TOT-Chapter 20: Fire in Bhrathairealm

[caamora]

Here we go. This will not be too long.

Lindens POV. She has taken on Covenant's absent mind. She sees and hears everything around her, but can only lament "Covenant is gone." Covenant's ritual "Don't touch me" becomes Linden's "Please, God, let me die."

Led by Lady Alif, the questors flee the Sandhold, which TC has turned to rubble with white gold, they are beset on all sides by hustin. They have to fight their way out. In the skirmish, a hustin spots Linden and closes in for the kill. Wounded Ceer hops in front of her and takes the spear that was meant for Linden, saving her life. Linden watches all around her without much regard. "Covenant is gone." "You never loved me anyway." "Please God, let me die."

As Ceer lies on Linden's lap bleeding to death, he says, "Help me rise. I must fight." (What a man!) Linden hears, "Let me die." She reaches down, taking a broken spear and aims it at Ceer's throat. In her mind, Ceer has become her mother, her father - herself? She is kicked away by Cail. Ceer dies of the hustin spear. The hustin have lost their focus and the party realizes that they have lost their master - Kasryne is dead.

The party races to the harbor where they see the dromond under attack. Rire Grist is there and is suddenly their friend. He says that had they not killed Kasryne, he would have not lived long since he was out of favor. The First engages him to call off the attack on the dromond. He says he cannot. She accepts this and instead, charges him to locate Thomas Covenant and bring him safely to the spikes.

Linden is now beginning to come out of the darkness and is having conscious thought. Cail sees the change in her but it makes no difference to him - she still tried to kill Ceer. Lady Alif takes this oppotunity to leave the party, saying that she has work to do now that thngs have changed in Bhrathairealm.( I think she does this before Rire Grist shows up ) The group watches the attack of the dromond with baited breath. She is an easy target in the harbor. Just at that moment, Brinn, with Covenant arrive. Findail emerges from the darkness.

Covenant is ravaged with power. He asks Linden if she is alright. Linden sees his pain and assures him that what he did saved them all. Don't blame yourself! But Covenant is anguished over all the death. "Findail says I'm the one who is going to destroy the Earth." The First reminds everyone that they must get to Starfare's Gem. Covenant was still trying to refuse Linden.

With the help of Rire Grist, the company gets to Starfare's Gem and escapes into the night.

[Durris]

Kevin's guts, what a chapter. It took me at least three tries to get through it at this rereading: I kept getting stuck at Linden's memories, not to mention the attempted murder I knew was about to happen.

As the sirens of the Sandhold give voice, Linden hears something else entirely.

But other cries were in Linden's ears--her own screams as she begged at her dying father. Night had flooded her soul then, though her father had died in daylight. He had sat in a half-broken rocker in the attic with blood pouring like despair from his gashed wrists. She could smell the sweet reek of blood, feel her former nausea more explicitly than Cail's grasp on her arm. Her father had thrown the key out the window, enforcing his self-pity on her, denying her the power to save him. Darkness had risen at her out of the floorboards and the walls, out of his mouth--his mouth stretched black in fathomless abjection and triumph, the insatiable hunger for darkness. He had spattered blood like Hergrom's on her.

At first I was struck by the contrast hidden in this simile: only the act of bleeding is the same. Hergrom died on behalf of others, in courage and acceptance ("We desire to meet this punishment, that we may see it ended.") Mr. Avery died for himself alone, in cowardice and utmost refusal. (May his name be erased.)

Then I realized that there's also a similarity: not in the two men or their deaths, but in Linden's position before them. Both times she is a mute and helpless witness who can do nothing, but because she can do nothing she feels responsible for what she is seeing. Her father made her responsible, corruptly, unjustly, by throwing away the key and by saying "You never loved me anyway." Cail held her responsible for Hergrom's death because she had not given permission to kill Kasreyn. Cail's accusation came from extravagant righteousness rather than depraved selfishness, but, like her father's, brought about conditions in which she later incurred actual guilt.

As Ceer lies on Linden's lap bleeding to death, he says, "Help me rise. I must fight." (What a man!)

I remain flabbergasted by such denial of mortality, such capacious absorption of pain. Poor brave sumbitch.

Linden hears, "Let me die."

I didn't realize that she had actually heard that instead of what Ceer literally said. That makes what's going on different somehow. (I still don't mean to condone it, but if she heard her own and her mother's refrain rather than just thinking it, her act becomes more a reenactment of her past and less a--spontaneous desecration.)

She reaches down, taking a broken spear and aims it at Ceer's throat. In her mind, Ceer has become her mother, her father - herself?

There's an awful economy in how he becomes all three for her. And she can't perceive the difference between present and past--she does not understand that Ceer is dying for her, not at her the way her father had done.

Somehow here Linden becomes a microcosm of the Sunbane--and seems, in both her own eyes and Cail's, to fulfill Gibbon-Raver's prophecies. The rivers of Haruchai blood that had already soaked Revelstone for generations in TWL somehow didn't affect me nearly as much as this one death.

I couldn't uncurl my toes or get a good breath throughout the chapter to this point; but I didn't weep until the Lady Alif took her leave of the company. (Withstanding pages of industrial-strength caamora material only to be undone by one peripheral eucatastrophe--!)

"Now there will be work for any who no longer love the gaddhi. And I possess some of the secrets of the Sandhold. That knowledge may be of service to those who do not wish to replace one Rant Absolain with another." She stood erect in her tattered robes, a woman who had at last come into her heart's estate.

You go, girl. *bows deeply*

Linden could hardly be farther from her own heart's estate at the moment. SRD always puts together "already" and "not yet" until the tug-of-war between hope and despair reaches rending proportions.

[Seafoam Understone]

I wonder if this is one of the chapters that makes readers "hate" or "dislike" Linden because of the attempt on Ceer's life.
Yes as always the Haruchai refuse to go down without a fight, especially in the middle of a fight. Kinda like Klingons... better to die in battle than in bed...pagh!"
Yet the Haruchai's judgement is still stone absolute. Doesn't matter that Linden may not know exactly what she is doing or even why, just the fact that she tried and against one of their own!

Lady Alif, definitely shows her true colors several times here. A worthy supporting character. Softened by her years in the Sandhold she suddenly reveals the true make of her stone (to paraphrase Giantish), when her world crashes around her. Brave is she that she still sees hope for her people and braver still that she goes off into the malestrom of the city's collapse to do what she can with the knowledge that she poessesses.

Same with Rire Gist. Sounds like a guy who did what he had to do because it was a job that put him above others which is a choice place to be it seems in Bhrathairealm. He too is made of sturdier stone than what it at first seems as he keeps his word to the First. Since the Harbor is their main source of commerce it would be wise to keep the "far-roaming" Giants' favor. Or at least salvage what ill name they've been given.
Even still he goes one further to the Spikes and uses his (now questionable) authority to halt the attack(s) on the Giantship.
It's not going to be easy for him or for Alif to try and re-instate their home and rebuild it without a tyrant, now that he's been removed from power. The Giants leave them to deal with that themselves.

Spoiler

(Seems to me that's what we Americans need to do with IRAQ for crying outloud!!)

Covenant, poor Covenant

Spoiler

we all know how he hates horses

arrives...

Brinn sat in the saddle. He saluted the Giants. Lifting one leg over the saddlehorn, he dismounted. Only then did Covenant become visible. He had been crouching against the Haruchai's back as if he feared for his life-dismayed by the speed and height of the horse. Brinn had to help him down.

He clearly wants to just curl up with Linden and forget the bloodshed, but that old Leper's cry of UNCLEAN still seems to echo in his mind, as if he is undeserving:

He bore himself like a cripple. Yet somewhere he found the strength to hear the First, understand her. Or perhaps it was guilt rather than strength. He moved past Linden toward the Spike as if he could not face his need for her. He was still trying to refuse her.

And Linden can only see his rejection as deserved refusal for her crimes...

Unable to comprehend his abnegation, she had no choice but to follow him. Her pants had become as stiff and necessary as death after Ceer's last wound. Her arm would not move. After all, Covenant was right to refuse her. Sooner or later, the Haruchai would tell him about Ceer. Then she would never be able to touch him. When Pitchwife took the place Cail had repudiated at her side, she let him steer her into the tower.

Of course the Haruchai will tell him about what she's done. Was she not evil? Was she not the hand of corruption among them?

[dlbpharmd]

This chapter is definitely a point where my dislike of LA reaches it's peak. I could strangle her for her attempt on Ceer's life. The image of Ceer raising a hand to try to stop the speer tip is one of the most disturbing in the entire Chronicles. He must've called out in Haruchai-mind speak for someone to help him, as Cail quickly comes to his defense.

[duchess of malfi]

It is truly horrifying, and very difficult to read...but on the other hand, Linden's mind has been messed up by the Elohim spell she has taken upon herself to free Covenant. All of the darkness in her past rises up and engulfs her...there is no excuse for what her parents did to her. And the wounds in her very soul that resulted from their actions to their daughter are shown here, in all of their gruesomeness.

On the other hand, isn't Lady Alif truly wonderful? She shows her true worth, her true beauty here...and to think, this brave and intelligent woman had been wasted as a sex toy in a petty tyrant's harem for who knows how long?

[danlo]

Well, I'm trying to catch up--but I try not to blame Linden-when in doubt blame the Elohim for that damm "silence". Everything has a cost, doesn't it? Covered in sin. Aside from from her arm Linden can barely even walk from Ceer's blood congealing on her so fast. If Pitch hadn't been around Cail would have killed her outright.

Speaking of being killed outright, if not for impeccable timing, the Search would have been. Again everything has it's cost. Sure, according to Findail , TC's whitegold blasts were ill-advised but if that energy hadn't been coruscating through the rings surrounding Kasreyn's chair blinding him with the power to kill Covenant he would have been able to destroy everyone else. He would have been able to coordinate the hustin to throw their spears, all at once, and the rest of the Search would be dead.

By putting his life in jeopardy TC unwittingly saves everybody else, the first time. Findail vindicates himself (at terrible cost) somewhat and then saves the Search again by killing the croyell but the Sunsage's dark past-stirred by the "silence"-is something the Elohim never bargained for when they imposed it. Inbetween the two scrapes with certian death Cail saves any hope for the entire Elohim race with one well placed kick. Even the Elohim are now forced to made choices against their very nature in this mad struggle to save the Land (and the Land's Earth).

Nobody's happy, but everyone's alive and Starfare's Gem is seaworthy...

[matrixman]

the Sunsage's dark past-stirred by the "silence"-is something the Elohim never bargained for when they imposed it.

Yes, Linden was an unpredictable variable that fouled up the Elohim's tidy equation for "solving" Covenant. They have difficulty fitting complex and contradictory human beings like Linden and Covenant into their orderly view. Right from the start, the Elohim were confused (though they would deny that they could ever be confused about anything) when the Sun-Sage and "ring-wielder" arrived as two separate beings. So the Elohim had to go to Plan B: the silence. But they underestimated (or weren't even aware of) the depth of the bond between the Sun-Sage and the ring-wielder. They hadn't counted on Linden taking Covenant's silence upon herself, much less foreseen her dark past rising up to take control of her actions in the case of Ceer. Poor Findail may be thinking to himself: This Sun-Sage is clearly nuts. What have I gotten myself into?

Dumb question: do the Elohim know about Linden's (and Covenant's) "real life" past? I was thinking about one of the basic limitations of the Elohim: they are of the Earth, but not outside it. They have knowledge of everything (or so they claim) in their world, but Linden comes from outside their world. Does that mean they have no knowledge of her dark history, only that she is the Sun-Sage? If so, then the Elohim's lack of understanding of Linden (and thus, lack of compassion for her plight?) plays right into Lord Foul's hands, since he knows very well Linden's dark past, and knows it can be used against her.

Same with the Haruchai. Linden is guilty in their eyes for trying to kill Ceer, no ifs and buts. I can see Lord Foul laughing at Linden's attempt on Ceer's life, and laughing at the Haruchai's ignorance of what made her do it.

All of the darkness in her past rises up and engulfs her...there is no excuse for what her parents did to her. And the wounds in her very soul that resulted from their actions to their daughter are shown here, in all of their gruesomeness.

Yes, which is why I can't be angry at Linden. When I first read the books all those years ago, I was probably peeved at her. But I've had twenty years to think about it.

Also want to add to the praise for the Lady Alif. She is wonderful indeed. Like Memla of the Clave, the Lady Alif was a woman who functioned within a system of control and coercion. And like Memla, the arrival of Thomas Covenant and the white gold (the wild magic that "destroys peace"--i.e. breaks the status quo) changed everything for the Lady. Unlike Memla, the Lady survived the cost of defying the system, and is now free to chart her own life as she sees fit.

Later on, as the First and Pitchwife turn to confront the gaddhi's Horse, SRD describes them in a simple little passage that I love:

The First held her falchion in her hands and waited. Pitchwife hunched forward with his hands braced on his knees, gathering breath and strength for battle. In the immanent silver of the light, they looked like colossal icons, numinously silent and puissant.

That image of "colossal icons" in moonlight has always stuck in my mind. The two Giants there just seem to symbolize the heroism and hope of the quest standing against impossible odds. Add the sirens wailing in the night, and the Giantship's lit-by-fireball drama in the Harbor, and you have a scene that gives me goosebumps.

The First and Pitchwife: what an awesome pair! (I think I said that before).

[Durris]

Yes, Linden was an unpredictable variable that fouled up the Elohim's tidy equation for "solving" Covenant. They have difficulty fitting complex and contradictory human beings like Linden and Covenant into their orderly view. Right from the start, the Elohim were confused (though they would deny that they could ever be confused about anything) when the Sun-Sage and "ring-wielder" arrived as two separate beings. So the Elohim had to go to Plan B: the silence. But they underestimated (or weren't even aware of) the depth of the bond between the Sun-Sage and the ring-wielder. They hadn't counted on Linden taking Covenant's silence upon herself, much less foreseen her dark past rising up to take control of her actions in the case of Ceer. Poor Findail may be thinking to himself: This Sun-Sage is clearly nuts. What have I gotten myself into?

In their initial consternation at seeing Sun-Sage and ring-wielder as two separate people, one of the Elohim says "Maybe there is a merging to come, or a death." Since each Elohim performs solitary self-contemplation and does not emotionally need, or become heavily identified with, other beings (whether Elohim or of other species), I think they fail to reckon with the human capacity for love. Though Covenant and Linden have had a long, slow development of their pair bond and neither has yet dared to avow it aloud, nonetheless each has already taken vast risks for the sake of the other. Although the consequences of Linden's absorption of the silence were terrible, her choice to absorb the silence was, given her fears, heroic. (And although self-vindicating promises/bargains appear to have been part of the motive, the description of her actual descent into Covenant's mind shows an act of selfless, vulnerable love.)

I'm rambling. To come to the point: I think the Elohim erred in placing the "merging and death" in the indefinite future; not understanding human souls, they didn't realize that Sun-Sage and ring-wielder had already begun merging, such that the well-being of each was necessary to the other, and they certainly didn't realize that human selfishness and separateness "dies" in love long before the death of the body.

Also, in their solitary arrogance and Earthpowerful mastery, the Elohim neither understood nor believed in the necessity of freedom. Since they already saw all lesser beings as infinitely manipulable by powers beyond lesser beings' ken, the Elohim trusted only their own manipulations to fend off Foul's. They could not or would not consider that puny humans might do something on their own initiative.

[duchess of malfi]

from both of you.

[matrixman]

Wow, that's some terrific insight into the Elohim, Durris!

Since each Elohim performs solitary self-contemplation and does not emotionally need, or become heavily identified with, other beings (whether Elohim or of other species), I think they fail to reckon with the human capacity for love.

That makes sense to me, Durris. It explains a lot about the Elohim's behavior toward Linden and Covenant, and other folk.

[tonyz]

>Since each Elohim performs solitary self-
>contemplation and does not emotionally need, or
>become heavily identified with, other beings
>(whether Elohim or of other species), I think they
>fail to reckon with the human capacity for love.

Indeed -- that may be part of the point of the story of Kastenessen. In fact, they <i>deliberately</i> fail to reckon with it -- they hide away in their demesne "so that we will be less taken by the love which leads to death."