Stephen Donaldson - White Gold Wielder

“That you took from us. In the dungeon of the Sandhold, you chose the wrong which you name possession above the responsibility of sight, and the hope we strove to nurture was lost.

“Now I say to you that he must be persuaded to surrender his ring. If he does not, it is certain that he will destroy the Earth.”

For a moment, Covenant reeled down the path of Findail's explanation. His balance was gone. To hear his own dread expressed so starkly, like a verdict! But when he turned toward Linden, he saw that she had been hit harder than he. Her face had gone pale. Her hands made small, fugitive movements at her sides. Her mouth tried to form a denial, but she had no strength for it. Confronted by the logic of her actions as Findail saw it, she was horrified. Once again, he placed her at the centre, at the cusp of responsibility and blame. And Covenant's earlier revelation was still too recent: she had not had time to absorb it. She had claimed fault for herself-but had not understood the extent to which she might be accused.

Ire for her stabilized him. Findail had no right to drop the whole weight of the Earth on her in this way. “It's not that simple,” he began. He did not know the true name of his objection. But Linden faced him in route appeal; and he did not let himself falter. “If Foul planned this all along, why did he go to the trouble?” That was not what he needed to ask. Yet he pursued it, hoping it would lead him to the right place. “Why didn't he just wake up the Worm himself?”

Findail's gaze held Linden. When her wide eyes went back to his, he replied, “This Despiser is not mad. Should be rouse the Worm himself, without the wild magic in his hand, would he not also be consumed in the destruction of the world?”

Covenant shrugged the argument aside, went on searching for the question he needed, the flaw in Findail's rationalizations. “Then why didn't you tell us sooner? Naturally you couldn't condescend to explain anything before she freed me.” With all the sarcasm he could muster, be tried to force the Appointed to look at him, release Linden. “After what you people did, you knew she'd never give you my ring if she understood how much you want it. But later-before we got to the One Tree. Why didn't you tell us what kind of danger we were in?”

The Elohim sighed; but still he did not relinquish Linden. “Perhaps in that I erred,” he said softly, "Yet I could not turn aside from hope. It was my hope that some access of wisdom or courage would inspire the ring-wielder to step back from the precipice of his intent.”

Covenant continued groping. But now he saw that Linden had begun to rally. She shook her head, struggled internally for some way to refute or withstand Findail's accusation. Her mouth tightened: she looked like she was chewing curses. The sight lit a spark of encouragement in him, made him lean forward to aim his next challenge at the Elohim .

“That doesn't justify you,” he grated. “You talk about silencing me as if that was the only decent alternative you had. But you know goddamn well it wasn't. For one thing, you could've done something about the venom that makes me so bloody dangerous.”

Then Findail did look at Covenant. His yellow gaze snapped upward with a fierceness which jolted Covenant. “We dared not.” His quiet passion left trails of fire across Covenant's brain. “The doom of this age lies also upon me, but I dare not Are we not the Elohim , the wϋrd of the Earth? Do we not read the truth in the very roots of the Rawedge Rim, in the shape of the mountainsides and in the snows which gild the winter peaks? You mock me at your peril. By means of his venom this Despiser attempts the destruction of the Arch of Time, and that is no little thing. But it pales beside the fate which would befall the Earth and all life upon the Earth. were there no venom within you. You conceive yourself to be a figure of power, but in the scale of worlds you are not. Had this Despiser's lust for the Illearth Stone not betrayed him, enhancing you beyond your mortal stature, you would not have stood against him so much as once. And he is wiser now, with the wisdom of old frustration, which some name madness.

“Lacking the venom, you would be too small to threaten him. If he did not seek you out for his own pleasure, you would wander the world without purpose, powerless against him. And the Sunbane would grow. It would grow, devouring every land and sea in turn until even Elemesnedene itself had fallen, and still it would grow, and there would be no halt to it. Seeing no blame for yourself, you would not surrender your ring. Therefore be would remain trapped within the Arch. But no other stricture would limit his victory. Even we, the Elohim , would in time be reduced to mere playthings for his mirth. While Time endured, the Desecration of the world would not end at all.

“Therefore,” the Appointed articulated with careful intensity, “we bless the frustration or madness which inspired the gambit of this venom. Discontented in the prison of the Earth, the Despiser has risked his hope of freedom in the venom which gives you such might. It is our hope also. For now the blame is plain. Since you are blind in other ways, we must pray that guilt will drive you to the surrender which may save us.”

The words went through Covenant like a shot. His arguments were punctured, made irrelevant. Findail admitted no alternative to submission except the Ritual of Desecration-the outright destruction of the Earth to spare it from Lord Foul's power. This was Kevin Landwaster's plight on a scale which staggered Covenant, appalled him to the marrow of his bones. If he did not give up his ring. how could he bear to do anything but ruin the world himself in order to foil the eternal Sunbane of the Despiser?

Yet he could not surrender his ring. The simple thought was immediately and intimately terrible to him. That metal circle meant too much: it contained every hard affirmation of life and love that he had ever wrested from the special cruelty of his loneliness, his leper's fate. The alternative was better. Yes . To destroy-Or to risk destroying in any kind of search for a different outcome.

His dilemma silenced him. In his previous confrontation with Lord Foul, he had found and used the quiet centre of his vertigo, the still point of strength between the contradictions of his plight; but now there seemed to be no centre, no place on which he could stand to affirm both the Earth and himself. And the necessity of choice was dreadful.

But Linden had taken hold of herself again. The conceptions which hurt her most were not the ones which pierced Covenant; and he had given her a chance to recover. The look she cast at him was brittle with stress; but it was alert once more, capable of reading his dismay. For an instant, empathy focused her gaze. Then she swung back toward the Appointed, and her voice bristled dangerously.

“That's just speculation. You're afraid you might lose your precious freedom, so you're trying to make him responsible for it You still haven't told us the truth.”

Findail faced her; and Covenant saw her flinch as if the Elohim 's eyes had burned her. But she did not stop.

“If you want us to believe you, tell us about Vain.”

At that, Findail recoiled.

Immediately, she went after him. “First you imprisoned him, as if he was some kind of crime against you. And you tried to trick us about it, so we wouldn't know what you were doing. When he escaped, you tried to kill him. Then, when he and Seadreamer found you aboard the ship, you spoke to him.” Her expression was a glower of memory. “You said, 'Whatever else you may do, that I will not suffer.'”

The Appointed started to reply; but she overrode him. “Later, you said, Only he whom you name Vain has it within him to expel me. I would give my soul that he should do so.”