The One Tree

Ceer ducked, evaded the strike. But one arm caught Hergrom across the chest, flung him away like a doll.

None of them made a sound. Only their blows, their movements on the sand, articulated the combat.

Surging forward, Ceer butted the beast's chin with such force that the Sandgorgon rebounded a step. Immediately, he followed, raining blows. But they had no effect. The beast caught its balance. Its back-bent knees flexed, preparing to spring.

Ceer met that thrust with a perfectly timed hit at the creature's throat.

Again the Sandgorgon staggered. But this time one of its arms came down on the Haruchai's shoulder. Dumbly, Linden's senses registered the breaking of bones. Ceer nearly fell.

Too swiftly for any defence, the Sandgorgon raised one footpad and stamped at Ceer's leg.

He sprawled helplessly, with splinters protruding from the wreckage of his thigh and knee. Blood spattered the sand around him.

Seadreamer was at the edge of the parapet, straining to leap downward as if he believed he would survive the fall. Honninscrave and the First fought to restrain him.

The gaddhi's giggling bubbled like the glee of a demon.

Cail's fingers gripped Linden's arm as if he were holding her responsible.

As Ceer fell, Hergrom returned to the combat. Running as hard as he could over the yielding surface, he leaped into the air, launched a flying kick at the Sandgorgon's head.

The beast retreated a step to absorb the blow, then turned, tried to sweep Hergrom into its embrace. He dodged. Wheeling behind the Sandgorgon, he sprang onto its back. Instantly, he clasped his legs to its torso, locked his arms around its neck and squeezed. Straining every muscle, he clamped his forearm into the beast's throat, fought to throttle the creature.

It flailed its arms, unable to reach him.

Rant Absolain stopped giggling. Disbelief radiated from him like a cry.

Linden forced herself against the corner of the parapet, clung to that pain. A soundless shout of encouragement stretched her mouth.

But behind the beast's ferocity lay a wild cunning. Suddenly, it stopped trying to strike at Hergrom. Its knees bent as if it were crouching to the ground.

Savagely, it hurled itself backward at the Sandwall.

There was nothing Hergrom could do. He was caught between the Sandgorgon and the hard stone. Tremors like hints of earthquake shuddered through the wall.

The beast stepped out of Hergrom's grasp, and he slumped to the ground. His chest had been crushed. For a moment, he continued to breathe in a wheeze of blood and pain, torturing his ruptured lungs, his pierced heart. As white and featureless as fate, the Sandgorgon regarded him as if wondering where to place the next blow.

Then a spasm brought dark red fluid gushing from his mouth. Linden saw the thews of his life snap. He lay still.

The Sandgorgon briefly confronted the wall as if wishing for the freedom to attack it. But the beast's release had ended.

Turning away, it moved at a coerced run back toward its Doom. Shortly, it disappeared into the sand-trail it raised behind it.

Linden's eyes bled tears. She felt that something inside her had perished. Her companions were stunned into silence; but she did not look at them. Her heart limped to the rhythm of Hergrom's name, iterating that sound as though there must have been something she could have done.

When she blinked her sight clear, she saw that Rant Absolain had started to move away, taking his women and Guards with him. His chortling faded into the sunlight and the dry white heat.

Kasreyn was nowhere on the Sandwall.

Seventeen: Charade's End

FOR a time that seemed as unanswerable as paralysis, Linden remained still. Kasreyn's absence-the fact that he had not stayed to watch the contest of the Sandgorgon-felt more terrible to her than the gaddhi's mirth. She knew that there were needs to be met, decisions to be made; but she was unable to recognize them. Hergrom's name ran along her pulse, numbing her to everything else.

She nearly cried out when Covenant said like an augur, “Don't touch me.”

Cail had released her; but the marks his fingers had left on her upper arm throbbed, echoing her heartbeat. He had dug his sternness into her flesh, engraved it on her bones.

Then the First moved. She confronted Rire Grist. The suffusion of her gaze made her appear purblind. She spoke in a raw whisper, as if she could not contain her passion in any other way.

“Bring us rope.”

The Caitiffin's face wore a look of nausea. He appeared to feel a genuine dismay at Hergrom's fate. Perhaps he had never seen a Sandgorgon at work before. Or perhaps he understood that he might someday displease his masters and have a name of terror placed in his mind as punishment. There was sweat on his brows, and in his voice, as he muttered a command to one of the hustin.

The Guard obeyed slowly. He snapped at it like a sudden cry, and it hastened away. In a short time, it came back carrying a second coil of heavy rope.

At once, Honninscrave and Seadreamer took the line. With the practiced celerity of sailors, they secured it to the parapet, cast it outward. Though it seemed small in their hands, it was strong enough to support a Giant. First the Master, then Seadreamer slid down to the bloodied sand and to Ceer.

Cail's touch impelled Linden forward. Numbly, she moved to the rope. She had no idea what she was doing. Wrapping her arms and legs around the line, she let her weight pull her after Honninscrave and Seadreamer.

When she reached the ground, her feet fumbled in the sand. Hergrom's body slumped against the wall, accusing her. She could hardly force her futile legs to carry her toward Ceer.

Cail followed her downward. Then came Brinn with Covenant slung over his shoulder. In a rush of iron grace, the First swarmed down the rope.

Vain gazed over the parapet as if he were considering the situation. Then he, too, descended the line. At the same time, Findail melted out of the base of the Sandwall and reformed himself among the questers.

Linden paid no heed to them. Stumbling to her knees at Ceer's side, she hunched over him and tried not to see the extremity of his pain.

He said nothing. His visage held no expression. But perspiration ran from his forehead like droplets of agony.

Perceptions seemed to fly at her face. Assailed by arid heat and vision, her eyes felt like ashes in their sockets. His shoulder was not too badly damaged. Only the clavicle was broken-a clean break. But his leg—

Jesus Christ.

Shards of bone mangled the flesh of his thigh and knee. He was losing blood copiously through the many wounds. She could not believe that he would ever walk again. Even if she had had access to a good hospital, x- rays, trained help, she might not have been able to save his leg. But those things belonged to the world she had lost-the only world she understood. She possessed nothing except the vulnerability which made her feel every fraction of his pain as if it were mapped explicitly in her own flesh.

Groaning inwardly, she closed her eyes, sparing herself the sight of his hurt, his valour. He appalled her- and needed her. He needed her. And she had nothing to offer him except her acute and outraged percipience. How could she deny him? She had denied Brinn, and this was the result. She felt that she was in danger of losing everything as she murmured into the clenched silence of her companions, “I need a tourniquet. And a splint.”

She heard a ripping noise. Brinn or Cail placed a long strip of cloth in her hands. At the same time, the First