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

mosses high on the walls, where until recently the cavern had been filled. Thin trickles fell here and there across the emptiness, perhaps dribbling from stalactites invisible in the dark. But there were no ripples: none at all. And no sounds. Drops struck the lake and were absorbed seamlessly. Water lay flat as glass against the rocks of the verge.
    The Ironhand had halted with Covenant near the curve of the lakefront. One by one, the rest of the company reached them and stopped, peering into the blind depths or the veiled distance. Branl waved Loric’s dagger for a moment, watched silver sweep across the immaculate ebony. Then he stepped back.
    A leaden silence ruled the cavern. From this vantage, even the waterfall appeared to make no sound. The Giants seemed unwilling or unable to speak. To Linden’s eyes, the air over the lake looked as condensed and heavy as sweat.
    Again her health-sense caught hints of She Who Must Not Be Named. Here they were stronger. The spilth of theurgies as old as the mountain—as old as the Land—stained the lake wherever she looked. Implied carrion-eaters tasted her skin.
    Distracted by noisome things, she was slow to notice that the Feroce were gone.
    Gone?
    “Thomas?” The silence seemed to seal her throat. She had to swallow several times before she could say more than his name. “The Feroce? Where did they go?”
    Rime Coldspray and her comrades scanned the cavern, the lake. Covenant gazed past or through Linden like a man who had lost his sight. “Into the water.” His voice sounded preternaturally distinct: precise and defiant. It should have raised echoes. Instead it fell stillborn. “I don’t know why. They didn’t say anything.”
    “I am loath to believe,” remarked Branl, “that they have forsaken us.”
    “As am I,” Stave agreed. “They heed their High God.”
    The Ironhand coughed, cleared her throat. “Without them—”
    As if she had summoned them, delicate green flames appeared on the surface near the spot where the cavern’s leftward sweep interrupted Linden’s view. Untroubled by the waters, the creatures arose under their fires, lifted emerald from the lake. Their passing left no mark on the water’s black sheen as they climbed the rocks.
    “Why do you tarry?” Their damp voice scaled into the heights. “You must hasten. There is peril, much peril. Are you deaf to majesty? Blind to wonder? You must hasten.”
    Tensions ran among the Giants. They prepared to move. But Rime Coldspray stood where she was. From her clasp, Covenant called to the Feroce, “What’s going on? You picked a hell of a time for a swim. Did you wake something up?”
    Studying the lake, Linden saw nothing, heard nothing. She felt only the noxious tickling of centipedes, tentative and eager.
    “Will you not hasten?” the creatures urged. “We are merely the Feroce. There is no peril for us. Your lives are forfeit.”
    Covenant appeared to freeze for an instant, startled into incomprehension. Then he snapped to the Ironhand, “Go!”
    At once, Coldspray surged ahead over the hazardous stones. Behind her, Giants followed as swiftly as they could. But Baf Scatterwit’s cracked knee slowed her. Grueburn waved her free arm, urged Halewhole Bluntfist and the trailing sailors to pass her. Then she drew her longsword; kept pace with Scatterwit. Cirrus Kindwind did the same, bracing Jeremiah with her maimed forearm. Holding Cabledarm’s longsword, Stave positioned himself between them and the water.
    Linden did not glance at her son. The lake seemed to grip her. There were too many centipedes, more and more of them. Spiders. Maggots. Worms avid to feast on her sins. Only Jeremiah’s tendrils of Earthpower and Law shielded her.
    A bulge appeared in the water.
    No, not a bulge: a
body
. A stone’s throw long. A double arm span wide. Lithe as a serpent, flowing up to bend the surface and then sliding back down endlessly. As dark as the lake, but rife with strength. If it had a head or a tail, Linden did not see them. No slight ripple or splash defined the immense monster’s glide.
    From the rocks ahead of Covenant, the Feroce confessed abjectly, “We sought to gaze upon our High God’s god. We have done so. Its thoughts are broken. They lack glory. Only ruin remains. It will slay you all.”
    “Hellfire,” Covenant rasped. “I suppose even the lurker had to come from somewhere. If that’s its mother, I’ve seen enough. I don’t want more.”
    Branl stood at the