extent, at least, she could forgive herself for what had happened to him.
At the time, she had given no thought to other forms of restitution. The particular sense of responsibility which she had learned from Covenant and the Land had asserted itself slowly. After the initial crisis, she had occupied herself for months adjusting to her new life: to the county itself; and to her work at County Hospital. And then Julius had involved her in the complex efforts that had eventually led to the construction of Berenford Memorial Psychiatric Hospital, and to her appointment as its chief medical officer.
Nearly two years passed before she recognised the residual ache in her heart for what it was: not grief over Covenant’s death, although that pang never lost its poignancy, but rather a hollow place left by the Land. Her parents had dedicated her to death, but she had transcended their legacy. Now she realised that her new convictions and passions required more of her. Her work with her patients suited her abilities; but it did not satisfy the woman who had sojourned with Giants, contended with Ravers, and opposed the Sunbane at Thomas Covenant’s side.
She wanted to heal as well some of the harm which Lord Foul had done in her present world. And she needed someone to love.
She had heard Pitchwife sing:
She could not allow the hollow place within her to remain unfilled.
Her own damaged childhood had taught her an intense empathy for children forced to pay the price of their parents’ folly; and before long she remembered Jeremiah Jason. She had already done him a little good. Perhaps she could do more.
When at last she tracked him down and arranged to meet him, she recognised immediately the missing piece of her heart, the part which might make her whole. His little face spoke to her as clearly as a wail. She knew what it was like to be a conscious prisoner inside her own skull, defeated by power and malice. The Clave and Ravers had victimised her in that way. Indirectly the
In the Land, she had been called “the Chosen.” Now she did the choosing. Doggedly, with Megan Roman’s help, she pursued Jeremiah through the legal and bureaucratic snarls of the county’s floundering foster care until he was made her son.
At first, the task she had assigned to herself was arduous and costly, in spite of Sandy Eastwall’s assistance. The closure of Jeremiah’s mind rebuffed any penetration. He was lost, and her love could not find him. If he had so much as wept, she would have celebrated for him, rejoiced in that victory over an intimate ruin. But he did not weep. Nothing breached the hard stone wall of his plight. His only response to every situation was an unresisting absence of cooperation. He did not stand, could not walk. Voiceless and alone, he could not engage in a child’s necessary play; and so she had no lever with which to spring him from his prison.
And then one day-The memory still brought tears of joy to her eyes. One day in his paediatrician’s office, surrounded by toys enjoyed by other children, he had suddenly reached out uninvited to place one bright wooden block upon another. When he was satisfied with what he had done, he had positioned another block; and then another.
Within an hour, hardly able to contain her excitement, Linden had bought him a mountain of blocks. And when she had seen him use them to build an impromptu Greek temple, she had rushed back to the store to purchase Lincoln Logs and Tinker Toys.
There his life had changed; and hers with it. In a few short weeks, he had learned-or re-learned- to stand so that he could reach higher, build higher. And mere months later he had regained his ability to walk, seeking to move around his constructs and position pieces more readily.
His newly discovered gift transformed him in Linden’s sight. With every construct, he built hope for the future. A child who could play might someday be set free. And his strange talent seemed to have limitless possibilities. Connecting one Lincoln Log or Tinker Toy to the next, he might at last devise a door to his prison and step out into her arms.
She would not, she swore to herself now,
Thomas Covenant had believed that the Land could not be damned by such decisions.
Linden was still afraid, but her indecision had passed. Deliberately she readied herself to go back downstairs.
On the way, she heard Sandy call, “Linden? We’re done with the Lego. Is there anything else you need before I leave?”
In the living room, Linden greeted Sandy with a smile; tousled Jeremiah’s hair where he knelt, rocking, beside a tall stack of Lego boxes. “No, thanks. You’ve done enough already.” To Jeremiah, she added, “Thanks for putting your Lego away. You’ve done a good job. I’m proud of you”
If her reaction gave him any pleasure, he did not reveal it.
When Sandy had gathered up her knitting, Linden walked her to the door. “I can’t thank you enough,” she told the other woman sincerely. “I can’t explain what came over me today, but it shook me up. I really appreciate everything you’ve done.”
Sandy dismissed the subject with a comfortable shrug. “He’s my sweetie.’ Over her shoulder, she asked, “Aren’t you, Jeremiah?” Then she finished to Linden, “I’ll see both of you tomorrow, if you don’t need me tonight.”
Refraining from more unnecessary thanks, Linden ushered her outside and said good night.
For a moment after Sandy left, however, Linden did not return to Jeremiah. Instead she leaned against the door and considered the castle which had transformed her entryway. It seemed to contradict her fears, as though it had the power to guard the sanctuary that she had made for her son.
Relieved for the first time since she had met Roger Covenant, she heated a casserole and fed Jeremiah while she ate. At intervals she paused to talk about anything she could think of-horses, Sam Diadem’s toys, places of wonder in the Land-hoping that the sound of her voice would also feed him, in its own way. When he stopped opening his mouth for the spoon, she took him upstairs to bathe him. Afterward she dressed him for bed in his- actually her-favourite pyjamas, the sky-blue flannel shirt and pants with mustangs ramping across the chest.
In his bedroom, she took a moment, as she often did, to marvel at how he had decorated it.
One day two or three years ago, she had purchased a set of flywheel-driven model racing cars that featured tracks which could be snapped together into structures as elaborate as roller coasters, complete with loop-the-loops and barrel-rolls. She had been drawn to the set because it included materials like plastic Tinker Toys for building towers and pylons to support the tracks. And because Jeremiah appeared to prefer large projects, she had bought every set in the store, four or five of them.
He had shown no interest in the cars. In fact, he had disappointed her by showing no interest in the tracks, either. He had not so much as touched the boxes, or turned his eyes toward them.
Maybe he needed time, she had told herself. Maybe his occult, hidden decisions required contemplation. Reluctant to surrender her hopes, she had carried one of the boxes up to his bedroom and left it there for him to consider.
That night he had gone to bed still oblivious to the box. The next morning, however, she discovered that during the night he had opened it and used every available piece to build towers on either side of the head of his bed. Through the towers he had twined tracks twisted into implausible shapes. And-uncharacteristic of him-the construct was plainly unfinished. He had run out of parts before he could connect the towers and tracks to each other above the head of his bed.
At once, she brought the remaining boxes up to his room. Like the first, they were ignored all day. And like
