me.
For a moment, Covenant met Bannor's level eyes, and read there the Bloodguard's competence, his ability and willingness to enforce his commands. The sight sharpened Covenant's anxiety still further. Even the eyes of Soranal and Baradakas when they had first captured him, thinking him a Raver, had not held such a calm and committed promise of coercion, violence. The Woodhelvennin had been harsh because of their habitual gentleness, but Bannor's gaze gave no hint of any Oath of Peace. Daunted, Covenant looked away. When Bannor started toward one of the tower doors, he followed in uncertainty and trepidation.
The door opened as they approached, and closed behind them, though Covenant could not see who or what moved it. It gave into an open-centred, spiral stairwell, up which Bannor climbed steadily until after a hundred feet or more he reached another door. Beyond it, Covenant found himself in a jumbled maze of passageways, stairs, doors that soon confused his sense of direction completely. Bannor led him this way and that at irregular intervals, up and down unmeasured flights of steps, along broad and then narrow corridors, until he feared that he would not be able to make his way out again without a guide. From time to time, he caught glimpses of other people, primarily Bloodguard and warriors, but he did not encounter any of them. At last, however, Bannor stopped in the middle of what appeared to be a blank corridor. With a short gesture, he opened a hidden door. Covenant followed him into a large living chamber with a balcony beyond it.
Bannor waited while Covenant gave the room a brief look, then said, “Call if there is anything you require,” and left, pulling the door shut behind him.
For a moment, Covenant continued to glance around him; he took a mental inventory of the furnishings so that he would know where all the dangerous corners, projections, edges were. The room contained a bed, a bath, a table arrayed with food, chairs-one of which was draped with a variety of apparel-and an arras on one wall. But none of these presented any urgent threat, and shortly his gaze returned to the door.
It had no handle, knob, latch, draw line-no means by which he could open it.
What the hell-?
He shoved at it with his shoulder, tried to grip it by the edges and pull; he could not budge the heavy stone.
“Bannor!” With a wrench, his mounting fear turned to anger. “Bloody damnation! Bannor. Open this door!”
Almost immediately, the stone swung inward. Bannor stood impassively in the doorway. His flat eyes were expressionless.
“I can't open the door,” Covenant snapped. “What is this? Some kind of prison?”
Bannor's shoulders lifted fractionally. “Call it what you choose. You must remain here until the Lords are prepared to send for you.”
“Until the Lords are prepared.” What am I supposed to do in the meantime? Just sit here and
“Eat. Rest. Do whatever you will.”
“I'll tell you what I will. I will not stay here and go crazy waiting for the good pleasure of those Lords of yours. I came here all the way from Kevin's Watch to talk to them. I risked my-” With an effort, he caught himself. He could see that his fuming made no impression on the Bloodguard. He gripped his anger with both hands, and said stiffly, “Why am I a prisoner?”
“Message-bearers may be friends or foes,” Bannor replied. “Perhaps you are a servant of Corruption. The safety of the Lords is in our care. The Bloodguard will not permit you to endanger them. We will be sure of you before we allow you to move freely.”
Hellfire! Covenant swore. Just what I need. The room behind him seemed suddenly full of the dark, vulturine thoughts on which he had striven so hard to turn his back. How could he defend against them if he did not keep moving? But he could not bear to stand where he was with all his fears exposed to Bannor's dispassionate scrutiny. He forced himself to turn around. “Tell them I don't like to wait.” Trembling, he moved to the table and picked up a stoneware flask of springwine.
When he heard the door close, he took a long draught like a gesture of defiance. Then, with his teeth clenched on the fine beery flavour of the springwine, he looked around the room again, glared about him as if he were daring dark spectres to come out of hiding and attack.
This time, the arras caught his attention. It was a thick, varicolored weaving, dominated by stark reds and sky blues, and after a moment's incomprehension he realized that it depicted the legend of Berek Halfhand.
Prominent in the centre stood the figure of Berek in a stylized stance which combined striving and beatitude. And around this foreground were worked scenes encapsulating the Lord-Fatherer's history-his pure loyalty to his Queen, the King's greedy pursuit of power, the Queen's repudiation of her husband, Berek's exertions in the war, the cleaving of his hand, his despair on Mount Thunder, the victory of the Fire-Lions. The effect of the whole was one of salvation, of redemption purchased on the very brink of ruin by rectitude-as if the Earth itself had intervened, could be trusted to intervene, to right the moral imbalance of the war.
Oh, bloody hell! Covenant groaned. Do I have to put up with this?
Clutching the stoneware flask as if it were the only solid thing in the room, he went toward the balcony.
He stopped in the entryway, braced himself against the stone. Beyond the railing of the balcony was a fall of three or four hundred feet to the foothills. He did not dare step out to the railing; already a premonition of giddiness gnawed like nausea in his guts. But he made himself look outward long enough to identify his surroundings.
The balcony was in the eastern face of the tower, overlooking a broad reach of plains. The late afternoon sun cast the shadow of the promontory eastward like an aegis, and in the subdued light beyond the shadow the plains appeared various and colourful. Bluish grasslands and ploughed brown fields and new-green crops intervaled each other into the distance, and between them sun-silvered threads of streams ran east and south; the clustered spots of villages spread a frail web of habitation over the fields; purple heather and grey bracken lay in broadening swaths toward the north. To his right, Covenant could see far away the White River winding in the direction of Trothgard.
The sight reminded him of how he had come to this place-of Foamfollower, Atiaran, Wraiths, Baradakas, a murdered Waynhim-A vertigo of memories gyred up out of the foothills at him. Atiaran had blamed him for the slaughter of the Wraiths. And yet she had forsworn her own just desire for retribution, her just rage. He had done her so much harm—
He recoiled back into the chamber, stumbled to sit down at the table. His hands shook so badly that he could not drink from the flask. He set it down, clenched both fists, and pressed his knuckles against the hard ring hidden over his heart.
I will not think about it.
A scowl like a contortion of the skull gripped his forehead.
I am not Berek.
He locked himself there until the sound of dangerous wings began to recede, and the giddy pain in his stomach eased. Then he unclawed his stiff fingers. Ignoring their impossible sensitivity, he started to eat.
On the table he found a variety of cold meats, cheeses, and fruits, with plenty of brown bread. He ate, deliberately, woodenly, like a puppet acting out the commands of his will, until he was no longer hungry. Then he stripped off his clothes and bathed, scrubbing himself thoroughly and scrutinizing his body to be sure he had no hidden wounds. He sorted through the clothing provided for him, finally donned a pale blue robe which he could tie closed securely to conceal his ring. Using Atiaran's knife, he shaved meticulously. Then, with the same wooden deliberateness, he washed his own clothes in the bath and hung them on chair backs to dry. All the time, his thoughts ran to the rhythm of,
I will notI am not—
While he worked, evening drifted westward over Revelstone, and when he was done he set a chair in the entrance to the balcony so that he could sit and watch the twilight without confronting the height of his perch. But darkness appeared to spread outward from the unlit room behind him into the wide world, as if his chamber were the source of night. Before long, the empty space at his back seemed to throng with carrion eaters.
He felt in the depths of his heart that he was becoming frantic to escape this dream.
The knock at his door jolted him, but he yanked his way through the darkness to answer it. “Come come in.” In momentary confusion, he groped for a handle which was not there. Then the door opened to a brightness that dazzled him.
