The Harrow did not answer. His emanations suggested that he was not paying attention.
Linden thought that she heard a distant sound which did not belong to evening in Andelain. But it was too elusive to be identified; and then it was gone.
“Mayhap, Chosen,” Stave offered, “he was not prevented because he is not a being of power. His theurgy is that of knowledge. It does not reside within him.”
Even Longwrath was possessed by a kind of magic: the ability to slough off his shackles whenever he wished.
Linden felt the Harrow’s gaze return. “Lady, I have promised my companionship, and the word of any Insequent is holy. Lacking such fidelity, knowledge erodes itself. I have striven too long, and have learned too much, to be made trivial by unfaith. Therefore I am here. No other justification is required.”
He still seemed to be mocking her.
Goaded by what he had done to the Mahdoubt, she said angrily, “And you think that just showing up occasionally makes you honest?” But then she caught herself. “No, forget that. I don’t care how you justify yourself. Tell me something else. I want to understand this.
“Anele has power. Why didn’t the Wraiths refuse him?”
Was it possible that the Wraiths had allowed the Harrow to enter Andelain because he did not serve Despite?
Something that she could not define seemed to snag his notice. It was not birdsong or breeze or the soughing of the Soulsease, although it resembled those sounds. Still she felt his posture shift; felt him probe the twilight behind her. Again he did not answer.
Stave appeared to shrug. “The old man desires no harm. And his power is that of Andelain. Here he was transformed in his mother’s womb, and given birth.”
“Then what about Longwrath?” Linden insisted, aiming her questions at the Harrow in spite of his inattention. “Is he possessed?” She did not think so. If a Raver—or some similar entity—ruled him, she would have sensed its presence. But she wanted to be sure. “Did the Wraiths stop him just because he’s trying to kill me?”
The Insequent faced her. “I would do so in their place.” His tone continued to jeer at her, but his manner implied boredom or distraction. “Have I not said that your might becomes you? Others may desire your death. I do not.
“However, concerning this Giant who craves your blood—”
He paused as though he expected an interruption. But Linden waited, and her companions were silent. After a moment, he resumed.
“His blade holds some interest. It was forged at a time millennia past, when Kasreyn of the Gyre feared the Sandgorgons, having not yet devised their Doom. He hungered for a weapon puissant to slay those feral beasts. Therefore he wrought the flamberge, aided by the croyel. It was fearsome in the hands of a knowing wielder. Yet its purpose ended when the Sandgorgons were bound to their Doom. Deprived of use, its theurgy fades.”
Staring, Linden asked. “Is that what attracted the Wraiths? His sword?”
“Lady,” replied the Harrow sardonically, “I have said that his blade holds some interest. It does not fascinate me. And the Wraiths are of no consequence. They merely articulate the might of Loric’s krill. Born of Andelain, they nurture its beauty. Far greater beings walk the Hills, among them one of vast arrogance and self-worship.”
She shook her head, trying to rid herself an innominate whisper. Far greater beings—Was he referring to the Dead?
Stubbornly she returned to her essential question. “I know what you want. You tried to force me, but you failed. So now I’m supposed to need your help.” I am able to convey you to your son. “That way, you can ‘demand recompense.’ All right. Let’s get on with it. Isn’t it time for you to offer me a bargain? Isn’t that why you’re here?”
“It is,” he replied. “and it is not. For the present, it would be bootless to barter. One comes who will preclude my desires without qualm. I do not relish the indignity of being thwarted. I will await a more congenial opportunity to speak of your son.”
Linden scowled. Hints of sound became more persistent, in spite of her efforts to dismiss them. She could almost—
An instant later, she realized that she was hearing the delicate music of bells or chimes: a soft ringing, at once beautiful and imprecise, as allusive as the scent of an exotic perfume. She nearly gasped as she recognized the tones. She knew them well.
Instinctively dismayed, she wheeled Hyn away from the Harrow.
“Linden?” Liand asked in surprise. Stave and the Humbled looked around, alert for danger. Muttering Giantish oaths, the Swordmainnir did the same.
They could not discern what Linden heard: she knew that. Long ago, this same chiming had filled her with turmoil and confusion—and none of her companions had been aware of it, not Covenant, not the Giants of the Search, not even the Haruchai.
Behind her, the Harrow said with rich sarcasm, “Be at peace, lady. Your concern is needless. No powers will contend in this place.”
Linden ignored him; ignored her friends. At once alarmed and angry, she watched a portion of Andelain’s dusk concatenate and flow as if the soul of the Hills were taking form.
Adorned with the tang and piquancy of tuned bells, a woman stepped out of the twilight and became herself.
She was tall and supple, lovely and lucent; bright with hues that glowed like the light of gems. Her raiment may have been sendaline, or it may have been composed of diamonds and rubies, its glitter and incarnadine woven together by the illimitable magic of dreams. The regal luster of her hair seemed more precious than jewels: it shone like her ornate cymar and her sovereign eyes; like a sea entranced by the moon. Her chosen flesh spread gleams that caused or resembled her chiming. When she moved, every line and curve was limned in exaltation.
And in her gaze and her mien, an imperious disdain struggled against pleading and sorrow.
Linden knew her. She was Infelice. In some sense which Linden had never understood, she was the leader or spokeswoman or potentate of the Elohim. Among her people, she embodied what they called “the Würd of the Earth,” although in their mellifluous voices “Würd” might have been “Wyrd” or “Word” or “Weird.”
Her simple presence commanded humility: it urged abasement. In spite of Hyn’s unflinching calm, Linden felt a blind impulse to kneel, abashed, before Infelice.
Her reaction was echoed by Liand and the Ramen. Their faces reflected Infelice’s radiance. Even Mahrtiir was stricken with awe and chagrin. Scowling, Anele refused to turn toward her. And the Giants, who had been acquainted with the Elohim for millennia, scrambled to put away their weapons and bow deeply. Only the Haruchai showed no reaction—the Haruchai and the Harrow.
Thousands of years ago, the uncompromising dedication of Stave’s ancestors had offended the Elohim. More recently, Linden had learned from the Theomach that his people resented the hauteur and power of the Elohim. The Vizard had tried to encourage Jeremiah to imprison them.
In the Elohimfest where Linden had first seen Infelice, her people had betrayed Covenant because they distrusted his possession of white gold. They had believed that Linden should wield wild magic. Even then, they had been certain that Covenant’s efforts to defeat Lord Foul would ultimately fail.
Facing Infelice, Linden feared suddenly that her straits, and the Land’s, demonstrated that the Elohim had been right all along. The Despiser’s repeated return to strength demeaned Covenant’s victories. They might as well have been failures.
Infelice did not walk on the grass. Instead she moved through the air at the height of the Giants. She may have wished to look down on Linden and the Harrow.
Her voice wore a penumbra of bells as she said, “The Insequent speaks sooth, Wildwielder.” Around her, night thickened over the Hills and the Soulsease as if her appearance absorbed the last of the light. “No powers will contend in sacred Andelain. Conscious of his littleness, and embittered, he faults us for arrogance and self-worship. Yet he declines to acknowledge that the quality which he deplores, the certainty that we
are equal to all things, preserves his petty machinations as well as his life. Our unconcern spares smaller beings. Were we less than we are, we would have taken umbrage in an earlier age and extinguished the Insequent for their meddlesomeness.”
“You vaunt yourself without cause, Elohim,” retorted the Harrow. “Was not your Appointed Guardian of the One Tree defeated by the Theomach?”
“He was,” admitted Infelice in a tone that conceded nothing. “And in his turn, the Theomach was defeated. Though he strove to affect the Würd of the Earth, he fell before one mere Haruchai. Thus our present peril is in part attributable to the Insequent. Had the Theomach refrained from aggrandizement, much which now threatens the Earth would not have occurred, and I would not have come to counter your gluttony.”
The Harrow laughed, mocking Infelice as he had mocked Linden. “You are clever, Elohim. You speak truth to conceal truth. Did you not also come to prevent the lady?”
Infelice did not waver. “I did.” Nevertheless expressions molted across her face, ire and grief and alarm commingled with a look that resembled self-pity. “If the Wildwielder will heed me.”
Their exchange gave Linden time to rally herself; step back from the brink of consternation. She did not trust the Harrow: she knew the intensity of his greed. And she was painfully, intimately familiar with the surquedry and secrets of the Elohim: she could not believe that Infelice wished her—or Jeremiah—well. As a people, the Elohim cared only for themselves.
The Theomach had enabled Berek Halfhand to fashion the first Staff of Law. He had made himself the Guardian of the One Tree. Then his stewardship had become Brinn’s. But Linden did not understand how such things contributed to Lord Foul’s designs.
“No,” she said before the Harrow spoke again. “You can talk around me as if I’m not here some other time. Tonight is mine.
“Stave. Mahrtiir. Coldspray.” Deliberately she turned away from Infelice. “We’re going. I need the krill.” And the Dead. “If Infelice and the Harrow want to come with us, I don’t mind. They can answer a few questions along the way.”
The Harrow laughed. A flare of anger burned in Infelice’s eyes. Almost immediately, however, he cut short his scorn, and she quelled her indignation.
Out of the new dark, Wraiths came skirling like music, the song of pipes and flutes. Dancing and bobbing, they appeared as if in response to Linden’s declaration, more and more of them at every moment: first a small handful, then a dozen, then one and two and three score. And as they lit themselves from their impalpable arcane wicks, they joined together in two rows to form an aisle leading southward.
Involuntarily Linden gasped. The Giants exclaimed their astonishment. “Linden,” Liand breathed, unable to contain himself. “Heaven and Earth. Linden.” The Ramen stared as if the Cords and their eyeless Manethrall were bedazzled.
“Sunder my father,” Anele panted between his teeth. “Hollian my mother. Preserve your son.” A tumult of distress ran through his voice. “Preserve me. Anele is lost. Without your forgiveness, he is damned.”
The Wraiths had come—
—to welcome Linden. For reasons which she could not fathom, they meant to escort her like an honor guard to Loric’s krill.
Their presence filled her with hope as if they had opened her heart.
Unable to speak, she urged Hyn into motion. With a stately step and an arched neck, the mare entered the avenue of Wraiths as though she had accepted an obeisance.
Quickly the Swordmainnir arrayed themselves around Linden and Hyn. Prompted by an instinctive reverence, they drew their swords and stretched out their arms, pointing their blades at the first faint stars. A moment later, Stave guided Liand, Anele, and the Ramen into formation behind Linden. None of the Humbled went ahead of her. Instead they rode down the aisle at the rear of the company as if to distance themselves from her intentions.
Without hesitation, the Harrow joined Linden; but he did not presume to precede her. Instead he rode his destrier beside one of the Giants. After an instant of outrage and chagrin, Infelice came to accompany Linden between the Wraiths. She, too, did not take the lead, but chose rather to float opposite the Harrow, placing her light in contrast with his darkness.
—hope in contradiction. Although they shared a wish to preserve the Arch of Time, the Insequent and the Elohim seemed to cancel each other.
Along a path defined by flames and implied melody, the riders, the Giants, and Infelice crossed a rounded hill and moved into a lea swept with night. Gradually stars began to peek out of the heavens, glittering dispassionately as the final remnants of daylight frayed and faded.
Old elms dotted the lea. Amid trees and Wraiths, the Harrow remarked quietly. “In an ancient age, this night would have been Banas Nimoram, the Celebration of Spring. We might perchance have witnessed the Dance of the Wraiths of Andelain.” Every hint of mockery had fled from his deep voice. “Millennia have passed since they last enacted their rite of gladness. Yet they remain to signify the import of our deeds and needs. Did I not say, lady, that here you would find delight and surprise?” After a pause, he added. “No other Insequent has beheld such a sight.”
Linden made no reply. The voiceless entrancement of the living fires held her. Doubtless the Haruchai and the Ramen had memories or tales of Banas Nimoram: she did not. Yet she understood that every swirl and glow and note of the Wraiths accentuated the meaning of her presence.
Then, however, Infelice said in a tone of careful severity, “Wildwielder, we must speak of your purpose here.”
With an effort, Linden set aside her hushed awe. She needed to ready herself for what she meant to attempt. More to occupy her conscious mind than to resolve any lingering uncertainty, she countered by asking. “Did you really come all of this way just to stop the Harrow from taking me to my son?”
The Elohim made their home far to the east beyond the Sunbirth Sea. Infelice had crossed many hundred of leagues, leaving behind the rapt self-contemplation of her people.
“In part,” she admitted with a faint suggestion of disdain or revulsion. “But I will not speak of the Harrow, or of his unscrupling greed, or of your son. We must address your intent.”
Linden refused to be distracted. “I would rather talk about meddling.” The Elohim had Appointed Findail and Kastenessen: they had sealed Covenant’s mind and tried to imprison Vain. They had sent one of their number to the aid of the One Forest, and another to warn the Land. “Even though you’re ‘equal to all things,’” the heart of the Earth. “you sometimes take matters into your own hands. You’re here to block the Harrow. You want to interfere with me. So tell me something.
“According to the Theomach, if he hadn’t disrupted Roger’s plans to destroy the Arch, you would have intervened. Is that true?”
Haughtiness and pleading bled together in Infelice. “It is. Much of the Despiser’s evil does not concern us. His ends are an abomination, but often his means are too paltry to merit our notice. When he strives to unmake Time, however, our existence is imperiled. This alone we share with the Insequent. We do not desire the destruction of the Earth.”
Softly, as if in the distance, the Harrow began to sing. His low voice followed the inferred tune of the Wraiths as if he had deciphered their minuet.
“The ending of all things is nigh.
Both grief and rue will pass away,
Both love and gratefulness; and why?
No one will stand to offer, ‘Nay.’
“This chosen plight is chosen doom,
A path unwisely, bravely found
Which leads us to a lonely tomb,
A sepulchre of ruined ground.
“Some fool or seer has made it so:
That life and lore give way to dross
And so preclude our wail of woe.
No heart remains to feel the loss.
“And so this way the world ends,
In failure and mistaken faith.
We dream that we will make amends,
Yet ev?
??ry hope is but a Wraith,
“A touch of soon extinguished flame,
A residue of ash and dust.
We ache to save our use and name,
And yet we die because we must.”
He seemed to be smiling as he sang.
But Linden did not heed him. “Then is it also true,” she continued stubbornly, probing the Elohim. “that the Insequent are the ‘shadow’ on your hearts?”
Other Elohim had referred to a shadow upon the heart of the Earth. It justified their distress that Linden did not wield Covenant’s ring, their betrayal of Covenant, and their efforts to neutralize Vain.
Divergent emotions chased each other across Infelice’s lambent features. “Wildwielder, the Insequent are filled to bursting with boasts. They vaunt their might and efficacy. Yet among them, only the Theomach has achieved an effect upon the fate of the Earth. Thoughts of them do not darken our absorption.”
“Then,” Linden insisted. “what is it? What is the ‘shadow’?”
All who live contain some darkness, and much lies hidden there. But in us it has not been a matter of exigency—for are we not equal to all things?
Infelice sighed; but she did not decline to answer. Apparently her desire to sway Linden compelled her.
“For a time which you would measure in eons, it remained nameless among us. Later, we considered that perhaps it was cast by the Despiser’s malevolence. But then we grew to understand that it was the threat of beings from beyond Time, beings such as yourself and also the Timewarden—beings both small and mortal who are nonetheless capable of utter devastation.
“By his own deeds, the Despiser cannot destroy the Arch of Time. He requires the connivance of such men and women as the Timewarden’s son and mate. He requires your aid, Wildwielder, and that of the man who was once the Unbeliever.”
Linden winced; but she did not relent. “Is that why you wanted me to have Covenant’s ring? Is that how you justify closing his mind?”