Covenant seems to have turned a corner -- maybe even done a 180 -- when it comes to this topic. In TWL, he smiles at Joan and offers himself in her place -- a literal sacrifice. At the end of AATE, he is unwilling to sacrifice the Land to save her again. It's almost as if his actions at the ruins of Foul's Creche are a do-over for his willingness to save her in TWL.
This is a clear indication of how different Covenant has become -- of how far he has come for the guy who smiled at his ex-wife and laid himself on a rock to die.
But he also doesn't have much of anything complimentary to say about the Masters. He tells Branl and Clyme that he respects the hell out of them, but he disagrees with their contention that good cannot be accomplished by evil means. He says, "There are always evil means." And the only way to avoid evil means is to do nothing -- to make no choices. But of course (as *I've* often said
), not choosing is also a choice. In the Masters' case, they're choosing what they perceive as safety, against the possibility of another Loric or Damelon or Berek. Which is a sacrifice in a different way.Linden, too, is choosing -- to rescue Jeremiah before she does anything else. She's not only sacrificing her friends to do it (or, more accurately, they're sacrificing themselves in her service), but making the kid her first priority means she herself has to come second (at best). Parents often put their kids' welfare first -- or they pay in feelings of guilt that they didn't do enough.
Anyway, what do y'all think? Is sacrifice a theme, or is it a facet of "good cannot be accomplished by evil means"?
