in a way that cast a haze across the air between them.

  Beyond them, in Doom’s Retreat itself, Lord Verement clambered over the rocks and fallen shale. As he moved, he waved the fire of his staff like a torch against the darkness of the cliffs. Only Thomin accompanied him.

  Troy looked closely at Callindrill. The wounded Lord looked wan and tired, and sweat glistened on his pale forehead, but he stood on his own, and wielded his staff firmly. Troy saluted him, then climbed the scree on the other side to join Lord Mhoram.

  When he reached Mhoram, he sat and watched while the haze moved and took shape. It appeared to revolve slowly like a large wheel standing in the end of the Retreat. Its circumference fitted just within the scree and stone, so that it effectively blocked the canyon floor, and it turned as if it were hanging on a pivot between Mhoram and Callindrill. Beyond it, Troy could see only the empty Retreat—the raven cleaned bones of the ur-viles and wolves—and the lone Lord struggling up and down the sides of the canyon with his flame bobbing like a will-o’-the-wisp.

  Soon, however, both Mhoram and Callindrill ended their exertions. They planted their staffs like anchors in the edges of the haze, and leaned back to rest. Lord Mhoram greeted Troy tiredly.

  After a moment’s hesitation, Troy nodded toward Verement. “What’s he doing?”

  Mhoram closed his eyes, and said as if he were answering Troy, “We have made a Word of Warning.”

  While he was thinking of ways to rephrase his question, Troy asked, “What does it do?”

  “It seals Doom’s Retreat.”

  “How will it work? I can see it. It won’t take Fleshharrower by surprise.”

  “Your sight is keen in some ways. I cannot see the Word.”

  Awkwardly Troy asked, “Is there anyone still out there—besides Verement?”

  “No. All the warriors have left. The scouts have been recalled. None may pass this way now without encountering the Word.”

  “So he’s committed himself—he’s stuck out there.”

  “Yes.” Mhoram bit at the word angrily.

  Troy returned to his first question. “What does he hope to gain? It’s suicide.”

  Mhoram opened his eyes, and Troy felt the force of the Lord’s gaze. “We will gain time,” Mhoram said. “You spoke of a need for time.” Then he sighed and looked away down the canyon. “And Lord Verement Shetra-mate will gain an end to anguish.”

  Numbly Troy watched Verement. The hawkish Lord did not look like a man in search of relief. He threw himself up and down in the tumbled edges of the defile, kicked his way through the shale and the fleshless bones and the watchful silence of the ravens, as if he were possessed. And he was exhausting himself. Already his stride was unsteady, and he had fallen several times. Yet he had covered less than a third of Doom’s Retreat with the invisible skein of his fire. But some power, some relentless coercion of will, kept him going. Throughout the morning, he continued his weird progress along the canyon, stopping only at rare moments to accept water and treasure-berries from Thomin. By midmorning, he was half done.

  Now, however, he could no longer keep up his pace. He had to lean on Thomin as he stumbled up into the rocks and down again, and his staff’s fire guttered and smoked. A few ravens dropped out of their high nests and sailed around him as if to see how much longer he would endure. But he went on; the force which blazed in him did not waver.

  In the end, he was compelled to leave the last yards of the Retreat unwoven. Thomin pointed out to him the rising dust of Fleshharrower’s approach. Shortly the leading wave of yellow wolves came into view. Lord Verement dropped his task, straightened his shoulders; he gave Thomin one final order. Then he walked out of Doom’s Retreat to meet the army of the Despiser.

  The wide front of wolves rushed toward him, suddenly eager for prey. But at the last they hesitated, halted. The unflinching challenge of his stance threw them into confusion. Though they snapped and snarled fiercely, they did not attack. They encircled the two men, and ran howling around them while the rest of the army made its approach.

  Fleshharrower’s army marched out of the northeast until the dark line of it filled the horizon, and the tramping of its myriad feet shook the ground. The Despiser’s hordes seemed to cover the whole Plains, and their tremendous numbers dwarfed Lord Verement like an ocean. When the Giant came forward, kicked his way through the wolves to confront the Lord and the Bloodguard, his size alone made the two men appear puny and insignificant.

  But when the Giant was within ten yards of him, Verement made a forbidding gesture. “Come no closer, moksha Raver!” he shouted hoarsely. “I know you, Jehannum Fleshharrower! Go back! Back to the evil which made you. I deny you passage—I, Verement Shetra-mate, Lord of the Council of Revelstone! You may not pass here!”

  Fleshharrower stopped. “Ah, a Lord,” he said, peering down at Verement as if the Lord were too tiny to be seen easily. “I am amazed.” His face was twisted, and his leer gave him an expression of acute pain, as if his flesh could not disguise the hurt of the rabid presence within it. But his voice seemed to suck and cling in the air like quicksand. It held only derision and lust as he continued, “Have
you come to welcome me to the slaughter of your army? But of course you know it is too small to be called an army. I have fought and followed you from Andelain, but do not think that you have outwitted me. I know you seek to meet me in Doom’s Retreat because your army is too weak to fight elsewhere. Perhaps you have come to surrender—to join me.”

  “You speak like a fool,” Verement barked. “No friend of the Land will ever surrender to you, or join you. Admit the truth, and go. Go, I say! Melenkurion abatha!” Abruptly he caught his staff in both hands and raised it over his head. “Duroc minas mill khabaal! With all the names of the Earthpower, I command you! There is no victory for the Despiser here!”

  As Verement shouted his Words, the Raver flinched. To defend himself, he thrust his hand into his leather jerkin, snatched out a smooth green stone that filled his fist. A lambent emerald flame played in its depths, and it steamed like boiling ice. He clenched it, made it steam more viciously, and exclaimed, “Verement Shetra-mate, for a hundred leagues I have driven two Lords before me like ants! Why do you believe that you can resist me now?”

  “Because you have killed Shetra my wife!” the Lord cried in rage. “Because I have been unworthy of her all my life! Because I do not fear you, Raver! I am free of all restraint! No fear or love limits my strength! I match you hate for hate, moksha Raver! Melenkurion abatha!”

  His staff whirled about his head, and a livid blue bolt of power sprang from the wood at Fleshharrower. Simultaneously Thomin rushed forward with his fingers crooked like claws, threw himself at the Giant’s throat.

  Fleshharrower met the attack easily, disdainfully. He caught Verement’s bolt on his Stone and held it burning there like a censer. Almost at once, the blue flame turned deep dazzling green, blazed up higher. And with his other hand the Giant dealt Thomin a blow which sent him sprawling behind Verement.

  Then Fleshharrower flung the fire back.

  The Lord’s fury never winced. Swinging his staff, he jabbed its metal end like a lance into the gout of power. Savage cracking noises came from the wood as it bucked and bent—but the staff held. Verement shouted mighty words over the flame, compelled it to his will again. Slowly the green burned blue on his staff. When he had mastered it, he hurled it again at the Raver.