Nevertheless her fire was warm. Its effects remained benign: a tangible relief. Her chills receded in waves like a withdrawing tide. Around her, the Giants opened their arms to her blackness and smiled. After a moment, Mahrtiir’s manner rediscovered its familiar edge, its implied craving for struggle. Only Stave and Jeremiah seemed to derive no comfort from her gentle efforts.

Ignoring her private revulsion, Linden sustained her exertion of Earthpower until every outward sign that her companions had suffered in the storms was eased. When she quenched her flames at last, she found that she, too, felt somewhat eased. Their benevolence was balm to her sore heart. The blackness was in her as it was in the wood, not in the magicks her Staff wielded. In spite of her sins and her despair, she had not tarnished the fundamental vitality of Earthpower and Law.

Not yet—

In any case, the armor of the Giants had absorbed a surprising amount of warmth. It radiated in the hollow, as affectionate as grins and jests. Disregarding the truncated winds, the sodden ground, the promise of a chilled night, Cabledarm and Onyx Stonemage began unpacking food and waterskins. Stormpast Galesend took Jeremiah’s steaming blankets, squeezed out as much water as she could, then draped them around him again.

While Stave set out Linden’s ground-cloth so that she and a few others would have a dry place to sit, she asked him, “So where are we? How far have we come?”

He appeared to consult his store of memories. “These hills have urged us away from Landsdrop toward Sarangrave Flat. I gauge that we rest some three leagues north of the promontory of the Colossus.”

“How close are we to the Sarangrave? Are we in danger?”

Why had Narunal and Hynyn whinnied so urgently during the day, when there were no caesures?

Without hesitation, Stave answered, “I estimate the distance at less than a league. However, the Flat’s proximity poses scant peril. In this region, the wetland is extensive but shallow, little more than a marsh sporadically snared with quagmires. The lurker prefers the deeper mire within the heart of the Sarangrave, and in Lifeswallower. Its vast bulk and ferocity require more noisome waters.

“It is conceivable,” he admitted impassively, “that the monstrous wight which the Ardent has named Horrim Carabal is cognizant of our presence. To the certain knowledge of the Haruchai, the lurker is avid to devour all Earthpower”—he paused to glance at Mahrtiir—“including that which the Ranyhyn possess. It may crave any form of theurgy. But its hungers do not respond swiftly. The lurker is fearsome and fatal, but first it is slow, suggesting that its attention must be drawn to Earthpower from a considerable distance or depth.

“Perhaps the lurker has noted your son’s passage. Perhaps it is able to discern the Ranyhyn. Perhaps it has sensed your use of the Staff. Nevertheless its reach is not known to extend beyond the bounds of the Sarangrave.”