Lord Foul's Bane

Covenant looked away.

He found Mhoram waging a weird contest with thirty or forty ur-viles. All the ur-viles in the attack they were few in proportion to the Cavewights-had formed a fighting wedge behind their tallest member, their loremaster-a wedge which allowed them to focus their whole power in the leader. The loremaster wielded a scimitar with a flaming blade, and against it Mhoram opposed his fiery staff. The clashing of power showered hot sparks that dazzled and singed the air.

Then a swirl of battle swept toward Covenant's trench. Figures leaped over him; Bannor fought like a dervish to ward off spears. A moment later, a warrior came to his aid. She was the Woodhelvennin who had assigned herself to Covenant. She and Bannor struggled to keep him alive.

He clutched his hands to his chest as if to protect his ring. His fingers unconsciously took hold of the metal.

Through the dark flash of legs, he caught a glimpse of Prothall, saw that the High Lord was under attack. Using his blazing staff like a lance, he strove with the griffin. The beast's wings almost buffeted him from his feet, but he kept his position and jabbed his blue fire upward. But astride the griffin sat another ur-vile loremaster. The creature used a black stave to block the High Lord's thrusts.

As Covenant watched, the desperation of the conflict mounted. Figures fell and rose and fell again. Blood spattered down on him. Across the glade, Foamfollower heaved to his feet from under a horde of Cavewights, and was instantly, deluged. Prothall fell to one knee under the combined force of his assailants. The ur-vile wedge drove Mhoram steadily backward; the two Bloodguard with him were hard pressed to protect his back.

Covenant's throat felt choked with sand.

Already, two warriors had fallen among the Cavewights around Variol and Tamarantha. At one instant, a Bloodguard found himself, and Tamarantha behind him, attacked simultaneously by three Cavewights with spears. The Bloodguard broke the first spear with a chop of his hand, and leaped high over the second to kick its wielder in the face. But even his great speed was not swift enough. The third Cavewight caught him by the arm. Grappling at once, the first latched his long fingers onto the Bloodguard's ankle. The two stretched their captive between them, and their companion jabbed his spear at the Bloodguard's belly.

Covenant watched, transfixed with helplessness, as the Bloodguard strained against the Cavewights, pulled them close enough together to wrench himself out of the path of the spear. Its tip scored his back. The next instant, he groined both his captors. They dropped him, staggered back. He hit the ground and rolled. But the middle Cavewight caught him with a kick so hard that it flung him away from Tamarantha.

Yelling his triumph, the Cavewight lunged forward with his spear raised high in both hands to impale the recumbent Lord.

Tamarantha!

Her peril overwhelmed Covenant's fear. Without thinking, he vaulted from the safety of his trench and started toward her. She was so old and frail that he could not restrain himself.

The Woodhelvennin yelled, “Down!” His sudden appearance aboveground distracted her, gave her opponents a target. As a result, she missed a parry, and a sword thrust opened her side. But Covenant did not see her. He was already running toward Tamarantha-and already too late.

The Cavewight drove his spear downward.

At the last instant, the Bloodguard saved Tamarantha by diving across her and catching the spear in his own back.

Covenant hurled himself at the Cavewight and tried to stab it with his stone knife. The blade twisted in his halfhand; he only managed to scratch the creature's shoulder blade.

The knife fell from his wrenched fingers.

The Cavewight whirled and struck him to the ground with a slap. The blow stunned him for a moment, but Bannor rescued him by attacking the creature. The Cavewight countered as if elevated, inspired, by his success against the dead Bloodguard. He shrugged off Bannor's blows, caught him in his long strong arms and began to squeeze. Bannor struck at the Cavewight's ears and eyes, but the maddened creature only tightened his grip.

Inchoate rage roared in Covenant's ears. Still half dazed, he stumbled toward Tamarantha's still form and snatched her staff from her side. She made no movement, and he asked no permission. Turning, he wheeled the staff wildly about his head and brought it down with all his strength on the back of the Cavewight's skull.

White and crimson power flashed in a silent explosion. The Cavewight fell instantly dead.

The ignition blinded Covenant for a moment. But he recognized the sick red hue of the flare. As his eyes cleared, he gaped at his hands, at his ring. He could not remember having removed it from the clingor on his chest. But it hung on his wedding finger and throbbed redly under the influence of the cloud-locked moon.

Another Cavewight loomed out of the battle at him. Instinctively, he hacked with the staff at the creature. It collapsed in a bright flash that was entirely crimson.

At the sight, his old fury erupted. His mind went blank with violence. Howling, “Foul!” as if the Despiser were there before him, he charged into the thick of the fray. Flailing about him like madness, he struck down another Cavewight, and another, and another. But he did not watch where he was going. After the third blow he fell into one of the trenches. Then for a long time he lay in the grave like a dead man. When he finally climbed to his feet, he was trembling with revulsion.

Above him, the battle burned feverishly. He could not judge how many of the attackers had been killed or disabled. But some turning point had been reached; the company had changed its tactics.Prothall fled from the griffin to Foamfollower's aid. And when the Giant regained his feet, he turned, dripping blood, to fight the griffin while Prothall joined Mhoram against the ur-viles. Bannor held himself over Covenant; but Quaan marshalled the survivors of his Eoman to make a stand around Variol and Tamarantha.

A moment later, the Ranyhyn gave a ringing call. Having freed the horses, they charged into the battle. And as their hooves and teeth crashed among the Cavewights, Prothall and Mhoram together swung their flaming staffs to block the loremaster's downstroke. Its hot scimitar shattered into fragments of lava, and the backlash of power felled the ur-vile itself. Instantly, the creatures shifted their wedge to present a new leader. But their strongest had fallen, and they began to give way.

On the other side of the battle, Foamfollower caught the griffin by surprise. The beast was harrying the warriors around Variol and Tamarantha. With a roar, Foamfollower sprang into the air and wrapped his arms in a death hug around the body of the griffin. His weight bore it to the ground; they rolled and struggled on the blood-slick grass. The riding ur-vile was thrown off, and Quaan beheaded it before it could raise its stave.

The griffin yowled hideously with rage and pain, tried to twist in Foamfollower's grip to reach him with its claws and fangs. But he squeezed it with all his might, silently braced himself against its thrashings and strove to kill it before it was able to turn and rend him.

For the most part, he succeeded. He exerted a furious jerk of pressure, and heard bones retort loudly in the beast's back. The griffin spat a final scream, and died. For a moment, he rested beside its body, panting hoarsely. Then he lumbered to his feet. His forehead had been clawed open to the bone.

But he did not stop. Dashing blood from his eyes, he ran and threw himself full-length onto the tight wedge of the ur-viles. Their formation crumbled under the impact.

At once, the ur-viles chose to flee. Before Foamfollower could get to his feet, they were gone, vanished into the darkness.

Their defection seemed to drain the Cavewights' mad courage. The gangrel creatures were no longer able to brave the Lords-fire. Panic spread among them from the brandished staffs, flash-firing in the sudden tinder of their hearts.

A cry of failure broke through the attack. The Cavewights began to run.

Howling their dismay, they scattered away from the blazing tree. They ran with grotesque jerkings of their knuckled joints, but their strength and length of limb gave them speed. In moments, the last of them had fled the glade.

Foamfollower charged after them. Yelling Giantish curses, he chased the fleers as if he meant to crush them all underfoot. Swiftly, he disappeared into the darkness, and soon he could no longer be heard. But from time to