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T
he old man sat alone in the shadow of the Dragon’s
Teeth and watched the coming darkness chase the day-
light west. The day had been cool, unusually so for
midsummer, and the night promised to be chill. Scattered clouds
masked the sky, casting their silhouettes upon the earth, drifting
in the manner of aimless beasts between moon and stars. A hush
filled the emptiness left by the fading light like a voice waiting
to speak.
It was a hush that whispered of magic, the old man thought.
A fire burned before him, small still, just the beginning of
what was needed. After all, he would be gone for several hours.
He studied the fire with a mixture of expectation and uneasiness
before reaching down to add the larger chunks ofdeadwood that
brought the flames up quickly. He poked at it with a stick, then
stepped away, driven back by the heat. He stood at the edge of
the light, caught between the fire and the growing dark, a crea-
ture who might have belonged to neither or both.
His eyes glittered as he looked off into the distance. The peaks
of the Dragon’s Teeth jutted skyward like bones the earth could
not contain. There was a hush to the mountains, a secrecy that
clung like mist on a frosty morning and hid all the dreams of
the ages.
The fire sparked sharply and the old man brushed at a stray
bit of glowing ash that threatened to settle on him. He was just
a bundle of sticks, loosely tied together, that might crumble into
dust if a strong wind were to blow. Gray robes and a forest cloak
hung on him as they would have on a scarecrow. His skin was
leathery and brown and had shrunken close against his bones.
White hair and beard wreathed his head, thin and fine, like
wisps of gauze against the firelight. He was so wrinkled and
hunched down that he looked to be a hundred years old.
He was, in fact, almost a thousand.
Strange, he thought suddenly, remembering his years. Para-
nor, the Councils of the Races, even the Druids-gone. Strange
that he should have outlasted them all.
He shook his head. It was so long ago, so far back in time
that it was a part of his life he only barely recognized. He had
thought that part finished, gone forever. He had thought himself
free. But he had never been mat, he guessed. It wasn’t possible
to be free of something that, at the very least, was responsible
for the fact that he was still alive.
How else, after all, save for the Druid Sleep, could he still
be standing there?
He shivered against the descending night, darkness all about
him now as the last of the sunlight slipped below the horizon.
It was time. The dreams had told him it must be now, and he
believed the dreams because he understood them. That, too,
was a part of his old life that would not let him go-dreams,
visions of worlds beyond worlds, of warnings and truths, of
things that could and sometimes must be.
He stepped away from the fire and started up the narrow
pathway into the rocks. Shadows closed about him, their touch
chill. He walked for a long time, winding through narrow de-
files, scrambling past massive boulders, angling along craggy
drops and jagged splits in the rock. When he emerged again into
the light, he stood within a shallow, rock-strewn valley domi-
nated by a lake whose glassy surface reflected back at him with
a harsh, greenish cast.
The lake was the resting place for the shades of Druids come
and gone. It was to the Hadeshom that he had been summoned.
“Might as well get on with it,” he growled softly.
He walked slowly, cautiously downward into the valley, his
steps uneasy, his heart pounding in his ears. He had been away
a long time. The waters before him did not stir; the shades lay
sleeping. It was best that way, he thought. It was best that they
not be disturbed.
He reached the lake’s edge and stopped. All was silent. He
took a deep breath, the air raiding from his chest as he exhaled
like dry leaves blown across stone. He fumbled at his waist for
a pouch and loosened its drawstrings. Carefully he reached
within and drew out a handful of black powder laced with silver
sparkle. He hesitated, then threw it into the air over the lake.
The powder exploded skyward with a strange light that
brightened the air around him as if it werc d^ Bg'””- There was
no heat only light It shimmered and danced against the night-
time like a living thu^- The old man watched, robes and forest
cloak pulled close, ey^ b1^111 wlth the reflected gtow. He rocked
back and forth slightly and for a moment felt young again.
Then a shadow appared in the light, lifting out of
it like a wraith a W^ ^orm mat “”ght have been something
strayed from the dark^^ beyond. But the old man knew better.
This was nothing straY^’ttus was something called. The shadow
tightened and took s^P®- K was the shade of a man cloaked au
in black a tall and forbidding apparition that anyone who had
ever seen before wou^ have recognized at once.
“So, Allanon,” the old man whispered.
The hooded face tit^” s0 tnat me “§”1 fevealed the dark,
harsh features clearly^t11® angular bearded face, the long thin
nose and mouth the fierce bTOW that “”S”! have been cast of
iron the eyes beneatflthat seemed to look directly into the soul.
The eyes found the o^ man and held him fast-
-I need you-
The voice was a whisper in the old man’s mind, a hiss of
dissatisfaction and ur^Y- The shade communicated by using
thoughts alone The c^d man shrank back momentarily, wishing
that the thing he had called would instead be gone. Then he
recovered himself an^ stood firm before hls fears-
“I am no longer one of V0″‘” he snapped, his own eyes
narrowing dangerous^’ forgetting that it was not necessary to
speak aloud. “You can command me!”
-I do not commad – Listen to me- You are all that
is left, the last that m^V be unti1 “^ successor is found. Do you
understand-
The old man laughed nervously. “Understand? Ha! Who un-
derstands better than me
-A part of you will always be what once you would not have
questioned. The mastar within you. Always. Help me. I
send the dreams and Shannara children do not respond.
Someone must go to them- Someone must make them see. You-
” Not me’ I have ^ved BP^ from the races for years now- I
wish nothing more to do with their roubles!” The old man
straightened his stick and frowned. I shed myself of such
nonsense long ago.”
The shade seemed t° nse anu broaden suddenly before him,
and he felt himself li^d free ofme earth- He soared skyward,
far into the night. He did not struggle, but held himself firm,
though he could feel the other’s anger rushing through him like
a black river. The shade’s voice was the sound of bones grating.
-Watch-
The Four Lands appeared, spread out before him, a panorama
of grasslands, mountains, hills, lakes, forests, and rivers, bright
swatches of earth colored by sunlight. He caught his breath to
see it so clearly and from so far up in the sky, even knowing that
it was only a vision. But the sunlight began to fade almost at
once, the color to wash. Darkness closed about, filled with dull
gray mist and sulfiirous ash that rose from burned-out craters.
The land lost its character and became barren and lifeless. He
felt himself drift closer, repulsed as he descended by the sights
and smells of it. Humans wandered the devastation in packs,
more animals than men. They rent and tore at each other; they
howled and shrieked. Dark shapes flitted among them, shadows
that lacked substance yet had eyes of fire. The shadows moved
through the humans, joining with them, becoming them, leaving
them again. They moved in a dance that was macabre, yet pur-
poseful. The shadows were devouring the humans, he saw. The
shadows were feeding on them.
-Watch-
The vision shifted. He saw himself then, a skeletal, ragged
beggar facing a cauldron of strange white fire that bubbled and
swirled and whispered his name. Vapors lifted from the caul-
dron and snaked their way down to where he stood, wrapping
about him, caressing him as if he were their child. Shadows
flitted all about, passing by at first, then entering him as if he
were a hollow casing in which they might play as they chose.
He could feel their touch; he wanted to scream.
-Watch-
The vision shifted once more. There was a huge forest and
in the middle of the forest a great mountain. Atop the mountain
sat a castle, old and weathered, towers and parapets rising up
against the dark of the land. Paranor, he thought! It was Paranor
come again! He felt something bright and hopeful well up within
him, and he wanted to shout his elation. But the vapors were
already coiling about the castle. The shadows were already flit-
ting close. The ancient fortress began to crack and crumble,
stone and mortar giving way as if caught in a vise. The earth
shuddered and screams lifted from the humans become animals.
Fire erupted out of the earth, splitting apart the mountain on
which Paranor sat and then the castle itself. Wailing filled the
air, the sound of one bereft of the only hope that had remained
to him. The old man recognized the wailing as his own.
Then the images were gone. He stood again before the Hades-
hom, in the shadow of the Dragon’s Teeth, alone with the shade
of Allanon. In spite of his resolve, he was shaking.
The shade pointed at him.
-It will be as I have shown you if the dreams are ignored. It
will be so if you fail to act. You must help. Go to them-the
boy, the girl, and the Dark Uncle. Tell them the dreams are real.
Tell them to come to me here on the first night of the new moon
when the present cycle is complete. I will speak with them then-
The old man frowned and muttered and worried his lower
lip. His fingers once more drew tight the drawstrings to the
pouch, and he shoved it back into his belt. “I will do so because
there is no one else!” he said finally, spitting out the words in
distaste. “But do not expect. . . !”
-Only go to them. Nothing more is required. Nothing more
will be asked. Go-
The shade of Allanon shimmered brightly and disappeared.
The light faded, and the valley was empty again. The old man
stood looking out over the still waters of the lake for a moment,
then turned away.
The fire he had left behind still burned on his return, but it
was small now and frail-looking against the night. The old man
stared absently at the flames, then hunkered down before them.
He stirred at the ashes already forming and listened to the si-
lence of his thoughts.
The boy, the girl, and the Dark Uncle-he knew them. They
were the Shannara children, the ones who could save them all,
the ones who could bring back the magic. He shook his grizzled
head. How was he to convince them? If they would not heed
Allanon, what chance that they would heed him?
He saw again in his mind the frightening visions. He had best
find a way to make them listen, he thought. Because, as he was
fond of reminding himself, he knew something of visions, and
there was a truth to these that even one such as he, one who had
foresworn the Druids and their magic, could recognize.
If the Shannara children failed to listen, these visions would
come to pass.
II
Par Ohmsford stood in the rear doorway of the Blue
Whisker Ale House and stared down the darkened tun-
nel of the narrow street that ran between the adjoining
buildings into the glimmer of Varfleet’s lights. The Blue Whisker
was a ramshackle, sprawling old building with weathered board
walls and a wood shingle roof and looked for all the world as if
once it had been someone’s barn. It had sleeping rooms upstairs
over the serving hall and storerooms in the back. It sat at the
base of a block of buildings that formed a somewhat lopsided U,
situated on a hill at the western edge of the city.
Par breathed deeply the night air, savoring its flavors. City
smells, smells of life, stews with meats and vegetables laced
with spice, sharp-flavored liquors and pungent ales, perfumes
that scented rooms and bodies, leather harness, iron from forges
still red with coals kept perpetually bright, the sweat of animals
and men in close quarters, the taste of stone and wood and dust,
mingling and mixing, each occasionally breaking free-they
were all there. Down the alleyway, beyond the slat-boarded,
graffiti-marked backs of the shops and businesses, the hill
dropped away to where the central part of the city lay east. An
ugly, colorless gathering of buildings in daylight, a maze of
stone walls and streets, wooden siding and pitch-sealed roofs,
the city took on a different look at night. The buildings faded
into the darkness and the lights appeared, thousands of them,
stretching away as far as the eye could see like a swarm of
fireflies. They dotted the masked landscape, flickering in the
black, trailing lines of gold across the liquid skin of the Mer-
midon as it passed south. Varfleet was beautiful now, the scrub-
woman become a fairy queen, transformed as if by magic.
Par liked the idea of the city being magic. He liked the city
in any case, liked its sprawl and its meld of people and things,
its rich mix of life. It was far different from his home of Shady
Vale, nothing like the forested hamlet that he had grown up in.
It lacked the purity of the trees and streams, the solitude, the
sense of timeless ease that graced life in the Vale. It knew noth-
ing of that life and couldn’t have cared less. But that didn’t
matter to Par. He liked the city anyway. There was nothing to
say that he had to choose between the two, after all. There wasn’t
any reason he couldn’t appreciate both.
Coil, of course, didn’t agree. Coil saw it quite differently. He
saw Varfleet as nothing more than an outlaw city at the edge of
Federation rule, a den of miscreants, a place where one could
get away with anything, hi all of Callahom, in all of the entire
Southland for that matter, there was no place worse. Coil hated
the city.
Voices and the clink of glasses drifted out of the darkness
behind him, the sounds of the ale house breaking free of the
front room momentarily as a door was opened, then disappear-
ing again as it was closed. Par turned. His brother moved care-
fully down the hallway, nearly faceless in the gloom.
“It’s almost time,” Coil said when he reached his brother.
Par nodded. He looked small and slender next to Coil, who
was a big, strong youth with blunt features and mud-colored
hair. A stranger would not have thought them brothers. Coil
looked a typical Valeman, tanned and rough, with enormous
hands and feet. The feet were an ongoing joke. Par was fond of
comparing them to a duck’s. Par was slight and fair, his own
features unmistakably Elven from the sharply pointed ears and
brows to the high, narrow bones of his face. There was a time
when the Elven blood had been all but bred out of the line, the
result of generations of Ohmsfords living in the Vale. But four
generations back (so his father had told him) his great-great-
grandfather had returned to the Westland and the Elves,
married an Elven girl, and produced a son and a daughter. The
son had married another Elven girl, and for reasons never made
clear the young couple who would become Par’s great-
grandparents had returned to the Vale, thereby infusing a fresh
supply of Elven blood back into the Ohmsford line. Even then,
many members of the family showed nothing of then- mixed
heritage; Coil and his parents Jaralan and Mirianna were ex-
amples. Par’s bloodlines, on the other hand, were immediately
evident.
Being recognizable in this way, unfortunately, was not nec-
essarily desirable. While in Varfleet, Par disguised his features,
plucking his brows, wearing his hair long to hide his ears, shad-
ing his face with darkener. He didn’t have much choice. It wasn’t
wise to draw attention to one’s Elven lineage these days.
“She has her gown nicely in place tonight, doesn’t she?”
Coil said, glancing off down the alleyway to the city beyond.
“Black velvet and sparkles, not a thread left hanging. Clever
girl, this city. Even the sky is her friend.”
Par smiled. My brother, the poet. The sky was clear and filled
with the brightness of a tiny crescent moon and stars. “You
might come to like her if you gave her half a chance.”
“Me?” Coil snorted. “Not likely. I’m here because you’re
here. I wouldn’t stay another minute if I didn’t have to.”
‘ ‘You could go if you wanted.”
Coil bristled. “Let’s not start again. Par. We’ve been all
through that. You were the one who thought we ought to come
north to the cities. I didn’t like the idea then, and I don’t like it
any better now. But that doesn’t change the fact that we agreed
to do this together, you and me. A fine brother I’d be if I left
you here and went back to the Vale now! In any case, I don’t
think you could manage without me.”
“All right, all right, I was just…” Par tried to interrupt.
“Attempting to have a little fan at my expense!” Coil fin-
ished heatedly. “You have done that on more than one occasion
of late. You seem to take some delight in it.”
“That is not so.”
Coil ignored him, gazing off into the dark.
‘ ‘I would never pick on anyone with duck feet.”
Coil grinned in spite of himself. “Fine talk from a little fel-
low with pointed ears. You should be grateful I choose to stay
and look after you!”
Par shoved him playfully, and they both laughed. Then they
went quiet, staring at each other in the dark, listening to the
sounds of the ale house and the streets beyond. Par sighed. It
was a warm, lazy midsummer night that made the cool, sharp
days of the past few weeks seem a distant memory. It was the
kind of night when troubles scatter and dreams come out to play.
“There are rumors of Seekers in the city,” Coil informed
him suddenly, spoiling his contentment.
“There are always rumors,” he replied.
“And the rumors are often true. Talk has it that they plan to
snatch up all the magic-makers, put them out of business and
close down the ale houses.” Coil was staring intently at him.
“Seekers, Par. Not simple soldiers. Seekers.”
Par knew what they were. Seekers-Federation secret police,
the enforcement arm of the Coalition Council’s Lawmakers. He
knew.
They had arrived in Varfleet two weeks earlier. Coil and he.
They journeyed north from Shady Vale, left the security and
familiarity and protective confines of their family home and came
into the Borderlands of Callahom. They did so because Par had
decided they must, that it was time for them to tell their stories
elsewhere, that it was necessary to see to it that others besides
the Vale people knew. They came to Varfleet because Varfleet
was an open city, free of Federation rule, a haven for outlaws
and refugees but also for ideas, a place where people still lis-
tened with open minds, a place where magic was still toler-
ated-even courted. He had the magic and, with Coil in tow, he
took it to Varfleet to share its wonder. There was already magic
aplenty being practiced by others, but his was of a far different
sort. His was real.
They found the Blue Whisker the first day they arrived, one
of the biggest and best known ale houses in the city. Par per-
suaded the owner to hire them in the first sitting. He had ex-
pected as much. After all, he could persuade anyone to do just
about anything with the wishsong.
Real magic. He mouthed the words without speaking them.
There wasn’t much real magic left in the Four Lands, not
outside the remote wilderness areas where Federation rule did
not yet extend. The wishsong was the last of the Ohmsford
magic. It had been passed down through ten generations to reach
him, the gift skipping some members of his family altogether,
picking and choosing on a whim. Coil didn’t have it. His parents
didn’t. In fact, no one in the Ohmsford family had had it since
his great-grandparents had returned from the Wesdand. But the
magic of the wishsong had been his from the time he was born,
the same magic that had come into existence almost three hun-
dred years ago with his ancestor Jair. The stories told him this,
the legends. Wish for it, sing for it. He could create images so
lifelike in the minds of his listeners that they appeared to be
real. He could create substance out of air.
That was what had brought him to Varfleet. For three centu-
ries the Ohmsford family had handed down stories of the Elven
house of Shannara. The practice had begun with Jan”. In truth,
it had begun long before that, when the stories were not of the
magic because it had not yet been discovered but of the old
world before its destruction in the Great Wars and the tellers
were the few who had survived that frightening holocaust. But
Jair was the first to have use of the wishsong to aid in the telling,
to give substance to the images created from his words, to make
his tales come alive in the minds of those who heard them. The
tales were of the old days: of the legends of the Elven house of
Shannara; of the Druids and their Keep at Paranor; of Elves and
Dwarves; and of the magic that ruled their lives. The tales were
of Shea Ohmsford and his brother Flick and their search to find
the Sword of Shannara; of Wil Ohmsford and the beautiful,
tragic Elven girl Amberie and their struggle to banish the De-
mon hordes back into the Forbidding; of Jair Ohmsford and his
sister Brin and their journey into the fortress of Graymark and
confrontation with the Mord Wraiths and the Ddatch; of the
Druids Allanon and Bremen; of the Elven King Eventine Eles-
sedil; of warriors such as Balinor Buckhannah and Stee Jans; of
heroes many and varied. Those who had command of the wish-
song made use of its magic. Those who did not relied on simple
words. Ohmsfords had come and gone, many carrying the sto-
ries with them to distant lands. Yet for three generations now,
no member of the family had told the stories outside the Vale.
No one had wanted to risk being caught.
It was a considerable risk. The practice of magic in any form
was outlawed in the Four Lands-or at least anywhere the Fed-
eration governed, which was practically the same thing. It had
been so for the past hundred years. In all that time no Ohmsford
had left the Vale. Par was the first. He had grown tired of telling
the same stories to the same few listeners over and over. Others
needed to hear the stories as well, to know the truth about the
Druids and the magic, about the struggle that preceded the age
in which they now lived. His fear of being caught was out-
weighed by the calling he felt. He made his decision despite the
objections of his parents and Coil. Coil, ultimately, decided to
come with him-just as he always did whenever he thought Par
needed looking after. Varfleet was to be the beginning, a city
where magic was still practiced in minor forms, an open secret
defying intervention by the Federation. Such magic as was found
in Varfleet was small stuff really and scarcely worth the trouble.
Callahom was only a protectorate of the Federation, and Var-
fleet so distant as to be almost into the free territories. It was
not yet army occupied. The Federation so far had disdained to
bother with it.
But Seekers? Par shook his head. Seekers were another mat-
ter altogether. Seekers only appeared when there was a serious
intent on the part of the Federation to stamp out a practice of
magic. No one wanted any part of them.
‘ ‘It grows too dangerous for us here,” Coil said, as if reading
Par’s mind. “We will be discovered.”
Par shook his head. “We are but one of a hundred practicing
the art,” he replied. ‘ ‘Just one in a city of many.”
Coil looked at him. “One in a hundred, yes. But the only one
using real magic.”
Par looked back. It was good money the ale house paid them,
the best they had ever seen. They needed it to help with the
taxes the Federation demanded. They needed it for their family
and the Vale. He hated to give up because of a rumor.
His jaw tightened. He hated to give up even more because it
meant the stories must be returned to the Vale and kept hidden
there, untold to those who needed to hear. It meant that the
repression of ideas and practices that clamped down about the
Four Lands like a vise had tightened one turn more.
“We have to go,” Coil said, interrupting his thoughts.
Par felt a sudden rush of anger before realizing his brother
was not saying they must go from the city, but from the doorway
of the ale house to the performing stage inside. The crowd would
be waiting. He let his anger slip away and felt a sadness take its
place.
“I wish we lived in another age,” he said softly. He paused,
watching the way Coil tensed. “I wish there were Elves and
Druids again. And heroes. I wish there could be heroes again-
even one.”
He trailed off, thinking suddenly of something else.
Coil shoved away from the doorjamb, clapped one big hand
to his brother’s shoulder, turned him about and started him back
down the darkened hallway. “If you keep singing about it, who
knows? Maybe there will be.”
Par let himself be led away like a child. He was no longer
thinking about heroes though, or Elves or Druids, or even about
Seekers.
He was thinking about the dreams.
They told the story of the Elven stand at Halys Cut, how
Eventine Elessedil and the Elves and Stee Jans and the Legion
Free Corps fought to hold the Breakline against the onslaught
of the Demon hordes. It was one of Par’s favorite stories, the
first of the great Elven battles in that terrible Westland war. They
stood on a low platform at one end of the main serving room,
Par in the forefront. Coil a step back and aside, the lights dimmed
against a sea of tightly packed bodies and watchful eyes. While
Coil narrated the story. Par sang to provide the accompanying
images, and the ale house came alive with the magic of his
voice. He invoked in the hundred or more gathered the feelings
of fear, anger, and determination that had infused the defenders
of the Cut. He let them see the fury of the Demons; he let them
hear their battle cries. He drew them in and would not let them
go. They stood in the pathway of the Demon assault. They saw
the wounding of Eventine and the emergence of his son Ander
as leader of the Elves. They watched the Druid Allanon stand
virtually alone against the Demon magic and turn it aside. They
experienced life and death with an intimacy that was almost
terrifying.
When Coil and he were finished, there was stunned silence,
then a wild thumping of ale glasses and cheers and shouts of
elation unmatched in any performance that had gone before. It
seemed for a moment that those gathered might bring the rafters
of the ale house down about their ears, so vehement were they
in their appreciation. Par was damp with his own sweat, aware
for the first time how much he had given to the telling. Yet his
mind was curiously detached as they left the platform for the
brief rest they were permitted between tellings, thinking still of
the dreams.
Coil stopped for a glass of ale by an open storage room and
Par continued down the hallway a short distance before coming
to an empty barrel turned upright by the cellar doors. He slumped
down wearily, his thoughts tight.
He had been having the dreams for almost a month now, and
he still didn’t know why.
The dreams occurred with a frequency that was unsettling.
They always began with a black-cloaked figure that rose from a
lake, a figure that might be Allanon, a lake that might be the
Hadeshom. There was a shimmering of images in his dreams,
an ethereal quality to the visions that made them difficult to
decipher. The figure always spoke to him, always with the same
words. “Come to me; you are needed. The Four Lands are in
gravest danger; the magic is almost lost. Come now, Shannara
child.”
There was more, although the rest varied. Sometimes there
were images of a world born of some unspeakable nightmare.
Sometimes there were images of the lost talismans-the Sword
of Shannara and the Elf stones. Sometimes there was a call for
Wren as well, little Wren, and sometimes a call for his uncle
Walker Boh. They were to come as well. They were needed,
too.
He had decided quite deliberately after the first night that the
dreams were a side effect of his prolonged use of the wishsong.
He sang the old stories of the Warlock Lord and the Skull Bear-
ers, of Demons and Mord Wraiths, of Allanon and a world
threatened by evil, and it was natural that something of those
stories and their images would carry over into his sleep. He had
tried to combat the effect by using the wishsong on lighter tell-
ings, but it hadn’t helped. The dreams persisted. He had re-
frained from telling Coil, who would have simply used that as
a new excuse to advise him to stop invoking the magic of the
wishsong and return to the Vale.
Then, three nights ago, the dreams had stopped coming as
suddenly as they had started. Now he was wondering why. He
was wondering if perhaps he had mistaken their origin. He was
considering the possibility that instead of being self-induced,
they might have been sent.
But who would have sent them?
Allanon? Truly Allanon, who was three hundred years dead?
Someone else?
Something else? Something that had a reason of its own and
meant him no good?
He shivered at the prospect, brushed the matter from his mind,
and went quickly back up the hallway to find Coll.
The crowd was even larger for the second telling, the walls
lined with standing men who could not find chairs or benches
to sit upon. The Blue Whisker was a large house, the front
serving room over a hundred feet across and open to the rafters
above a stringing of oil lamps and fish netting that lent a sort of
veiled appearance that was apparently designed to suggest inti-
macy. Par couldn’t have tolerated much more intimacy, so close
were the patrons of the ale house as they pressed up against the
platform, some actually sitting on it now as they drank. This
was a different group than earlier, although the Valeman was
hard-pressed to say why. It had a different feel to it, as if there
was something foreign in its makeup. Coil must have felt it, too.
He glanced over at Par several times as they prepared to per-
form, and there was uneasiness mirrored in his dark eyes.
A tall, black-bearded man wrapped in a dun-colored forest
cloak waded through the crowd to the platform’s edge and eased
himself down between two other men. The two looked up as if
they intended to say something, then caught a close glimpse of
the other’s face and apparently thought better of it. Par watched
momentarily and looked away. Everything felt wrong.
Coil leaned over as a rhythmic clapping began. The crowd
was growing restless. “Par, I don’t like this. There’s some-
thing . . .”
He didn’t finish. The owner of the ale house came up and told
them in no uncertain terms to begin before the crowd got out of
hand and started breaking things. Coil stepped away wordlessly.
The lights dimmed, and Par started to sing. The story was the
one about Allanon and the battle with the Jachyra. Coil began
to speak, setting the stage, telling those gathered what sort of
day it was, what the glen was like into which the Druid came
with Brin Ohmsford and Rone Leah, how everything suddenly
grew hushed. Par created the images in the minds of his listen-
ers, instilling in them a sense of anxiety and expectation, trying
unsuccessfully not to experience the same feelings himself.
At the rear of the room, men were moving to block the doors
and windows, men suddenly shed of cloaks and dressed all in
black. Weapons glittered. There were patches of white on sleeves
and breasts, insignia of some sort. Par squinted, Elven vision
sharp.
A wolf’s head.
The men in black were Seekers.
Par’s voice faltered and the images shimmered and lost their
hold. Men began to grumble and look about. Coil stopped his
narration. There was movement everywhere. There was some-
one in the darkness behind them. There was someone all about.
Coil edged closer protectively.
Then the lights rose again, and a wedge of the black-garbed
Seekers pushed forward from the front door. There were shouts
and groans of protest, but the men making them were quick to
move out of the way. The owner of the Blue Whisker tried to
intervene, but was shoved aside.
The wedge of men came to a stop directly in front of the
platform. Another group blocked the exits. They wore black
from head to toe, their faces covered above their mouths, their
wolf-head insignia gleaming. They were armed with short
swords, daggers, and truncheons, and their weapons were held
ready. They were a mixed bunch, big and small, stiff and bent,
but there was a feral look to all of them, as much in the way
they held themselves as in their eyes.
Their leader was a huge, rangy man with tremendously long
arms and a powerful frame. There was a craggy cast to his face
where the mask ended, and a half-beard of coarse reddish hair
covered his chin. His left arm was gloved to the elbow.
“Your names?” he asked. His voice was soft, almost a whis-
per.
Par hesitated. “What is it that we have done?”
“Is your name Ohmsford?” The speaker was studying him
intently.
Par nodded. “Yes. But we haven’t…”
“You are under arrest for violating Federation Supreme
Law,” the soft voice announced. There was a grumbling
sound from the patrons. “You have used magic in defiance
of. . .”
“They was just telling stories!” a man called out from a few
feet away.. One of the Seekers lashed out swiftly with his trun-
cheon and the man collapsed in a heap.
“You have used magic in defiance of Federation dictates and
thereby endangered the public.” The speaker did not even bother
to glance at the fallen man. “You will be taken …”
He never finished. An oil lamp dropped suddenly from the
center of the ceiling to the crowded ale house floor and exploded
in a shower of flames. Men sprang to their feet, howling. The
speaker and his companions turned in surprise. At the same
moment the tall, bearded man who had taken a seat on the
platform’s edge earlier came to his feet with a lunge, vaulted
several other astonished patrons, and slammed into the knot of
Seekers, spilling them to the floor. The tall man leaped onto the
stage in front of Par and Coil and threw off his shabby cloak to
reveal a fully armed hunter dressed in forest green. One arm
lifted, the hand clenched in a fist.
“Free-born!” he shouted into the confusion.
It seemed that everything happened at once after that. The
decorative netting, somehow loosened, followed the oil lamp
to the floor, and practically everyone gathered at the Blue
Whisker was suddenly entangled. Yells and curses rose from
those trapped. At the doors, green-clad men pounced on the
bewildered Seekers and hammered them to the floor. Oil
lamps were smashed, and the room was plunged into dark-
ness.
The tall man moved past Par and Coil with a quickness they
would not have believed possible. He caught the first of the
Seekers blocking the back entrance with a sweep of one boot,
snapping the man’s head back. A short sword and dagger ap-
peared, and the remaining two went down as well.
“This way, quick now!” he called back to Par and Coll.
They came at once. A dark shape clawed at them as they
rushed past, but Coil knocked the man from his feet into the
mass of struggling bodies. He reached back to be certain he had
not lost his brother, his big hand closing on Par’s slender shoul-
der. Par yelled in spite of himself. Coil always forgot how strong
he was.
They cleared the stage and reached the back hallway, the tall
stranger several paces ahead. Someone tried to stop them, but
the stranger ran right over him. The din from the room behind
them was deafening, and flames were scattered everywhere now,
licking hungrily at the flooring and walls. The stranger led them
quickly down the hall and through the rear door into the alley-
way. Two more of the green-clad men waited. Wordlessly, they
surrounded the brothers and rushed them clear of the ale house.
Par glanced back. The flames were already leaping from the
windows and crawling up toward the roof. The Blue Whisker
had seen its last night.
They slipped down the alleyway past startled faces and
wide eyes, turned into a passageway Par would have sworn
he had never seen before despite his many excursions out that
way, passed through a scattering of doors and anterooms and
finally emerged into a new street entirely. No one spoke.
When at last they were beyond the sound of the shouting and
the glow of the fire, the stranger slowed, motioned his two
companions to take up watch and pulled Par and Coil into a
shadowed alcove.
All were breathing heavily from the run. The stranger
looked at them in turn, grinning. “A little exercise is good
for the digestion, they say. What do you think? Are you all
right?”
The brothers both nodded. “Who are you?” asked Par.
The grin broadened. “Why, practically one of the family,
lad. Don’t you recognize me? Ah, you don’t, do you? But,
then, why should you? After all, you and I have never
met. But the songs should remind you.” He closed his left
hand into a fist, then thrust a single finger sharply at Par’s
nose. “Remember now? “
Mystified, Par looked at Coil, but his brother appeared as
confused as he was. “I don’t think . . .”he started.
“Well, well, it doesn’t matter just at the moment. All in
good time.” He bent close. ‘ ‘This is no longer safe country
for you, lad. Certainly not here in Varfleet and probably not
in all of Callahom. Maybe not anywhere. Do you know who
that was back there? The ugly one with the whisper?”
Par tried to place the rangy speaker with the soft voice. He
couldn’t. He shook his head slowly.
“Rimmer Dall,” the stranger said, the smile gone now.
“First Seeker, the high mucky-muck himself. Sits on the Co-
alition Council when he’s not out swatting flies. But you, he’s
taken a special interest if he’s come all the way to Varfleet to
arrest you. That’s not part of his ordinary fly-swatting. That’s
hunting bear. He thinks you are dangerous, lad-very dan-
gerous, indeed, or he wouldn’t have bothered coming all the
way here. Good thing I was looking out for you. I was, you
know. Heard Rimmer Dall was going to come for you and
came to make sure he didn’t get the job done. Mind now, he
won’t give up. You slipped his grasp this time, but that will
make him just that much more determined. He’ll keep com-
ing for you.”
He paused, gauging the effect of what he was saying. Par
was staring at him speechlessly, so he went on. “That magic
of yours, the singing, that’s real magic, isn’t it? I’ve seen
enough of the other kind to know. You could put that magic
to good use, lad, if you had a mind to. It’s wasted in these
ale houses and backstreets.”
“What do you mean?” Coil asked, suddenly suspicious.
The stranger smiled, charming and guileless. “The Move-
ment has need of such magic,” he said softly.
Coil snorted. “You’re one of the outlaws!”
The stranger executed a quick bow. “Yes, lad, I am proud
to say I am. More important, I am free-bom and I do not
accept Federation rule. No right-thinking man does.” He
bent close. “You don’t accept it yourself now, do you? Admit
it.”
“Hardly,” Coil answered defensively. “But I question
whether the outlaws are any better.”
‘ ‘Harsh words, lad!” the other exclaimed. ‘ ‘A good thing for
you I do not take ofiense easily.” He grinned roguishly.
“What is it you want?” Par interrupted quickly, his mind
clear again. He had been thinking of Rimmer Dall. He knew
the man’s reputation and he was frightened of the prospect
of being hunted by him. “You want us to join you, is that
it?”
The stranger nodded. “You would find it worth your time, I
think.”
But Par shook his head. It was one thing to accept the strang-
er’s help in fleeing the Seekers. It was another to join the Move-
ment. The matter needed a great deal more thought. “I think
we had better decline for now,” he said evenly. “That is, if
we’re being given a choice.”
“Of course you are being given a choice!” The stranger
seemed offended.
“Then we have to say no. But we thank you for the offer and
especially for your help back there.”
The stranger studied him a moment, solemn again. “You are
quite welcome, believe me. I wish only the best for you. Par
Ohmsford. Here, take this.” He removed from one hand a ring
that was cast in silver and bore the insigne of a hawk. “My
friends know me by this. If you need a favor-or if you change
your mind-take this to Kiltan Forge at Reaver’s End at the north
edge of the city and ask for the Archer. Can you remember
that?”
Par hesitated, then took the ring, nodding. “Butwhy. . . ?”
“Because there is much between us, lad,” the other said
softly, anticipating his question. One hand reached out to rest
on his shoulder. The eyes took in Coil as well. “There is
history that binds us, a bond of such strength that it requires
I be there for you if I can. More, it requires that we stand
together against what is threatening this land. Remember that,
too. One day, we will do so, I think-if we all manage to
stay alive until then.”
He grinned at the brothers and they stared back silently. The
stranger’s hand dropped away. “Time to go now. Quickly, too.
The street runs east to the river. You can go where you wish
from there. But watch yourselves. Keep your backs well guarded.
This matter isn’t finished.”
‘ ‘I know,” Par said and extended his hand. ‘ ‘Are you certain
you will not tell us your name?”
The stranger hesitated. “Another day,” he said.
He gripped Par’s hand tightly, then Coil’s, then whistled his
companions to him. He waved once, then melted into the shad-
ows and was gone.
Par stared down momentarily at the ring, then glanced
questioningly at Coll. Somewhere close at hand, the sound of
shouting started up.
“I think the questions will have to wait,” said Coil.
Par jammed the ring into his pocket. Wordlessly, they dis-
appeared into the night.
It was nearing midnight by the time Par and Coil reached
the waterfront section of Varfleet, and it was there that they
first realized how ill-prepared they were to make their es-
cape from Rimmer Dall and his Federation Seekers. Neither
had expected that flight would prove necessary, so neither had
brought anything that a lengthy journey might require. They had
no food, no blankets, no weapons save for the standard long
knives all Valemen wore, no camping gear or foul-weather
equipment, and worst of all, no money. The ale house keeper
hadn’t paid them in a month. What money they had managed to
save from the month before had been lost in the fire along with
everything else they owned. They had only the clothes on their
backs and a growing fear that perhaps they should have stuck
with the nameless stranger a bit longer.
The waterfront was a ramshackle mass of boathouses, piers,
mending shops, and storage sheds. Lights burned along its
length, and dockworkers and fishermen drank and joked in the
light of oil lamps and pipes. Smoke rose out of tin stoves and
barrels, and the smell of fish hung over everything.
‘ ‘Maybe they’ve given up on us for the night,” Par suggested
at one point. “The Seekers, I mean. Maybe they won’t bother
looking anymore until morning-or maybe not at all.”
Coil glanced at him and arched one eyebrow meaningfully.
“Maybe cows can fly too.” He looked away. “We should have
insisted we be paid more promptly for our work. Then we
wouldn’t be in this fix.”
Par shrugged. “It wouldn’t have made any difference.”
“It wouldn’t? We’d at least have some money!”
‘ ‘Only if we’d thought to carry it with us to the performance.
How likely is that?”
Coil hunched his shoulders and screwed up his face. “That
ale house keeper owes us.”
They walked all the way to the south end of the docks without
speaking further, stopped finally as the lighted waterfront gave
way to darkness, and stood looking at each other. The night was
cooler now and their clothes were too thin to protect them. They
were shivering, their hands jammed down in their pockets, their
arms clamped tightly against their sides. Insects buzzed about
them annoyingly.
Coil sighed. “Do you have any idea where we’re going. Par?
Do you have some kind of plan in mind?”
Par took out his hands and rubbed them briskly. “I do. But
it requires a boat to get there.”
“South, then-down the Mermidon?”
“All the way.”
Coil smiled, misunderstanding. He thought they were headed
back to Shady Vale. Par decided it was best to leave him with
that impression.
“Wait here,” Coil said suddenly and disappeared before Par
could object.
Par stood alone in the dark at the end of the docks for what
seemed like an hour, but was probably closer to half that. He
walked over to a bench by a fishing shack and sat down, hunched
up against the night air. He was feeling a mix of things. He was
angry, mostly-at the stranger for spiriting them away and then
abandoning them-all right, so Par had asked to have it that
way, that didn’t make him feel any better-at the Federation for
chasing them out from the city like common thieves, and at
himself for being stupid enough to think he could get away with
using real magic when it was absolutely forbidden to do so. It
was one thing to play around with the magics of sleight of hand
and quick change; it was another altogether to employ the magic
of the wishsong. It was too obviously the real thing, and he
should have known that sooner or later word of its use would
get back to the authorities.
He put his legs out in front of him and crossed his boots.
Well, there was nothing to be done about it now. Coil and he
would simply have to start over again. It never occurred to him
to quit. The stories were too important for that; it was his re-
sponsibility to see to it that they were not forgotten. He was
convinced that the magic was a gift he had received expressly
for that purpose. It didn’t matter what the Federation said-that
magic was outlawed and that it was a source of great harm to
the land and its people. What did the Federation know of magic?
Those on the Coalition Council lacked any practical experience.
They had simply decided that something needed to be done to
address the concerns of those who claimed parts of the Four
Lands were sickening and men were being turned into some-
thing like the dark creatures of Jair Ohmsford’s time, creatures
from some nether existence that defied understanding, beings
that drew their power from the night and from magics lost since
the time of the Druids.
They even had names, these creatures. They were called
Shadowen.
Suddenly, unpleasantly, Par thought again of the dreams and
of the dark thing within them that had summoned him.
He was aware then that the night had gone still; the voices of
the fishermen and dockworkers, the buzz of the insects, and
even the rustle of the night wind had disappeared. He could hear
the sound of his own pulse in his ears, and a whisper of some-
thing else . . .
Then a splash of water brought him to his feet with a start.
Coil appeared, clambering out of the Mermidon at the river’s
edge a dozen feet away, shedding water as he came. He was
naked. Par recovered his composure and stared at him in dis-
belief.
“Shades, you frightened me! What were you doing?”
“What does it look like I was doing?” Coil grinned. “I was
out swimming!”
What he was really doing, Par discovered after applying a bit
more pressure, was appropriating a fishing skiff owned by the
keeper of the Blue Whisker. The keeper had mentioned it to
Coil once or twice when bragging about his fishing skills. Coil
had remembered it when Par had mentioned needing a boat,
remembered as well the description of the boat shed where the
man said it was kept, and gone off to find it. He’d simply swum
up to where it was stored, snapped the lock on the shed, slipped
the mooring lines and towed it away.
‘ ‘It’s the least he owes us after the kind of business we brought
in,” he said defensively as he brushed himself dry and dressed.
Par didn’t argue the point. They needed a boat worse than
the ale house keeper, and this was probably their only chance
to find one. Assuming the Seekers were still scouring the city
for them, their only other alternative was to strike out on foot
into the Runne Mountains-an undertaking that would require
more than a week. A ride down the Mermidon was a journey of
only a few days. It wasn’t as if they were stealing the boat, after
all. He caught himself. Well, maybe it was. But they would
return it or provide proper compensation when they could.
The skiff was only a dozen feet in length, but it was equipped
with oars, fishing gear, some cooking and camping equipment,
a pair of blankets, and a canvas tarp. They boarded and pushed
off into the night, letting the current carry them out from the
shore and sweep them away.
They rode the river south for the remainder of the night, using
the oars to keep it in mid-channel, listening to the night sounds,
watching the shoreline, and trying to stay awake. As they trav-
eled, Coil offered his theory on what they should do next. It was
impossible, of course, to go back into Callahom any time in the
immediate future. The Federation would be looking for them.
It would be dangerous, in fact, to travel to any of the major
Southland cities because the Federation authorities stationed
there would be alerted as well. It was best that they simply return
to the Vale. They could still tell the stories-not right away
perhaps, but in a month or so after the Federation had stopped
looking for them. Then, later, they could travel to some of the
smaller hamlets, the more isolated communities, places the Fed-
eration seldom visited. It would all work out fine.
Par let him ramble. He was willing to bet that Coil didn’t
believe a word of it; and even if he did, there was no point in
arguing about it now.
They pulled into shore at sunrise and made camp in a grove
of shade trees at the base of a windswept bluff, sleeping until
noon, then rising to catch and eat fish. They were back on the
river by early afternoon and continued on until well after sunset.
Again they pulled into shore and made camp. It was starting to
rain, and they put up the canvas to provide shelter. They made
a small fire, pulled the blankets close, and sat silently facing the
river, watching the raindrops swell its flow and form intricate
patterns on its shimmering surface.
They spoke then for a while about how things had changed
in the Four Lands since the time of Jair Ohmsford.
Three hundred years ago, the Federation governed only the
deep Southland cities, adopting a strict policy of isolationism.
The Coalition Council provided its leadership even then, a body
of men selected by the cities as representatives to its govern-
ment. But it was the Federation armies that gradually came to
dominate the Council, and in time the policy of isolationism
gave way to one of expansion. It was time to extend its sphere
of influence, the Federation determined-to push back its fron-
tiers and offer a choice of leadership to the remainder of the
Southland. It was logical that the Southland should be united
under a single government, and who better to do that than the
Federation?
That was the way it started. The Federation began a push
north, gobbling up bits and pieces of the Southland as it went.
A hundred years after the death of Jair Ohmsford, everything
south of Callahom was Federation governed. The other races,
the Elves, the Trolls, the Dwarves, and even the Gnomes cast
nervous glances south. Before long, Callahom agreed to be-
come a protectorate, its Kings long dead, its cities feuding and
divided, and the last buffer between the Federation and the other
lands disappeared.
It was about this same time that the rumors of the Shadowen
began to surface. It was said that the magic of the old days was
at fault, magic that had taken seed in the earth and nurtured
there for decades and was now coming to life. The magic took
many forms, sometimes as nothing more than a cold wind,
sometimes as something vaguely human. It was labeled, in any
case, as Shadowen. The Shadowen sickened the land and its
life, turning pockets of it into quagmires of decay and lifeless-
ness. They attacked mortal creatures, man or beast, and, when
they were sufficiently weakened, took them over completely,
stealing into their bodies and residing there, hidden wraiths.
They needed the life of others for their own sustenance. That
was how they survived.
The Federation lent credibility to those rumors by proclaim-
ing that such creatures might indeed exist and only it was strong
enough to protect against them.
No one argued that the magic might not be at fault or that the
Shadowen or whatever it was that was causing the problem had
nothing to do with magic at all. It was easier simply to accept
the explanation offered. After all, there hadn’t been any magic
in the land since the passing of the Druids. The Ohmsfords told
their stories, of course, but only a few heard and fewer still
believed. Most thought the Druids just a legend. When Calla-
hom agreed to become a protectorate and the city ofTyrsis was
occupied, the Sword of Shannara disappeared. No one thought
much of it. No one knew how it happened, and no one much
cared. The Sword hadn’t even been seen for over two hundred
years. There was only the vault that was said to contain it, the
blade set in a block of Tre-Stone, there in the center of the
People’s Park-and then one day that was gone as well.
The Elfstones disappeared not long after. There was no rec-
ord of what became of them. Not even the Ohmsfords knew.
Then the Elves began to disappear as well, entire communi-
ties, whole cities at a time, until even Arborion was gone.
Finally, there were no more Elves at all; it was as if they had
never been. The Wesdand was deserted, save for a few hunters
and trappers from the other lands and the wandering bands of
Rovers. The Rovers, unwelcome anyplace else, had always been
there, but even the Rovers claimed to know nothing of what had
become of the Elves. The Federation quickly took advantage of
the situation. The Wesdand, it declared, was the seeding ground
for the magic that was at the root of die problems in die Four
Lands. It was the Elves, after all, who introduced magic into
the Lands years earlier. It was the Elves who first practiced it.
The magic had consumed them-an object lesson on what would
happen to all those who tried to do likewise.
The Federation emphasized the point by forbidding the prac-
tice of magic in any form. The Wesdand was made a protector-
ate, albeit an unoccupied one since the Federation lacked enough
soldiers to patrol so vast a territory unaided, but one dial would
be cleansed eventually, it was promised, of the ill effects of any
lingering magic.
Shortly after that, the Federation declared war on the
Dwarves. It did so ostensibly because die Dwarves had pro-
voked it, aldrough it was never made clear in what way. The
result was practically a forgone conclusion. The Federation had
the largest, most thoroughly equipped and best trained army in
the Four Lands by this time, and the Dwarves had no standing
army at all. The Dwarves no longer had the Elves as allies, as
they had all those years previous, and the Gnomes and Trolls
had never been friends. Nevertheless, the war lasted nearly five
years. The Dwarves knew die mountainous Eastiand far better
than the Federation, and even though Culhaven fell almost im-
mediately, the Dwarves continued to fight in the high country
until eventually they were starved into submission. They were
brought down out of the mountains and sent south to the Fed-
eration mines. Most died there. After seeing what happened to
the Dwarves, the Gnome tribes fell quickly into line. The Fed-
eration declared the Easdand a protectorate as well.
There remained a few pockets of isolated resistance. There
were still a handful of Dwarves and a scattering of Gnome tribes
that refused to recognize Federation rule and continued to fight
from the deep wilderness areas north and east. But they were
too few to make any difference.
To mark its unification of the greater portion of the Four Lands
and to honor those who had worked to achieve it, the Federation
constructed a monument at the north edge of the Rainbow Lake
where the Mermidon poured through the Runne. The monument
was constructed entirely of black granite, broad and square at
its base, curved inward as it rose over two hundred feet above
the cliffs, a monolithic tower that could be seen for miles in all
directions. The tower was called Southwatch.
That was almost a hundred years ago, and now only the Trolls
remained a free people, still entrenched deep within the moun-
tains of the Northland, the Chamals, and the Kershalt. That was
dangerous, hostile country, a natural fortress, and no one from
the Federation wanted much to do with it. The decision was
made to leave it alone as long as the Trolls did not interfere with
the other lands. The Trolls, very much a reclusive people for
the whole of their history, were happy to oblige.
“It’s all so different now,” Par concluded wistfully as they
continued to sit within their shelter and watch the rain fall into
the Mermidon. “No more Druids, no Paranor, no magic-
except the fake kind and the little we know. No Elves. Whatever
happened to them do you think?” He paused, but Coil didn’t
have anything to say. “No monarchies, no Leah, no Buckhan-
nahs, no Legion Free Corps, no Callahom for all intents and
purposes.”
“No freedom,” Coil finished darkly.
“No freedom,” Par echoed.
He rocked back, drawing his legs tight against his chest. “I
wish I knew how the Elfstones disappeared. And the Sword.
What happened to the Sword of Shannara?”
Coil shrugged. “Same thing that happens to everything even-
tually. It got lost.”
“What do you mean? How could they let it get lost?”
‘ ‘No one was taking care of it.”
Par thought about that. It made sense. No one bothered much
with the magic after Allanon died, after the Druids were gone.
The magic was simply ignored, a relic from another time, a
thing feared and misunderstood for the most part. It was easier
to forget about it, and so they did. They all did. He had to
include the Ohmsfords as well-otherwise they would still have
the Elfstones. All that was left of their magic was the wishsong.
“We know the stories, the tales of what it was like; we have
all that history, and we still don’t know anything,” he said softly.
“We know the Federation doesn’t want us talking about it,”
Coil offered archly. “We know that.”
‘ ‘There are times that I wonder what difference it makes any-
way. ” Par’s face twisted into a grimace.’ ‘After all, people come
to hear us and the day after, who remembers? Anyone besides
us? And what if they do? It’s all ancient history-not even that
to some. To some, it’s legend and myth, a lot of nonsense.”
“Not to everyone,” Coil said quietly.
“What’s the use of having the wishsong, if the telling of the
stories isn’t going to make any difference? Maybe the stranger
was right. Maybe there are better uses for the magic.”
“Like aiding the outlaws in their fight against the Federation?
Like getting yourself killed?” Coil shook his head. “That’s as
pointless as not using it at all.”
There was a sudden splash from somewhere out in me river,
and the brothers turned as one to seek out its source. But there
was only the churning of rain-swollen waters and nothing else.
” Everything seems pointless.” Par kicked at the earth in front
of him. “What are we doing, Coil? Chased out of Varfleet as
much as if we were outlaws ourselves, forced to take that boat
like thieves, made to run for home like dogs with our tails be-
tween our legs.” He paused, looking over at his brother.’ ‘Why
do you think we still have use of the magic?”
Coil’s blocky face shifted slightly toward Par’s. “What do
you mean?”
“Why do we have it? Why hasn’t it disappeared along with
everything else? Do you think there’s a reason?”
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