Fatal Revenant

you touch either one of us-or if you use that Staff-you’ll undo the fold. Time will snap back into shape.

“It’s like your son says,” he finished. “We’ll disappear. I’m not strong enough to keep us here.”

“Your son?” Liand breathed. “Linden, is this your son?”

“Liand, no,” Mahrtiir instructed at once. “Do not speak. This lies beyond us. The Ringthane will meet our questions when greater matters have been resolved.”

Linden did not so much as glance at them. But she could no longer look at Covenant. The torchlight in his eyes, and his unwonted smiles, daunted her. She understood nothing. She wanted to scoff at the idea of folding time. Or perhaps she merely yearned to reject the thought that she might undo such theurgy. How could she bear to be in his presence, and in Jeremiah’s, without touching them?

As if she were turning her back, she shifted so that she faced only her son.

“Jeremiah, honey-” she began. Oh, Jeremiah! Her eyes burned, although she had no tears. “None of this makes sense. Is he telling the truth?”

Had her son been restored to her for this? And was he truly still in Lord Foul’s grasp, suffering the Despiser’s wealth of torments in some other dimension or manifestation of time?

She was unable to see the truth for herself. Covenant and her son were closed to her, as they were to Stave and the Masters.

An Elohim had warned the Ramen as well as Liand’s people to Beware the halfhand.

Jeremiah gazed at her with a frown. He seemed to require a visible effort to set aside his excitement. You know he is, Mom.” His tone held an unexpected edge of reproach; of impatience with her confusion and yearning. “He’s Thomas Covenant. You can see that. He’s already saved the Land twice. He can’t be anybody else.”

But then he appeared to take pity on her. Ducking his head, he added softly, “What you can’t see is how much it hurts that I’m not just here.”

For years, she had hungered for the sound of her son’s voice; starved for it as though it were the nurturance that would give her life meaning. Yet now every word from his mouth only multiplied her chagrin.

Why could she not weep? She had always shed tears too easily. Surely her sorrow and bafflement were great enough for sobbing? Still her eyes remained dry; arid as a wilderland.

“All you have to do is trust me,” Covenant put in. “Or if you can’t do that, trust him.” He nodded toward Jeremiah. “We can do this. We can make it come out right. That’s another advantage I have. We have. We know what needs to be done.”

Angry because she had no other outlet, Linden wheeled back to confront the Unbeliever. “Is that a fact?” Her tone was acid. She had come to this: her beloved and her son were restored to her, and she treated them like foes. “Then tell me something. Why did the Demondim let you live? Hell, why have they left any of us alive? It was just yesterday that they wanted to kill us.”

Jeremiah laughed as if he were remembering one of the many jokes that she had told him over the years; jokes with which she had attempted to provoke a reaction when he was incapable of any response. The muscle at the corner of his left eye continued its tiny beat. But Covenant glared at her, and the fires in his gaze seemed hotter than any of the torches.

“Another trick,” he told her sourly. “An illusion.” He made a dismissive gesture with his halfhand. “Oh, I didn’t have anything to do with what happened yesterday.” Despite its size, the forehall seemed full of halfhands, the Humbled as well as Covenant and Jeremiah. “That’s a different issue. But they let Jeremiah and me get through because”- Covenant shrugged stiffly- “well, I suppose you could say I put a crimp in their reality. Just a little one. I’m already stretched pretty thin. I can’t do too many things at once. So I made us look like bait. Like we were leading them into an ambush. Like there’s a kind of power here they don’t understand. That’s why they just chased us instead of attacking. They want to contain us until they figure out what’s going on. And maybe they like the idea of trapping all their enemies in one place.”

Again he smiled at Linden, although his eyes continued to glare. “Are you satisfied? At least for now? Can I talk to Handir for a minute? Jeremiah and I need rest. You have no idea of the strain-”

He sighed heavily. And we have to get ready before those Demondim realise I made fools out of them. Once that happens, they’re going to unleash the IIIearth Stone. Then hellfire and bloody damnation won’t be something we just talk about. They’ll be real, and they’ll be here.”

Apparently he wanted Linden to believe that he was tired. Yet to her ordinary eyes he looked potent enough to defeat the horde unaided.

And her son seemed to belong with him.

She could not identify them with her health-sense. Jeremiah and Covenant were as blank, as isolated from her, as they would have been in her natural world. Yet there she would have been able to at least touch them. Here, in the unrevealing light of the torches, and fraught with shadows, Jeremiah seemed as distant and irreparable as the Unbeliever, in spite of his obvious alert sentience.

If Covenant could do all of this, why had he told her to find him?

Bowing her head, Linden forced herself to take a step backward, and another, into the cluster of her friends. She ached for the comfort of their support. She could discern them clearly enough: Liand’s open amazement, his concern on her behalf; Mahrtiir’s rapt eagerness and wonder and suspicion;

Anele’s distracted mental wandering. Even Stave’s impassivity and his ruined eye and his new hurts felt more familiar to her than Covenant and Jeremiah, her loved ones. Yet the complex devotion of those who stood with her gave no anodyne for what she had gained and lost.

Linden, find me.

Be cautious of love.

She needed the balm of touching Covenant; of hugging and hugging Jeremiah, running her fingers through his hair, stroking his cheeks-But she had been refused. Even the warm clean fire of the Staff of Law had been forbidden to her.

Covenant nodded with an air of satisfaction. Then both he and Jeremiah turned to the Voice of the Masters.

“Sorry about that. I didn’t mean to keep you waiting.” For a moment, Covenant’s voice held an unwonted note of unction, although he suppressed it quickly. “You know Linden. When she has questions, she insists on answers.” He grinned as if he were sharing a joke with Handir. “You have to respect that.”

Then he swallowed his smile. “You said we’re well come. You have no idea how well come we are.

“You speak for the Masters?”

Abruptly Linden swung away from them. She could no longer bear the sight of her son’s eagerness and denial. She wished that she could close her ears to the sound of Covenant’s voice.

In the light of the torches, her friends studied her. Liand’s curiosity and puzzlement had become alarm, and Mahrtiir glowered. Stave’s single eye regarded her with characteristic stoicism. Anele’s moonstone blindness shifted uncertainly around the great hall as though he were trying to recapture an elusive glimpse of significance.

Because her nerves burned for human contact-for any touch which might reassure her-she hooked her arms around Liand’s and Mahrtiir’s shoulders. At once, Liand gave her a hug like a promise that she could rely on him, whatever happened. And after an instant of hesitation, Mahrtiir did the same. Through his dislike of impending rock and the lack of open skies, she tasted his readiness to fight any foe in her name.

With senses other than sight, she felt Handir bowing to Covenant a second time, although the Voice of the Masters had never bowed to her.

“I am Handir,” he began again, “by right of-”

“Of years and attainment,” interrupted Covenant brusquely. “The Voice of the Masters.” Now his manner seemed to betray the exertion he had claimed; the difficulty of folding time. “I heard you the first time.

“Handir, I know you’re worried about the Demondim. You should be. You and your people can’t hold out against them. Not if they use the Stone. But they’re unsure of themselves right now. By hell, Foul himself is probably having fits.” Grim pleasure glinted through the impatience in Covenant’s tone. “They’ll realise the truth eventually. But I’ve been pretty clever, if I do say so myself.” With her peripheral vision, Linden saw Jeremiah’s nod, his happy grin. “I think we might have a day, or even two, before the real shit hits the fan.”

To her friends, Linden murmured, “Don’t say anything. Just listen.” She could not bear to be questioned. Not now. She was in too much pain. “That’s Thomas Covenant and my son. My Jeremiah. I