Stephen Donaldson - Lord Foul's Bane

She had already done enough-helped him to master himself, resist the pull of the dangerous questions he could not answer. But his fingers were numb; parts of her clasp on his hand he could not feel at all. He dredged himself into a sitting position, though the exertion made him feel faint. “I'm a leper,” he said weakly. “Don't touch me.”

Hesitantly, she loosened her grip, as if she were not sure he meant what he said, not sure he knew what he was saying.

With an effort that seemed harsh because of his weakness, he withdrew his hand.

She caught her lower lip between her teeth in chagrin. As if she feared she had offended him, she moved back and sat down against the opposite wall.

But he could see that she was consumed with interest in him. She could not remain silent long. After a moment, she asked softly, “Is it wrong to touch you? I meant no harm. You are Berek Halfhand, the Lord-Fatherer. An ill I could not see assailed you. How could I bear to see you tormented so?”

“I'm a leper,” he repeated, trying to conserve his strength. But her expression told him that the word conveyed nothing to her. “I'm sick-I have a disease. You don't know the danger.”

“If I touch you, will I become-'sick'?”

“Who knows?” Then, because he could hardly believe the evidence of his eyes and ears, he asked, “Don't you know what leprosy is?”

“No,” she answered with a return of her earlier wonder. “No.” She shook her head, and her hair swung lightly about her face. “But I am not afraid.”

“Be afraid!” he rasped. The girl's ignorance or innocence made him vehement. Behind her words, he heard wings beating like violence. “It's a disease that gnaws at you. It gnaws at you until your fingers and toes and hands and feet and arms and legs turn rotten and fall off. It makes you blind and ugly.”

“May it be healed? Perhaps the Lords-”

“There's no cure.”

He wanted to go on, to spit out some of the bitterness Foul had left in him. But he was too drained to sustain anger. He needed to rest and think, explore the implications of his dilemma.

“Then how may I aid you? I know not what to do. You are Berek Ha-”

“I'm not,” he sighed. The girl started, and into her surprise he repeated, “I'm not.”

“Then who? You have the omen of the hand, for the legends say that Berek Earthfriend may come again. Are you a Lord?”

With a tired gesture he held her question at bay. He needed to think. But when he closed his eyes, leaned his head back against the parapet, he felt fear crowding up in him. He had to move, go forward-flee along the path of the dream.

He pulled his gaze back into focus on the girl's face. For the first time, he noticed that she was pretty. Even her awe, the way she hung on his words, was pretty. And she had no fear of lepers.

After a last instant of hesitation, he said, “I'm Thomas Covenant.”

“Thomas Covenant?” His name sounded ungainly in her mouth. “It is a strange name-a strange name to match your strange apparel. Thomas Covenant.” She inclined her head in a slow bow to him.

Strange, he thought softly. The strangeness was mutual. He still had no conception of what he would have to deal with in this dream. He would have to find out where he stood. Following the girl's lead, he asked, “Who are you?”

“I am Lena,” she replied formally, "daughter of

Atiaran. My father is Trell, Gravelingas of the rhadhamaerl . Our home is in Mithil Stonedown. Have you been to our Stonedown?"

“No.” He was tempted to ask her what a Stonedown was, but he had a more important question in mind. “Where-” The word caught in his throat as if it were a dangerous concession to darkness. “Where are we?”

“We are upon Kevin's Watch.” Springing lightly to her feet, she stretched her arms to the earth and the sky. “Behold.”

Gritting his resolve, Covenant turned and knelt against the parapet. With his chest braced on the rim, he forced himself to look.

“This is the Land,” Lena said joyfully, as if the outspread earth had a power to thrill her. “It reaches far beyond seeing to the north, west, and east, though the old songs say that High Lord Kevin stood here and saw the whole of the Land and all its people. So this place is named Kevin's Watch. Is it possible that you do not know this?”

Despite the coolness of the breeze, Covenant was sweating. Vertigo knuckled his temples, and only the hard edge of the stone against his heart kept it under control. “I don't know anything,” he groaned into the open fall.

Lena glanced at him anxiously, then after a moment turned back to the Land. Pointing with one slim arm to the northwest, she said, "There is the Mithil River. Our Stonedown stands beside it, but hidden behind this mountain. It flows from the Southron Range behind us to join the Black River. That is the northern bound of the South Plains, where the soil is not generous and few people live. There are only five Stonedowns in the South Plains. But in this north-going line of hills live some Woodhelvennin.

“East of the hills are the Plains of Ra.” Her voice sparkled as she went on: "That is the home of the wild free horses, the Ranyhyn, and their tenders the Ramen. For fifty leagues across the Plains they gallop, and serve none that they do not themselves choose.

“Ah, Thomas Covenant,” she sighed, “it is my dream to see those horses. Most of my people are too content-they do not travel, and have not seen so much as a Woodhelven. But I wish to walk the Plains of Ra, and see the horses galloping.”

After a long pause, she resumed: “These mountains are the Southron Range. Behind them are the Wastes, and the Grey Desert. No life or passage is there; all the Land is north and west and east from us. And we stand on Kevin's Watch, where the highest of the Old Lords stood at the last battle, before the coming of the Desolation. Our people remember that, and avoid the Watch as a place of ill omen. But Atiaran my mother brought me here to teach me of the Land. And in two years I will be old enough to attend the Loresraat and learn for myself, as my mother did. Do you know,” she said proudly, “my mother has studied with the Lorewardens?” She looked at Covenant as if she expected him to be impressed. But then her eyes fell, and she murmured, “But you are a Lord, and know all these things. You listen to my talk so that you may laugh at my ignorance.”

Under the spell of her voice, and the pressure of his vertigo, he had a momentary vision of what the Land must have looked like after Kevin had unleashed the Ritual of Desecration. Behind the luminous morning, he saw hills ripped barren, soil blasted, rank water trickling through vile fens in the riverbed, and over it all a thick gloom of silence-no birds, no insects, no animals, no people, nothing living to raise one leaf or hum or growl or finger against the damage. Then sweat ran into his eyes, blurred them like tears. He pulled away from the view and seated himself again with his back to the wall. “No,” he murmured to Lena, thinking, You don't understand. “I did all my laughing-long ago.”

Now he seemed to see the way to go forward, to flee the dark madness which hovered over him. In that brief vision of Desolation, he found the path of the dream. Skipping transitions so that he would not have to ask or answer certain questions, he said, “I've got to go to the Council of Lords.”

He saw in her face that she wanted to ask him why. But she seemed to feel that it was not her place to question his purpose. His mention of the Council only verified his stature in her eyes. She moved toward the stair. “Come,” she said. “We must go to the Stonedown. There a way will be found to take you to Revelstone.” She looked as if she wanted to go with him.