Possessing Jeremiah, she would remain in his crypt. And the croyel would fight her. Oh, it would fight! With every scrap of its native puissance, with every particle of its gleaned lore and cunning, it would do battle to make her its prisoner as well.

Within the smaller world of Jeremiah, the creature’s magicks were as vast as firmaments.

But she: ah, she existed outside her son’s mind. She had a separate identity and a physical self which the croyel could not grasp. And she was not the monster’s only foe. Galt would not hesitate to cut its throat. Fear would hamper its efforts to contain her.

She could do this!

She, Linden Avery, who had already roused the Worm of the World’s End.

All she had to do—all she had to do—was exert enough Earthpower and outrage within Jeremiah’s mind to possess him.

But she had experienced possession. She knew its cost.

In her metaphysical hands—the clasp of health-sense and revelation—she felt the runes which defined her Staff awaken and burn. They seemed hot enough to scour the flesh from her bones. She could not read them. Nevertheless her nerves interpreted them as if their meaning were written in pain.

She had enough power. She could retrieve Jeremiah’s mind. But would her son thank her for replacing one form of possession with another? Even if she only violated the integrity of his deepest self in order to rescue him?

She might forget everything else; but she could not forget the Ranyhyn horserite. Not again. Not while runes of fire burned Caerroil Wildwood’s irrefragable anguish into her hands.

The Forestal’s ciphered bereavement had assisted her efforts to call Thomas Covenant back from death. She had thought then that she had stumbled upon the sole purpose of the runes.

Now she knew otherwise.

Must it transpire that beauty and truth shall pass utterly when we are gone?

She had made a promise to Caerroil Wildwood on Gallows Howe. He did not mean to let her forget it. Her unfurled fire had become visible; but it did not shed yellow light or smell of cornflowers. Instead it spread sheets and gouts of utter blackness through the caliginous air. In her hands, the runes demanded remembrance, and even Earthpower had become despair.

Her own extremity took her to the horserite. Surrounded by graves, she recalled the blending of minds which she had shared with Hynyn and Hyn; the images which had appalled her—