Linden interrupted him. “No.” Despite its flatness, her voice carried a timbre of despair. “I don't even have my bag. She needs a hospital, not wishful thinking. Let him make his own decisions.”
Covenant wheeled toward her. Was this the same woman who had insisted with such passion,
“Third-degree burns”- she articulated each word as if it were a mask for the contradictions of her heart — “are hard enough to treat under the best circumstances. If he wants to commit euthanasia, that's his business. Don't be so goddamn judgmental.”
Without transition, she addressed Sunder. “We need food.”
He regarded her suspiciously. “Linden Avery, there are things that I would give you for your ease, but food is not among them. We do not waste food on any man, woman, or child who is under judgment. Kalina my mother will not be given food unless I am able to show that she can be healed.”
She did not deign to look at him. “We also need water.”
Cursing sourly, Sunder turned on his heel, slapped the curtain out of his way. As he left, he snapped, “You will have water.” Outside, he yelled at someone, “The prisoners require water!” Then he passed beyond earshot.
Covenant watched the swaying of the curtain, and strove to still his confusion. He could feel his pulse beating like the rhythm of slow flame in the bones of his skull. What was wrong with Linden? Moving carefully, he went to her. She sat with her gaze lowered, her features shrouded by the dimness of the room. He sank to his knees to ask her what was the matter.
She faced him harshly, shook her hair. “I must be hysterical. These people are planning to kill us. For some silly reason, that bothers me.”
He studied her for a moment, measuring her belligerence, then retreated to sit against the opposite wall. What else could he do? She was already foundering; he could not insist that she surrender her secrets to him. In her straits, during his first experience with the Land, he had lost himself so badly-He closed his eyes, groped for courage. Then he sighed, “Don't worry about it. They're not going to kill us.”
“Naturally not.” Her tone was vicious. “You're Thomas Covenant, Unbeliever and white gold wielder. They won't dare.”
Her scorn hurt him; but he made an effort to suppress his anger. “We'll get out of here tonight.”
“How?” she demanded bluntly.
“Tonight”- he could not silence his weariness — “I'll try to show Sunder why he ought to let us go.”
A moment later, someone pushed two large stoneware bowls of water past the curtain. Linden reacted to them as if they were the only explicable things in the room. She shuttled toward them on her knees, lowered her head to drink deeply.
When Covenant joined her, she ordered him to use the bowl she had used. He obeyed to avoid an argument; but her reasons became clear when she told him to put his hands in the still-full bowl. The water might reduce their swelling, allow more blood past the bonds-perhaps even loosen the bonds themselves.
Apparently, his wrists were tied with leather; as he followed her instructions, the cool fluid palliated his discomfort; and a short while later he felt a tingle of recovery in his palms. He tried to thank her with a smile; but she did not respond. When he left the water, she took his place, soaked her own hands for a long time.
Gradually, Covenant's attention drifted away from her. The sun was beginning to slant toward afternoon; a bright hot sliver of light dissected by iron bars lay on the floor. He rested his head, and thought about the Sunstone.
But what if it were not? Covenant returned to the dread which had struck him in Nassic's hut. The world is not what it was. If there were no Earthpower-
He wished that he could feel his ring; but even if his hands had not been bound, his fingers would have been too numb. Leper, he muttered. Make it work. Make it. The sunlight became a white cynosure, growing until it throbbed like the pain in his head. Slowly, his mind filled with a brightness more fearsome and punishing than any night. He opposed it as if he were a fragment of the last kind dark which healed and renewed.
Then Linden was saying, “Covenant. You've slept enough. It's dangerous if you have a concussion. Covenant.”
The dazzle in his brain blinded him momentarily; he had to squint to see that the room was dim. Sunset faintly collared the air. The sky beyond the window lay in twilight.
He felt stiff and groggy, as if his life had congealed within him while he slept. His pain had burrowed into the bone; but it, too, seemed imprecise-stupefied by fatigue. At Linden's urging, he drank the remaining water. It cleared his throat, but could not unclog his mind.
For a long time, they sat without speaking. Night filled the valley like an exudation from the mountains; the air turned cool as the earth lost its warmth to the clear heavens. At first, the stars were as vivid as language-an articulation of themselves across the distance and the unfathomable night. But then the sky lost its depth as the moon rose.
“Covenant,” Linden breathed, “talk to me.” Her voice was as fragile as ice. She was near the limit of her endurance.
He searched for something that would help them both, fortify her and focus him.
“I don't want to die like this,” she grated. “Without even knowing why.”
He ached because he could not explain why, could not give her his sense of purpose. But he knew a story which might help her to understand what was at stake. Perhaps it was a story they both needed to hear. “All right,” he said quietly. “I'll tell you how this world came to be created.”
She did not answer. After a moment, he began.
Even to himself, his voice sounded bodiless, as if the dark were speaking for him. He was trying to reach out to her with words, though he could not see her, and had no very clear idea of who she was. His tale was a simple one; but for him its simplicity grew out of long distillation. It made even his dead nerves yearn as if he were moved by an eloquence he did not possess.
In the measureless heavens of the universe, he told her, where life and space were one, and the immortals strode through an ether without limitation, the Creator looked about him, and his heart swelled with the desire to make a new thing to gladden his bright children. Summoning his strength and subtlety, he set about the work which was his exaltation.
First he forged the Arch of Time, so that the world he wished to make would have a place to be. And then within the Arch he formed the Earth. Wielding the greatness of his love and vision as tools, he made the world in all its beauty, so that no eye could behold it without joy. And then upon the Earth he placed all the myriads of its inhabitants-beings to perceive and cherish the beauty which he made. Striving for perfection because it was the nature of creation to desire all things flawless, he made the inhabitants of the Earth capable of creation, and striving, and love for the world. Then he withdrew his hand, and beheld what he had done.
There to his great ire he saw that evil lay in the Earth: malice buried and abroad, banes and powers which had no part in his intent. For while he had laboured over his creation, he had closed his eyes, and had not seen the Despiser, the bitter son or brother of his heart, labouring beside him-casting dross into the forge, adding malignancy to his intent.
Then the Creator's wrath shook the heavens, and he grappled with the son or brother of his heart. He overthrew the Despiser and hurled him to the Earth, sealing him within the Arch of Time for his punishment. Thus it became for the inhabitants of the Earth as it was with the Creator; for in that act he harmed the tiling he loved, and so all living hearts were taught the power of self-despite. The Despiser was abroad in the Earth, awakening ills, seeking to escape his prison. And the Creator could not hinder him, for the reach of any immortal hand through the Arch would topple Time, destroying the Earth and freeing the Despiser. This was the great grief of the Creator, and
