The Runes of the Earth

by Stephen R. Donaldson

  Off to one side of the vale where the Ramen had camped, snowmelt gathered to form a stream which ran along the floor of the gorge. There the company paused briefly to refill their waterskins. Then they entered the gorge itself.

  The narrow defile squirmed between its crude walls, following an ancient seam in the substance of the peaks. At intervals, fallen boulders littered the way, constricting the stream to pools and small rapids. Stave, Anele, and the Ramen seemed oblivious to such obstacles, too sure-footed to be hindered. But Linden, Liand, and Somo had to pick their footing carefully.

  By the time they reached the far end of the gorge, the sun had risen past the shoulders of the lowest mountains. In the new light, she saw crests piling southward until they grew dark with distance. In shadow their cloaks of ice looked grimy and tattered, eroded by time. Direct sunlight, however, gave the ice a purity that seemed almost blue. As if exalted by the sun, the peaks lifted their grandeur proudly into the sky.

  There the route of the Ramen traversed an open mountainslope southeastward. This easier surface allowed Linden’s muscles to grow accustomed to movement. In addition, the sun warmed some of the tension from her joints. Gradually the aching in her thighs and calves faded, and her knees began to feel less brittle.

  Liand walked at her side, leading Somo after him; and his buoyant company also helped her along. He was new to percipience, delighted by it, and every unfamiliar vista among the peaks, every type of grass or shrub or tree which he had never seen before, every soaring bird, enhanced his excitement. For him, the world was being made fresh as he moved through it.

  Linden still believed that he should have remained in Mithil Stonedown; that he should return home as soon as he could. Nevertheless she found that she relied upon him more with every passing hour. He helped her believe that a world which gave birth to such people could never be entirely ruined by Despite.

  Then the Ramen began to descend to the south, avoiding a gnarled bluff that jutted from the mountainside, and Linden was forced to concentrate on her steps again. Walking downward strained her knees and thighs until they threatened to fold under her. She had to grit her teeth as well as her determination in order to stay on her feet.

  Whenever she glanced at Anele, she saw that his madness was modulating between its various phases, responding to necessities or catalysts which she could not begin to grasp.

  Ahead of her, the slope dropped toward a place of torn and jagged boulders, great blocks and monoliths, where two of the lower mountains appeared to have collided with each other. Studying the granite chaos, she feared that the Ramen would ask her to clamber there. However, they reassured her by turning so that their path angled more toward the east. As they rounded the mountainside beyond the tumbled monoliths, she saw that they were headed toward an arête between massive cliffs, a ridge like a saddle. It had been formed by tremendous rockfalls which had echoed each other off the higher cliffs and crashed together in the intervening valley, filling all of the space between the mountainsides with rubble.

  Linden groaned to herself. More rubble—She could not conceal her chagrin as she asked Manethrall Hami, “Is that where we’re going?”

  The woman nodded. “The Verge of Wandering lies beyond. There we will attempt to answer the Bloodguard’s doubts—and our own.”

  Temporizing, Linden inquired, “Can Somo make it?” She was not sure that she could. “It looks rough from here.”

  Hami concealed a smile. “We have learned a path among the stones. The mustang will not find it difficult.” Then she looked at Linden and said more gravely, “Your weariness is plain, Ringthane. Your mount will be able to bear you, if you wish it.”

  Linden stiffened. “No, thanks,” she muttered. Her weakness the previous day had injured her self-confidence. “If Somo can manage it, I probably can too.”

  The Ramen leader nodded. “I do not question it.”

  “But tell me something,” Linden went on, “before I start breathing too hard to talk.” She had not forgotten the apparent disingenuousness of Hami’s earlier claim that her people had no communication with or comprehension of the ur-viles.

  “If it will ease your way,” the Manethrall replied, “I will answer as I can.”

  Her tone conveyed sincerity, although Linden also heard hints of hesitation. The Ramen had their own secrets, which they did not mean to reveal.

  Troubled by her sense of unspoken intentions, Linden asked, “How did you know about the kresh?”

  Hami gave her a perplexed frown. “Ringthane?”

  “It all seems too tidy to me,” Linden explained awkwardly. “I don’t see how you could have known that I was in danger. But you came to my rescue anyway, right when I needed you.

  “How did you do that?”

  “Ah.” Hami nodded. “Now I comprehend. Our presence was indeed timely. It need not surprise you, however.

  “It is our custom betimes to scout the borders of the Land, seeking some glimpse of what transpires there. Yesterday with my Cords I had elected to keep watch on the Mithil valley, for only there are these mountains readily entered—there, and from the Plains of Ra. Elsewhere the cliffs forbid passage.

  “From the heights above the valley, we saw the kresh gather to hunt. We did not know what they hunted. We sought only to assail them when they dared the mountains. That you were their prey we did not discover until we had prepared our ambush.”

  Her explanation sounded plausible. Linden would not have questioned it if she had not heard hints of avoidance in the Manethrall’s tone.

  She stopped walking so that she would be able to stand her ground. When Hami halted as well, Linden said, “Yet somehow you picked yesterday to be right where I needed you. And so did the ur-viles.

  “Don’t misunderstand me,” she added quickly. “I’m grateful. I trust you already. But I’m”—she shrugged uncomfortably—“suspicious of coincidences.”

  Lord Foul had taught her that.

  She could believe that the ur-viles had known of her presence in the Land, and of her need. Millennia ago, they had recognized that Covenant would return. But nothing about the Ramen suggested that they had such lore.

  Cords gathered around her as she waited, but she ignored them; concentrated on Hami.

  “You keep saying,” she went on when the Manethrall did not answer, “you don’t speak the ur-viles’ language. But that’s not the whole story, is it? You communicate with them somehow. You have some way of working together.”

  “And the Demondim-spawn,” Stave put in harshly, “have ever served Corruption.” He had placed himself at Linden’s shoulder. “They opposed their ancient master in the time of the Sunbane. Yet plainly he did not destroy them, as he appeared to do. Perhaps he preserved them covertly across the centuries, in preparation, it may be, for the return of white gold to the Land.”

  Now Linden took notice of the Cords, drawn by the tension emanating from them. When she studied them, she realized that they shared Hami’s secrets; that all of the Ramen knew the things which the Manethrall would not say.

  Hami bristled at Stave’s words. Her fingers twitched to take hold of her garrote. Stave faced her impassively, however, unswayed by her indignation.

  “Does it offend you, Manethrall, that the Haruchai are not gladdened by your return to the borders of the Land? That we question your actions and your troth? Then reply to the Chosen’s query. Permit us to judge the nature of your purposes.”

  No doubt he could discern the presence of secrets as clearly as Linden did.

  Hami gauged him darkly: she seemed eager for combat. But then, distinctly, she closed the door on her ready pride.

  “You speak of that which lies beyond you, sleepless one,” she answered like a sigh. “Two days I asked in which to take counsel and seek comprehension. This you accepted. Therefore there can be no contest between us. You are safe among the Ramen. We will permit no harm to you, or to your companions.

  “Nor will we take offense. To provoke us is unseemly
. Such impatience ill becomes you.”

  Stave regarded Hami for a moment, apparently appraising her. Then he surprised Linden by bowing as he had in the rift.

  “I hear you, Manethrall. I will be patient, as I have agreed. I have named the causes of my doubt. But know also that I am grieved to encounter the Ramen after so many generations, and to be denied knowledge of the Ranyhyn.

  “You misjudge the Bloodguard. They did not ride Ranyhyn to their deaths, as you avow. Rather they accepted service which the Ranyhyn offered freely. No life or power in all the Land was honored or loved more highly than that of the great horses.”

  Again Hami did not return his bow. Instead she retorted, “The Bloodguard might have refused that service. The Ringthane did so. Yet he prevailed.”

  Then she returned her attention to Linden’s question.

  “As for the timeliness of our aid,” she answered like a shrug, “it is no great wonder. We were drawn to the region of the Mithil valley by the fall of Kevin’s Watch. I have said that we scout the borders of the Land. Such destruction could not escape our notice.”

  Without another word, she turned away, leading her Cords on toward the base of the arête.

  Linden wanted to stay where she was. The animosity between Stave and the Ramen disturbed her. Their every exchange was fraught with history; with memories and passions which she had not shared and could not evaluate. She did not know what to expect from them.

  But the Ramen were moving, and so she followed them. She could not afford the severity which seemed to rule Stave and Hami.

  At once, Liand came to her side, radiating confusion like heat. However, he waited until she acknowledged him with a glance before he murmured privately, “I do not understand. What troubles the Master? Can he not descry the worth of the Ramen?”

  “Sure, he can,” Linden replied softly. “It isn’t their honesty he’s worried about. It’s their secrets.”

  The Stonedownor looked surprised; but he did not contradict her. Perhaps he, too, had felt the undercurrents in Hami and her Cords. Instead he mused as if to himself, “I had not known that the Masters are capable of grief.”

  Linden sighed. “Of course they are.” If they had not felt love or known loss, they would not have sworn the Vow which had bound them to the service of the Lords. “They’re just too strict to admit it most of the time.”

  Liand frowned. “Does that account for their denial of the Land’s history and wonder? Do they fear to grieve?”

  Linden looked at him sharply. “Maybe.” She had not thought of Stave’s people in those terms. “I don’t know anything about Ranyhyn, but it’s obvious they were precious to the Haruchai. Stave is afraid something terrible has happened to them.”

  The young man kept her company in silence for a while. Then he said slowly, “I do not believe so. I know nothing of these Ramen. Nor am I accustomed to the new life which fills my senses. Perhaps it misleads me. Yet—” He paused again, then said more strongly, “Yet I do not believe that any great harm has befallen the Ranyhyn. The Ramen would not countenance it. They would have died, all of them, to prevent it.”

  Linden nodded. The Ramen had given her the same impression.

  But surely Stave could see the Manethrall and her Cords as clearly as Liand did? As clearly as Linden herself? If so—

  If so, his suspicions sprang from a deeper source.

  Like him, she wanted to know why the Ramen would not speak of the great horses.

  In silence, the company finished their descent to the foot of the rubble piled between the cliffs, the base of the arête.

  By the time they reached it, the sun had risen near noon, and Linden could feel its force beginning to scorch her face and neck. She could not gauge how much elevation she had gained since leaving Mithil Stonedown; but the air was noticeably thinner, sharper, and the sun’s fire, masked by the cool atmosphere, had a deceptive intensity. Before long, every exposed inch of her skin would be burned.

  She felt vaguely faint as she joined the Ramen below the arête, light-headed with too much exertion and sun. Fortunately Manethrall Hami called a halt so that the travelers could rest and refresh themselves before tackling the knurled litter of the ridge. No doubt she had done so primarily for Linden’s benefit. Nonetheless Linden was grateful.

  Seen from its base, the arête looked unattainably high: an enormous wrack of boulders piled precariously toward the sky. Its sides appeared to lean outward, impending ominously over anyone foolish enough to attempt them. And some trick of perspective foreshortened the brusque cliffs on either side so that they seemed to emphasize rather than dwarf the ridge. Staring upward, Linden lost her balance and stumbled as though she had felt a tremor in the rubble, a hint of shattering like the unsteadiness that had presaged the fall of Kevin’s Watch.

  The rock remembered its own breaking. If she could have heard granite speak, as Anele did, it might have shared with her the convulsion which had ripped it down from the cliffs.

  She looked around for the old man. He would heed stone wherever he found it, she was sure of that. If he were in one of the more lucid phases of his madness, he might tell her what he gleaned.

  However, she found him seated on a swath of grass sprinkled with wildflowers, gnawing on a strip of jerky which one of the Cords had given him, and muttering imprecations at anyone who went near. His aura reeked of Despite.

  Even here, beyond the familiar borders of the Land, Lord Foul could still reach him.

  Could still know where he was—and Linden with him.

  She had become convinced that the Despiser had sent kresh after her because he had learned of her movements through Anele and sought to stop her. Therefore she assumed—prayed?—that her present course thwarted Lord Foul in some way. Yet as long as he retained his ability to inhabit Anele, however erratically, he could ambush her anywhere.

  She told herself that she should approach the old man now; but the fears which had stopped her earlier restrained her still. She lacked the courage to take his madness into herself.

  For a time, at least, she also might become accessible to the Despiser. And if Lord Foul could reach her, he would reach Covenant’s ring as well.

  Trust yourself, Covenant had urged her in dreams. Linden, find me. But he was dead: she had seen him slain ten years and several millennia ago. She was no nearer to him now than she had been two days ago.

  When the Manethrall called the company forward again, Linden complied with a groan.

  Hami had told her the truth, however: the Ramen knew a way among the boulders that did not surpass her strength. Although the path wove and twisted upward, contorting itself back and forth across the slope, it offered stable footing and a gentle ascent. And it was wider than she had expected, in spite of the towering bulk and knuckled shapes of the stones. Somo navigated the path with little urging: she was able to climb it almost easily.

  Still the ascent took some time. Linden had to stop more and more frequently to rest her quivering muscles. Under other circumstances, she might have accepted a ride on Somo’s back. But she was no horsewoman; and the pinto already looked heavily burdened by Liand’s supplies. And being carried would not make her stronger.

  Lord Foul had Jeremiah. The Land needed her. And the fact that she was entirely unequal to such demands changed nothing. If she did not free her son, no one would. The time had come for her to exceed herself.

  This ridge was as good a place as any to start.

  Somehow she made it. By the time she reached the saddle between the mountains, the sun had moved into the mid-afternoon sky, and her legs had gone numb with strain. Sweat dripped from her cheeks, stained her shirt under her arms and down her back. At intervals, the pangs of cramps or blisters jabbed her feet. Yet she made it. And when she stood, cooling in the breeze, at the crest of the piled stones, she could see what lay ahead of her.

  Beyond the arête, a cluster of mountains leaned away from each other to unfurl a wide valley in their midst: a rich grassland, v
erdant as a meadow in springtime, fed by a network of delicate streams and small pools. In the afternoon light, the whole floor of the valley had a lush hue, an aspect of luxuriance, far deeper than the green sprouting of buds and grass around Mithil Stonedown; and the streams and pools seemed to catch the sun like liquid diamonds. It might have been a place out of time, sheltered from winter by the surrounding peaks: an instance of late spring or summer made possible by an abundance of water and sunshine amid the lingering cold of the mountains.

  The eagerness of the Ramen assured Linden that there lay the Verge of Wandering. From this distance, however, she saw no signs of habitation. If the Ramen lived here, they concealed the evidence well. They may not have been a people who valued structures or permanence. Perhaps they preferred to roam, touching the Earth lightly wherever they paused.

  They were waiting for a chance to return home. To the Plains of Ra, where they belonged.

  Reflexively Linden looked around for Anele. At first, she was unable to locate him: he was not among the Ramen. Then she spotted him a short way off the path. He had clambered away from his companions in order to sprawl on a sheet of stone and wedge his face into the gap between two weathered chunks of granite.

  Anele? Frowning in concern, she limped toward him.

  He had not collapsed there; was not unconscious. Rather her health-sense detected a sharpened awareness, as if his nerves had been tuned to a higher pitch. His aura had taken on a hue of concentration, lucid and helpless. Automatically she assumed that he was listening to the stone; that he had jammed his face against it in order to hear its whispering.

  When she reached his side, however, she saw that she was wrong. He was not listening: he was cowering. Fear boiled off him like steam. He had forced his head between those two stones as though they might stop his ears.

  Earthpower throbbed in him like the labor of a stricken heart.

  “Anele, what’s wrong?” She had asked him that too often. He needed more than her concerned incomprehension. “What do you hear?”

  The stones he had chosen were comparatively smooth. Wind and water and time had worn away their roughness until they resembled the floor of his gaol in Mithil Stonedown; the surface of Kevin’s Watch.