The Fatal Revenant Part 13

"Chosen, the Masters will support the ur-Lord in this. If you do not oppose him, they will not oppose you. But he is the Unbeliever, the Illender. The Giants have named him Earthfriend and Rockbrother. The Lords of old entrusted him with the Land's doom. If he requests it of them, the Masters will aid him."

Linden heard him. The Masters would use force-And they were too many: Stave, Liand, and the Ramen could not fight them. She would lose everything that might be gained by cooperating with Covenant.

She might cost Jeremiah his redemption.

I can't do it without you.

The boy moved so that she could see him past Stave and Covenant. His young face wore an expression of pleading which was almost desperation. "Please, Mom," he said tensely. "We need this. It has to be just you."

His tic signaled to her in a code that she could not decipher.

-if you do not fall the perils which have been prepared for you.

Deliberately Linden turned away from Covenant and Jeremiah and the a.s.sembled Masters. With a gesture, she gathered her friends around her. Vitrim and the Staff of Law gave her the strength to say. "Listen. I know how you feel. I don't like this any better than you do. But it's a risk that we have to take. Covenant says that he can save the Land." He can save my son. "If he fails, I'm not exactly helpless. And you won't be far away.

"I'm not asking you to trust him. h.e.l.l, I'm not even asking you to trust me." She smiled grimly. "I just think that we can't afford to miss this chance."

One by one, she looked around at the people who had chosen to share her fate.

Liand ducked his head as if he were abashed. Mahrtiir glared at her, fierce with disapproval. Stave's scarred visage revealed nothing. Bhapa frowned like a man who agreed absolutely with his Manethrall. But Pahni's gaze was fixed on Liand as though she feared for him; wanted him to comply with Covenant's demand. And Anele's blind eyes watched the north as if it held secrets that only he could discern.

At last, Stave said flatly. "I see no other road." And Mahrtiir muttered. "Nor do I."

Liand flung a look like an appeal at Linden, but he did not protest. Instead he went abruptly to help Pahni draw Anele away from Covenant and Jeremiah, away from Linden.

With a tight shrug, Bhapa joined Mahrtiir and Stave as they retreated perhaps a dozen paces. There Linden's companions stood in a loose cl.u.s.ter, holding themselves in abeyance.

All of her friends except the old man followed Linden with their eyes as she faced Covenant and Jeremiah again.

More angrily than she intended, she asked; demanded, Are you satisfied?" She felt an inexplicable bereavement, as if like Kastenessen she had maimed herself with her own pain.

She wanted to add, I remember a time when you weren't like this. But she also recalled vividly that he had rejected the company of the Haruchai when he had left Revelstone to seek out the Despiser. He had always been severe in his purposes-and stubbornly determined to spare as many people as possible from sharing the price of his actions.

He may have been trying to spare her friends, despite his ire and scorn- The Unbeliever did not reply directly. He seemed to be in a hurry now, driven to complete his purpose. Instead of answering her, he pointed at a spot on the gra.s.s one long stride in front of him and ordered. "Stand there. And don't touch us. Don't let that d.a.m.n Staff touch us. If we feel even a reminder of power from you, this whole thing is going to unravel."

The wind raised an unsteady wailing among the distant trees. It cut at the wet gra.s.s; lashed fine spray from the surface of the river. For a moment, it whipped at Linden's eyes, blinding her with tears. If for no other reason than because Covenant was afraid of her, she wanted to call up Earthpower and Law. Then she would learn the truth in an instant- -and she would sacrifice her best opportunity to succor Jeremiah. Perhaps her only opportunity.

Rubbing moisture from her eyes with the back of her hand, she moved to stand where her former lover had indicated. There she planted one heel of the Staff near her boots and hugged the incorruptible wood against her chest.

At once, Covenant and Jeremiah separated. Her son came to stand in front of her scarcely more than an arm's length away. His smile may have been intended to rea.s.sure her; but the frantic twitching at the corner of his eye made him appear feverish with excitement or dread. His muddy gaze seemed to blur in the wind, losing definition as the air whipped past him.

At the same time, Covenant positioned himself directly behind Linden, facing her and Jeremiah. Like her son, he stood nearly close enough to reach out and touch her.

I can't do it- Jeremiah glanced past her toward Covenant; nodded at what he saw. His smile fell away, replaced by an expression of intent concentration. His mouth moved as if he were speaking, although he made no sound that she could hear. Still he and Covenant were closed to her health-sense. She felt the knotted anxiety and frustration of her friends more acutely than the presence of Covenant or Jeremiah. Only ordinary sight a.s.sured her that her son and his companion in fact stood near her.

I can'tThe Masters tightened their cordon, perhaps preparing to intervene if they saw any sign of her power-or if her friends attempted to intrude.

Slowly, and apparently in unison, Jeremiah and Covenant began to raise their arms, holding their fingers splayed. For an instant, Jeremiah's hands seemed to point straight at Covenant's through Linden's shoulders. But their arms continued to rise until together the two men implied an arch over her head.

-the perils which have been prepared- Without warning, Anele proclaimed, "I have said that I no longer fear the urviles! Did you not heed me?"

At the edge of her vision, Linden caught a glimpse of blackness to the north, upstream beside the river. Instinctively she turned to squint across the wind in that direction.

A tight black wedge of ur-viles had appeared with startling suddenness. They might have been translated from some other realm of existence, although Linden knew that they had only concealed themselves until they were ready to be noticed. Their loremaster brandished an iron jerrid or scepter fraught with vitriol: the entire formation was a seethe of power, bitter and corrosive. And the wedge seemed huge*Every ur-vile that she and Esmer had brought to this time must have joined together, united by some new interpretation of their Weird. Scores of glowing blades flashed among them, as cruel as lava, and as fatal.

They charged toward the poised arc of Masters, running hard. In seconds, they would be near enough to strike. Yet Linden believed instantly that their a.s.sault was not intended for the Haruchai. Handir and his kinsmen merely stood in the way.

The point of the wedge was aimed straight at her-or at Covenant and Jeremiah. The loremaster's weapon spat acrid theurgy and ruin as the creatures rushed forward.

They had created manacles- Frozen with shock, she had stared at them for two quick heartbeats, or three, before she realized that there were no Waynhim among them. She saw no Waynhim anywhere. Apparently the ancient servants of the Land had declined to partic.i.p.ate in the actions of their black kindred. But if they had not chosen to join the ur-viles, they also did not interfere.

What had their complex intentions required of them now?

If the manacles were intended for Covenant, and the ur-viles were trustworthy, then he was not.

If. If. If.

But the Demondim-sp.a.w.n could not tell Linden how to reach her son.

Liand and Bhapa shouted warnings. Jeremiah dropped his arms, plainly stricken with dismay. At Linden's back, Covenant snarled, "h.e.l.l and blood!" Then he yelled at the Masters. "Stop them! We've been betrayed!"

The Haruchai had already spun to face the wedge. At Covenant's command, they moved to intercept the ur-viles.

They were potent and supremely skilled. Nevertheless they were too few to do more than slow the advance of the creatures.

Linden had time to think, Betrayed. Yes. But not by the ur-viles. Suddenly her guts were filled with the nausea that bespoke Esmer's nearness.

Looking around wildly, she saw him step out of the air on the far side of the river.

His cymar hung loosely along his limbs as if he were impervious to the tangling wind. She could hardly make out his features. In spite of the distance, however, the dangerous and fuming green of his eyes blazed vividly, as incandescent and unclean as small emerald suns tainted by despair.

In a mounting roar, he shouted, You have given birth to havoc, Haruchai, Bloodguard, treachers! Now bear the blame for the Land's doom!"

Everything happened too quickly: Linden could not react to it. Ignoring Esmer, the ur-viles and the Masters flung themselves toward each other. Vitriol frothed and spattered on the blades of the creatures: the loremaster's jerrid gathered gouts of darkness. But none of the weapons struck as the Haruchai spread out swiftly to challenge the wedge along its edges. Linden's companions sprang forward to ward her, Stave and Mahrtiir first among them. And Esmer Cail's son made a savage gesture with one hand; gave a howl like a great blaring of horns. Instantly all of the earth under the feet of the ur-viles and the Masters erupted.

Gra.s.s and soil spattered upward like oil on hot iron. Gouts of sodden loam and rocks and roots and gra.s.s-blades burst into the air and were immediately torn to chaos by the wind. Ur-viles and Haruchai alike were scattered like withered leaves: they could not keep their feet, hold their formations; summon their power. Linden half expected to see them tumble away, hurled across the hillside by Esmer's violence. But they only fell, and were tossed upward, and fell again, pummeled by a hurtling rain of stones and dirt.

Yet the ground where she stood with Jeremiah and Covenant remained stable. Shock and incomprehension held her friends motionless, but Esmer's puissance did not threaten them.

He spared them deliberately: Linden could not believe otherwise. Aid and betrayal. He must have wanted Covenant and Jeremiah to succeed Abruptly Covenant yelled. "Now, Jeremiah!"

The boy shrugged off his chagrin. Instantly obedient, he repulsed Linden's companions with a flick of his hand. Then he raised his arms as he had before; swung them upward until once again they and Covenant's suggested an arch over Linden's head. Jeremiah resumed his voiceless incantation. Covenant may have done the same.

For a brief moment, a piece of time too slight to be measured by the convulsive labor of her heart, Linden felt power gather around her: the onset of an innominate theurgy. From Jeremiah, it seemed to be the same force which had stopped her in the forehall, but multiplied a hundredfold. From Covenant, however, it had the ferocity of running magma. If it continued, it would scorch the cloak from her back, char away her clothes until her flesh bubbled and ran.

Liand and Pahni may have shouted her name: even Stave may have called out to her. But their voices could not penetrate the acc.u.mulating catastrophe.

Then Linden heard and saw and felt and tasted a tremendous concussion. Lightning completed the arch over her head, striking like the devastation of worlds from Jeremiah's fingertips to Covenant's.

After that, Covenant and Jeremiah, all of her friends, Esmer, the geyser-scattered ur-viles and Haruchai, the gradual slopes on either side of the watercourse, the whole promontory of Revelstone: everything vanished. The fierce arc of lightning lingered momentarily, burned onto her retinas. The Earthpower of Glimmermere's outflow persisted. But such things faded; and when they did, everything that she knew-perhaps everything that she had ever known-was gone.

Interference The shock was too great. Linden was too human: no aspect of her body or her mind had been formed to accommodate such a sudden and absolute transition.

The sheer sensory excess of her original translation to the Land had left her numbed and dissociated; hardly able to react. And her pa.s.sages through caesures had been bearable only because she had been protected by power, the ur-viles' and her own.

This was utterly different. In some ways, it was worse. In a small fraction of an instant, everything that she could see and feel and understand and care about vanished- -or was transformed.

She hardly noticed that she staggered, instinctively trying to regain her balance on different ground; scarcely realized that the gloom and the battering wind were gone, replaced by dazzling whiteness and sharp cold. The chill in her lungs was only another version of her icy garments. She did not seem to have gone blind because the sunlight was too intense, but rather because her optic nerves simply could not accept the change. If the Staff of Law had not remained, unaltered and kindly, in her embrace, she might have believed that she had been snuffed out. Every neuron in her body except those that acknowledged the Staff refused to recognize where and who she was.

But then she heard Covenant pant as if he were enraged. "h.e.l.lfire! h.e.l.l and blood!" and she knew that she was not alone.

An autonomic reflex shut her eyes against the concussive dazzling that seemed to fill the whole inside of her head like the clamor of great incandescent bells. And a different kind of visceral reflex caused her to reach for the fire of the Staff. She wanted to wall herself off with Earthpower from the incomprehensible change which had come over the world.

At once, however, Covenant yelled, "Don't even think about it! G.o.d d.a.m.n it, Linden! Don't you understand that you can still erase me? I'm still folding time, and it's fragile. If you use that Staff, you'll be stuck here alone, you'll be helpless while Foul destroys everything!"

Cowed by his anger, and belatedly afraid, she s.n.a.t.c.hed herself back from the strength of Law. Gripping the Staff in one hand, she held it away from her so that its dangerous succor would not rest so close to her heart.

She felt Covenant's fury change directions. Muttering. "h.e.l.lfire and b.l.o.o.d.y d.a.m.nation," he turned his back on her. His steps crunched through a brittle surface as he increased the distance between them.

With her eyes closed and her entire sensorium stunned, she could not find any sign of Jeremiah's presence.

Or of the Masters. Or of her friends. Somehow she had left them behind. The nausea with which Esmer afflicted her was gone. The ur-viles could conceal themselves whenever they wished.

But Jeremiah- Now she wanted to open her eyes, look around frantically for her son. But she could not. Not yet. The brightness was too concentrated to be borne; or she was too vulnerable to it. She might damage her retinas- Covenant? she asked, demanded, pleaded. Where are we? What have you done? But her voice refused to respond.

What have you done with Jeremiah?

"d.a.m.n it!" Covenant shouted abruptly. "Show yourself!" His anger carried away from her. "I know you're here! This whole place stinks of you! And"-he lowered his voice threateningly-"you do not want me to force you. That's going to hurt like h.e.l.l."

"And do you not fear that I will reveal you'?" answered a light voice.

Cupping her free hand over her eyes, Linden began blinking furiously, trying to accustom herself to the cold white glare so that she could see. She had never heard that voice before.

"You," Covenant snorted. "You wouldn't dare. You'll be caught in the cross-fire. You'll lose everything."

"Perhaps you speak sooth-" the stranger began.

Covenant insisted. "So what the h.e.l.l are you doing? d.a.m.n it, we're not supposed to be here."

"-yet my knowledge suffices," the other voice continued calmly, "to intervene in your designs. As you have seen."

Linden fought the stricken numbness of her senses; and after a moment, she found that she could discern the new arrival. He stood a few paces beyond Covenant. Even through the confusion of cold and dazzling, he appeared to be an ordinary man. If he moved, his steps did not crunch as Covenant's did. Nevertheless his aura seemed comparatively human.

And yet-And yet- Something about the man conveyed an impression of slippage, as if in some insidious, almost undetectable fas.h.i.+on he was simultaneously in front of and behind himself; and on both sides- Perhaps he had simply stepped out of hiding when Covenant demanded it.

"You didn't have to show me," retorted Covenant bitterly. "I already know what you can do. h.e.l.lfire, I already know what you're going to do. What I don't know is why you put me here. This is the wrong time. Not to mention the wrong d.a.m.n place."

"The Elohim would have done so, if I did not." The stranger sounded amused.

The Elohim-? Still blinking urgently, Linden made slits of her fingers; tried to force herself to see through the hurtful brilliance. By slow degrees, her health-sense adjusted to the changed world. Spring had inexplicably become winter- Covenant swore between his teeth. "No, they wouldn't. That's why I brought her. As long as they think she's the Wildwielder, she protects me.

"Anyway," he growled. "you hate them. You people might as well be that 'darkness' they keep talking about, that shadow on their hearts. So why are you doing their dirty work?"

"It pleases me to usurp them, when I may." Now the man's tone suggested satisfaction; smugness. "Also I do not desire the destruction of the Earth. The peril of your chosen path I deemed too great. Therefore I have set you upon another. It is equally apt for your purpose. And its hazards lie within the scope of my knowledge. It will serve me well."

Covenant, Linden tried to say, listen to me. Where is Jeremiah? What have you done to my son? But the cold sc.r.a.ped at her throat with every breath, making the muscles clench. She was involuntarily mute; helpless.

"No," Covenant snapped, "it isn't equally d.a.m.n apt. It's a b.l.o.o.d.y disaster. You people are such infernal meddlers. I wish you would find something else to do. Go start a war with somebody, leave the rest of us alone."

The stranger laughed. "When such powers are joined in the hands of one who is constrained by mortality, unable to wield both together?" His tone was ambiguous, a mixture of scorn and regret. "When the Elohim as a race gnash their teeth in frustration and fear? My gratification is too great to be denied. If ever she obtains that which will enable her to bear her strengths, your chagrin will provide my people with vast amus.e.m.e.nt."

He did not sound amused.

"Amus.e.m.e.nt, h.e.l.l," growled Covenant. "If that ever happens-which it won't-your people will be frantically trying to stop her, just like everybody else. Only in their case, it'll be sheer greed. They'll want all that power for themselves.

"Oh, that's right," he added suddenly, mocking the newcomer. "I forgot. Your people hardly ever agree on anything.

Half of them will be after her power. Half of them will be busy at something completely loony, like trying to make friends with the d.a.m.n Worm of the World's End. And half of them will be doing the only thing they're really good at, which is watching the rest of the world go by and wis.h.i.+ng they were Elohim."

At last, the stabbing glare was blunted enough to let Linden make out blurred details through the slits between her fingers. Gradually her health-sense approached clarity. The sun shone hard on a wide field of snow; snow so pristine and untrampled that it reflected and concentrated the light cruelly. At one time, she guessed, it would have covered her knees. But it had fallen some time ago. Days of hard suns.h.i.+ne had melted its surface often enough to compact the snow and form an icy crust. As her vision improved, she could see the scars which Covenant's boots had gouged in the snow, leading away from her. But he and his companion or antagonist remained indistinct: they were no more than blots on her straining sight.

The surrounding silence was sharper than the chill, and more ominous.

She did not know where she was. She could be sure only that she was still in the Land. Even through the snow and her freezing boots, she felt its characteristic life-pulse, its unique vitality. But this place was not familiar in any other way.

"Covenant." Her voice was a hoa.r.s.e croak, raw with cold. "Where's Jeremiah?"

Instead of responding to Covenant's gibes, the stranger said, She requires your consolation." Now he sounded impatient with Covenant. "Doubtless your merciful heart will urge you to attend to her. I will abide the delay."

The imprecise stain of Covenant's shape appeared to gesture in Linden's direction. "Ignore her. She always thinks what she wants is more important than what anybody else is doing. She's lost here without me. We're too far from her time. And she can't get back without me. She can wait until I'm done with you."

Too far- She should have been shocked.

-from her time.

Covenant had removed her from Revelstone, from the upland plateau, from her friends-and from the time in which she belonged.

And she can't get back- But the incomprehensible jolt of her dislocation was fading as her senses rea.s.serted themselves. She could not be shocked again, or paralyzed: not while Jeremiah was missing. At that moment, nothing else mattered.

Don't you understand that you can still erase me?

Covenant had cause to fear her. She could compel answers- Squeezing her eyes shut to dismiss tears of pain, Linden opened them again; dropped her hand. "Covenant!" she gasped harshly as she took a couple of unsteady steps toward him. Her boots broke through the stiff crust and plunged into snow deep enough to reach her s.h.i.+ns. "Catch!"

In desperation and dismay, she flung the Staff of Law straight at him.

Panic flared in his eyes. Cursing, he jumped aside.