The Ramen believed that No servant of Fangthane craves or will consumealiantha. The virtue of the berries is too potent.
Facing Covenant again, she said stiffly, “You’re drunk.”
He shrugged, grimacing again. “Hellfire, Linden. A man’s got to unwind once in a while. With everything I’m going through right now, I’ve earned it.
“Anyway,” he added, “Jeremiah’s had as much as I have-“
“I have not,” retorted Jeremiah cheerfully.
“-and he’s not drunk,” Covenant continued. “Just look at him.” As if to himself, he muttered, “Maybe when he swallows it ends up in his other stomach. The one where he’s still Foul’s prisoner.”
Linden shook her head. Covenant’s behaviour baffled her. For that very reason, however, she grew calmer. His strangeness enabled her to reclaim a measure of the professional detachment with which she had for years listened to the oblique ramblings of the psychotic and the deranged: dissociated observations, warnings, justifications, all intended to both conceal and expose underlying sources of pain. She did not suddenly decide that Covenant was insane: she could not. He was too much himself to be evaluated in that way. But she began to hear him as if from a distance. As if she had erected a wall between him and her denied anguish-or had hidden her distress in a room like the secret place where her access to wild magic lurked.
Her tone was deliberately impersonal as she replied, “You said that you wanted to talk to me. Are you in any condition to explain things?”
“What,” Covenant protested, “you think a little alcohol can slow me down? Linden, you’re forgetting who I am. The keystone of the Arch of Time, remember? I know everything. Or I can, if I make the effort.”
He seemed to consider the air, trying to choose an example. Then he turned his smeared gaze toward her again.
“You’ve been to Glimmermere. And you’ve talked to Esmer. Him and something like a hundred ur-viles and Waynhim. Tell me. Why do you think they’re here? I don’t care what he said. He was just trying to justify himself. What do you think’?”
Disturbed by his manner, Linden kept her reactions to herself. Instead of answering, she said cautiously, “I have no idea. He took me by surprise. I don’t know how to think about it.”
Covenant snorted. “Don’t let him confuse you. It’s really pretty simple. He likes to talk about ‘aid and betrayal,’ but with him it’s mostly betrayal. Listening to him is a waste of time.”
While Covenant spoke, Jeremiah took his racecar from the waistband of his pajamas and began to roll the toy over and around the fingers and palm of his halfhand as if he were practicing a conjuring trick; as if he meant to make the car vanish like a coin from the hand of a magician.
Covenant’s awareness of her encounter with Esmer startled Linden; but she clung to her protective detachment. You know what he said to me?”
You must be the first to drink of the EarthBlood. Did Covenant understand what Esmer meant?
“Probably,” Covenant drawled. “Most of it, anyway. But it’s better if you tell me.”
He was Thomas Covenant: she did not question that. But she did not know how to trust him now. Carefully she replied, He said that the ur-viles and Waynhim want to serve me.”
“How?” Suddenly he was angry. “By joining up with all those Demondim? Hell and blood, Linden. Use your brain. They were created by the Demondim, for God’s sake. Even the Waynhim can’t forget that, no matter how hard they try. They were created evil. And the ur-viles have been Foul’s servants ever since they met him.”
“They made Vain,” she countered as if she were speaking to one of her patients. Without the ur-viles, her Staff of Law would not exist.
And you think that’s a good thing?” Covenant demanded. “Sure, you stopped the Sunbane. But it would have faded out on its own after a while. It needed the Banefire. And since then mostly what that thing you insist on carrying around has done is make my job a hell of a lot harder.
“Damn it, Linden, if you hadn’t taken my ring and made that Staff, I would have been able to fix everything ages ago. I could have stopped time around Foul right where he was when you left the Land. Then Kastenessen would still be stuck in his Durance, and the skurj would still be trapped, and Kevin’s Dirt wouldn’t exist, and Foul wouldn’t have been able to find that chink in Joan’s mind, and we wouldn’t have caesures and Demondim and ur-viles and Esmer and the bloody IIIearth Stone to worry about. Not to mention some of the other powers that have noticed what’s happening here and want to take advantage of it.
“Hellfire, I know you like that Staff. You’re probably even proud of it. But you have no idea what it’s costing me.” He glanced over at Jeremiah. “Or your son.”
Jeremiah nodded without raising his eyes from the racecar tumbling in his halfhand.
“What do you think I’m doing here?” Covenant finished. “I’m still trying to clean up your mess.”
Linden flinched in spite of her self-discipline. He held her responsible-? She wanted to protest, But you said-!
In her dreams, he had told her, You need the Staff of Law.
And through Anele, he had urged her to find him. I can’t help you unless you find me.
Yet he was the one who had found her.
“It’s awful, Mom,” Jeremiah said softly as if he were talking to his car. “There aren’t any words for what it feels like. Words aren’t strong enough. The Despiser is ripping me to pieces. And I can’t stop him. Covenant can’t stop him. He just keeps hurting me and laughing like he’s never had so much fun.”
Oh, my son!
Linden bit her lip and forced herself to face Covenant again. She was beginning to understand why he had warned her to be wary of him. The man whom she had loved would never have held her accountable for consequences which she could not have foreseen.
Nevertheless the discrepancy between her recollections and his attitudes helped her to regain her balance. In a moment, the impact of his recrimination was gone; hidden away. She would consider it later. For the present, she stood her ground.
As she had so often with her patients, she responded to his ire by trying to alter the direction of their interaction, attempting to slip past his defences. She hoped to surprise some revelation from him which he could or would not offer voluntarily.
Instead of defending herself, she asked mildly, as if he had not hurt her, “How did you get that scar on your forehead? I don’t think you ever told me.”
Covenant’s manner or his mood was as labile as Esmer’s. His anger seemed to fade into a brume of springwine. Rubbing at his forehead with his halfhand, he grinned sheepishly. “You know, I’ve forgotten. Isn’t that weird? You’d think I’d remember what happened to my own body. But I’ve been away from myself for so long-” His voice faded to a sigh. “So full of time-” Then he seemed to shake himself. Emptying his flagon with one long draught, he refilled it and set it in his lap again. “Maybe that’s why this stuff tastes so much better than I remember.”
Linden paid no attention to his reply: she heeded only his manner. Deliberately casual, she changed the subject again.
“Esmer mentioned manacles.”
His response was not what she expected. “Exactly,” he sighed as if he were drowsy with drink. “And who do you think they’re for? Not you. Of course not. Those ur-viles are here to serve you.” His tone scarcely hinted at sarcasm. “No, Linden, the manacles are for me. That’s why Esmer brought his creatures here. That’s how they’re going to help their makers. And Foul. By stopping me before we can do what we have to do to save the Land.”
Although she tried to conceal her reaction, she flinched. What she knew of the ur-viles and Waynhim led her to believe that they were her allies, that she could rely on them. But what she knew of Esmer urged doubt. The creatures that had enabled her to retrieve the Staff of Law and reach Revelstone had clearly accepted the newcomers. But if both groups wished to serve her because they felt sure that she would fail the Land-if thei
r real purpose, and Esmer’s, hinged on stopping Covenant-
She could not sustain her detachment in the face of such possibilities. They were too threatening; and the truth was beyond her grasp. She had no sortilege for such determinations. The Demondim-spawn had done so much to earn her trust-If she had not witnessed Esmer’s conflicted treachery, she might have concluded that Covenant was lying.
Trembling inside, she turned away from her former lover. Her lost son was here as well. Even if he, too, blamed her for the Land’s plight, she yearned to talk to him.
He had regained his mind at the cost of more torment than he could describe.
Carefully she leaned the Staff against the wall near the hearth. Although she craved its comforting touch, she wanted to show Jeremiah that he was in no danger from her. Then she took one of the stools and placed it so that she could sit facing him. Leaning forward with her elbows braced on her knees, she focused all of her attention on him; closed her mind to Thomas Covenant.
“Jeremiah, honey,” she asked quietly, intently, “were you shot?”
Jeremiah wrapped his hand around his toy. For a moment, he appeared to consider trying to crush the racecar in his fist; and the pulse at the corner of his eye became more urgent. But then he returned the car to the waistband of his pajamas. Lifting his head, he faced Linden with his soiled gaze.
“You really should ask him, Mom.” Her son nodded toward Covenant. “He’s the one with all the answers.” He shrugged uncomfortably. “I’m just here.”
As if he were speaking to himself, Covenant murmured, “You know, that tapestry is pretty amazing. I think it’s the same one they had in my room the first time I came here. Somehow it survived for seven thousand years. Not to mention the fact that it must have been old when I first saw it.”
Linden ignored the Unbeliever.
“Jeremiah, listen to me.” Intensity throbbed in her voice: she could not stifle it. “I need to know. Were you shot?”
Could she still attempt to save his former life? Was it possible that he might return to the world in which he belonged?
“Maybe they didn’t keep it in the Hall of Gifts,” Covenant mused. “There was a lot of damage when we fought Gibbon. Maybe they stored the tapestry in the Aumbrie. That might explain why it hasn’t fallen apart.”
Jeremiah hesitated briefly before he replied, “I’m not sure. Something knocked me down pretty hard, I remember that. But there wasn’t any pain.” Reflexively he rubbed at the muscle beating in the corner of his eye. “I mean, not at first. Not until Lord Foul started talking-
“It’s strange. Nothing here”- he pressed both palms against his chest- “hurts. In this time-or this version of reality-I’m fine. But that only makes it worse. Pain is worse when you have something to compare it to-”
Covenant was saying, “That’s Berek there in the centre. The o-rigi-nal Halfhand. He’s doing his “beatitude and striving” thing, peace in the midst of desperate struggle. Whatever that means. And the rest tells his story.”
Linden’s gaze burned. If she could have lowered her defences-if she could have borne the cost of her emotions, any of them-she would have wept. Jeremiah conveyed impressions which made her want to tear at her own flesh for simple distraction, so that she would feel some other suffering than his.
Her voice threatened to choke her as she asked, “Do you know where you are? In that other reality?”
That Queen there,” Covenant explained, “turned against her King when she found out he was human enough to actually like power. And Berek was loyal to her. He fought on her side until the King beat him. Cut his hand in half. After which Berek tried to escape. He ran for Mount Thunder. That scene shows his despair. Or maybe it was just self-pity. And in that one, the FireLions come to his rescue.”
Jeremiah shook his head. “It’s dark.” Like Linden, he seemed to ignore Covenant. “Sometimes there’s fire, and I’m in the middle of it. But there isn’t really anything to see. It could be anywhere.”
“So you don’t know where Lord Foul is?” she insisted. “You can’t tell me where to look for you?’
Until she found him, she could do nothing to end his torture.
“It all started there,” Covenant went on, the whole history of the Lords with their grand ideals and their hopeless mistakes. Even Foul’s plotting started there-in the Land, anyway. Not directly, of course. Oh, he sent out a shadow to help the King against Berek. But he didn’t show himself then. For centuries, the Lords were too pure to feel Berek’s despair. Just remembering Berek’s victories was enough to protect Damelon-and Loric too, at least for a while. Foul couldn’t risk anything overt until Kevin inherited a real talent for doubt from his father. But even that was Foul’s doing. He used the Viles and the Demondim to undermine Loric’s confidence, plant the seeds of failure. By the time Kevin became High Lord, he was already doomed.”
“I’m sorry, Mom.” Jeremiah’s tone was like his eyes: it suggested solid earth eroded by the irresistible rush of his plight. “I want to help you. I really do. I want you to make it stop. But as far as I know, I just fell into a pit, and I’ve been there ever since. It could be anywhere. Even Covenant doesn’t know where I am.”
Linden clenched herself against the distraction of Covenant’s obscure commentary. She needed all of her strength to withstand the force and sharpness of her empathy for her son.
“Poor Kevin,” Covenant sighed unkindly. “He didn’t recognise Foul because no one in the Land knew who the Despiser was. No one told Berek, and his descendants didn’t figure it out for themselves. While Foul was hard at work in Ridjeck Thome and Kurash Qwellinir, the Lords didn’t even know he existed. Kevin actually let him join the Council, and still no one saw the truth.
“I suppose it’s understandable,” the older man added. “Foul confused the hell out of them. Of course, he didn’t use his real name. That would have been too obvious. He called himself a-Jeroth until it was too late for anyone to stop him. And he’s pretty damn good at getting what he wants by misdirection. He always acts like he’s after something completely different.”
Gritting her teeth, Linden continued her questions. “That’s all right, honey,” she assured Jeremiah. “Maybe you can tell me something else that might help me.
“I don’t understand why”- she swallowed convulsively- “why that other reality doesn’t show. You said that you’re fine here. How is that possible, if Foul is still torturing you?”
Despite the damage to his pajamas, he seemed entirely intact.
“It’s sort of funny,” remarked Covenant. “Do you know the real reason Kevin let Foul talk him into the Ritual of Desecration? It wasn’t because Foul defeated him. Kevin hated that, but he could have lived with it. He still had enough of Berek’s blood in him. But Foul beat him before the war even started. What really broke him is that he let his best friends, his most loyal supporters, get killed in his place.”
“He’s doing it,” Jeremiah answered. Again he nodded toward Covenant. “He’s doing something with time to protect me while I’m here.” The boy’s gaze slipped out of focus as if he were concentrating on his other self in its prison. “He’s keeping me whole. That’s another reason you can’t touch me. He’s using more power for me than he is for himself. A lot more.”
Covenant’s voice held a hint of relish as he explained, “The Demondim invited him to a parley in Mount Thunder. Naturally he suspected it was a trap. He didn’t go. But then he felt ashamed of himself for thinking that way, so he sent his friends instead. And of course it was a trap. His friends were slaughtered.
“That,” Covenant finished in a tone of sodden triumph, “is what made Kevin crazy enough to think he had something to gain by desecrating the Land. Losing the war just confirmed his opinion of himself. The legends all say he thought the Ritual would destroy Foul, but that’s a rationalisation. The truth is, he wanted to be punished, and he couldn’t think of anything else bad enough to give him what he deserved.”
Linden
wished that she did not believe Jeremiah. Everything that he said-everything that happened in this room-was inconceivable to her. She had not forgotten his unaccountable theurgy. And the Ranyhyn had shown her horrific images of her son possessed- But of course she did believe him. How could she not? He was her son, speaking to her for the first time in his life. His presence, and his healed mind, were all that enabled her to retain some semblance of self-control.
And because she believed Jeremiah, she could not doubt Covenant. He knew too much.
At last she brought herself to her most urgent question.
“Jeremiah, honey, I don’t understand any of this. It’s incredible-and wonderful.” It was also terrible. Yet how could she regret anything that allowed him to acknowledge her? “But I don’t understand it.
“How did you get your mind back? And when? How long have you been-?”
“You mean,” he interrupted, “how long have I been able to talk?’ Now he did not meet her gaze. Instead he looked at Covenant as if he needed help. “Since we came to the Land.”
“Linden,” Covenant suggested, his voice sloppy with springwine, “you should ask him where his mind has been all this time. He made it pretty obvious that he always had a mind. Where do you suppose it was?”
Linden kept her eyes and her heart fixed on her son. “Jeremiah? Can you tell me?”
So far, he had revealed nothing that might aid her.
He twitched his shoulders awkwardly. The tic of his eye increased its thetic signalling. “It’s hard to explain. For a while”- he sighed- “I don’t know how long, I was sort of hiding. It was like a different version of being in two places at once. Except the other place wasn’t anywhere in particular. It was just away.” Flames empty of daylight gave his face a ruddy flush, made him look feverish. “It was safe.
“But then you gave me that racecar set with all the tracks and pylons. When it was done-when you gave me enough pieces, and they were all connected in the right shapes-I had a”- he clung to Covenant with his eyes- “a loop. Like a worm that eats its own tail. I guess you could call it a door in my mind. I went through it. And when I did that, I came here.
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