Against All Things Ending

by Donaldson, Stephen R.

  They had not touched each other physically: their blows met in the air between them. Roger’s pyrotic theurgy held Covenant’s blade in a grip of crimson and sulphur, as fluid and fatal as lava. Covenant answered with the salvific possibilities of wild magic channeled and focused by High Lord Loric’s mighty lore. The krill’s pure gem was an expanding cynosure of incandescence.

  Too much incandescence. Linden did not need health-sense to guess that Joan was pouring out her madness, trying to hurt the man who had been her husband. Somehow Joan—or turiya Herem—had recognized Covenant’s grip on the krill, Covenant’s intention. While he struggled against their son, she wielded her own ring in an effort to incinerate him.

  She could not attack him directly. She was not present; and her own plight hampered her. But if she unleashed enough wild magic through the gem, she might make the krill so hot that it burned the flesh from his bones.

  And Roger’s power was the essence of the skurj multiplied by Kastenessen’s immense might. Even a Giant could not have endured such heat.

  Leprosy aggravated the numbness in Covenant’s fingers. The Ardent had bandaged his hands in garish strips of magic and knowledge. The handle of the krill was wrapped in vellum. Yet the vehemence directed at him was too great. Linden watched in horror as the vellum charred and curled, cracking into flickers of flame. For a moment, the Ardent’s bandages resisted. Then they, too, began to smolder.

  Wailing, the skest crowded back against the walls. The croyel appeared to be searching for an opportunity to attack.

  “Hell and blood, Roger!” Covenant shouted: a cry thick with excruciation. “You don’t have to do this! There are better answers!”

  “What makes you think I want your answers?” Roger retorted, fierce as scoria. “You’re done being the hero, Dad!” He made “Dad” sound like a vile obscenity. “It’s time somebody put you in your place! I’m just glad that somebody is going to be me!”

  The krill’s brilliance nearly blinded Linden. Its echo of wild magic was too bright to be borne. God! she thought, oh, God, there must be caesures all across the Land, Joan is trying to bring down the Arch by herself—Sudden flames undid the bandages from Covenant’s hands. Soon he would be too badly hurt to hold the krill.

  In an argent blur cruelly tainted with crimson and malice, Linden saw another figure sprint into the chamber. Indistinct amid the squall of magicks, Stave leapt as if he meant to join Covenant’s battle. But he did not. Instead he stretched out in the air, landed full-length on the stone. His momentum carried him, skidding, beneath the conflagration of Kastenessen’s hand and Joan’s ring and Loric’s krill.

  Covenant withstood Roger’s assault because Joan’s efforts increased the krill’s puissance. Nevertheless Covenant’s flesh was dying. His protections were gone: flames ate at his fingers. Only the reek of Roger’s magma masked the odor of burning meat.

  Roger’s concentration was fixed on his father: the croyel’s was not. The creature’s gaze resembled howling as it raised Jeremiah’s arm to hurl hate like boulders down on Stave.

  Yet Stave had taken the croyel by surprise. Before it could unleash its blast, he collided with the Harrow’s body. A thrust of Stave’s arms shoved the dead Insequent at Jeremiah.

  The unexpected impact swept Jeremiah’s feet out from under him. He fell awkwardly atop the Harrow, disrupting the croyel’s magicks.

  Through Jeremiah, the croyel clutched at Stave; failed to catch him. Stave was too swift. Snatching up Covenant’s ring, he rolled aside, evading Jeremiah’s hands—

  —rolled onto and over the Staff of Law.

  Then Linden thought that she heard Stave shout her name. From the core of the clashing theurgies, she seemed to see a black shaft like a spear arc through the air toward her as though it had been aimed at her chest.

  She dropped the Sunstone. Pure reflex enabled her to reach out and catch the Staff.

  In that instant, she was transformed.

  Stave. Of course. When she needed him most.

  Of the Haruchai, he alone knew how to silence his thoughts. Perhaps that skill—or the discipline to attain it—lessened the entrancement of the palace. He must have felt her absence and broken free when none of her other companions could do so. If he had been bestirred by Anele’s return, he had not paused to rouse anyone else.

  The touch of the Staff restored Linden’s health-sense. Earthpower lifted her to her feet. The torn flesh of her fingers and palms seemed to heal itself. Stave had renewed her true heritage, the birthright that she had wrested from her parents’ legacy of despair.

  Jeremiah had already clambered upright. The croyel was summoning enough wrath to crush every bone in Stave’s body.

  Without a heartbeat’s hesitation, Linden flung flame and Law into the fight.

  She wanted to hurl her fire everywhere at once. Liand needed her. Covenant needed her urgently. Stave had no defense: not against the croyel’s theurgies. The skest might advance at any moment, rallied by Roger or the croyel. Surely one or both of them would turn their powers against her? If they were given an opportunity, they could transport themselves out of danger.

  But she was limited by her mortality. She could not focus on so many perils simultaneously.

  Trusting that Stave could fend for himself—that Roger and the croyel were done with Liand—that the skest were too frightened to advance—Linden threw her desperation at Covenant’s son.

  If Covenant’s hands were crippled or burned away, no power known to her would repair them. Like Mahrtiir’s eyes, like Stave’s eye, they would be permanently lost. Covenant would not be able to hold Loric’s krill. And he would be in too much pain to call up wild magic from his ring.

  Linden wept for her son; but she fought for her former lover.

  She had defeated Roger once before. She had faced his ferocity and croyel’s together, and had prevailed. But here she was hampered by Kevin’s Dirt. And she could not draw on the supreme energies of the EarthBlood. As soon as Covenant failed—as soon as Roger and the croyel joined their strengths against her—she would die. Magma and malevolence would extinguish her.

  Yet somehow Covenant endured his agony; his scorched and melting skin. Roger could not aim Kastenessen’s fist at Linden because he was forced to defend himself from his father.

  Before the croyel could strike at Stave, the Haruchai bounded up from the floor. Imponderably swift, he whirled a flying kick at Jeremiah’s head. The creature could not evade him.

  But its backward flinch diminished the impact of the kick. Jeremiah’s head snapped sideways: blood and saliva sprayed from his lips: he staggered. Wailing, skest scattered to avoid contact with their master. Yet Jeremiah did not go down.

  Stave rushed after him. As Jeremiah hit the wall, Stave was poised to deliver a second blow.

  A thin stream of blood dribbled from Jeremiah’s mouth. Nonetheless the croyel was unharmed. Perhaps no merely physical assault could harm it. Spite and eagerness frothed in its eyes as its fangs bit down harder on Jeremiah’s neck.

  Involuntarily Jeremiah jerked up his halfhand—and Stave fell back as though he had crashed into an invisible wall.

  He could not hope to defeat the croyel. In moments, he would be dead. Briefly, however, he had prevented the creature from aiding Roger against Covenant and Linden.

  While she could, Linden poured Staff-fire straight at Roger’s face; at his bitter mockery of his father’s features.

  Exalted by runes and blackness, weeping and frenzy, she compelled Roger to turn away from Covenant.

  Covenant plunged, helpless, to his knees. Smoke rose from his twisted fingers. But he did not release the krill. As if his flesh had melted onto the dagger—had become one with it—he clutched it while he struggled to regain his feet.

  Argent still blazed from the krill’s gem. But now its incandescence began to falter. Joan’s awareness of him was fading. She was too weak to support turiya’s demands on her.

  A quick glance told Linden that Covenant’
s hands would never be whole again. Given time and peace, she might be able to unclose his fingers from the krill without peeling away too much skin. She might be able to straighten them; heal them enough to let them flex. But with her best efforts she would never make them more useful than blunt stumps—

  Distracted, she let a blast of Roger’s rage brush her cheek. He may have burned her badly, perhaps disfigured her; yet she felt no pain. Her cracked kneecap did not trouble her. She had not forgotten Jeremiah and the croyel, or the waiting threat of the skest: she had not forgotten Stave or Liand. For the moment, however, she fought as though nothing mattered except what had been done to Covenant’s hands.

  Goading herself with the Seven Words, she forced Roger to retreat from his father.

  Somehow Covenant regained his feet. Every movement was shrill with pain; but he did not retreat. Instead he advanced on Roger, still aiming the krill at Kastenessen’s hand.

  Together, he and Linden might be able to beat Roger. She knew that Roger feared death. And she did not believe that he would allow harm to his grafted power; his halfhand. If Covenant could endure his suffering a little longer, he and Linden might succeed at driving Roger from the chamber.

  Inadvertently Stave broke her concentration. Thwarted in his attack on the croyel, Stave countered by tossing Covenant’s ring toward the ceiling.

  Surprise and avarice drew the croyel’s gaze to follow the rise and fall of white gold. Avid for wild magic, the creature dropped its defenses; tried to claw the ring out of the air.

  With all of his Haruchai muscle and speed, Stave punched the croyel between its gleaming eyes.

  The creature’s head jolted back, ripping its fangs out of Jeremiah’s neck. Quickly, however, the deformed head whipped forward again. Its eyes focused fury on Stave.

  As Stave caught the ring, closed it in his fist, Jeremiah’s arm swept upward. Stave was flung into the air; hurled toward the waiting skest.

  Stave—! Even his extraordinary reflexes could not save him now. He would land on living acid. His heart, or Linden’s, might have time to beat as much as twice before the corrosion of the skest scoured the skin from his bones. He would die hideously, in swift torment.

  Helpless to do otherwise, Linden wheeled away from Roger. With the Staff blazing in both hands, she swept all of her power like a scythe among the skest, trying frantically to cut them down, burn them to ash; clear a space for Stave.

  She almost succeeded. Creatures by the score burst into flame and fell apart, spilling viscid conflagration across the floor. Vitriol ate at the Harrow’s corpse. Twisting to right himself, Stave came down on his feet in a pool of fiery fluid.

  He tried to leap away. But acid splashed his feet and calves; bit into his legs. Nearly crippled, he managed to sprawl beyond the edge of the vitriol. Then he tried to stand, and could not. Corrosion had eaten too deeply into his muscles. It was still burning.

  Linden took a moment that she could not afford to slap her own fire at Stave’s legs. Expecting death, she stopped the damage with Earthpower. Then she abandoned Stave to his injuries; spun away to face Roger’s assault, and the croyel’s, and doom.

  As she turned, however, she saw that Roger had not used her distraction to muster a killing blast. The croyel had not followed its attack on Stave. They had not joined together against Covenant.

  Instead they had hastened toward each other. Already they had raised their arms, extending their magicks to form a portal. They were about to disappear—

  Their powers would translate them to a time or a place where she could not hope to discover them again.

  Covenant had seen what they were doing: he must have understood it. He stumbled toward them, aiming to thrust the krill between them before they could complete their sorcery. But he was too late. Linden felt their might gather while he was still too far away.

  And he was directly between her and them. She could not fling fire at Roger and the croyel without scathing Covenant.

  Stave may have been shouting at her, urging her to strike. He may have believed that Covenant would forgive her.

  Nonetheless she froze for a moment.

  In that small space of time, a concussion like a burst of thunder shook the chamber.

  The floor split in a dozen places. Stone like geysers of rubble or scree spouted upward. The whole chamber lurched as though it had cracked free of its moorings.

  Riding a jolt of theurgy, Esmer appeared between Roger and Jeremiah. “No!” Cail’s son roared in a voice of horns and storm. “This I will not permit!”

  The blast of his arrival knocked Roger and Jeremiah apart. Fuming, acid leaked away into fissures and upheavals.

  Linden had no chance to notice the sudden bile in her throat, the nausea in her guts. Sick with shock, she saw that Esmer’s condition had worsened since his last appearance. Clearly he was unable to treat the wounds inflicted on him during the battle of First Woodhelven. The grime and blood that fouled his rent cymar were unchanged; but now the festering burns and tears in his flesh wept rank fluids. The purulent reek of his hurts was both more human and more painful than the stench of Roger’s halfhand.

  He had told Linden that Kastenessen wanted him to suffer for aiding her. His wrath is boundless. But he retained his strength in spite of his bodily distress. He could be as devastating as a hurricane.

  “Fool!” he raged at Linden. Spume boiled in the dark seas of his eyes. “You have revealed your discovery of your son to Kastenessen!”

  Falling stone hit Linden’s head and shoulders; battered Covenant, Stave, and Liand. Belatedly she raised Earthpower to fend off the detritus of Esmer’s might. As she had during the earthquake under Melenkurion Skyweir, she protected herself: she shielded her companions. As then, she was hardly aware of what she did.

  “So what?” she shouted back at Esmer. “You’re already here!” Aid and betrayal. “You’ll do whatever he wants!”

  A hail of rock ruptured more of the skest, spilling their substance across the rent floor. The creatures that survived fled into their tunnels.

  “In this,” retorted Esmer, “I do not serve him! The skurj will do so! She Who Must Not Be Named will do so!”

  Shattered rock continued to erupt, tossing Roger and Jeremiah from side to side, coercing them to defend themselves; holding them at bay. With the Staff, Linden deflected granite rain.

  Where—? She expected ur-viles and Waynhim to swarm around her. They keep watch against me. Whenever Esmer had helped or endangered her, the creatures had appeared. They had been profligate with their own lives in her defense.

  This time, however, they did not come. Esmer had been too swift for them, or too sudden—

  While she warded herself and her friends with flame, Esmer surged like a running wave at Roger; crashed like a breaker over Covenant’s son.

  At once, the two of them vanished. For his own reasons, or Kastenessen’s, or Lord Foul’s, Esmer carried Roger away.

  The fall of rock ceased as abruptly as it had begun.

  The croyel’s dismay drew a yelp from Jeremiah. Frantically the boy brandished his arms. With one hand, he hailed or harried skest back into the chamber. With the other, he slapped Covenant aside as though Covenant’s opposition and anguish were trivial. Then he hurled frenzy like a battering ram at Linden.

  She met the burst with Earthpower; blocked it. But it hit her barrier so fiercely that the Staff bucked in her grasp. The creature’s fury shoved her backward.

  Its desperation matched hers.

  Skest rushed to attack. Covenant tumbled away. His hands seemed fused to the krill.

  By sheer force of will, Stave wrenched himself to his feet. He still clenched Covenant’s ring. Its chain swung between his fingers. Limping on savaged legs, he struggled toward Liand.

  “Defend yourself, Chosen,” he panted hoarsely. “Preserve your son. I cannot combat the skest. I will aid Liand.”

  It was too much. There were too many skest. The croyel was too strong. And Linden could not
call on the EarthBlood to make her greater than she was.

  Nevertheless she flung herself forward, driven by love and need—and by a new surge of despair. Covenant and Liand and Stave were about to die; and she could not bear to abandon Jeremiah to the croyel’s cruelty.

  But her plight required her to strike at her son. In abhorrence, she wielded Earthpower as if she were screaming.

  Esmer had aided her. Where was the betrayal required by his conflicted nature? I am made to be what I am. Was it this, that she could only save Jeremiah by attacking him? By killing him? If so, her horror would delight the Despiser.

  But she did not believe it. Lord Foul did not desire Jeremiah’s death. Esmer had told her, Your son is beyond price. No matter how keenly Lord Foul relished her distress, he did not wish her to kill Jeremiah. He still had a use for her son——of my deeper purpose I will not speak.

  No, this fight did not serve the Despiser’s purposes, or Kastenessen’s: not now that the croyel had been prevented from escaping with Jeremiah. Esmer had not yet revealed his treachery; or he had masked it too cunningly for Linden to see it.

  Howling fire, she tried to divide her focus between the croyel and the skest, and could not. The creature feeding on Jeremiah was too strong. And it appeared able to summon an endless number of misshapen children, glowing and fatal.

  Stave had wrestled Liand into his arms, but the damage to his legs crippled his efforts to escape. Rife with hurts, Covenant had climbed back to his feet, bracing himself against the wall where Jeremiah had thrown him. In his ruined hands, the light of the krill wavered and pulsed as though it were unsure of its use. For the moment, at least, he was spared Joan’s virulence. In that brief reprieve, he staggered arduously toward the lost boy. Like Stave, however, he had been too badly hurt to move quickly. Agony galled his face. Only stubbornness kept him upright.

  Frantic and failing, Linden alternated her attacks. She hit the croyel’s defenses as hard as she could. Then she swept flame through the skest until they ruptured and burned. As soon as she had beaten them back, she scrambled to assail the croyel again.