“The Master is gone,” she said through her teeth. “He pursues his purpose inward. I know not what he seeks-but I fear that he will find it.”
Behind her, Pitchwife retched for air as if his exertions had torn the tissues of his cramped lungs. Mistweave shivered toward convulsions as Courser-poison spread into him. Sunder's face was grey with exhaustion; Hollian had to hold him to keep him on his feet. Six of the Haruchai had been burned by the Grim and nearly crippled; one was in Mistweave's plight, gouged by a spur during the battle. Findail had vanished. Linden looked as bitter as acid.
And Honninscrave was gone. Nom was gone. Seeking their individual conceptions of ruin in the heart of Revelstone.
Too many lives. Too much pain. And Covenant was no closer to his goal than the entrance hall of the na-Mhoram's Keep.
That tears it, he thought dumbly. That is absolutely enough. I will not take any more of this.
“Linden,” he said thickly. His voice was hoarse with fire. “Tell Pitchwife how to treat these people.”
For an instant, her eyes widened. He feared that she would demur. She was a physician: seven Haruchai and Mistweave needed her sorely. But then she seemed to understand him. The Land also required healing. And she had wounds of her own which demanded care.
Turning to Pitchwife, she said, “You've got some vitrim left.” In spite of the Banefire, her senses had become explicit, immune to bafflement. “Use it on the bums. Give diamondraught to everybody who's hurt.” Then she gazed squarely back at Covenant. “Mistweave's arm can wait. But voure is the only thing I know of that'll help against the poison.”
He did not hesitate; he had no hesitation left. “Cail,” he said, “you know Revelstone. And you know voure.” The distilled sap which the Clave used to ward off the effects of the sun of pestilence had once saved Call's life. “Tell your people to find some.” There were only four Haruchai uninjured. “And tell them to take Sunder and Hollian with them.” Hollian was experienced with voure. “For God's sake, keep them safe.”
Without waiting for a response, he swung toward the First.
“What you ought to do is secure our retreat.” His tone thickened like blood. He had told all his companions to stay out of Revelstone, and none of them obeyed. But they would obey him now. He would not accept refusal. “But it's too late for that. I want you to go after Honninscrave. Find him somehow. Don't let him do it-whatever it is.”
Then he faced Cail again. “I don't need to be protected. Not anymore. But if there's anybody left in the hold,” any villagers or Haruchai the Clave had not yet shed, “they need help. Break in there somehow. Get them out. Before they're fed to the Banefire.
“Linden and I are going after Gibbon.”
None of his companions protested. He was impossible to refuse. He held the world in his hands, and his skin seemed to be wearing thinner, so that the black power gnawing in him showed more and more clearly. His cut fingers dripped blood; but the wound gave him no pain. When Linden indicated the far end of the forehall, he went in that direction with her, leaving behind him all the needs and problems for which he lacked both strength and time. Leaving behind especially Sunder and Hollian, on whom the future depended; but also the First and Pitchwife, who were dear to him; Mistweave on the verge of convulsions; the proven Haruchai; leaving them behind, not as encumbrances, but as people who were too precious to be risked. Linden also he would have left behind, but he needed her to guide him and to support him. He was hag-ridden by vertigo. The reports of their steps rustled like dry leaves as they moved; and he felt that he was going to the place where all things withered. But he did not look back or turn aside.
When they passed out of the cavern into the mazing, Giant-planned ways of the great Keep, they were suddenly attacked by a small band of Riders. But the proximity of rukh-fire triggered his ring. The Riders were swept away in a wash of midnight.
The dark was complete for a short distance. Ahead, however, the normal lights of the city burned, torches smoking in sconces along the walls. No fires of the Lords had ever smoked: their flames had not harmed the essential wood. The Clave kept its passage lit so that Gibbon could move his forces from place to place; but these halls were empty. They echoed like crypts. Much beauty had died here, been undone by time or malice.
Behind him Covenant heard the sounds of renewed combat; and his shoulders flinched.
“They can take care of themselves,” Linden gritted, holding her fear for her friends between her teeth. “This way.”
Covenant stayed with her as she turned toward a side-passage and started down a long sequence of stairs toward the roots of Revelstone.
Her perception of the Raver made no mistakes. Not uncertainty, but only her ignorance of the Keep, caused her to take occasional corridors or turnings which did not lead toward her goal. At intervals, Riders appeared from nowhere to attack and retreat again as if they raised their fire for no other reason than to mark Covenant's progress through the Keep. They posed no danger in themselves; his defences were instantaneous and thorough. But each onslaught accentuated his dizziness, weakened his control. His ability to suppress the black raving frayed. He had to lean on Linden as if she were one of the Haruchai.
Always the path she chose tended downward; and after a while he felt a sick conviction that he knew where she was going-where Gibbon had decided to hazard his fate. The place where any violence would do the most damage. His forearm throbbed as if it had been freshly bitten Then Linden opened a small, heavy door in a chamber which had once been a meeting hall, with curtains on its walls; and a long twisting stairwell gaped below them. Now he was sure. Night gyred up out of the depths; he thought that he would fall. But he did not. She upheld him. Only his nightmares gathered around him as they made the long descent toward the place where Gibbon meant to break him.
Abruptly, she stopped, wheeled to look upward. A man came down the stairs, as noiseless as wings. In a moment, the Haruchai reached them.
Cail.
He faced Covenant. Haste did not heighten his respiration; disobedience did not abash him. “Ur-Lord,” he said, “I bring word of what transpires above.”
Covenant blinked at the Haruchai; but the nauseous whirl of his vision blurred everything.
“It is fortunate that voure was readily found. The company, is now sorely beleaguered. That battle is one to wring the heart”- he spoke as if he had no heart- “for it is fought in large part by those who should not give battle. Among the few Riders are many others who merely serve the Clave and Revelstone. They are cooks and herders, artisans and scullions, tenders of hearth and Courser. They have no skill for this work, and it is a shameful thing to slay them. Yet they will not be halted or daunted. A possession is upon them. They accept naught but their own slaughter. Felling them, Pitchwife weeps as no Haruchai has ever wept.” Call spoke flatly; but Linden's grasp on Covenant's arm conveyed a visceral tremor of the emotion Cail projected, “Voure and vitrim enable the company for defence,” he went on. “And the hold has been opened. There were found Stell and some few other Haruchai, though no villagers. They have gone to the support of the company. The Graveler and the eh-brand are well. But of neither the First nor the Master have we seen sign.”