Sunder shifted in the darkness as if he were trying to frame a question. But before he could articulate it, the dim flicker of Covenant’s ring was effaced by a bright spangling from the walls of the barranca. Suddenly the whole ravine seemed to be on fire.
Linden sprang erect, expecting to find scores of angry Stonedownors rushing toward her. But as her eyes adjusted, she saw that the source of the reflection was some distance away. The village must have lit an immense bonfire. Flames showed the profile of stone houses between her and the light; fire echoed off the crystal facets in all directions. She could hear nothing to indicate that she and her companions were in danger.
Sunder touched her shoulder. “Come,” he whispered. “Some high purpose gathers the Stonedown. All its people will attend. Perhaps we have been granted an opportunity to find food.”
She hesitated, bent to examine Covenant. A complex fear made her reluctant. “Should we leave him?” His skin felt crisp with fever.
“Where will he go?” the Graveler responded simply.
She bowed her head. Sunder would probably need her. And Covenant seemed far too ill to move, to harm himself. Yet he looked so frail— But she had no choice. Pulling herself upright, she motioned for the Graveler to lead the way.
Without delay, Sunder crept up the ravine. Linden followed as stealthily as she could.
She felt exposed in the brightness of the vale; but no alarm was raised. And the light allowed them to approach the Stonedown easily. Soon they were among the houses.
Sunder stopped at every corner to be sure that the path was clear. But they saw no one. All the dwellings seemed to be empty. The Graveler chose a house. Motioning for Linden to guard the doorway, he eased himself past the curtain.
The sound of voices reached her. For an instant, she froze with a warning in her throat. But then her hearing clarified, located the sound. It came from the center of the Stonedown. She gripped her relief and waited.
Moments later, Sunder returned. He had a bulging leather knapsack under his arm. In her ear, he breathed that he had found mirkfruit as well as food.
He started to leave. But she stopped him, gestured inward. For a moment, he considered the advantages of knowing what transpired in the village. Then he agreed.
Together they sneaked forward until only one house stood between them and the center. The voices became distinct; she could hear anger and uncertainty in them. When Sunder pointed at the roof, she nodded at once. He set his knapsack down, lifted her to the flat eaves. Carefully she climbed onto the roof.
Sunder handed her the sack. She took it, then reached down to help him join her. The exertion tore a groan from his sore chest; but the sound was too soft to disturb the voices. Side by side, they slid forward until they were able to see and hear what was happening in the center of the Stonedown.
The people were gathered in a tight ring around the open space. They were a substantially larger number than the population of Mithil Stonedown. In an elusive way, they seemed more prosperous, better-fed, than the folk of Sunder’s home. But their faces were grim, anxious, fearful. They watched the center of the circle with tense attention.
Beside the bonfire stood three figures—two men and a woman. The woman was poised between the men in an attitude of prayer, as if she were pleading with both of them. She wore a sturdy leather shift like the other Stonedownor women. Her pale delicate features were urgent, and the disarray of her raven hair gave her an appearance of fatality.
The man nearest to Linden and Sunder was also a Stonedownor, a tall square individual with a bristling black beard and eyes darkened by conflict. But the person opposite him was unlike anyone Linden had seen before. His raiment was a vivid red robe draped with a black chasuble. A hood shadowed his features. His hands held a short iron rod like a scepter with an open triangle affixed to its end. Emanations of hieratic pride and vitriol flowed from him as if he were defying the entire Stonedown.
“A Rider!” Sunder whispered. “A Rider of the Clave.”
The woman—she was hardly more than a girl—faced the tall Stonedownor. “Croft!” she begged. Tears suffused her mien. “You are the Graveler. You must forbid!”
“Aye, Hollian,” he replied with great bitterness. While he spoke, his hands toyed with a slim wooden wand. “By right of blood and power, I am the Graveler. And you are an eh-Brand—a benison beyond price to the life of Crystal Stonedown. But he is Sivit na-Mhoram-wist. He claims you in the name of the Clave. How may I refuse?”
“You may refuse—” began the Rider in a sepulchral tone.
“You must refuse!” the woman cried.
“—but should you refuse,” Sivit continued remorselessly, “should you think to deny me, I swear by the Sunbane that I will levy the na-Mhoram’s Grim upon you, and you will be ground under its might like chaff!”
At the word Grim, a moan ran through the Stonedown; and Sunder shivered.
But Hollian defied their fear. “Croft!” she insisted, “forbid! I care nothing for the na-Mhoram or his Grim. I am an eh-Brand. I foretell the Sunbane! No harm, no Grim or any curse, will find you unwary while I abide here. Croft! My people!” She appealed to the ring of Stonedownors. “Am I nothing, that you cast me aside at the whim of Sivit na-Mhoram-wist?”
“Whim?” barked the Rider. “I speak for the Clave. I do not utter whims. Harken to me, girl. I claim you by right of service. Without the mediation of the Clave—without the wisdom of the Rede and the sacrifice of the na-Mhoram—there would be no life left in any Stonedown or Woodhelven, despite your arrogance. And we must have life for our work. Do you think to deny me? Condemnable folly!”
“She is precious to us,” said the tall Graveler softly. “Do not enforce your will upon us.”
“Is she?” Sivit raged, brandishing his scepter. “You are sick with her folly. She is not precious. She is an abomination! You think her an eh-Brand, a boon rare in the Land. I say to you, she is a Sun-Sage! Damned as a servant of a-Jeroth! She does not foretell the Sunbane. She causes it to be as she chooses. Against her and her foul kind the Clave strives, seeking to undo the harm such beings wreak.”
The Rider continued to rant; but Linden turned away. To Sunder, she whispered, “Why does he want her?”
“Have you learned nothing?” he replied tightly. “The Clave has power over the Sunbane. For power, they must have blood.”
“Blood?”
He nodded. “At all times, Riders journey the Land, visiting again and again every village. At each visit, they take one or two or three lives—ever young and strong lives—and bear them to Revelstone, where the na-Mhoram works his work.”
Linden clenched her outrage, kept her voice at a whisper. “You mean they’re going to kill her?”
“Yes!” he hissed.
At once, all her instincts rebelled. A shock of purpose ran through her, clarifying for the first time her maddening relationship to the Land. Some of Covenant’s ready passion became suddenly explicable. “Sunder,” she breathed, “we’ve got to save her.”
“Save—?” He almost lost control of his voice. “We are two against a Stonedown. And the Rider is mighty.”
“We’ve got to!” She groped for a way to convince him. The murder of this woman could not be allowed. Why else had Covenant tried to save Joan? Why else had Linden herself risked her life to prevent his death? Urgently she said, “Covenant tried to save Marid.”
“Yes!” rasped Sunder. “And behold the cost!”
“No.” For a moment, she could not find the answer she needed. Then it came to her. “What’s a Sun-Sage?”
He stared at her. “Such a being cannot exist.”
“What,” she enunciated, “is it?”
“The Rider has said,” he murmured. “It is one who can cause the Sunbane.”
She fixed him with all her determination. “Then we need her.”
His eyes seemed to bulge in their sockets. His hands grasped for something to hold onto. But he could not deny the force of her argume
nt. “Mad,” he exhaled through his teeth. “All of us—mad.” Briefly he searched the Stonedown as if he were looking for valor. Then he reached a decision. “Remain here,” he whispered. “I go to find the Rider’s Courser. Perhaps it may be harmed, or driven off. Then he will be unable to bear her away. We will gain time to consider other action.”
“Good!” she responded eagerly. “If they leave here, I’ll try to see where they take her.”
He gave a curt nod. Muttering softly to himself, “Mad. Mad,” he crept to the rear of the roof and dropped to the ground, taking his knapsack with him.
Linden returned her attention to Hollian’s people. The young woman was on her knees, hiding her face in her hands. The Rider stood over her, denouncing her with his scepter; but he shouted at the Stonedownors.
“Do you believe that you can endure the na-Mhoram’s Grim? You are fey and anile. By the Three Corners of Truth! At one word from me, the Clave will unleash such devastation upon you that you will grovel to be permitted to deliver up this foul eh-Brand, and it will avail you nothing!”
Abruptly the woman jerked upright, threw herself to confront the Graveler. “Croft!” she panted in desperation, “slay this Rider! Let him not carry word to the Clave. Then I will remain in Crystal Stonedown, and the Clave will know nothing of what we have done.” Her hands gripped his jerkin, urging him. “Croft, hear me. Slay him!”
Sivit barked a contemptuous laugh. Then his voice dropped, became low and deadly. “You have not the power.”
“He speaks truly,” Croft murmured to Hollian. Misery knurled his countenance. “He requires no Grim to work our ruin. I must meet his claim, else we will not endure to rue our defiance.”
An inarticulate cry broke from her. For a moment, Linden feared that the young woman would collapse into hysteria. But out of Hollian’s distress came an angry dignity. She raised her head, drew herself erect. “You surrender me,” she said bitterly. “I am without help or hope. Yet you must at least accord to me the courtesy of my worth. Restore to me the lianar.”
Croft looked down at the wand in his hands. The rictus of his shoulders revealed his shame and decision. “No,” he said softly. “With this wood you perform your foretelling. Sivit na-Mhoram-wist has no claim upon it—and for you it has no future. Crystal Stonedown will retain it. As a prayer for the birth of a new eh-Brand.”
Triumph shone from the Rider as if he were a torch of malice.
At the far side of the village, Linden glimpsed a sudden hot flaring of red. Sunder’s power. He must have made use of his Sunstone. The beam cast vermeil through the crystal, then vanished. She held her breath, fearing that Sunder had given himself away. But the Stonedownors were intent on the conflict in their midst: the instant of force passed unnoticed.
Mute with despair, Hollian turned away from the Graveler, then stopped as if she had been slapped, staring past the corner of the house on which Linden lay. Muffled gasps spattered around the ring; everyone followed the en-Brand’s stare.
What—?
Linden peered over the eaves in time to see Covenant come shambling into the center of the village. He moved like a derelict. His right arm was hideously swollen. Poison blazed in his eyes. His ring spat erratic bursts of white fire.
No! she cried silently. Covenant!
He was so weak that any of the Stonedownors could have toppled him with one hand. But the rage of his fever commanded their restraint; the circle parted for him involuntarily, admitting him to the open space.
He lurched to a stop, stood glaring flames around him. “Linden,” he croaked in a parched voice. “Linden.”
Covenant!
Without hesitation, she dropped from the roof. Before they could realize what was happening, she thrust her way between the Stonedownors, hastened to Covenant.
“Linden?” He recognized her with difficulty; confusion and venom wrestled across his visage. “You left me.”
“The Halfhand!” Sivit yelled. “The white ring!”
The air was bright with peril; it sprang from the bonfire, leaped off the walls of the barranca. Scores of people trembled on the verge of violence. But Linden held everything else in abeyance, concentrated on Covenant. “No. We didn’t leave you. We came to find food. And to save her.” She pointed at Hollian.
The stare of his delirium did not shift. “You left me.”
“I say it is the Halfhand!” shouted the Rider. “He has come as the Clave foretold! Take him! Slay him!”
The Stonedownors flinched under Sivit’s demand; but they made no move. Covenant’s intensity held them back.
“No!” Linden averred to him urgently. “Listen to me! That man is a Rider of the Clave. The Clave. He’s going to kill her so that he can use her blood. We’ve got to save her!”
His gaze twisted toward Hollian, then returned to Linden. He blinked at her uncomprehendingly. “You left me.” The pain of finding himself alone had closed his mind to every other appeal.
“Fools!” Sivit raged. Suddenly he flourished his scepter. Blood covered his lean hands. Gouts of red fire spewed from the iron triangle. Swift as vengeance, he moved forward.
“She’s going to be sacrificed!” Linden cried at Covenant’s confusion. “Like Joan! Like Joan!”
“Joan?” In an instant, all his uncertainty became anger and poison. He swung to face the Rider. “Joan!”
Before Sivit could strike, white flame exploded around Covenant, enveloping him in conflagration. He burned with silver fury, coruscated the air. Linden recoiled, flung up her hands to ward her face. Wild magic began to erupt in all directions.
A rampage of force tore Sivit’s scepter from his hands. The iron fired black, red, white, then melted into slag on the ground. Argent lashed the bonfire; flaming brands scattered across the circle. Wild lightning sizzled into the heavens until the sky screamed and the crystal walls rang out celestial peals of power.
The very fabric of the dirt stretched under Linden’s feet, as if it were about to tear. She staggered to her knees.
The Stonedownors fled. Shrieks of fear escaped among the houses. A moment later, only Croft, Hollian, and Sivit remained. Croft and Hollian were too stunned to move. Sivit huddled on the ground like a craven, with his arms over his head.
Abruptly as if Covenant had closed a door in his mind, the wild magic subsided. He emerged from the flame; his ring flickered and went out. His legs started to fold.
Linden surged to her feet, caught him before he fell. Wrapping her arms around him, she held him upright.
Then Sunder appeared, carrying the knapsack. He ran forward, shouting, “Flee! Swiftly lest they regain their wits and pursue us!” Blood still marked a new cut on his left forearm. As he passed her, he snatched at Hollian’s arm. She resisted; she was too numb with shock to understand what was happening. He spun on her, fumed into her face, “Do you covet death?”
His urgency pierced her stupor. She regained her alertness with a moan. “No. I will come. But—but I must have my lianar.” She pointed at the wand in Croft’s hands.
Sunder marched over to the tall Stonedownor. Croft’s grasp tightened reflexively on the wood.
Wincing with pain, Sunder struck Croft a sharp blow in the stomach. As the taller man doubled over, Sunder neatly plucked the lianar from him.
“Come!” Sunder shouted at Linden and Hollian. “Now!”
A strange grim relief came over Linden. Her first assessments of Covenant had been vindicated; at last, he had shown himself capable of significant power. Bracing his left arm over her shoulders, she helped him out of the center of the Stonedown.
Sunder took Hollian’s wrist. He led the way among the houses as fast as Covenant could move.
The vale was dark now; only the crescent moon, and the reflection of dying embers along the walls, lit the ravine. The breeze carried a sickly odor of rot from across the Mithil, and the water looked black and viscid, like an evil chrism. But no one hesitated. Hollian seemed to accept her rescue with mute incomprehension.
She helped Linden ease Covenant into the water, secure him across the raft. Sunder urged them out into the River, and they went downstream clinging to the wood.
ELEVEN: The Corruption of Beauty
There was no pursuit. Covenant’s power had stunned the people of Crystal Stonedown; the Rider had lost both scepter and Courser; and the River was swift. Soon Linden stopped looking behind her, stopped listening for the sounds of chase. She gave her concern to Covenant.
He had no strength left, made no effort to grip the raft, did not even try to hold up his head. She could not hear his respiration over the lapping of the water, and his pulse seemed to have withdrawn to a place beyond her reach. His face looked ghastly in the pale moonlight. All her senses groaned to her that he suffered from a venom of the soul.
His condition galled her. She clung to him, searching among her ignorances and incapacities for some way to succor him. A voice in her insisted that if she could feel his distress so acutely she ought to be able to affect it somehow, that surely the current of perception which linked her to him could run both ways. But she shied away from the implications. She had no power, had nothing with which to oppose his illness except the private blood of her own life. Her fear of so much vulnerability foiled her, left her cursing because she lacked even the limited resources of her medical bag—lacked anything which could have spared her this intimate responsibility for his survival.
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