The Wounded Land

But often that was unnecessary. With damaged antennae, the creatures became disoriented, turned aside, grappled with each other, toppled to the ground. And Stell or Ceer warded him.

The attack did not falter; hundreds of creatures replaced the scores which fell. But the company held. In time, all the ground around the knoll was denuded of grass; and a storm of mute rage covered the bare dirt, seeking to strike upward. But only a certain number of beasts could assail the boulders at any one moment. Against these limited numbers, the company held. Their ordeal dragged out like slow torture. Covenant's arms became leaden; he had to grip the krill in both hands. Sunder kept up a mutter of curses, lashing himself to continue the struggle long after he had exhausted his strength. But Hollian gave him periods of rest by taking his place, using his poniard because her dirk was too small for the task. And Vain's power helped, though he seemed unaware of what he did. The company held.

The afternoon wore on. Covenant became little more than a blank reflex. He grew numb to the passage of time, the progress of the assault. His joints were cramped with fire. Time and again, Brinn saved him from attacks he was too slow to meet.

He hardly noticed when the sun started to set, and the frenzy of the creatures began to abate. At the onset of twilight, the beasts seemed to lose purpose or direction. By ones and twos, then by scores, they scuttled away, wandering hurriedly into the grass. As dusk thickened over the savannah, the goad of the Sunbane faded. Soon all the creatures were fleeing.

Covenant stopped. His heart trembled like prostration in his chest. He was gasping for breath. He dropped the krill among the rocks. The knoll tilted under him. On his hands and knees, he tried to crawl up to Linden. But he could not reach her. His dizziness became suddenly violent. It whirled him out into the blind night.

Sometime after the moon had passed its apex, he was awakened by Linden's knotted retching as she went into convulsions.

He lurched upright and groped through a blur of fatigue, hunger, thirst, to try to see what was happening.

The crown of the boulders was lit by the krill; it had been wedged among the stones so that it shed illumination over the company. Sunder and Hollian crouched beside Linden, watching her anxiously. Ceer and Hergrom restrained her so that she would not hurt herself, as long, mad clenchings shook her muscles.

On the lower boulders, the other Haruchai clustered as if they were fighting each other. With a quick glance, Covenant saw Brinn, Stell, and Harn struggling to quell Cail. Like Linden, the injured Haruchai lay in the grip of frenetic seizures.

Seeing Covenant, Sunder rasped grimly, “The sun of pestilence has infected her wound. From this sickness none recover.”

Oh, God.

A rush of panic started up in him, then shattered as he realized that Linden was gagging, choking on her tongue.

He grabbed for her face and tried to pry her jaws open. But he could not break the locking of her teeth. Her whole body sprang rigid.

“She's swallowed her tongue! Get her mouth open!”

Instantly, Ceer clinched both her wrists in his left hand. With his right, he tried to wedge open her jaws. For one heartbeat, even his strength was not enough. Then he succeeded in forcing her teeth apart. She quivered under a lash of pain. Holding her mouth open with the width of his hand, he reached deftly down her throat, cleared her tongue.

She drew breath as if she wanted to scream; but convulsions blocked the wail in her chest.

With a feral spasm, Cail hurled Brinn from him. Twisting in the air, Brinn landed lightly on the ground, came bounding upward again as Stell and Harn grappled with their kinsman.

Linden's face was ghastly in the sunlight. Her breathing wept in and out of her excruciated lungs.

Cail sounded as if he were asphyxiating. An obscure part of Covenant thought, He's immune to the Sunbane. There must have been poison in the spur.

He concentrated on Linden as if he could keep her alive by sheer force of will. His hand shook as he stroked her forehead, wiped the sweat away; but he could feel nothing.

“Ur-Lord,” Hollian said in a stretched whisper, “I must speak of this. It must be uttered.” He could not read her countenance; her face was averted from the krill Out of the shadow, she breathed, “I have consulted the Iianar. The morrow will bring a desert sun.”

Covenant clung to Linden's torment, willing it to ease. “I don't give a damn.”

“There is more.” Hollian's tone sharpened. She was an eh-Brand, accustomed to respect. “There will be fire, as if the sun were a sun of flame. This will become a place of ill. We must flee.”

“Now?”

“At once. We must return to the west-to the soil where trees grow. The earth of this grassland will be death to us.”

“She's in no condition!” His sudden fury shocked the night, struck the company into a silence punctuated only by the hoarse breathing of the injured. With a wrench of his shoulders, he dismissed Hollian's warning. “I'm not going to move her.”

She started to protest. Sunder interrupted her gruffly. “He is the ur-Lord.”

“He is wrong. The truth must be met. These deaths cannot be prevented. To remain here will be death for us all.”

“He is the ur-Lord.” Sunder's roughness grew gentle. “Every task to which he sets his hand is impossible-yet it is accomplished. Have courage, eh-Brand.”

Linden broke into another series of spasms. Watching the way her illness brutalized her, Covenant feared that every breath would be her last. But then, abruptly, her convulsions ended; she fell limp as if the puppet strings of her plight had been cut. Slowly, her respiration deepened as she sank into the sleep of exhaustion.

Cail's affliction was more advanced. The fits which wracked him went on until moonset. Brinn's people had to fight incessantly to prevent him from battering himself to death on the rocks.

“Dawn is near,” Sunder murmured softly, as if he feared to disturb the stillness, feared that the sound of his voice might trigger Linden or Cail into frenzy again.

“We are too late.” Hollian could not suppress her bitterness. “We must remain here. We cannot gain safety in time.”

Covenant ignored both of them. He sat with Linden in his embrace and sought to believe that she would live.

No one moved. They sat in the krill-light while the east paled toward sunrise. A dusty glow began to silhouette the earth. All the stars were washed away. The sky modulated as brown gathered around the imminence of the dawn. The atmosphere grew palpably drier, foretelling heat.

When the sun rose, it wore a cloak of desiccation. Its touch reminded Covenant that he had not had food or fluid since the previous morning. A giddy dispassion began to revolve in him, distancing him from his fate. Linden's flagrant slumber felt like an accomplished fact in his arms.

As the Sunbane collared the savannah, the pampas grass began to melt. Its fiber turned to a dead grey sludge, and slumped to the ground like spilth. This, Covenant mused in a mood of canted detachment, was what had happened to Morinmoss. To Grimmerdhore and Garroting Deep. A desert sun had risen over them, and tens of thousands of years of sentient forest had simply dissolved into muck. And the glory of the world becomes less than it was. For a moment, he recovered enough passion to ache out, Damn you, Foul! It would be better if you just killed me.

In a voice like Covenant's inanition, but infinitely steadier, Brinn addressed Hollian. “Eh-Brand, you spoke of fire.”

“The Iianar spoke of fire.” Both affronted dignity and nagging self-doubt marked her words. “Never have I seen such a flame in my foretelling. Do not question me. I cannot answer.”

Covenant thought dimly that there was no reason for fire. The quest was without water under a desert sun. Nothing else was necessary.