Then Seadreamer reached Cail and Ceer. The Giant took Linden from them; his huge arms supported her as securely as a litter.
The sight unlocked Covenant’s paralysis. He trusted the Giant instinctively. The company began to climb the hillside northward. He left them, turned to confront the water.
Just try it! His fists jerked threats at the fell luster and the howl. Come on! Try to hurt us again!
Brinn yanked him away from the lakeshore and dragged him stumbling up the hill.
Reeling with exertion and anoxia, he fought to keep his feet. Dark trees leaped across his vision like aghast dancers in the nacreous light. He tripped repeatedly. But Brinn upheld him.
The lurker’s cry whetted itself on pain and frustration, shrilled into his ears. At the fringes of his sight, he could see the skest. They moved in pursuit, as if the lurker’s fury were a scourge at their backs.
Then Brinn impelled him over the crest of the hill.
At once, the ghost-light was cut off. Torches bounded into the jungle ahead of him. He struggled after them as if he were chasing swamp-fires. Only Brinn’s support saved him from slamming into trunks, thick brush, vines as heavy as hawsers.
The howling scaled toward a shriek, then dropped to a lower, more cunning pitch. But the sound continued to impale Covenant like a swordthorn. He retched for air; the night became vertigo. He did not know where he was going.
A lurid, green blur appeared beyond the torches. The skest angled closer on the left, forcing the company to veer to the right.
More skest.
The flight of the torches swung farther to the right.
Lacking air, strength, courage, Covenant could hardly bear his own weight. His limbs yearned to fall, his chest ached for oblivion. But Hergrom gripped his other arm. Stumbling between Haruchai, he followed his companions.
For long moments, they splashed down the length of a cold stream which ran like an aisle between advancing hordes of skest. But then the stream faded into quicksand. The company lost time hunting for solid ground around the quagmire.
They gained a reach of clear dirt, soil so dead that even marshgrass could not grow there. They began to sprint. Brinn and Hergrom drew Covenant along more swiftly than he could move.
Suddenly the whole group crashed to a halt, as if they had blundered against an invisible wall.
The First hissed an oath like a sword-cut. Sunder and Hollian sobbed for air. Pitchwife hugged his crippled chest. Honninscrave swung in circles, scanning the night. Seadreamer stood like a tree with Linden asleep in his arms and stared into the darkness as if he had lost his sight.
With his own breath rending like an internal wound, Covenant jerked forward to see why the company had stopped.
Herded! Bloody hell.
The dead ground stretched like a peninsula out into a region of mud: mire blocked the way for more than a stone’s throw on three sides. The muck stank like a charnel, seething faintly, as if corpses writhed in its depths. It looked thick enough to swallow even Giants without a trace.
Already skest had begun to mass at the head of the peninsula, sealing the company in the lurker’s trap. Hundreds of skest, scores of hundreds. They made the whole night green, pulsing like worship. Even armed with a mountain of wood, no Giant or Haruchai could have fought through that throng; and the company had no wood left except the torches.
Covenant’s respiration became febrile with cursing.
He looked at his companions. Emerald etched them out of the darkness, as distinct as the accursed. Linden lay panting in Seadreamer’s arms as if her sleep were troubled by nightmares. Hollian’s face was bloodless under her black hair, pale as prophecy. Sunder’s whole visage clenched around the grinding of his teeth. Their vulnerability wrung Covenant’s heart. The Haruchai and the Giants could at least give some account of themselves before they fell. What could Linden, Sunder, and Hollian do except die?
“Ur-Lord.” Brinn’s singed hair and dispassion looked ghastly in the green light. “The white ring. May these skest be driven back?”
Thousands of them? Covenant wanted to demand. I don’t have the strength. But his chest could not force out words.
One of Honninscrave’s torches burned down to his hand. With a grimace, he tossed the sputtering wood into the mire.
Instantly the surface of the mud lake caught fire.
Flames capered across the mire like souls in torment. Heat like a foretaste of hell blasted against the company, drove them into a tight cluster in the center of the peninsula.
The First discarded her torches, whipped out her sword, and tried to shout something. The lurker drowned her voice. But the Giants understood. They placed themselves around their companions, using their bodies as shields against the heat. The First, Honninscrave, and Pitchwife faced outward; Seadreamer put his back to the fire, protecting Linden.
The next instant, a concussion shook the ground. Pitchwife stumbled. Hollian, Sunder, and Covenant fell.
As Covenant climbed back to his feet, he saw a tremendous spout of flame mounting out of the mud.
It rose like a fire-storm and whirled toward the heavens. Its fury tore a gale through the night. Towering over the peninsula, it leaned to hammer the company. The howl of the lurker became a gyre of conflagration.
No!
Covenant eluded Brinn’s grasp, wrenched past Honninscrave. He forged out into the heat to meet the firespout.
Baring the krill, he raised it so that its gem shone clear. Purest argent pierced the orange mudfire, defying it as hotly as lightning.
In the silence of his clogged lungs, Covenant raged words he did not understand. Words of power.
Melenkurion abatha! Duroc minas mill khabaal!
Immediately the firespout ruptured. In broken gouts and fear, it crashed backward as if he had cut off another arm of the lurker. Flames skirted like frustrated ire across the mud. Abruptly the air was free. Wind empty of howling fed the fire. Covenant’s companions coughed and gasped as if they had been rescued from the hands of a strangler.
He knelt on the dead ground. Peals of light rang in his head, tintinnabulating victory or defeat; either one, there was no difference; triumph and desecration were the same thing. He was foundering—
But hands came to succor him. They were steady and gentle. They draped cloth over the krill, took it from his power-cramped fingers. Relative darkness poured through his eye-sockets as if they were empty pits, gaping for night. The dark spoke in Brinn’s voice. “The lurker has been pained. It fears to be pained again.”
“Sooth,” the First muttered starkly. “Therefore it has given our deaths into the hands of its acolytes.”
Brinn helped Covenant to his feet. Blinking at numberless krill echoes, he fought to see. But the after-flares were too bright. He was still watching them turn to emerald when he heard Hollian’s gasp. The Giants and Haruchai went rigid. Brinn’s fingers dug reflexively into Covenant’s arm.
By degrees, the white spots became orange and green—mudfire and skest. The acid-creatures thronged at the head of the peninsula, shimmering like religious ecstasy. They oozed forward slowly, not as if they were frightened, but rather as if they sought to prolong the anticipation of their advance.
Covenant’s companions stared in the direction of the skest. But not at the skest.
Untouched amid the green forms, as if he were impervious to every conceivable vitriol, stood Vain.
His posture was one of relaxation and poise; his arms hung, slightly bent, at his sides. But at intervals he took a step, two steps, drew gradually closer to the leading edge of the skest. They broke against his legs and had no effect.
His gaze was unmistakably fixed on Linden.
In a flash of memory, Covenant saw Vain snatch Linden into his arms, leap down into a sea of graveling. The Demondim-spawn had returned from quicksand and loss to rescue her.
“Who—?” the First began.
“He is Vain,” Brinn replied, “given to ur-Lord Thomas Covenant by the Giant Saltheart Foam
follower among the Dead in Andelain.”
She cleared her throat, searching for a question which would produce a more useful answer. But before she could speak, Covenant heard a soft popping noise like the bursting of a bubble of mud.
At once, Vain came to a halt. His gaze flicked past the company, then faded into disfocus.
Covenant turned in time to see a short figure detach itself from the burning mud, step queasily onto the hard ground.
The figure was scarcely taller than the skest, and shaped like them, a misborn child without eyes or any other features. But it was made of mud. Flames flickered over it as it climbed from the fire, then died away, leaving a dull brown creature like a sculpture poorly wrought in clay. Reddish pockets embedded in its form glowed dully.
Paralyzed by recognition, Covenant watched as a second clay form emerged like a damp sponge from the mud. It looked like a crocodile fashioned by a blind man.
The two halted on the bank and faced the company. From somewhere within themselves, they produced modulated squishing noises which sounded eerily like language. Mud talking.
The First and Pitchwife stared, she sternly, he with a light like hilarity in his eyes. But Honninscrave stepped forward and bowed formally. With his lips, he made sounds which approximated those of the clay forms.
In a whisper, Pitchwife informed his companions, “They name themselves the sur-jheherrin. They ask if we desire aid against the skest. Honninscrave replies that our need is absolute.” The clay creatures spoke again. A look of puzzlement crossed Pitchwife’s face. “The sur-jheherrin say that we will be redeemed. ‘In the name of the Pure One,’ ” he added, then shrugged. “I do not comprehend it.”
The jheherrin. Covenant staggered inwardly as memories struck him like blows. Oh dear God.
The soft ones. They had lived in the caves and mud pits skirting Foul’s Creche. They had been the Despiser’s failures, the rejected mischances of his breeding dens. He had let them live because the torment of their craven lives amused him.
But he had misjudged them. In spite of their ingrown terror, they had rescued Covenant and Foamfollower from Lord Foul’s minions, had taught Covenant and Foamfollower the secrets of Foul’s Creche, enabling them to reach the throne-hall and confront the Despiser. In the name of the Pure One—
The sur-jheherrin were clearly descendants of the soft ones. They had been freed from thrall, as their old legend had foretold. But not by Covenant, though he had wielded the power. His mind burned with remembrance; he could hear himself saying, because he had had no choice, Look at me. I’m not pure. I’m corrupt. The word jheherrin meant “the corrupt.” His reply had stricken the clay creatures with despair. And still they had aided him.
But Foamfollower—The Pure One. Burned clean by the caamora of Hotash Slay, he had cast down the Despiser, broken the doom of the jheherrin.
And now their inheritors lived in the mud and mire of Sarangrave Flat. Covenant clung to the sur-jheherrin with his eyes as if they were an act of grace, the fruit of Foamfollower’s great clean heart, which they still treasured across centuries that had corroded all human memories of the Land.
The acid-creatures continued to advance, oblivious to Vain and the sur-jheherrin. The first skest were no more than five paces away, radiating dire emerald. Hergrom, Ceer, and Harn stood poised to sacrifice themselves as expensively as possible, though they must have known that even Haruchai were futile against so much green vitriol. Their expressionlessness appeared demonic in that light.
The two sur-jheherrin speaking with Honninscrave did not move. Yet they fulfilled their offer of aid. Without warning, the muck edging the peninsula began to seethe. Mud rose like a wave leaping shoreward, then resolved into separate forms. Sur-jheherrin like stunted apes, misrecollected reptiles, inept dogs. Scores of them came wetly forward, trailing fires which quickly died on their backs. They surged with surprising speed past the Haruchai. And more of them followed. Out of mud lit garishly by the lurker’s fire, they arose to defend the company.
The forces met, vitriol and clay pouring bluntly into contact. There was no fighting, no impact of strength or skill. Skest and sur-jheherrin pitted their essential natures against each other. The skest were created to spill green flame over whatever opposed them. But the clay forms absorbed acid and fire. Each sur-jheherrin embraced one of the skest, drew the acid-creature into itself. For an instant, emerald glazed the mud. Then the green was quenched, and the sur-jheherrin moved to another skest.
Covenant watched the contest distantly. To his conflicted passions, the battle seemed to have no meaning apart from the sur-jheherrin themselves. While his eyes followed the struggle, his ears clinched every word of the dialogue between Honninscrave and the first mud-forms. Honninscrave went on questioning them as if he feared that the outcome of the combat was uncertain, and the survival of the Search might come to depend on what he could learn.
“Honninscrave asks”—Pitchwife continued to translate across the mute conflict—“if so many skest may be defeated. The sur-jheherrin reply that they are greatly outnumbered. But in the name of the Pure One, they undertake to clear our way from this trap and to aid our flight from the Sarangrave.”
More clay forms climbed from the mud to join the struggle. They were needed. The sur-jheherrin were not able to absorb skest without cost. As each creature took in more acid, the green burning within it became stronger, and its clay began to lose shape. Already the leaders were melting like heated wax. With the last of their solidity, they oozed out of the combat and ran down the sides of the peninsula back into the mud.
“Honninscrave asks if the sur-jheherrin who depart are mortally harmed. They reply that their suffering is not fatal. As the acid dissipates, their people will be restored.”
Each of the clay forms consumed several of the skest before being forced to retreat. Slowly the assault was eaten back, clearing the ground. And more sur-jheherrin continued to rise from the mud, replacing those which fled.
Another part of Covenant knew that his arms were clamped over his stomach, that he was rocking himself from side to side, like a sore child. Everything was too vivid. Past and present collided in him: Foamfollower’s agony in Hotash Slay; the despair of the soft ones; innocent men and women slaughtered; Linden helpless in Seadreamer’s arms; fragments of insanity.
Yet he could hear Pitchwife’s murmur as distinctly as a bare nerve. “Honninscrave asks how the sur-jheherrin are able to survive so intimately with the lurker. They reply that they are creatures of mire, at home in quicksand and bog and clay bank, and the lurker cannot see them.”
Absorbing their way forward, the sur-jheherrin reached Vain, shoved past his thighs. The Demondim-spawn did not glance at them. He remained still, as if time meant nothing to him. The clay forms were halfway to the head of the peninsula.
“Honninscrave asks if the sur-jheherrin know this man whom you name Vain. He asks if they were brought to our aid by Vain. They reply that they do not know him. He entered their clay pits to the west, and began journeying at once in this direction, traversing their demesne as if he knew all its ways. Therefore they followed him, seeking an answer to his mystery.” Again Pitchwife seemed puzzled. “Thus he brought them by apparent chance to an awareness that the people of the Pure One were present in Sarangrave Flat—and imperiled. At once, they discarded the question of this Vain and set themselves to answer their ancient debt.”
Back-lit by emeralds, orange mudfire in his face, Vain gazed enigmatically through the company revealing nothing.
Behind him, the skest began to falter. Some sense of peril seemed to penetrate their dim minds; instead of oozing continuously toward absorption, they started to retreat. The sur-jheherrin advanced more quickly.
Honninscrave made noises with his lips. Pitchwife murmured, “Honninscrave asks the sur-jheherrin to speak to him of this Pure One, whom he does not know.”
“No,” the First commanded over her shoulder. “Inquire into such matters at another time. Our way
clears before us. The sur-jheherrin have offered to aid us from this place. We must choose our path.” She faced Covenant dourly, as if he had given her a dilemma she did not like. “It is my word that the duty of the Search lies westward. What is your reply?”
Seadreamer stood at her side, bearing Linden lightly. His countenance wore a suspense more personal than any mere question of west or east.
Covenant hugged his chest, unable to stop rocking. “No.” His mind was a jumble of shards like a broken stoneware pot, each as sharp-edged and vivid as blame, “You’re wrong.” The Stonedownors stared at him; but he could not read their faces. He hardly knew who he was. “You need to know about the Pure One.”
The First’s eyes sharpened. “Thomas Covenant,” she rasped, “do not taunt me. The survival and purpose of the Search are in my hands. I must choose swiftly.”
“Then choose.” Suddenly Covenant’s hands became fists, jerking blows at the invulnerable air. “Choose and be ignorant.” His weakness hurt his throat. “I’m talking about a Giant.”
The First winced, as if he had unexpectedly struck her to the heart, She hesitated, glancing past the company to gauge the progress of the sur-jheherrin. The head of the peninsula would be clear in moments. To Covenant, she said sternly, “Very well, Giantfriend. Speak to me of this Pure One.”
Giantfriend! Covenant ached. He wanted to hide his face in grief; but the passion of his memories could not be silenced.
“Saltheart Foamfollower. A Giant. The last of the Giants who lived in the Land. They’d lost their way Home.” Foamfollower’s visage shone in front of him. It was Honninscrave’s face. All his Dead were coming back to him. “Every other hope was gone. Foul had the Land in his hands, to crush it. There was nothing left. Except me. And Foamfollower.
“He helped me. He took me to Foul’s Creche, so that I could at least fight, at least make that much restitution, die if I had to. He was burned—” Shuddering he fought to keep his tale in order. “Before we got there, Foul trapped us. We would have been killed. But the jheherrin—his ancestors— They rescued us. In the name of the Pure One.