“Nothing. Want to go with me or not?”
“You can’t visit Jared. He’s off limits. They’ve got him in intensive care.”
Nest looked at the shadows lengthening in the park. “Let’s go see him anyway.”
She hung up and when the phone rang, she left it alone. With Robert, it was best not to argue or explain.
Twenty minutes later he wheeled into her drive, dropped his bike in the grass, and walked up to her where she was back sitting out on the porch steps. He brushed at his unruly blond hair as he strode up, bouncing defiantly on the balls of his feet.
“Why’d you hang up on me?” he demanded.
“I’m a girl,” she said, shrugging. “Girls do things like that. Want a root beer?”
“Geez. Bribery, yet.” He followed her into the kitchen. “How’s your grandpa?”
“Good. He won’t be able to come home for a while, maybe a week. But he’s okay.”
“Good for him. Wish I could say the same.”
She cocked one eyebrow speculatively. “What’s the matter? Did I hurt you last night?”
“Ah-hah! You admit it!” Robert was ecstatic. “I knew you did something! I knew it! What was it? C’mon, tell me!”
She reached into the refrigerator, brought out a can of root beer, and handed it to him. “I used a stun gun.”
He stared at her, openmouthed. Then he flushed. “No, you didn’t! You’re just saying that because that was what I told the cops! Where would you get a stun gun, anyway? Come on! What did you do?”
She cocked her head. “You mean you lied to the police?”
He continued to stare at her, frustration mirrored in his narrow, bunched features. Then he crooked his finger. “C’mere.”
He led her back outside, down the steps and into the yard. Then he shook the can of root beer as hard as he could, pointed it at her, and popped the top. Cold fizz sprayed all over her. He waited until she was glaring openly at him, then took a long drink from the can and said, “Okay, now we’re even.”
She went inside to wash and change her T-shirt, then came back out to find him dangling a length of string in front of Spook, who was watching with a mix of curiosity and mistrust. “Are you ready?” she asked, picking the kitten up and depositing him inside the house.
He shrugged. “Why are we doing this, anyway?” He dropped the string and walked over to retrieve his bike.
She kicked at his tire as she walked past. “Because I’m afraid Jared might not come back from wherever he’s gone if one of us doesn’t go get him.”
They wheeled their bikes to the top of the drive, climbed onto the seats, and began to pedal into the twilight. They rode down Sinnissippi Road and across Lincoln Highway to the back streets that led to the hospital. They rode in silence, watching the city darken around them, its people settling in behind lighted windows in front of lighted screens. Children played in yards, and lawn mowers roared. Starlings sang raucously, and elderly couples walked in slow motion down the concrete sidewalks that had become the measure of their lives.
When they reached the hospital, Nest and Robert chained their bikes to the rack by the front entry and went inside. It was after nine o’clock, and the waiting room was quiet, most of the visitors gone home for the night. Side by side, they walked up to look in on Nest’s grandfather, but he was sleeping again, so they didn’t stay. Instead, they found a stairwell that connected the six floors of the hospital and stood just outside, glancing around surreptitiously.
“So, what’s the plan, Stan?” Robert asked, lifting one eyebrow.
“He’s in five fourteen,” Nest answered. “Just off the stairway. You go up the elevator and talk to whoever’s working the nursing station. Ask about Jared or something. I’ll go up the stairs and slip into his room while they’re busy with you.”
Robert smirked. “That’s your whole plan?”
“Assuming you intend to help.”
He stared at her. “Tell you what. I’ll help if you’ll tell me what you did to me last night. The truth, this time.”
She stared back at him without answering, thinking it over. Then she said, “I used magic on you.”
He hesitated, and she could tell that for just half a second he believed her. Then he smirked dismissively. “You’re weirder than I am, Nest. You know that? Okay, let’s go.”
She waited until she saw him stop in front of the elevator; then she entered the stairwell and began to climb. She reached the fifth floor, inched the door open, and peered out into the hall. It was virtually deserted. She could see room 514 almost directly across from her. When Robert stepped out of the elevator a moment later and walked over to the nursing station, she slipped from her hiding place.
A moment later, she was inside Jared’s room.
Jared Scott lay motionless in a hospital bed, looking small and lost amid an array of equipment, eyes staring at nothing behind half-closed lids, arms and legs laid out straight beneath the covers, face pale and drawn. The room was dark except for the lights from the monitors and a small night-light near the door. The blinds to the street were closed, and the air conditioner hummed softly. Nest glanced around the room, then back at Jared. A bandage covered the top half of his head, and there were raw, savage marks on his face and arms from the beating he had received. She stared at him in despair, her eyes shifting from his face to the blinking green lights of the monitoring equipment and back again.
She had been thinking about coming to see him all afternoon, ever since leaving her grandfather. Spook had decided her. She would use her magic to help Jared. She didn’t know for certain that she could, of course. She had never used the magic this way. But she understood its potential to affect the human body, and there was a chance she could do some good. She needed to try, perhaps as much for herself as for him. She needed to step out from her father’s shadow, from the dark legacy of his life, something she would never be able to do until she embraced what he had given her and turned it to a use he would never have considered. She would start here.
She walked over to Jared’s bed and lowered the railing so that she could sit next to him. “Hey, Jared,” she said softly.
She touched his hand, held it in her own as she had held her grandfather’s that afternoon, and reached up to stroke his face. His skin felt warm and soft. She waited to see if he would respond, but he didn’t. He just lay there, staring. She fought to hold back her tears.
This would be dangerous, she knew. It would be risky. If the magic failed her, she might kill Jared. But she knew as well, somewhere deep inside, that if she failed to act, she would lose him anyway. He was not coming back alone from wherever he had gone. He was waiting there for her to come get him.
She leaned over him, still holding his hand, and stared down into his unseeing eyes. “Jared, it’s me, Nest,” she whispered.
She moved until she was directly in his line of sight, her face only inches from his own. The room was still except for the slight hiss and blip of the machines, cloaked in darkness and solitude.
“Look at me, Jared,” she whispered.
She reached out to him with her magic, spidery tendrils of sound and movement that passed through his staring eyes and probed inward. “Where are you, Jared?” she asked softly. “We miss you. Me, Cass, Robert, Brianna. We miss you.”
She nudged him gently, tried to reach deeper. She could feel something inside him resisting her, could feel it draw back, a curtain that tightened. She waited patiently for the curtain to loosen. If she pushed too hard, she could damage him. She experienced a sudden rush of uncertainty. She was taking an enormous chance, using the magic like this, experimenting. Perhaps she was making a mistake, thinking she could help, that the magic could do what she expected. Perhaps she should stop now and let nature take its intended course, unhindered by her interference.
She felt him relax then, and she probed anew, stroking him, brushing lightly against his fragile consciousness, the part he had locked deep inside where it was dark a
nd safe.
Within her body, the magic hummed and vibrated, a living thing. She had never gotten this close to it for this long. She could feel its power building, working its way through her, heat and sound and motion. It was like trying to direct the movements of a cat; you felt it could spring away at any moment.
“Jared, look at me,” she whispered.
Careful, careful. The magic prodded gently, insistently. Sweat beaded on Nest’s forehead, and her chest and throat tightened with her efforts.
“I’m here, Jared. Can you hear me?”
Time slipped away. She lost track of how much, her concentration focused on making contact with him, on breaking through the shell into which he had retreated. Once, she heard someone approach, but the steps turned away before they reached Jared’s room. Her concentration tightened. She forgot about Robert, about the nurses, about everything. She stayed where she was, not looking up, not shifting her gaze away from Jared, not even for a moment. She refused to give up. She kept talking to him, saying his name, using her magic to bump him gently, to open the door to his safehold just a crack.
“Jared,” she said over and over. “It’s me, Nest.”
Until finally his eyes shifted to find hers, and he replied in a hoarse whisper, “Hey, Nest,” and she knew he was going to be all right.
* * *
On a Greyhound traveling west between Denver and Salt Lake City, John Ross sat staring out into the night, watching the lights of ranches and towns hunkered down in the empty flats below the Rockies flash by in the darkness. He sat alone at the rear of the bus, his staff propped up against the seat beside him, the roar of the engine and the whine of the wheels drowning out the snoring of his fellow passengers. It was nearing midnight, and he was the only one awake.
He sighed wearily. Soon he would sleep, too. Because he would have to. Because the demands of his body would give him no choice.
Almost two days had passed since he had left Nest Freemark standing in the rain in Sinnissippi Park. He had gone back to the hotel, gathered up his things, and waited in the lobby for the early-morning bus. When it arrived, he had climbed aboard without a backward glance and ridden away. Already his memory of Hopewell and her people was beginning to fade, the larger picture shrinking to small, bright moments that he could tuck away and carry with him. Old Bob, greeting him that first day at Josie’s, believing him Caitlin’s friend. Gran, her sharp old eyes raking across him as she sought to see through the façade he had created. Josie Jackson, sleepy-eyed and warm, lying next to him on their last day. Pick, the sylvan, the keeper of Sinnissippi Park. Daniel. Wraith. The demon.
But mostly there was Nest Freemark, a fourteen-year-old girl who could work magic and by doing so come to terms with the truth about her family, when anything less would have destroyed her. He could see her face clearly, her freckles and quirky smile and curly dark hair. He would remember the long, smooth strides she took when she ran and the way she stood her ground when it mattered. In a world in which so much of what he encountered only served to reinforce his fears that the future of his dreams was an inevitability, Nest gave him hope. When so many others might have succumbed to their fear and despair, Nest had not. She represented a little victory when measured against the enormity of the battle being fought by the Word and the Void, but sometimes little victories made the difference. Little victories, like the small events that tipped the scales in the balance of life, really could change the world.
I wish I could have been your father, he had said, and he had meant it.
He wondered if he would ever see her again.
He straightened in his seat, looking down the aisle past the slouched forms of the sleepers to where the driver hunched over the steering wheel, eyes on the road. In the bright glare of the headlights, the highway was an endless concrete ribbon unrolling out of the black. Morning was still far away; it was time to sleep. He had not slept since he had left Hopewell, and he could not put it off any longer. He shivered involuntarily at the prospect. It would be bad, he knew. It would be horrendous. He would be bereft of his magic, a night’s payment for his expenditure in his battle with the maentwrog. He would be forced to run and to hide while his enemies hunted him; he would be alone and defenseless against them. Maybe they would find him this night. Maybe they would kill him. In the world of his dreams, all things were possible.
Weary and resigned, he eased his bad leg onto the padded bench and propped his body between the seat back and the bus wall. He was afraid, but he would not allow his fear to master him. He was a Knight of the Word, and he would find a way to survive.
John Ross closed his eyes, a warrior traveling through time, and drifted away to dream of a future he hoped would never be.
The long-awaited story
of the magical, mystical
Genesis of Shannara!
For many years, fans of the Shannara series have suspected a link between our world and that of the Four Lands. At long last, Terry Brooks reveals how it all began.
Not so very far in our future, civilization teeters on the edge of collapse. Evil forces roam the ruined landscape of the former United States, recruiting the weak and enslaving the rest. Only a few pockets of resistance remain, and only a few heroes to protect them. One such person is Logan Tom, a Knight of the Word. He is on a mission: to locate a group of Seattle street kids and to guard them with his life. Because one of them carries a magic that might—just might—be powerful enough to save the world.
Here is an excerpt from
Armageddon’s Children,
the first in the Genesis of Shannara trilogy,
now available in stores everywhere.
And don’t miss the sequel novels,
The Elves of Cintra and The Gypsy Morph,
available now!
HE IS FAST asleep in his bed on the night that the demon and the once-men come for his family. They have been watching the compound for days, studying its walls and the routine of the guards who ward them. They have waited patiently for their chance, and now it has arrived. An advance party is over the walls and past the guards. They have opened the gates from the inside to let in the others, and now all are pouring into the compound. In less than five minutes, everything has been lost.
He doesn’t realize this when his father shakes him awake, but he knows something is wrong.
“Logan, get up.” Urgency and fear are apparent in his father’s voice.
Logan blinks against the beam of the flashlight his father holds, one of two they still possess. He sees his brother dressing across the way, pulling on his shirt and pants, moving quickly, anxiously. Tyler isn’t griping, isn’t saying anything, doesn’t even look over at him.
His father bends close, his strong features all planes and angles at the edges of the flashlight’s beam. His big hand grips his son’s shoulder and squeezes. “It’s time for us to leave here, Logan. Put on your clothes and your pack and wait by the trapdoor with Tyler. Your mother and I will be along with Megan.”
His sister. He looks around, but doesn’t see her. Outside, there is shouting and the sound of gunfire. A battle is being fought. He knows now what has happened, even without seeing it. He has heard it talked about all of his life, the day their enemies would find a way to break through, the day that the walls and gates and guards and defenses would finally give way. It has happened all across the United States. It has happened all over the world. No one is safe anywhere. Maybe no one will ever be safe again.
He rises quickly now and dresses. His brother already has his pack strapped across his back and tosses Logan his. The packs have been sitting in a corner of his bedroom for as far back as he can remember. Each month, they are unpacked, checked, and repacked. His father is a careful man, a planner, a survivor. He has always assumed this day would come, even though he assured his family it would not. Logan was not fooled. His father did not speak of it directly, but in the spaces between the words of reassurance were silent warnings. Logan did not miss them, did not
ignore their implications.
“Hurry, slug,” Tyler hisses at him, going out the door.
He finishes fastening his boots, throws his pack over his shoulder, and hurries after his brother. The shouts are growing louder now, more frantic. There are screams, as well. He feels curiously removed from all of it, as if it were happening to people with whom he had no connection, even though these are his friends and neighbors. He feels light-headed, and there is a buzzing in his ears. Maybe he has gotten up too fast, has rushed himself the way he does sometimes without allowing his body to adjust to a sudden change.
Maybe it is just the first of many adjustments he is going to have to make in his life.
He knows what is going to happen now. His father has told them all, taking care to use the word if rather than the word when. They are going to have to escape through the tunnels and flee into the surrounding countryside. They are going to have to abandon their home and all their possessions because otherwise they will be caught and killed. The demons and the once-men have made it clear from the beginning that those who choose to shut themselves away in the compounds will not be spared once their defenses are breached. It is punishment for defiance, but it is a warning, too.
If you want to survive, you have to place yourself in our hands.
No one believes this is true, of course. No one can survive outside the compounds. Not as a free man or woman. Not with the plagues and poisons in the air, water, and soil. Not with the slave camps to take you in and swallow you up. Not with the Freaks and the monsters running amok in cities and towns and villages everywhere.
Not with the demons and once-men seeking to exterminate the human race.
Not in this brave new world.
Logan knows this even though he is only eight years old. He knows it because he is dreaming it, reliving it twenty years later. His understanding of its truths transcends time and place; he embraces the knowledge in the form of memories. He knows it the way he already knows how things will end.