The One Tree t2cotc-2

by Stephen R. Donaldson

  Sunlight covered the piers, spangled the gently heaving strip of water along the shipside, shone into the face of Coercri as if this day marked the first true dawn since the destruction of the Unhomed. Responding to Honninscrave's commands, some of the Giants positioned themselves to release the moorings. Others leaped into the rigging, climbing the heavy cables as lightly as children. Still others went below, where Linden could feel them tending the inner life of the ship until they passed beyond her inexperienced perceptions. In moments, the lower sails began to ripple in the breeze; and Starfare's Gem eased out to Sea.

  Two: Black Mood

  LINDEN tried to watch everything as the dromond slipped backward from the levee, then turned toward open water. Shifting from side to side, she saw the Giants unfurling canvas as if the labour were done by incantation rather than effort. Under her feet, the deck began to roll; but the seas were light, and the Giantship's great weight made it stable. She felt no discomfort. Her gaze repeatedly intersected Covenant's, and his excitement heightened hers. His expression was free of darkness; even his beard seemed to bristle with possibilities. After a moment, she became aware that he was breathing words along the breeze:

  “Stone and Sea are deep in life,

  two unalterable symbols of the world:

  permanence at rest, and permanence in motion;

  participants in the Power that remains.”

  They resonated in her memory like an act of homage.

  When she changed positions to look back toward Coercri, the breeze caught her hair, fluttering it across her face. She ran her fingers into her wheaten tresses, held them in place; and that simple gesture gave her more pleasure in herself than she had felt for a long time. Salt tanged the air, sharpening the very sunlight so that The Grieve looked like a place of rebirth as it receded. She began to think that perhaps more things had been reborn there than she would have dared to hope.

  Then Pitchwife began to sing. He stood some distance away, but his voice carried like light across the dromond, rising strongly from his deformed chest over the slapping of the waves and the snap of the canvas. His tune was a plain-song spiced with accents and suggestions of harmony; and the other Giants joined him:

  “Come sea and wave -

  broad footpath of those who roam

  and gateway to the world!

  All ways lead the way to Home.

  “Come wind and speed -

  sky-breath and the life of sail!

  Lines and sheets unfurled,

  our hearts covet every gale.

  “Come travel and quest!

  Discovery of the Earth:

  mysteries unknurled:

  roaming without stint or dearth:

  “Risk and journey save

  the heart of life from loss and need.

  We are the ocean's guest,

  and we love the vasty world!”

  The Giants were joyful singers, and their voices formed a counterpoint to the rocking of the masts, a song punctuated by a rising staccato as the breeze knocked the canvas. Starfare's Gem appeared to ride music as well as wind.

  And as the wind stiffened, Coercri slid toward the horizon with surprising celerity while the sun rose into midday. Honninscrave and his crew exchanged comments and jests as if they were all negligent; but his eyes under the bulwark of his brows missed nothing. At his orders, the rest of the sails had been raised; and Starfare's Gem strode into the Sunbirth Sea with a fleetness that fulfilled the prophecy of its moire-marked sides. Linden could feel vibrancy running like a thrill through the stone. In the hands of Giants, even granite became a thing of swiftness and graceful poise.

  Before long, her sensations became so sapid that she could no longer remain still. Instinctively, she moved away to begin exploring the ship.

  At once, Cail was at her shoulder. As she crossed the foredeck, he surprised her by asking if she wanted to see her quarters.

  She stopped to stare at him. The impassive wall of his mien gave no hint of how he had come by enough knowledge of the dromond to make such an offer. His short tunic left his brown limbs always free and ready; but his question made him appear not only prepared but also prescient. However, he answered her mute inquiry by explaining that Ceer and Hergrom had already spoken to the Storesmaster and had obtained from her at least a skeletal understanding of the ship.

  For a moment, Linden paused to consider the continuing providence of the Haruchai. But then she realised that Cail had offered her exactly what she did want-a place of her own; privacy in which to accustom herself to the sensations of the Giantship; a chance to clarify the new things that were happening to her. And perhaps the hospitality of the Giants would extend as far as bathwater? Hot bathwater? Images of luxuriance filled her head. How long had it been since she had last taken a hot bath? Since she had felt genuinely clean? She nodded to Cail and followed him toward the stern of the dromond.

  Amidship stood a flat-roofed structure that separated the fore-and afterdecks, completely spanning the vessel from side to side. When Cail led her into the housing through a seadoor with a storm-sill as high as her knees, she found herself in a long eating-hall with a galley on one side and a warren of storage-lockers on the other. The structure had no windows, but lanterns made it bright and cheery. Their light gleamed on the stone of the midmast as it passed straight through the hall like a rooftree. The shaft was carved like a hatchment with patterns at which she was tempted to look more closely. But Cail moved through the hall as if he already knew all its secrets; and she went with him out to the afterdeck.

  Together, they crossed to the Giantship's stern. She acknowledged Honninscrave's salute from the wheeldeck, then followed Cail through another seadoor to starboard below the Master's position. That entrance gave access to a smooth stone ladder leading downward. The ladder had been formed for Giants, but she was able to use it. And she only had to descend one level. There, in a passageway lit by more lanterns, she found a series of doors-rooms, Cail explained, which had been set aside for her, Vain, Ceer, and himself.

  Covenant, Brinn, and Hergrom were to be similarly housed on the port side of the vessel.

  When she entered her cabin, she discovered that it was a chamber which would have been small for a Giant but seemed almost wastefully large for her. A long hammock hung near one wall; two massive chairs and a table occupied most of the floor. These furnishings outsized her: the chair-seats reached to her waist; and she would have to stand on the table to gain the hammock. But for the present those difficulties did not bother her. The chamber was bright with sunshine reflecting through an open port, and it offered privacy. She was glad to have it.

  But moments after Cail left in search of the food and bathwater she requested of him, a tension which had been nagging at her underneath her excitement demanded her notice. The withdrawal of Cail's hard Haruchai presence pulled aside a veil within her. A hand of darkness hidden somewhere inside the depths of the dromond reached out one dire finger toward her heart. At its touch, all her relief and anticipation and newness eroded and fell down like a sea-doused castle of sand. An old and half forgotten black mood began to seep back into her.

  It stank of her parents and Gibbon.

  After all, what had truly changed for her? What right or reason did she have to be where she was? She was still the same-a woman driven by the need to flee death rather than to pursue life. She did not know how to change. And the na-Mhoram had explicitly denied her hope. He had said, You are being forged as iron is forged to achieve the ruin of the Earth. Because you are open to that which no other in the Land can discern, you are open to be forged. She would never be free of his eager cruelty, of the gelid ill with which he had desecrated her private flesh-or of the way she had responded. The message of his doom came back to her now, rising as if it grew from the keel of Starfare's Gem-as if the health of the dromond contained a canker spot which fed on the Giants and their ship.

  That blackness had contorted much of her life. It was her parents, her fath
er and mother. And it was here. It was within her, and yet she inhaled it as if the air were full of it as well. A fate she could neither name nor endure seemed to lurk in ambush for her, so that her cabin felt more like a cell in the hold of Revelstone than a sun-washed chamber in the company of Giants.

  For several long moments, she fought the oppression, struggled to define the strange way it appeared to spring from outside her. But her past was too strong; it blinded her percipience. Long before Cail could return, she fled her cabin, rushed back up to the open air. Clinging to the starboard rail with hands that trembled, she swallowed repeatedly, heavily, at the old dread rising in her throat like a recognition of Gibbon's touch.

  But gradually the darkness lessened. She could think of no reason why this should be true; but she felt instinctively that she had put some distance between herself and the source of the mood. Seeking to increase that distance, she turned toward the nearest stairway to the wheeldeck.

  Ceer had appeared at her side toward her while Cail was away. She could hardly refrain from leaning against him, bracing her frailty on his rectitude. But she hated that weakness. Striving to ignore it, deny it, she impelled herself up the stairs alone.

  On the wheeldeck, she found Honninscrave, the First, Covenant, Brinn, and another Giant who held the great wheel which guided the ship. This wheel was formed of stone and stood half again as tall as Linden; but the steerswoman turned its spokes as lightly as if it had been carved of balsa wood. Honninscrave greeted the Chosen, and the First gave her a nod of welcome; yet Linden felt immediately that she had interrupted a discussion. Covenant looked toward her as if he meant to ask her opinion. But then he closed his mouth and gazed at her more intently. Before she could speak, he said, “Linden, what's the matter?”

  She frowned back at him, vexed and shamed by the transparency of her emotions. Clearly, she had not changed in any way that mattered. She still could not tell him the truth-not here, under an open sky and the eyes of the Giants. She tried to dismiss his question with a shrug, smooth out the lines of her face. But his attention did not lose its acuity. In a careful voice, she said, “I was thinking about Gibbon.” With her eyes, she asked him to let the matter pass. “I'd rather think about something else.”

  At that, his stare softened. He looked like a man who Was willing to do almost anything for her. Clearing his throat, he said, “We were talking about Vain. He hasn't moved since he came aboard. And he's in the way. Interferes with some of the rigging. The crew asked him to move-but you know how much good that did.”

  She knew. Time and again, she had seen the Demondim-spawn in his familiar relaxed stance, arms slightly bent, eyes focused on nothing-as motionless as an obelisk.

  “So they tried to shift him. Three of them. He didn't budge.” Covenant shook his head at the idea that anyone could be heavy or strong enough to defeat three Giants. Then he concluded, “We were trying to decide what to do about it. Honninscrave wants to use a block-and-tackle.”

  Linden gave an inward sigh of relief. The darkness retreated another step, pushed back by this chance to be of use. “It won't do any good,” she replied. Vain's purposes were a mystery to her; but she had seen deeply enough into him to know that he could become denser and less tractible than the granite of the ship. “If he doesn't want to move, he won't move.”

  Covenant nodded as if she had confirmed his expectations. The First muttered sourly to herself. With a shrug, Honninscrave ordered his crew to work around the Demondim-spawn.

  Linden was glad of their company. Her sense of oppression was definitely weaker now. The huge health of the Giants seemed to shield her. And Covenant's considerateness eased her. She could breathe as if her lungs were not clogged with memories of death. Moving to the taffrail, she sat down against one of the posts and tried to tune herself to the Giantship.

  Shortly, Cail came to take Ceer's place. His features betrayed no reproach for the wasted errand on which she had sent him. For that forbearance also she was grateful. She sensed the presence of a fierce capacity for judgment behind the impassivity of the Haruchai. She did not want it turned against her.

  Almost without volition, her gaze returned to Covenant. But his attention was elsewhere. Starfare's Gem and its crew had taken hold of him again. He was so entranced by the dromond, so moved by the companionship of Giants, that everything else receded. He asked Honninscrave and the First questions to start them talking, then listened to their responses with the hunger of a man who had found no other answer to his loneliness.

  Following his example, Linden also listened and watched.

  Honninscrave talked at glad length about the life and workings of his craft. The crew was divided into three watches under the command of the Master, the Anchormaster, and the ship's third-in-command, the Storesmaster. However, like their officers, the Giants did not appear to rest when they were off duty. Their affection would not permit them to leave Starfare's Gem alone, and they spent their time doing odd jobs around the vessel. But when Honninscrave began to describe these tasks, and the purposes they served, Linden lost her way. The crew had Giantish names for every line and sheet, every part of the ship, every implement; and she could not absorb the barrage of unfamiliar words. Some stayed with her: Dawngreeter, the highest sail on the foremast; Horizon-scan, the lookout atop the midmast; Shipsheartthew, the great wheel which turned the rudder. But she did not know enough about ships and sailing to retain the rest.

  This problem was aggravated by the fact that Honninscrave rarely phrased his instructions to his watch as direct orders. More often, he shouted a comment about the state of the sails, or the wind, or the seas, and left the choice of appropriate action to any Giant who happened to be near the right place. As a result, the tacking of the ship seemed to happen almost spontaneously-a reaction to the shifting air rather than to Honninscrave's mastery, or perhaps a theurgy enacted by the vivid and complex vibrations of the rigging. This beguiled Linden, but did not greatly enhance her grasp on the plethora of names the Master used.

  Later, she was vaguely surprised to see Ceer and Hergrom in the shrouds of the aftermast. They moved deftly among the lines, learning from and aiding the Giants with an easy alacrity which seemed almost gay. When she asked Cail what his people were doing, he replied that they were fulfilling an old dream of the Haruchai. During all the centuries that the Unhomed and the Bloodguard had known each other before and after the Ritual of Desecration, no Haruchai had ever set foot on a Giantship. Ceer and Hergrom were answering a desire which had panged their ancestors more than three thousand years ago.

  Cail's terse account touched her obscurely, like a glimpse of an unsuspected and occult beauty. The steadfastness of his people transcended all bounds. During Covenant's previous visits to the Land, the Bloodguard had already been warding the Council of Lords without sleep or death for nearly two thousand years, so extravagant had been their Vow of service. And now, millennia later, Cail and his people still preserved the memories and commitments of those Bloodguard.

  But the implications of such constancy eventually cast Linden back upon herself; and as the afternoon waned, her gloom returned. Her senses were growing steadily more attuned to the Giantship. She could read the movements and mirth of the Giants passing through the decks below her; with effort, she could estimate the number of people in Foodfendhall, the midship housing. This should have eased her. Everything she consciously felt was redolent with clean strength and good humour. And yet her darkness thickened along the slow expansion of her range.

  Again, she was troubled by the sensation that her mood grew from an external source-from some fatal flaw or ill in the Giantship. Yet she could not disentangle that sensation from her personal response. She had spent too much of her life in this oppression to think seriously that it could be blamed on anything outside herself. Gibbon had not created her blackness: he had only given her a glimpse of its meaning. But familiarity did not make it more bearable.

  When the call for supper came, she resisted h
er depression to answer it. Covenant did not hesitate; and she meant to follow him to the ends of the Earth if necessary to learn the kind of courage which made him forever active against his doom. Beneath his surface, leprosy slept and Lord Foul's venom awaited the opportunity to work its intended desecration. Yet he seemed equal to his plight, more than equal to it. He did not suffer from the particular fear which had paralyzed her in the face of Joan's possession, Marid's monstrous ill, Gibbon-Raver's horror. But for that very reason she was determined to accompany him until she had found his answer. Hastening to his side, she went with him toward Foodfendhall.

  However, as night gathered over the decks, her uneasiness mounted. The setting of the sun left her exposed to a stalking peril. In the eating-hall, she was crowded among Giants whose appetites radiated vitality; but she could barely force food past the thickness of defeat in her throat, although she had not had a meal since that morning. Steaming stew, cakes full of honey, dried fruit: her black mood made such things vaguely nauseating.

  Soon afterward, Honninscrave ordered the sails shortened for the night; and the time came for tales. The Giants responded eagerly, gathering on the afterdeck and in the shrouds of the aftermast so that the First and Covenant could speak to them from the wheeldeck. Their love of tales was plain in them-a love which made them appear childlike, and yet also gave them a precious and encompassing courage. And Covenant went aft to meet them as though this, too, were something he already knew how to bear. But Linden had reached the limit of her endurance. Above the masts, the stars appeared disconsolate in their immense isolation. The noises of the ship-the creak of the rigging, the uncertainty of the sails whenever the wind shifted, the protest of the waves as the dromond shouldered through them-sounded like pre-echoes of anger or grief. And she had already heard many stories-the tales of the Earth's creation, of Kevin Landwaster's despair, of Covenant's victory. She was not ready for any more.