It was strange company in which Jair found himself now—a Gnome who had tracked him down, taken him prisoner, and kept him so for three days, and a legendary adventurer who had killed dozens more men than he had seen years on this earth. Here they were, the three of them, and Jair found the alliance thoroughly baffling. What were these two doing with him? Garet Jax might have gone his way without troubling himself about Jair, yet he had not done so. At risk to his own life, he had rescued the Valeman and then chosen to make himself temporary guardian. Why would a man like Garet Jax do such a thing? And Slanter might have rebuffed his request for help in avoiding whatever lay between them and the Anar, knowing the danger to himself and knowing that Garet Jax clearly didn’t trust him and would watch his every move. Yet quite unexpectedly, almost perversely, he had chosen to come anyway. Again—why?
But it was his own motives that surprised him most of all when he began to consider them. After all, if their decision to be with him was baffling, what of his to be with them? Slanter, until just moments ago, had been his jailer! And he was genuinely frightened of Garet Jax, his rescuer. Over and over again, he thought of the Weapons Master facing those Gnomes—quick, deadly, terrifying, as black as the death he dealt.
For an instant, the picture hung suspended in the Valeman’s mind; then quickly he thrust it aside.
Well, strangers on the road became companions for safety’s sake, and Jair supposed that that was the way to view what had happened here. He must keep his wits. After all, he was free now and in no real danger. In an instant’s time he could disappear. A single note of the wishsong, sung with the whisper of the wind, and he could be gone. Thinking about that gave him some sense of comfort. If he hadn’t been so deep within the Black Oaks, if it weren’t for the fact that the Mord Wraiths were searching for him, and if it weren’t for his desperate need to find help somewhere . . .
He tightened his mouth against the words. Speculation on what might have been was pointless. He had enough with which to concern himself. Above all, he had to remember to say nothing about Brin or the Elfstones.
They had walked less than an hour through the Oaks when they came to a clearing in which half a dozen trails merged. Slanter, leading the way through the darkened forest, drew to a halt and pointed to a trail leading south.
“This way,” he announced.
Garet Jax looked at him curiously. “South?”
Slanter’s heavy brows knitted. “South. The walker will come down out of the Silver River country through the Mist Marsh. It is the quickest and easiest way—at least for those devils. They’re not afraid of anything that lives in the marsh. If we want to take as few chances as possible, we’ll go south around the Marsh through the Oaks, then turn north above the lowlands.”
“A long way, Gnome,” the Weapons Master murmured.
“At least that way you’ll get where you’re going!” the other snapped.
“Perhaps we could slip by him.”
Slanter put his hands on his hips and squared his stocky frame about. “Perhaps we could fly, too! Hah! You haven’t any idea at all what you’re talking about!”
Garet Jax said nothing, his eyes fixing on the Gnome. Slanter seemed to sense suddenly that perhaps he had gone too far. Glancing hurriedly at Jair, he cleared his throat nervously and shrugged.
“Well, you don’t know the Mord Wraiths like I do. You haven’t lived among them. You haven’t seen what they can do.” He took a deep breath. “They’re like something stolen from the dark—as if each were a bit of night broken off. When they pass, you never see them. You never hear them. You just sense them—you feel their coming.” Jair shivered, remembering his encounter at Shady Vale and the invisible presence, just beyond the wall. “They leave no trail when they pass,” Slanter went on. “They appear and disappear just as their name would suggest. Mord Wraiths. Black walkers.”
He trailed off, shaking his head. Garet Jax looked over at Jair. All the Valeman could think about was what he had felt when he had come back to his home that night in the Vale and found one of them waiting.
“I don’t want to take the chance that we might stumble onto one of them,” he said quietly.
The Weapons Master readjusted the pack across his shoulders. “Then we go south.”
All afternoon they wound southward through the Black Oaks, following the pathway as it snaked ahead through the trees. Dusk fell over the forest, the gray light of midday fading rapidly into night. A faint mist began to seep through the trees, damp and clinging. It thickened steadily. The trail became more difficult to follow, disappearing at regular intervals as the mist settled in. Night sounds came out of the growing dark and the sounds were not pleasant.
Slanter called a halt. Should they stop for the night? he wanted to know. Both men looked to Jair. Stiff and tired, the Valeman glanced quickly about. Giant oaks rose about them, glistening black trunks hemming them in like a massive keep. Mist and shadows lay all around, and somewhere within them a black walker hunted.
Jair Ohmsford gritted his teeth against the aches and the weariness and shook his head. The little company went on.
Night also came to the clearing where Spilk sat bound to the great oak. All afternoon he had worked at his bonds, loosening the knots that held them and forcing them slack. Nothing else had passed through the clearing that day; no travelers had stopped to water; no wolves had come to drink. The crumpled bodies of his patrol lay where they had fallen, shapeless forms in the dusk.
His cruel features tightened as he strained against the ropes. Another hour or so and he would be free to hunt the ones who had done this to him. And he would hunt them to the very ends . . .
A shadow passed over him, and his head jerked up. A tall black form stood before him, cloaked and hooded, a thing of death strayed from the night. Spilk went cold to the bone.
“Master!” he whispered harshly.
The black figure gave no response. It simply stood there, looking down on him. Frantically the Sedt began to speak, the words tumbling over one another in his haste to get them out. He revealed all that had befallen him—the stranger in black, the betrayal by Slanter, and the escape of the Valeman with the magic voice. His muscled body thrashed against the bonds that held him fast, words inadequate to halt the fear that tightened about his throat. “I tried! Master, I tried! Free me! Please, free me!”
His voice broke, and the flood of words died away into stillness. His head drooped downward, and sobs wracked his body. For a moment, the figure above him remained motionless. Then one lean, black-gloved hand reached down to fasten on the Gnome’s head, and red fire exploded forth. Spilk shrieked, a single, terrible cry.
The black-robed figure withdrew his hand, turned, and disappeared back into the night. No sound marked its passing.
In the empty clearing, Spilk’s lifeless form lay slumped within its bonds, eyes open and staring.
IX
Across the towering, jagged ridge of the Dragon’s Teeth, the night sky had gone from deepest blue to gray; the moon and stars were beginning to fade in brilliance, and the eastern sky began to glimmer faintly with the coming dawn.
Allanon’s dark eyes swept the impassable wall of the mountains that stood about him, across cliffs and peaks of monstrous, aged rock, barren and ravaged by wind and time. Then his gaze dropped quickly, almost anxiously, to where the stone split apart before him. Below lay the Valley of Shale, doorstep to the forbidden Hall of Kings, the home of the spirits of the ages. He stood upon its rim, his black robes wrapped close about his tall, spare frame. There was a sudden wistfulness on his face. A mass of black rock, glistening like opaque glass, crushed and strewn blindly, stretched downward to the valley floor, forming a broken walk. At the center of the rock stood a lake, its murky waters colored a dull, greenish black, the surface swirling sluggishly in the empty, windless silence—swirling like a kettle of brew that some invisible hand stirred with slow, mechanical purpose.
Father, he whispered soundlessly.
&
nbsp; A sudden scraping of booted feet on the loose rock caused him to glance quickly about, reminded of the two who traveled with him. They emerged now from the shadow of the rocks below to stand beside him. Silently, they stared downward into the barren valley.
“Is this it?” Rone Leah asked shortly.
Allanon nodded. Suspicion cloaked the highlander’s words and lingered in his eyes. It was always evident. There was no attempt to hide it.
“The Valley of Shale,” the Druid said quietly. He started forward, winding his way down the rock-strewn slope. “We must hurry.”
Suspicion and mistrust were in the eyes of the Valegirl as well, though she sought to keep them from her face. There was always suspicion in those who shared his travel. It had been there with Shea Ohmsford and Flick when he had taken them in search of the Sword of Shannara and with Wil Ohmsford and the Elven girl Amberle when he had taken them in search of the Bloodfire. Perhaps it was deserved. Trust was something to be earned, not blindly given, and to earn it, one must first be open and honest. He was never that—could never be that. He was a keeper of secrets that could be shared with no other, and he must always veil the truth, for the truth could not be told, but must be learned. It was difficult to keep close what he knew, yet to do otherwise would be to tamper with the trust that had been given to him and which he had worked hard to earn.
His gaze flickered back briefly to be certain that the Valegirl and the highlander followed him; then he turned his attention again to the scattered rock at his feet, picking his way in studied silence. It would be easy to forgo the trust he kept, to reveal all that he knew of the fate of those he counseled, to lay bare the secrets he kept, and to let events transpire in a fashion different from that which he had ordered.
Yet he knew that he could never do that. He answered to a higher code of being and of duty. It was his life and purpose. If it meant that he must endure their suspicion, then so it must be. Harsh though it was, the price was a necessary one.
But I am so tired, he thought. Father, I am so tired.
At the floor of the valley, he came to a halt. Valegirl and highlander stopped beside him, and he turned to face them. One arm lifted from within the black robes and pointed to the waters of the lake.
“The Hadeshorn,” he whispered. “My father waits there, and I must go to him. You will stand here until I call. Do not move from this place. Whatever happens, do not move. Except for you and me, only the dead live here.”
Neither replied. They nodded their assent, eyes darting uneasily to where the waters of the Hadeshorn swirled soundlessly. He studied their faces a moment longer, then turned and walked away.
A strange sense of expectation swept through him as he approached the lake, almost as if he were at the end of a long journey. It was always that way, he supposed, thinking back. There was that strange sense of coming home. Once Paranor had been the home of the Druids. But the other Druids were gone now, and this valley felt more like home than the Keep. All things began and ended here. It was here that he returned to find the sleep that renewed his life each time his journeys through the Four Lands were finished, with his mortal shell hung half within this world and half within the world of death. Here both worlds touched, a small crossing point that gave him some brief access to all that had been and all that would ever be. Most important of all, he would find his father here.
Trapped, exiled, and waiting to be delivered!
He blocked the thought from his mind. Dark eyes lifted briefly to the faint lightening of the eastern sky, then dropped again to the lake. Shea Ohmsford had come here once, many years ago, with his half brother Flick and the others of the small company who had gone in search of the Sword of Shannara. It had been prophesied that one of their number would be lost, and so it had happened. Shea had been swept over the falls below the Dragon’s Crease. The Druid remembered the mistrust and suspicion the others had exhibited toward him. Yet he had been fond of Shea, of Flick, and of Wil Ohmsford. Shea had been almost like a son to him—would have been, perhaps, had he been permitted to have a son. Wil Ohmsford had been more a comrade-in-arms, sharing the responsibility for the search that would restore the Ellcrys and save the Elves.
His dark face creased thoughtfully. Now there was Brin, a girl with power that surpassed anything that her forebears had possessed in their time. What would she be to him?
He had reached the edge of the lake, and he came to a halt. He stood for a moment looking down into the depthless water, wishing . . . Then slowly he lifted his arms skyward, power radiating out from his body, and the Hadeshorn began to churn restlessly. The waters swirled faster, beginning to boil and hiss, and spray rose skyward. All about the Druid, the empty valley shuddered and rumbled as if awakened from a long, dreamless sleep. Then the cries rose, low and terrible, from out of the depths of the lake.
Come to me, the Druid called soundlessly. Be free.
The cries rose higher, shrill and less than human—imprisoned souls calling out in their bondage, straining to be free. The whole of the darkened valley filled with their wail, and the spray of the Hadeshorn’s murky waters hissed with sharp relief.
Come!
From out of the roiling dark waters the shade of Bremen lifted, its thin, skeletal body a transparent gray against the night, shrouded and bent with age. Out of the waters, the terrible form rose to stand upon the surface with Allanon. Slowly the Druid lowered his arms, black robes wrapping tight as if for warmth; within his cowl, his dark face lifted to find the empty, sightless eyes of his father.
I am here.
The arms of the shade lifted then. Though they did not touch him, Allanon felt their cold embrace wrap about him like death. Slow and anguished, his father’s voice reached out to him.
—The age ends. The circle is closed—
The chill within him deepened, froze him as ice. The words ran on together as one, and though he heard them all, each in painful detail, they were strung and tightened like knots upon a line. He listened to them all in silent desperation, afraid as he had never been afraid, understanding at last what was meant to be, must be, and would be.
In his hard, black eyes there were tears.
In frightened silence, Brin Ohmsford and Rone Leah stood where the Druid had left them and watched the emergence of the shade of Bremen from the depths of the Hadeshorn. Cold sliced through them, borne not on some errant wind, for there was none, but by the coming of the shade. Together they faced it, watched it stand before Allanon, tattered and skeletal, and saw its arms lift as if to embrace and draw the Druid’s black form downward. They could near nothing of its words; the air about them filled with the shrill cries let free from the lake. The rock shuddered and groaned beneath their feet. If they had been able, they would have fled and not looked back. At that moment, they were certain that death had been set loose to walk among them.
Then abruptly it was ended. The shade of Bremen turned, sinking slowly back into the murky waters. The cries surged higher, a frantic wail of anguish, then died into silence. The lake churned and boiled anew for a brief instant, then settled back, the waters swirling once again with placid calm.
In the east, the crest of the sun broke over the ragged edge of the Dragon’s Teeth, silver gray light spilling down through the dying night shadows.
Brin heard Rone exhale sharply, and her hand reached over to grip his. At the edge of the Hadeshorn, Allanon dropped to his knees, head bowed.
“Rone!” she whispered harshly and started forward. The highlander seized her arm in warning, remembering what the Druid had told them, but she pulled free, racing for the lake. Instantly he was after her.
Together they rushed to the Druid, slid to a halt on the loose rock, and bent down beside him. His eyes were closed, and his dark face was pale. Brin reached for one great hand and found it as cold as ice. The Druid seemed to be in a trance. The Valegirl glanced hesitantly at Rone. The highlander shrugged. Ignoring him, she put her hands on the big man’s shoulders and gently shook him. r />
“Allanon,” she said softly.
The dark eyes flickered open, met hers. For an instant she saw clear through him. There was a terrible heedless anguish in his eyes. There was fear. And there was disbelief. It shocked her so that she moved back from him quickly. Then all that she had seen disappeared; in its place there was anger.
“I told you not to move.” He pushed himself roughly to his feet.
His anger meant nothing, and she ignored it. “What happened, Allanon? What did you see?”
He said nothing for a moment, his eyes straying back across the murky green waters of the lake. His head shook slowly. “Father,” he whispered.
Brin glanced hurriedly at Rone. The highlander frowned. She tried again, one hand touching lightly the Druid’s sleeve. “What has he told you?”
Depthless black eyes fixed upon her own. “That time slips away from us, Valegirl. That we are hunted on all sides, and that it shall be thus until the end. That end is determined, but he will not tell me what it is. He will only tell me this—that it will come, that you will see it, and that for our cause you are both savior and destroyer.”
Brin stared at him. “What does that mean, Allanon?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know.”
“Very helpful.” Rone straightened and looked away into the mountains.
Brin kept her eyes on the Druid. There was something more. “What else did he say, Allanon?”
But again the Druid shook his head. “Nothing more. That was all.”
He was lying! Brin knew it instantly. Something more had passed between them, something dark and terrible that he was not prepared to reveal. The thought frightened her, the certainty of it an omen that, like her father and her great-grandfather before her, she was to be used to a purpose she did not comprehend.
Her thoughts snapped back to what he had said before. Savior and destroyer to their cause—she would be both, the shade had said. But how could that be?