“What then, fat one, fool, meddler? Will you drive me to depart, abandoning the Earth to its end, merely to gratify your gangrel corpulence? Must I leave the lady to grieve for her son while she may? Are you blind to the truth that neither you nor the combined will of the Insequent suffice to alter the world’s doom? You cannot discover the prison of the lady’s son. Without him, you are lost. All is lost.”

Wreathed in bands of color like anxiety, the Ardent replied, “This outcome some among the Insequent have foreseen. Others disagree. One matter on which all concur, however, is that of the lady’s import. To an extent which you fear to acknowledge, the fate of life rests with her as much as with her son.

“Yet that is not the substance of our contention. Its crux is this. Do my pronouncements, or the lady’s desires, suffice to daunt you? Is your purpose, or your pride, so fragile that you cannot suffer obstruction? If not, you must concede that your avarice forbids you to turn from your chosen path.”

“My avarice?” barked the Harrow scornfully. His fingers twitched, eager for the magic of his beads and fringes. “I am not a living embodiment of gluttony. There can be no comparison between us. Where I have hazarded my life assiduously for centuries, you have merely feasted. You cannot out-face me. You prize your gross flesh too highly.”

Feigning confidence, the Ardent answered, “Thus you display ignorance rather than knowledge. Truly I prize my flesh, as I do all sustenance. But I do not fear death when I am able to spend the last of my days feasting. I will happily perish in surfeit and satiation while the Worm devours the Earth.”

Then his manner changed. Between one word and the next, sharpness emerged like a knife from the concealment of his garb.

“However, I also do not scruple to betray you. I fear, but I do not scruple. If I must, I will ensure that you cannot abandon your purpose. Depart if you wish. Forsake your intent. You will gain naught. I need only speak your true name, and the lady will receive from you all that she requires.”

“And when you have uttered my true name,” countered the Harrow viciously, “I will reveal yours.” He seemed barely able to contain his rage: it congested his voice like alluvial mud.

But his antagonist did not falter. “Thus the lady will be empowered to compel us both equally. For me, nothing will be lost. As you have observed, I will be damned by my own deed. For you, however, all that you have ever craved will fray and fade.”

The Ardent may have been bluffing: Linden could not tell. Beneath his flamboyant magicks, he was as mundane as she was; as legible as Liand or the Ramen. But the acquired power of his ribbands obscured aspects of his aura, distracted her senses.