Near the center of the chamber stood the Insequent. He held the Staff of Law braced on the stone near his feet and Covenant’s ring raised over his head. But he made no attempt to wield those powers: not yet. Instead he glared into the acrid yellow gaze of the croyel, plainly trying to swallow the deformed creature’s will and power with his bottomless eyes.

The creature still clung to Jeremiah’s back: a hairless monster the size of a child, scrawny and insatiable. Its fingers gripped his shoulders while its toes dug into his ribs, rending his flesh like claws. Avidly its fangs chewed the side of his neck to drink his blood, devour his mind. Its virulent eyes implied howling and shrieks. But it did not exert its strength against the Harrow. Instead it appeared to revel in defying him.

Between those antagonists, Jeremiah stood slumped as if he were nothing more than the croyel’s puppet: a means to define and transport the creature’s malice. His muddy, disfocused gaze regarded the floor with the blank stare of a youth who had lost hope long ago. From his slack slips, a small dribble of saliva ran into the nascent stubble on his chin. His arms hung, useless, at his sides. His fingers dangled as though they were empty of import; as though they had never held anything as ordinary and human as a red racecar.

He was an abused boy whose only escape from the prison of his maimed mind was through the croyel’s ferocity.

But he was alive.

Chapter 9. - Hastening Doom

9.

Hastening Doom

In time you will behold the fruit of my endeavors.

Linden could hear Lord Foul as if he stood beside her, laughing like a scourge.

If your son serves me, he will do so in your presence. Jeremiah had done so under Melenkurion Skyweir. He did so now. Or the croyel used his unresisting body and trapped mind as a conveyance for its harsh appetites. Confident of its dominion, the creature faced the Harrow with mockery in its cruel eyes.

If I slaughter him, I will do so before you. Think on that when you seek to retrieve him from me.

Dull-eyed and vacant, Jeremiah remained on his feet only because the croyel compelled him. The false or transmuted alertness and excitement that Linden had seen in her son’s face before she had exposed the succubus was absent. Every sign that he might be capable of outward consciousness was gone.

If you discover him, you will only hasten his doom.

While the Harrow strove to master the croyel, and received only contempt, Linden stood helpless, transfixed by dismay.

—this I vow.