Then the ice and snow of the heights failed on the verge of a moiling chaos of vegetation which had already grown high enough to appear impenetrable. His head still reeling, Covenant considered himself fortunate that dusk prevented the First from tackling the verdure immediately But the Swordmain was not insensitive to the nausea in his face-or the aggravated ache in Linden's. While Mistweave and Honninscrave prepared a camp, she passed a flask of diamondraught to the two humans, then left them alone to try to recover themselves.
The liquor settled Covenant's guts, but could not soften the wide, white outrage and dread of Linden's stare. At intervals during the evening, Pitchwife and the First addressed comments to her; but her replies were monosyllabic and distant The crouching vegetation spoke a language that only she could hear, consuming her attention. Unconscious of being watched, she chewed her lips as if she had lost her old severity and did not know how to recapture it.
Her huddled posture-thighs pressed against her chest, arms hugged around her shins, chin braced on her knees-reminded him of a time many days ago, a time when they had begun travelling together, and she had nearly broken under the pressure of her first fertile sun. She had quailed into herself, protesting, I can't shut it out. It's too personal. I don't believe in evil.
She believed in evil now; but that only made the sensory assault of the Sunbane more intimate and unanswerable-as heinous as murder and as immedicable as leprosy.
He tried to stay awake with her, offering her the support of his silent companionship. But she was still taut and unslumberous when the mortal pull of his dreams took him away. He went to sleep thinking that if he had possessed anything akin to her percipience the Land would not be in such danger-and she would not be so alone.
Visions he could neither face nor shun seemed to protract the night; yet dawn and Cail's rousing touch came too early. He awoke with a jerk and found himself staring at the dense growth. His companions were already up. While Pitchwife and Mistweave prepared a meal, and Honninscrave dismantled the sleds, the First studied the choked terrain, clenching a tuneless hum between her teeth. A gap among the peaks sent an early shaft of light onto the vegetation directly in front of the camp. The sun would touch the company soon.
Covenant's skin crawled as he watched the verdure writhe and grow. The contrast between the places where the sun hit and where it did not only made the effect more eerie and ominous. In the stony soil among the foothills, there were no trees But the hardy, twisted shrubs were already as tall as trees; thistles and other weeds crowded the ground between the trunks; huge slabs of lichen clung to the rocks like scabs. And everything the sun touched grew so rapidly that it seemed animate-a form of helpless flesh tortured mercilessly toward the sky. He had forgotten how horrific the Sunbane truly was. He dreaded the moment when he would have to descend into that lush green anguish.
Then the sunlight fell through the gap onto the company.
At the last moment, the First, Honninscrave, and Pitchwife had found rocks on which to stand. Under Mistweave's feet lay the stone with which he had formerly shielded his campfires from ice and snow.
Distantly, Linden nodded at the caution of the Giants. “Cail's got something you don't,” she murmured. “You need the protection.” But Vain and Findail required no defence; and Covenant and Linden had their footwear. Together, they faced the onset of the sun.
As it first crested the gap, the sun appeared normal. For that reason, at least this much of the foothills remained free of vegetation. Yet the company stayed motionless, suspended and silent in an anticipation like dread. And before their eyes the sun changed. A green aura closed around it, altering the light. Even the strip of bare ground between the end of the snow and the beginning of the vegetation took on an emerald timbre.
Because of the winter which still held the mountains, the air was not warm. But Covenant found that he was sweating.
Grimly, Linden turned her back on the sun. The Giants went to their tasks. Vain's constant, black, ambiguous smile betrayed no reaction. But Findail's pain marked face looked more aggrieved than ever Covenant thought he saw the Elohim's hands trembling.
Shortly after the company had eaten, Honninscrave finished reducing the sleds to firewood. He and Mistweave packed their supplies into huge bundles for themselves and smaller ones for Pitchwife and the First. Soon Covenant's companions were prepared to commence the day's journey.
“Giantfriend,” the First asked sternly, “is there peril for us here other than that which we have all witnessed?”
Peril, he thought dumbly. If the Riders of the Clave don't come this far north. And nothing else has changed. “Not under this sun,” he replied with sweat in his voice. “But if we stand still too long, we'll have trouble moving again.”
The Swordmain nodded. “That is plain.”
Drawing her blade, she took two long steps down the hillside and began hacking tall thistles out of her way.
Honninscrave followed her. With his bulk and muscle, he widened her path for the rest of the company.
Covenant compelled himself to take his position at Pitchwife's back. Cail followed between the Unbeliever and Linden. Then came Mistweave, with Vain and Findail inseparably behind him.
In that formation, the failed quest for the One Tree met the atrocity of the Sunbane.
For the morning and part of the afternoon, they managed a surprising pace. Monstrous scrub brush and weeds gave way to stands of immense, raw bracken clotted with clumps of grass; and every added degree of the sun's arc made each frond and leaf and stem more desperately upward, as frantic as the damned. Yet the First and Honninscrave forged ahead as fast as Covenant and Linden could comfortably walk. The air became warmer, noticeably more humid, as the snows and elevation of the mountains were left behind. Although Covenant had added his robe to Pitchwife's bundle, he perspired constantly. But his days in the range had toughened him somewhat; he was able to keep the pace.
But toward mid-afternoon the company entered a region like a surreal madland. Juniper trees as contorted as ghouls sprawled thickly against each other, strangled by the prodigious vines which festooned them like the web of a gargantuan and insane spider. And between the vine-stems and tree trunks the ground was profuse with lurid orchids that smelled like poison. The First struck one fierce blow against the nearest vine, then snatched back her green-slick blade to see if she had damaged it: the stem was as hard as ironwood. Around her, the trees and vines rustled like execration. In order to advance at all, the companions had to clamber and squirm awkwardly among the hindrances.
Night caught them in the middle of the region, with no stone in sight and scarcely enough space for them to lay their blankets between the trunks. But when Cail roused the company the next morning, they found that he had somehow contrived to collect sufficient small rocks to protect two of the Giants. And the stone which Mistweave still carried could bold two more. Thus warded, they braced themselves to meet the sun.
When its first touch filtered insidiously down through the choked trees, Covenant flinched; and Linden jerked a hand to her mouth to stifle a gasp.
They could see only pieces of the sun's aura But those pieces were red. The colour of pestilence.