The Last Dark (72 page)

Grueburn and Kindwind led Bluntfist and Furledsail upward. The river fumed against their knees, boiled to carry them away. But they were Giants: they kept their feet. All of the Swordmainnir were in the tunnel. More sailors swarmed up the ropes. By Linden’s count, only Scatterwit, Squallish Blustergale, and Branl remained in immediate danger.

The river here was as corrupt as it had been around the lake. It reeked of the bane’s exudations.

As Grueburn joined the Ironhand, Covenant gave Linden a look like a glare of fever. By its very nature, wild magic resisted restraint. It became more dangerous with repeated use. But Linden could not help him. There was too much Earthpower in the air. The chute constricted it. Reminders of She Who Must Not Be Named assailed her. Her wedding band no longer answered his.

“It’s getting harder,” Jeremiah groaned. He kept his eyes squeezed shut. “The Worm—I can see
Melenkurion
Skyweir.”

Grueburn and Kindwind stood in the river shoulder to shoulder. Aching to relieve Jeremiah and Covenant—to relieve herself—Linden put her hand on the Staff again, added her determination to her son’s.

“How far?” she asked him. “How far away is it?”

“I don’t know.” Jeremiah was near his limits. “Close enough.” Then he added, “But the Worm is in a river. It isn’t moving as fast.”

Linden closed her eyes as well; listened to the tumid clamor of water. The Worm must have passed the boundary of the Last Hills. It was crossing the wilderland which had once been Garroting Deep. And along the way, it was appeasing its hunger by drinking from the Black River, which took its name from its burden of diluted EarthBlood.

Yet the Worm had traversed most of the Land with appalling speed. How much time remained before it forced its way into the depths of the Skyweir? A day? Less?

A moment later, Covenant’s wild magic faded. When Linden opened her eyes, she saw silver streaming from the
krill
in Branl’s grasp. It shone on the water frothing down the contorted length of the channel. At the same time, she heard shouts.

Hurl called, “They are safe!” And the Anchormaster crowed, “Stone and Sea! We are Giants in all sooth! And the
Haruchai
are Giants also, in their fashion. We live!”

“The lake rises still,” continued Hurl. “Indeed, it swells more swiftly. Yet Scatterwit has suffered no further harm. And Blustergale has lost no more than two toes and a portion of a third. Had we been but a heartbeat sooner—”

Blustergale interrupted him, roaring in feigned indignation. “There is no pain! None, I say! Is this not an affront to fire the coldest heart? Am I not a Giant, as mortal as any, and as worthy of my hurts? Does the lurker’s god think so little of me, or of Baf Scatterwit, or of all here, that it does not deign to cause
pain
?”

While Scatterwit chuckled, Bluff Stoutgirth commanded, “Enough, Blustergale. Some among us deem toes needful. Demonstrate that you are able to ascend here, and I will suffer your umbrage. Should you slip or falter, however, I will regard you justly chastened.”

“The lake rises still,” Hurl repeated more urgently. “Badinage and bravado will not slow it.”

“Aye,” the Anchormaster replied, “and aye again.” He had recovered his good humor. “As you have seen fit to chide us, you will remain to mark the water’s advance.” Then he urged his sailors into motion.

Led by Onyx Stonemage, the others thrashed ahead.

Branl approached Coldspray, Grueburn, and Kindwind; Covenant, Linden, and Jeremiah. He held Loric’s dagger so that its radiance did not shine into his eyes. Shadows obscured his mien as he announced, “The lake did not heed the
krill
.”

“The Feroce were right,” Covenant grumbled. “The lurker’s god is crazy. That knife can cut anything.” He peered into the darkness of the chute. “Now I’m worried. We don’t know what’s up there. We’re going to need those creatures.”

“They’ve come this far,” Linden sighed. In spite of their fears—“If they don’t rejoin us, it’s because they can’t.”

“I know.” Tension throbbed in Covenant’s voice. His arms were getting tired. He would not be able to cling to the Ironhand’s back indefinitely. But Coldspray would need her hands to help her defy the weight of the river. Grueburn and Kindwind would need their hands. “I just want to bitch for a while.”

“Timewarden,” Rime Coldspray replied like a reprimand, “your tales are foreshortened beyond sufferance. They are ended ere I am able to hear joy in them. And you employ words strangely. ‘Bitch,’ forsooth. I will deem it a courtesy if you will refrain until we are better able to heed you.”

Covenant gave Linden a twisted smile, rolled his eyes. “Have it your way. I’ll do my complaining when we find the damn Despiser.”

“And another,” sighed the Ironhand. “Is there no limit to your brevity?”

Linden wished that Covenant could laugh. She wanted to laugh herself. But she did not have it in her. The spray promised carrion. It implied horror. Even in the constriction of the flume, the sensations were oblique. Nevertheless they were getting stronger.

ow the company did not tarry. A shout from Hurl announced that the lake was nearing the rim of the waterfall. Heaving against the pressure of the river, the Swordmainnir and the sailors fought their way upward. One of the Anchormaster’s crew had tied a rope around Baf Scatterwit’s waist. Giants ahead of her held the line. And Squallish Blustergale stayed with her, taking some of her weight. Together they struggled along behind their comrades.

Linden’s arms ached. Cramps threatened her thighs. Nevertheless riding Grueburn’s back was easier than it might have been. All of the Giants moved hunching over, ready to catch themselves if they slipped on slick rocks or secreted moss. Grueburn’s posture helped Linden to hang on.

The passage should have been impossible for the
Haruchai
. Water that reached the Giants’ knees struck Stave and Branl above their waists. Nevertheless the two men forged ahead as if they were incapable of faltering. The
krill
in Branl’s grasp did not waver. He and Stave carried their cumbersome swords like men who had spent decades training with such weapons.

Before long, Hurl called to inform the company that the lake had reached the bottom of the chute.

Muttering elaborate Giantish curses, the Swordmainnir and the sailors continued an ascent that seemed to have no end.

Eventually, however, Rime Coldspray came to a widening. There across the centuries the river had eaten deposits of sandstone and shale out of the walls. It had dug a pit in the underlying basalt. The result was a space in which all of the Giants could gather—and a pool deep enough to swallow the
Haruchai
. Fortunately a few boulders clung to the sides. Here and there, stubborn granite ledges protruded from the walls.

Coldspray looked a question at Bluff Stoutgirth. When he nodded, she ordered a rest.

Gratefully Frostheart Grueburn sloughed Linden onto a boulder. Cirrus Kindwind put Jeremiah down beside Linden, stood straighter to ease the tension in her back. As Coldspray settled Covenant nearby, the Anchormaster arranged Stonemage, Bluntfist, and his crew, some standing to their chests in the pool, others leaning on boulders or propped against the walls. Then he asked for food and clean water.

Sailors unpacked chunks of cured beef and mutton, rinds of cheese, bread with the texture of hardpan, dried fruits, waterskins. As they did so, Linden accepted the Staff of Law from Jeremiah and assumed the whole task of purifying the air so that he could rest and eat. He had not questioned her assistance earlier: he was not loath to trust her now. Apparently he was learning to believe that she would not recant her gift.

While she had the opportunity, she extended other forms of refreshment to the Giants; eased the trembling of Covenant’s muscles; nourished Jeremiah’s strength. As if to himself, the boy murmured, “That’s a neat trick. I want to learn it.” But he did not reach for the Staff. Images of the Worm seemed to glide like ravens across the depths of his gaze.

Some of the waterskins held diluted
diamondraught
. When Linden had swallowed enough to wash the taste of pollution out of her mouth and throat, she joined the Giants eating.

She had not heard Hurl’s voice for a while. Surely he was able to stay above the lake? But if the Anchormaster felt any anxiety on Hurl’s behalf, he concealed it with jests.

“Thomas?” Linden asked. “What do you think? How high can that monster lift so much water?”

He opened his mouth to answer; closed it again. After a moment, he said, “By damn.” Surprise and relief. With the index finger of his halfhand, he pointed down the chute.

In the distance below the pool, unsteady emerald reflected wetly on the walls.

The fires of the Feroce were still some distance away, but they were coming closer. And before long, Linden made out Hurl’s bulk looming behind them. In the green glow, he looked somehow ghoulish, like an avatar of the Illearth Stone. His grin resembled the grimace of a fiend. Nevertheless he was unharmed.

The condition of the Feroce was more difficult to gauge. Linden had never been able to sense the nature of their magicks. From her perspective, they seemed smaller, weaker, as if they had been reduced by their immersion in the lake. And when they finally waded into the pool, she saw that they had indeed shrunk. Although they floated effortlessly with their arms and flames above water, they appeared to have drawn into themselves as if their encounter with their High God’s god had shamed them.

“They rose with the lake,” Hurl proclaimed in a tone of wonder. “I had surrendered all hope of them. Yet when the lake began to hint that it might recede, the Feroce emerged.”

The creatures faced Covenant; but now they did not flinch or cower. Nor did they ask his pardon for their absence. “We are merely the Feroce,” they stated. “We serve our High God. We do not question our worship. Commanded, we obey.” The strangeness of their shared voice seemed to accentuate the corruption of the atmosphere, the taint of the river, the slick sheen of the walls.

“But we have beheld our High God’s god. He is lessened. Perhaps he is lessened.” They regarded only Covenant. Even their flames appeared to focus on him. “Perhaps the Pure One is also lessened.” Their emerald shone in his eyes. It gleamed like spray on his scarred forehead. “You must hasten again. We do not question. Commanded, we obey. Yet doubt infects. It spreads. An end draws near. We fear it. It gladdens us.

“You must hasten.”

“Or what?” Covenant asked carefully.

The Feroce were no longer afraid—or their fear had become a different form of apprehension. “We are naught,” they answered. “Worship is all things. Or it also is naught.”

“Mom?” Jeremiah breathed. “What’s going on?”

Linden touched his shoulder to quiet him. She tightened her grip on the Staff.

“Then forget your High God,” Covenant said almost calmly; almost mildly. “Forget our alliance. Forget that Clyme died for it, and the Worm is going to destroy every god you can imagine.” He did not raise his voice, but his tone became thicker, harder. “Remember that the
jheherrin
saved the Pure One. They were weaker than you are, and maybe more scared, but they helped him anyway. Then he set them free.

“Try remembering
that
. If doubt infects, so does courage.”

Linden held her breath. If the Feroce turned back now—

For a long moment, they were silent. They did not move. Their large eyes remained fixed on Covenant. Nevertheless they conveyed the impression that they were conferring with each other.

Covenant faced them steadily, waiting.

Finally they sighed like slumping mud. “We are the Feroce. We are ignorant of courage. We obey because we must.”

They did not urge haste again. Instead they drifted away from Covenant, gathered in the center of the pool. There they faced each other, holding out their fires like questions for which they had no answers.

“Thomas?” Linden asked.

He frowned at her, or at his own thoughts. “I know. Not exactly reassuring.” Then he grimaced. “So what else is new?

“We should go,” he told Rime Coldspray. “We’re running out of time.”