As she was brought near Covenant, his presence gave her a false energy. She took hold of the arm Seadreamer extended toward her, moved like braciation from him to Brinn and the railing. Then she huddled beside Covenant and at once began to explore him for injuries or deterioration.
He was nearly as wet as she, and automatic shivers ran through him like an ague in the marrow of his bones. But in other ways he was as well as the Elohim had left him. His eyes stared as if they had lost the capability of focus; his mouth hung open; water bedraggled his beard. When she examined him, he repeated his warning almost inaudibly against the background of the wind. But the words meant nothing to him.
Weakened by relief and pain, she sagged at his side.
The First and Pitchwife were nearby, watching for her verdict on Covenant's state. Linden shook her head; and Pitchwife winced. But the First said nothing. She held herself as if the absence of any bearable foe cramped her muscles. She was a trained warrior; but the Giantship's survival depended on sea-craft, not swords. Linden met the First's gaze and nodded. She knew how the Swordmain felt.
Looking around the dromond, she was appalled to see that Galewrath still stood at Shipsheartthew. Locked between the stone spokes of the wheel and the deck, the Storesmaster held her place with the stolid intransigence of a statue. At first, Linden did not understand why Galewrath stayed in a place of such exposure and strain-or why the Master allowed anyone to remain there. But then her thinking clarified. The dromond still needed its rudder to maintain its precarious balance. In addition, if the wind shifted forward Galewrath might be able to turn Starfare's Gem perpendicular to the blast again; for the Giantship would surely sink if any change sent its prow even slightly into the wind. And if the gale shifted aft, she might have a chance to turn away. With the storm at its back, Starfare's Gem might be able to rise and run.
Linden did not know how even a Giant's thews could stand the strain Galewrath endured. But the blunt woman clung like hard hope to her task and did not let go.
At last, Honninscrave finished setting his lifelines. Swarming from cable to cable, he climbed to join the First and Pitchwife near Linden. As he moved, he shouted encouragements and jests to the hunched shapes of his crew. Pitchwife had described him accurately: he was in his element. His oaken shoulders bore the dromond's plight as if the burden were light to him.
Reaching Linden's proximity, he called, “Be not daunted, Chosen! Starfare's Gem will yet redeem us from this storm!”
She was no match for him. His fortitude only underscored her apprehension. Her voice nearly broke as she returned, “How many have we lost?”
“Lost?” His reply pierced the blind ferocity of the hurricane. “None! Your forewarning prepared us! All are here! Those you see not I have sent to the pumps!” As he spoke, Linden became aware that bursts of water were slashing away from the side of the ship above her, boiling into mist and darkness as the wind tore them from the pumpholes. “Those to port we cannot employ. But those to starboard we have linked across the holds. Sevinhand, who commands below, reports that his crew keeps pace. We endure, Chosen! We will survive!”
She groped for a share of his faith and could not find it. “Maybe we should abandon ship!”
He gaped at her. She heard the folly of her words before he responded, “Do you wish to chance this sea in a longboat?”
Helplessly, she asked, “What're you going to do?”
“Naught!” he returned in a shout like a challenge. "While this gale holds, we are too precarious. But when the change comes, as come it must-Then perhaps you will see that the Giants are sailors-and Starfare's Gem, a ship-to make the heart proud!
“Until that time, hold faith! Stone and Sea, do you not comprehend that we are alive?”
But she was no longer listening to him. The imponderable screech and yowl of the blast seemed to strike straight at Covenant. He was shivering with cold. His need was poignant to her; but she did not know how to touch him. Her hands were useless, so deeply chilled that she could hardly curl them into fists. Slow blood oozed from several abrasions on her palms, formed in viscid drops between her fingers. She paid no attention to it.
Later, large bowls of diamondraught were passed among the companions. The Giantish liquor reduced her weakness somewhat, enabling her to go on clinging for her life. But still she did not raise her head. She could not think why Vain had saved her. The force of the storm felt like an act of malice. Surely if the Demondim-spawn had not saved her the blast would have been appeased.
Her health-sense insisted that the hurricane was a natural one, not a manifestation of deliberate evil. But she was so badly battered by the wind's violence and the cold, so eroded by her fear, that she no longer knew the difference.
They were all going to die, and she had not yet found a way to give Covenant back his mind.
Later still, night effaced the last illumination. The gale did not abate; it appeared to have blown out the stars. Nothing but a few weak lanterns-one near Galewrath, the rest scattered along the upper edge of the afterdeck-reduced the blackness. The wind went on reaping across the sea with a sound as shrill as a scythe. Through the stone came the groaning of the masts as they protested against their moorings, the repetitive thud and pound of the pumps. All the crewmembers took turns below, but their best efforts were barely enough to keep pace with the water. They could not lessen the great salt weight which held Starfare's Gem on its side. More diamondraught was passed around. The day had seemed interminable. Linden did not know how she could face the night and stay sane.
By degrees, her companions sank into themselves as she did. Dismay covered them like the night, soaked into them like the cold. If the wind shifted now, Galewrath would have no forewarning. In the distant light of her lantern, she looked as immobile as stone, no longer capable of the reactions upon which the dromond might depend. Yet Honninscrave sent no one to relieve her: any brief uncertainty while Shipsheartthew changed hands might cause the vessel to founder. And so the Giants who were not at the pumps had no other way to fight for their lives except to cling and shiver. Eventually, even the Master's chaffering could not rouse them to hope or spirit. They crouched against the rail, with the black sea running almost directly below them, and waited like men and women who had been sentenced to death.
But Honninscrave did not leave them alone. When his guyings and jollyings became ineffective, he shouted unexpectedly, “Ho, Pitchwife! The somnolence of these Giants abashes me! In days to come, they will hang their heads to hear such a tale told of them! Grant us a song to lift our hearts, that we may remember who we are!”
From a place near her, Linden heard the First mutter mordantly, “Aye, Pitchwife. Grant them a song. When those who are whole falter, those who are halt must bear them up.”
But Pitchwife did not appear to hear her. “Master!” he replied to Honninscrave with a frantic laugh, “I have been meditating such a song! It may not be kept silent, for it swells in my heart, becoming too great for any breast to contain! Behold!” With a lugubrious stagger, he let himself fall down the deck. When he hit the first lifeline, it thrummed under his weight, but held. Half-reclining against the line, he faced upward. “It will boon me to sing this song for you!”
Shadows cast by the lanterns made his misshapen face into a grimace. But his grin was unmistakable; and as he continued his humour became less forced.