Against All Things Ending (34 page)

The dank fluid of the Demondim-spawn tasted old and musty, thick with age or mold. Nevertheless she swallowed it greedily. It lacked the healing vitality of hurtloam; but it was full of strength. In its own way, it was as rich and vital as ichor. As she drank, its gifts helped her absorb the shock of Liand’s wound.

Flashes of sight shot through her darkness, sharp brief gleams as though a shutter were being snapped open and shut. Like illusions woven of phosphenes and sensory confusion, she caught glimpses of Covenant confronting Jeremiah; of Stave crouched beside her; of Bhapa hovering while Pahni hugged Liand. In quick flickers, she seemed to see one of the Waynhim poised near her.

She was still too weak to do more than twitch her fingers. But now she did not need to grip the Staff in order to feel its potential fire; its readiness for use. Shutting her eyes against flashes that resembled reflections from polished blades, she reached out for Earthpower.

Slowly flame and Law eased her. After a while, she was able to close her fingers on the Staff. Then she struggled to her feet. Her head still throbbed, sending raw jabs down her spine, through her chest, along her limbs. But the scale of her pain shrank with every beat of her heart. Soon she would be able to think, and speak, and give heed.

As her health-sense burgeoned, however, the nature of her distress shifted: it was being transformed. By the theurgy of percipience, her physical hurt acquired an edged sensation of
wrongness
. On an almost subcutaneous level, she felt or heard the pulse of something rising; something hungry and wicked.

Its beat was as deep as a tectonic shift, the gathering violence of an earthquake.

She Who Must Not Be Named has been fully roused
.

She’s going to get bigger
.

Swallowing instinctive terror, Linden looked at her companions.

Will you waste the remnants of your life thus—?

The Ironhand no longer held her glaive at Esmer’s neck. Instead she and two of her Swordmainnir stood in a tight cordon around him, guarding against powers which they could not oppose. Latebirth and Galesend still carried Mahrtiir and Anele. Cabledarm watched over Stonemage and Liand while Bluntfist stood ready to help Galt if he needed aid.

Among them, the remaining ur-viles crouched on all fours, apparently waiting for some signal or command.
They offer guidance
—But their loremaster stood before Covenant. While Covenant swore through his teeth, muttering curses as familiar as endearments, the black creature used a knife of ruddy iron, lambent and steaming, to cut the palm of its other hand. Its acrid blood dripped onto Covenant’s burns.

The state of his hands pierced Linden like another self-inflicted wound. The loremaster’s blood ate into them like vitriol, but its effects were benignant. Drop by drop, the creature shed its own life to peel away strips of charred skin, comfort exposed flesh. Yet there was only so much that the loremaster’s unnatural gifts could accomplish. His fingers and thumbs were swollen and maimed: their last phalanges were already dead. When Linden could add Earthpower to the ur-vile’s magicks, his hands might regain a degree of use. To some extent, he might be able to grip weakly and touch—

But she would have to amputate the end of each finger and thumb at the knuckle to prevent their necrosis from spreading. And he would feel nothing: leprosy and the
krill
’s vehemence had destroyed those nerves completely.

As for his palms—The loremaster had done much to preserve them. They would be horribly scarred, but they were functionally intact. Nevertheless they, too, would never feel anything again.

In other ways, Linden’s companions were comparatively whole. The native toughness of the Giants had sloughed away the worst effects of the
skest
. Stave’s legs still bore corrosive wounds like teeth-marks, but he stood beside Linden without obvious discomfort. Branl gave no sign that his bruises and contusions troubled him. Held by Stonemage, and tended anxiously by Pahni, Liand was recovering, although he remained weak. The agility of the Cords had enabled them both to avoid acid and injury. Anele squirmed aimlessly in Galesend’s arms, disturbed by impending calamities that he could not name. The Manethrall studied every detail around him with his restored health-sense, apparently seeking to imprint it on his memory.

By turns, the Waynhim offered
vitrim
to the rest of the company, ignoring only Esmer, the Ardent, and Jeremiah. Branl held a cup for Covenant to drink, but none of the Humbled accepted anything for themselves.

Earlier the Ardent had said that his doom was assured. Now, however, he did not comport himself like a man who felt doomed. Instead his manner suggested some of the smugness which he had displayed in Andelain. Perhaps he had regained his confidence in the powers which his people had entrusted to him.

In contrast, Esmer seemed to give off frustration like spume. His eyes were the color of wind-lashed seas. Among the tatters of his cymar, his festering wounds leaked pus and distress. On his cheek, the hurt of Coldspray’s blow still bled.

His desire for Linden’s attention was as clear as a cry.

She recognized the urgency of his appeal.
Will you condone this outcome—?
Through her own sensations, she felt the thudding of a subterranean pulse. It beat against her nerves like the harsh and riven labor of Mount Thunder’s heart.

—
She Who Must Not Be Named has been fully roused
.

But neither Cail’s son nor the approaching bane had brought Linden back from her immersion in Liand’s wounds. She had been retrieved by the
croyel
’s mockery—and by Covenant’s response.

I belong to the Despiser
.

Esmer could wait. And the loremaster did not interrupt its efforts to preserve Covenant’s hands. They, too, could wait a little longer.

More than anything else at that moment, Linden wanted to ensure that she would never hear Jeremiah’s tormentor speak again.

I even learned to enjoy it
.

Covenant had said,
Even the
Elohim
don’t know how to kill one of the
croyel
without killing its host
; but Linden intended to discover the truth for herself.

Uncoiling flames like the thongs of a scourge, she extended her power to quench the
croyel
’s life.

Covenant’s strangled protest she ignored. Law and Earthpower had renewed some of her percipience, in spite of her proximity to the source of Kevin’s Dirt. If indeed the monster could not be slain without killing Jeremiah as well, she would be able to discern their symbiosis before she unleashed her full force.

Facing the creature’s fright, the loose features of her son, Galt’s stoic countenance, and the clear argence of the
krill
’s gem, Linden thrust her senses into the cesspit of the
croyel
’s yellow gaze—

—into a ravening as absolute as
caesures
or the Sunbane, but far more thetic—

—and found herself gazing outward through Jeremiah’s vacant eyes. With his disfocused sight, she saw her own stricken expression as she struggled to understand what had become of him.

If he had any thoughts of his own, she could not find them. His mind had become a bubbling moil of fright and malevolence: his possessor’s passions filled him completely. The voice of his own identity, if he still had one, was too small to be heard amid the clamor of the
croyel
’s yearning for escape and murder.

They have done this to my
son
!

In a brief blaze of thwarted love and chagrin, she flung flame like a howl at the ceiling. Covenant was right. The
croyel
was
too deep inside him
. It occupied Jeremiah’s trapped self too intimately to be disentangled: not while Kevin’s Dirt hampered her. If she tried to distinguish one life from the other, she would certainly destroy her son.

Sick with failure and bitterness, she felt that she was committing an act of cruelty as she turned away from Jeremiah.

Her companions stared at her as if she had stepped back from the precipice of another misjudgment as fatal as Covenant’s resurrection. Liand tried to say her name. And Covenant sighed, “Linden.” His tone was laden with mourning. “I’m so sorry. I tried to warn you.”

But his empathy could not ease her now. She did not need solace: she needed an outlet for her ire and shame. Fierce as a Sandgorgon, or as one of the
skurj
, she moved to confront Esmer.

“All right,” she said heavily. “You wanted my
heed
. You’ve got it.” Dangers thronged in her voice. “But tell me something first. Show me that you’re worth hearing.

“When we talked near Glimmermere, how did you know that I was going to meet the Viles? How did you know that I needed to understand some of their history?”

From her perspective, none of her experiences in the past had happened yet when Cail’s son had spoken to her. If his own life were as consecutive as hers—

“I did not,” Esmer replied as though her question were an affront. “I sought merely to account for the presence and purpose of the ur-viles. As I have done repeatedly.”

Linden bit her lip; swallowed curses. “Then say what you have to say. Get it over with.” The residue of Liand’s trauma throbbed in her skull. “You’ve already betrayed us. You’re betraying us right now,” blocking her access to Covenant’s ring. “You’re going to betray us again soon.” She did not doubt that he would make the attempt. “I can’t even imagine what you think you can do to counterbalance that much harm.”

He tried to face her; but his gaze shied away. Truths and falsehoods fought each other in his mien. “I do not offer words.” He spoke as if his divided nature forced him to utter thorns. “I speak only to request the marred metal which you reclaimed from your son under
Melenkurion
Skyweir.”

Like a man who expected to be struck, he winced.

“
What?
” While her friends gaped in surprise and confusion, Linden thrust a hand into her pocket to touch Jeremiah’s crumpled racecar. “You want me to give you a
toy
?” The only thing that she had left of the boy whom she had loved for so many years? “Are you out of your mind? I won’t—”

“Wildwielder!” Esmer cried as if she had dealt him a mortal blow. At once, however, he restrained himself. More quietly, he stated, “I will return it.” His eyes oozed like his wounds. “Nevertheless I must have it. I must hold it.”

Then his dismay broke loose. “Are you blind to my anguish? Do you not hear that my woe transcends endurance? Wildwielder, I beseech you. Grant me this small recompense for the abominations which I have wrought against you.”

“Linden,” murmured Liand. “Perhaps it would be wise—”

“Ringthane,” Mahrtiir put in sternly. “This tortured wight strives ever to provide both aid and betrayal. His struggles we have witnessed to our cost—and also to our benefit. And I do not forget that he received his wounds in defense of the Demondim-spawn, whose fidelity is beyond question. I do not comprehend him. Yet is it not conceivable that he seeks now to ameliorate his wrongs in some fashion?”

Linden glared at Esmer. With her fingers, she measured the damage that the
croyel
had done to Jeremiah’s racecar. He had brought the toy with him when Roger had abducted him: his last act of initiative or volition—and the only one which did not involve a construct. Had he picked up the car because Lord Foul had told him to do so? Because he belonged to the Despiser? Or did the toy represent something else? Had some private, unreachable part of him claimed the car because he needed it? Because it comforted him? Because it reminded him of her?

Because he was trying to tell her something—?

In the Hall of Gifts, Stave had spoken of the children of the
Haruchai
—and of his own sons.
They are born to strength, and it is their birthright to remain who they are
.

Then he had asked,
Are you certain that the same may not be said of your son?

There, in the safety of Revelstone, she had replied like a promise,
I’m going to believe that he has the right to be himself
.

Since then, nothing fundamental had changed. The
croyel
still possessed Jeremiah—and it was still a liar. While he stood near her, the husk of a living boy, she had more difficulty trusting that some essential part of his nature held true to itself. Nevertheless nothing had changed. Not really.

In Andelain, Covenant had asserted,
I refuse to believe he made choices then that can’t be undone
.

She had to put her faith in
some
thing.

That which appears evil need not have been so from the beginning, and need not remain so until the end
.

Perhaps the same could be said of Esmer.

“All right.” Trembling, she drew the racecar from her pocket. Shards of pain cut her heart with every beat. “But I want it back.”

Esmer did not move. Like Caerroil Wildwood with the Staff of Law on Gallows Howe, he caused the mangled wreckage of the toy to rise from her grasp and float toward him. When he plucked the metal from the air, he folded it in both hands; enclosed it gently, as if he had captured a butterfly or some other fragile creature. For a moment, energies gathered around his head like storm clouds. The flesh of his fingers appeared to blur and melt. Then he tossed the red car upward as though he expected it to flap and flutter like a winged thing.

Instinctively Linden stepped forward, caught the racecar as it fell.

It was whole. Esmer had restored it perfectly. She could not see that it had ever been damaged. If some force had held it to its track, it could have followed the recursions of Jeremiah’s raceway construct endlessly.

Needing witnesses, she held it up for her companions to see; but she was deaf to their reactions. Deliberately she showed it to Jeremiah and the
croyel
, hoping that the toy would look like an augury of hope to her son—and a threat to the monster. Then she inclined her head to Esmer: a show of thanks. She had no words for her gratitude; or for her sharp shame.