The Giants and the Ramen, Liand and Stave: they might be able to aid her son in ways that she could not yet imagine. She believed that Anele would be granted deep rock. And while Covenant remained in Andelain with the Humbled and the krill, she could feel sure that the Land had not been utterly forsaken.

She could bear to leave Covenant behind if it meant preserving some manner of hope for the Land.

Turning to the Harrow, she surrendered again; but not to him. Not to him.

“In that case,” she said distinctly, “I’ve changed my mind. I want my friends with me.”

All who live share the Land’s plight.

“And I have said,” the Harrow retorted in fury, “that I do not heed you. This purpose is mine. The knowledge necessary to accomplish it is mine. I will not countenance the corruption of all that I have craved and sought.”

The Ardent flinched. His eyes rolled. For a moment, he looked like he might turn his back and flee. But then some form of courage or coercion came to his aid. Thickly he intoned, “Lady, it is both my pleasure and my task by the will of the Insequent to inform you that the Harrow’s true name is—”

The Harrow wheeled on his ribboned opponent. “Silence, fool!” he roared. “If you betray me in this fashion, you betray yourself as well. Revealing my name, you will empower the lady to command me. Thus you will destroy my intent—and you will perish, damned by your own deed.

“But I will not permit it. Rather than suffer ruin at your hand, I will forsake my design utterly.

“What then, fat one, fool, meddler? Will you drive me to depart, abandoning the Earth to its end, merely to gratify your gangrel corpulence? Must I leave the lady to grieve for her son while she may? Are you blind to the truth that neither you nor the combined will of the Insequent suffice to alter the world’s doom? You cannot discover the prison of the lady’s son. Without him, you are lost. All is lost.”

Wreathed in bands of color like anxiety, the Ardent replied, “This outcome some among the Insequent have foreseen. Others disagree. One matter on which all concur, however, is that of the lady’s import. To an extent which you fear to acknowledge, the fate of life rests with her as much as with her son.

“Yet that is not the substance of our contention. Its crux is this. Do my pronouncements, or the lady’s desires, suffice to daunt you? Is your purpose, or your pride, so fragile that you cannot suffer obstruction? If not, you must concede that your avarice forbids you to turn from your chosen path.”