The Power That Preserves

They moved with unexpected speed. Bulging and oozing at every step, they half trotted and half poured their way down the tunnel. Covenant could not keep up with them. In his cramped crouch, his lungs ached on the stale air, and his feet slipped erratically in the slimy mud. Foamfollower’s pace was even slower; the low ceiling forced him to crawl. But some of the jheherrln stayed behind with them, guiding them past the bends and intersections of the passage. And before long the tunnel began to grow larger. As the number and complexity of the junctions increased, the ceiling rose. Soon Covenant was able to stand erect, and Foamfollower could move at a crouch. Then they travelled more swiftly.

Their journey went on for a long time. Through intricate clusters of intersections where tunnels honeycombed the earth, and the travellers caught glimpses of other creatures, all hastening the same way, through mud so wet and thick that Covenant could barely wade it and shiny coal-lodes reflecting the rocklight of the jheherrin garishly, they tramped for leagues with all the speed Covenant could muster. But that speed was not great, and it became steadily less as the leagues passed. He had been two days without food and closer to ten without adequate rest. The caked mud throbbed like fever on his forehead. And the numbness in his hands and feet-a lack of sensation which had nothing to do with the cold-was spreading.

Yet he trudged on. He was not afraid that he would cripple himself; in his weariness, that perpetual leper’s dread had lost its power over him. Feet, head, hunger-the conditions for his return to his own world were being met. It was not the fear of leprosy which drove him. He had other motivations.

The conditions of the trek gradually improved. Rock replaced the mud of the tunnel; the air grew slowly lighter, cleaner; the temperature moderated. Such things helped Covenant keep going. And whenever he faltered, Foamfollower’s concern and encouragement steadied him. League after league, he went on as if he were trying to erase the troublesome numbness of his feet on the bare rock.

At last he lapsed into somnolence. He took no more notice of his surroundings or his guides or his exhaustion. He did not feel the hand Foamfollower placed on his shoulder from time to time to direct him. When he found himself unexpectedly stationary in a large, rocklit cavern full of milling creatures, he stared at it dumbly as if he could not imagine how he had arrived there.

Most of the creatures stayed a safe distance from him and Foamfollower, but a few dragged themselves forward, carrying clay bowls of water and food. As they approached, they oozed with instinctive fear. Nevertheless, they came close enough to offer the bowls.

Covenant reached out to accept, but the Giant stopped him.

“Ah, jheherrin,” Foamfollower said in a formal tone, “your hospitality honours us. If we could, we would return honour to you by accepting. But we are not like you-our lives are unalike. Your food would do us harm rather than help.”

This speech roused Covenant somewhat. He made himself look into the bowls and found that Foamfollower was right. The food had the appearance of liquefied marl, and it reeked of old rot, as if dead flesh had mouldered in it for centuries.

But the water was fresh and pure. Foamfollower accepted it with a bow of thanks, drank deeply, then handed it to Covenant.

For the first time, Covenant realized that Foamfollower’s sack had been lost in the thorn wastes.

The rush of cold water into his emptiness helped him shake off more of his somnolence. He drank the bowl dry, savouring the purity of the water as if he believed he would never taste anything clean again. When he returned it to the waiting, trembling jheherrin, he did his best to match Foamfollower’s bow.

Then he began to take stock of his situation. The cavern already held several hundred creatures, and more were arriving constantly. Like the jheherrin who had rescued him, they all appeared to be made of animated mud. They were grotesquely formed, like monsters ridiculed for their monstrosity; they lacked any sense organs that Covenant could recognize. Yet he was vaguely surprised to see that they came in several different types. In addition to the short erect forms he had first seen, there were two or three distinct beast- shapes, which looked like miserably failed attempts to mould horses, wolves, Cavewights in mud, and one oddly serpentine group of belly crawlers.

“Foamfollower?” he murmured. A painful intuition twisted in him. “What are they?”

“They name themselves in the tongue of the Old Lords,” Foamfollower replied carefully, as if he were skirting something dangerous, “according to their shapes. Those who rescued us are the aussat Befylam of the jheherrin. Other Befylam you see- the fael Befylam”- he pointed to the crawlers- “and the roge”- he indicated the Cavewight-like creatures. “I have heard portions of their talk as we marched,” he explained. But he did not continue.

Covenant felt nauseated by the thrust of his guess. He insisted, “What are they?”

Under the mud which darkened his face, Foamfollower’s jaw muscles knotted. His voice quivered slightly as he said, “Ask them. Let them speak of it if they will.” He stared around the cavern, did not meet Covenant’s gaze.

“We will speak,” a cold, dusky voice said. One of the fael jheherrin Befylam crawled a short distance toward them. It slopped wetly over the rock as it moved, and when it halted, it lay panting and gasping like a landed fish. Resolution and fear opposed each other in every heave of its length. But Covenant was not repelled. He felt wrung with pity for all the jheherrin. “We will speak,” the crawler repeated. “You are hard-you threaten us all.”

“They will destroy us,” a host of voices whimpered.

“But we have chosen to aid.”

“The choice was not unopposed!” voices cried.

“We have chosen. You are-the legend says- ” It faltered in confusion. “We accept this risk.” Then a wave of misery filled its voice. “We beg you-do not turn against us.”

Evenly, firmly, Foamfollower said, “We will never willingly harm the jheherrin.”‘

A silence like disbelief answered him from every part of the cavern. But then a few voices said in a tone of weary self-abandonment, “Speak, then. We have chosen.”

The crawler steadied itself. “We will speak. We have chosen. White gold human, you ask what we are. We are the jheherrin- the soft ones-Maker-work.” As it spoke, the rocklight pulsed in the air like sorrow.

‘ “The Maker labours deep in the fastness of his home, breeding armies. He takes living flesh as you know living flesh, and works his power upon it, shaping power and malice to serve his own. But his work does not always grow to his desires. At times the result is weakness rather than strength. At times his making is blind-or crippled-or stillborn. Such spawn he casts into a vast quagmire of fiery mud to be consumed.”

A vibration of remembered terror filled the cavern.

“But there is another potency in that abysm. We are not slain. In agony we become the jheherrin- the soft ones. We are transformed. From the depths of the pit we crawl.”

“We crawl,” voices echoed.

“In lightless combs lost even to the memory of the Maker-“

“Lost.”

“- we supplicate our lives.”

“Lives.”

“From the mud of the thorn wastes to the very walls of the Maker-place, we wander in soil and fear, searching-“

“Searching.”

“- listening — “

“Listening.”

“- waiting.”

“Waiting.”

“The surface of the Earth is denied to us. We would perish in dust if the light of the sun were to touch us. And we cannot delve-we cannot make new tunnels to lead us from this place. We are soft.”

“Lost.”

“And we dare not offend the Maker. We live in sufferance-he smiles upon our abjection.”