Part 27 (1/2)

The makers of the Demondim might resolve their hermetic debate by snuffing out her life. But the risks if she swayed them were no less extreme. Contradicting the seductions of the Ravers, she might irretrievably alter the Land's history. A cascade of consequences might spread throughout time. If the Viles did not learn to loathe themselves, they would not create the Demondim-who would in turn not create- With every word, she risked the Arch of Time.

Nevertheless she did not allow herself to hesitate or falter. Here, at least, she believed that calamity was not inevitable. The Law of Time opposed its own disintegration. And the effects of what she did might well prove temporary. Her arguments might do nothing more than delay the gradual corruption of the Viles.

The wood that you claim must defy them, yet it does not.

”Sure,” she continued as though her companions had not spoken, the Forestal is angry. His trees have been slaughtered. But his rage isn't aimed at you. If you don't threaten Garroting Deep, he won't even acknowledge that you're here.”

Risking everything, uttering sulfur and incarnadine to the gloom, she averred, ”You've been lied to. You're being manipulated. The Ravers hate trees. They want you to do the same. Not because they care about you. Not because you're in any danger. They just want you to start hating.” Extinguis.h.i.+ng. ”If you do that enough, you'll end up just like them.”

All contempt turns upon the contemptuous, as it must.

For an immeasurable time, the Viles were silent. Linden felt serpentine darkness coil and twist around her, a nest of snakes and self-dissent; smelled subterranean stone and dust, caves so old and deeply buried that they may have been airless. Get ready. Jeremiah and Covenant had reached a decision, but it lay beyond her discernment. Sensory confusion cut her off from everything except the hollow and the dusk.

Then all or some of the black tendrils repeated, She has lore. And others insisted, It is not lore. It is given knowledge. She has been taught. She merely holds powers which surpa.s.s her.

They debated among themselves, gathering vehemence with every a.s.sertion. Then the others must concern us.

They do not. They are no mystery to US.

This contention is foolish. The fierceness of the voices blinded Linden. She no longer saw sounds: she felt them. They sc.r.a.ped along her skin like the teeth of a rasp. We cannot accuse her. She has spoken sooth. We also are moved by given knowledge. Have we not heeded those who report that we are despised?

We have. What of that? We seek only comprehension. The intent of her companions is far otherwise. And she consents by withholding her strength. For that reason, we confront her.

Unrestrained anger. For that reason, she must be extinguished.

Stern contradiction. For that reason, she must be understood. Her inaction requires justification.

As one, the voices turned against Linden. Give answer, lover of trees. Why do you permit the purposes of the others, when you have no need of it?

There her determination stumbled. The Viles' question was more fatal than their ire. In this circ.u.mstance, her mind cannot be distinguished from the Arch of Time. How could she explain herself without violating the strictures of history? Her choices could only be justified by events which had not yet occurred; events which would not occur for thousands of years. If she answered, the repercussions would exceed any hope of containment.

Desperately she countered the challenge of the Viles with one of her own.

”You aren't thinking clearly. You've got it backward. Before you question me, you have to question yourselves. Why do you listen to Ravers? Don't you realize that they're lying? Beings like you?” Lofty and admirable-”I can't answer you if you aren't able to recognize the difference between truth and lies.”

Instantly the twilight grew darker. She saw only stark ebony as if it were the benighted hearts of the Viles. The scents of offal and new blood and repudiation were flung into her face. The ground under her boots thrummed as though the bones of the Last Hills had begun to vibrate. The taste of dead branches and twigs filled her mouth, as bright as bra.s.s.

Voices clawed at her skin. She dares to speak so. To us. When they replied to themselves, they spoke in fangs. Yet she speaks sooth. We have heeded that which desires only slaughter.

We seek comprehension.

We seek meaning. Our lives are sterile.

Nonetheless their vehemence no longer threatened Linden. Their conflict did not include her. If she felt savaged by it, that was a side effect of their black theurgy.

They uttered falsehood. What of that? they countered. They also spoke sooth.

Truth may mask lies. It may mislead.

Yet it was indeed sooth. Was it not? Have we not acknowledged that it was?

We have. We were informed without chicane that we are self-absorbed spectres, affectless and wasted. The loveliness we devise and adore is without meaning or purpose. Our lore is great, and our strength dire, yet we are but playthings for ourselves. This is sooth. We have acknowledged it.

Linden groaned. She flinched at the touch of every claw and tooth. There could be no question about it: the Ravers had been at work. She recognized their malignancy, their acid gall.

And have we not also acknowledged that therefore we may be deemed paltry by the wider world? Have we not come to this place seeking truth? Is not our first purpose to determine if the Forestal indeed views us with scorn? Only when that is known can we consider the cause of his scorn.

Yet is not our reasoning flawed, as the lover of trees has proclaimed?

She is specious. Unjustified. Her own reasoning is flawed.

No, she wanted to protest. No. Everything that you heard from those Ravers was a lie. Even if it sounded like the truth. You can't listen- But she had no voice and no will: she hardly seemed to think. The mounting debate left her mute as well as blind; nearly insensate. She had come to the end of words as though it were the end of worlds.

Agreed, the Viles continued, scoring her flesh, rending her courage. Yet our reasoning is also flawed. We acknowledge that we are self-absorbed and affectless. But we mislead ourselves if we conclude that therefore we are deemed paltry. The att.i.tude of the wider world cannot be inferred from the disdain of those whom she names Ravers.

No. We have not erred in that fas.h.i.+on. We have come to this woodland that we might distinguish truth from falsehood.

We have erred in precisely that fas.h.i.+on. We have come to this woodland expecting to discover that we are scorned. We have been taught scorn for ourselves. Is this wisdom? Is it just? Do we merit disdain because we have clung to loveliness, ignoring the concerns of the Earth?

That's it! Linden fought to say; to confirm. That's what the Ravers want-scorn for ourselves. But still she could not speak. Somehow the Viles had silenced her. They would not permit her to intrude on their dissension.

When she felt Covenant's voice roar through her clothes, ”Now, Linden! Runk' she did not hesitate, although she could not tell where she was and had no idea where she was going.

She feared a collision with the upthrust stones; feared falling; feared the outrage of the Viles. She could hardly be certain that she still held the Staff of Law. Every step carried her from nothing to nothing. Under her feet, the packed dirt sounded as unsteady as water: it felt as suffocating as a cave-in. Nevertheless she attempted to flee, seeking the tone or scent of higher ground.

For an instant, she thought that she heard the Viles muster black madness against her. But then a gap opened in her writhing paresthesia. Through it, she felt Covenant hurl a torrent of heat and fire down into the hollow, power as liquid as magma, and as destructive. At the same time, Jeremiah's unexplained magic gathered until it seemed to tower over the forest. Then it crashed like a shattered wall down onto the trees of the Deep.

Chaos erupted among the Viles: rage and force virulent enough to strip flesh from bones. Simultaneously, however, the disruption faded from Linden's senses, swept aside by Covenant's fire, or by the horrendous response of the Demondim-makers. In that swift rush of clarification, time and her frantic breathing and even the urgent throb of her heart: all seemed to stop at once.

In tiny increments, minuscule fragments of infinity, she saw the hillside under her feet; saw herself striving to run diagonally up the slope toward Covenant and Jeremiah; saw the Staff clenched in her urgent fist. Above her, Covenant faced the Viles with heat spouting viciously from his halfhand. While she watched, the creatures parted like mist to evade his attack, then swirled together to concentrate their corrosive theurgy.

A mere shard of an instant later, she saw Jeremiah standing near Covenant with his back to the Viles, flinging repulsion like frenetic blows into Garroting Deep. Exposed. Defenseless- The sides of the hollow blocked Linden's view of the Deep. Nevertheless she felt as well as heard an abrupt cavalcade of music among the trees.

It shocked her; held her nearly immobile in mid-stride while slivers of time acc.u.mulated to create a single moment. The leaves sang a myriad-throated melody of ineffable loveliness while the twigs and boughs contributed chords of aching harmony and the trunks added a chaconne as poignant as a lament. Each note seemed as pristine and new as the first dew of springtime, dulcet as daisies, th.o.r.n.y as briars. Together the thousands upon thousands of notes fas.h.i.+oned a song of such heartbreaking beauty that Linden would have wept to hear it if she had not been trying feverishly to run-and if her companions had not stood in the path of havoc.

Within the profound glory of the music lay a savage power. Her nerves were stunned by the sheer magnitude of the magic which the singing summoned. It was not merely beauty and grief: it was also a tsunami of rage. Somewhere beyond the hillside, Caerroil Wildwood must have come to the verge of the Deep; and there he sang devastation for every living being that opposed him.

Separately the Viles and the Forestal were potent enough to banish Covenant and her son, her son. Together their energies would rend both of her loves. Jeremiah and Covenant would not simply disappear: they would perish utterly.

Without Covenant's support, the Arch of Time itself might be undone. Then we'll have to do it. Get ready.

She could not reach them; could do nothing to protect them.

She had scarcely finished one stride and begun the next, however, when Covenant and Jeremiah turned away from their peril. Running headlong, they sprinted down the slope toward her. Again Covenant yelled. ”Now, Linden!”

Behind them, a tremendous explosion shook the hills as focused serpentine vitriol struck lucent melody. The impact seemed to jolt the sky, jarring the sun, spilling winter brightness back into the hollow: it made the ground under Linden's boots pitch and heave. At once, time began to race like Covenant and Jeremiah, like Linden herself, as if opposing forces had knocked the interrupted moments loose to bleed and blur. The Viles released an unremitting gush of black unnatural puissance. Caerroil Wildwood sang in response, using the given lore of the Elohim and the sentient Earthpower of trees by the millions. Suddenly Linden and her companions were able to close the gap between them.

”Now!' Covenant panted yet again. ”While they're fighting each other!”