Brin nodded. She started to turn away, then stopped. “I am the same person I was when you helped me that first night,” she said quietly.
Leather boots scuffed against the wooden planks of the porch. “Maybe it just don’t seem that way to me,” came the response.
Her mouth tightened. “You don’t have to be afraid of me, you know. You really don’t.”
The boots went still and the trader looked down at them. “I’m not afraid,” he said, his voice low.
She waited a moment longer, searching futilely for something more to say, then turned and walked into the dark.
The following morning, shortly after daybreak, Brin and Rone departed the Rooker Line Trading Center for the country that lay east. Carrying foodstuffs, blankets, and the bow supplied by the trader, they bade the anxious man farewell and disappeared into the trees.
It was a bright, warm day that greeted them. As they made their way downriver along the south bank of the Chard Rush, the air was filled with the sounds of forest life and the smell of drying leaves. A west wind blew gently out of the distant Wolfsktaag, and leaves drifted earthward in lazy spirals to lie thick upon the forest ground. Through the trees, the land ahead could be seen to run on in a gentle sloping of rises and vales. Squirrels and chipmunks scattered and darted away at the sound of their approach, interrupted in their preparations for a winter that seemed far distant from this day.
At midmorning, Valegirl and highlander paused to rest for a time, sitting side by side on an old log, hollowed out and worm-eaten with age. In front of them, barely a dozen yards distant, the Chard Rush flowed steadily eastward into the deep Anar; in its grasp, deadwood and debris that was washed down from out of the high country twisted and turned in intricate patterns.
“It’s still hard for me to believe that he’s really gone,” Rone said after a time, eyes gazing out across the river.
Brin didn’t have to ask whom he meant. “For me, too,” she acknowledged softly. “I sometimes think that he really isn’t gone at all—that I was mistaken in what I saw—that if I am patient, he will come back, just as he always has.”
“Would that be so strange?” Rone mused. “Would it be so surprising if Allanon were to do exactly that?”
The Valegirl looked at him. “He is dead, Rone.”
Rone kept his face turned away, but nodded. “I know.” He was quiet for a moment before continuing. “Do you think that there was anything that could have been done to save him, Brin?”
He looked at the girl then. He was asking her if there was anything that he could have done. Brin’s smile was quick and bitter. “No, Rone. He knew that he was going to die; he was told that he would not complete this quest. He had accepted the inevitability of that, I think.”
Rone shook his head. “I would not have done so.”
“Nor I, I suppose,” Brin agreed. “Perhaps that was why he chose to tell us nothing of what was to happen. And perhaps his acceptance is something we cannot hope to understand, because we could never hope to understand him.”
The highlander leaned forward, his arms braced against his outstretched legs. “So the last of the Druids disappears from the land, and there is no one left to stand against the walkers except you and me.” He shook his head hopelessly. “Poor us.”
Brin glanced down self-consciously at her hands, folded in her lap before her. She remembered Allanon touching her forehead with his blood as he lay dying and she shivered with the memory.
“Poor us,” she echoed softly.
They rested for a few minutes longer, then resumed their journey east. Barely an hour later, they crossed a shallow, gravel-bottomed stream that meandered lazily away from the swifter flow of the main channel of the Chard Rush back along a worn gully. They caught sight of a single-room cabin that sat back in among the forest trees. Built from hand-cut logs laid crosswise and caulked with mortar, the little home was settled in a clearing upon a small rise that formed a threshold to a series of low hills sloping gently away into the forest. A handful of sheep and goats and a single milk cow grazed in the timber behind the cabin. At the sound of their approach, an aged hunting dog rose from his favorite napping spot next to the cabin stoop and stretched contentedly.
The woodsman Jeft stood at the far side of the little clearing, stripped to the waist as he cut firewood. With a sure, practiced swing downward of the long-handled axe, he split the piece of timber that stood upright on the worn stump that served as a chopping block. Working the embedded blade free, he brushed aside the cloven halves before pausing in his work to watch his visitors approach. Lowering the axe-head to the stump, he rested his gnarled hands on the smooth butt of the handle and waited.
“Morning,” Brin greeted as they came up to him.
“Morning,” the woodsman replied, nodding. He seemed not at all surprised that they were there. He glanced at Rone. “Feeling a bit better, are you?”
“Much,” Rone answered. “Thanks in part to you, I’m told.”
The woodsman shrugged, the muscles on his powerful body knotting. He gestured toward the cabin. “There’s drinking water on the stoop in that bucket. I bring it fresh from the hills in back each day.”
He led them down to the cabin porch and the promised bucket. All three took a long drink. Then they seated themselves on the stoop, and the woodsman produced pipe and tobacco. He offered the pouch to his guests, but they declined, so he packed the bowl of his own pipe and began to smoke.
“Everything fine back at the trading center?” he asked casually. There was a long silence. “I heard about what happened the other night with that bunch from Spanning Ridge country.”
His eyes shifted slowly to Brin. “Word has a way of getting around a lot quicker than you’d think out here.”
The Valegirl held his gaze, ignoring her discomfort. “The trader told us where to find you,” she informed him. “He said you might be able to help us.”
The woodsman puffed on the pipe. “In what way?”
“He told us that you know as much as anyone about this country.”
“I’ve been out here a long time,” the man agreed.
Brin leaned forward. “We are already in your debt for what you did to help us back at the trading center. But we need your help again. We need to find a way through the country that lies east of here.”
The woodsman stared at her sharply, then slowly removed the pipe from between his teeth. “East of here? You mean Darklin Reach?”
Both Valegirl and highlander nodded.
The woodsman shook his head doubtfully. “That’s dangerous country. No one goes into Darklin Reach if they can avoid it.” He glanced up. “How far in do you plan to go?”
“All the way,” Brin said quietly. “And then into Olden Moor and the Ravenshorn.”
“You’re mad as jays,” the woodsman announced matter-of-factly and knocked the ashes from the pipe, grinding them into the earth with his boot. “Gnomes and walkers and worse own that country. You’ll never come out alive.”
There was no reply. The woodsman studied their faces in turn, rubbed his bearded chin thoughtfully, and finally shrugged.
“Guess you’ve got your own reasons for doing this, and it’s none of my business what they are. But I’m telling you here and now that you’re making a big mistake—maybe the biggest mistake you’ll ever make. Even the trappers stay clear of that country. Men disappear up there like smoke—gone without a trace.”
He waited for a reply. Brin glanced briefly at Rone and then back at the woodsman once more. “We have to go. Can you help us?”
“Me?” The woodsman grinned crookedly and shook his head. “Not me, girl. Even if I was to go with you—which I won’t, ’cause I like living—I’d be lost myself after the first day or so.”
He paused, studying them shrewdly. “I suppose you’re set on this?”
Brin nodded wordlessly, waiting.
The woodsman sighed. “Maybe there’s someone else who can help you then—if you’re sure t
his is what you want.” He blew sharply through the stem of his pipe to clean it, then folded his arms across his broad chest. “There’s an old man named Cogline. Must be ninety by now if he’s still alive. Haven’t seen him for almost two years, so I can’t be sure if he’s even there anymore. Two years ago, though, he was living up around a rock formation called Hearthstone that sits right in the middle of Darklin Reach—formation that looks just like a big chimney.” He shook his head doubtfully. “I can give you directions, but the trails aren’t much. That’s wild country; hardly anything human living that far east that isn’t Gnome.”
“Do you think he would help us?” Brin pressed anxiously.
The woodsman shrugged. “He knows the country. He’s lived there all his life. Doesn’t bother coming out more than once a year or so—not even that the last two. Stays alive somehow in that jungle.” The heavy brows lifted. “He’s an odd duck, old Cogline. Crazier than a fish swimming through grass. He might be more trouble than help to you.”
“We’ll be all right,” Brin assured him.
“Maybe.” The woodsman looked her over carefully. “You’re a pretty thing to be wandering off into that country, girl—even with your singing to protect you. There’s more than thieves and cowards out there. I’d think on this before you go any further with it.”
“We have thought.” Brin came to her feet. “We’re decided.”
The woodsman nodded. “You’re welcome to take with you all the water you can carry, then. At least you won’t die of thirst.”
He helped them refill their water pouches, carrying a fresh bucket of water from the spring that ran down out of the hills behind his cabin, then took several minutes more to give them the directions they needed to reach Hearthstone, scratching a crude map in the earth before the stoop.
“Look after yourselves,” he admonished, offering each a firm handshake.
With a final word of farewell, Brin and Rone hitched up their provisions across their backs and walked slowly from the little cabin into the trees. Behind them, the woodsman stood watching. It was clear from the look on his bearded face that he did not expect to see them pass that way again.
XXIX
They journeyed through that day and the next, following the twists and turns of the Chard Rush as it wound steadily deeper through the forests of the Anar and crossed into Darklin Reach. Rone was gaining in strength, but he had not yet fully recovered, and progress was slow. After a brief meal on the second evening, he went directly to sleep.
Brin sat before the fire, staring into the flames. Her mind was still filled with unhappy memories and dark thoughts. Once, before she felt herself growing sleepy, it seemed that Jair was with her. Unconsciously, she looked up, seeking him. But there was no one there, and logic told her that her brother was far away, indeed. She sighed, banked the fire, and crawled into her blankets.
It was not until well into the afternoon of the third day following their departure from the Rooker Line Trading Center that Brin and Rone caught sight of a singular rock formation that loomed blackly in the distance and knew that they had found Hearthstone.
Hearthstone was a dark, clear silhouette against the changing colors of autumn, its rugged pinnacle dominating the shallow, wooded valley over which it stood watch. Chimneylike in appearance, the formation was a mass of weathered stone carved by nature’s fine hand and shaped with the passing of the years. Silence hung starkly over its towering shadow. Solitary and enduring, it beckoned compellingly from out of the dark sea of the vast, sprawling forestland of Darklin Reach.
Standing at the crest of a ridge, staring out across the land, Brin felt its unspoken whisper call out through her weariness and her uncertainty and experienced an unexpected sense of peace. Another leg of the long trek east was almost over. The memories of what she had endured to reach this point and the warnings of what yet lay ahead were strangely distant now. She smiled at Rone and the smile clearly caught the highlander by surprise. Then, touching his arm gently, she started downward along the shallow valley slope.
The barely discernible line of a trail snaked down through the wall of the great trees. As the sun moved steadily toward the western horizon, the forest closed about them once more. They picked their way carefully over fallen logs and around jagged rock formations until the thickly grown slope leveled off at its base. Within the forested canopy of the valley, the pathway broadened and them disappeared altogether as the dense scrub brush and fallen timber began to thin. Warm afternoon sunlight flooded softly through the cracks and chinks of the interwoven branches overhead and lighted the whole of the darkened woodland. Dozens of wide, pleasant little clearings pocketed the valley forest and lent a feeling of space and openness. The earth grew soft and loose, free from rock and carpeted with a layer of small twigs and leaves that rustled gently as the Valegirl and the highlander walked across them.
There was a sense of comfort and familiarity to this little valley that was foreign to the wilderness that lay about it, and Brin Ohmsford found herself thinking of Shady Vale. The life sounds, insect and animal, the brief traces of movement through the trees, sudden and furtive, even the warm, fresh smell of the autumn woods—all were similar to that distant Southland village. There was no Rappahalladran, yet there were dozens of tiny streams meandering lazily across their path. The Valegirl breathed deeply. No wonder the woodsman Cogline had chosen this valley for his home.
The travelers passed deeper into the forest, and time slipped slowly from them. Now and again they caught brief glimpses of Hearthstone through the webbing of the dark forest limbs, its towering shadow black against the blue of the sky, and they pointed themselves toward it. They walked in silence, worn and anxious to be done with the day’s long march, their thoughts concentrated on the terrain ahead and the sounds and sights of the forest.
At last Rone Leah came to a stop, one hand fastening guardedly on Brin’s arm as he peered ahead.
“Hear that?” he asked quietly, after listening for a moment.
Brin nodded. It was a voice—thin, almost inaudible, but clearly human. They waited a moment, gauging its direction, then began walking toward it. The voice disappeared for a time, then returned, louder, almost angry. Whoever was speaking was directly ahead.
“You had better show yourself and right now!” The voice was high and strident. “I’ve no time for games!”
There was some muttering and cursing, and the Valegirl and the highlander looked at each other questioningly.
“Come out, come out, come out!” the voice shrilled, then trailed off in an angry murmur. “Should have left you back on the moor . . . if it wasn’t for my kind heart . . .”
There was more cursing, and the sound of someone crashing through the underbrush reached their ears.
“I’ve a few tricks myself, you know! I’ve got powders to blow the ground right out from under you and potions that would tie you in knots! Think you know so much, you . . . Let’s see you climb a rope! Let’s see you do that! Let’s see you do anything besides cause me trouble! How would you like me to leave you here? How would you like that? Wouldn’t think yourself so smart then, I’ll wager! Now get out here!”
Brin and Rone stepped through the screen of trees and brush blocking their view and found themselves at the edge of a small clearing with a wide, still pond at its center. Across from them, crawling aimlessly about on his hands and knees was an old man. He scrambled to his feet at the sound of their approach.
“Ha! So you’ve decided . . . !” He stopped short as he saw them. “Who are you supposed to be? No, never mind who you are. It doesn’t make a twig’s difference. Just get out of here and go back to wherever it was you came from.”
He turned from them with a dismissive gesture and resumed crawling along the forest’s edge, his skeletal arms groping left and right, his thin, hunched body like a twisted bit of deadwood. Great tufts of ragged white hair and beard hung down about his shoulders, and his green-colored clothes and half-cloak were tattered and wor
n. The Valegirl and the highlander stared blankly at him and then at each other.
“This is ridiculous!” the old man stormed, directing his wrath at the silent trees. Then he looked around and saw that the travelers were still there. “Well, what are you waiting for? Get out of here! This is my house, and I didn’t invite you! So get out, get out!”
“This is where you live?” Rone asked, glancing about doubtfully.
The old man looked at him as if he were an idiot. “Didn’t you just hear me say so? What else do you think I’d be doing here at this hour?”
“I don’t know,” the highlander admitted.
“A man should be in his home at this hour!” the other continued in something of a scolding tone. “As a matter of fact, what are you doing here? Don’t you have homes of your own to go to?”
“We’ve come all the way from Shady Vale in the Southland,” Brin tried to explain, but the old man just stared blankly at her. “It’s below the Rainbow Lake, several days’ ride.” The old man’s expression never changed. “Anyway, we’ve come here looking for someone who . . .”
“No one here but me.” The old man shook his head firmly. “Except for Whisper, and I can’t find him. Where do you think . . . ?”
He trailed off distractedly, turning again from them as if to resume his hunt for whoever it was that was missing. Brin glanced doubtfully at Rone.
“Wait a minute!” she called after the old man, who looked around sharply. “A woodsman told us about this man. He told us he lived here. He said that his name was Cogline.”
The old man shrugged. “Never heard of him.”
“Well, maybe he lives in some other part of the valley. Maybe you could tell us where we might . . .”
“You don’t listen very well, do you?” the other interrupted irritably. “Now I don’t know where it is that you come from—don’t care either—but I’ll wager you don’t have strange people running around your home, do you? I’ll wager you know everyone living there or visiting there or whatever! So what makes you think it’s any different with me?”