Thomas Covenant 01: Lord Foul's Bane

by Stephen R. Donaldson

  Prothall said firmly, “Step there again, ur-Lord.”

  Grimacing, Covenant strode forward and stamped his foot on the spot. As his heel hit the ground, he winced in expectation, tried to brace himself for the sensation that at this one point the earth had become insecure, foundationless. But nothing stung him. As in Andelain, the ill had vanished, leaving him with the impression that a veneer of trustworthiness had been replaced over a pit.

  In answer to the silent question of the Lords, he shook his head.

  After a pause, Mhoram said evenly, “You have felt this before.”

  With an effort, Covenant forced himself to say, “Yes. Several times—in Andelain. Before that attack on the Celebration.”

  “The hand of the Gray Slayer touched you,” Birinair spat. But he could not sustain his accusation. His bones seemed to remember their age, and ire sagged tiredly, leaned on his staff. In an odd tone of self-reproach, as if he were apologizing, he mumbled, “Of course. Younger. If I were younger.” He tamed from the company and shuffled away to his bed beyond the circle.

  “Why did you not tell us?” Mhoram asked severely.

  The question made Covenant feel suddenly ashamed, as if his ring were visible through the fabric of his pants. His shoulders hunched, drove his hands deeper into his pockets. “I didn’t—at first I didn’t want you to know what—how important Foul and Drool think I am. After that”—he referred to his crisis in the Close with his eyes—“I was thinking about other things.”

  Mhoram accepted this with a nod, and after a moment Covenant went on: “I don’t know what it is. But I only get it through my boots. I can’t touch it—with my hands or my feet.”

  Mhoram and Prothall shared a glance of surprise. Shortly the High Lord said, “Unbeliever, the cause of these attacks surpasses me. Why do your boots make you sensitive to this wrong? I do not know. But either Lord Mhoram or myself must remain by you at all times, so that we may respond without delay.” Over his shoulder, he said, “First Mark Tuvor. Warhaft Quaan. Have you heard?”

  Quaan came to attention and replied, “Yes, High Lord.” And from behind the circle Tuvor’s voice carried softly, “There will be an attack. We have heard.”

  “Readiness will be needed,” said Mhoram grimly, “and stout hearts to face an onslaught of ur-viles and wolves and Cavewights without faltering.”

  “That is so,” the High Lord said at last. “But such things will come in their own time. Now we must rest. We must gather strength.”

  Slowly the company began the business of bedding down. Humming his Giantish plainsong, Foamfollower stretched out on the ground with his arm around his leather flask of diamondraught. While the Bloodguard set watches, the warriors spread blankets for themselves and the Lords. Covenant went to bed self-consciously, as if he felt the company studying him, and he was glad of the blankets that helped him hide his ring. Then he lay awake long into the night, feeling too cold to sleep; the blankets did not keep out the chill which emanated from his ring.

  But until he finally fell asleep, he could hear Foamfollower’s humming and see Prothall sitting by the embers of the fire. The Giant and the High Lord kept watch together, two old friends of the Land sharing some vigil against their impending doom.

  The next day dawned gray and cheerless—overcast with clouds like ashes in the sky—and into it Covenant rode bent in his saddle as if he had a weight around his neck. His ring had lost its red stain with the setting of the moon; but the color remained in his mind, and the ring seemed to drag him down like a meaningless crime. Helplessly he perceived that an allegiance he had not chosen, could not have chosen, was being forced upon him. The evidence seemed irrefutable. Like the moon, he was falling prey to Lord Foul’s machinations. His volition was not required; the strings which dangled him were strong enough to overbear any resistance.

  He did not understand how it could happen to him. Was his death wish, his leper’s weariness or despair, so strong? What had become of his obdurate instinct for survival? Where was his anger, his violence? Had he been victimized for so long that now he could only respond as a victim, even to himself?

  He had no answers. He was sure of nothing but the fear which came over him when the company halted at noon. He found that he did not want to get down from Dura’s back.

  He distrusted the ground, dreaded contact with it. He had lost a fundamental confidence: his faith that the earth was stable—a faith so obvious and constant and necessary that it had been unconscious until now—had been shaken. Blind silent soil had become a dark hand malevolently seeking out him and him alone.

  Nevertheless, he swung down from the saddle, forced himself—set foot on the ground and was stung. The virulence of the sensation made all his nerves cringe, and he could hardly stand as he watched Prothall and Mhoram and Birinair try to capture what he had felt. But they failed completely; the misery of that ill touch withdrew the instant he jumped away from it.

  That evening during supper he was stung again. When he went to bed to hide his ring from the moon, he shivered as if he were feverish. On the morning of the sixth day, he arose with a gray face and a crippled look in his eyes. Before he could mount Dura he was stung again.

  And again during one of the company’s rest halts.

  And again the instant he mustered enough despair to dismount at the end of the day’s ride. The wrong felt like another spike in his coffin lid. This time, his nerves reacted so violently that he tumbled to the ground like a demonstration of futility. He had to lie still for a long time before he could coax his arms and legs under control again, and when he finally regained feet, he jerked and winced with fear at every step.

  Pathetic, pathetic, he panted to himself. But he could not find the rage to master it.

  With keen concern in his eyes, Foamfollower asked him why he did not take off his boots. Covenant had to think for a moment before he could remember why. Then he murmured, “They’re part of me—they’re part of the way I have to live. I don’t have—very many parts left. And besides,” he added wanly, “if I don’t keep having these fits, how is Prothall going to figure them out?”

  “Do not do such a thing for us,” Mhoram replied intently. “How could we ask it?”

  But Covenant only shrugged and went to sit by the fire. He could not face food that night—the thought of eating made his raw nerves nauseous—but he tried a few aliantha from a bush near the camp, and found that they had a calming effect. He ate a handful of the berries, absentmindedly tossing away the seeds as Lena had taught him, and returned to the fire.

  When the company had finished its meal, Mhoram seated himself beside Covenant. Without looking at him, the Lord asked, “How can we help you? Should we build a litter so that you will not have to touch the earth? Or are there other ways? Perhaps one of Foamfollower’s tales would ease your heart. I have heard Giants boast that the Despiser himself would become an Earthfriend if he could be made to listen to the story of Bahgoon the Unbearable and Thelma Twofist—such healing there is in stories.” Abruptly Mhoram turned squarely toward Covenant, and Covenant saw that the Lord’s face was full of sympathy. “I see your pain, ur-Lord.”

  Covenant hung his head to avoid Mhoram’s gaze, made sure his left hand was securely in his pocket. After a moment, he said distantly, “Tell me about the Creator.”

  “Ah,” Mhoram sighed, “we do not know that a Creator lives. Our only lore of such a being comes from the most shadowy reaches of our oldest legends. We know the Despiser. But the Creator we do not know.”

  Then Covenant was vaguely startled to hear Lord Tamarantha cut in, “Of course we know. Ah, the folly of the young. Mhoram my son, you are not yet a prophet. You must learn that kind of courage.” Slowly she pulled her ancient limbs together and got to her feet, leaning on her staff for support. Her thin white hair hung in wisps about her face as she moved into the circle around the fire, muttering frailly, “Oracles and prophecy are incompatible. According to Kevin’s Lore, only Heartthew the Lord-Fatherer
was both seer and prophet. Lesser souls lose the paradox. Why, I do not know. But when Kevin Landwaster decided in his heart to invoke the Ritual of Desecration, he saved the Bloodguard and the Ranyhyn and the Giants because he was an oracle. And because he was no prophet he failed to see that Lord Foul would survive. A lesser man than Berek. Of course the Creator lives.”

  She looked over at Variol for confirmation, and he nodded, but Covenant could not tell whether he was approving or drowsing. But Tamarantha nodded in return as if Variol had supported her. Lifting her head to the night sky and the stars, she spoke in a voice fragile with age.

  “Of course the Creator lives,” she repeated. “How else? Opposites require each other. Otherwise the difference is lost, and only chaos remains. No, there can be no Despite without Creation. Better to ask how the Creator could have forgotten that when he made the Earth. For if he did not forget, then Creation and Despite existed together in his one being, and he did not know it.

  “This the elder legends tell us: into the infinity before Time was made came the Creator like a worker into his workshop. And since it is the nature of creating to desire perfection, the Creator devoted all himself to the task. First he built the arch of Time, so that his creation would have a place in which to be—and for the keystone of that arch he forged the wild magic, so that Time would be able to resist chaos and endure. Then within the arch he formed the Earth. For ages he labored, formed and unformed, trialed and tested and rejected and trialed and tested again, so that when he was done his creation would have no cause to reproach him. And when the Earth was fair to his eye, he gave birth to the inhabitants of the Earth, beings to act out in their lives his reach for perfection—and he did not neglect to give them the means to strive for perfection themselves. When he was done, he was proud as only those who create can be.

  “Alas, he did not understand Despite, or had forgotten it. He undertook his task thinking that perfect labor was all that he required to create perfection. But when he was done, and his pride had tasted its first satisfaction, he looked closely at the Earth, thinking to gratify himself with the sight—and he was dismayed. For, behold! Buried deep in the Earth through no will or forming of his were banes of destruction, powers virile enough to rip his masterwork into dust.

  “Then he understood or remembered. Perhaps he found Despite itself beside him, misguiding his hand. Or perhaps he saw the harm in himself. It does not matter. He became outraged with grief and torn pride. In his fury he wrestled with Despite, either within him or without, and in his fury he cast the Despiser down, out of the infinity of the cosmos onto the Earth.

  “Alas! thus the Despiser was imprisoned within Time. And thus the Creator’s creation became the Despiser’s world, to torment as he chose. For the very Law of Time, the principle of power which made the arch possible, worked to preserve Lord Foul, as we now call him. That Law requires that no act may be undone. Desecration may not be undone—defilement may not be recanted. It may be survived or healed, but not denied. Therefore Lord Foul has afflicted the Earth, and the Creator cannot stop him—for it was the Creator’s act which placed Despite here.

  “In sorrow and humility, the Creator saw what he had done. So that the plight of the Earth would not be utterly without hope, he sought to help his creation in indirect ways. He guided the Lord-Fatherer to the fashioning of the Staff of Law—a weapon against Despite. But the very Law of the Earth’s creation permits nothing more. If the Creator were to silence Lord Foul, that act would destroy Time—and then the Despiser would be free in infinity again, free to make whatever befoulments he desired.”

  Tamarantha paused. She had told her tale simply, without towering rhetoric or agitation or any sign of passion beyond her agedness. But for a moment, her thin old voice convinced Covenant that the universe was at stake—that his own struggle was only a microcosm of a far larger conflict. During that moment, he waited in suspense for what she would say next.

  Shortly she lowered her head and turned her wrinkled gaze full on him. Almost whispering, she said, “Thus we are come to the greatest test. The wild magic is here. With a word our world could be riven to the core. Do not mistake,” she quavered. “If we cannot win this Unbeliever to our cause, then the Earth will end in rubble.” But Covenant could not tell whether her voice shook because she was old, or because she was afraid.

  Moonrise was near; he went to his bed to avoid exposing the alteration of his ring. With his head under the blankets, he stared into the blackness, saw when the moon came up by the bloody glow which grew in his wedding band. The metal seemed more deeply stained than it had two nights ago. It held his covered gaze like a fixation; and when he finally slept, he was as exhausted as if he had been worn out under an interrogation.

  The next morning, he managed to reach Dura’s back without being attacked—and he groaned in unashamed relief. Then Prothall broke his usual habit and did not call for a halt at noon. The reason became clear when the riders topped a rise and came in sight of the Soulsease River. They rode down out of the harsh plains and swam their horses across the river before stopping to rest. And there again Covenant was not attacked when he set foot on the ground.

  But the rest of the day contrasted grimly with this inexplicable respite. A few leagues beyond the Soulsease, the Quest came upon a Waymeet for the first time. Remembering Covenant’s tale of a murdered Waynhim, Prothall sent two Bloodguard, Korik and Terrel (who warded Lord Mhoram), into the Waymeet. The investigation was only necessary for confirmation. Even Covenant in his straitened condition could see the neglect, smell the disuse; the green travelers’ haven had gone brown and sour. When Korik and Terrel returned, they could only report what the company had already perceived: the Waymeet was untended.

  The Lords met this discovery with stern faces. Clearly they had feared that the murder Covenant had described would lead the Waynhim to end their service. But several of the warriors groaned in shock and dismay, and Foamfollower ground his teeth. Covenant glanced around at the Giant, and for a moment saw Foamfollower’s face suffused with fury. The expression passed quickly, but it left Covenant feeling shaken. Unexpectedly he sensed that the unmarred loyalty of the Giants to the Land was dangerous; it was quick to judge.

  So there was a gloom on the company at the end of the seventh day, a gloom which could only be aggravated by the moon, incarnadine and corrupt, as it colored the night like a conviction of disaster. Only Covenant received any relief; once again, his private, stalking ill left him alone. But the next day brought the riders in sight of Andelain. Their path lay along the outskirts of the Hills on the southwest side, and even through the hanging gray weather, the richness of Andelain glistened like the proudest gem of the Earth. It made the company feel light-boned, affected the Quest like a living view of what the Land had been like before the Desecration.

  Covenant needed that quiet consolation as much as anyone, but it was denied him. While eating breakfast, he had been bitten again by the wrong in the earth. The previous day’s respite seemed only to multiply the virulence of the attack; it was compact with malevolence, as if that respite had frustrated it, intensified its spite. The sensation of wrong left him foundering.

  During one of the rest halts, he was struck again.

  And that evening, while he made himself a supper of aliantha, he was struck again. This time the wrong lashed him so viciously that he passed out for some time. When he regained consciousness, he was lying in Foamfollower’s arms like a child. He felt vaguely that he had had convulsions.

  “Take off your boots,” Foamfollower urged intently.

  Numbness filled Covenant’s head like mist, clouded his reactions. But he mustered the lucidity to ask, “Why?”

  “Why? Stone and Sea, my friend! When you ask like that, how can I answer? Ask yourself. What do you gain by enduring such wrong?”

  “Myself,” he murmured faintly. He wanted simply to recline in the Giant’s arms and sleep, but he fought the desire, pushed himself away from Foamfollower until
the Giant set him on his feet by Birinair’s lillianrill fire. For a moment, he had to cling decrepitly to Foamfollower’s arm to support himself, but then one of the warriors gave him his staff, and he braced himself on it. “By resisting.”

  But he knew in his bones that he was not resisting. They felt weak, as if they were melting under the strain. His boots had become a hollow symbol for an intransigence he no longer felt.

  Foamfollower started to object, but Mhoram stopped him. “It is his choice,” the Lord said softly.

  After a while, Covenant fell into feverish sleep. He did not know that he was carried tenderly to bed, did not know that Mhoram watched over him during the night, and saw the bloody stain on his wedding band.

  He reached some sort of crisis while he slept, and awoke with the feeling that he had lost, that his ability to endure had reached the final either-or of a toss which had gone against him. His throat was parched like a battleground. When he forced his eyes open, he found himself again prostrated in Foamfollower’s arms. Around him, the company was ready to mount for the day’s ride.

  When he saw Covenant’s eyes open, Foamfollower bent over him and said quietly, “I would rather bear you in my arms than see you suffer. Our journey to Lord’s Keep was easier for me than watching you now.”

  Part of Covenant rallied to look at the Giant. Foamfollower’s face showed strain, but it was not the strain of exhaustion. Rather, it seemed like a pressure building up in his mind—a pressure that made the fortress of his forehead appear to bulge. Covenant stared at it dumbly for a long moment before he realized that it was sympathy. The sight of his own pain made Foamfollower’s pulse throb in his temples.

  Giants? Covenant breathed to himself. Are they all like this? Watching that concentration of emotion, he murmured, “What’s a ‘Foamfollower’?”