Even? Never! Linden wanted to launch herself at him again; to feel him return her embrace of his own volition. A part of her had spent years dying to be held as well as to hold; withering like a plant that could not live much longer without sun and rain. He was not Jeremiah: he could choose—

Before she moved, however, she saw a quick flaring of alarm in his eyes. He raised his hands to ward her away; stumbled backward. “Don’t touch me.” Some private conflict undermined him: she felt its emanations. He was barely able to make himself heard over the fretted susurration of the current. “Linden, please. I’m not ready. I’ve lost too much of myself. I’m afraid of what I’m becoming. Or what I might have to be. I need to find that out before—” His voice faded. Pain blurred his gaze. The muscles of his jaw clenched. Obviously forcing himself, he finished, “Just don’t touch me. There’s too much at stake.”

Stung, Linden jerked her gaze away. Without transition, the clarity of the light and the cleanliness of the water seemed to become sterile and comfortless, uncaring. He might as well have said in chagrin, What have you done? Irrationally she believed that he could see the bane within her still, crouched ready to emerge as soon as She found an opportunity to do harm.

It was more than she could bear.

After a moment, however, she found that she was not surprised. What had she expected? An eager welcome? Immediate love? For the woman who had forced him back into his damaged mortality? The woman who had roused the Worm of the World’s End?

It was fitting that Covenant did not want her touch. It was fitting that her Staff was as black as the Lost Deep.

And it changed nothing.

Rigid with self-coercion, she nodded. “All right.” The air had turned to ash in her throat. “I think I understand that much.” She did not look at Covenant again; avoided Stave’s steady regard. Instead she followed the stream with her eyes as it curled around her waist and swirled past her. “So tell me what happened. Why are we still alive? Where is everyone else? Where is Jeremiah? How is he?”

“For the moment, Chosen,” Stave replied promptly, “you need not fear. All are safe. By cunning and desperation, the ur-Lord persuaded Esmer to depart. Thereafter the Ardent transported us here, beyond the bane’s grasp. Though I am not certain, I deem that even the ur-viles and Waynhim eluded the bane’s wrath.