Then for an instant the air seemed to fall completely still, as if the very winds of the world were horrified by the extremity of Brinn's judgment. The deck appeared to cant under Linden's feet; her head reeled. Speak-?
Is that what you think of me?
Slowly, words penetrated her dismay. The First was speaking in a voice thick with suppressed anguish.
“Chosen, will you not make answer?”
Linden fought to take hold of herself. Covenant said not one word in her defence. He stood there and waited for her, as the Giants and Haruchai waited. Her numb hand slapped softly against the side of her leg, but the effort was futile. She still had no feeling there.
Thickly, she said, “No.”
The First started to expostulate. Pitchwife's face worked as if he wanted to cry out. Linden made them both fall silent.
“They don't have the right.”
Brinn's mouth moved. She cracked at him in denial, “You don't have the right.”
Then every voice around the afterdeck was stilled. The Giants in the rigging watched her, listening through the ragged run of the seas, the wind-twisted plaint of the shrouds. Brian's visage was closed against her. Deliberately, she forced herself to face the raw distress in Covenant's eyes.
“Did you ever ask yourself why Kevin Landwaster chose the Ritual of Desecration?” She was shivering in the marrow of her bones. “He must've been an admirable man-or at least powerful”- she uttered that word as if it nauseated her- “if the Bloodguard were willing to give up death and even sleep to serve him. So what happened to him?”
She saw that Covenant might try to answer. She did not let him. “I'll tell you. The goddamn Bloodguard happened to him. It wasn't bad enough that he was failing-that he couldn't save the Land himself. He had to put up with them as well. Standing there like God Almighty and serving him while he lost everything he loved.” Her voice snarled like sarcasm; but it was not sarcasm. It was her last supplication against the dark place toward which she was being impelled. You never loved me anyway. “Jesus Christ! No wonder he went crazy with despair. How could he keep any shred of his self-respect, with people like them around? He must've thought he didn't have any choice except to destroy everything that wasn't worthy of them.”
She saw shock in Covenant's expression, refusal in Brinn's. Quivering, she went on, “Now you're doing the same thing.” She aimed her fierce pleading straight at Covenant's heart. “You've got all the power in the world, and you're so pure about it. Everything you do is so dedicated.” Dedicated in a way that made all her own commitments look like just so much cowardice and denial. “You drive everyone around you to such extremes.” And I don't have the power to match you. It's not my—
But there she stopped herself. In spite of her misery, she was not willing to blame him for what she had done. He would take that charge seriously-and he did not deserve it. Bitter with pain at the contrast between his deserts and hers, she concluded stiffly, “You don't have the right.”
Covenant did not respond. He was no longer looking at her. His gaze searched the stone at her feet like shame or pleading.
But Brinn did not remain silent. “Linden Avery.” The detachment of his tone was as flat as the face of doom. “Is it truly your claim that the Bloodguard gave cause to Kevin Landwaster's despair?”
She made no reply. She was fixed on Covenant and had no room for anyone else.
Abruptly, something in him snapped. He jerked his fists through the air like a cry; and wild magic left an arc of argent across the silence. Almost at once, the flame vanished. But his fists did not unclose. “Linden.” His voice was choked in his throat-at once harsh and gentle. “What happened to your arm?”
He took her by surprise. The Giants stared at him. Cail's brows tensed into a suggestion of a scowl. But that brief flare of power took hold of the gathering. In an instant, the conflict changed. It was no longer a contest of Haruchai against Linden. Now it lay between Covenant and her, between him and anyone who sought to gainsay him. And she found that she had to answer him. She had lost any defence she might have had against his passion.
Yet her sheer loathing for what she had done made the words acid. “Cail kicked me. To stop me from killing Ceer.”
At that stark statement, his breath hissed through his teeth like a flinch of pain.
Brinn nodded. If he had taken any hurt from Linden's accusation, he did not show it.
For a moment, Covenant grasped after comprehension. Then he muttered, “All right. That's enough.”
The Haruchai did not retreat. “Ur-Lord, there must be retribution.”
“No,” Covenant responded as if he had heard a different reply. “She's a doctor. She saves lives. Do you think she isn't already suffering?”
“I know nothing of that,” retorted Brinn. “I know only that she attempted Ceer's life.”
Without warning, Covenant broke into a shout. “I don't care!” He spat vehemence at Brinn as if it were being physically torn out of him. “She saved me! She saved all of us! Do you think that was easy? I'm not going to turn my back on her, just because she did something I don't understand!”
“Ur-Lord-” Brinn began.
“No!” Covenant's passion carried so many implications of power that it shocked the deck under Linden's feet. “You've gone too far already!” His chest heaved with the effort he made to control himself. "In Andelain-with the Dead-Elena talked about her. She said, 'Care for her, beloved, so that in the end she may heal us all.' Elena“ he insisted. ”The High Lord. She loved me, and it killed her. But never mind that. I won't have her treated this way.“ His voice shredded under the strain of self-containment. ”Maybe you don't trust her.“ His half-fist jabbed possibilities of fire around him. ”Maybe you don't trust me.“ He could not keep himself from yelling, ”But you are by God going to leave her alone!"
Brinn did not reply. His fiat eyes blinked as if he were questioning Covenant's sanity.
Instantly, light on the verge of flame licked from every line of the Unbeliever's frame. The marks on his forearm gleamed like fangs. His shout was a concussion of force which staggered the atmosphere.
“Do you hear me?”
Brinn and Cail retreated a step as if Covenant's might awed them. Then, together, they bowed to him as scores of the Haruchai had bowed when he had returned from Glimmermere with Loric's krill and their freedom in his hands. “Ur-Lord,” Brinn said in recognition. “We hear you.”
Panting through his teeth, Covenant wrestled down the fire.
The next moment, Findail appeared at his side. The Appointed's mien was lined with anxiety and exasperation; and he spoke as if he had been trying to get Covenant's attention for some time.
“Ring-wielder, they hear you. All who inhabit the Earth hear you. You alone have no ears. Have I not said and said that you must not raise this wild magic? You are a peril to all you deem dear.”
Covenant swung on the Elohim, With the index finger of his half-hand, he stabbed at Findail as if to mark the spot where he meant to strike.
“If you're not going to answer questions,” he snarled, “don't talk to me at all. If you people had any goddamn scruples, none of this would've happened.”
For a moment, Findail met Covenant's ire with his yellow gaze. Then, softly, he asked, “Did we not preserve your soul?”
He did not wait for a reply. Turning with the dignity of old pain, he went back to his chosen station in the prow.