One Tree (6 page)

She did not know what to do.

No, that was not true. She knew. In the past, he had been brought back from this death by
aliantha
, by Hollian’s succor, by the roborant of the Waynhim. Perhaps
diamondraught
would also serve. But he was already in the grip of delirium. How could he be induced to drink the liquor?

Brinn tried to approach Covenant. A white blast tore half the rigging from the midmast, compelling Brinn to retreat. Its force heated Linden’s cheeks like shame.

All the
Haruchai
were looking at her. The Giants were looking at her. The First held her silence like a sword. They were waiting for her to tell them what to do.

She knew the answer. But she could not bear it. To possess him? Try to take over his mind, force him to hold back his power, accept
diamondraught
? After what she had seen in Joan?

His blast still wailed in her, Gritting her teeth against that cry, she rasped, “I can’t do it.”

Without conscious decision, she started to leave, to flee.

The First stopped her. “Chosen.” The Swordmain’s tone was hard. “We have no knowledge of this illness. That such harm should come from the bite of one rat is beyond our ken. Yet he must be aided. Were he merely a man, he would require aid. But I have named him Giantfriend. I have placed the Search into his hands. He must be given succor.”

“No.” Linden was full of fear and revulsion. The horror was too intimate: Gibbon had taught her to understand it too well. That she was powerless—that all her life had been a lie! Her eyes bled tears involuntarily. In desperation, she retorted, “He can take care of himself.”

The First’s stare glinted dangerously; and Honninscrave started to expostulate. Linden denied them.

“He can do it. When we first showed up here, he had a knife stuck in his chest, and he healed that. The Clave slit his wrists, and he healed that. He can do it.” As she articulated them, the words turned to falsehood in her mouth. But the alternative was heinous to her beyond bearing.

In shame, she thrust her way past the First toward Foodfendhall. The combined incomprehension and anger of so many brave, valuable people pressed against her back. To
possess
him? His power had come close to burning through her as virulently as Gibbon’s touch. Was this how Lord Foul meant to forge her for desecration? Pressure and protest sent her half running through the hall to the empty foredeck.

Afterimages of Covenant’s blast continued to dismay her senses for a long time. She had been hugging one of the cross-supports of the rail near the prow for half the morning before she realized that the ship was not moving.

Its motionlessness was not due to the damage Covenant had done. The gear of the midmast hung in shambles still. Erratic bursts of wild magic had thwarted every attempt at repair. But even with whole canvas on all three masts, Starfare’s Gem would have lain dead in the water. There was no wind. No movement in the Sea at all. The ocean had become a blank echo of the sky—deep azure and flat, as empty of life as a mirror. The
dromond
might have been fused to the surface of the water. Its sails hung like cerements from the inanimate yards: lines and shrouds which had seemed alive in the wind now dangled like stricken things, shorn of meaning. And the heat— The sun was all that moved across the Sea. Shimmerings rose from the decks as though Starfare’s Gem were losing substance, evaporating off the face of the deep.

Heat made the dull trudge of Linden’s thoughts giddy. She half believed that the Raver had taken away the wind, that this calm was part of Lord Foul’s design. Trap the ship where it lay, impale the quest until Covenant’s venom gnawed through the cords of his life. And then what? Perhaps in his delirium he would sink the
dromond
before he died. Or perhaps he would be able to withhold that blow. Then the ring and the quest would be left to someone else.

To her?

Dear God! she protested vainly. I can’t!

But she could not refute that logic. Why else had Marid feinted toward her before attacking Covenant—why else had Gibbon spared her, spoken to her, touched her—if not to confirm her in her paralyzing fear, the lesson of her own ill? And why else had the old man on Haven Farm told her to
Be true
? Why indeed, if both he and the Despiser had not known that she would eventually inherit Covenant’s ring?

What kind of person had she become?

At painful intervals, blasts of wild magic sent tremors of apprehension through the stone. Repeatedly Covenant cried out, “Never! Never give it to him!” hurling his refusal at the blind sky. He had become a man she could not touch. After all her years of evasion, she had finally received the legacy of her parents. She had no choice but to possess him or to let him die.

When Cail came to speak with her, she did not turn her head, did not let him see her forlornness, until he demanded, “Linden Avery, you must.”

At that, she rounded on him. He was sweating faintly. Even his
Haruchai
flesh was not immune to this heat. But his manner denied any discomfort. He seemed so secure in his rectitude mat she could not hold herself from snapping at him, “No.
You
swore to protect him.
I
didn’t.”

“Chosen.” He used her title with a tinge of asperity. “We have done what lies within our reach. But none can approach him. His fire lashes out at all who draw near. Brinn has been burned—but that is nothing.
Diamondraught
will speed his healing. Consider instead the Giants. Though they can withstand fire, they cannot bear the force of his white ring. When the First sought to near him, she was nigh thrown from the deck. And the Anchormaster, Sevinhand, also assayed the task. When he regained consciousness, he named himself fortunate that he had suffered no more than a broken arm.”

Burned, Linden thought dumbly. Broken. Her hands writhed against each other. She was a doctor; she should already have gone to treat Brinn and Sevinhand. But even at this distance Covenant’s illness assaulted her sanity. She had made no decision. Her legs would not take one step in that direction. She could not help him without violating him. She had no other power. That was what she had become.

When she did not speak, Cail went on, “It is a clean break, which the Storesmaster is able to tend. I do not speak of that. I desire you to understand only that we are surpassed. We cannot approach him. Thus it falls to you. You must succor him.

“We believe that he will not strike at you. You are his nearest companion—a woman of his world. Surely even in his madness he will know you and withhold his fire. We have seen that he holds you in his heart.”

In his heart? Linden almost cried out. But still Cail addressed her as if he had been charged with a speech and meant to deliver it in the name of his duty.

“Yet perhaps in that we are misled. Perhaps he would strike at you also. Yet you must make the attempt. You are possessed of a sight which no
Haruchai
or Giant can share or comprehend. When the Sunbane-sickness came upon you, you perceived that
voure
would restore you. When your ankle was beyond all other aid, you guided its setting.” The demand in his expressionless mien was as plain as a fist. “Chosen, you must gaze upon him. You must find the means to succor him.”

“Must?” she returned huskily. Cail’s flat insistence made her wild. “You don’t know what you’re saying. The only way I can help him is go into him and take over. Like the Sunbane. Or a Raver. It would be
bad enough if I were as innocent as a baby. But what do you think I’ll turn into if I get that much power?”

She might have gone on, might have cried at him, And he’ll hate me for it! He’ll never trust me again! Or himself. But the simple uselessness of shouting at Cail stopped her. Her intensity seemed to have no purpose. His uncompromising visage leeched it away from her. Instead of protesting further, she murmured dimly, “I’m already too much like Gibbon.”

Cail’s gaze did not waver from her face. “Then he will die.”

I know. God help me. She turned from the
Haruchai
, hung her arms over the cross-supports of the rail to keep herself from sagging to her knees.
Possess
him?

After a moment, she felt Cail withdrawing toward the afterdeck. Her hands twisted against each other as if their futility threatened to drive them mad. She had spent so many years training them, teaching them to heal, trusting them. Now they were good for nothing. She could not so much as touch Covenant.

Starfare’s Gem remained becalmed throughout the day. The heat baked down until Linden thought that her bones would melt; but she could not resolve the contradictions in her. Around the ship, the Giants were strangely silent. They seemed to wait with bated breath for Covenant’s eruptions of fire, his ranting shouts. No hint of wind stirred the sails. At times, she wanted to fall overboard—not to immerse herself in the Sea’s coolness, though anything cool would have been bliss to her aching nerves—but simply to break the unrelieved stillness of the water. Through the stone, she could feel Covenant’s delirium worsening.

At noon and again at eventide, Cail brought her food. He performed this task as if no conflict between them could alter his duty; but she did not eat. Though she had not taken one step toward Covenant, she shared his ordeal. The same rack of venom and madness on which he was stretched tortured her as well. That was her punishment for failure—to participate in the anguish she feared to confront.

The old man on Haven Farm had said,
You will not fail, however he may assail you. There is also love in the world
. Not fail? she ached to herself. Good God! As for love, she had already denied it. She did not know how to turn her life around.

So the day ended, and later the waxing moon began to ascend over the lifeless Sea, and still she stood at the railing on the long foredeck, staring sightlessly into the blank distance. Her hands knotted together and unknotted like a nest of snakes. Sweat darkened the hair at her temples, drew faint lines down through the erosions which marked her face; but she paid no heed. The black water lay unmoving and benighted, as empty of life as the air. The moon shone as if it were engrossed in its own thoughts; but its reflection sprawled on the flat surface like a stillborn. High above her, the sails hung limp among their shrouds, untouched by any rumor or foretaste of wind. Again and again, Covenant’s voice rose ranting into the hot night. Occasional white lightning paled the stars. Yet she did not respond, though she knew he could not heal himself. The Despiser’s venom was a moral poison, and he had no health-sense to guide his fire. Even if his power had been hers to wield as she willed, she might not have been able to burn out that ill without tearing up his life by the roots.

Then Pitchwife came toward her. She heard his determination to speak in the rhythm of his stride. But when she turned her head to him,
the sight of her flagrant visage silenced him. After a moment, he retreated with a damp sheen of moonlight or tears in his misshapen eyes.

She thought then that she would be left alone. But soon she felt another Giant looming nearby. Without looking at him, she recognized Seadreamer by his knotted aura. He had come to share his muteness with her. He was the only Giant who suffered anything comparable to her vision, and the pervading sadness of his mood held no recrimination. Yet after a time his silence seemed to pull at her, asking for answers.

“Because I’m afraid.” His muteness enabled her to speak. “It terrifies me.

“I can understand what Covenant’s doing. His love for the Land—” She envied Covenant his passion, his accessible heart. She had nothing like it. “I’d do anything to help him. But I don’t have that kind of power.”

Then she could not stop; she had to try to explain herself. Her voice slipped out into the night without touching the air or the Sea. But her companion’s gentle presence encouraged her.

“It’s all possession. Lord Foul possessed Joan to make Covenant come to the Land.” Joan’s face had worn a contortion of predatory malice which still haunted Linden. She could not forget the woman’s thirst for Covenant’s blood. “A Raver possessed Marid to get that venom into him. A Raver possessed the na-Mhoram of the Clave so that the Clave would serve the Sunbane. And the Sunbane itself! Foul is trying to possess the Law. He wants to make himself the natural order of the Earth. Once you start believing in evil, the greatest evil there is is
possession
. It’s a denial of life—of humanity. Whatever you possess loses everything. Just because you think you’re doing it for reasons like pity or help doesn’t change what it
is
. I’m a doctor, not a Raver.”

She tried to give her insistence the force of affirmation; but it was not true enough for that.

“He needs me to go into him. Take over. Control him so he can drink some
diamondraught
, stop righting the people who want to help him. But that’s evil. Even if I’m trying to save him.” Struggling to put the truth into words, she said, “To do it, I’d have to take his power away from him.”

She was pleading for Seadreamer’s comprehension. “When I was in Revelstone, Gibbon touched me. I learned something about myself then.” The na-Mhoram had told her she was evil. That was the truth. “There’s a part of me that wants to do it. Take over him. Take his power. I don’t have any of my own, and I want it.”
Want
it. All her life, she had striven for power, for effectiveness against death. For the means to transcend her heritage—and to make restitution. If she had possessed Covenant’s power, she would have gladly torn Gibbon soul from body in the name of her own crime. “That’s what paralyzes me. I’ve spent my life trying to deny evil. When it shows up, I can’t escape it.” She did not know how to escape the contradiction between her commitment to life and her yearning for the dark might of death. Her father’s suicide had taught her a hunger she had satisfied once and dreaded to face again. The conflict of her desires had no answer. In its own way, Gibbon-Raver’s touch had been no more horrible than her father’s death; and the black force of her memories made her shiver on the verge of crying.