A long, sound sleep restored his sense of health, and the next morning he was able to pay better attention to his situation. Riding at Elena's side, he scrutinized Melenkurion Skyweir. It stood over him like an aegis, shutting out the whole southeastern dawn. With a low surge of apprehension, he judged that the High Lord's party would probably arrive there before this day was done. Carefully, he asked her about the Skyweir.
“I can tell you little,” she replied. "It is the tallest mountain known to the Land, and its name shares one of the Seven Words. But Kevin's Lore reveals little of it. Perhaps there is other knowledge in the other Wards, but the First and Second contain few hints or references. And in our age the Lords have gained nothing of their own concerning this place. None have come so close to the Skyweir since people returned to the Land after the Ritual of Desecration.
"It is in my heart that these great peaks mark a place of power-a place surpassing even Gravin Threndor. But I have no evidence for this belief apart from the strange silence of Kevin's Lore. Melenkurion Skyweir is one of the high places of the Land-and yet the First and Second Wards contain no knowledge of it beyond a few old maps, a fragment of one song, and two unexplained sentences which, if their translation is not faulty, speak of command and blood. So,“ she said wryly, ”my failure to unlock Amok is not altogether surprising."
This brought her back to a contemplation of her ignorance, and she lapsed into silence. Covenant tried to think of a way to help her. But the effort was like trying to see through a wall of stone; he had even less of the requisite knowledge. If he intended to keep his side of the bargain, he would have to do so in some other way.
He believed intuitively that his chance would come.
In the meantime, he settled himself to wait for Amok to bring them to the mountain.
Their final approach came sooner than he had expected. Amok took them down a long col between two blunt peaks, then into a crooked ravine that continued to descend while it shifted toward the east. By noon they had lost more than two thousand feet of elevation. There the ravine ended, leaving them on a wide, flat, barren plateau which clung to the slopes of the great mountain. The plateau ran east and south as far as Covenant could see around Melenkurion Skyweir. The flat ground looked like a setting, a base for the fifteen or twenty thousand feet of its matched spires. And east of the plateau were no mountains at all.
The Ranyhyn were eager for a run after long days of constricted climbing, and they cantered out onto the flat rock. With surprising fleetness, Amok kept ahead of them. He laughed as he ran, and even increased his pace. The Ranyhyn stretched into full stride, began to gallop in earnest, leaving Covenant's mustang behind. But still Amok's prancing step outran them. Gaily, he led the riders east and then south down the centre of the plateau.
Covenant followed at a more leisurely gait. Soon he was passing along the face of the first peak. The plateau here was several hundred yards wide, and it extended southward until it curved west out of sight beyond the base of the second peak. The spires joined each other a few thousand feet above the plateau, but the line of juncture between them remained clear, as if the two sides differed in texture. At the place where this line touched the plateau, a cleft appeared in the flat rock. This crevice ran straight across the plateau to its eastern edge.
Ahead of Covenant, the Ranyhyn had ended their gallop near the rim of the crevice. Now Elena trotted down its length toward the outer edge of the plateau. Covenant swung his mustang in that direction, and joined her there.
Together, they dismounted, and he lay down on his stomach to peer over the precipice. Four thousand feet below the sheer cliff, a dark, knotted forest spread out as far as he could see. The woods brooded over its rumpled terrain-a thick-grown old blanket of trees which draped the foot of the Westron Mountains as if to conceal, provide the solace of privacy for, a rigid and immediate anguish. And northeastward across this covered expanse ran the red-black line of the river which spewed from the base of the cleft. Inaudible in the distance, it came moiling out of the rock and slashed away through the heart of the forest. The river looked like a weal in the woods, a cut across the glowering green countenance. This scar gave the hurt, rigid face an expression of ferocity, as if it dreamed of rending limb from limb the enemy which had scored it.
Elena explained the view to Covenant. “That is the Black River,” she said reverently. She was the first new Lord ever to see this sight. “From this place, it flows a hundred fifty leagues and more to join the Mithil on its way toward Andelain. Its spring is said to lie deep under Melenkurion Skyweir. We stand on Rivenrock, the eastern porch or portal of the great mountain. And below us is Garroting Deep, the last forest in the Land where a Forestal still walks where the maimed consciousness of the One Forest still holds communion with itself.” For a moment, she breathed the brisk air. Then she added, “Beloved, I believe that we are not far from the Seventh Ward.”
Pushing himself back from the edge, he climbed unsteadily to his feet. The breeze seemed to carry vertigo up at him from the precipice. He waited until he was several strides from the edge before he replied, "I hope so. For all we know, that war could be over by now. If Troy's plans didn't work, Foul might be halfway to Revelstone."
“Yes. I, too, have felt that fear. But my belief remains that the Land's future will not be won in war. And that battle is not in our hands. We have other work.”
Covenant studied the distance of her eyes, measuring the risk of offending her, then said, “Has it occurred to you that you might not be able to unlock Amok?”
“Of course,” she returned sharply. “I am not blind.”
“Then what will you do, if he doesn't talk?”
“I hold the Staff of Law. It is a potent key. When Amok has guided us to the Seventh Ward, I will not be helpless.”
Covenant looked away with a sour expression on his face. He did not believe that it would be that easy.
At Elena's side, he walked back along the crevice toward the two Bloodguard and Amok. The afternoon was not far gone, but already Melenkurion Skyweir's shadow stretched across Rivenrock. The shadow thickened the natural gloom of the cleft, so that it lay like a fault of darkness across the plateau. At its widest, it was no more than twenty feet broad, but it seemed immeasurably deep, as if it went straight down to the buried roots of the mountain. On an impulse, Covenant tossed a small rock into the cleft. It bounced from wall to wall on its way down; he counted twenty-two heartbeats before it fell beyond hearing. Instinctively, he kept himself a safe distance from the crevice as he went on toward Bannor and Morin.
The two Bloodguard had unpacked the food, and Covenant and Elena made a light meal for themselves. Covenant ate slowly, as if he were trying to postpone the next phase of the quest. He foresaw only three alternatives-up the mountain, down the crevice, across the cleft-and they all looked bad to him. He did not want to do any kind of climbing or jumping; the simple proximity of precipices made him nervous. But when he saw that the High Lord was waiting for him, he recollected the terms of his bargain. He finished what he was eating, and tried to brace himself for whatever Amok had in mind.
Gripping the Staff of Law firmly, Elena turned to her guide. “Amok, we are ready. What should be done with the Ranyhyn? Will you have us ride or walk?”
“That is your choice, High Lord,” said Amok with a grin. “If the Ranyhyn remain, they will not be needed. If they depart, you will be forced to resummon them.”
“Then we must walk to follow you now?”
“Follow me? I have said nothing of leaving this place.”
“Is the Seventh Ward here?” she asked quickly.
“No.”
“Then it is elsewhere.”
“Yes, High Lord.”
“If it is elsewhere, we must go to it.”
“That is true. The Seventh Ward cannot be brought to you.”
“To go to it, we must walk or ride.”
“That also is true.”
“Which?”
&n
bsp; As he listened to this exchange, Covenant felt a quiet admiration for the way in which Elena tackled Amok's vagueness. Her past experience appeared to have taught her how to corner the youth. But with his next answer he eluded her.
“That is your choice,” he repeated. “Decide and go.”
“Do you not lead us?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I act according to my nature. I do what I have been created to do.”
“Amok, are you not the way and the door of the Seventh Ward?”
“Yes, High Lord.”
“Then you must guide us.”
“No.”
“Why not?” she demanded again. “Are you capricious?” Covenant heard a hint of desperation in her tone.
Amok replied in mild reproof, "High Lord, I have been created for the purpose I serve. If I appear wilful, you must ask my maker to explain me."
“In other words,” Covenant interjected heavily, “we're stuck without the other four Wards. This is Kevin's way of protecting-whatever it is. Without the clues he planted with such cleverness in the other Wards, we're up against a blank wall.”
“The krill of Loric came to life,” said Amok. “That is the appointed word. And the Land is in peril. Therefore I have made myself accessible. I can do no more. I must serve my purpose.”
The High Lord searched him for a moment, then said sternly, “Amok, are my companions unsuitable to your purpose in some way?”
“Your companions must suit themselves. I am the way and the door. I do not judge those who seek.”
“Amok”-she hung fire, and her lips moved silently as if she were reciting a list of choices-“are there conditions to be met before you can guide us onward?”
Amok bowed in recognition of her question, and answered with a chuckle, “Yes, High Lord.”
“Will you guide us to the Seventh Ward when the conditions are met?”
“That is the purpose of my creation.”
“What are your conditions?”
“There is only one. If you desire more, you must conceive them without my aid.”
“What is your condition, Amok?”
The youth gazed impishly askance at Elena. “High Lord,” he said in a tone of soaring glee, “you must name the power of the Seventh Ward.”
She gaped at him for an instant, then exclaimed, “Melenkurion! You know I lack that knowledge.”
He was unmoved. “Then perhaps it is well that the Ranyhyn have not departed. They can bear you to Revelstone. If you gain wisdom there, you may return. You will find me here.” With a bow of infuriating insouciance, he waved his arms and vanished.
She stared after him and clenched the Staff as if she meant to strike the empty air of his absence. Her back was to Covenant; he could not see what was happening in her face, but the tension of her shoulders made him fear that her eyes were drawing into focus. At that thought, blood pounded in his temples. He reached out, tried to interrupt or distract her.
His touch caused her to swing around toward him. Her face looked emaciated-her flesh was tight over the pale intensity of her skull-and she seemed astonished, as if she had just discovered her capacity for panic. But she did not move into his arms. She halted, deliberately closed her eyes. The bones of her jaw and cheeks and forehead concentrated on him.
He felt an abyss opening in his mind.
He did not comprehend the black, yawning sensation. Elena stood before him in the shadow of Melenkurion Skyweir like an icon of gleaming bone robed in blue; but behind her, behind the solid stone of Rivenrock, darkness widened like a crack across the cistern of his thoughts. The rift sucked at him; he was losing himself.
The sensation came from Elena.
Suddenly, he understood. She was attempting to meld her mind with his.
A glare of fear shot through the sable vertigo which drained him. It illuminated his peril; if he abandoned himself to the melding, she would learn the truth about him. He could not afford such a plunge, could never have afforded it. Crying, No! he recoiled, staggered back away from her within himself.
The pressure eased. He found that his body was also retreating. With an effort, he stopped, raised his head.
Elena's eyes were wide with disappointment and grief, and she leaned painfully on the Staff of Law. “Pardon me, beloved,” she breathed. “I have asked for more than you are ready to give.” For a moment, she remained still, gave him a chance to respond. Then she groaned, “I must think,” and turned away. Supporting herself with the Staff, she moved slowly along the cleft toward the outer edge of the plateau.
Shaken, Covenant sat straight down on the rock, and caught his head in his hands. Conflicting emotions tore at him. He was dismayed by his narrow escape, and angry at his weakness. To save himself, he had hurt Elena. He thought that he should go to her, but something in the focused isolation of her figure warned him not to intrude. For a time, he gazed at her with an ache in his heart. Then he climbed to his feet, muttering at the needless air, “He could've had the decency to tell us-at least before she lost her Ranyhyn.”
To his surprise, the First Mark answered, “Amok acts according to the law of his creation. He cannot break that law merely to avoid pain.”
Covenant threw up his hands in disgust. Fulminating uselessly, he stalked away across the plateau.
He spent the remainder of the afternoon roving restlessly from place to place across Rivenrock, searching for some clue to the continuation of Amok's trail. After a while, he calmed down enough to understand Morin's comment on Amok. Morin and Bannor were the prisoners of their Vow; they could speak with authority about the exigencies of an implacable law. But if the Bloodguard sympathized with Amok, that was just one more coffin nail in the doom of the High Lord's quest.
Covenant's effectlessness was another such nail. He could hear the inflated fatuity of his bargain mocking him now. How could he help Elena? He did not even know enough to grasp the issues Amok raised. Though his disconsolate hiking covered a wide section of the plateau, he learned nothing of any significance. The barren stone was like his inefficacy-irreducible and binding. While the last sunlight turned to dust in the sky, he bent his steps toward the graveling glow which marked the High Lord's camp. He was brooding on the familiar idea that futility governed his very existence.
He found Elena beside her pot of graveling. She looked both worn and whetted, as if the pressure on her ground down her individuality, fitted her to the pattern of her Lord's duty. Resolution gleamed in the honed patina of her bones. She had accepted all the implications of her burden.
Covenant cleared his throat awkwardly. “What have you got? Have you figured it out?”
In a distant voice, she asked, “How great is your knowledge of Warmark Troy's battle plan?”
“I know generally what he's trying to do-nothing specific:”
“If his plan did not fail, the battle began yesterday.”
He considered for a moment, then inquired carefully, “Where does that leave us?”
“We must meet Amok's condition.”
He gestured his incomprehension. “How?”
“I do not know. But I believe that it may be done.”
“You're missing four Wards.”
“Yes,” she sighed. “Kevin clearly intended that we should gain the Seventh Ward only after mastering the first Six. But Amok has already violated that intent. Knowing that we have not comprehended Loric's krill, he still returned to us. He saw the Land's peril, and returned. This shows some freedom-some discretion. He is not explicitly bound by his law at all points.”
She paused, and after a moment Covenant said, “Offhand, I would say that makes him dangerous. Why would he drag us all the way out here when he knew we would get stuck-unless he was trying to distract you from the war?”
"Amok intends no betrayal. I hear no malice in
To penetrate her abstraction, he snapped, “You can be fooled. Or are you forgetting that Kevin even accepted Foul as a Lord?”
>
Steadily, Elena replied, “Perhaps the first Six Wards do not contain the name of this power. Perhaps they teach only the way in which Amok may be brought to speak its name himself.”
“In that case-”
“Amok guided us here because in some way it is possible for us to meet his condition.”
“But can you find the right questions?”
“I must. What other choice exists for me? I cannot rejoin the Wayward now.”
Her voice had a dull finality, as if she were passing sentence on herself. Early the next morning, she called Amok.
He appeared, grinning boyishly. She gripped the Staff of Law in both hands and braced it on the rock before her.
In the dawn under Melenkurion Skyweir, they began to duel for access to the Seventh Ward.
For two days, High Lord Elena strove to wrest the prerequisite name from Amok. During the second day, a massive storm brooded on the southeastern horizon, but it did not approach Rivenrock, and everyone ignored it. While Covenant sat twisting his ring around his finger, or paced restlessly beside the combatants, or wandered muttering away at intervals to escape the strain, she probed Amok with every question she could devise. At times, she worked methodically; at others, intuitively. She elaborated ideas for his assent or denial. She forced him to recite his answers at greater and greater length. She led him through painstaking rehearsals of known ground, and launched him with all her accuracy toward the unknown. She built traps of logic for him, tried to fence him into contradictions. She sought to meld her mind with his.
It was like duelling with a pool of water. Every slash and counter of her questions touched him as if she had slapped a pond with the flat of her blade. His answers splashed at every inquiry. But when she strove to catch him on her need's point, she passed through him and left no mark. Occasionally he allowed himself a laughing riposte, but for the most part he parried her questions with his accustomed cheerful evasiveness. Her toil earned no success. By sunset, she was trembling with frustration and suppressed fury and psychic starvation. The very solidity of Rivenrock seemed to jeer at her.
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