Fatal Revenant

seen his chest unmarked by bullets.

Covenant nodded, shedding shadows and reflected fire. “That’s the general idea. But you’ll have to think of a way to do everything you want with one Command. The EarthBlood is more powerful than you can imagine. No one survives tasting it twice.”

“In that case-” Linden faced her son squarely, although he still did not look at her. The emanations of the cairn felt like fever on her cheeks. “Jeremiah, honey. I have to ask you what you want from me.

“I assume that Joan will die as soon as Lord Foul stops keeping her alive. When that happens”- her throat closed for an instant- “you’ll leave the Land.” She no longer cared that Covenant had lied about this. “The EarthBlood might let me do something about that.

“I might be able to protect your mind. Keep it the way it is now,” although she could not be confident that any Command of Earthpower would survive the translation between realities. “Or I can concentrate on rescuing you from wherever you’re hidden. I can try to free you so that you’ll be able to live the life you want here.” If she could phrase her Command to accomplish such things. “But I can’t do both. And I can’t make that choice for you. It’s up to you.”

She did not believe that any single act of will would affect both her and her son. She would not be able to save herself as well as him. Aiding him would doom her: she would remain where she was now. And no caesure would help her. Neither the Law of Death nor the Law of Life had been broken yet. If she succeeded at creating a Fall, the Arch would surely be destroyed.

When-or if-Covenant succeeded in his designs, Jeremiah would be lost to her forever.

Covenant turned his head to look at her. Slowly he rubbed his cheeks. As he did so, the echoes of heat faded from his gaze. His eyes held only darkness.

She thought that she was ready to accept her bereavement until Jeremiah said without hesitation. “I want to stay here. With Covenant.” Then tears burst from her, as hot as the stones, and as impossible to console. She was barely able to keep herself from sobbing aloud.

She had been obsessed by her desire to save Jeremiah from the Despiser, consumed by images of his torment: she had hardly considered the outcome of Covenant’s designs. Now she saw what would happen.

Her desire to put her arms around her son was so acute that it cut her heart.

Stop, she told herself. Stop.

It doesn’t help.

Cold seemed to creep up her back even though the furnace of stones retained its fierce radiance.

We still have to get there.

And she did not trust Covenant.

I want to repay some of this pain.

The peril of your chosen path I deemed too great.

And I won’t even mention how stone ignorant Berek is.

This version of Thomas Covenant had lied to her about Jeremiah’s circumstances as well as her own: a revealing mistake.

Deeply shaken, Linden strove to master her tears. She could not meet Covenant’s scrutiny, and did not try. Instead she clung to her Staff with her head bowed until the first torrents of her dismay had passed.

She meant to ask him how he intended to reach Melenkurion Skyweir against The kind of opposition that might damage the Arch. But when she had swallowed her grief and scrubbed away her tears, she did not raise that subject immediately. Instead she asked in a raw voice. “What about Roger?”

Glowering suddenly, Covenant turned away.

With a visible effort, Jeremiah met her gaze. The muscles at the corner of his left eye clenched and released erratically. “What about him, Mom?”

“I don’t know where he is, or what he wants, or what he’s doing.” Linden was pitifully grateful to have this much of her son’s attention. “I’m pretty sure that Lytton’s deputies killed him. But Anele told us that he’s here. In the Land.” Seeking such havoc that the bones of mountains tremble to contemplate it. “Shouldn’t we be worried about him?”

Someone must have healed him during his translation, as she had healed herself with wild magic. Lord Foul? Or Kastenessen? Was the enraged Elohim sane enough for such a task? Joan certainly was not-

Reluctance seemed to erode Jeremiah’s eyes until they slipped away from hers. “I don’t see why,” he murmured uncomfortably. “When Covenant stops Foul, there won’t be anything left for Roger to do. He’s just a man. He doesn’t have any power.”

He will if he can get his hands on Joan’s ring, Linden thought. But she kept that fear to herself. Joan’s white gold did not belong to Roger: he was not its rightful wielder. If Covenant had told her the truth about anything, Roger’s ability to unleash wild magic would be limited.

But even limited wild magic-

Grimly Linden strove to appear calm. She did not want what she was thinking to show on her face.

— might be enough to release Lord Foul after Covenant snared him.

And if Roger failed or died, some other dark being might make the attempt.

Covenant’s design for the salvation of the Land did not take Joan’s ring into account. Another revealing mistake; one which might prove fatal.

Abruptly Covenant surged to his feet. Keeping his back toward Linden, he moved to stand over the small cairn as if he felt a need for heat; more heat than ordinary flesh should have been able to endure. Then he gestured along the barranca. For no apparent reason, he announced, “This place is called Bargas Slit. Or it will be, when somebody gets around to discovering it.” He sounded strangely cheerful, despite his glower earlier. “It has a name because it’s unique. It goes all the way through. In fact, it’s the only place north of the Black River where you can walk into Garroting Deep without having to climb the Last Hills.”

He may have sensed the direction of Linden’s thoughts. Once again, his manner conveyed an impression of disharmony: it seemed poorly tempered, slightly off pitch.

“We can leave the horses here. We won’t need them anymore. If we get an early start, we can be at the edge of the Deep by mid-morning.”

Linden stared at his back, but he ignored her. When she looked at Jeremiah, she found him playing with his racecar, concentrating intently as the toy tumbled back and forth among his fingers.

She cleared her throat, hoping that Covenant would face her. When he did not, however, she said carefully, “I don’t understand. Didn’t you say that we can’t go into Garroting Deep?”

“That’s right.” His tone was amiable. The heat of the rocks seemed to give him an obscure pleasure. “And we can’t go over it either. It’s Caerroil Wildwood’s domain. On his own turf, his power is absolute. Every bird and breeze in the whole forest needs his permission just to move from one branch to another. If we try to get past him, well all three of us be dead before your heart can beat twice.

And I don’t mean banished,” he said with an odd timbre of satisfaction. “sent back where we came from. I mean stone cold absolutely by hell dead. The only good part is, it’ll happen so fast we won’t have time to feel bad about it.”

Baffled, Linden asked. “Then why do you want to go there? What’s the point?”

“Because,” he told her without hesitation, “there are times when it’s useful to be stuck between a rock and a hard place.”

He sounded unaccountably proud of himself.

Before Linden could think of a response, he added. “You should get some sleep. I’m serious about an early start.”

Still without looking at her, he picked up one of the blankets, returned to the place where he had been sitting, and wrapped the blanket around his head and shoulders as if to conceal himself from her questions. Hidden by the dirty fabric, he seemed to blend into the wall of the ravine. The dull laval glow of the mound barely revealed his shape against the inaudible rock.

Jeremiah promptly followed his example. In moments, her son, too, was little more than an extrusion of the stone.

Linden had not seen either of them sleep; not once since they had entered Revelstone ten thousand years in