Can't play the victim here, eh Linden, TC has taken your crutches away? All the trust and affirmation of this now rather large cast of characters; Giants, Ramen, etc...and yes now, even those obstinate Humbled has weakened her and now she has no choice but to stand alone. Everyone, from Foul to Kastenessen to the Harrow wants her son who, Covenant believes, resembles the plight of the Land (lost and having the life sucked out of it?).What has gone before wrote: She had resurrected Covenant at a terrible cost. She had purchased the means to reach her son by making herself powerless to aid him. Yet Covenant had reaffirmed his belief in her, his unmerited support. Indeed, he had backed her with such certainty that even the Humbled---the Humbled---had been moved.
Re the Humbled: who knows what Stave is thinking? The Ramen are shocked, but not sold, Liand is merely shocked (our "protectors" might actually have a flaw? whoa!!!). The Giants don't trust them at all, but the old tales of Covenant must be considered. The Giants discuss the danger of the impending journey, the risks, and the Ardent and Harrow.
Covenant slips away again envisioning the future import of Sandgorgons and getting nowhere.
The Harrow stands apart, impatient as ever.
Liand tries to encourage Linden by running by past events and the loyalty of her friends by her and asks her to consider those of lesser power, such as himself and the Ramen, who have stood by her side unerringly. As expected nothing can console her. She screwed up first with Elena and now Covenant,
"I'm glad you're all coming. But I'm as broken as Covenant is. I've fallen ---somewhere---and I don't know how to climb out."
Liand turns into an old school football coach-'...get up bitch, it's your row to hoe, Staff or not, seal your deal, if you hesitate your son is lost.' Linden tells the company that it's time.
Mathriir has his Cords find sustenance for what may come and forms a deep camaraderie with the Giants. Linden faces her footsteps and thinks, 'if you only have one thing left to do, you better do it right'.
She ponders the krill stuck in Covenant's jeans and wonders how Andelian and the Wraiths will survive without it. Roger doesn't care, Kastenessen too crazy and fixated on the Elohim, the Sandgorgons and scraps of samadhi would love to return to kill the trees, but, for now, are kept busy, but the skurj...ah yi, the skurj... Wherever the company ended up turiya and Joan would try to kill Covenant through the krill.
As Linden realizes she probably messed up even more by agreeing with the Harrow's term she touches her only connection to Jeremiah, the crushed race car, if no one can free him this would be all that was left of him. With Liand's urging she considers Anele's protection and his need for deep stone-once again: he may be the hope of the Land, then again dead weight. Prehaps the race car inspires Linden to think about Jeremiah's constructs at her house: Revelstone and Mt. Thunder. The stone connection and Kiril Threndor where they had once confronted Lord Foul suddenly makes her realize where the Harrow is taking her. Her son's clue was always there...
Anele's prophesies, especially on stone had always been there too. In Salva Gildenbourne he had also spoken of the necessity forbidding of evils. But, what did that mean?
As the company further readies itself, Linden goes towards the Harrow but first stops to confer with the Ardent. Aside from the monitoring, protection and intent of the Insequent, as a whole, she asks him what he, personally will get out of all this, to which he replies 'to be witness to the most unprecedented spectacle, of any lifetime' the gluttony of gluttonies the scope of which even the Harrow cannot appreciate, but in the end, not just for himself, but the Insequent as whole. Nothing compares to this for him, not even the mating of the Nicor or standing atop Melenkurion Skyweir. A front row seat at all things ending, it just doesn't get any better than this.
Linden tries to measure his worth and contributions to this journey, already he has threatened to say the Harrow's true name. He wouldn't stand a chance v. Foul. And now, he even admits that the deep places of the earth scare the hellfire out of him,
"I fear them. They are hazardous beyond estimation. Indeed, some few among the Insequent have perished in their search for knowledge in those depths. I need only name the Auriference."
Wow a another Insequent we haven't hear of before? Highly interesting. Long, long ago she lost her life and mind plumbing such depths, scaring the Insequent almost totally off the Land throughout time because of the banes and evils that consumed her in almost the same spot they are heading.
With the staff and ring in the Harrow's possession and Covenant's mercurial state, even with the krill, they could only rely on the Giants to protect them wherever they emerged and whatever assailed them.
Linden is helpless, Mathriir is eager to face this destiny, Pahni will follow her Manetrall without question despite her growing fears for Liand. Liand is excited and evolving as the last true Stonedowner since the Sunbane. The Giants are ready for anything that results in a tale worth telling. The Harrow grows as impatient as ever and Anele becomes increasingly agitated seeing horror everywhere and Covenant remains in his own world, with his particular struggles, babbling about the time he and Lord Mhoram had watched the hapless Cavewrights going off to die for Foul from above Treacher's Gorge.
Still this is the same Thomas Covenant who had conquered Foul, and more than once.
She reminds him he promised to take them all there, to retrieve Jeremiah and get them all out of there. The Ardent assured her that he will work for all the Insequent to ensue that such a thing will happen."Are you done with hesitation, lady?" asked the Harrow acidly. "Even now, the Worm feeds. Ere long, it's hunger will become a convulsion in the fundament of the Earth. Will you at last permit me to uphold our bargain?"
The Harrow positions the group as tightly as possible, with the Giants holding as many as possible leaving only two at the ready to fight, but still, they can't draw weapons in such a cramped circle-this leaves the Haruchai as their only defense. The Harrow and the Adrent's thuergies surround them, and the orcest must be cutoff as not to interfere.
...she had to pray that at least one of her companions possessed the force necessary to make the monster let go---
Leaning against Grueburn's stone cataphract. Linden waited; tried to hope. She felt no power gather around her. Nothing more eldritch than Andelian itself seemed to inhabit the night. But she had never been able to sense the particular magicks of the Insequent. Like the Theomach's and the Mahdoubt's, the Harrow's form of wizardry articulated itself in a dimension of reality or time which lay outside the reach of her perceptions.
She did not know that anything had happened unti the stars, and the deeper night beneath the surrounding trees, and the Hills themselves vanished into utter darkness. Then heavy stone closed over her---over all of her company---like the sealing of a tomb.
Additionally, since the world has descended into chaos, the emergence of this character who thirsts after that which is utterly novel and unprecedented is all too apt.
