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

meant, We’re all going to die.
    “Well, sure.” Covenant’s tone conveyed a shrug. The Despiser did not lie. “But that’s not the point. The Worm isn’t more real than
you
are. It’s just more dramatic.”
    “I don’t get it,” Jeremiah groaned. “I can’t—Lord Foul is too strong.”
    His confusion and need twisted Linden’s heart; but Covenant did not relent. “Then let him be too strong. You don’t need to beat him. Just do
something
he doesn’t expect. Be yourself.”
    A young man with the Staff of Law and his own Earthpower: a young man with a talent for
making
. Even the Despiser in his fury and frustration could not satisfy all of his desires without the ability to create. Linden understood what Covenant was saying. She knew why Lord Foul needed her son.
    But she could see as clearly as if she had entered him with her health-sense that Jeremiah did not understand. He was too young to know how much he did not know about himself. When he ducked his head to mutter as if he were ashamed, “Maybe Roger had the right idea. Maybe we should all try to become gods,” she seemed to hear the
croyel
in him: the legacy of being possessed.
    Yet she did not hear scorn. Bitterness, yes. Fear. Self-pity. But not contempt. He had other birthrights as well.
    Surely she could try to believe that they would come to his aid when he needed them? Surely she should trust him, no matter how much his distress hurt her, or how much she feared for him? She would not be there for him when his plight came to its crisis. Trusting him now might be the last gift that she would ever be able to give him.

    hen the companions had eaten another meal, shared their waterskins, and refreshed themselves as much as they could on the better air drifting into the crevice, they started upward. Once again, the Ironhand and the Anchormaster took the lead; but this time Covenant walked behind them with Branl and Halewhole Bluntfist. After Hurl, Keenreef, and several other sailors, Linden and Jeremiah essayed the terraced ledge accompanied by Stave, Frostheart Grueburn, and Cirrus Kindwind. Onyx Stonemage and more of Stoutgirth’s crew came next. As before, Blustergale and Baf Scatterwit brought up the rear.
    In places, the surface they trod resembled sheets of slate, and there the going was easy. Some of the stairs where the rock had crumbled were minor obstacles. But occasionally the sheared steps reached to Linden’s waist. A few were taller than she was: they cast shadows as threatening as chasms. Like Covenant and Jeremiah, she had to be lifted to the next level.
    The walls leaned toward and away from each other, tracing the variations of Mount Thunder’s flaws and stubbornness. By increments, the river fell below the reach of the company’s illumination. The rush of water became distant, as if it were fading out of the world; and with it the spilth or detritus of She Who Must Not Be Named also receded. In gusts and eddies, the air improved.
    Like the crevice, the width of the ledge undulated. At intervals, Linden was able to walk at Jeremiah’s shoulder as if she could still shield him. More often, the company was forced to go in single file. When the ledge became dangerously narrow, Cirrus Kindwind kept her hand on Jeremiah’s shoulder, and Frostheart Grueburn did the same for Linden.
    After some distance, Rime Coldspray and Bluff Stoutgirth came to a break in the ledge. Linden could not see how they crossed it. Giants blocked her view. Her every step was obscured by shadows. But when she and Jeremiah reached the gap, she found that the sailors had stretched a rope over it, held taut by Hurl on one end and Wiver Setrock on the other. Using the line for support, Kindwind and Grueburn helped Jeremiah and Linden to the far side.
    When the last of the Giants were safe, the company continued to climb.
    Linden lost her sense of duration. Nothing in the mountain’s perpetual midnight marked the passage of time. Gradually the river passed out of hearing. After that, there were no sounds apart from the efforts and breathing of the companions. The
krill
’s light shifted as Branl moved, but it revealed only rock and more rock, enduring and unrelieved. Beyond it, darkness crowded thick as obsidian or basalt.
    Still the river pulled air downward with it: a guttering breeze on Linden’s face. For a while, she derived a sense of progress from the declining pressure of taints in her lungs. Soon, however, the changes became too subtle to