Covenant was looking at her intently, waiting for her response. After a moment, she pursued the thread of his explanation.
“So he can't break you. And you can't fight him. What good is a stalemate?”
At that, he smiled harshly. But his reply took a different direction than she had expected. “When I saw Mhoram in Andelain”- his tone was as direct as courage- “he tried to warn me. He said, “It boots nothing to avoid his snares, for they are ever beset with other snares, and life and death are too intimately intergrown to be severed from each other. When you have come to the crux, and have no other recourse, remember the paradox of white gold. There is hope in contradiction.” By degrees, his expression softened, became more like the one for which she was insatiable. “I don't think there's going to be any stalemate.”
She returned his smile as best as she could, trying to emulate him in the same way that he strove to match the ancient Lord who had befriended him.
She hoped he would take her in his arms again. She wanted that, regardless of the Sunbane. She could bear the violation of the desert sun for the sake of his embrace. But as they gazed at each other, she heard a faint, strange sound wafting over the upland hills-a high run of notes, as poignant as the tone of a flute. But it conveyed no discernible melody. It might have been the wind singing among the barren rocks.
Covenant jerked up his head, scanned the hillsides “The last time I heard a flute up here-” He had been with Elena; and the music of a flute had presaged the coming of the man who had told him that his dreams were true.
But this sound was not music. It cracked on a shrill note and fell silent. When it began again, it was clearly a flute-and clearly being played by someone who did not know how. Its lack of melody was caused by simple ineptitude.
It came from the direction of Revelstone.
The tone cracked again; and Covenant winced humorously. “Whoever's playing that thing needs help,” he muttered. “And we ought to go back anyway. I want to settle things and get started today.”
Linden nodded. She would have been content to spend a few days resting in Revelstone; but she was willing to do whatever he wanted. And she would, be able to enjoy her scrubbed skin and clean hair better in the Keep, protected from the Sunbane. She took his band, and together they climbed out of the basin of the tarn.
From the hilltop, they heard the flute more accurately. It sounded like its music had been warped by the desert sun.
The plains beyond the plateau looked flat and ruined to the horizons, all life hammered out of them; nothing green or bearable lifted its head from the upland dirt. Yet Glimmermere's water and the shape of the hills seemed to insist that life was still possible here, that in some stubborn way the ground was not entirely wasted.
However, the lower plains gave no such impression. Most of the river evaporated before it reached the bottom of Furl Falls; the rest disappeared within a stone's throw of the cliff. The sun flamed down at Linden as if it were calling her to itself. Before they reached the flat wedge of the plateau which contained Revelstone, she knew that her determination to stand by him would not prove easy. In the bottom of her heart lurked a black desire for the power to master the Sunbane, make it serve her. Every moment of the sun's touch reminded her that she was still vulnerable to desecration.
But by the time they rejoined Cail at the city's entrance, they could hear that the fluting came from the tip of the promontory overlooking the watchtower. By mute agreement, they walked on down the wedge; and at the Keep's apex they found Pitchwife. He sat with his legs over the edge, facing eastward. The deformation of his spine bent him forward. He appeared to be leaning toward a fall.
His huge hands held a flute to his mouth as if he were wrestling with it-as if he thought that by sheer obstinate effort he would be able to wring a dirge from the tiny instrument.
At their approach, he lowered the flute to his lap, gave them a wan smile of habit rather than conviction. “Earthfriend,” he said; and his voice sounded as frayed and uncertain as the notes he had been playing. “It boons me to behold you again and whole. The Chosen has proven and reproven her worth for all to see-and yet has survived to bring her beauty like gladness before me.” He did not glance at Linden. “But I had thought that you were gone from us altogether.”
Then his moist gaze wandered back to the dry, dead terrain below him. “Pardon me that I have feared for you. Fear is born in doubt, and you have not merited my doubt.” With an awkward movement, like suppressed violence, he indicated the flute. “The fault is mine. I can find no music in this instrument.”
Instinctively, Linden went to stand behind the Giant, placed her hands on his shoulders. In spite of his sitting posture and crooked back, his shoulders were only a little below hers; and his muscles were so oaken that she could hardly massage them. Yet she rubbed at his distress because she did not know how else to comfort him.
“Everybody doubts,” Covenant breathed. He did not go near the Giant. He remained rigidly where he was, holding his vertigo back from the precipice. But his voice reached out through the sun's arid heat. “We're all scared. You have the right.” Then his tone changed as if he were remembering what Pitchwife had undergone. Softly, he asked, “What can I do for you?”
Pitchwife's muscles knotted under Linden's hands. After a moment, he said simply, “Earthfriend, I desire a better outcome.”
At once, he added, “Do not mistake me. That which has been done here has been well done. Mortal though you are, Earthfriend and Chosen, you surpass all estimation.” He let out a quiet sigh. “But I am not content. I have shed such blood-The lives of the innocent I have taken from them by the score, though I am no Swordmain and loathe such work. And as I did so, my doubt was terrible to me. It is a dire thing to commit butchery when hope has been consumed by fear. As you have said. Chosen, there must be a reason. The world's grief should unite those who live, not sunder them in slaughter and malice.
“My friends, there is a great need in my heart for song, but no song comes. I am a Giant. Often have I vaunted myself in music. 'We are Giants, born to sail, and bold to go wherever dreaming goes.' But such songs have become folly and arrogance to me. In the face of doom, I have not the courage of my dreams. Ah, my heart must have song. I find no music in it.
“I desire a better outcome.”».
His voice trailed away over the cliff-edge and was gone. Linden felt the ache in him as if she had wrapped her arms around it. She wanted to protest the way he seemed to blame himself; yet she sensed that his need went deeper than blame. He had tasted the Despiser's malice and was appalled. She understood that. But she had no answer to it.
Covenant was more certain. He sounded as strict as a vow as he asked, “What're you going to do?”
Pitchwife responded with a shrug that shifted Linden's hands from his shoulders. He did not look away from the destitution sprawling below him. “The First has spoken of this,” he said distantly. The thought of his wife gave him no ease. “We will accompany you to the end. The Search requires no less of us. But when you have made your purpose known, Mistweave will bear word of it to Seareach. There Starfare's Gem will come if the ice and the seas permit. Should you fail, and those with you fall, the Search must yet continue. The knowledge which Mistweave will bear to Seareach will enable Sevinhand Anchormaster to choose the path of his service.”