“I know,” Covenant sighed. “I know all about it.” He was remembering Triock, the man who had loved Lena in Mithil Stonedown forty years ago. Triock had wanted to kill Covenant, but Atiaran had prevented him on the strength of the Oath of Peace. “Please don't say any more. I'm having a hard enough time as it is.”
“Covenant,” Troy continued as if he were still on the same subject, “I don't see why you aren't ecstatic about being here. How can the `real' world be any more important than this?”
“It's the only world there is.” Covenant climbed heavily to his feet. “Let's get out of here. This heat is making me giddy.”
Moving slowly, they left the amphitheatre. The air in Revelstone welcomed them back with its cool, dim pleasance, and Covenant breathed it deeply, trying to steady himself.
He wanted to get away from Troy, evade the questions he knew Troy would ask him. But the Warmark had a look of determination. After a few moments, he said, “Listen, Covenant. I'm trying to understand. Since the last time we talked, I've spent half my time trying. Somebody has got to have some idea what to expect from you. But I just don't see it. Back there, you're a leper. Isn't this better?”
Dully, answering as briefly as possible, Covenant said, “It isn't real. I don't believe it.” Half to himself, he added, “Lepers who pay too much attention to their own dreams or whatever don't live very long.”
“Jesus,” Troy muttered. “You make it sound as if leprosy is all there is.” He thought for a moment, then demanded, “How can you be so sure this isn't real?”
'Because life isn't like this. Lepers don't get well. People with no eyes don't suddenly start seeing. Such things don't happen. Somehow, we're being betrayed. Our own-our own needs for something that we don't have- are seducing us into this. It's crazy. Look at you. Come on-think about what happened to you. There you were, trapped between a nine-story fall and a raging fire-blind and helpless and about to die. Is it so strange to think that you cracked up?
“That is,” he went on mordantly, “assuming you exist at all. I've got an idea about you. I must've made you up subconsciously so that I would have someone to argue with. Someone to tell me I'm wrong.”
“Damn it!” Troy cried. Turning swiftly, he snatched up Covenant's right hand and gripped it at eye level between them. With his head thrust defiantly forward, he said intensely, “Look at me. Feel my grip. I'm here. It's a fact. It's real.”
For a moment, Covenant considered Troy's hand. Then he said, “I feel you. And I see you. I even hear you. But that only proves my point. I don't believe it. Now let go of me.”
“Why?!”
Troy's sunglasses loomed at him darkly, but Covenant glared back into them until they turned away. Gradually, the Warmark released the pressure of his grip. Covenant yanked his hand away, and walked on with a quiver in his breathing. After a few strides, he said, 'Because I
'Just forget that you know there's no possible way you could have come here. It's impossible-But just forget that for a while. Listen. I'm a leper. Leprosy is not a directly fatal disease, but it can kill indirectly. I can only-any leper can only stay alive by concentrating all the time every minute to keep himself from getting hurt-and to take care of his hurts as soon as they happen. The one thing-Listen to me. The one thing no leper can afford is to let his mind wander. If he wants to stay alive. As soon as he stops concentrating, and starts thinking about how he's going to make a better life for himself, or starts dreaming about how his life was before he got sick, or about what he would do if he only got cured, or even if people simply stopped abhorring lepers“-he threw the words at Troy's head like chunks of stone-”then he is as good as dead.
“This-Land- is suicide to me. It's an escape, and I can't afford even thinking about escapes, much less actually falling into one. Maybe a blind man can stand the risk, but a leper can't. If I give in here, I won't last a month where it really counts. Because I'll have to go back. Am I getting through to you”
“Yes,” Troy said. “Yes. I'm not stupid. But think about it for a minute. If it should happen-if it should somehow be true that the Land is real-then you're denying your only hope. And that's-”
“I know.”
“-that's not all. There's something you're not taking into account. The one thing that doesn't fit this delusion theory of yours is power-your power. White gold. Wild magic. That damn ring of yours changes everything. You're not a victim here. This isn't being done to you. You're responsible.”
“No,” Covenant groaned.
“Wait a minute! You can't just deny this. You're responsible for your dreams, Covenant. Just like anybody else.”
No! Nobody can control dreams. Covenant tried to fill himself with icy confidence, but his heart was chilled by another cold entirely.
Troy pressed his argument. “There's been plenty of evidence that white gold is just exactly what the Lords say it is. How were the defences of the Second Ward broken? How did the Fire-Lions of Mount Thunder get called down to save you? White gold, that's how. You've already got the key to the whole thing.”
“No.” Covenant struggled to give his refusal some force. “No. It isn't like that. What white gold does in the Land has nothing to do with me. It isn't me. I can't touch it, make it work, influence it. It's just another thing that's happened to me. I've got no power. For all I know or can do about it, this wild magic could turn on tomorrow or five seconds from now and blast us all. It could crown Foul king of the universe whether I want it to or not. It has nothing to do with me.”
“Is that a fact?” Troy said sourly. “And since you don't have any power, no one can hold you to blame.”
Troy's tone gave Covenant something on which to focus his anger. “That's right!” he flared. 'Let me tell you something. The only person in life who's free at all, ever, is a person who's impotent. Like me. Or what do you think freedom is? Unlimited potential? Unrestricted possibilities? Hellfire! Impotence is freedom. When you're incapable of anything, no one can expect anything from you. Power has its own limit seven ultimate power. Only the impotent are free.
“No!” he snapped to stop Troy's protest. “I'll tell you something else. What you're really asking me to do is learn how to use this wild magic so I can go around butchering the poor, miserable creatures in Foul's army. Well, I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do any more killing-and certainly not in the name of something that isn't even real!”
“Hooray,” muttered Troy in tight sarcasm. “Sweet Jesus. Whatever happened to people who used to believe in things?”
“They got leprosy and died. Weren't you listening to that song?”
Before Troy could reply, they rounded a corner, and entered an intersection where several halls came together. Bannor stood in the junction as if he were waiting for them. He blocked the hall Covenant had intended to take. “Choose another way,” he said expressionlessly. “Turn aside. Now.”
Troy did not hesitate; he swung away to his right. While he moved, he asked quickly, “Why? What's going on?”
But Covenant did not follow. The crest of his anger, his bone-deep frustration, still held him up. He stopped where he was and glared at the Bloodguard.
“Turn aside,” Bannor repeated. “The High Lord desires that you should not meet.”
From the next hallway, Troy called, “Covenant! Come on!”
For a moment, Covenant maintained his defiance. But Bannor's impervious gaze deflated him. The Bloodguard looked as immune to affront or doubt as a stone wall. Muttering uselessly under his breath, Covenant started after Troy.
But he had delayed too long. Before he was hidden in the next hallway, a man came into the intersection from the passage behind Bannor. He was as tall, thick, and solid as a pillar; his deep chest easily supported his broad massive shoulders and brawny arms. He walked with his head down, so that his heavy, regret beard rested like a burden on his breast; and his face had a look of ruddy strength gone ominously rancid, curdled by some admixture of gall.
Woven into the shoulders of his brown Stonedownor tunic was a pattern of white leaves.
Covenant froze; a spasm of suspense and fear gripped his guts. He recognized the Stonedownor. In the still place at the centre of the spasm, he felt sorrow and remorse for this man whose life he had ruined as if he were incapable of regret.
Striding back into the intersection, Troy said, “I don't understand. Why shouldn't we meet this man? He's
