The Druid of Shannara (56 page)

The dome where the Stone King made his lair stood intact.

Quickening turned and her face lifted. For an instant she was beautiful once more, as alive as she had been when she had brought Walker back from the dead, when she had restored his life and driven the poison of the Asphinx from his body. Walker caught his breath seeing her so, blinking against the momentary illusion. Her dark eyes fixed him.

“Dark Uncle,” she whispered. “When you leave this place, when you go back into the world of the Four Lands, take with you the lessons you have learned here. Do not fight against yourself or what you might be. Simply consider your choices. Nothing is predetermined, Walker. We can always choose.”

She reached up then and touched his face, her fingers cool against his cheek. Images flooded through him, her thoughts, her memories, and her knowledge. In an instant’s time, she
revealed herself completely, showing him the secrets she had kept hidden so carefully during the whole of their journey, the truth of who and what she was. He cried out as if he had been burned, staggered by what he saw. He clutched her tightly to him, and his pale face lowered into her hair in dismay.

Both Morgan and Horner Dees started forward, but Walker shouted for them to stand where they were. They stopped, hesitant, uncertain. Walker half-turned, still holding Quickening against him, his face an iron mask of concentration. He understood now; he understood everything.

“Walker.” She spoke his name again. Her hand brushed him one final time, and a single image appeared.

It was the Grimpond’s second vision.

Her eyes lifted to his. “Let me fall,” she said softly.

He saw the vision clearly, himself standing at the summit of these cliffs with the Four Lands stretched out below and Quickening beside him, her black eyes beseeching as he shoved her away.

Here. Now. The vision come to pass.

He started to shake his head no, but her eyes stopped him, her gaze so intense it was threatening.

“Goodbye, Walker,” she whispered.

He released her. He held her in the circle of his arm for just an instant more, then spun her away over the precipice. It was almost as if someone else was responsible, someone hidden inside himself, a being over which reason could not prevail. He heard Horner Dees gasp, horror-stricken. He heard Morgan scream out in disbelief. They rushed at him in a frenzy, grasped him roughly, and held him as Quickening tumbled away. They watched her fall, a small bundle of cloth with her silver hair streaming out behind her. They watched her shimmer.

Then, incredibly, she began to disintegrate. She came apart at the edges first, like fraying cloth, bits and pieces scattering away. Mute, awestruck, the three at the edge of the precipice stared downward as she disappeared. In seconds she was no more, her body turned to a dust that sparkled and shone as it was caught by the wind.

Below, the Maw Grint ceased its advance, its head lifting. Perhaps it knew what was about to happen; perhaps it even understood. It made no effort to escape, waiting patiently as the dust that had been Quickening settled over it. It shuddered then, cried out once, and began to shrink. It withered rapidly, its bulk
shriveling away, disappearing back into the earth until nothing remained.

The dust blanketed the isthmus next and the rock began to change, turning green with grass and moss. Shoots sprang to life, vibrant and bright. The dust swept on, reaching the peninsula and Eldwist, and the transformation continued. Centuries of Uhl Belk’s dark repression were undone in moments. The stone of the city crumbled—walls, towers, streets, and tunnels all collapsing. Everything gave way before the power of Quickening’s magic, just as it had at the Meade Gardens in Culhaven. All that had existed before the Stone King had worked his change was brought to life again. Rocks shifted and reformed. Trees sprang up, gnarled limbs filled with summer leaves that shone against the gray skies and water. Patches of wildflowers bloomed, not in abundance as in Culhaven, for this had always been a rugged and unsettled place, but in isolated pockets, vibrant and rich. Sea grasses and scrub swept over the broken rock, changing the face of the land back into a coastal plain. The air came alive again, filled with the smell of growing things. The deadness of the land’s stone armor faded into memory. Slowly, grudgingly, Eldwist sank from view, swallowed back into the earth, gone into the past that had given it birth.

When the transformation was complete, all that remained of Eldwist was the dome in which the Stone King had entombed himself—a solitary gray island amid the green of the land.

“There was nothing we could do to save her, Morgan,” Walker Boh explained softly, bent close to the devastated Highlander to make certain he could hear. “Quickening came to Eldwist to die.”

They were crouched down together at the edge of the cliffs, Horner Dees with them, speaking in hushed voices, as if the silence that had settled over the land in the aftermath of Quickening’s transformation was glass that might shatter. Far distant, the roar of the Tiderace breaking against the shoreline and the cries of seabirds on the wing were faint and momentary. The magic had worked its way up the cliffs now and gone past them, cleansing the rock of the Maw Grint’s poison, giving life back again to the land. Island breezes gusted at the clouds, forming breaks, and sunshine peeked through guardedly.

Morgan nodded wordlessly, his head purposefully lowered, his face taut.

Walker glanced at Horner Dees, who nodded encouragingly.
“She let me see everything, Highlander, just before she died. She wanted me to know, so that I could tell you. She touched me on the cheek as we stood together looking down at Eldwist, and everything was revealed. All the secrets she kept hidden from us. All of her carefully guarded mysteries.”

He shifted-a few inches closer. “Her father created her to counteract the magic of Uhl Belk. He made her from the elements of the Gardens where he lived, from the strongest of his magic. He sent her to Eldwist to die. In a sense, he sent a part of himself. He really had no other choice. Nothing less would be sufficient to overcome the Stone King in his own domain. And Uhl Belk had to be overcome there because he would never leave Eldwist—could not leave, in fact, although he didn’t know it. He was already a prisoner of his own magic. The Maw Grint had become Uhl Belk’s surrogate, dispatched in his stead to turn the rest of the Four Lands to stone. But if the King of the Silver River waited for the monster to get close enough to confront, it would have grown too huge to stop.”

His hand came up to rest on Morgan’s shoulder. He felt the other flinch. “She selected each of us for a purpose, Highlander—just as she said. You and I were chosen to regain possession of the Black Elfstone, stolen by Belk from the Hall of Kings. The problem Quickening faced, of course, was that her magic would not work while Uhl Belk controlled the Elfstone. As long as he could wield the Druid magic, he could siphon off her own magic and prevent the necessary transformation from taking place. He would have done so instantly if he had discovered who she was. He would have turned her to stone. That was why she couldn’t use her magic until the very last.”

“But she changed the Meade Gardens simply by touching the earth!” Morgan protested, his voice angry, defiant.

“The Meade Gardens, yes. But Eldwist was far too monstrous to change so easily. She could not have done so with a simple touching. She needed to infuse herself into the rock, to make herself a part of the land.” Walker sighed. “That was why she chose Pe Ell. The King of the Silver River must have known or at least sensed that the Shadowen would send someone to try to stop Quickening. It was no secret who she was or how she could change things. She was a very real threat. She had to be eliminated. A Shadowen, it appears now, would lack the necessary means. So Pe Ell was sent instead. Pe Ell believed that his purpose was a secret, that killing Quickening was his own idea. It wasn’t. Not ever. It was hers, right from the beginning.
It was the reason she sought him out, because her father had told her to do so, to take with her to Eldwist the man and the weapon that could penetrate the armor of her magic and allow her to transform.”

“Why couldn’t she simply change by willing it?”

“She was alive, Morgan—as human as you and I. She was an elemental, but an elemental in human guise. I don’t think she could be anything else in life. It was necessary for her to die before she could work her magic on Eldwist. No ordinary weapon could kill her; her body would protect her against common metals. It required magic equal to her own, the magic of a weapon like the Stiehl—and the hands and mind of an assassin like Pe Ell.”

Walker’s smile was brief, tight. “She summoned us to help her—because she was told to and because we were needed to serve a purpose, yes—but because she believed in us, too. If we had failed her, any of us, even Pe Ell, if we had not done what she knew we could do, Uhl Belk would have won. There would have been no transformation of the land. The Maw Grint would have continued its advance and Uhl Belk’s kingdom would have continued to expand. Combined with the onslaught of the Shadowen, everything would have been lost.”

Morgan straightened perceptibly, and his eyes finally lifted. “She should have told us, Walker. She should have let us know what she had planned.”

Walker shook his head gently. “No, Morgan. That was exactly what she couldn’t do. We would not have acted as we did had we known the truth. Tell me. Wouldn’t you have stopped her? You were in love with her, Highlander. She knew what that meant.”

Morgan stared at him tight-lipped for a moment, then nodded reluctantly. “You’re right. She knew.”

“There wasn’t any other way. She had to keep her purpose in coming here a secret.”

“I know. I know.” Morgan’s breathing was ragged, strained. “But it hurts anyway. I can almost believe she isn’t gone, that she will find a way to come back somehow.” He took a deep breath. “I need her to come back.”

They were silent then, staring off in separate directions, remembering. Walker wondered momentarily if he should tell the other of the Grimpond’s vision, of how he had spoken of that vision with Quickening yet she had brought him anyway, of how she must have known from the first how it would end yet had
come nevertheless so that her father’s purpose in creating her could be fulfilled. He decided against it. The Highlander had heard enough of secrets and hidden plans. There was nothing to be gained by telling him any more.

“What’s become of Belk, do you think?” Horner Dees’ rough voice broke the silence. “Is he still down there in that dome? Still alive?”

They looked as one over the cliff edge to where the last vestige of Eldwist sat amid the newborn green of the peninsula, closed about and secretive.

“I think a fairy creature like Uhl Belk does not die easily,” Walker answered, his voice soft, introspective. “But Quickening holds him fast, a prisoner within a shell, and the land will not be changed to his liking again any time soon.” He paused. “I think Uhl Belk might go mad when he understands that.”

Morgan reached down tentatively and touched a patch of grass as if searching for something. His fingers brushed the blades gently. Walker watched him for a moment, then rose. His body ached, and his spirits were dark and mean. He was starved for real food, and his thirst seemed unquenchable. His own Odyssey was just beginning, a trek back through the Four Lands in search of Pe Ell and the stolen Black Elfstone, a second confrontation to discover who should possess it, and if he survived all that, a journey to recover disappeared Paranor and the Druids …

His thoughts threatened to overwhelm him, to drain the last of his strength, and he shoved them away.

“Come, Highlander,” Horner Dees urged, reaching down to take Morgan’s shoulders. “She’s gone. Be glad we had her for as long as we did. She was never meant to live in this world. She was meant for a better use. Take comfort in the fact that she loved you. That’s no small thing.”

The big hands gripped tight, and Morgan allowed himself to be pulled to his feet. He nodded without looking at the other. When his eyes finally lifted, they were hard and fixed. “I’m going after Pe Ell.”

Horner Dees spat. “We’re all going after him, Morgan Leah. All of us. He won’t get away.”

They took one final look down from the heights, then turned and began walking toward the defile that led back into the mountains. They had gone only a few steps when Morgan stopped suddenly, remembering, and looked over to where he had left the Sword of Leah. The Sword was still jammed into the rocks, its shattered blade buried from sight. Morgan hesitated a moment,
almost as if thinking to leave the weapon where it was, to abandon it once and for all. Then he stepped over and fastened his hands on the hilt. Slowly, he began to pull. And kept pulling, far longer than he should have needed to.

The blade slid free. Morgan Leah stared. The Sword of Leah was no longer broken. It was as perfect as it had been on the day it had been given to him by his father.

“Highlander!” Horner Dees breathed in astonishment.

“She spoke the truth,” Morgan whispered, letting his fingers slide along the blade’s gleaming surface. He looked at Walker, incredulous. “How?”

“Her magic,” Walker answered, smiling at the look on the other’s face. “She became again the elements of the earth that were used by her father to create her, among them the metals that forged the blade of the Sword of Leah. She remade your talisman in the same way she remade this land. It was her final act, Highlander. An act of love.”

Morgan’s gray eyes burned fiercely. “In a sense then, she’s still with me, isn’t she? And she’ll stay with me as long as I keep possession of the Sword.” He took a deep breath. “Do you think the Sword has its magic back again, Walker?”

“I think that the magic comes from you. I think it always has.”

Morgan studied him wordlessly for a moment, then nodded slowly. He sheathed his weapon carefully in his belt. “I have my Sword back, but there is still the matter of your arm. What of that? She said that you, like the blade, would be made whole again.”

Walker thought carefully a moment, then pursed his lips. “Indeed.” With his good hand, he turned Morgan gently toward the defile. “I am beginning to think, Highlander,” he said softly, “that when she spoke of becoming whole, she was not referring to my arm, but to something else altogether.”