The Power That Preserves

He put Lena on his left, wrapped his arm around her, and started north across the preternatural current of the winter.

He hurried as much as possible, supporting Lena, glancing fearfully back over his shoulder to see if they were being followed. When he reached a break in the hills on his left, he faced a difficult decision: Bannor and Foamfollower would locate him more easily if he stayed on the edge of the Plains, but if he moved up among the hills he would have a better chance of finding shelter and aliantha. After a painful moment, he chose the hills. He would have to trust the hunting skills of his friends; Lena was his first concern.

He laboured strenuously up through the break, half carrying his companion. Once he had passed beyond the first crests, he found a shallow valley running roughly northward which provided some cover from the wind. But he did not stop; he was not far enough from the tunnel. Instead, he took Lena along the valley and into the hills beyond it.

On the way, he stumbled by chance into a battered aliantha. It had few berries, but its presence there reassured him somewhat. He ate two berries himself, then tried to get Lena to take the others. But she neither saw the aliantha nor heard his demands; all her outer senses were blank.

He ate the rest of the treasure-berries so that they would not be wasted, then left the bush behind and took Lena along and out of the valley. For a long time after that, he could not find an easy way through the hills. He struggled generally northward, searching for usable valleys or paths, but the terrain turned him insistently east, downhill toward the plains. Now the sweat was freezing in his beard again, and his muscles slowly stiffened against the icy cut of the wind. Whenever the wind hit Lena directly, she trembled. At last her need for shelter became imperative in his mind. When he saw a darker shadow which looked like a gully in the wasteland below him, he gave up on the hills and went down to it.

It had not deceived him. It was a dry arroyo with sheer sides. In places its walls were more than ten feet high. He took Lena down an uneven slope into the gully, then guided her under the lee of the opposite wall and seated her with her back against the packed dirt.

As he peered at her through the darkness, her condition scared him. She shivered constantly now, and her skin was cold and clammy. Her face held no recognition, no awareness of where she was or what was happening to her. He chafed her wrists roughly, but her arms remained limp, as if the cold had unmarrowed her bones. “Lena,” he called to her hesitantly, then with more force. “Lena!” She did not answer. She sat slack against the wall as if she had decided to freeze to death rather than acknowledge the fact that the man she loved was a murderer.

“Lena!” he begged gruffly. “Don’t make me do this. I don’t want to do it again.”

She did not respond. The irregular moan and catch of her breathing gave no indication that she had heard him. She looked as brittle as frostbitten porcelain.

With a fierce grimace clenched on his face, he drew back his halfhand and struck her hard across the side of her head for the second time in his life.

Her head snapped soddenly to the side, swung back toward him. For an instant, her breath shuddered in her lungs, and her lips trembled as if the air hurt her mouth. Then suddenly her hands leaped out like claws. Her nails dug into the flesh of his face around his eyes. She gripped him there, gouging him, poised ready to tear his eyes out.

A sharp nausea of fear wrenched his guts, made him flinch. But he did not back away.

After a moment, she said starkly, “You slew Elena my daughter.”

“Yes.”

Her fingers tightened. “I could blind you.”

“Yes.”

“Are you not afraid?”

“I’m afraid.”

Her fingers tightened again. “Then why do you not resist?” Her nails drew blood from his left cheek.

“Because I’ve got to talk to you-about what happened to Elena. I’ve got to tell you what she did-and what I did-and why I did it. You won’t listen unless you decide- “

“I will not listen at all!” Her voice shook with weeping. Savagely, she snatched back her hands and returned his blow, struck his cheek with all her strength. The sting brought water to his eyes. When he blinked them clear, he saw that she had clamped her hands to her face to keep herself from sobbing aloud.

Awkwardly, he put his arms around her. She did not resist. He held her firmly while she wept, and after a time she moved her head, pressed her face into his jacket. But soon she stiffened and withdrew. She wiped her eyes, averting her face as if she were ashamed of a momentary weakness. “I do not want your comfort, Unbeliever. You have not been her father. It is a father’s place to love his daughter, and you did not love her. Do not mistake my frail grief-I will not forget what you have done.”

Covenant hugged himself in an effort to contain his hurt. “I don’t want you to forget.” For that moment, he would have been willing to lose his eyes if the pain of blindness could have enabled him to weep. “I don’t want anyone to forget.”

But he was too barren for tears; the water which blurred his sight did not come from his heart. Roughly, he forced himself to his feet. “Come on. We’ll freeze to death if we don’t get moving.”

Before she could respond, he heard feet hit the ground behind him. He whirled, waving his hands to ward off an attack. A dark figure stood opposite him in the gully. It was wrapped in a cloak; he could not discern its outlines. But it carried a spear like a staff in its right hand.

“Pah!” the figure spat. “You would be dead five times if I had not chosen to watch over you.”

“Pietten?” Covenant asked in surprise. “What’re you doing here?” Lena was at his side, but she did not touch him.

” You are stupid as well as unskilled,” rasped Pietten. ” I saw at once that the Ramen would not defend you. I took the task upon myself. What folly made you deliver yourself into their hands?”

“What happened in the fight?” Questions rushed up in Covenant. “What happened to Banner and Foamfollower? Where are they?”

“Come!” the Woodhelvennin snapped. “Those wormspawn are not far behind. We must move swiftly if you wish to live.”

Covenant stared. Pietten’s attitude unnerved him. For an instant, his jaw worked uselessly. Then he repeated with a note of desperation in his voice, “What happened to Bannor and Foamfollower?”

“You will not see them again.” Pietten sounded scornful. “You will see nothing again unless you follow me now. You have no food and no skill. Remain here, and you will be dead before I have gone a league.” Without waiting for answer, he turned and trotted away along the gully.

Covenant hesitated indecisively while contradictory fears clamoured in him. He did not want to trust Pietten. His instincts shouted loudly: He drinks blood; Foul did something to him and he likes the taste of blood! But he and Lena were too helpless. They could not fend for themselves. Abruptly, he took Lena’s arm and started after Pietten.

The Ramen-trained Woodhelvennin allowed Covenant and Lena to catch up with him, but then he set a pace for them which kept Covenant from asking any questions. Travelling swiftly, he guided them northward out of the arroyo into the open Plains, hastened them along like a man with a goal clearly visible before him. When they showed signs of tiring, he irritably found aliantha for them. But he revealed no weariness himself; he moved strongly, surely, revelling in the flow of his strides. And from time to time he grinned jeeringly at Covenant and Lena, mocking them for their inability to match him.

They followed him as if they were entranced, spellbound to him by the harsh winter and their extreme need. Covenant maintained the pace doggedly, and Lena laboured at his side, spurning his every effort to help her. Her new, grim independence seemed to sustain her; she covered nearly two leagues before she began to weaken. Then, however, her strength rapidly deserted her.

Covenant was deeply tired himself, but he ached to aid her. When she stumbled for the third time, and could hardly regain her feet, he demanded breathlessly across the wind, “Pietten, we’ve got to rest. We need fire and shelter.”

“You are not hardy, Ringthane,” Pietten gibed. “Why do so many people fear you?”

“We can’t go on like this.”

“You will freeze to death if you stop here.”