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

Ardent delivered Bhapa and Pahni to the vicinity of Revelstone. Their words gave the Masters cause to come in search of you, Chosen.” He gave a subtle emphasis to Linden’s title. “Now the Cords accompany the Masters. If our foes and our fate permit it, you will be reunited with them.
    “More than that I will not disclose.”
    “Damn it, Stave,” Linden muttered. “That’s not enough. How could they not know that Covenant is alive? Didn’t Bhapa or Pahni tell them?”
    How had the Cords goaded the Masters into action at last, if not by insisting that the ur-Lord needed them, the Unbeliever, the man who had twice defeated Corruption?
    “We’ll hear about it soon enough,” Covenant put in. He did not have the heart to challenge Stave’s scruples. Instead he tightened his grip on Linden’s hand, trying to reassure her. “Or we’ll spend what’s left of our lives fighting, and we won’t hear anything at all. Either way, it doesn’t matter. They aren’t just Masters. They’re
Haruchai
. Eventually they’ll help us, even if they think we did something terrible behind their backs. They have to. They’re too ashamed to do anything else. They’ve already passed up two chances to face Lord Foul with me, not to mention once with Kevin. They don’t know how to live with it.”
    Stave nodded like a shrug. Branl did not offer his opinion.
    For a long moment, Linden studied the ungiving stone ahead of her. When she finally spoke, her voice was so soft that Covenant barely heard her.
    “Don’t let them get in my way. This is my last chance. We can’t stop the Worm. It’s my fault, but I can’t do anything about it. That’s why I have to—”
    Abruptly she stopped.
    “I know,” Covenant sighed. “We’re all in the same boat. The only thing that might be worse than facing our fears is not facing them.”
    Linden did not reply; did not lift her head. She clung to his hand as if she were drowning.
    Covenant knew the feeling. He believed that she would find the courage she needed. A woman who could do what she had done would be able to do more. But he was not at all sure how he would bear losing her.
    The sheer scale of his anger at the Despiser was becoming a liability. Often it had kept him going when he should have failed. But now he needed a better answer—and his anger threatened to blind him.
    That was the paradox of his leprosy. In order to confront Lord Foul, he positively required numbness. He had to be untouchable: immune to every affront; impervious to the extremes of wild magic. Unaffected by the implicit betrayal of Roger’s allegiance. Yet numbness might also leave him impotent. It had done so before.
    When Linden left, she would take his heart with her. If he allowed fury to fill that great hole in his chest, he was sure to fail.

    ven in this unfamiliar passage, Covenant recognized the Wightwarrens. He knew them by the crudity of the Cavewights’ delving—the careless walls and ragged ceiling, the irregular protrusions of stone where the creatures had neglected to finish what they started—and by the instinctive cunning with which the tunnel followed veins and lodes within the gutrock. From here, anyone who knew the catacombs well would be able to find Kiril Threndor, Heart of Thunder, where Covenant had once surrendered to the Despiser.
    But he had no idea how far he still had to go. And he felt sure that the company would be attacked again before he reached his goal.
    As if to prove him right, a warning shout came from the darkness ahead: the Ironhand’s voice. He heard yells and effort, the clash of weapons. At once, Onyx Stonemage gestured for a halt. She went three paces farther, then stopped, waiting with her longsword in her fists.
    “Mom?” Jeremiah asked uselessly. “Mom?”
    “Cavewights bar the passage,” Branl announced, “a small force. I surmise that they did not anticipate our ascent from the crevice. They were not prepared against us. Yet the constricted space aids them. They suffice to—”
    Stave shook his head. Briefly Branl narrowed his gaze. Then the Humbled said, “They do not suffice. Four Masters assail the creatures from the rear. Openings are created for the blades of the Swordmainnir, and for Canrik and Dast. Three Cavewights have fallen. Five. Now eight.” After a moment’s silence, Branl stated, “The passage has been cleared.”
    “Is anyone hurt?” Linden asked.
    Branl appeared to hesitate before saying, “Skill and armor shielded the