Against All Things Ending (62 page)

In moments, the Fall vanished as though it had been sucked away, inhaled by the sovereign
rightness
of healed Time.

Yet encroaching evils still wailed in the night. The
caesure
which had struck near Clyme surged closer. Joan’s initial attack continued the hard wrench-and-lurch of its advance.

And Anele had risen to his feet on bare dirt: crumbling sandstone and gypsum, exposed chunks of shale, the friable detritus of erosion and ancient wars.

Anele!

He radiated raw power as horrendous as the
caesures
, but far more conscious; full of intention and screaming rage. With gestures like shrieks of lava, he dismissed Giants, swept obstacles aside. A fulvous crimson like primal brimstone blazed in his blind eyes, the hue of fangs in the maws of the
skurj
.

Howling, he rushed at Liand.

Kastenessen had taken possession of the old man. In agony, the
Elohim
had come to rescue the
croyel
and claim Jeremiah.

Linden could not react quickly enough. She was too human; too horrified. But Stave had already left her side to stand in Anele’s path.

Long days ago, the former Master had lost an eye to the horde of the Demondim. Nevertheless he had struck down Anele then, borne the old man to safety. Now he did not hesitate to confront Kastenessen’s charge.

A slash of power flung Stave aside as if he were a handful of desiccated bones.

Standing in the heart of the
orcrest
’s clean light, Liand seemed unaware of his peril. Oblivious to every darkness, he touched Jeremiah’s forehead with his Sunstone: the sum and incarnation of his Stonedownor birthright.

Galt saw the threat. Of course he saw it. His flat eyes watched Anele. Yet the Master remained motionless, uncharacteristically trapped by conflicting commitments. He gripped Loric’s
krill
. And he was swift. He could have driven death into the center of Kastenessen’s fury. Could have killed Anele. Distrusting the old man’s heritage of Earthpower, Galt might have slain him without a qualm.

But he could not do so without releasing the
croyel
.

Freed from the blade at its throat, the monster would surely support Kastenessen. It might destroy or deflect Galt before the Humbled could harm Anele.

Perhaps Galt considered killing the
croyel
and Jeremiah before confronting Kastenessen. Perhaps he did not have time to weigh every implication, Covenant’s commands against the cause of Kevin’s Dirt.

Screaming like Elena, Linden finally hurled black Earthpower against the
Elohim
. But she was too late. Anele shed her fire like water as he slapped his hands to the sides of Liand’s head.

Compelled by Kastenessen’s strength, the old man filled Liand’s fragile skull with lava. In a spray of blood and bone and tissues, Liand’s head was torn apart.

Then Stormpast Galesend hurtled forward. She slammed into Anele; wrapped her arms around the old man’s incinerating force; carried him past Liand and Jeremiah, Galt and the
croyel
. Ignoring the murderous heat in her clasp, the instantaneous burn like a furnace-blast, she somehow remembered to roll as she fell so that Anele’s flesh lost contact with the ground.

In the instant before Galesend hit him, however, Anele contrived to catch the
orcrest
as it dropped from Liand’s dead fingers. Linden saw the old man clearly. Kastenessen was trying to destroy the Sunstone—

—until Galesend snatched Anele off the dirt.

When Galesend landed on her back in a welter of stones and snarled pain, Kastenessen’s power vanished. The
orcrest
went dark. Night seemed to crash down onto the ridge like the sealing of a sepulcher despite the hungry throb of the
krill
’s gem and the swelling rapacity of the
caesures
.

Galt remained as rigid as a carving in the Hall of Gifts. Jeremiah stood like an empty husk while the
croyel
gibbered and spat on his back. Gushing blood, Liand slumped to his knees; leaned forward until he rested like an act of contrition against Jeremiah’s legs.

When your deeds have come to doom
—

Unconscious in Galesend’s arms, Anele still gripped the inert Sunstone as though his life depended on it.

—
remember that he is the hope of the Land
.

The impending Falls were all that kept Linden from wailing like a maimed child.

4.

Attempts Must Be Made

Storms of time and anguish filled the night. Somewhere
turiya
Raver imposed purpose on Joan’s weakness by sheer brutality; compelled her to direct her blasts. Moments after Linden quenched the nearest
caesure
, a fourth made madness of the stream at the foot of the canyon, spun the sand where she and her companions had eaten and slept into a migraine tornado. A fifth nearly claimed Branl as he sprinted toward the company. He saved himself only by diving headlong down a bouldered slope. A sixth found the ridge a stone’s throw to the east and staggered closer.

After that, there were no more. The Raver must have exhausted Joan. Still five fierce instances of chaos converged on Jeremiah—or on the
krill
. Linden could not answer them all. Other storms raged through her, leaving her concentration in shreds.

Liand.

She had brought this upon him. In spite of his youth and ignorance, she had allowed him to accompany her when she fled from Mithil Stonedown. She had taken him to Revelstone, where he had become the first true Stonedownor in many millennia. And she had practically commanded him to risk his life for Jeremiah.

Liand!

She had seen Anele gesture at Liand, asking for the
orcrest
and sanity: his only defense against possession. But in the frenzy of other pressures, she had ignored the old man’s plea.

Liand!

Here was the result. Still on his knees, Liand leaned against Jeremiah’s legs, resting there with his skull torn open as though he prayed to the idol of a false god.

In a sense, Handir had foretold this. Speaking of Anele, the Voice of the Masters had said,
Yet the Earthpower within him cannot be set aside
.
Therefore his deeds will serve Corruption, whatever his intentions may be
. Now Anele had killed Liand.

It was too much. Linden needed to hold Liand in her arms and wail her bereavement; weep herself out of existence. Yet
caesures
lurched closer. Toward Jeremiah. Joan sent no more; but these five did not dissipate. Instead they raved like hurricanes trapped in spaces too small for them. Joan or
turiya
Herem had made them strong. And Thomas Covenant’s spirit no longer defended the Arch of Time.

If Linden did not set aside her horror and grief—and if she did not do so
now
—everyone she loved would be destroyed. Swept away into a future of unrelieved absence and cruel cold.
The eventual outcome of Joan’s craziness
.

Voices shouted tumult at Linden, but she did not hear Covenant’s among them. Stave said her name with something like urgency. She did not hear him at all.

Battered by storms, she could not look away from Liand and Jeremiah.

The hunger echoing like exaltation from the
krill
’s gem had begun to ebb. Now the
croyel
struggled for freedom. Finally it feared the
caesures
. Jeremiah jerked up his head; his arms. Reaching behind him, he clawed at Galt’s forearm, tried to drag it away from the throat of the creature.

If he shifted Galt’s grasp, the blade would bite into his own neck. Nevertheless he strained to free the
croyel
.

The Humbled did not move. He betrayed no hint that the heat of wild magic had hurt him. Unyielding as Loric’s dagger, his forearm defied Jeremiah’s efforts.

The Ironhand barked orders, rallied the Swordmainnir. Still on her back, Stormpast Galesend hugged Anele as though she meant to squeeze out his life. Swift as a hawk, Pahni threw herself at Liand.

Through the confusion, Mahrtiir yelled Bhapa’s name.

Instantly obedient, the older Cord rushed to Linden’s side. But she hardly noticed him. She only remained on her feet because Stave held her.

Caesures
yowled at her from every direction. Their sheer
wrongness
made her want to puke up her soul.

Bhapa may have rubbed something under her nose. He may have dabbed a powder as fine as dust onto her tongue. Nothing made any sense—

—until she closed her mouth and swallowed; inhaled through her nose.

At once, the acrid sting of
amanibhavam
ignited flames in her as if she were tinder, apt only for bonfires and lightning, conflagrations that would consume the housing of her entire life.

She needed flame. Oh, she
needed
it!

With an inadvertent slash of Earthpower and despair, Linden sent Bhapa tumbling down the slope. Involuntarily her gaze followed his plunge; but she could not afford to watch what happened to him. The Fall which had routed Clyme was only heartbeats away. Bhapa was not swift enough to catch his balance and sprint aside.

This, too, was her doing.

There were four other Falls. They were all advancing. But she did not look at them. Crying curses as if they were the Seven Words, she flung dire Earthpower and Law like a shriek into the abomination which threatened Bhapa.

Perhaps she extinguished it. Perhaps she failed. She did not wait to observe the outcome. Like a surgeon surrounded by carnage, she did not pause to check her work or watch for intimations of survival. With Stave’s help, she whirled away.

Four more
caesures
. Four unconscionable rents in the necessary fabric of time.

Her Staff was a streak of midnight in Linden’s hands as she wheeled it around her head; lashed ebon fire like the scourge of a titan in every direction. Her theurgy had changed, but she did not feel the difference. It was an exact reflection of her spirit.

Blinded by fury and woe, she did not know whether she snuffed the Falls, any of them. Her own flame consumed her. Moments ago, she had been helpless; paralyzed. She had simply watched while Liand was slain; watched and done nothing. But if Lord Foul, or Joan, or Roger, or any abhorrent bane had stood before her now, she would have striven to tear them apart.

I perceive only that her need for death is great
.

God damn
right!

Shouting accompanied her grief-stricken rage, her inconsolable slash of flame. She may have been yelling herself. The only voices that she could hear clearly were the cries and excoriation of She Who Must Not Be Named’s victims. Around herself and her companions and the ridgecrest, she created a whirlwind to answer the seethe and distortion of the Falls. But she no longer knew what she did. Exalted or broken by pain and loss, she whipped blackness into the dark heavens until it seemed to erase the stars.

Until Stave reached out to catch hold of the Staff.

Until her vehemence and Stave’s grip nearly ripped the Staff out of her hands.

Then the energies of
amanibhavam
and fury failed her. In an instant, her lash of Earthpower vanished, leaving only Loric’s
krill
to answer the irreparable night. Panting like sobs, she sagged into Stave’s clasp.

“It is done, Linden.” His voice sounded as unrelieved as the Earth’s deep rock. He seemed to know the cost of what she had done—and had failed to do. “There is no more need. Wild magic and Desecration have passed. We endure.”

Word by word, he brought Linden back from storms. Every sentence restored some riven piece of her. Leaning against him, she believed that he had stopped her at the brink of a catastrophe as intimate as her immersion in She Who Must Not Be Named.

But he could not heal her.

“When you are able,” he continued as if he spoke for the darkness, “you will observe that we have lost only Liand. Bruises and gashed flesh we have in abundance. And Kastenessen’s fires were bitter to the Swordmainnir. But they are Giants, hardy against any heat or flame. They will prevail over their hurts. Also the Manethrall has preserved the Unbeliever. He is absent once again, but unharmed. And your son stands unscathed”—Linden felt Stave shrug—“apart from the many cruelties of the
croyel
.

“Six Falls assailed us, Linden. Nonetheless we endure.”

He may have meant to comfort her. But she could not be comforted. She felt like a derelict in his arms, wracked beyond repair.

Nevertheless her health-sense returned by increments. As her vision cleared, she saw that Stave spoke the truth.

Above her on the ridge, Giants towered against the benighted sky. The dagger’s gem lit their forms with silver streaks like cuts. Cirrus Kindwind had taken Covenant from Mahrtiir. Vaguely Linden recognized that Covenant had again collapsed into his crippled memories. Kindwind carried him in one arm as if to protect him from himself.

Frostheart Grueburn trod heavily toward Linden and Stave while Bhapa scrambled upward. The Swordmain’s face and arms radiated a scalding pain, and a deep contusion ached on one side of her forehead. Her right hand and forearm bled from various scrapes. Yet she was essentially whole.

As was Bhapa. Patches of skin had been torn from his limbs, but those injuries were superficial. At some other time—perhaps in another life—Linden would be able to treat them.

Both Grueburn and the Cord peered at Linden, perhaps seeking to assure themselves that she was still sane. Then Grueburn called a few words over her shoulder to Rime Coldspray; and the Ironhand passed them to the other Giants. Linden Giantfriend remains among us. She has suffered no bodily wound.

Galt and Jeremiah were likewise untouched. The
croyel
had ceased its struggles. The boy stood slack and vacant, as if the creature had relaxed his puppet-strings. Blood and gore stained his pajama bottoms from thigh to hem.

Careful to keep Anele from touching dirt, Stormpast Galesend climbed to her feet. Unconscious, the old man dangled in her arms as if every possible meaning had been taken from him. But he still gripped Liand’s
orcrest
as though it might restore what he had lost.

—
the hope of the Land
.

Fresh wailing strained for release in Linden. Biting down on her lower lip, she held it back. Any cry that she permitted herself to utter now would be Elena’s screaming, and Emereau Vrai’s, and Diassomer Mininderain’s. It would be the compacted rage and ruin of Gallows Howe.

Dark in Jeremiah’s shadow, Pahni had taken Liand into her arms. She knelt on gypsum and shale, hugging her lover against her while his sundered skull oozed its last blood onto her shoulder. She seemed as motionless as the Stonedownor, as unable to draw breath. Nevertheless the young Cord emanated distress as loud as keening. Her pain struck blows at Linden’s heart.

Gently Galesend bore Anele to the spine of the ridge where Coldspray and Kindwind stood with their comrades. At Grueburn’s urging, Linden forced herself to step away from Stave’s support. With Stave and Bhapa ready to catch her if she stumbled, she trudged toward her gathered companions.

Her friends. Who had loved Liand as much as she did.

Mahrtiir had placed himself like a guardian in front of Kindwind and Covenant. Blindly he scrutinized Linden’s approach. In his stance, she saw a raptor’s acute ferocity.

Clyme and Branl now stood poised on either side of Kindwind. But their attention was fixed, not on Linden, but on Anele, and their hands were fists. The
krill
’s reflections in their eyes resembled threats. They had stood watch over the company to no purpose. And they had foreseen the peril in Anele from the first.

Instinctively Linden feared them. They were
Haruchai
, Masters, the Humbled—and they had failed. If they did not fault Galt for Liand’s death, they would accuse Anele.

Hoping to forestall them, Linden said in a hoarse rasp, “You can’t blame him. He didn’t choose this.”

Days ago, Anele had urged his companions to give him the Sunstone when he requested it.

“The Earthpower is his,” Branl replied without glancing at her. “It alone enabled him to endure such possession. Also the madness is his. The openness to Corruption is his. Such flaws conduce always to Desecration. Who will accept the burden of his deeds, if he does not?”

“I will,” Linden answered through the turmoil of remembered cries. “It’s my fault.” She deserved this. “I only cared about Jeremiah. I stopped paying attention to Anele.”

Together Clyme and Branl turned to regard her sternly.

You hold great powers
.
Yet if we determine that we must wrest them from you, do you truly doubt that we will prevail?

Mahrtiir ignored the tension in the Humbled. Standing between argent and darkness, he retorted, “Do not speak of
fault
, Ringthane. The deed was Kastenessen’s. His and no other’s.” Suppressed mourning fretted the Manethrall’s wrath. “To assert otherwise is to urge despair in the guise of blame.”

“I stopped paying attention,” Linden insisted. “I let it happen. Anyone here could have told you what Kastenessen would do if Anele touched bare dirt without—” Her voice caught in her throat. Oh, Liand! She could not say his name. “Without the Sunstone. I caused this when I ignored him.”

Galt might conceivably have warned Liand. But she had seen Cail beaten bloody by his kindred. She had watched Stave’s expulsion from the communion of the Masters. For Galt’s sake as well as her own, she insisted that she was culpable.