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

him and be done with it?”
    He had seen
Haruchai
fight on any number of occasions, but he had never seen such an abandoned frenzy of violence.
    Branl’s answer ached across the water. “It was agreed between us. We remember Grimmand Honninscrave, and the Sandgorgon Nom, and
samadhi
Sheol. By Grimmand Honninscrave’s death, Nom rent the Raver. Yet shreds of that dark spirit endured within the Sandgorgon. They endure still, and cling to malice.
    “We knew no other means by which
turiya
Herem might be altogether unmade.”
    Covenant nodded to himself. He accepted Branl’s justification. What choice did he have? The Humbled had argued against pursuing
turiya
, or considering the lurker’s plight—and still they had accomplished something that Covenant could not have achieved alone.
    Later he suggested like an offer of forgiveness, although he did not know how to forgive anything that had occurred, “Then maybe you’d better explain how you did it. I told the Feroce to leave you behind.”
    Silence held the gloaming for a while before Branl replied, “It was not difficult to persuade the Feroce that you would have need of us.” He sounded like the stars, forlorn and doomed. “Our lives are memory. The creatures have no power to disturb or alter us. And their fear for their High God was extreme. Regardless of your command, they could not reject any form of aid. They summoned the arms of the lurker, that we might follow behind you.
    “Thereafter Clyme and I determined our course together. I chose the task of your life, deeming that purpose paramount. Freely Clyme assumed the burden of the Raver.
    “The
ak-Haru
spoke of simony. We are”—his sudden pause had the force of a stab—“we were the Humbled. We could descry no other means by which we might correct our fault. How otherwise might we have become worthy of the Guardian, and of ourselves?”
    In a voice thick with woe, he concluded, “I must believe that good may be gained by evil means.”
    And now you’re alone, Covenant sighed. This far from any of your people, you’re cut off from everything that makes you who you are.
    As isolated as a leper.
    Simony
, by hell! Covenant breathed faint curses to himself. Branl’s people had never been as open-hearted as the Giants. But they had always been generous with their lives.
    Eventually Covenant began to think that forgiveness might be possible after all.
    Then a shiver of anticipation or effort ran through the burning green around the pond. Sharing one voice, the Feroce announced, “Consolation has been made ready. We are the Feroce. Our High God speaks in us. But you must remove yourselves from the water. To sustain its purity demands much of us, and our High God will not touch it.”
    With Covenant’s consent, Branl swam toward the pond’s edge. And when they were able to stand in the muck of the bottom, two tentacles snaked out of the surrounding marsh. As before, the lurker’s arms closed carefully around Covenant and Branl, and lifted them high to avoid the trees.
    Again the
krill
shone silver in all directions, but its light revealed nothing that might be
consolation
.
    Side by side, Covenant and Branl arced upward, still moving eastward, into the accumulated dark of night in a sunless world.
    Horrim Carabal bore Covenant and his companion so lightly that he had no sense of duration or distance. He only knew that he was moving because the Sarangrave squirmed below him and the air felt like a rasp on his raw skin.
    Soon, however, the tentacles descended again. Then the lurker halted once more. This time, the monster held Covenant and Branl over a vaguely shimmering swath of dampness like a pit of quicksand eight or ten paces wide. Here, also, Feroce surrounded the lurker’s destination. But now their numbers had become a multitude. Hundreds of the creatures waved their small fires, making the wetland garish, and chanted like worshippers in the presence of divinity.
    Horrim Carabal poised Covenant and Branl over the center of the quag, but did not drop them. The Feroce did not speak.
    “Ur-Lord.” Branl’s tone changed. Surprise—or something more than surprise—penetrated his distress. “Here is a great wonder. I would have avowed that such a—I have no name for it—that such astonishment could not exist in Sarangrave Flat. Surely it is precluded by the manifold illnesses and evils of the lurker’s demesne. Yet it is unmistakable. It is—”
    He stopped as though what he beheld had