White Gold Wielder

Fatal as a bludgeon, he crashed headlong against the Demondim-spawn.

Vain made no effort to evade the impact. Yet he could not withstand it. Findail was Earthpower incarnate. The shock of collision made the road lurch, sent tremors like wailing through the stone. Vain had proved himself stronger than Giants or storms, impervious to spears and the na-Mhoram's Grim. He had felt the power of the Worm of the World's End and had survived, though that touch had cost him the use of one arm. He had escaped alone from Elemesnedene and all the Elohim. But Findail hit him with such concentrated might that he was driven backward.

Two steps. Three. To the last edge of the rim.

“Vain!” Covenant thrashed in Linden's grasp. Frenzy almost made him strong enough to break away from her. “Vain!”

Instinctively, Linden fought him, held him.

Impelled by Covenant's fear, the First charged past Pitchwife after the Appointed.

Vain caught his balance on the lip of the abyss. His black eyes were vivid with intensity. A grin of relish sharpened his immaculate features. The iron heels of the Staff of Law gleamed dully in the hot rocklight.

He did not glance away from Findail. But his good arm made a warding gesture that knocked the First backward, stretched her at her husband's feet, out of danger.

“Fall!” the Appointed raged. His fists hammered the air. The rock under Vain's feet ruptured in splinters. “Fall and die!”

The Demondim-spawn fell. With the slowness of nightmare, he dropped straight into the abyss.

At the same instant, his dead arm lashed out, struck like a snake. His right hand closed on Findail’s forearm. The Appointed was pulled after him over the edge.

Rebounding from the wall, they tumbled together toward the centre of the lake Covenants cry echoed after them, inarticulate and wild.

Findail could not break Vain's grip.

He was Elohim, capable of taking any form of the living Earth He dissolved himself and became an eagle, pounded the air with his wings to escape the spouting magma. But Vain dung to one of his legs and was borne upward.

Instantly, Findail transformed himself to water. The heat threw him in vapour and agony toward the ceiling. But Vain clutched a handful of essential moisture and drew the Appointed back to him.

Swifter than panic, Findail became a Giant with a greatsword in both fists. He hacked savagely at Vain's wrist. But Vain only clenched his grip and let the blade glance off his iron band.

They were so close to the lava that Linden could barely see them through the blaze. In desperation, Findail took the shape of a sail and rode the heat upward again. But Vain still held him is an unbreakable grasp.

And before he rose high enough, a spout climbed like a tower toward him. He tried to evade it by veering; but he was too late. Magma took both Elohim and Demondim-spawn and snatched them down into the lake.

Linden hugged Covenant as if she shared his cries.

He was no longer struggling. “You don’t understand!” he gasped. AH the strength had gone out of him. “That's the place. Where the ur-viles got rid of their failures. When something they made didn't work, they threw it down there. That's why Findail- ” The words seized in his throat.

Why Findail had made his final attempt upon the Demondim-spawn here. Even Vain could not hope to come back from that fall.

Dear Christ! She did not understand how the Elohim saw such an extravagant threat in one lone creation of the ur-viles. Vain had bowed to her once-and had never acknowledged her again. He had saved her life-and had refused to save it. And after all this time and distance and peril, he was lost before he found what he sought. Before she understood—

He had gripped Findail with the hand that hung from his wooden forearm.

Other perceptions demanded her attention, but she was slow to notice them. She had not heeded the Appointed's warning. Too late, she sensed movement in the passage which had led the company to this abyss.

Along the rim of the pit, a party of Cavewights charged into the rocklight.

At least a score of them. Upright on their long limbs, they were almost as tall as Pitchwife. They ran with an exaggerated, jerky awkwardness, like stick-figures; but their strength was unmistakable: they were the delvers of the Wightwarrens. The red heat of lava burned in their eyes. Most of them were armed with truncheons; the rest carried battle axes with wicked blades.

Still half stunned by the force of Vain's blow, the First reeled to her feet. For an instant, she wavered. But the company's need galvanized her. Her longsword flashed in readiness. Roaring, “Flee!” she faced the onset of the Cavewights.

Covenant made no effort to move. The people he loved were in danger, and he had the power to protect them-power he dared not use. Linden read his plight immediately. The exertion of will which held back the wild magic took all his strength.

She fought herself into motion. Summoning her resolve, she began to wrestle him down the tunnel.

He seemed weightless, almost abject Yet his very slackness hampered her. Her progress was fatally slow.

Then Pitchwife caught up with her. He started to take Covenant from her.

The clangour of battle echoed along the passage. Linden spun and saw the First fighting for her life.

She was a Swordmain, an artist of combat. Her glaive flayed about her, at once feral an precise; rocklight flared in splinters off the swift iron. Blood spattered from her attackers as if by incantation rather than violence, her blade the wand or sceptre by which she wrought her theurgy.

But the roadway was too wide to constrict the Cavewights. Their reach was as great as hers. And they were born to contend with stone; their blows had the force of granite. Most of her effort went to parry clubs which would have shattered her arms. Step by step, she was driven backward.

She stumbled slightly on the uneven surface, and a truncheon flicked past her. On her left temple, a bloody welt seemed to appear without transition. The Cavewight that hit her pitched into the abyss, clutching his slashed chest. But more creatures crowded after her.

Linden looked at Pitchwife. He was being torn apart by conflicting needs. His eyes ached whitely, desperate and sup; pliant. He had offered her his life. Like Mistweave. She could not bear it. He deserved better. “Help the First!” she barked at him. “I'll take care of Covenant!”

Pitchwife was too frantic to hesitate. Releasing the Unbeliever, he sped to the aid of his wife.

Linden grabbed Covenant by the shoulders, shook him fiercely. “Come on!” she raged into his raw visage. “For God's sake!”

His struggle was terrible to behold. He could have effaced the Cavewights with a simple thought-and brought down the Arch of Time, or desecrated it with venom. He was willing to sacrifice himself. But his friends! Their peril rent at him. For the space of one heart-beat, she thought he would destroy everything to save the First and Pitchwife. So that they would not die like Foamfollower for him.

Yet he withheld-clamped his ripped and wailing spirit in a restraint as inhuman as his purpose. His features hardened; his gaze became bleak and desolate, like the Land under the scourge of the Sunbane. “You're right,” he muttered softly. “This is pathetic.”

Straightening his back, he started down the tunnel.

She clinched his numb half-hand and fled with him into darkness. Cries and blows shouted after them, echoed and were swallowed by the Wightwarrens.

As the reflected rocklight faded, they reached an intersection Covenant veered instinctively to the right; but she took the leftward turning because it felt less travelled. Almost at once. she regretted her choice. It did not lead away from the light. Instead, it opened into a wide chamber with fissures along one side that admitted the shining of the molten lake. Sulphur and heat clogged the air. Two more tunnels gave access to the chamber; but they did not draw off the accumulated reek.

The roadway along the rim of the abyss was visible through the fissures. This chamber had probably been intended to allow Mount Thunder's denizens to watch the road without being seen.

The First and Pitchwife were no longer upon the rim. They had retreated into the tunnel after Linden and