But the sun was remorseless. Slowly, ineluctably, it beat him toward abjection. By mid-morning, he was hardly carrying a fraction of his own weight. To his burned eyes, the haze sang threnodies of prostration; motes of darkness began to flit across his vision. From time to time, he saw small clumps of night crouching on the pale ground just beyond clarity, as if they were waiting for him.
Then the earth seemed to rise up in front of him. Sunder came to a halt. Linden almost fell; but Covenant clung to her somehow. He fought to focus his eyes. After a moment, he saw that the rise was a shelf of rock jutting westward.
Sunder tugged him and Linden forward. They limped past another clump like a low bush, into the shadow of the rock.
The jut of the shelf formed an eroded lee large enough to shelter several people. In the shadow, the rock and dirt felt cool. Linden helped Sunder place Covenant sitting against the balm of the stone. Covenant tried to lie down; but the Graveller stopped him, and Linden panted, “Don't. You might go to sleep. You've lost too much fluid,”
He nodded vaguely. The coolness was only relative, and he was febrile with thirst. No amount of shade could answer the unpity of the sun. But the shadow itself was bliss to him, and he was content. Linden sat down on one side of him; Sunder, on the other. He closed his eyes, let himself drift.
Some time later, he became conscious of voices. Linden and Sunder were talking. The hebetude of her tone betrayed the difficulty of staying alert. Sunder's responses were distant, as if he found her inquiries painful but could not think of any way to refuse them.
“Sunder,” she asked dimly, “what is Mithil Stonedown going to do without you?”
“Linden Avery?” He seemed not to understand her question.
“Call me Linden. After today-” Her voice trailed away.
He hesitated, then said, “Linden.”
“You're the Graveller. What will they do without a Graveller?”
“Ah.” Now he caught her meaning. “I signify little. The loss of the Sunstone is of more import, yet even that loss can be overcome. The Stonedown is chary of its lore. My prentice is adept in all the rites which must be performed in the absence of the Sunstone. Without doubt, he shed Kalina my mother at the sun's rising. The Stonedown will endure. How otherwise could I have done what I have done?”
After a pause, she asked, “You're not married?”
“No.” His reply was like a wince.
Linden seemed to hear a wide range of implications in that one word. Quietly, she said, “But you were.”
“Yes.”
“What happened?”
Sunder was silent at first. But then he replied, "Among my people, only the Graveller is given the choice of his own mate. The survival of the Stonedown depends upon its children. Mating for children is not left to the hazard of affection or preference. But by long custom, the Graveller is given freedom. As recompense for the burden of his work.
"The choice of my heart fell upon Aimil daughter of Anest. Anest was sister to Kalina my mother. From childhood, Aimil and I were dear to each other. We were gladly wed, and gladly sought to vindicate our choosing with children.
“A son came to us, and was given the name Nelbrin, which is 'heart's child.'” His tone was as astringent as the terrain. "He was a pale child, not greatly well. But he grew as a child should grow and was a treasure to us.
“For a score of turnings of the moon he grew. He was slow in learning to walk, and not steady upon his legs, but he came at last to walk with glee. Until-” He swallowed convulsively. "Until by mischance Aimil my wife injured him in our home. She turned from the hearth bearing a heavy pot, and Nelbrin our son had walked to stand behind her. The pot struck him upon the chest.
“From that day, he sickened toward death. A dark swelling grew in him, and his life faltered.”
“Hemophilia,” Linden breathed almost inaudibly. “Poor kid.”
Sunder did not stop. “When his death was written upon his face for all to see, the Stonedown invoked judgment. I was commanded to sacrifice him for the good of the people.”
A rot gnawed at Covenant's guts. He looked up at the Graveller. The dryness in his throat felt like slow strangulation. He seemed to hear the ground sizzling.
In protest, Linden asked, “Your own son? What did you do?”
Sunder stared out into the Sunbane as if it were the story of his life. “I could not halt his death. The desert sun and the sun of pestilence had left us sorely in need. I shed his life to raise water and food for the Stonedown.”
Oh, Sunder! Covenant groaned.
Tightly, Linden demanded, “How did Aimil feel about that?”
“It maddened her. She fought to prevent me-and when she could not, she became wild in her mind. Despair afflicted her, and she-” For a moment, Sunder could not summon the words he needed. Then he went on harshly, “She committed a mortal harm against herself. So that her death would not be altogether meaningless, I shed her also.”
So that her-Hellfire! Covenant understood now why the thought of killing his mother had driven Sunder to abandon his home. How many loved ones could a man bear to kill?
Grimly, Linden said, “It wasn't your fault. You did what you had to do.” Passion gathered in her tone. “It's this Sunbane.”
The Graveller did not look at her. “All men and women die. It signifies nothing to complain.” He sounded as sun-tormented as the Plains. “What else do you desire to know of me? You need only ask. I have no secrets from you.”
Covenant ached to comfort Sunder; but he knew nothing about comfort. Anger and defiance were the only answers he understood. Because he could not ease the Stonedownor, he tried to distract him. “Tell me about Nassic.” The words were rough in his mouth. “How did he come to have a son?”
Linden glared at Covenant as if she were vexed by his insensitivity; but Sunder relaxed visibly. He seemed relieved by the question-glad to escape the futility of his mourning. “Nassic my father,” he said, with a weariness which served as calm, "was like Jous his father, and like Prassan his father's father. He was a man of Mithil Stonedown.
"Jous his father lived in the place he named his temple, and from time to time Nassic visited Jous, out of respect for his father, and also to ascertain that no harm had befallen him. The Stonedown wed Nassic to Kalina, and they were together as any young man and woman. But then Jous fell toward his death. Nassic went to the temple to bear his father to Mithil Stonedown for sacrifice. He did not return. Dying, Jous placed his hands upon Nassic, and the madness or prophecy of the father passed into the son. Thus Nassic was lost to the Stonedown.
“This loss was sore to Kalina my mother. She was ill content with just one son. Many a time, she went to the temple, to give her love to my father and to plead for his. Always she returned weeping and barren. I fear-” He paused sadly. “I fear she hurled herself at Marid hoping to die.”
Gradually, Covenant's attention drifted. He was too weak to concentrate. Dimly, he noted the shifting angle of the sun. Noon had come, laying sunlight within inches of his feet. By mid-afternoon, the shade would be gone. By mid-afternoon -
He could not survive much more of the sun's direct weight.
The dark clump which he had passed near the shelf was still there. Apparently, it was not a mirage. He blinked at it, trying to make out details. If not a mirage, then what? A bush? What kind of bush could endure this sun, when every other form of life had been burned away?
The question raised echoes in his memory, but he could not hear them clearly. Exhaustion and thirst deafened his mind.
“Die?”
He was hardly aware that he had spoken aloud. His voice felt like sand rubbing against stone. What kind-? He strove to focus his eyes. “That bush.” He nodded weakly toward the patch of darkness. “What is it?”