Stephen Donaldson - Fatal Revenant

“Then,” Mahrtiir instructed, “permit the Ringthane to witness his plight, as he desires. When she has beheld it, words will follow.”

The young man cast a look like an appeal at Linden; but he obeyed the Manethrall. Sighing unhappily, he reached to a sash at his waist, a pale blue strip of cloth which Linden had not seen before, and from which hung a leather pouch the size of his cupped hand. Untying the pouch, he slipped an object into his hand, took a deep breath to steady himself, then pressed the object into Anele’s grasp.

It was a smooth piece of stone, vaguely translucent-and distinctly familiar. Linden’s health-sense received an impression of compacted possibilities.

Anele’s fingers clenched immediately around the stone. At once, he flung back his head and wailed as though his heart were being torn from him.

Instinctively Linden moved toward the old man. But Liand reached out to stop her; and Mahrtiir barked. “Withhold, Ringthane! Anele wishes this.”

An instant later, a rush of power from Anele’s closed fist washed away every hint of his lunacy.

Linden jerked to a halt and stared. That was Earthpower, but it was not Anele’s inborn strength. Rather his latent force catalysed or evoked a different form of magic; a particular eldritch energy which she had known long ago.

Then the flood of puissance passed, and Anele fell silent. Slowly he lowered his head. When he looked at Linden, his blind gaze focused on her as if he could see.

“Linden Avery,” he said hoarsely. “Chosen and Sun-Sage. White gold wielder. You are known to me.”

“Anele,” she breathed. “You’re sane.”

None of her companions showed any surprise, although their distress was plain. They had recognised the old man’s gestures; must have seen this transformation before-

“I am,” he acknowledged, and do not wish it. It torments me, for it is clarity without succour. I cannot heal the harm that I have wrought. But I must speak and be understood. They ask it of me.”

“They”?” urged Linden. Anele had endured Lord Foul’s brutal presence, and Kastenessen’s. He had felt Esmer’s coercion. And Thomas Covenant had spoken through him as well: a more benign possession, but a violation nonetheless. If even sleep had become fear and anguish, how could he retain any vestige of himself?

“They do not possess me,” he replied with fragile dignity, as though he understood her alarm. “Rather they speak in my dreams, imploring this of me. They are Sunder my father and Hollian my mother, whom my weakness has betrayed. And behind them stands Thomas Covenant, who craves only that I assure you of his love. But the intent of Sunder Graveler and Hollian eh-Brand is more urgent.”

Sunder? Linden thought dumbly. Hollian? She gaped at the son of her long-dead friends as he continued, “They sojourn among the Dead in Andelain, and they beg of you that you do not seek them out. They know not how the peril of Kastenessen and the skurj and white gold may be answered. They cannot guide or counsel you. They are certain only that doom awaits you in the company of the Dead.”

His love. “Anele-” Linden’s voice was a croak of chagrin. “Can you talk to them?” They beg of you- “In your dreams? Can you tell them that I know what I’m doing?”

All of her hopes were founded in Andelain. If she were forbidden to approach the Dead, she was truly lost; and Jeremiah would suffer until the Arch of Time crumbled.

The old man shook his head. “Sleeping, I am mute.” His moonstone eyes regarded her in supplication. “In my remorse, I would cry out to them, but they cannot hear. No power of dream or comprehension will shrive me until I have discovered and fulfilled my geas. ”

Then he turned away. “Liand,” he panted, faltering, “I beseech you. Relieve me of this burden. I cannot bear the knowledge of myself.”

Doom awaits you in the company of the Dead.

When he extended his hand and opened his fingers, he revealed a piece of orcrest, Sunstone. To Linden’s senses, it appeared identical to the smooth, unevenly shaped rock with which Sunder had warded the folk of Mithil Stonedown from the Sunbane. Its potency made it seem transparent, but it was not. Instead it resembled a void in the substance of Anele’s palm; an opening into some other dimension of reality or Earthpower.

Its touch had restored his mind.

“ No. ” As Liand reached for the stone, Linden grabbed Anele; forced him to face her again. She wanted to demand, Why? You’re sane now. Tell me why. She had heard too many prophesies of disaster. Even Liand had warned her, You have it within you to perform horrors. She needed to know what Sunder and Hollian feared from her.

But when her hands closed on his gaunt frame, her nerves felt his excruciation like a jolt of lightning. He was sane: oh, he was sane. And for that reason, he was defenceless. Even his heritage of Earthpower could not rebuff the self-denunciation and grief which had broken his mind; blinded him; condemned him to decades of starvation and loneliness while he searched for the implications of his fractured past.

Linden’s heart may have grown as ungiving and dark as obsidian; but she could ask nothing of this frail old man. Even to save her son, she could not. She had already extorted too much pain from Anele. She was done with it.

And behind them stands Thomas Covenant, who craves only that I assure you of his love.

Swallowing grief as acute as rage, Linden said softly, “I want you to understand something. While you still can. I used you. When I was trying to convince the Masters to help me.” And she had contemplated causing him more hurt. “But I won’t do that again. I’m finished.”

She had learned at least this much from her betrayal by Roger and the croyel . They had wanted her to achieve their ends for them. And their manipulations had nearly destroyed her. But what the croyel was doing to Jeremiah was worse.

“I’ll keep you with me,” she promised. “I’ll protect you as much as I can.” She had no other hope to offer him. “But I won’t ask you to pay the price for what I want. Not again.”

Anele breathed heavily for a moment. He shuddered in her grasp: his eyes were closed. When he had mastered himself, he replied. “Linden Avery, you are the Chosen, and will determine much.” His low growl echoed Mahrtiir’s severity. “But that choice is not vouchsafed to you. All who live share the Land’s plight. Its cost will be borne by all who live. This you cannot alter. In the attempt, you may achieve only ruin.”

Then he pulled away from her easily, as if her strength had failed. Leaving her confounded, he handed the orcrest to Liand.

As soon as the stone left his fingers, he appeared to faint.

Too late, Linden snatched at his slumping form. But Bhapa was quicker. He caught the old man and lowered him gently to the rug.

Obviously the Cord had known what to expect. All of Linden’s friends had known.

“Liand?” she asked in chagrin. “Is he-?”

Liand continued to cradle the orcrest in his palm as though its touch gave him pleasure. “We have spoken of this,” he answered quietly, gazing at Anele. “We discern no lasting hurt. He will slumber briefly. When he wakes, he will be as he was. In some form, his madness is kindly. It shields him. In its absence, his bereavements would compel despair.” When the young man looked up at Linden, his compassion for Anele filled his eyes. “This we have concluded among ourselves, for we know not how otherwise to comprehend either his pain or his endurance of it.”

Mahrtiir nodded; and Pahni rested her hand on Liand’s shoulder, sharing his sympathy.