Chapter Seven: 

Taking the Risk

The cold seemed to speak directly to Linden: she saw its uncompromising beauty. Certainly it could kill her. It had no pity. And she was not dressed warmly enough to contain her body’s inadequate heat. The sensation of fire that Covenant had given to her was slipping away. Already shivers began to rise through her undefended flesh. Soon she would lose control of her limbs; or she would have to implore Covenant to succour her again.

Nevertheless the austerity and precision of the cold gave it a numinous glory. The sunlit crystalline untrammelled brilliance of the snow on all sides defined the contours of the hilltop as distinctly as etch-work in purest glass. The air itself might have been glass. Every slope and crest around her seemed to burn as though it were afire with cold. 

And winds had shaped and sculpted the crust as it melted and refroze repeatedly between day and night. She could see delicate, dazzling whorls everywhere; sastrugi as scalloped and articulate as hieroglyphs or runes; ridges and hollows as suggestive as the elaborate surface of the sea. With every step that she and Covenant and Jeremiah had taken, or would take, they marred instances of the most casual and frangible loveliness.

Covenant had not stopped speaking: he seemed unaware that she heeded a voice other than his. Trenchant with bitterness, he was saying. Of course, the Elohim could have done the same thing, saved us all this trouble, if they weren’t so damn self-absorbed. And if they didn’t object to messing around with time. That was Kastenessen’s original crime. They Appointed him to contain the skurj because he shared himself with a mortal lover, gave her some of who he was. He wanted her with him, so he gave her the power to stay young. To defy time. To use magicks like his. So naturally the Elohim took offense.”

With her health-sense, Linden felt each probing finger of winter as it found its way through her garments to touch her skin with ice. If she had known how to interpret the speech of wind and weather, she might have been able to name every avatar of the snow and cold: every flake and crystal, every self-sufficient pattern; every broken and unbreakable rumple in the cloak that covered the hillsides. The stark and brittle branches of the distant forest might have spoken to her.

And if you do all that,” she asked Covenant as if she were unaware of her own voice. “what happens to Jeremiah? Will he be freed? Will he be safe?”

Would she be able to find him?

Her son was in more danger than anyone; more peril and more pain. Although he stood at Covenant’s side, his tangible body remained at Lord Foul’s mercy. Because he was her son, the strange bifurcation of his torment seemed too great to be borne.

Covenant sighed. In a gentler voice, he replied, “Unfortunately, no. Oh, his suffering will end. As soon as I freeze Foul, everything he’s doing will stop. But drinking the EarthBlood, using the Power of Command—Unleashing forces on that scale will pretty much overwhelm us. Jeremiah and I will disappear. Well snap back to where we belong.” If he felt any grief at the prospect of losing his physical existence—or losing Linden—he did not show it. “He won’t hurt anymore, but he’ll still be trapped wherever Foul has him. And he won’t know any more about where that is than he does now. He’ll still need rescuing.”

Before Linden could pull her thoughts out of the cold to protest, he added, “That’s one of the reasons you’re here. In fact, I never even considered doing this without you. After Jeremiah and I vanish, it’ll be your turn. Once we’re gone, you can drink the EarthBlood yourself. You can Command—” His tone remained gentle. “Hellfire, Linden, you can Command any damn thing you want. All you have to do is want it, and you and your kid will be reunited. In your proper time. Anywhere you choose. If it’ll make you happy, you two can live in Andelain together for the rest of your natural lives.”

Trembling with relief and cold—with a hope so sudden that it seemed to shake the marrow of her bones—she asked. “Is that true? Is that what you meant? When you said that you can’t do this without me?”

At once, Covenant’s manner became aggrieved. “What, did you think I didn’t care? Did you think I’m not trying to do what’s best for you and Jeremiah as well as for the Land and the rest of the Earth? I’m Thomas Covenant, for God’s sake. I’ve saved the Land twice. And I sure as hell didn’t get myself killed because I like being dead.

“Yes,” he admitted sharply, “you’re why the Elohim won’t interfere. I brought you for that. You’re the Wildwielder. As long as you’re here, they think they don’t have anything to worry about. But I also want to save your kid.”

Abruptly the Theomach began to laugh.

“What’s so funny?” demanded Covenant.

The stranger’s laughter stopped. “I find amusement in your justifications.” He did not sound at all amused.

Again Linden seemed to feel an afterflash of power as she had when Covenant had warmed her earlier. The Theomach vanished from the hilltop.

With a shudder, she dragged her attention away from the beauty which the snow and wind and sun had wrought. “Then why didn’t you transport us straight to Melenkurion Skyweir? Why did we have to come here? Into the past?”

And why so far into the past?

But Covenant had turned his back on her. Instead of facing her question, he was staring back down into the valley.

Jeremiah came a step or two closer. Then he met her gaze on Covenant’s behalf. “Because, Mom, the Blood of the Earth isn’t accessible in the time where we belong.” Now her son’s eyes reminded her of Esmer’s: they seemed to blur and run, melting from the silted hue of dark loam to the pale dun of fine sand. “There have never been more than one or two ways to approach it, and Elena’s battle with Kevin wrecked those passages.”

Jeremiah’s tic signalled his discomfort. “But even before that battle, it wasn’t accessible. The first thing Damelon did after he discovered the EarthBlood was put up wards. He thought the Power of Command was too dangerous for anyone to use. He left all kinds of barricades behind. We would have to fight our way in, and you’re the only one of us who can do that. Which would banish Covenant and me before we could accomplish anything. We have to get inside the mountain before Damelon seals it.”

“But”—troubled by Jeremiah’s disquiet, Linden struggled to think—“if Covenant shuts down Lord Foul now,” thousands of years before his first confrontation with the Despiser. “won’t he destroy the Arch of Time?” 

Surely such an exertion of Command would unmake all of Lord Foul’s actions for the next ten thousand years?

“He could,” Jeremiah conceded without hesitation. “But he won’t. What would be the point? He’s trying to save the Land, not destroy it. He’ll seal Foul right after we leave to come here. Ten thousand years from now, in the time where you and I belong. That way, the Arch won’t be in any danger.”

Tremors ran through Linden’s chest and arms; through her voice. “Then why are we still standing here?” If she did not draw on the Staff for warmth, she would not be able to remain coherent much longer. “Why don’t the two of you transport us right now? Get us to Melenkurion Skyweir before I freeze?”

The scraps of Jeremiah’s pyjamas gave him scant protection; much less than Linden’s cloak and clothes. Nevertheless he seemed unaware of the chill. His encrypted uneasiness had nothing to do with ice and snow.

He looked to Covenant as if he were loath to answer her without Covenant’s support or approval; and as Jeremiah turned his head, the Theomach came lightly up the hillside. His wrapped feet made no mark on the surface of the crust. Once again, he conveyed the eerie impression that he occupied more than one time and place; that with every step he blurred the definitions of reality.

He ascended as if he meant to accost Covenant. But when he was still nearly a dozen paces away, he halted. Behind his bindings, his eyes seemed to study Covenant for some promise of violence.

“That was just a warning,” Covenant pronounced harshly. “Next time, I’ll actually hurt you.”

The Theomach shrugged. His tone implied its own threat as he said. “Do not doubt that I remain able to frustrate your designs. I have counselled wisdom as well as caution, yet you give me cause to doubt that you will heed me.”

“Just so we understand each other,” Covenant retorted. “I’m on your damn path. I’ll stay on your damn path. But I’m tired of being taunted.”

The stranger nodded once, slowly. Then he seemed to slip sideways and was gone. Linden could not detect any evidence that he had ever been present.

Apparently unsurprised, Jeremiah moved closer to Covenant. When Covenant glanced at him, the boy said, “Mom wants to know why we don’t just transport ourselves to Melenkurion Skyweir. But I think there’s something more important.” He seemed unsure of his ability to form an independent opinion. “It’s too cold for her. She’s going to—”

“Oh, bloody hell,” muttered Covenant. “I keep forgetting.”

His halfhand drew a brusque arc in the air. Linden only registered the gesture as a trail of phosphenes like the sweep of a comet: she hardly saw the red flicker of heat in the depths of his eyes. Then a second tide of warmth flooded through her, washing the ice from her skin in an instant, dispelling shivers from the core of her body. Between one heartbeat and the next, she felt a flush of fire as if Covenant had ignited her blood.

Momentarily helpless with relief, she breathed, “God in Heaven. How do you do that?”

Covenant frowned critically at his hand; flexed his fingers as though they did not entirely belong to him. “It doesn’t matter. Being part of the Arch isn’t exactly fun. It ought to be good for at least a few tricks.”

A moment later, he looked at Linden, and his expression changed to a humourless grin. “But as it happens, there’s a perfectly good reason why we can’t ‘just transport ourselves.’ I mean, aside from the fact that the Theomach won’t let us. He may be right. It could be too dangerous.”

Covenant sighed. “This is a pivotal time for the Land. New possibilities are coming to life. Old powers are changing. In the grand scheme of things, it won’t be all that long before the Forestals start to fade.” Some of his earlier scorn returned. “They’ll make the mistake of thinking the Lords can take care of the forests for them. And of course people just naturally like cutting down trees.”

Then he appeared to shake off an impulse to digress. “But that’s not the problem. The problem is those “puissant beings” the Theomach mentioned. If Jeremiah and I risk using power now, well be noticed. And not in a good way. We could run into opposition. The kind of opposition that might damage the Arch.”

Linden wanted to ask, What beings? But she had more immediate concerns. The heat in her veins had given her a sense of urgency. And it had restored a measure of her earlier determination. Covenant and Jeremiah had answered some of her most compelling questions; but she had more.

“All right,” she said, nodding more to herself than to Covenant. “We can’t do this the easy way. So what are we going to do? You said it yourself. We have two hundred leagues to go. On foot in the dead of winter, with no food or shelter. You and Jeremiah don’t look like you feel the cold, but it can kill me. And I assume that you need to eat. How do you expect us to survive?”

Covenant looked away. “Actually,” he said as if he could taste bile. “that’s up to you.” Then he met her gaze again, glaring angrily. “This whole mess is the Theomach’s idea. He expects you to make the decisions.

“Right now, you sort of are the Arch of Time. Or you represent it. You’re the only one of us who’s all here. Or just here. You’re the only one who isn’t already a walking violation of Time. So you’re the only one who might be able to do things safely. Your kid and I can keep you alive—as long as we don’t attract any attention. As long as no one sees us do anything that isn’t supposed to happen in this time. But you have to take charge.

“Should be simple enough,” he growled in disgust. “All we have to do is reach Melenkurion Skyweir. Without going through Garroting Deep. 

“I’m ready when you are.”

Linden stared at him. “You can’t be serious.”

In response, Covenant wheeled away from her. Brandishing his fists, he shouted into the air over the valley. “Do you hear that? She thinks you aren’t serious!” He must have believed—or known—that the Theomach was still nearby.

“We don’t really have much choice, Mom,” Jeremiah said tentatively. “We weren’t expecting to end up here. What we wanted to do was pretty easy. This is much more complicated. Right now, we’re as lost as you are.”

Reflexively Linden wanted to reassure him. “That’s all right, honey. I’ll think of something.” In fact, she did not need to think. Her choices were already plain to her. The shaped snow had whispered them to her; or she had seen them in the winter’s irrefusable beauty. “There’s just one more thing that I want to understand.”

She had many other questions, a long list of them. But first she needed to leave this hilltop; needed an answer to the cold. And the potential for redemption in Covenant’s intentions urged movement. For the first time since Roger had taken her son, she seemed to see a road which might lead to Jeremiah’s rescue, and the Land’s.

Covenant spun back toward her as if he meant to yell in her face. But his tone was unexpectedly mild as he said. “Just one? Linden, you astonish me.”

“Just one for now,” she acknowledged. “But it’s important. In spite of the Theomach, you make it sound like there’s hope. If I choose the right path. If we can get to Melenkurion Skyweir. So why did the ur-viles try to stop you?”

The implications of their attack undermined Covenant’s explanations. What did they see that she did not?

“Is that all?” Covenant scowled sourly. “Hell and blood! They’re Demondim-spawn, Linden. Their makers are besieging Revelstone. Don’t tell me you still imagine they want to help you?

“Think, for God’s sake. They made Vain so you could create that Staff, which has effectively prevented me from stopping Foul. Then they guided you to it so you would have the power to erase me anytime you don’t happen to like what I’m doing. Sure, they gave you what you needed to weaken the Demondim. Hell, why not? If I don’t succeed, Revelstone is going to fall eventually, and in the meantime they want to stay on your good side. Every bit of trust they can squeeze out of you serves the Despiser. They’re trying to turn you against me.”

Linden did not believe him: she could not. The ur-viles had done too much—And whenever he reproached her for forming and using the Staff of Law, her instinctive resistance to him stiffened. The man whom she had accompanied to his death would not have said such things.

His scorn and ire made her ache for the Thomas Covenant who had once loved and accepted her.

But she had nothing to gain by arguing. If the ur-viles had intended their manacles for Covenant, they had failed. She would have to live with the consequences of their failure.

All right,” she said as if Covenant’s vehemence had persuaded her. He had enabled her to withstand the cold—temporarily, at least. To that extent, he resembled his former self. “I’m just trying to understand. If I have to decide what we’re going to do, I need to understand as much as I can.”

She took a deep breath, let it out slowly. “Here’s an idea. Why don’t we call the Ranyhyn?”

Hyn would not be born for thousands of years. Even the herd that had reared to Covenant lived millennia in the future of this present. But Linden did not know how to gauge the mysterious relationship between the Ranyhyn and Time. Her constrained linear conceptions had been proven inadequate repeatedly. Hyn’s far distant ancestors might already be aware of her need for them.

But Jeremiah covered his face as if she had embarrassed him. And Covenant exploded. “Hellfire and bloody damnation! That’s another terrible idea. In fact, it’s even worse than wanting to go to Andelain.”

Holding his glare, Linden made no effort to interrupt him.

“Maybe they can hear you,” he told her hotly. “Maybe they can’t. If they can, they’ll probably answer. They’re loyal enough for anything. That’s not the point. You’ll be asking them to violate the Land’s history. To risk the Arch.”

“How?” she countered.

Covenant made a visible effort to recover his composure. “Because right now there aren’t any Ranyhyn in the Land. After Foul killed Kelenbhrabanal, he drove them away. If they hadn’t left, he would have exterminated them. They won’t come back for another three or four hundred years. Until they find the Ramen—or the Ramen find them. Without Kelenbhrabanal, they need the Ramen to lead them.

“If you summon them now—and they answer—the consequences will ripple for millennia. And they’ll only get worse. One thing will lead to another. They’ll cause more and more changes.”

Linden waited coldly until Covenant was done. Then she said without inflection. “I didn’t know any of that. There are too many things that you haven’t told me. I don’t have any way to tell the difference between good ideas and bad ones.”

“She’s right,” Jeremiah put in hesitantly. “We’re asking an awful lot of her. It isn’t her fault if she gets some of it wrong.”

His apparent reluctance to defend her—or to disagree with Covenant in any way—made her bite her lip. She needed that small hurt to conceal her deeper pain. She had spent much of his life caring for him with her whole heart; and during that time, Covenant had become more essential to him than she had ever been.

She remembered a Covenant who would not have blamed her— 

She did not fault her son for his loyalties. She loved him enough to be grateful that he had grown capable of the kind of attachment which he felt for Covenant. But her helpless rage at what the Despiser had done mounted with every fresh sign that Jeremiah did not love her.

Covenant avoided her gaze. “I get mad too easily,” he admitted as if he were speaking to the empty air. “I know that. It’s the frustration—What I’m trying to do is hard as hell. And it hurts. But it’s nothing compared to what Jeremiah is going through. I want to help him so bad—” After a moment, he added, “And you. And the Land. You didn’t cause any of these delays and obstacles. But they’re making me crazy.”

He seemed to be attempting an apology.

Linden did not care. He could have asked for her sufferance on his knees without swaying her. For Jeremiah’s sake, however, she replied quietly, “Don’t worry about it. Eventually we’ll learn how to talk to each other.

“We’re all tired of frustration. We should go before it gets any worse.”

The relief on Jeremiah’s face was so plain that she could not bear to look at it.

Covenant jerked his eyes to hers. A sudden intensity exaggerated the strictures of his face. “Go where? You still haven’t—”

Linden cut him off. “Where else? Berek’s camp. You said that he’s in the middle of a battle. But he has food. He has warm clothes.” Even true believers could not fight on faith alone. And I’m willing to bet that he has horses. If we can reach him”—if she could endure the cold long enough—“he might be persuaded to help us.”

She was serious: she did not know how else she could hope to reach Covenant’s goal. But she also wanted to hear what he would say about ripples now. If her choices and actions were somehow consonant with the Arch—The Theomach had asserted that her deeds will do no harm. That I will ensure.

Surely entering Berek’s camp would be less dangerous than redirecting the entire past of the Ranyhyn?

“I told you,” Jeremiah crowed. “Sometimes she does exactly the right thing. This is going to work. She’ll make it work.”

For a long moment, Covenant studied her sceptically, as if he suspected a trick of some kind. Then he seemed to throw up his hands. “It’s worth a try. Berek is still in the dark about almost everything. He hardly knows what he can do, or how he can do it. He isn’t likely to recognise the truth about any of us. And he definitely has horses.

“I should warn you, though,” he added grimly. “You’ll have to make this work because I sure as hell can’t. He doesn’t realise it yet, but he’s full of Earthpower. He can erase us. If he so much as touches us, this whole ordeal will be wasted.”

Linden nodded to herself. She was not surprised: she was only sure. If she stepped aside from the Theomach’s “path,” he would correct her.

At first, she led the way, not because she knew the location of Berek’s battle, but because she was in a hurry to leave the hilltop. She did not want to exhaust herself by following the difficult crests: she needed the less arduous passage of the valley bottom, in spite of its death-laden atmosphere. So she headed downward across the slopes at the best pace that she could manage, keeping her back to the west.

Her haste caused her to slip often as her boots skidded over buried stones or bones. Sometimes she fell. But her cloak gave her a measure of protection from the snow. She did not slow her steps until she reached the floor of the valley.

There the implications of the fallen were stronger. The mere thought that she trod over abandoned corpses daunted her. But the sun was westering; and with its light behind her, she did not suffer from its flagrant glare. Now she moved more slowly for the same reason that she had hurried to reach the valley: she feared exhaustion. The laborious hesitation-and-plunge of every step drained her strength. And the cold grew sharper as the sun lost its force. If she tried to walk too quickly, she would soon defeat herself.

Before long, Covenant and Jeremiah caught up with her. For a time, they matched her burdened plod, keeping a safe distance from her. But they both seemed proof against exertion as well as cold; and gradually they began to draw ahead as if they were reluctant for her company.

“Covenant, wait,” Linden panted. “I have another question.” She did not want to be left behind.

Covenant and Jeremiah exchanged comments too low for her to hear. Then they slowed their strides.

Hardly able to control her breathing, she asked. “How far do we have to go’?”

“Three leagues,” Covenant answered brusquely. “Maybe more. At this rate, we won’t get there until after dark.”

Until even the insufficient warmth of the sun had vanished from the Last Hills.

If she did not think about something other than her own weakness, she would lose heart altogether. “I have no idea what were getting into,” she admitted. “I know that there are things the Theomach doesn’t want you to say. But what can you tell me?”

Covenant scowled at her. “You want me to describe the battle? What does it matter? People are hacking at each other, but they’re too tired to be much good at it. From one minute to the next, most of them don’t know if they’re winning or losing. There’s yelling and screaming, but mostly it’s just hacking.”

Linden shook her head. She had already been in too many battles. “I meant Berek. You said that he doesn’t realise what he can do. Or how he can do it. But he summoned the Fire-Lions. He must have some kind of lore.”

“Oh, well.” Covenant seemed to lose interest. “It wasn’t like that. He didn’t exactly summon the Fire-Lions. He didn’t even know they existed. But he got their attention, and for that he only had to be desperate and bleeding. And he had to have a little power. The real question is, where did he get power?

“According to the legends, when Berek was desperate and bleeding and beaten on Mount Thunder, the rocks spoke to him. They offered him help against the King if he pledged to serve the Land. So he swore he would, and the rocks sent the Fire-Lions to decimate the King’s forces.

“But that doesn’t actually make sense. Sure, the stone of the Land is aware. That’s especially true in Mount Thunder, where so many forces have been at work for so long. But it doesn’t talk. I mean, it doesn’t talk fast enough for most people to hear it.

“So how did Berek do it?” Covenant asked rhetorically. “How did he tap into the little bit of Earthpower he needed to call down the Fire-Lions?”

Concentrating so that she would not think about her weariness, Linden waited for him to go on.

“This is the Land, remember,” Covenant said after a moment. She could not read him with her health-sense; but his manner betrayed that he was losing patience again. His tone gave off glints of scorn. “Earthpower runs near the surface. And Berek has what you might call a natural affinity. He just didn’t know it. The damn stones were more aware than he was.”

“Then how—?” Linden began.

Without transition, Covenant seemed to digress. “It’s easy to criticise Elena,” he drawled. “Silly woman. Didn’t she know despair is a weakness, not a strength?” He was talking about his own daughter. “Didn’t she know Kevin dead was bound to be weaker than he was alive?

“But she had precedent. She understood that better than anybody. Which is probably why they made her High Lord. No matter what you’ve heard, the Old Lords were all about despair. It gave them some of their greatest victories. And it’s what saved Berek.

“It opened him up. Tapped into his natural affinity. Being half insane with pain and blood loss and despair made him raw enough to feel what’s really going on here. What the life of the Land is really like. That’s all it took. When he finally felt the Earthpower in Mount Thunder, he felt it in himself as well. And the Fire-Lions felt that. They responded to it because that’s what they do.”

As Covenant’s restiveness mounted, he began to pull ahead, taking Jeremiah with him. Without turning his

head, he finished, “The rest of it, all the legends people told about him—That stuff was just a way to make what happened sound heroic.”

Because of Berek, everything in the Land had changed. It had been made new. He had given its inhabitants their heritage of Earthpower. Yet Covenant disdained Berek’s achievement.

She did not ask him to wait for her: she hardly wanted his company now. But in one sense, he had not answered her question. Breathing painfully, she increased her pace for a moment.

“Just tell me one more thing,” she panted at his back. “What’s Berek like? What kind of man is he?”

If she wanted the first Halfhand’s help while he fought a fierce battle that would leave many of his supporters dead, she needed to know enough about him to gain his sympathy.

Covenant quickened his strides. Keeping his face to the east, he replied harshly, “He’s charismatic as all hell. Basically a good man, or his despair wouldn’t have left him so raw. And half the time he has no earthly idea what he’s doing.”

Then, for no apparent reason, he added. “When Elena summoned Kevin, he didn’t fail her. She failed him.”

After that, he and Jeremiah left Linden to struggle along as well as she could.

Gradually the uneven shadows of the hills spread into the valley. As much as possible, trying to conserve her strength, Linden followed the trail that Covenant and Jeremiah broke in the crust ahead of her. But more and more often, their way took her into the shade; and then she understood that the coming night would be far more cruel than the day. The temperature of the air seemed to plummet whenever she crossed out of the light.

She did not know how much longer she could go on.

When Covenant and Jeremiah were forty or fifty paces ahead of her—far enough to fade in the shadows, so that she could only be sure of them when they returned to sunlight—she began to draw cautiously on the sustenance of the Staff, evoking a slow current of heat and fortitude from the untroubled wood. Doubtless her son and her former lover would warn her if she endangered them. They had too much to lose. And she needed the nourishment of Law and Earthpower. Without it, she would have to ask for more of Covenant’s inexplicable fire; and that prospect increased her sense of helplessness.

The more time she spent with him, the less she trusted him.

She was prepared to support his purpose. But she would do so for Jeremiah’s sake, and to oppose the Despiser, and so that she would not find herself stranded ten thousand years before her proper time. Covenant had been too profoundly altered: Linden no longer knew how to believe in him.

In that fashion, she continued her burdened trudge through the snow and the cold while the shadows deepened and the valley grew dim. Long after she should have fallen on her face, she kept walking because the Staff of Law nurtured her.

But then, in one of the last swaths of sunshine, she saw Jeremiah dropping back. He let Covenant forge ahead alone so that she would be able to catch up with him.

Of its own accord, Linden’s heart lifted. Involuntarily she pushed herself to move faster; and as she did so, she quenched the Staff’s subtle warmth. She did not intend to threaten her son.

He started talking as soon as she drew near enough to hear him. He sounded tense; uncomfortable with her. Or perhaps he had been afflicted with Covenant’s frustration, Covenant’s impatience. He almost babbled as he said. “This isn’t normal. We’re too far south. The winters aren’t usually this bad.”

Nevertheless he had elected to accompany her, at least for a while. He must have felt some concern for her, despite his devotion to Covenant. That was enough to encourage her.

“It’s an after-effect of the war,” Jeremiah went on as if he could not stop. “when Berek was losing. Nobody in this time knows Foul. They won’t meet him until after Kevin becomes High Lord. But he’s in the Land. He has a home where nobody can stumble on him by accident. He’s waiting. Until the Lords become powerful enough, they won’t have a realistic chance of breaking the Arch.”

As Linden drew level with him, Jeremiah matched his pace to hers. He kept a distance of four or five steps between them, and he stayed on her left: she could not see his tic. But he did not pull ahead again, or fall behind. And he did not stop talking.

“But earlier Foul wasn’t just waiting. Once samadhi started this war, Foul did what he could to help Berek’s King win it.

“Of course, if that happened, there wouldn’t be any Lords. But Foul didn’t want Lords then. He wanted the King to win. That whole kingdom had the right attitude. I mean the right attitude for Foul. He could manipulate them easily. If they won, he could teach them how to set him free. They could use the Earthpower in the Land to provoke the Creator until the Creator had to intervene. That would break the Arch. Or Foul could get them to rouse the Worm.

“So Foul tried to help Berek’s King by sending darkness out of Ridjeck Thome. Malice so thick it blotted out the sun. It practically broke the hearts of Berek’s people And it weakened Berek himself. Almost got him killed. He’s a great warrior, but when he fought the King, he’d lost a lot of his strength. That’s why the King was able to beat him.

“This winter is sort of left over from losing the sun for a season or two.”

Jeremiah was watching Linden sidelong, apparently studying her, although he looked away whenever she turned toward him. But the air’s getting warmer,” he said. “Can you tell?” His voice had taken on a faintly pleading tone. “This valley goes down into the Centre Plains. It’s still going to be cold when the sun sets. But Covenant can help you. All you have to do is ask.”

He seemed to want her to accept her dependence on Covenant.

She wanted to hear her son justify his loyalty to Covenant. He had called Covenant the best. How had Covenant won Jeremiah’s heart? But she did not wish to risk alienating him. Instead of rejecting his implicit appeal directly, she said, “I’m hanging in there, Jeremiah, honey. I’ll make it somehow.

“But it really helps when you talk to me. Can I ask you something?”

The boy frowned at Covenant’s dark shape as if he were unsure of himself. “I guess, Mom. If it’ll do any good. Depending on what it is.”

They were deep in shadow; still far from the nearest dwindling patch of sunshine. Without light, Linden could not insist on an answer to the question that mattered most to her. For the moment, she concentrated on other concerns.

“I understand that there are things you can’t tell me,” she began, keeping her tone as neutral as possible. “They’ll interfere with the—I’m not sure what to call it—the continuity of what we’re doing.” In this circumstance, her mind cannot be distinguished from the Arch of Time. “But I’m curious. How do you know the Theomach? You said that you’ve never met him, but you obviously recognised him.”

“Oh, that.” Jeremiah’s relief was plain in his voice. Clearly her question did not trouble him. “I heard about him, that’s all. He’s one of the Insequent.

“I told you I’ve been here a lot. I mean, in the Land. And around the Earth. Sort of disembodied, like a ghost. Most of the time, I didn’t choose where I was. Choosing is hard. And I never knew when I was. But once in a while, I met one of the Insequent. They talked about him. The Theomach. I guess he’s their biggest hero. Or he’s going to be. It’s confusing. I don’t know when any of them talked to me, but it seems like it must have been after where we are now. I can’t see why he’s supposed to be such a big deal, so maybe being a hero comes later.

“But there was one—I saw him a bunch of times. I don’t think that was an accident. I think he was looking for me. He called himself the Vizard. He said he wanted us to be friends, but I thought he really just wanted me to do something. When I saw him, he almost always talked about the Theomach. I got the impression he was jealous or something.”

In the distance ahead, Covenant passed back into sunlight; and the sudden change seemed to make him flare as if he had emerged from a dimension of darkness.

Waiting for her opportunity—for the burst of light that might be her last chance—Linden asked carefully. “What did he want you to do?”

Jeremiah shrugged. “Build something, I guess. Like the door that let me come here. Only what he wanted was really a trap. A door into a prison.”

Simply to keep her son with her, she asked. “Why did he want that?”

“Oh,” he replied as if the subject were inconsequential. “it was for the Elohim. All of them. I guess they hate each other. The Insequent and the Elohim. The Vizard thought if I made the right door it would lure them in and they wouldn’t be able to get out. And maybe if he just talked about it enough I would know how to make it.

“But I wasn’t really listening. I didn’t like him. And nothing made sense. I didn’t understand why he hated the Elohim. He didn’t seem to have a reason. I decided he just wanted to prove he’s greater than the Theomach, so I stopped paying attention.”

A few steps more: only a dozen or so. Jeremiah could not conceal his disquiet. He had retrieved his racecar and was playing with it tensely, flipping it back and forth between his hands. Ahead, Covenant had vanished back into shadow. As the sun fell closer to setting, the shadows grew darker: Linden could hardly be sure that he still existed. And Jeremiah gave her the impression that he might bolt at any moment, overcome by the stress of talking to her.

“Just a little longer, honey,” she urged quietly. “I can see that it’s hard for you to be around me. But there’s one thing I have to know. I’m not sure that I can keep going without it.”

“What is it?” His manner was suddenly thick with distrust.

Linden hazarded a moment or two of silence. Then through the crunching of her boots and the crisp stamp of the Staff, she said, “You won’t have to talk at all. You can just show me.”

Half a stride ahead of her, Jeremiah crossed into the light of the sun.

It was pale with constriction and approaching twilight, but it seemed bright as morning after the gloom of the shadows. As soon as she reached the sunshine herself, and her son was fully illumined, she halted. Bracing her fears on the Staff, she said. “Jeremiah,” as if she had the right to command him, “take off your shirt. Let me look at you. I have to know if you were shot.”

Harsh as a blow, he wheeled to face her. The mud of his gaze roiled with darkness and anger. At the corner of his left eye, the muscles beat as steadily as a war-drum; a summons to battle.

Startled and afraid, Linden flinched as if her son had threatened her.

But he complied. Vehemently, almost viciously, he undid the remaining buttons of his pajama top; tore it from his shoulders; flung it to the snow at his feet. If he felt the cold, he did not show it.

As if she had demanded a violation he resented fiercely but could not refuse, he turned in a circle, letting her scrutinise his naked back as well as his chest. But there were too many stains on his skin, too much grime. If he had been wounded and healed, she could not find the scars.

He must have recognised her uncertainty. Abruptly he stooped, punched his fists through the icy crust, and scooped up handfuls of snow. Then he slapped the snow onto his chest and stomach, rubbing furiously until he had cleaned away the marks of struggle and torment.

In the sun’s failing light, his skin looked as healthy and whole as if she had bathed him herself; as if he were the son whom she had loved and tended for so many years.

Are you satisfied?” he hissed venomously. “Mom?”

Oh, God. Instinctively Linden hugged the Staff to her chest, covered her face with her icy hands. Sweet Jesus. The previous day—or ten thousand years in the future—she had asked Jeremiah if he had been shot. At first, he had tried to avoid an answer. Then he had replied, I’m not sure. Something knocked me down pretty hard, I remember that. But there wasn’t any pain.

But he had not been shot. Somehow Barton Lytton’s deputies had missed him. Instead he had merely been struck, perhaps by Roger’s falling body. Therefore he remained alive in the world to which he had been born; the world where he belonged. His life, his natural birthright, could still be saved. In fact, if she understood what she had once experienced herself, and what Covenant had explained about his own visits to the Land—

She heard Jeremiah retrieve his shirt and shove his arms into the sleeves; heard him stride angrily away. But she could not uncover her eyes to watch him leave her. If she understood the rules, the Law, governing translations to the Land, Jeremiah could not be slain here while he remained alive in his proper reality. Lord Foul might torture him until his mind tore itself, but the Despiser could not kill him. Instead Jeremiah would only remain in Lord Foul’s power until his summoner passed away. Then he would be released to his former life. And his body would bear no sign of what he had endured. Only his sane or shredded mind would suffer the consequences of his time in the Land.

My son—Unregarded tears froze on Linden’s cheeks and fingers. Covenant had indeed offered her hope. But he had also misled her. Worse than that, he had lied to her.

If he succeeded against the Despiser, Jeremiah’s summoner would die. Linden knew Joan too well to believe otherwise. Joan was too frail, too brittle, to preserve herself. Wild magic and her own agony were too destructive to be endured. Without the imposed goad and sustenance of Lord Foul’s servants, she would perish quickly.

Then Jeremiah’s torment would end. He would vanish from the Land. Linden would remain because she was already dead. Even Roger might remain, seeking such havoc that the bones of mountains tremble to contemplate it. But Jeremiah—

If he returned to his natural world a mental cripple, she would not be there to care for him. He would be lost to her forever.

That was the lie. Covenant had said that he’ll still be trapped wherever Foul has him, but Jeremiah would not be, he would not. He’ll still need rescuing. Yet surely Covenant knew that Joan’s death would release the boy?

Nonetheless Linden had been given a reason to hope. The Despiser’s defeat would spare her son’s life.

And she had another reason as well; an entirely different kind of reason. The Blood of the Earth. You can Command any damn thing you want. All you have to do is want it, and you and your kid will be reunited. Anywhere you choose. She could block Jeremiah’s return to the world of her death: she could keep him in the Land. Then she would not need to fear for the condition of his mind. Here he could be truly restored, healed.

But she would still lose him. If it’ll make you happy, you two can live in Andelain— There Covenant had misled her. Jeremiah’s vehemence toward her moments ago, like his devotion to Covenant, proclaimed the truth. If she enabled him to remain in the Land, he would not choose to live with her. He did not love her. He had never loved her. For years while she had lavished her heart on him, he had been absent from himself. Dissociated and unreactive, he had been more conscious of Covenant’s friendship than of anything that she had done or felt.

From his damaged perspective, he had no cause to love her—

An uncertain future in his natural world or a life of wholeness in the Land. The Power of Command would enable her to provide one or the other for her son. But that choice was not hers to make: it belonged to him. Either way, he would be lost her to her; but her bereavement was beside the point. She had already lost him. And he was not responsible for her dedication—or her sorrow.

Covenant was another matter entirely. He had lied to her. Deliberately he had tried to obscure the true crux of Jeremiah’s straits—and of her own.

She needed to talk to him. She needed to talk to him now.

But when she snatched down her hands and opened her eyes to the dying light, she found the Theomach standing in front of her.

Instinctively she clasped her numb fingers around the Staff. But she did not call upon its power. She felt no threat from the Insequent. To her health-sense, he still appeared to be an ordinary man beneath his strange habiliments; devoid of any inherent theurgy. If she had not fallen so far down into her grief and anger, she would have discerned him as soon as he approached her.

Instead of fire, she drew a little heat from the ready wood, a little comfort, so that she would not collapse into shivering.

She meant to demand, Tell me. I have to know. Why did Covenant lie to me? But before she could form the words, the Theomach held up his hand to forestall her. His wrapped and hidden face regarded her with an attitude of grave attention.

“Lady,” he said in his light voice, “understand that your son’s plight is not a simple matter—as yours is not. Even the Halfhand is not free of pain.

“I may say nothing of his designs. You must earn the knowledge that you seek. However,” he added as she started to protest, “I will accompany you now, if you will permit it. In recompense for your courtesy, I will answer any questions which do not undermine the integrity of Time, or of my own purposes.” Then he lowered his voice as if he did not wish to be overheard. “Also I will ease your passage through this winter, so that you need not hazard either your own fire or the Halfhand’s. Perhaps my aid will enable you to gain your destination with strength sufficient for what must be done.”

Linden stared at him. He had surprised her out of her immediate turmoil, but she did not forget it. And she was sick to death of people who sought to manipulate her by concealing the truth. However, she understood nothing about the Theomach—and he had offered to answer questions.

After a moment, she said stiffly, “I’m not sure that I want company.” Convince me. “Let’s start with this. If Covenant stays on your path—and I do—will I get a chance to find out what he isn’t telling me?”

The Theomach bowed as though her query signalled acquiescence. “Lady, I believe that you will. You have displayed cleverness, and perhaps wisdom as well. You will contrive opportunities to wrest what veracity you may from your companions.”

What veracity you may—Linden heard disturbing implications in the words, but she was too distraught to consider them. She already knew that she did not trust Covenant.

And her son had not been shot. He would live, whatever happened.

“In that case,” she replied, “I can’t pretend that I don’t need help. What can you do to make this easier?”

Her companion gestured along Covenant’s and Jeremiah’s trail. “Words will not demonstrate my intent. Walk and you will witness my aid.”

Linden stared at him for a moment longer. Then she sighed to herself. Gripping the Staff tensely in one hand, she resumed her long floundering trudge through the snow.

But she did not flounder: her boots did not break through the crust. Instead she found herself striding like the Theomach over the unreliable surface, unimpeded by brittle ice or clogging snow. The iron heel of the Staff struck the crust with a muted thud like a buried echo, but did not pierce it.

The change relieved her tired muscles and worn resolve more than she would have thought possible. She felt lighter, as though a portion of her mortal dross had been lifted from her. —with strength sufficient for what must be done. She had no idea what the Theomach meant; but now she could believe that she would be able to reach her immediate goal.

All right,” she said when she had passed back into the shadows and could see no more sunlight along her way. “That’s one promise you’ve kept. As long as you don’t vanish again—”

“I will not.” Her companion sounded mildly offended. “Here my path lies with yours. You serve my purpose. Therefore I must serve yours.”

“Good.” She nodded to herself several times, arranging her thoughts to the rhythm of strides and echoes. “In that case, I’ll try a few questions. I need something to think about besides the cold.” She meant, Besides Covenant’s lies and my son’s life.

As she walked, she continued to pull a gentle current of warmth and sustenance from the Staff. She needed more support than the Theomach could give her.

“As you wish, lady.” Now his tone suggested an admixture of satisfaction and secret relief. “I will answer as our circumstances permit.”

“The Theomach” seems a bit unwieldy,” Linden began. “Do you have a name?”

“I do. But it is not for your use.”

His words were brusque, although his manner was not.

She shrugged. “Never mind, then.” She had not expected him to reveal himself. “Since Jeremiah has already mentioned your people, maybe you can tell me something about them.

“Why do you hate the Elohim? And what did the Vizard want with Jeremiah? Do your people really think that my son can build a trap,” a prison. “to hold the Elohim?”

The Theomach replied with a shrug of his own. “Lady, we loathe the Elohim for their arrogance, and for their ease. Every other being that strides the Earth must strive for knowledge and power sedulously, at great cost. But the Elohim are power. They do not strive—and seldom encounter unease. Yet they do not scruple to determine the deeds and dooms of any striving being that mischances to attract their opprobrium.

“The differences between us are various and vast, but the chiefest is this. The Elohim have no hearts. I am not present in the Vizard’s thoughts. All of the Insequent hold their own counsel and knowledge, and some are spiteful. But where our interests oppose those of the Elohim, we are seldom petty. There larger concerns move us.”

For a moment, the Theomach walked beside Linden in silence, appearing to shift slightly in and out of definition with every step. Then he added, “Does your son possess both the knowledge and the prowess to devise a snare which the Elohim could not evade, and from which they would not escape? Of that I will not speak. It is a matter for another time. A distant time, lady.”

In the setting dark, Linden was slow to realise that the hills on either side of the valley had begun to slump away. But when she extended her health-sense, she felt the changing shapes of the terrain. Gradually the Last Hills were fading toward the flatland of the Centre Plains.

Vexed by all of the secrets that surrounded Jeremiah, she let a taste of acid into her voice. “Then I don’t suppose that you’ll tell me how you’re going to “humiliate” the Elohim yourself?”

“I will not.” Her tone did not ruffle the Theomach’s aura. “Were I to do so, you would feel the Arch of Time tremble to its roots. The Halfhand should not speak as he does.”

Linden took a deep breath, trying to calm herself. In an abstract sense, she understood his refusals and obfuscations. She was ten thousand years away from her own present. She could not begin to guess what the consequences of her actions might be. And inevitably her choices would be influenced by what she was told. Whatever the Theomach’s motives might be, they required him to strike a complex and ambiguous balance between his impulse to aid her and his determination to preserve the security of Time.

Although the details of their situation were very different, Covenant and Jeremiah faced the same problem. With the Staff of Law and Covenant’s ring, Linden had the power to alter the Land’s past irrevocably. If she acted on knowledge which she should not have been able to possess—

More to herself than to her companion, she muttered, “Are we having fun yet?” Then she resumed her questions.

“We’re going to Berek’s camp because we’re in an impossible position. We need help, and I couldn’t think of anywhere else to get it. But it’s pretty obvious that this is what you had in mind for us. If all you wanted was to interfere with Covenant’s plans, you could have left us anywhere. You picked this place. This time.

“I assume that what we’re doing suits your purpose, whatever that is. But isn’t it dangerous? For God’s sake, we’re about to meet the most famous of the Land’s old heroes.” Covenant had warned her about ripples. No matter how careful we are, he’ll see and hear things—”

“Lady,” the Theomach put in, be at peace.” His tone was gentle; meant to soothe her. “I have said that you serve my purpose. Therefore I must serve yours.

“Here the preservation of the Arch need not trouble you. That burden is mine. At great cost, I have garnered knowledge which you lack, and my knowledge is profound. Be assured that I will watch over you. Indeed, I have already done so. I have set you at a distance which ensured that my theurgy would not be witnessed, but which will not prevent the accomplishment of your intent.

“Where my guidance is needed, I will provide it. And I will accommodate the effects of both your presence and your deeds. You need only trust in yourself—and heed my counsel. In the fullness of time, my aid will demonstrate its worth.”

To her surprise, Linden found that she believed him. He was not closed to her: she could hear his sincerity.

In dreams, Covenant had told her to trust herself. And he had sounded like himself; like the Covenant whom she remembered rather than the man who led her eastward. The man who had lied—

“And I guess,” she murmured to the cold and the waiting night, “that I’ll have to take your promises on faith.”

Her companion answered her with a silence that seemed to imply assent.

By slow degrees, stars began to prick the darkening sky as if they were manifesting themselves like Covenant and Jeremiah across an unfathomable gulf of time. Warmed by Earthpower, Linden could endure the piercing accumulation of the cold. Nevertheless the first few stars seemed as chill as absolute ice, gelid with distance and loneliness. She could have considered herself one of them, unfathomably alone in spite of the Theomach’s presence.

Still she had to make use of the time which had been given to her—or imposed upon her.

“In that case,” she went on. “can you tell me why you interfered with Covenant and Jeremiah in the first place? What was so dangerous about what they were trying to do’?”

“Lady,” the Insequent answered without hesitation, “I do not consider it plausible that you would have been able to avoid High Lord Damelon’s notice. From this arises the true peril. He holds the Staff of Law. The first Staff, of which yours is but an unfinished semblance.”

Linden wanted to ask, Unfinished? But the Theomach did not pause.

“Surely it is plain that the simultaneous proximity in Damelon’s presence of two such implements of Earthpower would cause a convulsion in the Arch. And your own knowledge that such an event both did not and should not occur would increase the violence of the violation. You are fully aware that your Staff was created many centuries after the destruction of the Staff which Damelon Giantfriend will hold upon his approach to Melenkurion Skyweir. That awareness would sever the continuity of the Land as it exists within your own experience. It would sever the essential continuity of Time.”

In this circumstance, her mind cannot be distinguished from the Arch of Time.

His explanation shocked her. “Then why—?” She faltered in dismay, unable to complete the question. Why would Covenant want to take that kind of risk? What had he hoped to accomplish?

“Lady, nothing is certain,” her companion said as if he wanted to reassure her. “Yet the peril cannot be doubted. In fear, I disturbed the Halfhand’s designs. And also in pride,” he admitted, “for assuredly the Elohim would have done so if I did not. Here both your presence and your ignorance ward the Halfhand. But neither would suffice to forestall the Elohim if High Lord Damelon became cognisant of your Staff.”

He paused for a moment, then added carefully, “It is sooth that you aid my purposes. But I do not require such service. I am able to achieve what I must. I was not compelled by my own needs to thwart the Halfhand.”

His tone asked Linden to believe him. She heard an emotion in it which may have been sympathy or pleading.

The heavens held too many stars: she could not imagine them all. They seemed as profligate and irredeemable as the motes of dust in a wilderland. Directly or indirectly, Covenant had lied to her. And he had planned to chance exposing Linden and Jeremiah and the Land and Time itself to the possibility of a catastrophic encounter with Berek’s son.

As she walked on across the surface of the snow and ice into the unknown dark, she clung to the Staff of Law, her Staff; and to Covenant’s ring on its chain under her shirt; and to the warning that Esmer had given her.

You must be the first to drink of the EarthBlood.

She absolutely did not trust the man who had brought her son back to her with his mind restored and his heart shut against her.

Some time later, long after her comparatively easy progress had become a stupefied trudge of hunger and weariness, and even the Staffs given warmth had been enclosed in a cold as pitiless as the sky’s bedizened infinity, she caught the first scent of smoke.

When she noticed it initially, she was not sure of it. But soon it became unmistakable: wood smoke, the distinctive tang of a campfire. Somewhere within the range of her senses, people had lit flames against the winter’s cruelty.

She lifted her head as her pulse quickened. “Is that—?” she asked the Theomach. Studying the smells, she detected many fires. And now the smoke carried faint intimations of cooking; of meats being roasted, stews bubbling, poultices steeping over the fires.

“Berek’s camp is nigh,” her companion confirmed. “Half a league, no more. Shortly we will encounter those who scout the night for the protection of their comrades.”

As her percipience attuned itself, Linden became conscious of more than fires and food. She heard or felt muffled groans, oaths muttered in anger or pain, occasional sharp commands. They came to her through the silence, carried on the frigid air. And her nerves found an early taste of suffering; of wounds that threatened death, and hurts that were worse than dying. Among them, she perceived the sickly odours of illness, malnutrition, infection: fetid bowels, running sores, flesh in all of the crippling stages of putrefaction: the consequences of a prolonged and brutal struggle. Camped somewhere ahead of her were the remnants of two desperate armies; forces which had warred against each other season after season in a running battle across much of the Land’s terrain. Berek and his warriors—and their enemies—must have been marching and fighting and dying for two years or more. Those among them who had somehow remained hale enough to give battle must be pitifully few—and growing fewer by the day.

“If I am not mistaken,” the Theomach remarked after a brief pause, “the Halfhand and your son have marked the presence of Berek’s scouts, and have concealed themselves in darkness, awaiting our accompaniment ere they venture farther.”

Linden hardly heard him. She had begun to push her pace into a shambling rush, not because Covenant and Jeremiah might be in danger, but because she was needed. She was a physician; and Berek’s sick, wounded, and dying numbered in the hundreds.

People are hacking at each other, but they’re too tired to be much good at it. Sheer attrition should have forced them to surrender this war seasons ago.

“How many men has Berek got left?” she asked the Insequent.

“Men and women,” he amended. “Perhaps thirty score.”

“And how many of them are actually fit to fight?”

“Perhaps a third.” His tone suggested a shrug. “Others contribute as they can. They serve as wagoners and drovers, foragers and healers. Still others are able only to be conveyed in wagons and litters while they await their deaths.”

Linden swore under her breath. She had always hated wars. This one sickened her, and she had not yet encountered it.

For Jeremiah’s sake, and Covenant’s, she stemmed the flow of Earthpower from the Staff, although she craved its generous vitality. Then she asked the Theomach, “What about the other army? The King’s supporters?”

“Their numbers are thrice Berek’s. And they have this vantage, that they abandon their wounded and infirm as well as their dead. Thus they are unencumbered, as Berek is not. And indeed his straits are more narrow than I have described, for he retrieves the living fallen among his foes and accords to them the same succour which he provides for his own, scant though that succour assuredly is.

“Yet he continues to harry his foes toward Doom’s Retreat. They have lost heart and purpose, and give battle only because they fear to do otherwise. They adjudge Berek by the standard of themselves, and so they believe that to surrender is to be slaughtered.”

Linden went on swearing to herself. Now she wished that she could run; that she had the strength—Every passing moment meant more death.

When Covenant and Jeremiah appeared suddenly out of the dark, they startled her as if she had forgotten all about them. They moved without a sound. Here the snow was not as deep as it had been in the valley, and the ice did not break under them.

“Linden, slow down,” Covenant whispered urgently. “Berek has scouts out here. One of them just missed us.

And there are outriders closer to the camp. We need a way to get around them.”

Linden strode past him and her son without hesitation. Deliberately she raised her voice. “Well, we certainly aren’t going to sneak up on them. We aren’t their enemies, for God’s sake.” And she was needed. “Maybe those outriders will let us use their horses.”

“Mom!” Jeremiah protested; but she did not pause, even for him.

The Theomach matched her stride. “Lady,” he remarked, “it grows ever more apparent that your folly is wisdom disguised.”

In response, she began to shout, punctuating each sentence with a stamp of the Staff. “Listen to me! I’m a healer! The people with me are my friends! We want Berek’s help, but we also want to help him!”

If the scouts did not hear her, they were too far gone in privation and weariness to be of any use.

Almost at once, however, they reacted. Leather slid over slick ice as they ran. Linden heard the muted jangle of armour, the scrape of drawn blades.

She continued ahead; but she stopped shouting. She had attracted enough attention.

Covenant swore as he and Jeremiah scrambled to catch up with her. Then the night in front of her seemed to solidify, and she found herself facing three warriors with their swords drawn.

Reluctantly she halted. She could not make out their features, but she felt their trepidation as well as their exhaustion: two men and a woman who had endured for seasons or years on raw courage and belief alone. The woman had a badly infected cut in one bicep. One of the men had been slashed across the side of his face recently. The other bore so many smaller wounds that Linden could not count them all.

“There are four of us,” she stated. Her voice shook with exertion. “I’m a healer. The others are my friends. We’ve been walking all day. From the west,” she added because she guessed that Berek’s foes were in the southeast. “And we’re too tired to have much patience. We need to talk to Berek. But first I want to help your wounded. Some of them can still be saved.”

If she distanced herself from Jeremiah and Covenant, she could use her Staff.

“Spies would say the same,” countered the woman. The arm holding her sword trembled. “Doubtless Lord Berek” —she stressed the title grimly—“will speak to you when our Warhaft has ascertained your true purpose.”

“When you see the truth,” Linden retorted, “you’ll regret that you held us back. If you want to escort us to your camp, we won’t give you any trouble. But we aren’t going to waste time on some useless interrogation. This is too important.” She wanted to yell, but she swallowed the impulse. “Too many of your people are dying.”

Turning to the man with the smaller wounds, she commanded, “You. Go tell your outriders that we’re coming. They can warn Lord Berek. And maybe they can spare some horses for us.”

When none of the scouts moved, she said between her teeth. “Do it now. I won’t tolerate delays.”

“You are mistaken,” the woman replied more harshly. Her sword-arm stiffened. “You will tolerate this delay, and more. We have not suffered the struggles and pain of this war to be daunted by imperious strangers whose purposes are hidden. You will remain where you stand until we have gathered a force sufficient to ensure that you cause no harm. Then we will escort you to our Warhaft. Mayhap he will deign to treat gently with you.”

Linden did not hesitate: she was done with hesitation. “Jeremiah,” she ordered quietly, holding the scouts with her glare. “ask them to step aside, please.”

“Mom?” he protested; then. “Covenant?”

“Do it carefully,” she insisted. “Don’t hurt anyone.”

“Hellfire,” Covenant muttered. “You know your mother. If we don’t help her, this mess is going to get worse fast.”

Linden resisted a fierce desire to thrust her way between the warriors; to force them aside with the Staff if necessary. Biting her lip, she waited for Jeremiah.

The scouts took a step backward, prepared to swing their weapons. Their stances shouted belligerence; nerves stretched past weariness into unthinking rage. Then Linden felt a warm wave of force flow past her from Jeremiah’s outstretched hand. At once, the man with the slashed face lurched out of her way. The woman and the other man stumbled aside.

While her son’s weird theurgy held, she set off quickly in the direction of the camp with the Theomach silent at her side and Covenant and Jeremiah following close behind her.

When the scouts recovered their balance, they swore in fear and anger; tried to rush an attack. But Jeremiah’s unseen magic repulsed them: they rebounded from it as though they had encountered a barricade.

Walking with as much speed as she could manage, Linden asserted as if she spoke to the frigid darkness, “I’ve already told you that I’m a healer. I want to help. And we don’t want trouble. You’re in no danger. There’s no need to turn this into a fight. You’ve done too much fighting as it is.

“Why don’t you just escort us while one of you lets Lord Berek know that we’re coming? If nothing else, you have to think that we’re strange enough to be worth his attention.”

For a long moment, the scouts held back. Then, abruptly, the woman sheathed her sword. “Very well,” she rasped. “It will be as you have said.”

She made a rough gesture that Linden felt rather than saw; and at once, the man with the smaller wounds sprinted away, clearly heading toward the nearest of Berek’s outriders. The woman jogged to catch up with Linden at a safe distance, while her comrade took a similar position on the far side of Linden’s small company.

After a brief hesitation, Jeremiah lowered his barrier. Linden sent him her silent gratitude, hoping that he would be able to read her aura. But she did not pause to thank him aloud. The woman who led the scouts was speaking again.

“Comprehend me, however,” she said in a bitten voice. “I accede because I know not how to oppose you. But you are folk of power, hazardous in this war. If by any word or deed you threaten the Lord, or cause harm to those who stand with him, I will contrive to slay you. I have learned much of death. By some means, I will evade your eldritch force and end your haughtiness.”

Linden sighed. Without turning her head, or shifting her attention from the burgeoning and hurtful emanations of Berek’s camp, she asked, “Don’t you have anyone with you who can hear truth? I would have thought that by now,” under the influence of the Land’s rich Earthpower. “some of you would start to notice changes in what you can see and feel and hear.”

“What do you know of such matters?” demanded the woman suspiciously. She seemed unaware that Jeremiah’s barrier was gone.

“This war,” Linden replied. “It changed on the slopes of Mount Thunder. That’s when Lord Berek started to show signs of power you hadn’t seen before. But I find it hard to believe that he’s the only one.” Surely Berek was not alone in his sensitivity to the true life around him? “There have to be more of you who can sense things that seem impossible.”

Now the woman sounded less sure of herself. “Krenwill avers that he has become able to distinguish truth from falsehood.” A jerk of her head indicated the scout striding opposite her. At first, I deemed him a fool. Yet I have beheld proofs—Commonly now, our Warhaft enlists his aid in the questioning of prisoners, for the Lord frowns upon harshness toward our foes when they cannot defend themselves.”

Linden glanced at the man, a vague shape in the night. With every step, the sensations of Berek’s camp became stronger: the fear and pain bordering on madness; the frantic fatigue; the stunned, almost unreactive resolve. And now she could smell horses, already half maimed by inadequate provender and far too much exertion. The cold carried the scents of dung and rotting straw as clearly as sounds.

“Then listen,” she told the scout Krenwill. “I’m a healer. I want to help. Not with the war. With the wounded. And my companions don’t mean you any harm.”

The man studied her in silence for a moment. Then he announced softly, “I hear truth, Basila. If her words are false, she does not know them to be so.”

Linden felt a grudging, uncertain relief from the woman. Still suspiciously, Basila asked. “You say that you desire Lord Berek’s aid. What do you wish of him?”

The clatter of hooves on ice came faintly through the dark, growing louder. Linden counted two riders approaching cautiously. And they were alone. Presumably the man who had run to warn them had continued on toward the camp.

“Horses,” she answered, brusque with the effort of sustaining her haste. “Food. Warm clothes. I want to get as far away from here as possible.

“That’s a lot to ask, I know,” she added. “But first I’m going to earn it.”

If the stubborn hostility of men and women who had seen too much war did not prevent her—

“Wisdom indeed,” the Theomach remarked to the forlorn multitude of the stars. Then he told Linden. You have been well chosen, lady.”

“Hell and blood,” Covenant muttered at her back. “How did the two of you become such buddies? I’m the one who’s trying to save the damn world.”

“There is your error,” replied the Theomach over his shoulder. “You aim too high. The Earth is too wide and rife with mystery to be saved or damned by such as you.”

Peering ahead, Linden studied the approach of the riders. Long ago, Covenant had told her of prophecies which the Council of Lords had preserved concerning the white gold wielder.

And with the one word of truth or treachery,

he will save or damn the Earth

because he is mad and sane,

cold and passionate,

lost and found.

She did not know what she would do if the outriders blocked her path. She needed to reach Berek’s camp while she still had enough stamina to be of some use. But she was reluctant to call on Jeremiah’s aid again. She did not understand his power, and feared its consequences.

With a muffled clash of tack and an uneasy skitter of hooves, two mounted horses condensed from the dark. Involuntarily she slowed to a stop; leaned on the Staff while she strove to steady her breathing. The riders were both women. When they had halted, one of them asked gruffly. “What transpires, Basila? All darkness is fraught with peril, and the coming of these strangers does not rest lightly upon us.”

Basila’s manner conveyed a shrug. “Krenwill conceives that the woman speaks sooth.”

That she means no harm?” insisted the rider. That she is a healer, and intends healing? That she seeks aid of the Lord?”

“Aye,” Basila replied. And Krenwill said. “If there is falsehood here, or peril, she has no knowledge of it.”

“And the theurgy which compelled you to let them pass?” the rider continued. “Does it ward them still?”

Basila extended her arm toward Linden; moved closer until she was almost near enough to touch Linden. Then she let her arm drop. “It does not.” As if she wished to be fair, she added, “And we received no hurt from it. We were merely” —she shrugged again—“repelled.”

“Then we will not tarry,” the rider announced. She radiated a desire for haste that had nothing to do with Linden’s urgency. Rather she seemed to feel exposed on the open plain; eager for light—and for the support of Berek’s army. “Warhaft Inbull will adjudge the matter. A healer we would welcome gladly. But that the woman speaks sooth promises little for her companions.

“Resume your watch,” she told the scouts. “This seems a night for hazards. If four strangers approach from the west, eight may follow, or a score, or—” She left the thought unfinished. “Epemin and I will continue your escort.”

Relieved, Linden started forward again with her companions. At once, the two riders separated, turning their weary horses to take the positions that Basila and Krenwill had occupied; and the scouts drifted back into the night.

Linden forgot the scouts as soon as they were gone. Her percipience was focused on the growing emanations of Berek’s camp. Her face felt frozen, and all of her skin ached with cold. Nonetheless her nerves were certain.

She was nearing a large body of men and women—and a much smaller number of horses. She sensed the turmoil and determination among the warriors; the prolonged strain of overexertion and blood loss and insufficient food; the instances of agony and anguish. As well as she could, she watched the east for the glow of campfires. But her eyes themselves felt frozen, and ordinary sight was of little use to her. Unable to sustain herself with Earthpower while Covenant and Jeremiah were nearby, she had nothing to rely on except her health-sense.

In her concentration, she was slow to realise that the nearer rider, the woman who had spoken earlier, was speaking again. “I am Yellinin,” the woman said, “third after Warhaft Inbull in the tenth Eoman of the second Eoward. He will require your names. And if indeed you come as friends, I would wish to speak of you courteously. How shall I introduce you to the Warhaft?”

Linden bit down on her numb lip. She had no time, and less strength, for questions. And she had caught her first glimpse of firelight. It dimmed the stars, diminished the depth of the night—and limned a long, low rise ahead of her, the last obstacle between her and the encampment. The sight increased her feeling of urgency. Nevertheless she tried to contain her impatience.

“I’m Linden Avery. The man beside me is the Theomach. Thomas Covenant and my son, Jeremiah, are behind us.” Then, because she was desperate in her own way, she asked, “Can’t we just skip arguing with your Warhaft? I don’t mean to be rude myself. But you have an appalling number of wounded. I can feel them from here. It would be better for all of us if you took me straight to your field hospital”—she grimaced at the awkwardness of using a term which might not be familiar to Yellinin—“or wherever you care for your wounded.

“Let me prove myself,” she urged the rider as they began to ascend the rise, and the light of uncounted campfires grew brighter. “Then your Warhaft—or Lord Berek—can decide what he thinks of me.” Suddenly an idea came to her. “In the meantime, you can take my companions to your Warhaft. Let him ask them as many questions as he wants.” Linden wished him joy of the experience. Together, Covenant, Jeremiah, and the Theomach were probably cryptic enough to confound tree trunks or plinths of basalt. But if Berek’s cutters and herbalists had no other resources, she would need to draw on the Staff of Law—and for that she required as much distance from Covenant and Jeremiah as possible. “Think of them as hostages to ensure my good faith.”

“Mom,” Jeremiah objected: he sounded frightened. And Covenant muttered, “Bloody hell, Linden. Just when I think you’ve run out of terrible ideas.”

Her son’s alarm tugged at her as Covenant’s vexation did not. But she kept her back to them; hardened her heart. Her attention was fixed on the injuries of Berek’s people, and her gaze focused her appeal on Yellinin. If she had not been so tightly clenched to her purpose, she might have said, Please. I beg of you.

“Wisdom, as I have proclaimed,” the Theomach announced. “Lady, I am both pleased and gratified.”

The mounted woman leaned down from her saddle, trying to study Linden’s face in the dim glow of the camp. “You ask much, Linden Avery,” she replied severely. “If I judge wrongly—or if Krenwill’s hearing has misled him—you may cause great woe.”

“And if I’m telling the truth,” Linden countered. “you’ll save lives.” She did not slow her strides to accommodate Yellinin’s uncertainty.

After a moment, the outrider said slowly, feeling her way. “It was the one whom you name Jeremiah—was it not?—who wielded theurgy against Basila and her comrades? If you are parted from him, he will be unable to ward you.”

Her tone added, And in your absence, he will be free to wreak any harm which he may desire.

“Yes,” Linden answered at once. “it was. But I don’t need his protection.” If she had been a different woman, she could have challenged Berek’s foes for him; perhaps routed them. “He won’t use his power again unless Covenant tells him to—and Covenant won’t do that.” Covenant had accepted the path which the Theomach had laid out for him. Linden was confident that he would not risk Berek’s enmity: not in the Theomach’s presence. “I can’t promise that your Warhaft will like their answers. But they won’t fight him.”

“Assuredly I will not,” the Theomach offered lightly. “And I will watch over your companions.”

“Linden.” Covenant’s voice was harsh with warnings or threats. “You know what can go wrong here.”

“Sure,” she replied over her shoulder. Disturbances in the integrity of Time, lethal discontinuities. And she had been warned that Berek held enough Earthpower to erase Covenant and Jeremiah—“But you know what we have to gain. You’ll be all right without me for a while.”

Abruptly Yellinin dismounted. Leaving her horse, she came to Linden. In spite of her obscured features, her sword and cuirass, and her warrior’s bearing, she radiated concern rather than suspicion as she grasped Linden’s arm and pulled her away from her companions.

Softly, tensely, Yellinin said, “Linden Avery, if you choose to part from your comrades, I must inform you that Warhaft Inbull is not known for gentleness. Lord Berek endeavours to restrain him, but he has suffered much in this war—lost much, endured much—and has become cruel. Upon occasion, he has refused Krenwill’s aid because he desires to discover truth with pain.

Is it truly your wish that your son should be delivered to the Warhaft?”

For the first time since she had become aware that she was needed, Linden faltered. Instinctively she looked at the pleading on Jeremiah’s face. He, Covenant, and the Theomach had stopped: they stood watching her; waiting for her. She could not read Covenant or her son; but the meaning of Covenant’s scowl was obvious, and Jeremiah’s open chagrin seemed as poignant as a cry.

—has become cruel.

He’s full of Earthpower. If he so much as touches us, this whole ordeal will be wasted.

But the call of the wounded was too strong. She was a physician, and could not refuse it.

Like Covenant and the Theomach, Jeremiah had resources which surpassed her ability to measure them.

Deliberately Linden turned back to Yellinin. “My companions don’t mean any harm.” She made no effort to conceal the pressure rising in her. “They won’t cause any trouble. I keep saying that. But they can protect themselves if they have to. Right now, people are dying. Your people.” She could feel them: they were as vivid to her as the ravages of the Sunbane. “The sooner I get to work, the more of them I can help.”

The outrider remained caught in indecision for a moment longer. Then she shook it off. She was a fighter, uncomfortable with doubt and hesitation.

“Accept my mount, Linden Avery,” she said as if she were sure. Her hand released Linden’s arm. “If you are indeed able to feel the wounded and dying, you will have no difficulty discovering where they lie. Should any seek to thwart you, reply that you act by Yellinin’s command. Epemin and I will escort your comrades to the Warhaft. If I have erred, I will bear his wrath, and Lord Berek’s.”

“I don’t believe it,” Covenant growled under his breath. “Here she is, completely lost, with no idea what’s at stake—and total strangers still do what she wants.”

“That’s my Mom,” Jeremiah sighed glumly. He sounded like a boy who had resigned himself to an unjust punishment.

But Linden ignored them now. As soon as Yellinin let her go, she strode to the woman’s mount; grabbed at the reins.

When she had found the stirrup, she heaved herself into the saddle.

“Thank you,” she said to the outrider. “You’re not going to regret this.” Then she called, “Jeremiah! I’m counting on you!” She did not trust Covenant. “Don’t make these people sorry that they helped me.”

No one responded—and she did not wait. Digging her heels inexpertly into the horse’s sides, she headed for the top of the rise as swiftly as her shambling mount could carry her.

God, she loathed war.