Linden was examining the old man's hand. She turned it to the firelight, spread the fingers; her grip on his wrist slowed the flow of blood. “It's clean.” Her voice was flat, impersonal. “Needs a bandage to stop the bleeding. But there's no infection.”
No infection, Covenant breathed. His thoughts limped like cripples. “How can you tell?”
She was concentrating on the wound. “What?”
He laboured to say what he meant. “How can you tell there's no infection?”
“I don't know.” His question seemed to trigger surprise in her. “I can see it. I can see”- her astonishment mounted — “the pain. But it's clean. How-? Can't you?”
He shook his head. She confirmed his earlier impression; her senses were already becoming attuned to the Land.
His were not. He was blind to everything not written on the surface. Why? He closed his eyes. Old rue throbbed in him. He had forgotten that numbness could hurt so much.
After a moment, she moved; he could hear her searching around the room. When she returned to the old man's side, she was tearing a piece of cloth to form bandages.
You will not fail- Covenant felt that he had already been given up for lost. The thought was salt to his sore heart.
Smoke? Blood? There's only one way to hurt a man. Give him back something broken. Damnation.
But the old man demanded his attention. The man had bowed his wet grey head to the stone. His hands groped to touch Covenant's boots. “Ur-Lord,” he moaned, “Ur-Lord. At last you have come. The Land is saved.”
That obeisance pulled Covenant out of his inner gyre. He could not afford to be overwhelmed by ignorance or loss. And he could not bear to be treated as if he were some kind of saviour; he could not live with such an image of himself. He climbed erect, then took hold of the old man's arms and drew him to his feet.
The man's eyes rolled fearfully, gleaming in the firelight. To reassure him, Covenant spoke evenly, quietly.
“Tell me your name.”
“I am Nassic son of Jous son of Prassan,” the old man replied in a fumbling voice. “Descended in direct lineage son by son from the Unfettered One.”
Covenant winced. The Unfettered Ones he had known were hermits freed from all normal responsibilities so that they could pursue their private visions. An Unfettered One had once saved his life-and died. Another had read his dreams-and told him that he dreamed the truth. He took a stringent grip on himself. “What was his calling?”
“Ur-Lord, he saw your return. Therefore he came to this place-to the vale below Kevin's Watch, which was given its name in an age so long past that none remember its meaning.”
Briefly, Nassic's tone stabilized, as if he were reciting something he had memorized long ago. “He built the temple as a place of welcome for you, and a place of healing, for it was not forgotten among the people of those years that your own world is one of great hazard and strife, inflicting harm even upon its heroes. In his vision, he beheld the severe doom of the Sunbane, though to him it was nameless as nightmare, and he foresaw that the Unbeliever, ur-Lord Illender, Prover of Life, would return to combat it. From son to son he handed down his vision, faith un-”
Then he faltered. “Ah, shame,” he muttered. “Temple-faith- healing-Land. All ruins.” But indignation stiffened him. “Fools will cry for mercy. They deserve only retribution. For lo! The Unbeliever has come. Let the Clave and all its works wail to be spared. Let the very sun tremble in its course! It will avail them nothing! Woe unto you, wicked and abominable! The-”
“Nassic.” Covenant forced the old man to stop. Linden was watching them keenly. Questions crowded her face; but Covenant ignored them. “Nassic,” he asked of the man's white stare, “what is this Sunbane?”
“Sunbane?” Nassic lost his fear in amazement. “Do you ask-? How can you not-?” His hands tugged at his beard. “Why else have you come?”
Covenant tightened his grip. “Just tell me what it is.”
“It is-why, it is yes, it- ” Nassic stumbled to a halt, then cried in a sudden appeal, “Ur-Lord, what is it not? It is sun and rain and blood and desert and fear and the screaming of trees.” He squirmed with renewed abasement. “It was-it was the fire of my torch. Ur-Lord!” Misery clenched his face like a fist. He tried to drop to his knees again.
“Nassic.” Covenant held him erect, hunted for some way to reassure him. “We're not going to harm you. Can't you see that?” Then another thought occurred to him. Remembering Linden's injury, his own bruises, he said, “Your hand's still bleeding. We've both been hurt. And I-” He almost said, I can't see what she sees. But the words stuck in his throat. “I've been away for a long time. Do you have any hurtloam?”
Hurtloam? Linden's expression asked.
“Hurtloam?” queried Nassic. “What is hurtloam?”
What is-? Distress lurched across Covenant's features. What-? Shouts flared in him like screams, Hurtloam! Earthpower! Life! “Hurtloam,” he rasped savagely. “The mud that heals.” His grasp shook Nassic's frail bones.
“Forgive me, Ur-Lord. Be not angry. I-”
“It was here! In this valley!” Lena had healed him with it.
Nassic found a moment of dignity. “I know nothing of hurtloam. I am an old man, and have never heard the name spoken.”
“Damnation!” Covenant spat. “Next you're going to tell me you've never heard of Earthpower!”
The old man sagged. “Earthpower?” he breathed. “Earthpower?”
Covenant's hands ground his giddy dismay into Nassic's thin arms. But Linden was at his side, trying to loosen his grip. “Covenant! He's telling the truth!”
Covenant jerked his gaze like a whip to her face.
Her lips were tight with strain, but she did not let herself flinch. “He doesn't know what you're talking about.”
She silenced him. He believed her; she could hear the truth in Nassic's voice, just as she could see the lack of infection in his cuts. No hurtloam? He bled inwardly. Forgotten? Lost? Images of desecration poured through him. Have mercy. The Land without hurtloam. Without Earthpower? The weight of Nassic's revelation was too much for him. He sank to the floor like an invalid.
Linden stood over him. She was groping for decision, insight; but he could not help her. After a moment, she said, “Nassic.” Her tone was severe. “Do you have any food?”
“Food?” he replied as if she had reminded him of his inadequacy. “Yes. No. It is unworthy.”
“We need food.”
Her statement brooked no argument. Nassic bowed, went at once to the opposite wall, where he began lifting down crude bowls and pots from the shelves.
Linden came to Covenant, knelt in front of him. “What is it?” she asked tightly. He could not keep the despair out of his face. “What's wrong?”
He did not want to answer. He had spent too many years in the isolation of his leprosy; her desire to understand him only aggravated his pain. He could not bear to be so exposed. Yet he could not refuse the demand of her hard mouth, her soft eyes. Her life was at issue as much as his. He made an effort of will. “Later.” His voice ached through his teeth. “I need time to think about it.”
Her jaws locked; darkness wounded her eyes. He looked away, so that he would not be led to speak before he had regained his self-mastery.
Shortly, Nassic brought bowls of dried meat, fruit, and unleavened bread, which he offered tentatively, as if he knew they deserved to be rejected. Linden accepted hers with a difficult smile; but Nassic did not move until Covenant had mustered the strength to nod his approval. Then the old man took pots and collected rainwater for them to drink.