The Heritage of Shannara (219 page)

Walker did not speak, staring at the apparition, staring right through him, looking far away at events come and gone, at Cogline's final stand. Death had claimed the old man, but it had claimed him on his terms.

—If I could, I would give you back all those you have lost, Walker Boh. But I cannot. I can give you nothing of what is gone and nothing of what will yet be lost. A Druid's life sees many passings—

In his dream the valley was darkened by a wash of mistiness that swept like rain through a forest or clouds across the sun. It was a slow, soft passage, and it carried with it a sense that lives had come into being and run their course, all in a matter of seconds. There were faces, all unknown; there were voices that called out in laughter and pain. Time stretched away, hours to days, days to years, and Walker was there, unchanged, through it all, constantly left behind, eternally alone.

—It will be like that for you. Remember—

But Walker did not need to remember. He had Allanon's memories for that. The transformation had given them to him. He had the memories of all the Druids who had gone before. He knew what his life would be like. He understood what he was facing.

—Remember—

The shade's whisper brought time to a halt again, the Valley of Shale back into focus, and the flow of Walker's thoughts to bear on the dream's intent once more.

“Why am I here, Allanon?” he asked.

—You are complete now, Walker Boh. You have become what you were intended to be, and there is nothing more that remains to be done. You bear the Druid mantle; you will wear it in my stead. Carry it now from Paranor into the Four Lands. You are needed there—

“I know.”

Spray hissed and sang. Allanon's hooded face lowered.

—You do not know. You are transformed, Walker Boh, but that is only the beginning. You have become a Druid, yes—but becoming is not being. Yours is the responsibility of the Races, of their well-being, Dark Uncle. Those from whom you once sought to isolate yourself must now be your charge. They wait—

“To be free of the Shadowen.”

—For you to show them
how
to be free. For you to set them on the path. For you to guide them from the darkness—

Walker Boh shook his head, confused. “But I don't know the way any better than they do.”

The surface of the Hadeshorn steamed, and the air was filled with mist. The dampness settled on Walker's face like the chill of an early winter's morning. It was death to touch the waters of the Hadeshorn, but not for him. For the Druids had discovered secrets long ago that enabled them to transcend death.

Allanon's voice was dark and certain.

—You will find the way. You have the strength and the wisdom of all those who have gone before. You have the magic of the ages. Take yourself out from Paranor and find the other children of Shannara. Each of you was sent to fulfill a charge. Each of you has done so. You are bearers of talismans, Walker Boh. Those talismans shall sustain you—

Walker shook his head in confusion. “What talisman do I bear?”

The shade of Allanon shimmered momentarily in a wailing of cries that rose out of the lake, threatening to disappear.

—The most powerful talisman of all: the Druid mantle which you have assumed. It can never be seen, but it is always there and it is yours alone. Its power increases as you wield it; it strengthens with each use. Think, Walker Boh. Before you fought and destroyed the Horsemen, you were less than what you are now. So shall it be with each challenge you face and overcome. You are in your infancy, and you are just beginning to discover what it is to be a Druid. With time, you will grow—

“But for now … ?”

—The charges are enough. The charges yield talismans, and the talismans yield magic. Magic combined with knowledge shall see the end of the Shadowen. It was thus when I first spoke to you. It is thus now. If I could, I would give you more, Walker Boh. But I have given you all I can, all that I know. Remember, Dark Uncle. I am gone from your world and placed within another. I am without substance. I am now of other things. I see imperfectly from where I stand. I see only shadows of what would be and must rely on those. Yours is the vision that can be relied upon. Go, Walker. Find the scions of Shannara and discover what they have done. In their stories and in your own you will find what you need. You must believe—

Walker said nothing then, thinking for a moment that he was being asked once again to proceed on faith alone. But, of course, that was what he had been doing ever since the dreams had first appeared to him and he had been persuaded to travel to the Hadeshorn and Allanon. Was it really so difficult to accept that faith must guide him anew?

He looked at the pale figure before him, all lines about transparency, all memories of life gone before. “I believe,” he said to Allanon's shade, and meant it.

—Walker Boh—

The shade's voice was soft and filled with regrets that words could not speak.

—Find the children of Shannara. You have the Druid sight. You have the wisdom they need. Do not fail them—

“No,” Walker said hoarsely. “I will not.”

—Put an end to the Shadowen before they destroy the Four Lands completely. I feel their sickness spreading even here. They steal the earth's life. Stop them, Walker Boh—

“Yes, Allanon, I will.”

—Bend to me then, Dark Uncle. Bend to me one final time before you go. Sleep carries us towards daybreak, and we must travel different paths. Hear the last of what I would tell you, and let your wisdom and your reason divine what remains concealed from us both. Bend to me, Walker Boh, and listen—

The shade approached, steam upon the waters of the Hadeshorn in human shape, a cloaking of mist and gray light, a wraith formed of sounds come out of terrifying darkness.

Tense and uncertain, Walker Boh waited, eyes lowered to the boiling waters, to the reflection of stars and sky, until both disappeared in the blackness of shadow.

Then he felt the other's touch against his skin, and he shuddered uncontrollably.

He came awake at sunrise, the light a faint creeping from the hallway beyond his darkened room. He lay without moving for a time, thinking of the dream and what it had shown him. Allanon had sent the dream so that he would have a place to begin his new life. The dream had reinforced his intention to seek out Par and Wren, but it had also given him reason to believe in himself. He could accept who and what he had become if there was at least a chance that he could bring the ravaged lands and their people safely out of the Shadowen thrall.

Find the children of Shannara. Do not fail them.

He rose then from his bed, washed, dressed, and ate breakfast on the castle battlements looking out over the land in the light of the new day. He thought again of Cogline, of all that the old man had taught him. He recited to himself the litany of rules and understandings that his transformation from mortal man to Druid had given him, the whole of the history of the Druids come and gone. He worked his way carefully through the teachings of his magic's use—some already put to the test, some that remained untried.

Last of all, he recounted the events of the dream and the secrets it had shown him. And there had been secrets—a few, important ones, there at the last, when Allanon had touched him. What he had learned was already beginning to suggest answers to his heretofore-unanswered questions. The whole of the history of the Four Lands since the time of the First Council
at Paranor formed a pattern for what was happening now. The events of weeks past gave color and shape to that pattern. But it was the dream and the insights with which it provided him that thrust that pattern into the light where it could be clearly seen.

What was missing still was the reason that Wren had been charged with bringing back the Elves.

What was missing was the reason Par had been sent to find the Sword of Shannara.

Most of all what was missing was the truth behind the secret of the Shadowen power.

He rose finally and went down into the depths of the castle, Rumor trailing silently, a shadow at his back. He would take the moor cat with him, he decided. Cogline had given him the cat, after all; it was his responsibility to see that it was looked after. It could not be left locked up within the Keep, and the closeness they shared might prove useful. He smiled as he examined his thinking. The truth was that Rumor would provide a little of the companionship he would miss without Cogline.

Down into the well of the Keep he descended, there to place his hands on the walls of stone, reaching inward to the life that rested there. The magic came to him, obedient to his summons, and he set in place a bar to any but himself so that none could enter until he returned.

Then he closed Paranor's gates and went out into the world again. He went down from the bluff and into the forests where the heat was screened away and it was shady and cool. Rumor went with him, grateful to be free again of the confining walls, slipping into the shadows to forage and track, returning now and again to Walker's side to be certain he was still there. They traveled north of the place where Cogline lay, and Walker did not turn aside. He had said goodbye already to the old man; it was best to leave it at that.

The day eased away toward nightfall, the sun's fiery glare slipping west toward the Dragon's Teeth, the heat dissipating slowly into the cool of the evening shadows. Walker and the moor cat traveled steadily on. Ahead, the watch fires of the Federation soldiers camped within the Kennon Pass were lit, meals were consumed, and guards sent to their posts.

By midnight Walker and the cat had slipped by them unseen and were on their way south.

T
he rains that had inundated the Westland Elves and the pursuing Federation army were still thunderheads on the western horizon the morning the two ragged scrapwomen led their elderly blind father through the gates of Tyrsis with the other tradesmen, merchants, drummers, peddlers, and itinerant hucksters who had come in from the outlying communities to barter their wares. As with most of the others that sought entry, they had spent the night camped before the gates, anxious to enter early so as to secure the best stalls in the open market where the trading and bartering took place. They shuffled along as quickly as they could manage, the women slowed by the old man as he groped his way uncertainly, supported on either side, his feet directed carefully along the dusty way.

Federation guards lined the entries through the outer and inner walls, checking everyone who passed, pulling aside those who seemed suspicious. It was unusual for them to worry about who was entering the city, for the emphasis in the past had been directed toward worrying about who might leave. But Padishar Creel, the leader of the free-born, was to be executed at noon of the following day, and the Federation was concerned that an attempt would be made to rescue him. It was believed that such a rescue would fail, no matter how well conceived, because the city garrison was at full strength, some five thousand men strong, and security measures were extraordinary. Still, nothing was to be left to chance, so the guards at the gates had been given explicit instructions to make certain of everyone.

They chose to pull aside the scrapwomen and the old man. It was a random selection, an approach the guard commander had settled on early, a compromise between stopping everyone, which would take forever, and no one, which would seem a dereliction of his duty. The three were ordered to stand apart from the throng, to occupy a space in the center of the court between the city's walls, there to wait for questioning. Scattered glances from the crowd were directed their way, furtive and suspicious. Better you than me, they seemed to say. Dust rose with the crowd's passing, and even now, before the heat of the day had settled in, the air had a hot, sticky feel to it.

“Names,” the duty officer said to the scrapwomen and the old man.

“Asra, Wintath, and our father, Criape,” the one with the ragged, tangled reddish hair said. Sores dappled the skin of her face, and she smelled like old rubbish.

The officer glanced at the other woman, who promptly opened her mouth to reveal blackened teeth and a raw, red throat in which the tongue was missing. The officer swallowed.

“She can't speak,” the first said, grinning.

“What's your village?”

“Spekese Run,” said the woman. “Know of it?”

The officer shook his head. He studied the piles of rags they carried strapped to their backs. Worthless stuff. He glanced at the old man, whose head was lowered into his cowl. Couldn't see much of his face. The officer stepped forward and pushed back the cowl. The old man's head jerked up and his blackened lids snapped back to reveal a thick, milky fluid where his eyes should have been. The officer gagged.

“On with you.” He beckoned, moving quickly away to question the next unfortunate.

The women and the old man shuffled off obediently, slipping back into the crowd, passing through the cordon of guards that lined the gates of the inner wall, moving on from there into the city. They were well off the Tyr-sian Way and into the side streets where there were no Federation guards before Matty Roh spit out the dyed fruit skin pasted to the inside of her mouth and said, “I told you this was too risky!”