To her left, the basin narrowed. Beyond the pool there, at least a Giant’s stone’s throw distant, a concave wall of granite too obdurate to be eroded by mere moisture formed the lower end of the tremendous cavity. But she could not descry the cavern’s limit opposite her. As far as she knew, it reached forever into darkness. To her right, however, the side of the basin rose slowly, and continued to rise in gradual increments, until it was swallowed by midnight.

In the crevice behind the company, the bane still poured upward without haste, confident of Her craved prey. Heartbeats agitated the surface of the pool more and more. Nevertheless the Giants paused to gasp for breath, straining to imagine endurance which they no longer possessed. At the same time, the noxious crawling on Linden’s skin intensified. She needed every scrap and fragment of her remaining will to refuse the torment of small creatures that did not exist. Hundreds of them, or thousands, crept everywhere to savor her illimitable faults.

Under Esmer’s scornful gaze, the Waynhim had halted off to Linden’s right, apparently waiting for the Ardent and the ur-viles. But now all of the Swordmainnir stood on the slope of the basin, fighting to breathe and looking urgently around them. Soon three or four score ur-viles arrived in a black torrent. Limping badly, the Ardent tottered toward Coldspray and Grueburn. Strips of his raiment dragged after him like beaten things, and his head hung down as if he had lost the will to meet anyone’s gaze.

At once, the grey Demondim-spawn ran at the slope, beckoning and barking for Linden’s company to follow. Without delay, the ur-viles joined the Waynhim. Led by their loremaster, the black creatures snarled demands like curses. Esmer trailed after them as though as he assumed that everyone else would do the same.

But the Giants did not move. Perhaps they could not.

Among them, the Humbled and Stave stood, patient and implacable. Perhaps Linden’s crumbling defenses troubled them. Or perhaps not. If they debated decisions that they might need to make for themselves, they did so in silence.

“Now what must we do?” asked the Ironhand thinly. “The bane’s evil is itself a mountain. We have beheld no more than hints of its true extent. It was for this”—she gestured around her—“that it has pursued us at such leisure. Here it will expand to consume us.

“We will run again, if run we must. But we cannot run far, or swiftly. And this cavern appears to have no end. Surely She Who Must Not Be Named will pounce upon us at Her pleasure.”

Her voice fell flat in the cavern, echoless and defeated.