Free Against All Things Ending by Stephen R. Donaldson Page B

might be forever flawed. And on this subject, the Ranyhyn had warned her clearly enough. They had shown her the likely outcome if she imposed her will on Covenant. Or on Jeremiah.
    Some evils could not be twisted to serve any purpose but their own. Manipulating Covenant’s condition for her own benefit would make her no better than the vile succubus that feasted on Jeremiah’s neck. Perhaps some obdurate instinct for salvation would enable Covenant to find his way through the maze of his fissured consciousness. Linden would not.
    Liand winced at her answer: at the words themselves, or at their acrid sound in the lush night. Pahni stifled a whimper against his shoulder. Mahrtiir’s fierce silence conveyed the impression that he was mustering arguments to persuade her.
    But Linden moved past them as though she had been indurated to any simple or direct form of compassion. She made no effort to retrieve her Staff or Covenant’s ring. Jeremiah’s ruined toy in her pocket was enough for her: the bullet hole and the small tears in her shirt were enough. Ignoring the grim enmity of the Humbled, she went to confront Infelice.
    Now that the crisis of Linden’s powers had passed, the echo of wild magic from Loric’s krill did not outshine the Elohim ’s refulgence. Infelice stood before Linden like a cynosure of loveliness and aghast hauteur. Wreathed about her limbs, her bedizened garment resembled weeping woven of gemstones and recrimination.
    The Mahdoubt had told Linden that There is hope in contradiction . Long ago, Covenant had said the same thing. Before that, High Lord Mhoram had said it.
    But the Mahdoubt had fallen into madness and death for Linden’s sake; and Covenant lay shattered on the grass. Linden had never known Mhoram.
    Without preamble, she said, “The Dead are gone.” She did not doubt that Sunder and Hollian had already bid farewell to their immeasurably bereft son; that Grimmand Honninscrave had left the Swordmainnir to consider all that they had lost. “And Covenant can’t help me. I’ve hurt him too badly.” Nor could the Harrow’s knowledge, the fruit of his long diligence and greed, be compared to the immortal awareness of the Elohim . “That only leaves you.
    “Tell me how to find my son.”
    The Harrow had averred that Infelice would not or could not do so.
    “Wildwielder,” the Elohim retorted sharply: a reprimand. “You yourself have asked if the harm which you have wrought does not suffice. Will you compound ruin with delirancy? Your son is an abomination. His uses are abominable. Did not the first Halfhand say that you must exceed yourself yet again? He wished to convey that you must set aside this mad craving for your son.”
    Linden shook her head again. Infelice’s words slipped past her like shadows, wasted and empty of affect. No objurgation could touch her while she remained deaf to despair.
    And she did not choose to credit the Elohim ’s interpretation of High Lord Berek’s insistence—
    “Then tell me,” she said as though Infelice had not spoken, “how to stop the Worm.”
    “ Stop the Worm? ” The woman’s voice nearly cracked. “Do you imagine that such a being may be hindered or halted in any manner? Your ignorance is as extreme as your transgressions.”
    Behind Linden, the Harrow chuckled softly; but she heard no humor in the sound.
    “So explain it to me,” she demanded. “Cure my ignorance. Why does such a being even exist? What’s it for ? What made the Creator think that the Worm of the World’s End was a good idea? Did he want to kill his own creation? Was all of this,” all of life and time, “just some cruel experiment to see how long it would take us to do everything wrong?”
    “Fool!” retorted Infelice. Impatiently she dismissed the worth of Linden’s question. “How otherwise might the Creator have devised a living world? You have named yourself a healer. How do you fail to grasp that life cannot exist without death?”
    Her voice wove