Stephen Donaldson - Fatal Revenant

Linden winced. “You’re saying that we’ll have to make it on foot.” Fifteen leagues through the heaviest jungle that she had seen since the rampant dire fertility of the Sunbane. “That doesn’t even sound possible.”

“Yet the Manethrall speaks sooth,” said Stave. “In this, the Humbled and I concur.”

Damn it, she thought. “And there aren’t any roads? Any paths? No, of course not.” The Masters had discouraged travel for centuries. They certainly had not wanted anyone to visit Andelain, where the numinous manifestation of Earthpower would undermine everything that Stave’s kinsmen had striven to accomplish. “So where is the nearest river?”

“In this region,” Bhapa offered hesitantly, “are streams aplenty. The nearest lies no more than half a league to the east. Doubtless it provides a path into Salva Gildenbourne. Yet-”

“Yet,” rasped Mahrtiir. “it would serve neither us nor the Ranyhyn if we are assailed. Such a path would be too easily blocked against us.”

“No true river enters Salva Gildenbourne from the north,” Stave added. “Only the nearer streams flow southward. Others gather toward Landsdrop in the east. If you seek to approach Andelain by water, we must ride west and south to the Soulsease. Even mounted as we are, that journey must delay us further. And there we will be no less distant from our goal.”

Bitter with frustration, Linden faced Stave. “Why didn’t you tell me? You knew all this. We could have headed straight for the Soulsease from Revelstone. We could have saved-”

“Chosen.” Stave’s eye flashed. “I did not speak of the Soulsease because I had no certain knowledge of the skurj . Also I deem our present course to be the safer road. Any passage into Salva Gildenbourne by river will be fraught with hazard. Doubtless the Ranyhyn would be able to bear us, swimming. But doing so, they could not guard themselves.” He indicated her other companions. “Nor could we give battle on their behalf-or on our own. Only your powers might preserve us.”

Mahrtiir and the Cords nodded their agreement.

“A raft-?” Liand offered tentatively.

Stave held Linden’s gaze. “Grant that we may devise a raft adequate to convey us. Still we would be required to part from the Ranyhyn. And still would we be defenceless, apart from your powers. Do you relish the prospect of spears, arrows, flung stones, and nameless theurgies while we stand exposed upon the unsteady support of a raft?

“If you did not ward us all, we could do naught but perish.”

From the forest’s edge, Linden could not see the place where the skurj consumed Salva Gildenbourne. She sensed nothing of the monsters. For that very reason, she seemed to feel them rush closer by the moment.

Bracing herself on the hard stone of her purpose, she said, All right. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to blame you.

“I’m sure that you’re right. And I really can’t face the delay of riding around this forest.” She did not want to give Kastenessen or Roger that much time- “Let’s go to that stream Bhapa mentioned. Well do what we can on foot.”

Surely any watercourse would be less occluded with brush and deadwood than the rest of the forest?

Mahrtiir nodded his assent. Without waiting for a reply from Stave or any of the Humbled, he and his Cords sent their mounts racing eastward along the fringe of Salva Gildenbourne.

Linden ground her teeth as she and the rest of her companions followed. She was galloping straight toward the most deadly of her many foes, but she could not imagine a better alternative. She had to locate Loric’s krill ; needed to find Thomas Covenant among the Dead. She would never rescue Jeremiah without them.

The Harrow’s claim that he could take her to her son meant nothing while he stayed away. He may have feared Kastenessen and the skurj as badly as she did-

The swift run of the Ranyhyn startled birds from the nearby trees.

Grasshoppers leapt away and butterflies scattered. Linden’s company ploughed a furrow of small frights, quickly forgotten in the immaculate sunlight, as the riders shortened the distance between themselves and their peril.

Soon they reached the stream. It came tumbling through a notch in the nearest ridge and down a series of flat stones like shelves or stairs, then slowed as the ground tilted more gradually toward the forest. Where it disappeared under the crowded canopy, it was little more than a rill which Linden could have crossed with a step. However, the watercourse was wider than the stream. More water often flowed there, chuckling over its rocks as it was fed by spring and summer rains. If trees and brush did not throng too closely to the stream, or spill over its banks, Linden and her companions would not be forced to walk in single-file into Salva Gildenbourne.

Linden could not guess how Anele’s mind would be affected by the jungle, but the stones and sand of the streambed might suffice to keep him safe.

Mahrtiir and the Cords had already dismounted when the rest of the riders arrived in muted thunder. Carrying bundles of supplies, Bhapa and Pahni entered the trees at once to scout ahead. At the same time, Stave and the Humbled sprang down from their Ranyhyn to survey the forest and take defensive positions.

For a moment, Linden, Liand, and Anele remained on their horses. Now that she had decided to part from Hyn, Linden found that she was acutely reluctant to do so. She had learned to feel safe on Hyn’s back-And the trees seemed to brood ominously among their shadows, in spite of the distant calling of birds and the glad rippling of the stream.

Liand was uncharacteristically anxious: he had heard the Elohim give warning, and had spent enough time in Anele’s company to absorb the old man’s horror of the skurj . And Anele himself was obviously alarmed. He tested the air repeatedly, jerking his head from side to side as if his blindness galled him. His knuckles were white as he clung to Hrama’s mane.

I could have preserved the Durance! Stopped the skurj. With the Staff!

Somewhere underneath his madness, he blamed himself for Kastenessen’s freedom. My fault! Behind the Mithil’s Plunge, he had begged Linden to let him die. If the skurj closed on him, he would be trapped between terror and culpability.

Oh, hell, Linden growled to herself. She could not heal the old man’s mind: he had made that clear. She had no hope for him, or for any of her companions, if she did not reach Andelain and Loric’s krill .

Angry at her own fear, she dropped abruptly from Hyn’s back and strode over to the stream. Standing in the watercourse beside the rill, she muttered. “Let’s do this. I’m not getting any younger.

“Clyme,” she ordered as Liand dismounted and began urging Anele to join him, “you’re in the lead with Mahrtiir.” She could not bear to send the Manethrall ahead alone. “Stave, you’re with Liand, Anele, and me. Galt and Branl can take the rear.” The Cords would watch over the company from among the trees. If they were fortunate, they might avoid being caught. “We should spread out a bit. I don’t want anything”- or anyone- “to hit all of us at once.”

Facing the Humbled, she added stiffly, “I know what Handir said. No Master will answer Stave unless he speaks aloud. This is the exception. Sound won’t carry far through these trees.”

And she and her companions might easily lose sight of each other along the twisted stream. “If you refuse to communicate with Stave, you might get us killed.”

Galt, Clyme, and Branl gazed at her without expression. She thought that they would take offense-or simply ignore her. But then Clyme joined Mahrtiir, and Branl gestured for Linden to precede him.