The One Tree

Horizonscan snatched every eye on deck toward the east: “Bareisle!” And there off the port bow stood the black burned rock of the island.

From a distance, it appeared to be no more than a dark eyot amid the sun-burnished blue of the Sea. But as the wind swept Starfare's Gem forward on the south, Bareisle's true size became manifest. With its towering igneous peaks and sheer valleys, its barren stone scarcely fringed by the stubborn clutch of vegetation, the island looked like a tremendous cairn or marker, erected toward the sky in warning. Birds cycled above it as if it were a dead thing. As she studied the craggy rock, Linden felt a quiver of foreboding.

At the same time, Honninscrave lifted his voice over the Giantship. “Hear me!” he cried-a shout of yearning and trepidation, as lorn and resonant as the wind. “Here we pass from the safe Sea into the demesne and ken of the Elohim. Be warned! They are lovely and perilous, and none can foretell them. If they so desire, the very Sea will rise against us.” Then he barked his commands, turning Starfare's Gem so that it passed around Bareisle with its stern braced on the wind, running now straight into the northeast.

Linden's foreboding tightened. The Elohim, she murmured. What kind of people marked the verge of their territory with so much black stone? As her view of the island changed from south to east, Bareisle came between her and the sunset and was silhouetted in red glory. Then the rock appeared to take on life, so that it looked like the stark straining fist of a drowner, upraised against the fatal Sea. But as the sun slipped past the horizon, Bareisle was lost in dusk.

That night, the Questsimoon faded into a succession of crosswinds which kept each watch in turn almost constantly aloft, fighting the sails from tack to tack. But the next day the breezes clarified, allowing Starfare's Gem to make steady progress. And the following dawn, when Linden hurried from her cabin to learn why the dromond was riding at rest, she found that the Giants had dropped anchor off a jutting coast of mountains.

The ship stood with its prow aimed squarely toward a channel which lay like a fiord between rugged peaks. Bifurcated only by the inlet, these mountains spread away to the north and south as far as Linden could see, forming an impassable coast. In the distance on both sides, the littoral curved as if it were receding from the Sea. As a result, the cliffs directly facing the dromond appeared to be out-thrust like jaws to grab whatever approached their gullet.

The dawn was crisp; behind the salt breeze and the sunlight glittering along the channel, the air tasted like late fall. But the mountains looked too cold for autumn. Their dour cols and tors were cloaked with evergreens which seemed to take a gray hue from the granite around them, as if this land passed without transition and almost without change from summer into winter. Yet only the highest peaks cast any hints of snow.

The Giants had begun to gather near the wheeldeck. Linden went to join them. Honninscrave's words, Lovely and perilous, were still with her. And she had heard other hints of strangeness concerning the Elohim.

Covenant and Brinn, Pitchwife and the First had preceded her, and Seadreamer followed her up to the wheeldeck almost on Cail's heels. On the afterdeck, Sevinhand and the Storesmaster stood with the other Giants and Haruchai, all waiting to hear what would be said. Only Vain seemed oblivious to the imminence in the air. He remained motionless near Foodfendhall, with his back to the coast as if it meant nothing to him.

Linden expected the First to speak, but it was Honninscrave who addressed the gathering. “My friends,” he said with a wide gesture, 'behold the land of the Elohim. Before us lies our path. This inlet is named the Raw. It arises from the River Callowwail, and the River Callowwail in turn arises from the place which the Elohim name their clachan — from the spring and fountainhead of Elemesnedene itself. These mountains are the Rawedge Rim, warding Elemesnedene from intrusion. Thus are the Elohim preserved in their peace, for no way lies inward except the way of the Raw. And from the Raw no being or vessel returns without the goodwill of those who hold the Raw and the Callowwail and Woodenwold in their mastery.

“I have spoken of the Elohim. They are gay and subtle, warm and cunning. If they are at all limited in lore or power, that limit is unknown. None who have emerged from the Raw have gained such knowledge. And of those who have not emerged, no tale remains. They have passed out of life, leaving no trace.”

Honninscrave paused. Into the silence, Covenant protested, “That's not the way Foamfollower talked about them.” His tone was sharp with memory. “He called them 'the sylvan faery Elohim. A laughing people.' Before the Unhomed got to Seareach, a hundred of them decided to stay and live with the Elohim. How perilous can they be? Or have they changed too-?” His voice trailed off into uncertainty.

The Master faced Covenant squarely. 'The Elohim are what they are. They do not alter. And Saltheart Foamfollower bespoke them truly.

'Those of our people whom you have named the Unhomed were known to us as the Lost. In their proud ships they ventured the Earth and did not return. In the generations which followed, search was made for them. The Lost we did not find, but signs of their sojourn were found. Among the Bhrathair still lived a handful of our people, descendants of those few Giants who remained to give aid against the Sandgorgons of the Great Desert. And among the Elohim were found tales of those fivescore Lost who chose to take their rest in Elemesnedene.

'But Saltheart Foamfollower spoke as one descended from those who emerged from the Raw, permitted by the goodwill of the Elohim. What of the fivescore who remained? Covenant Giantfriend, they were more surely Lost than any of the Unhomed, for they were Lost to themselves. Twice a hundred years later, naught remained of them but their tale in the mouths of the Elohim. In such a span, fivescore Giants would not have died of age-yet these were gone. And behind them they left no children. None, though our people love children and the making of children as dearly as life.

“No.” The Master straightened his shoulders, confronted the channel of the Raw. 'I have said that the Elohim are perilous, I have not said that they desire hurt to any life, or to the Earth. But in their own tales they are portrayed as the bastion of the last truth, and that truth they preserve in ways which baffle all who behold them. On Starfare's Gem, I alone have once entered the Raw and emerged. As a youth on another dromond, I came to this place with my companions. We returned scatheless, having won no boon from the Elohim by all our gifts and bargaining but the benison of their goodwill. I speak from knowledge.

“I do not anticipate harm. In the name of the white ring-of the Earth-Sight”- he glanced intently at Seadreamer, betraying a glimpse of the pressure which had been driving him-'and of our need for the One Tree-I trust we will be well received. But such surpassing power is ever perilous. And this power is both squandered and withheld for purposes which the Elohim do not deign to reveal. They are occult beyond the grasp of any mortal.

'From time to time, their power is given in gift. Such is the gift of tongues, won for our people in a time many and many generations past, yet still unwaning and untainted. And such a gift we now seek. But the Elohim grant no gifts unpurchased. Even their goodwill must be won in barter-and in this bartering we are blind, for the quality which gives a thing or a tale value in their sight is concealed. For precious stone and metal they have no need. Of knowledge they have no dearth. Many tales hold scant interest for them. Yet it was with a tale that the gift of tongues was won-the tale, much loved by Giants, of Bahgoon the Unbearable and Thelma Twofist who tamed him. And the goodwill of the Elohim for me and my companions was won by the teaching of a simple knot-a thing so common among us that we scarcely thought to offer it, yet it was deemed of worth to the Elohim.

“Therefore we emerged from Elemesnedene in wonder and bafflement. And in conviction of peril, for a people of power who find such delight in a knot for which they have no use are surely perilous. If we give them offense, the Raw will never yield up our bones.”

As he spoke, tension mounted in Linden. Some of it grew from Covenant; his aggravated aura was palpable to her. Perplexity and fear emphasized the gauntness of his eyes, compressed the strictness which lined his face. He had based his urgent hope on what Foamfollower had told him about the Elohim. Now he was asking himself how he could possibly barter with them for the knowledge he needed. What did he have that they might want?