White Gold Wielder

it attacked in another way.

With both arms, it hit the floor so hard that the entire centre of the Hall bucked and spattered like a sheet of water.

The mosaic cracked across its face, lifted in pieces, fell apart.

Shrieking rage, Gibbon staggered to regain his balance, then cocked back his crozier to deliver a blast which would fry Nom's flesh from its bones.

But he was maddened by strain and death-lust, and his blow required a moment's preparation. He did not see the chief result of Nom's attack.

That blow sent a fracture from wall to wall-a split which passed directly through the place where Honninscrave knelt in the stone. His bonds were shattered as if that had been Nom’s intent.

With a roar, Honninscrave charged the na-Mhoram.

Gibbon was too intensely focused on Nom, too precariously poised. He could not react in time. His human flesh had no defence as Honninscrave struck him a blow which seemed to crush his bones. His crozier clattered across the floor, rang against the base of a column, and lay still, deprived of fire.

The First cried Honninscrave's name; but her voice appeared to make no sound in the stunned Hall.

For a moment, Honninscrave remained hunched and panting over Gibbon's corpse Covenant had time for one clear thought: You can't kill a Raver that way. You can only kill the body—

Then the Master turned toward his companions; and Covenant nearly broke. He did not need Linden's percipience to see what had happened, did not need to hear her anguished whisper. He had witnessed such horrors before. And Honninscrave's plight was plain.

He stood as if he were still himself. His fists clenched as if he knew what he was doing. But his face was flowing like an hallucination, melting back and forth between savage glee and settled grim resolve. He was Grimmand Honninscrave, the Master of Starfare's Gem. And he was samadhi Sheol, the Raver that had led the Clave in Gibbon's body.

At war with each other.

The entire battle was internal. Red flared into his eyes and glazed away. Grins bared his teeth, were fought back. Snarling laughter choked in his throat. When he spoke, his voice cracked and seized under the strain.

“Thomas Covenant”

At once, his voice scaled upward out of control, crying, “Madman! Madman!”

He forced it down again. “Earthfriend. Hear me.” The effort seemed to tear the muscles of his face. Helpless with power, Covenant watched in fever as Honninscrave wrestled for possession of his soul. Through his teeth, the Giant articulated like a death-gasp, “Heed the bidding of your despair. It must be done.”

At once, several piercing shrieks burst from him-the Raver's staccato anguish, or Honninscrave's. “Help him,” Linden panted, “Help him. Dear God.” But there was nothing anybody could do. She alone had the capacity to interfere in such a struggle-and if she made the attempt, Covenant meant to stop her. If samadhi Sheol sprang from Honninscrave to her. it would have access to the wild magic through her.

Retching for air, Honninscrave gained the mastery.

“You must slay me.” The words bled from ha lips, but they were distinct and certain. His face turned murderous, then regained its familiar lines. “I will contain this Raver while you slay me. In that way, it also will be slain. And I will be at peace.”

Sheol writhed for freedom; but Honninscrave held.

“I beg of you.”

Covenant let out a groan of fire; but it went nowhere near the Giant. The First gripped her sword in both fists until her arms trembled; but her tears blinded her, and she could not move. Call folded his arms across his chest as if he were deaf.

Linden was savage with suppressed weeping. “Give me a knife. Somebody give me a knife. Oh God damn you all to hell. Honninscrave.” But she had no knife, and her revulsion would not let her go any closer to the Raver.

Yet Honninscrave was answered.

By Nom, the Sandgorgon of the Great Desert.

The beast waited a moment for the others to act, as if it understood that they all had to pass through this crisis and be changed. Then it padded over to Honninscrave, its strange knees tense with strength. He watched it come while the Raver in him gibbered and yowled. But he was the Master now in a way which surpassed samadhi Sheol, and his control did not slip.

Slowly, almost gently, Nom placed its arms around his waist. For an instant, his eyes gazed toward his companions and yearned as if he wished to say farewell-wished poignantly at the last that he had found some way to go on living. Then, with a wrench as unexpected as an act of kindness, the Sandgorgon crumpled him to the floor.

As if he were not in tears, Covenant thought dumbly. You can't kill a Raver that way. But he was not sure anymore. There were mysteries in the world which even Lord Foul could not corrupt.

Linden gave a gasp as if her own bones had broken. When she raised her head, her eyes were bright and hungry for the power to exact retribution.

Stiffly, the First started toward the body of her friend.

Before she reached him, Nom turned; and Cail said as if even his native dispassion were not proof against surprise, “The Sandgorgon speaks.”

Covenant could not clear his sight. All his peripheral vision was gone, blackened by imminent combustion.

“It speaks in the manner of the Haruchai.” Faint lines of perplexity marked the space between Call's brows. “Its speech is alien-yet comprehensible.”

His companions stared at him.

“It says that it has rent the Raver. It does not say slain. The word is to rend. The Raver has been rent. And the shreds of its being Nom has consumed.” With an effort, Cail smoothed the frown from his forehead. “Thus has the Sandgorgon gained the capacity for such speech.”

Then the Haruchai faced Covenant, “Nom gives you thanks, ur-Lord.”

Thanks, Covenant grieved. He had let Honninscrave die. Had failed to defeat Gibbon. He did not deserve thanks. And he had no time. All his time had been used up. It was too late for sorrow. His skin had a dark, sick underhue; his sense of himself was fraying away. A gale of blackness rose in him, and it demanded an answer. The answer he had learned in nightmares. From Linden and the First and Cail and Nom and fallen Honninscrave he turned away as if he were alone and walked like a mounting flicker of fire out of the Hall of Gifts.

But when he put his feet to the stairs, a hand closed around his mind, and he stopped. Another will imposed itself on his, taking his choices from him.

Please, it said. Please don't.

Though he had no health-sense and was hardly sane, he recognized Linden's grasp. She was possessing him with her percipience.

Don't do this to yourself.

Through the link between them, he knew that she was weeping wildly. But behind her pain shone a fervid passion. She would not permit him to end in this way. Not allow him to go willingly out of her life.

I can't let you.

He understood her. How could he not? She was too vulnerable to everything. She saw that his control was almost gone. And his purpose must have been transparent to her; his desperation was too extreme to elude her discernment. She was trying to save him.

You mean too much.

But this was not salvation: it was doom. She had misinterpreted his need for her. What could she hope to do with him when his madness had become irremediable? And how would she be able to face the Despiser with the consequences of possession chained about her soul?

He did not try to fight her with fire. He refused to risk harming her. Instead, he remembered the imposed silence of the Elohim- and the delirium of venom. In the past, either defence had sufficed to daunt her. Now he raised them together, sought deliberately to close the doors of his mind, shut her out.