One Tree (70 page)

His voice sounded distant and small to him, insanely detached. He was as mad as the
Haruchai
. Impossible to talk about such things as if they were not appalling. Why did he not sound appalled?
The approach to the One Tree lies before you
. So the Tree was here after all, in this place of piled death. Not one bird trammeled the immense sky with its paltry life; not one weed or patch of lichen marked the rocks. It was insane to stand here and talk as if such things could be borne.

He was saying, “You’re not Brinn.” Lunatic with distance and detachment. “Are you?” His throat would not accept that other name.

Brinn’s expression did not waver. Perhaps there was a smile in his eyes; it was difficult to see in the early light. “I am who I am,” he said evenly. “
Ak-Haru Kenaustin Ardenol
. The Guardian of the One Tree. Brinn of the
Haruchai
. And many other names. Thus am I renewed from age to age, until the end.”

Vain did not move; but Findail bowed as if Brinn had become a figure whom even the
Elohim
were required to respect.

“No,” Covenant said. He could not help himself. Brinn. “No.” The First, Pitchwife, and Honninscrave were staring at the
Haruchai
with dumbfounded eyes. Seadreamer went on nodding like a puppet with a broken neck. Somehow, Brinn’s victory had sealed Seadreamer’s plight. By opening the way to the One Tree?
Brinn
.

Brinn’s gaze was knowing and absolute. “Be not dismayed, ur-Lord.” His tone reconciled passion and self-control. “Though I may no longer sojourn in your service, I am not dead to life and use. Good will come of it, when there is need.”

“Don’t tell me that!” The protest broke from Covenant involuntarily. I’m going to die. Or break my heart. “Do you think I can stand to lose you?”

“You will endure it,” that composed voice replied. “Are you not Thomas Covenant, ur-Lord and Unbeliever? That is the grace which has been given to you, to bear what must be borne.” Then Brinn’s visage altered slightly, as if even he were not immune to loss. “Cail will accept my place at your side until the word of the Bloodguard Bannor has been carried to its end. Then he will follow his heart.” Call’s face caught the light ambiguously. “Ur-Lord, do not delay,” Brinn concluded, gesturing toward the sun-limned crest. “The way of hope and doom lies open to you.”

Covenant swore to himself. He did not seem to have the strength to curse aloud. The cold numb mist of the night clung to his bones, defying the sun’s warmth. He wanted to storm and rave, expostulate like a madman. It would be condign. He had done such things before—especially to Bannor. But he could not. Brinn’s mien held the completeness toward which Bannor had only aspired. Abruptly Covenant sat down, thudded his back against a boulder and fought to keep his grief apart from the quick tinder of his venom.

A shape squatted in front of him. For an instant, he feared that it was Linden and nearly lost his grip. He would not have been able to sustain an offer of comfort from her. He was going to lose her no matter what he did, if he sent her back or if he failed, either way. But she still stood with her back to the sun and her face covered as if she did not want the morning to see her weep. With an effort, he forced himself to meet Pitchwife’s anxious gaze.

The deformed Giant was holding a leather flask of
diamondraught
. Mutely he offered it to Covenant.

For a moment like an instance of insanity, Covenant saw Foamfollower there, as vivid as Pitchwife. Foamfollower was commenting wryly,
Some old seers say that privation refines the soul—but I say that it is soon enough to refine the soul when the body has no other choice
. At that, the knot in Covenant loosened a bit. With a raw sigh, he accepted the flask and drank a few swallows of the analystic liquor.

The way of hope and doom
, he thought mordantly. Hellfire.

But the
diamondraught
was a blessing to his abraded nerves, his taut and weary muscles. The ascent of the Isle promised vertigo; but he had faced vertigo before.
To bear what must be borne
. Ah, God.

Handing the flask back to Pitchwife, he rose to his feet. Then he approached Linden.

When he touched her shoulders, she flinched as if she feared him—feared the purpose which she could surely perceive in him as clearly as if it were written on his forehead. But she did not pull away. After a moment, he began, “I’ve got—” He wanted to say, I’ve got to do it. Don’t you understand? But he knew she did not understand. And he had no one to blame but himself. He had never found the courage to explain to her why he had to send her back, why his life depended on her return to their former world. Instead he said, “I’ve got to go up there.”

At once, she turned as if she meant to attack him with protests, imprecations, pleas. But her eyes were distracted and elsewhere, like Elena’s. Words came out of her as if she were forcing herself to have pity on him.

“It’s not as bad as it looks. It isn’t really dead.” Her hands indicated the Isle with a jerk. “Not like all that ruin around Stonemight Woodhelven. It’s powerful—too powerful for anything mortal to live here. But not dead. It’s more like sleep. Not exactly. Something this”—she groped momentarily—“this eternal doesn’t sleep. Resting, maybe. Resting deeply. Whatever it is, it isn’t likely to notice us.”

Covenant’s throat closed. She was trying to comfort him after all—offering him her percipience because she had nothing else to give. Or maybe she still wanted to go back, wanted her old life more than him.

He had to swallow a great weight of grief before he could face the company again and say, “Let’s go.”

They looked at him with plain apprehension and hope. Seadreamer’s face was knotted around his stark scar. The First contained herself with sternness; but Pitch wife made no effort to conceal his mixed rue and excitement. Honninscrave’s great muscles bunched and released as if
he were prepared to fight anything which threatened his brother. They were all poised on the culmination of their quest, the satisfaction or denial of the needs which had brought them so far across the seas of the world.

All except Vain. If the Demondim-spawn wore the heels of the Staff of Law for any conceivable reason, he did not betray it. His black visage remained as impenetrable as the minds of the ur-viles that had made him.

Covenant turned from them. It was on his head. Every one of them was here in his name—driven through risk and betrayal to this place by his self-distrust, his sovereign need for any weapon which would not destroy what he loved.
Hope and doom
. Vehemently he forced himself to the ascent.

At once, Pitchwife and the First sprang ahead of him. They were Giants, adept at stone, and better equipped than he to find a bearable path. Brinn came to his side; but Covenant refused the Guardian’s tacit offer of aid, and he stayed a few steps away. Cail supported Linden as she scrambled upward. Then came Honninscrave and Seadreamer, moving shoulder-to-shoulder. Vain and Findail brought up the rear like the shadows of each other’s secrets.

From certain angles, certain positions, the crest looked unattainable. The Isle’s ragged sides offered no paths; and neither Covenant nor Linden was able to scale sheer rock-fronts. Covenant only controlled the dizziness that tugged at his mind by locking his attention to the boulders in front of him. But the First and Pitchwife seemed to understand the way the stones would fit together, know what any given formation implied about the terrain above it. Their climb described a circuit which the company had no serious trouble following around the roughly conical cairn.

Yet Covenant was soon panting as if the air were too pure for him. His life aboard Starfare’s Gem had not hardened him for such exertions. Each new upward step became more difficult than the last. The sun baked the complex light-and-dark of the rocks until every shadow was as distinct as a knife-edge and every exposed surface shimmered. By degrees, his robe began to weigh on him as if in leaving behind his old clothes he had assumed something heavier than he could carry. Only the numbness of his bare feet spared him from limping as Linden did at the small bruises and nicks of the stones. Perhaps he should have been more careful with himself. But he had no more room in his heart for leprosy or self-protection. He followed the First and Pitchwife as he had followed his summoner into the woods behind Haven Farm, toward Joan and fire.

The ascent took half the morning. By tortuous increments, the company rose higher and higher above the immaculate expanse of the sea. From the north, Starfare’s Gem was easily visible, A pennon hung from the aftermast, indicating that all was well. Occasional sun-flashes off the ocean caught Covenant’s eyes brilliantly, like reminders of the white flame which had borne him up through the Sandhold to confront Kasreyn. But he had come here to escape the necessity for that power.

Then the crown of the Isle was in sight. The sun burned in the cloudless sky. Sweat streamed down his face, air rasped hoarsely in his chest, as he trudged up the last slope.

The One Tree was not there. His trembling muscles had hoped that the eyot’s top would hold a patch of soil in which a tree could grow. But it did not.

From the rim of the crest, a black gulf sank into the center of the Isle.

Covenant groaned at it as Linden and Cail came up behind him. A moment later, Honninscrave and Seadreamer arrived. Together, the companions gaped into the lightless depths.

The gulf was nearly a stone’s throw across; and the walls were sheer, almost smooth. They descended like the sides of a well far beyond the range of Covenant’s sight. The air rising from that hole was as black and cold as an exhalation of night. It carried a tang that stung his nostrils. When he looked to Linden for her reaction, he saw her eyes brimming as if the air were so sharp with power that it hurt her.

“Down there?” His voice was a croak. He had to take hold of Brinn’s shoulder to defend himself from the sick giddy yawning of the pit.

“Aye,” muttered Pitchwife warily. “No otherwhere remains. We have encountered this Isle with sufficient intimacy to ascertain that the One Tree does not lie behind us.”

Quietly Brinn confirmed, “That is the way.” He was unruffled by the climb, unwearied by his night of battle. Beside him, even Cail appeared frangible and limited.

Covenant bared his teeth. He had to fight for breath against the dark air of the gulf. “How? Do you expect me to jump?”

“I will guide you.” Brinn pointed to the side of the hole a short distance away. Peering in that direction, Covenant saw a ledge which angled into the pit, spiraling steeply around the walls like a rude stairway. He stared at it, and his guts twisted.

“But I must say again,” Brinn went on, “that I may no longer serve you. I am
ak-Haru Kenaustin Ardenol
, the Guardian of the One Tree. I will not interfere.”

“Terrific,” Covenant snarled. Dismay made him bitter. When he let his anger show, a flicker of fire ran through him like a glimpse of distant lightning. In spite of everything that frightened or grieved or restrained him, his nerves were primed for wild magic. He wanted to demand, Interfere with
what
? But Brinn was too complete to be questioned.

For a moment, Covenant searched the area like a cornered animal. His hands fumbled at the sash of his robe. Fighting the uncertainty of his numb fingers, his half-hand, he jerked the sash tight as if it were a lifeline.

Linden was looking at him now. She could not blink the dampness out of her eyes. Her face was pale with alarm. Her features looked too delicate to suffer the air of that hole much longer.

With a wrench, he tore himself into motion toward the ledge.

She caught at his arm as if he had started to fall. “Covenant—” When his glare jumped to her face, she faltered. But she did not let herself duck his gaze. In a difficult voice, as if she were trying to convey something that defied utterance, she said, “You look like you did on Kevin’s Watch. When you had to go down the stairs. You were the only thing I had, and you wouldn’t let me help you.”

He pulled his arm away. If she tried to make him change his mind now, she would break his heart. “It’s only vertigo,” he said harshly. “I know the answer. I just need a little while to find it again.”

Her expression pierced him like a cry. For one terrible moment, he feared that she was going to shout at him, No! It’s not vertigo. You’re so afraid of sharing anything, of letting anybody else help you—you think you’re so destructive to everything you love—that you’re going to
send me back
! He nearly cringed as he waited for the words to come. Echoes of his passion burned across the background of her orbs. But she
did not rail against him. Her severity made her appear old and care-carved as she said, “You can’t make the Staff without me.”

Even that was more than he could stand. She might as well have said, You can’t save the Land without me. The implications nearly tore away what little courage he had left. Was it true? Was he really so far gone in selfishness that he intended to sell the Land so that he could live?

No. It was not true. He did not want the life he would be forced to live without her. But he had to live anyway, had to, or he would have no chance to fight Lord Foul. One man’s sole human love was not too high a price.

Yet the mere sight of her was enough to tie his face into a grimace of desire and loss. He had to excoriate himself with curses in order to summon the grace to respond, “I know. I’m counting on you.”

Then he turned to the rest of the company. “What’re we waiting for? Let’s get it over with.”

The Giants passed a glance among themselves. Seadreamer’s eyes were as red-rimmed as lacerations; but he nodded to the First’s mute question. Pitchwife did not hesitate. Honninscrave made a gesture that exposed the emptiness of his hands.

The First’s mouth tightened grimly. Drawing her long-sword, she held it before her like the linchpin of her resolve.

Linden stared darkly down into the gulf as if it were the empty void into which she had thrown herself in order to rescue Covenant and the quest from Kasreyn.