The Last Dark: The climax of the entire Thomas Covenant Chronicles (Last Chronicles of Thomas Cove)

followed by the sounds of feeding. Casting a bleary glance over her shoulder, she found horses in the bower.
    Hyn and Hynyn. Khelen. Rallyn. And the Ardent’s mulish steed, Mishio Massima. In this lifeless region, their need for fodder had become imperative.
    Linden closed her eyes again, nestled against the anodyne of Covenant’s shoulder. Her only true lover—He had never stopped loving her: she believed that now. To some extent, she understood why he had seemed to spurn her days ago. And those aspects of his singular straits that still baffled her did not mar her gratitude. The sensation that he had vindicated her, body and soul, was more profound than her fatigue. It felt numinous and ineffable: a homecoming of the spirit. Every part of him had become as precious to her as a sunrise.
    The ring on her finger resembled certainty. She could have spent days with her husband in the balm of Caerwood ur-Mahrtiir’s bower, and done so gladly.
    But eventually the snorts and snuffles of horses cropping grass prodded her to wonder how much time had passed. Motionless so she would not disturb Covenant, she extended her senses beyond the Forestal’s bedizened canopy, and was surprised to discern that dawn was near: the feigned dawn of a sunless day. The fourth day—was it really the fourth?—since the sun had failed to rise.
    Her companions had left her alone with Covenant for most of the night. Even Jeremiah—
    Curious now, Linden raised her head to look around.
    Melodies gemmed the leaves overhead as if they had been set in place to watch over her and Covenant; but of Caerwood ur-Mahrtiir there was no sign. He had hidden himself in the fecund intricacies of his hymns. Apart from the horses, she saw only the broad trunk of the tree, and beyond it the fane of the
Elohim
.
    Groaning softly, Covenant blinked his eyes open. When his gaze found Linden, he tried to smile: an awkward twist of his mouth. In the delicate light of the Forestal’s music, the pale scar on his forehead seemed to glow. It might have been a nascent anadem, an old wound that was slowly becoming a crown. The stark silver of his hair promised flames.
    Remembering his ardor, she felt a delicious shiver like an intimation of the life that she wanted to have with him.
    An impossible life while the Worm stalked the World’s End, and Lord Foul plotted to reclaim Jeremiah.
    Covenant propped himself up on his elbows and looked her over with yearning in his eyes. He seemed to desire every contour. Then he frowned ruefully. Nodding toward the Ranyhyn and Mishio Massima, he muttered in mock-disgust, “I probably shouldn’t say this, Linden, but I don’t really like horses.”
    She laughed softly. “Neither do I.” He made her name sound like a cherished endearment. “But I’m very fond of Hyn,” she added in case the mare understood her. “And Khelen, of course.”
    How could she feel anything other than affection for them?
    As if her response were a cue, Jeremiah called from within the fane, “Mom? Can we come out? We’re hungry. You have all the
aliantha
.”
    She was on the verge of saying, Sure, honey, when she remembered that she was naked.
    Stifling a giggle, she answered, “Give us a minute.” She looked at Covenant, offered him a lop-sided smile, kissed him swiftly. Then she reached for her clothes.
    “Hellfire,” he growled under his breath. “Bloody damnation.”
    He had not had enough of peace and privacy, or of her.
    She pulled up her jeans, buttoned her shirt without regarding its tears and snags, its neat hole over her heart. Leaving her feet bare to enjoy the lush grass a little longer, she retrieved her Staff. Then she paused to study Covenant.
    His leprosy had worsened in recent days. A slight haze occluded his vision. She suspected that he could not see clearly past twenty or thirty paces. And the numbness of his fingers stretched into his palms toward his wrists. His toes, and patches on the soles of his feet, had no sensation. Now the end of Kevin’s Dirt had halted his deterioration. She found no indication that his symptoms were still spreading. Nevertheless he was farther from health than he had been when she had first resurrected him.
    He fumbled into his jeans, worked his T-shirt over his head. While he tugged at the laces of his boots, she asked tentatively, “Do you want any help, Thomas? I can heal—”
    He hesitated for a moment, scowled, then shook his head. “Thanks anyway. I can see well enough.” He seemed