Thomas Covenant 03: Power That Preserves

by Stephen R. Donaldson

  When his eyes regained their sight, he beheld Thomas Covenant, Unbeliever and white gold wielder, standing half substantial in the light before him.

  But the apparition came no closer, did not incarnate itself. Covenant remained on the verge of physical presence; he refused to cross over. In a voice that barely existed, he cried, “Not now! Let me go!”

  The sight of the Unbeliever’s suffering shocked Mhoram. Covenant was starving, he desperately needed rest, he had a deep and seriously untended wound on his forehead. His whole body was bruised and battered as if he had been stoned, and one side of his mouth was caked with ugly blood. But as bad as his physical injuries were, they paled beside his psychic distress. Appalled resistance oozed from him like the sweat of pain, and a fierce fire of will held him unincarnate. As he fought the completion of his summoning, he reminded Mhoram forcibly of dukkha, the poor Waynhim upon which Lord Foul had practiced so many torments with the Illearth Stone. He resisted as if the Lords were coercing him into a vat of acid and virulent horror.

  “Covenant!” Mhoram groaned. “Oh, Covenant.” In his fatigue, he feared that he would not be able to hold back his weeping. “You are in hell. Your world is a hell.”

  Covenant flinched. The High Lord’s voice seemed to buffet him physically. But an instant later he demanded again, “Send me back! She needs me!”

  “We need you also,” murmured Mhoram. He felt frail, sinewless, as if he lacked the thews and ligaments to keep himself erect. He understood now why he had been able to summon Covenant without the Staff of Law, and that understanding was like a hole of grief knocked in the side of his being. He seemed to feel himself spilling away.

  “She needs me!” Covenant repeated. The effort of speech made blood trickle from his mouth. “Mhoram, can’t you hear me?”

  That appeal touched something in Mhoram. He was the High Lord; he could not, must not, fall short of the demands placed upon him. He forced himself to meet Covenant’s feverish gaze.

  “I hear you, Unbeliever,” he said. His voice became stronger as he spoke. “I am Mhoram son of Variol, High Lord by the choice of the Council. We need you also. I have summoned you to help us face the Land’s last need. The prophecy which Lord Foul the Despiser gave you to pronounce upon the Land has come to pass. If we fall, he will have the command of life and death in his hand, and the universe will be a hell forever. Ur-Lord Covenant, help us! It is I, Mhoram son of Variol, who beseech you.”

  The words struck Covenant in flurries. He staggered and quailed under the sound of Mhoram’s voice. But his aghast resistance did not falter. When he regained his balance, he shouted again, “She needs me, I tell you! That rattlesnake is going to bite her! If you take me now, I can’t help her.”

  In the back of his mind, Mhoram marveled that Covenant could so grimly deny the summoning without employing the power of his ring. Yet that capacity for refusal accorded with Mhoram’s secret knowledge. Hope and fear struggled in the High Lord, and he had difficulty keeping his voice steady.

  “Covenant—my friend—please hear me. Hear the Land’s need in my voice. We cannot hold you. You have the white gold—you have the power to refuse us. The Law of Death does not bind you. Please hear me. I will not require much time. After I have spoken, if you still choose to depart—I will recant the summoning. I will—I will tell you how to make use of your white gold to deny us.”

  Again Covenant recoiled from the assault of sound. But when he had recovered, he did not repeat his demand. Instead he said harshly, “Talk fast. This is my only chance—the only chance to get out of a delusion is at the beginning. I’ve got to help her.”

  High Lord Mhoram clenched himself, mustered all his love and fear for the Land, put it into his voice. “Ur-Lord, seven years have passed since we stood together on Gallows Howe. In that time we have recovered from some of our losses. But since—since the Staff of Law was lost—the Despiser has been much more free. He has built a new army as vast as the sea, and has marched against us. Already he has destroyed Revelwood. Satansfist Raver has burned Revelwood and slain Lord Callindrill. In a very few days, the siege of Lord’s Keep will begin.

  “But that does not complete the tale of our trouble. Seven years ago, we might have held Revelstone against any foe for seasons together. Even without the Staff of Law, we might have defended ourselves well. But—my friend, hear me—we have lost the Bloodguard.”

  Covenant cowered as if he were being pounded by a rockfall, but Mhoram did not stop. “When Korik of the Bloodguard led his mission to the Giants of Seareach, great evils claimed the lives of the Lords Hyrim and Shetra. Without them—” Mhoram hesitated. He remembered Covenant’s friendship with the Giant, Saltheart Foamfollower. He could not bear to torment Covenant by telling him of the Giants’ bloody fate. “Without them to advise him, Korik and two comrades captured a fragment of the Illearth Stone. He did not recognize his danger. The three Bloodguard bore the fragment with them, thinking to carry it to Lord’s Keep.

  “But the Illearth Stone is a terrible wrong in the Land. The three Bloodguard were not forewarned—and the Stone enslaved them. Under its power, they bore their fragment to Foul’s Creche. They believed that they would fight the Despiser. But he made them his own.” Again Mhoram forbore to tell the whole story. He could not say to Covenant that the Bloodguard Vow had been subtly betrayed by the breaking of the Law of Death—or that the fine metal of the Bloodguard rectitude had been crucially tarnished when Covenant had forced Bannor to reveal the name of the Power of Command. “Then he”—Mhoram still winced whenever he remembered what had happened—“he sent the three to attack Revelstone. Korik, Sill, and Doar marched here with green fire in their eyes and Corruption in their hearts. They killed many farmers and warriors before we comprehended what had been done to them.

  “Then First Mark Bannor and Terrel and Runnik of the Bloodguard went to do battle with the three. They slew Korik and Sill and Doar their comrades, and brought their bodies to the Keep. In that way, we found—” Mhoram swallowed thickly. “We found that Lord Foul had cut off the last two fingers from the right hand of each of the three.”

  Covenant cried out in pain, but Mhoram drove his point home hoarsely. “He damaged each Bloodguard to resemble you.”

  “Stop!” Covenant groaned. “Stop. I can’t stand it.”

  Still the High Lord continued. “When First Mark Bannor saw how Korik and his comrades had been corrupted despite their Vow, he and all the Bloodguard abandoned their service. They returned to the mountain home of the Haruchai. He said that they had been conquered by Corruption, and could no longer serve any Vow.

  “My friend, without them—without the Staff of Law—without any immense army or dour-handed allies—we will surely fall. Only the wild magic can now come between us and Lord Foul’s hunger.”

  As Mhoram finished, Covenant’s eyes looked as bleak as a wilderland. The heat of his fever seemed to make any tears impossible. His resistance sagged briefly, and for an instant he almost allowed his translation into the Close to be completed. But then he raised his head to look at other memories. His refusal stiffened; he moved back until he almost vanished in the bright graveling light. “Mhoram, I can’t,” he said as distantly as if he were choking. “I can’t. The snake—That little girl is all alone. I’m responsible for her. There’s no one to help the child but me.”

  From high in the opposite gallery, Mhoram felt a surge of anger as Quaan’s old indignation at Covenant flared into speech. “By the Seven!” he barked. “He speaks of responsibility.” Quaan had watched himself become old and helpless to save the Land, while Covenant neither aged nor acted, He spoke with a warrior’s sense of death, a warrior’s sense of the value in sacrificing a few lives to save many. “Covenant, you are responsible for us!”

  The Unbeliever suffered under Quaan’s voice as he did under Mhoram’s, but he did not turn to face the Warmark. He met Mhoram’s gaze painfully and answered, “Yes, I know. I know. I am—responsible. But she needs me. There’
s no one else. She’s part of my world, my real world. You’re—not so real now. I can’t give you anything now.” His face twisted frantically, and his resistance mounted until it poured from him like agony. “Mhoram, if I don’t get back to her she is going to die.”

  The desolate passion of Covenant’s appeal wrung Mhoram. Unconsciously he gnawed his lips, trying to control with physical pain the strain of his conflicting compassions. His whole life, all his long commitments, seemed rent within him. His love for the Land urged him to deny the Unbeliever, to struggle now as if he were wrestling for possession of Covenant’s soul. But from the same wellspring of his self arose an opposite urge, a refusal to derogate Covenant’s sovereignty, Covenant’s right to choose his own fate. For a time, the High Lord hesitated, trapped in the contradiction. Then slowly he lifted his head and spoke to the people in the Close as well as to Thomas Covenant.

  “No one may be compelled to fight the Despiser. He is resisted willingly, or not at all. Unbeliever, I release you. You turn from us to save life in your own world. We will not be undone by such motives. And if darkness should fall upon us, still the beauty of the Land endures. If we are a dream—and you the dreamer—then the Land is imperishable, for you will not forget.

  “Be not afraid, ur-Lord Thomas Covenant. Go in Peace.”

  He felt a pressure of protest from Lord Loerya and some of the other spectators, but he overruled them with a commanding gesture. One by one, the Lords withdrew the power of their staffs while Tohrm lowered the graveling fire. Covenant began to fade as if he were dissolving in the abyss beyond the arch of Time.

  Then High Lord Mhoram recollected his promise to reveal the secret of the wild magic. He did not know whether or not Covenant could still hear him, but he whispered after the fading form, “You are the white gold.”

  A moment later, he knew that the Unbeliever was gone. All sense of resistance and power had left the air, and the light of the graveling had declined to a more normal level. For the first time since the summoning began, Mhoram saw the shapes and faces of the people around him. But the sight did not last. Tears blinded him, and he leaned weakly on his staff as if only its stern wood could uphold him.

  He was full of grief over the strange ease with which he had summoned the Unbeliever. Without the Staff of Law, he should not have been able to call Covenant alone; yet he had succeeded. He knew why. Covenant had been so vulnerable to the summons because he was dying.

  Through his sorrow, he heard Trevor say, “High Lord—the krill—the gem of the krill came to life. It burned as it did when the Unbeliever first placed it within the table.”

  Mhoram blinked back his tears. Leaning heavily on his staff, he moved to the table. In its center, Loric’s krill stood like a dead cross—as opaque and fireless as if it had lost all possibility of light. A rage of grief came over Mhoram. With one hand, he grasped the hilt of the silver sword.

  A fleeting blue gleam flickered across its gem, then vanished.

  “It has no life now,” he said dully.

  Then he left the Close and went to the sacred enclosure to sing for Covenant and Callindrill and the Land.

  THREE: The Rescue

  A cold wind blew through Covenant’s soul as he struggled up out of the rock. It chilled him as if the marrow of his bones had been laid bare to an exhalation of cruel ice—cruel and sardonic, tinged with that faint yet bottomless green travail which was the antithesis of green things growing. But slowly it left him, slid away into another dimension. He became more conscious of the stone. Its granite impenetrability thickened around him; he began to feel that he was suffocating.

  He flailed his arms and legs, tried to reach toward the surface. But for a time he could not even be sure that his limbs were moving. Then a series of jolts began to hurt his joints. He sensed through his elbows and knees that he was thrashing against something hard.

  He was pounding his arms and legs at the hillside. Behind the muffled thuds and slaps he made, he could hear running water. The sun shone objectively somewhere beyond him. He jerked up his head.

  At first, he could not orient himself. A stream splashed vividly across his sight; he felt that he was peering at it from above, that the slope down which it ran was canted impossibly under him. But at last he realized that he was not looking downward. He lay horizontally across the slope. The hill rose above him on the right, dropped away on the left.

  He turned his head to search for the girl and the snake.

  His eyes refused to focus. Something pale gleamed in front of his face, prevented him from seeing down the hill.

  A thin, childish voice near him said, “Mister? Are you okay, mister? You fell down.”

  He was trying to see too far away. With an effort, he screwed his gaze closer, and at last found himself staring from a distance of a few inches at a bare shin. In the sunlight, it gleamed as pure and pale as if it had been anointed with chrism. But already it showed a slight swelling. And in the center of the swelling were two small red marks like paired pinpricks.

  “Mister?” the child said again. “Are you okay? The snake bit me. My leg hurts.”

  The frigid winter he had left behind seemed to leap at him from the depths of his mind. He began to shiver. But he forced himself to disregard the cold, bent all his attention toward those two red fang marks. Without taking his eyes off them, he climbed into a sitting position. His bruises groaned at him, and his forehead throbbed sickly, but he ignored all the pain, discounted it as if it had nothing to do with him. His trembling hands drew the little girl toward him.

  Snakebite, he thought numbly. How do you treat snakebite?

  “All right,” he said, then stopped. His voice shook unreassuringly, and his throat felt too dry to be controlled. He did not seem to know any comforting words. He swallowed hoarsely and hugged the child’s thin bones to his chest. “All right. You’re going to be all right. I’m here. I’ll help you.”

  He sounded grotesque to himself—ghoulish and useless. The cut in his lip and gum interfered with his articulation. But he ignored that, too. He could not afford the energy to worry about such things. A haze of fever parched his thoughts, and he needed all his strength to fight it, recollect the treatment for snakebite.

  He stared at the fang marks until he remembered. Stop the circulation, he said to himself as if he were stupid. Cut. Get out the poison.

  Jerking himself into movement, he fumbled for his penknife.

  When he got it out, he dropped it on the ground beside him, and hunted through the debris which littered his brain for something which he could use as a tourniquet. His belt would not do, he had no way to fasten it tightly enough. The child’s dress had no belt. Her shoelaces did not look long enough.

  “My leg hurts,” she said plaintively. “I want my mommy.”

  “Where is she?” muttered Covenant.

  “That way.” She pointed vaguely downstream. “A long way. Daddy spanked me and I snuck away.”

  Covenant clutched the girl with one arm to keep her from moving, and thus hastened the spread of the venom. With his free hand, he tore at the lace of his left boot. But it was badly frayed and snapped in his hand. Hellfire! he groaned in chagrin. He was taking too long. Trembling he started on the right bootlace.

  After a moment, he succeeded in removing it intact.

  “All right,” he said unclearly. “I’ve got—got to do something about that bite. First I have to tie off your leg—so the poison won’t spread. Then I have to cut your leg a little. That way the poison can get out, and it won’t hurt you so much.” He strove to sound calm. “Are you brave today?”

  She replied solemnly, “Daddy spanked me and I didn’t cry. I ran away.” He heard no trace of her earlier terror.

  “Good girl,” he mumbled. He could not delay any longer; the swelling over her skin had increased noticeably, and a faint, blackish hue had started to stain her pale flesh. He wrapped his bootlace around her wounded leg above the knee.

  “Stand on your other leg
, so this one can relax.”

  When she obeyed, he pulled the lace tight until she let out a low gasp of pain. Then he tied it off. “Good girl,” he said again. “You’re very brave today.”

  With uncertain hands, he picked up his penknife and opened it.

  For a time, he quailed at the prospect of cutting her. He was shivering too badly; the sun’s warmth went nowhere near the chill in his bones. But the livid fang marks compelled him. Gently he lifted the child and seated her on his lap. With his left hand, he raised her leg until its swelling was only ten or twelve inches from his face. His penknife he gripped inadequately with the two fingers and thumb of his right hand.

  “If you don’t look, you might not even feel it,” he said, and hoped he was not lying.

  She acted as if the mere presence of an adult banished all her fears. “I’m not afraid,” she replied proudly. “I’m brave today.” But when Covenant turned so that his right shoulder came between her face and the sight of her leg, she caught her hands in his shirt and pressed her face against him.

  In the back of his mind, he could hear Mhoram saying, We have lost the Bloodguard. Lost the Bloodguard. Lost. Oh, Bannor! he moaned silently. Was it that bad?

  He clenched his teeth until his jaws ached, and the wound on his forehead pounded. The pain steadied him. It held him like a spike driven through his brain, affixing him to the task of the fang marks.

  With an abrupt movement, he slashed twice, cut an X across the swelling between the two red marks.

  The child let out a low cry, and went rigid, clinging to him fervidly.

  For an instant he stared in horror at the violent red blood which welled out of the cuts and ran across the pale leg. Then he dropped the knife as if it had burned him. Gripping her leg in both hands, he bent his mouth to the fang marks and sucked.