“I need a bath,” she explained, groaning to herself. More than that, she needed to recover some semblance of emotional balance. “If you don’t mind, Stave, you can take Covenant back to the others.” She could not bear to look at him yet. “Pahni can stay with me. When I don’t feel quite so disgusted”—her mouth twisted at the thought of her filthy hair and rank clothes—“she’ll help me find you.”

“By my Manethrall’s command, Ringthane,” Pahni answered, “I must comply with Thomas Covenant’s wishes. If the Unbeliever will grant it, however, I will abide with you gladly.” Her tone hinted that she might choose to defy Mahrtiir’s orders.

“Ah, hell,” Covenant sighed. “Why not?” Linden heard regret in his voice. “After what you’ve been through, the least you deserve is a chance to be left alone.

“Come on, Stave.” He lifted a hand in the direction of Stave’s shoulder. “I’m exhausted. I probably won’t make it without help.”

“Go on,” Linden murmured automatically. She wanted him gone; wanted to forget him if she could. In self-defense, she had fixed her mind on the idea of a bath: she was impatient to take off her clothes. In the absence of soap, she could use sand to rub away the most tactile of her many soilures.

Pahni shot Stave a quick glance. “If you will, Stave, assure Liand that I am”—she caught herself—“that we are well.”

Linden was vaguely surprised to hear the Cord use Stave’s name. Her closest friends had become more comfortable with each other than they had once been. For that, she gave Stave most of the credit. He had taught the Ramen and Liand to regret their initial distrust.

“Be certain of it,” Stave replied as he drew Covenant’s arm across his shoulders. “Return to us when the Chosen desires it. There is no present need for haste.”

“He means,” Covenant muttered, “we don’t have any food, so you might as well do what you can to save your strength.”

Then he and Stave turned away, heading for the small scrap of beach and the nearest hillside.

Was that north? Linden wondered briefly. Yes, her health-sense assured her. Or rather northwest. But she dismissed such matters almost immediately. Her percipience had become as precise as Loric’s krill; and she was acutely conscious of muck and strain staining her hair, her skin, her clothes. While Covenant and Stave rose dripping from the stream and began to angle across the littered hillside, she confirmed that Jeremiah’s healed racecar still rested deep in her pocket. When she explored her sore ribs, her cracked kneecap, her battered shin, she found that they did not demand care. She dismissed them as well.