The Heritage of Shannara (169 page)

He was still thinking about it when he woke the next day. A cloak that when worn could hide the identity of the wearer from those he encountered, making him appear to be someone they trusted—here at last was a way out of Southwatch. Rimmer Dall might envision the Mirrorshroud as a subterfuge that would allow him to trap Par, but Coll had a far better use for the magic. If he could find a way to get possession of the cloak long enough to put it on … His excitement at the prospect would not allow him to finish the thought. How could he manage it? he wondered, his mind racing as he dressed and paced the length of his cell, waiting for his breakfast.

It occurred to him then, for just a moment, that it was extraordinarily careless of Rimmer Dall to show him such a magic when the Shadowen had been so careful to keep all their other magics hidden. But then the First Seeker had been anxious for his help in locating Par, hadn't he, and the cloak was useless unless they found Par, wasn't it? Probably Dall had hoped to persuade Coll simply by letting him know he possessed such magic.

Then the first suspicion was abruptly crowded aside by a second. What if the cloak was a trick? How did he know that the Mirrorshroud could do what was claimed? What proof did he have? He started sharply as the metal food tray slid through the slot at the bottom of his door. He stared at it helplessly a moment, wondering. But why would the First Seeker lie? What did he stand to gain?

The questions besieged and finally overwhelmed him, and he brushed them aside long enough to eat his breakfast. When he was finished, he went down to the exercise yard to train with Ulf kingroh. He needed to talk with Rimmer Dall again, to find out more about the cloak and to discover the truth of its magic. But he could not afford to seem too interested; he could not let the First Seeker surmise his true motive. That meant he had to wait for Rimmer Dall to come to him.

But the First Seeker did not appear that day or the next, and it was not until three days later as sunset approached that he materialized from the shadows as Coll was trudging wearily back to his cell and fell in beside him.

“Have you given further thought to helping me find your brother?” he asked perfunctorily, his face lowered within the cowl of his black cloak.

“Some,” Coll allowed.

“Time passes swiftly, Valeman.”

Coll shrugged casually. “I have trouble believing anything you tell me. A prisoner is not often persuaded to confide in his jailor.”

“No?” Coll could almost feel the other's dark smile. “I would have thought it was just the opposite.”

They walked in silence for a few paces, Coll's face burning with anger. He wanted to strike out at the other, having him this close, alone in these dark halls, just the two of them. He fought down the temptation, knowing how foolish it would be to give in to it.

“I think Par would see through the magic of the Mirrorshroud,” he said finally.

Dall glanced over. “How?”

Coll took a deep breath. “His own magic would warn him.”

“So you think I would fail to get close enough even to speak with him?” The whispery voice was hoarse and low.

“I wonder,” Coll replied.

Dall stopped and turned to face him. “How would it be if I tested the magic on you? Then you could make your own judgment.”

Coll frowned, hiding the elation that surged abruptly within. “I don't know. It might not make any difference whether it works with me.”

The gloved hand lifted, a lean blackness stealing the light from the air. “Why not let me try? What harm can it do?”

They went down the hallway and up a dozen flights of stairs until they were only several floors below the cell where Coll was kept imprisoned. At a door marked with a wolf 's head and red lettering that Coll could not decipher, Rimmer Dall produced a key, inserted it in a heavy lock, and pushed the door back. Inside was a single window through which a narrow band of sunlight shone on a tall wooden cabinet. Rimmer Dall walked to the cabinet, opened its double doors, and took out the Mirrorshroud.

“Look away from me for a moment,” he ordered.

Coll turned his head, waiting.

“Coll,” a voice came.

He turned back. There was his father, Jaralan, tall and stooped, thick shouldered, wearing his favorite leather apron, the one he used for his woodworking. Coll blinked in disbelief, telling himself that it wasn't his father, that it was Rimmer Dall, and still it was his father he saw.

Then his father reached up to remove the apron, which instantly became the Mirrorshroud, and Rimmer Dall stood before him once more.

“Who did you see?” the First Seeker asked softly.

Coll could not bring himself to answer. He shook his head. “I still think Par will recognize you.”

Rimmer Dall studied him a moment, the big, rawboned face flat and empty, the strange eyes as hard as stone. “I want you to think about something,” he said finally. “Do you remember those pitiful creatures in the Pit at Tyrsis, the ones driven mad by Federation imprisonment, their magic consuming them? That is what will happen to your brother. It may not happen today or tomorrow or next week or even next month, but it will happen eventually. Once it does, there will be no help for him.”

Coll fought to keep the fear from his eyes.

“I want you to think about this as well. All Shadowen have the power to invade and consume. They can inhabit the bodies of other creatures and become them for as long as it is needed.” He paused. “I could become you, Coll Ohmsford. I could slip beneath your skin as easily as a knife blade and make you my own.” The harsh whisper was a hiss against the silence. “But I don't choose to do that because I don't want to hurt you. I spoke the truth when I told you I wanted to help your brother. You will have to decide for yourself whether or not to believe me, but think about what I have just told you as you do.”

He turned, shoved the Mirrorshroud back into its locker, and closed the door. Whether he was angry or frustrated or something else was difficult to tell, but his walk was purposeful as he led Coll from the room and pulled the door closed behind them. Coll listened automatically for the click of the lock and did not hear it. Rimmer Dall was already moving away, so Coll went after him without slowing. The First Seeker took him to a stairway and pointed up.

“Your quarters lie that way. Think carefully, Valeman,” he warned. “You play with two lives while you delay.”

Coll turned wordlessly and started up the stairs. When he glanced back over his shoulder a dozen steps later, Rimmer Dall was gone.

It was still light, if barely, when he went out once again, passing along the hallway to the stairs, then winding his way downward through the shadows toward the exercise yard. He had left his tunic there; he had forgotten it earlier. He didn't require it, of course, but it provided the excuse he needed to discover whether the door to the room that held the Mirrorshroud had been left unlocked.

His breathing was rapid and harsh-sounding in the silence of his descent. It was a reckless thing he was attempting to do, but his desperation was growing. If he did not get free soon, something bad was going to happen to Par. His conviction of this was based mostly on supposition and fear, but it was no less real for being so. He knew he wasn't thinking as clearly as he should; if he had been, he would never have even considered taking this risk. But if the lock had not released back into place, if the room was still open and the Mirrorshroud still in its locker, waiting …

Footsteps sounded from somewhere below, and he froze against the stair wall. The steps grew momentarily louder and then disappeared. Coll wiped his hands on his pants and tried to think. Which floor was it? Four, he had counted, hadn't he? He worked his way ahead again, then stepped onto the fourth landing down and with his body pressed against the stone, peered around the corner.

The hallway before him stood empty.

He took a deep breath to steady himself and stepped from hiding. Down the hall he crept, swift and silent, casting anxious glances ahead and behind as he went. The Shadowen were always watching him. Always. But there were none now, it seemed, none that he could see. He kept going. He checked each door as he passed it. A wolf 's head with red lettering below—where was it?

If he was caught …

Then the door he was searching for was before him, the wolf 's eyes glaring into his own. He stepped up to it quickly, put his ear close and listened. Silence. Carefully he reached out and turned the handle.

It gave easily. The door opened before him and he was through.

The room was empty save for the wooden cabinet, a tall, shrouded coffin propped against the far wall. He could hardly believe his good fortune.

Swiftly he went to the cabinet, opened it, and reached inside. His hands closed about the Mirrorshroud. Cautiously he took it out, lifting it toward the graying light. The fabric was soft and thick, the cloak as light as dust. Its blackness was disconcerting, an inkiness that looked as if it could swallow you whole. He held the cloak before him momentarily, studying it, weighing a final time the advisability of what he was about to do.

Then quickly he swung it over his shoulders and let it settle into place. He could barely feel it, a presence no greater than the shadow he cast in the failing daylight. He tied its cords about his neck and lifted the hood into place. He waited expectantly. Nothing seemed different. Everything was the same. He wished suddenly for a mirror in which to study himself, but there was none.

After closing the locker behind him, he crossed the room and stepped out into the hallway.

He hadn't taken a dozen steps when a Shadowen appeared from out of the stairwell.

Coll felt his heart sink. He had no weapons, no means of protection, and no time or place in which to hide. He kept walking toward his discoverer, unable to think what else to do.

The Shadowen went by him without slowing. A brief nod, a barely perceptible lifting of the dark face, and the other was past, moving away as if nothing had happened.

Coll felt a rush of elation coupled with relief. The Shadowen hadn't recognized him! He could scarcely believe it. But there was no time to revel in his good fortune. If he was ever to escape Southwatch and Rimmer Dall, it must be now.

Down he went through the corridors and stairwells of the monolith, skirting well-lit places in favor of darker ones, knowing only one way to go but determined to be noticed as little as possible, cloak or no cloak. His hands clutched the dark folds protectively, and his eyes searched the shadows as the daylight faded to dusk. He reached the exercise yard unchallenged. Weapons and armor stood stacked in racks and hung on pegs, metal edges and fastenings glinting dully. Ulf kingroh was nowhere to be seen. Coll helped himself to a brace of long knives, which he stuffed beneath his cloak. He circled the open area for the doors that led to the outer courts. A pair of Shadowen appeared and went past in the manner of the one before, oblivious. Coll felt his muscles tighten with tension, but his confidence in the Mirrorshroud was growing.

Momentarily he considered going down into the bowels of South-watch to discover what the Shadowen were hiding there. But the risk was too great, he decided. Better to get clear as quickly as possible. Whatever else, he must be free.

He hastened along the corridors that led to the outer courts, another of twilight's shadows. He reached the courts without challenge, passed through, and almost before he realized it stood before an outer door. He glanced around hurriedly. No one was in sight.

He released the lock, pushed the door open, and stepped out.

He stood within an alcove that sheltered him from the coming night. Beyond, the Rainbow Lake spread away in a glimmer of silver, the surrounding forests a dark, irregular mass that buzzed and hummed with life, the smell of leaves, earth, and grasses wafting sweetly on the summer air.

Coll Ohmsford took a deep breath and smiled. He was free.

He would have preferred to wait until it was completely dark, but he couldn't chance the delay. It wouldn't be long before he was missed. Crouching low against the sawgrass, he sprinted from the shadows of the wall into the trees.

From the window of a darkened room thirty feet up, Rimmer Dall watched him go.

There was never any question in Coll Ohmsford's mind as to where he would go. He worked his way through the trees that separated Southwatch from the Mermidon, chose a quiet narrows a mile or so upstream, swam the river, and began his trek toward Tyrsis and his brother. He did not know how he would find Par once he reached the city; he would worry about that later. His most immediate concern was that the Shadowen were already searching for him. They seemed to materialize within moments of his escape, black shadows that slipped through the night like wraiths at haunt, silent and spectral. But if they saw him, and he was certain they must have, the Mirrorshroud disguised him from them. They passed without slowing, without interest, disappearing as anonymously as they had come.

But so many of them!

Oddly enough, the cloak seemed to give him a heightened sense of who and where they were. He could feel their presence before he saw them, know from which direction they approached, and discern in advance how many there were. He did not try to hide from them; after all, if the cloak's magic failed, they would search him out in any case. Instead, he tried to appear as an ordinary traveler, keeping to the open grasslands, to the roads when he found them, walking easily, casually, trying not to look furtive.

Somehow it all worked. Though the Shadowen were all about, obviously hunting him, they could not seem to tell who he was.

He slept for a few hours before dawn and resumed his journey at daybreak. He thought on more than one occasion to remove the cloak, but the presence of so many of the black things kept him from doing so. Better to be safe, he told himself. After all, as long as he wore the cloak, he would not be found out.

He passed other travelers on the road as he went. None seemed interested in what they saw of him. A few offered greetings. Most simply passed him by.

He wondered how he appeared to them. He must not have seemed someone they recognized or they would have said something. He must have seemed an ordinary traveler. It made him wonder why Rimmer Dall
had looked like his father in the cloak. It made him wonder why the magic acted differently toward him.