The sight was momentarily more than Covenant could bear. Why was he forever so doomed to give pain? With unwanted harshness, he rasped, “You don’t have to go.”
Sunder stiffened. Hollian blinked at Covenant as if he had just slapped her face. But before he could master himself enough to apologize, she reached out and placed her hand on his arm. “Ur-Lord, you miscomprehend us.” Her voice was like the simple gesture of her touch. “We have long and long ago given up all thought of refusing you.”
With an effort, Sunder loosened the clenching of his teeth. “That is sooth. Do you not understand this of us? The peril is nothing. We have sojourned so far beyond our knowledge that all perils are become equal. And Linden Avery has said that soon we will be free of the threat of the Clave.”
Covenant stared at the Graveler, at the eh-Brand.
“No, Covenant,” Sunder went on. “Our concern is otherwise. We journey where the Sunbane does not obtain. We do not love the Sunbane. We are not mad. But without it—” He hesitated, then said, “What purpose do we serve? What is our value to you? We have not forgotten Andelain. The Sunbane has made us to be who we are. Perhaps under another sun we will merely burden you.”
The frankness of their uncertainty touched Covenant. He was a leper; he understood perfectly what they were saying. But he believed that the Sunbane could be altered, had to believe that it was not the whole truth of their lives. How else could he go on? Against the sudden thickness in his throat, he said, “You’re my friends. Let’s try it and see.”
Fumbling for self-control, he went to get something to eat.
His companions joined him. In silence, they ate as if they were chewing the gristle of their apprehensions.
Shortly Ceer brought word of a path down the cliff. Hergrom and Cail began to load the Coursers. Long before Covenant had found any courage, the quest was mounted and moving.
Ceer, Hergrom, and Cail led the way on Annoy. With Linden’s care and the native health of the Haruchai, Cail had essentially recovered from his wound. Brinn, Linden, and Covenant followed on Clash. Then came Harn and Hollian on Clangor, Stell and Sunder on Clang. Vain brought up the rear.
They went northward for half a league to a wide trail cut into the face of Landsdrop. This was a vestige of one of the ancient Giantways, by which the Unhomed had traveled between Seareach and Revelstone. Covenant locked his hands in Clash’s hair, and fought his vertigo as the company began to descend.
The sheer drop to the Lower Land pulled at him constantly. But the trail had been made by Giants; though it angled and doubled steeply, it was wide enough for the huge Coursers. Still the swing of Clash’s back made him feel that he was about to be pitched over the edge. Even during a brief rest, when Brinn halted the company to refill the waterskins from a rill trickling out of the cliff-face, the Flat seemed to reel upward at him like a green storm. He spun, sweating, down the last slope and lurched out into the humid air of the foothills with a pain in his chest, as if he had forgotten how to breathe.
The foothills were clear for some distance before they rolled down into the peril of the Sarangrave. Brinn took the Coursers forward at a clattering run, as if he meant to plunge straight into the verdant sea. But he stopped on the verge of the thick marshgrass which lapped the hills. For a moment, he surveyed the quest, studying Vain briefly, as if he wondered what to expect from the Demondim-spawn. Then he addressed Linden.
“Chosen,” he said with flat formality, “the old tellers say that the Bloodguard had eyes such as yours. That is not true of us. We understand caution. But we also understand that your sight surpasses ours. You must watch with me, lest we fall to the snares of the Sarangrave.”
Linden swallowed. Her posture was taut, keyed beyond speech by dread. But she answered with a stiff nod.
Now Clash led. Covenant glared out past Linden and Brinn, past Clash’s massive head, toward the Sarangrave. The hillside descended into a breeze-ruffled lake of marshgrass, and beyond the grass stood the first gnarled brush of the Flat. Dark shrubs piled toward trees which concealed the horizon. The green of their leaves seemed vaguely poisonous under the pale red sun. In the distance, a bird cried, then fell silent. The Sarangrave was still, as if it waited with bated breath. Covenant could hardly force himself to say, “Let’s go.”
Brinn nudged Clash forward. Bunched together like a fist, the company entered Sarangrave Flat.
Clash stepped into the marshgrass, and immediately sank to its knees in hidden mire.
“Chosen,” Brinn murmured in reproof as the Courser lumbered backward to extricate itself.
Linden winced. “Sorry. I’m not—” She took a deep breath, straightened her back. “Solid ground to the left.”
Clash veered in that direction. This time, the footing held. Soon the beast was breasting its way through chest-high grass.
An animal the size of a crocodile suddenly thrashed out from under Clash’s hooves—a predator with no taste for such large prey. Clash shied; but the rukh steadied it quickly. Clinging to his seat, Covenant forced his gaze ahead and tried not to believe that he was riding into a morass from which there was no outlet and no escape.
Guided by Linden’s senses, Brinn led the company toward the trees. In spite of past suns, the growth here was of normal size; yet even to Covenant’s blunt perceptions, the atmosphere felt brooding and chancrous, like an exhalation of disease, the palpable leprosy of pollution.
As they reached the trees, the quest passed under thickening blotches of shade. At first, clear ground lay between the trunks, wind-riffled swaths of bland grass concealed things at which Covenant could not guess. But as the riders moved inward, the trees intensified. The grass gave way to shallow puddles, stretches of mud which sucked like hunger at the hooves of the Coursers. Branches and vines variegated the sky. At the edges of hearing came the sounds of water, almost subliminal, as if wary behemoths were drinking from a nearby pool. The ambience of the Sarangrave settled in Covenant’s chest like a miasma.
Abruptly an iridescent bird blundered, squalling, skyward out of the brush. His guts lurched. Sweating he gaped about him. The jungle was complete; he could not see more than fifty feet in any direction. The Coursers followed a path which wandered out of sight between squat gray trees with cracked bark and swollen trunks. But when he looked behind him, he could see no sign of the way he had come. The Sarangrave sealed itself after the company. Somewhere not far away, he could hear water dripping, like the last blood from Marid’s throat.
His companions’ nerves were raw. Sunder’s eyes seemed to flinch from place to place. Hollian’s mien wore a look of unconscious fright, as if she were a child expecting to be terrified. Linden sat hunched forward, gripping Brinn’s shoulders. Whenever she spoke, her voice was thin and tense, etiolated by her vulnerability to the ill on all sides. Yet Vain looked as careless as the accursed, untouched even by the possibility of wrong.
Covenant felt that his lungs were filling up with moisture.
The Coursers seemed to share his difficulty. He could hear them snuffling stertorously. They grew restive by degrees, choppy of gait, alternately headstrong and timorous. What do they—? he began. But the question daunted him, and he did not finish it.
At noon, Brinn halted the company on a hillock covered with pimpernels, and defended on two sides by a pool of viscid sludge which smelled like tar. In it, pale flagellant creatures swam. They broke the surface, spread sluggish ripples about them, then disappeared. They looked like corpses, wan and necrotic, against the darkness of the fluid.
Then Linden pointed through the branches toward the sun. When Covenant peered at the faint aura, he saw it change, just as she had predicted. The full power of the Sunbane returned, restoring pestilence to the Sarangrave.
At the sight, a nameless chill clutched his viscera. The Sarangrave under a sun of pestilence—
Hollian’s gasp yanked the company toward her. She was gaping at the pool, with her knuckles jammed between her teeth.
At eve
ry spot where sunlight touched the dark surface, pale creatures rose. They thrust blind heads into the light, seemed to yearn upward. A slight wind ruffled the trees, shifting pieces of sunshine back and forth. The creatures flailed to follow the spots of light.
When any creature had kept its head in the light for several moments, it began to expand. It swelled like ripening fruit, then split open, scattering green droplets around the pool. The droplets which fell in shadow quickly turned black and faded. But the ones which fell in light became bright—
Covenant closed his eyes; but he could not shut out the sight. Green flecks danced against red behind his eyelids. He looked again. The droplets were luminescent and baleful, like liquid emeralds. They grew as they swam, feeding on sludge and pestilence.
“Good God!” Horror compacted Linden’s whisper. “We’ve got to get out of here!”
Her tone carried complete conviction. The Haruchai sprang into motion. Sunder called the Coursers forward. Cail boosted first Linden, then Covenant, upward, so that Clash would not have to kneel. Stell and Ham did the same for the Stonedownors.
Skirting the pool, Brinn guided the beasts eastward as swiftly as he dared, deeper into the toils of Sarangrave Hat.
Fortunately the Sunbane seemed to steady the Coursers, enforcing the hold of Sunder’s rukh. Their ponderous skittishness eased. When malformed animals scuttled out from under their hooves, or shrieking birds flapped past their heads, they remained manageable. After half a league, the riders were able to eat a meal without dismounting.
As they ate, Covenant looked for a way to question Linden. But she forestalled him. “Don’t ask.” Specters haunted the backs of her eyes. “It hurt. I just knew we were in danger. I don’t want to know what it was.”
He nodded. The plight of the company required her to accept visions which wrung her soul. She was so exposed. And he had no way to help her.
The Haruchai passed around a pouch of voure. As he dabbed the pungent sap on his face and arms, Covenant became aware that the air was alive with butterflies.
Fluttering red and blue, yellow like clean sunshine, gleams of purple and peacock-green, they clouded the spaces between the trees like particolored snow, alert and lovely. The dance of the Sarangrave—Sarangrave Flat under a sun of pestilence. The insects made him feel strangely bemused and violent. They were beautiful. And they were born of the Sunbane. The venom in him answered their entrancement as if, despite himself, he yearned to fry every lambent wing in sight. He hardly noticed when the company began moving again through the clutches of the marsh. At one time, he had watched helplessly while Wraiths died. Now every memory increased the pressure in him, urged him toward power. But in this place power was suicide.
Piloted by Brinn’s caution and Linden’s sight, the questers worked eastward. For a time, they traveled the edges of a water channel clogged with lilies. But then the channel cut toward the north, and they were forced to a decision. Linden said that the water was safe. Brinn feared that the lily-stems might fatally tangle the legs of the Coursers.
The choice was taken out of their hands. Hergrom directed their attention northwestward. For a moment, Covenant could see nothing through the obscure jungle. Then he caught a glimpse.
Fragments of livid green. The same green he had watched aborning in the pool of tar.
They were moving. Advancing—
Linden swore urgently. “Come on.” She clinched Brinn’s shoulders. “Cross. We’ve got to stay away from those things.”
Without hesitation, Brinn sent Clash into the water.
At once, the Courser’s legs were toiled in the stems. But the channel was shallow enough to give the beast a purchase on its bottom. Clash fought forward in a series of violent heaves, thrashing spray in all directions.
The other mounts followed to the east bank. Cascading water from their thick coats, they began to move as swiftly as Sarangrave Flat allowed.
Through stretches of jungle so dense that the trees seemed to claw at the quest, and the creepers dangled like garrotes. Across waving greenswards intricately beset with quagmires. Along the edges of black bogs which reeked like carrion eaters, pools which fulminated trenchantly. Into clear streams, slime-covered brooks, avenues of mud. Everywhere the riders went, animals fled from them; birds betrayed them in raucous fear or outrage; insects hove and swarmed, warded away only by the smell of voure.
And behind them came glimpses of green, elusive spangles, barely seen, as if the company were being stalked by emeralds.
Throughout the afternoon, they wrestled with the Flat; but, as far as Covenant could see, they gained nothing except a sense of panic. They could not outdistance those iridescent green blinks. He felt threats crawling between his shoulder blades. From time to time, his hands twitched as if they ached to fight, as if he knew no other answer to fear except violence.
In the gloaming of sunset, Brinn halted the company for supper. But no one suggested that they should make camp. The pursuit was more clearly visible now.
Green shapes the size of small children, burning inwardly like swamp lights, crept furtively through the brush—creatures of emerald stealth and purpose. Scores of them. They advanced slowly, like a malison that had no need for haste.
A thin rain began to fall, as if the ambience of the Sarangrave were sweating in eagerness.
One of the Coursers snorted. Annoy stamped its feet, tossed its head. Covenant groaned. Shetra had been one of the most potent Lords of Elena’s Council, adept at power. Fifteen Bloodguard and Lord Hyrim had been unable to save her.
He clutched at his mount and yearned forward as Brinn and Linden picked their way through the drizzle.
Water slowly soaked his hair and trickled into his eyes. The susurrus of the rain filled the air like a sigh. Everything else had fallen still. The advance of the lambent green creatures was as silent as gravestones. Sunder began to mutter at the Coursers, warning them to obedience.
“Quicksand,” Linden gritted. “To the right.”
Through his knees, Covenant could feel Clash trembling.
For a moment, the quicksand made a sucking noise. Then the sound of the rain intensified. It became an exhalation of wet lust. Behind the drizzle, Sarangrave Flat waited.
The creatures were within a stone’s throw of the company and drawing closer.
A gasp stiffened Linden. Covenant jerked his gaze ahead, searched the night.
In the distance lay a line of green lights.
It cut the quest off from the east.
The line arced to the north, spreading out to join the pursuit.
Hellfire!
The company had ridden into a snare. Flickering through the trees and brush and rain, the fires began to contract around the riders like a noose. They were being herded southward.
Clangor stumbled to its knees, then lurched upright again, blowing fearfully.
Linden panted curses under her breath. Covenant heard them as if they were the voice of the rain. She was desperate, dangerously close to hysteria. Opening her senses in this place must have violated her like submitting to a rape.
A stream he could not see gave an undertone to the rain, then faded. For a time, the beasts slapped through shallow water between knurled old cypresses. The drizzle fell like chrism, anointing the company for sacrifice. He did not want to die like this, un-shriven and without meaning. His half-hand clenched and loosened around his ring like an unconscious prophecy.
Linden continued instructing Brinn, barking what she saw into his ear as if that were her only defense against the mad night; but Covenant no longer heard her. He twisted in his seat, trying to gauge the pursuit. The rain sounded like the sizzling of water against hot gems. If he fell from Clash’s back, the creatures would be on him in moments.
Out of the darkness, Sunder croaked, “Heaven and Earth!” A noise like a whimper broke from Hollian.
Covenant turned and saw that the south, too, was lined with green fires. They pent the company on all sides.
&
nbsp; The terrain had opened; nothing obscured the encirclement. To one side, streaks of green reflected off a small pond. The water seemed to be leering. The creatures advanced like leprosy. The night held no sound except the sighing of the rain.
Clang danced like a nervous colt. Annoy snorted heavily, winced from side to side. But Sunder kept the Coursers under control. He urged them forward until they stood in the center of the green circle. There he stopped.
In a flat voice, Brinn said, “Withhold your power. The lurker must not be made to notice us.”
Linden panted as if she could hardly breathe.
The creatures came seething noiselessly through the dark. The ones beyond the water stopped at its edge; the others continued to approach. They were featureless and telic, like lambent gangrene. They looked horribly like children.
Hergrom dismounted, became a shadow moving to meet the line. For a moment, he was limned by slime fire. Rain stippled his silhouette.
Then Linden coughed, “No! Don’t touch them!”
“Chosen.” Brinn’s voice was stone. “We must breach this snare. Hergrom will make trial, that we may learn how to fight.”
“No.” Her urgency suffocated her. “They’re acid. They’re made out of acid.”
Hergrom stopped.
Pieces of darkness whirled at him from Ceer’s direction. He caught them, two brands from the quest’s store of firewood.
Hefting them by their ends, he confronted the creatures.
Stark against the green, he swung one of the faggots like a club, striking the nearest child-form.
It burst like a wineskin, spilling emerald vitriol over the ground. His brand broke into flame.
The creatures on either side appeared not to care that one of them had fallen. But they promptly shifted to close the gap.
He struck with the other brand, ruptured another shape. Then he returned, bearing the faggots like torches.
In the firelight, Covenant saw that the company stood in an incongruously open stretch of grass. Beyond the advancing children, black trees crouched like craven ghouls. The pool on his left was larger than he had guessed it to be. Scant inches below its surface lay thick, dark mud. A quagmire.