One Tree

by Stephen R. Donaldson

  The First made a cautioning gesture. But when Linden looked stiffly in that direction, she saw a grim satisfaction in the First’s eyes. Honninscrave appeared distressed; but Seadreamer was nodding, and Covenant’s features were keen with indignation and approval.

  “Your pardon.” In an instant, Chant donned an urbane calm like a second mantle. “My welcoming has been unseemly. Though you know it not, my intent has been to serve the purpose which impels you. Let me make amends. Ring-wielder, will you accompany me?”

  The invitation startled Covenant. But then he gritted, “Try to stop me.”

  Riding the effect of his approval, Linden turned to Daphin. “I’m ready when you are.”

  Daphin’s countenance betrayed neither conflict nor disdain. “You are gracious. I am pleased.” Taking Linden’s arm once again, she led her away from the company.

  When Linden glanced backward, she saw that all her companions were moving in different directions, each accompanied by an Elohim. A dim sense of incompleteness, of something missing, afflicted her momentarily; but she attributed it to the absence of the Haruchai and let Daphin guide her away among the wonders of Elemesnedene.

  But she detached her arm from the Elohim’s touch. She did not want Daphin to feel her reactions. For all its amazements, the clachan suddenly seemed a cold and joyless place, where beings of inbred life and convoluted intent mimed an exuberance they were unable to share.

  And yet on every hand Elemesnedene contradicted her. Sportive and gratuitous incarnations were everywhere as far as she could see—pools casting rainbows of iridescent fish; mists composed of a myriad ice crystals; flowers whose every leaf and petal burned like a cruse. And each of them was an Elohim, enacting transformations for reasons which eluded her. The whole of the clachan appeared to be one luxurious entertainment.

  But who was meant to be entertained by it? Daphin moved as if she were bemused by her own thoughts, unaware of what transpired around her. And each performance appeared hermetic and self-complete. In no discernible way did they cooperate with or observe each other. Was this entire display performed for no other reason than the simple joy of wonder and play?

  Her inability to answer such questions disturbed Linden. Like the language of the bells, the Elohim surpassed her. She had been learning to rely on the Land-born penetration of her senses; but here that ability did not suffice. When she looked at a fountain of feathers or a glode of ophite, she only knew that it was one of the Elohim because she had already witnessed similar incarnations. She could not see a sentient being in the gavotte of butterflies or the budding of liquid saplings, just as she had not seen Chant and Daphin in the earth near her feet. And she could not pierce Daphin’s blank beauty to whatever lay within. The spirit of what she saw and heard was beyond her reach. All she could descry clearly was power—an essential puissance that seemed to transcend every structure or law of existence. Whatever the Elohim were, they were too much for her.

  Then she began to wonder if that were the purpose of her examination—to learn how much of the truth she could discern, how much she was worthy of the role the Elohim had seen in her. If so, the test was one she had already failed.

  But she refused to be daunted. Covenant would not have surrendered his resolve. She could see him limned in danger and old refusal, prepared to battle doom itself in order to wrest out survival for the Land he loved. Very well. She would do no less.

  Girding herself in severity, she turned her mind to her examination.

  Daphin had said, I will ask you nothing. You will ask me. That made more sense to her now. She might reveal much in her questions. But she accepted the risk and looked for ways to gain information while exposing as little as possible.

  She took a moment to formulate her words clearly against the incessant background of the bells, then asked in her flat professional voice, “Where are we going?”

  “Going?” replied Daphin lightly. “We are not ‘going’ at all. We merely walk.” When Linden stared at her, she continued, “This is Elemesnedene itself. Here there is no other ‘where’ to which we might go.”

  Deliberately Linden exaggerated her surface incomprehension. “There has to be. We’re moving. My friends are somewhere else. How will we get back to them? How will we find that Elohimfest Chant mentioned?”

  “Ah, Sun-Sage,” Daphin chuckled. Her laugh sounded like a moonrise in this place which had neither moon nor sun. “In Elemesnedene all ways are one. We will meet with your companions when that meeting has ripened. And there will be no need to seek the place of the Elohimfest. It will be held at the center, and in Elemesnedene all places are the center. We walk from the center to the center, and where we now walk is also the center.”

  Is that what happened to those Giants who decided to stay here? Linden barely stopped herself from speaking aloud. Did they just start walking and never find each other again until they died?

  But she kept the thought to herself. It revealed too much of her apprehension and distrust. Instead she chose an entirely different reaction. In a level tone, as if she were simply reporting symptoms, she said, “Well, I’ve been walking all day, and I’m tired. I need some rest.”

  This was not true. Though she had not eaten or rested since the quest had left Starfare’s Gem, she felt as fresh as if she had just arisen from a good sleep and a satisfying meal. Somehow, the atmosphere of the clachan met all her physical needs. She made her assertion simply to see how Daphin would respond.

  The Elohim appeared to perceive the lie; yet she delicately refrained from challenging it. “There is no weariness in Elemesnedene,” she said, “and walking is pleasant. Yet it is also pleasant to sit or to recline. Here is a soothing place.” She indicated the slope of a low grassy hill nearby. On the hillcrest stood a large willow leaved entirely in butterfly-wings; and at the foot of the slope lay a still vlei with colors floating across its surface like a lacustrine portrait of the clachan itself. Daphin moved onto the hillside and sat down, disposing her cymar gracefully about her.

  Linden followed. When she had found a comfortable position upon the lush grass, she framed her next question.

  Pointing toward the vlei, she asked, “Is that a man or a woman?” Her words sounded crude beside Daphin’s beauty; but she made no attempt to soften them. She did not like exposing her impercipience; but she guessed that her past actions had already made the Elohim aware of this limitation.

  “Morninglight?” replied Daphin, gazing at the color-swept water. “You would name him a man.”

  “What’s he doing?”

  Daphin returned her apple-green eyes to Linden. “Sun-Sage, what question is this? Are we not in Elemesnedene? In the sense of your word, there is no ‘doing’ here. This is not an act with a purpose such as you name purpose. Morninglight performs self-contemplation. He enacts the truth of his being as he beholds it, and thus he explores that truth, beholding and enacting new truth. We are the Elohim. For certain visions we look elsewhere. The ‘doing’ of which you speak is more easily read on the surface of the Earth than in its heart. But all truths are within us, and for these truths we seek into ourselves.”

  “Then,” Linden asked, reacting to a curious detachment in Daphin’s tone, “you don’t watch him? You don’t pay attention to each other?

  This”—she indicated Morninglight’s water-show—“isn’t intended to communicate something?”

  The question seemed to give Daphin a gentle surprise. “What is the need? I also am the heart of the Earth, as he is. Wherefore should I desire his truth, when I may freely seek my own?”

  This answer appeared consistent to Linden; and yet its self-sufficiency baffled her. How could any being be so complete? Daphin sat there in her loveliness and her inward repose, as if she had never asked herself a question for which she did not already know the answer. Her personal radiance shone like hints of sunlight, and when she spoke her voice was full of moonbeams. Linden did not trust her. But now she comprehended the wonder and excitement, the awe
bordering on adoration, which Honninscrave had learned to feel toward these people.

  Still she could not shake off her tremorous inner disquiet. The bells would not leave her alone. They came so close to meaning, but she could not decipher their message. Her nerves tightened involuntarily.

  “That’s not what Chant thinks. He thinks his truth is the only one there is.”

  Daphin’s limpid gaze did not waver. “Perhaps that is true. Where is the harm? He is but one Elohim among many. And yet,” she went on after a moment’s consideration, “he was not always so. He has found within himself a place of shadow which he must explore. All who live contain some darkness, and much lies hidden there. Surely it is perilous, as any shadow which encroaches upon the light is perilous. But in us it has not been a matter of exigency—for are we not equal to all things? Yet for Chant that shadow has become exigent. Risking much, as he does, he grows impatient with those who have not yet beheld or entered the shadows cast by their own truths. And others tread this path with him.

  “Sun-Sage.” Now a new intentness shone from Daphin—the light of a clear desire. “This you must comprehend. We are the Elohim, the heart of the Earth. We stand at the center of all that lives and moves and is. We live in peace because there are none who can do us hurt, and if it were our choice to sit within Elemesnedene and watch the Earth age until the end of Time, there would be none to gainsay us. No other being or need may judge us, just as the hand may not judge the heart which gives it life.

  “But because we are the heart, we do not shirk the burden of the truth within us. We have said that our vision foreknew the coming of Sun-Sage and ring-wielder. It is cause for concern that they are separate. There is great need that Sun-Sage and ring-wielder should be one. Nevertheless the coming itself was known. In the mountains which cradle our clachan, we see the peril of this Sunbane which requires you to your quest. And in the trees of Woodenwold we have read your arrival.

  “Yet had such knowing comprised the limit of our knowledge, you would have been welcomed here merely as other visitors are welcomed, in simple kindness and curiosity. But our knowledge is not so small. We have found within ourselves this shadow upon the heart of the Earth, and it has altered our thoughts. It has taught us to conceive of the Sunbane in new ways—and to reply to the Earth’s peril in a manner other than our wont.

  “You have doubted us. And your doubt will remain. Perhaps it will grow until it resembles loathing. Yet I say to you, Sun-Sage, that you judge us falsely. That you should presume to judge us at all is incondign and displeasing. We are the heart of the Earth and not to be judged.”

  Daphin spoke strongly; but she did not appear vexed. Rather, she asked for understanding in the way a parent might ask a child for good behavior. Her tone abashed Linden. But she also rebelled. Daphin was asking her to give up her responsibility for discernment and action; and she would not. That responsibility was her reason for being here, and she had earned it.

  Then the bells seemed to rise up in her like the disapproval of Elemesnedene. “What are you?” she inquired in a constrained voice. “The heart of the Earth. The center. The truth. What does all that mean?”

  “Sun-Sage,” replied Daphin, “we are the Würd of the Earth.”

  She spoke clearly, but her tone was confusing. Her Würd sounded like Wyrd or Word.

  Wyrd? Linden thought. Destiny—doom? Or Word?

  Or both.

  Into the silence, Daphin placed her story. It was an account of the creation of the Earth; and Linden soon realized that it was the same tale Pitchwife had told her during the calling of the Nicor. Yet it contained one baffling difference. Daphin did not speak of a Worm. Rather, she used that blurred sound, Würd, which seemed to signify both Wyrd and Word.

  This Würd had awakened at the dawning of the eon and begun to consume the stars as if it intended to devour the cosmos whole. After a time, it had grown satiated and had curled around itself to rest, thus forming the Earth. And thus the Earth would remain until the Würd roused to resume its feeding.

  It was precisely the same story Pitchwife had told. Had the Giants who had first brought that tale out of Elemesnedene misheard it? Or had the Elohim pronounced it differently to other visitors?

  As if in answer, Daphin concluded, “Sun-Sage, we are the Würd—the direct offspring of the creation of the Earth. From it we arose, and in it we have our being. Thus we are the heart, and the center, and the truth, and therefore we are what we are. We are all answers, just as we are every question. For that reason, you must not judge the reply which we will give to your need.”

  Linden hardly heard the Elohim. Her mind was awhirl with implications. Intuitions rang against the limits of her understanding like the clamor of bells. We are the Würd. Morninglight swirling with color like a portrait of the clachan in metaphor. A willow leaved in butterflies. Self-contemplation.

  Power.

  Dear God! She could hardly form words through the soundless adumbration of the chimes. The Elohim—! They’re Earthpower. The heart of the Earth. Earthpower incarnate.

  She could not think in sequence. Hopes and insights out-raced each other. These people could do everything they wanted. They were everything they wanted. They could give any gift they chose for any reason of whim or conviction. Could give her what she was after. What Honninscrave desired. Give Covenant —

  They were the answer to Lord Foul. The cure for the Sunbane. They—

  “Daphin—” she began. What secret reply had these people already decided to give the quest? But the clanging muffled everything. Volitionlessly she protested, “I can’t think. What in hell are these bells?”

  At that instant, Morninglight suddenly swept himself into human form, effacing the vlei. He was tall and stately, with inward eyes and gray-stroked hair. He wore a mantle like Chant’s as if it, too, were an expression of his self-knowledge. Moving up the hillside, he turned a gentle smile toward Linden.

  And as he approached, the notes in her mind said as clearly as language:

  —We must hasten, lest this Sun-Sage learn to hear us too acutely.

  As if she were uplifted by music, Daphin rose to her feet, extended her hand to Linden. “Come, Sun-Sage,” she said smoothly. “The Elohimfest awaits you.”

  EIGHT: The Elohimfest

  What the hell?

  Linden could not move. The lucidity with which the soundless bells had spoken staggered her. She gaped at Daphin’s outstretched hand. It made no impression on her. Feverishly she grappled for the meaning of the music.

  We must hasten—

  Had she heard that—or invented it in her confusion?

  Hear us too acutely.

  Her Land-born percipience had stumbled onto something she had not been intended to receive. The speakers of the bells did not want her to know what they were saying.

  She fought to concentrate. But she could not take hold of that language. Though it hushed itself as she groped toward it, it did not fall altogether silent. It continued to run in the background of her awareness like a conversation of fine crystal. And yet it eluded her. The more she struggled to comprehend it, the more it sounded like mere bells and nothing else.

  Daphin and Morninglight were gazing at her as if they could read the rush of her thoughts. She needed to be left alone, needed time to think. But the eyes of the Elohim did not waver. Her trepidation tightened, and she recognized another need—to keep both the extent and the limitation of her hearing secret. If she were not intended to discern these bells, then in order to benefit from them she must conceal what she heard.

  She had to glean every secret she could. Behind Daphin’s apparent candor, the Elohim were keeping their true purposes hidden. And Covenant and the rest of her companions were dependent on her, whether they knew it or not. They did not have her ears.

  The music had not been silenced. Therefore she had not entirely given herself away. Yet. Trying to cover her confusion, she blinked at Daphin and asked incredulously, “Is that all? You’re done e
xamining me? You don’t know anything about me.”

  Daphin laughed lightly. “Sun-Sage, this ‘examining’ is like the ‘doing’ of which you speak so inflexibly. For us, the word has another meaning. I have considered myself and garnered all the truth of you that I require. Now come.” She repeated the outreach of her hand. “Have I not said that the Elohimfest awaits you? There the coming of Infelice will offer another insight. And also we will perform the asking and answering for which you have quested over such distances. Is it not your desire to attend that congregation?”

  “Yes,” replied Linden, suppressing her discomfiture. “That’s what I want.” She had forgotten her hopes amid the disquieting implications of the bells. But her friends would have to be warned. She would have to find a way to ward them against the danger they could not hear. Stiffly she accepted Daphin’s hand, let the Elohim lift her to her feet.

  With Daphin on one side and Morninglight on the other like guards, she left the hillside.

  She had no sense of direction in this place; but she did not question Daphin’s lead. Instead she concentrated on concealing her thoughts behind a mask of severity.

  On all sides were the wonders of Elemesnedene. Bedizened trees and flaming shrubs, fountains imbued with the color of ichor, animals emblazoned like tapestries: everywhere the Elohim enacted astonishment as if it were merely gratuitous—the spilth or detritus of their self-contemplations. But now each of these nonchalant theurgies appeared ominous to Linden, suggestive of peril and surquedry. The bells chimed in her head. Though she fought to hold them, they meant nothing.

  For one blade-sharp moment, she felt as she had felt when she had first entered Revelstone: trapped in the coercion of Santonin’s power, riven of every reason which had ever given shape or will to her life. Here the compulsion was more subtle; but it was as cloying as attar, and it covered everything with its pall. If the Elohim did not choose to release her, she would never leave Elemesnedene.