Terry Brooks - Shannara 0 - The First King of Shannara

First King of Shannara

The Fall of Paranor

I

The old man just appeared, seemingly out of nowhere. The Borderman was watching for him, sitting well

back within the concealing shadows of a spreading hardwood high on a hillside overlooking the whole of

the Streleheim and the trails leading out of it, everything clearly visible in the light of a full moon for at least

ten miles, and he still didn't see him. It was unnerving and vaguely embarrassing, and the fact that it

happened this way every time didn't make it any more palatable. How did the old man do it? The

Borderman had spent almost the whole of his life in this country, kept alive by his wits and experience.

He saw things that others did not even know were there. He could read the movements of animals from

their passage through tall grass. He could tell you how far ahead of him they were and how fast they were

traveling. But he could not spy out the old man on the clearest night and the broadest plain, even when he

knew to look for him.

It did not help matters that the old man easily found him. Moving quite deliberately off the trail, he came

toward the Borderman with slow, measured strides, head lowered slightly, eyes tilted up out of the

shadow of his cowl. He wore black, like all the Druids, cloaked and hooded, wrapped darker than the

shadows he passed through. He was not a big man, neither tall nor well muscled, but he gave the

impression of being hard and fixed of purpose. His eyes, when visible, were vaguely green. But at times

they seemed as white as bone, too-now, especially, when right stole away colors and reduced all things

to shades of gray. They gleamed like an animal's caught in a fragment of light-feral, piercing, hypnotic.

Light illuminated the old man's face as well, carving out the deep lines that creased it from forehead to

chin, playing across the ridges and valleys of the ancient skin. The old man's hair and beard were gray

going fast toward white, the strands wispy and thin like tangled spiderwebs.

The Borderman gave it up and climbed slowly to his feet. He was tall, rangy, and broad-shouldered, his

dark hair worn long and tied back, his brown eyes sharp and steady, his lean face all planes and angles,

but handsome in a rough sort of way.

A smile crossed the old man's face as he came up. "How are you, Kinson?" he greeted.

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The familiar sound of his voice swept away Kinson Ravenlock's irritation as if it were dust on the wind.

"I am well, Bremen," he answered, and held out his hand in response.

The old man took it and clasped it firmly in his own. The skin was dry and rough with age, but the hand

beneath was strong. "How long have you been waiting?"

"Three weeks. Not as long as I had expected. I am surprised. But then I am always surprised by you."

Bremen laughed. He had left the Borderman six months earlier with instructions to meet him again on the

first full moon of the quarter season directly north of Paranor where the forests gave way to the Plains of

Streleheim. The time and place of the meeting were set, but hardly written in stone. Both appreciated the

uncertainties the old man faced. Bremen had gone north into forbidden country. The time and place of his

return would be dictated by events not yet known to either of them. It was nothing to Kinson that he had

been forced to wait three weeks. It could just as easily have been three months.

The Druid looked at him with those piercing eyes, white now in the moonlight, drained of any other

color. "Have you learned much in my absence? Have you put your time to good use?"

The Borderman shrugged. "Some of it. Sit down with me and rest. Have you eaten?"

He gave the old man some bread and ale, and they sat hunched close together in the dark, staring out

across the broad sweep of the plains. It was silent out there, empty and depthless and vast beneath the

night's moonlit dome. The old man chewed absently, taking his time. The Borderman had built no fire that

night or on any other since he had begun his vigil. A fire was too dangerous to chance.

"The Trolls move east," Kinson offered after a moment. "Thousands of them, more than I could count

accurately, though I went down into their camp on the new moon several weeks back when they were

closer to where we sit. Their numbers grow as others are sent to serve. They control everything from the

Streleheim north as far as I can determine." He paused. "Have you discovered otherwise?"

The Druid shook his head. He had pushed back his cowl, and his gray head was etched in moonlight.

"No, all of it belongs now to him."

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Kinson gave him a sharp look. "Then . . ."

"What else have you seen?" the old man urged, ignoring him.

The Borderman took the aleskin and drank from it. "The leaders of the army stay closed away in their

tents. No one sees them. The Trolls are afraid even to speak their names. This should not be. Nothing

frightens Rock Trolls. Except this, it seems."

He looked at the other. "But at night, sometimes, at watch for you, I see strange shadows flit across the

sky in the light of moon and stars. Winged black things sweep across the void, hunting or scouting or

simply surveying what they have taken-I can't tell and don't want to know. I feel them, though. Even now.

They are out there, circling. I feel their presence like an itch. No, not like an itch-like a shiver, the sort

that comes to you when you feel eyes watching and the owner of those eyes has bad intentions. My skin

crawls. They do not see me; I know if they did I would be dead."

Bremen nodded. "Skull Bearers, bound in service to him."

"So he is alive?" Kinson could not help himself. "You know it to be so? You have made certain?"

The Druid put aside the ale and bread and faced him squarely. The eyes were distant and filled with dark

memories.

"He is alive, Kinson. As alive as you and I. I tracked him to his lair, deep in the shadow of the Knife

Edge, where the Skull Kingdom puts down its roots. I was not sure at first, as you know. I suspected it,

believed it to be so, but lacked evidence that could stand as proof. So I traveled north as we had

planned, across the plains and into the mountains. I saw the winged hunters as I went, emerging only at

night, great birds of prey that patrolled and kept watch for living things. I made myself as invisible as the

air through which they flew. They saw me and saw nothing. I kept myself shrouded in magic, but not of

such significance that they would notice it in the presence of their own. I passed west of the Trolls, but

found the whole of their land subdued. All who resisted have been put to death. All who could manage to

do so have fled. The rest now serve him."

Kinson nodded. It had been six months since the Troll marauders had swept down out of the Charnals

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east and begun a systematic subjugation of their people. Their army was vast and swift, and in less than

three months all resistance was crushed. The Northland was placed under rule of the conquering army's

mysterious and still unknown leader. There were rumors concerning his identity, but they remained

unconfirmed. In truth, few even knew he existed. No word of this army and its leader had penetrated

farther south than the border settlements of Varfleet and Tyrsis, fledgling outposts for the Race of Man,

though it had spread east and west to the Dwarves and Elves. But the Dwarves and Elves were tied

more closely to the Trolls. Man was the outcast race, the more recent enemy of the others. Memories of

the First War of the Races still lingered, three hundred and fifty years later. Man lived apart in his distant

Southland cities, the rabbit sent scurrying to earth, timid and toothless and of no consequence in the

greater scheme of things, food for predators and little more.

But not me, Kinson thought darkly. Never me. I am no rabbit. l have escaped that fate. I have become

one of the hunters.

Bremen stirred, shifting his weight to make himself more comfortable. "I went deep into the mountains,

searching," he continued, lost again in his tale. "The farther I went, the more convinced I became. The

Skull Bearers were everywhere. There were other beings as well, creatures summoned out of the spirit

world, dead things brought to life, evil given form. I kept clear of them all, watchful and cautious. I knew

that if I was discovered my magic would probably not be enough to save me. The darkness of this region

was overwhelming. It was oppressive and tainted with the smell and taste of death. l went into Skull

Mountain finally-one brief visit, for that was all I could chance. I slipped into the passageways and found

what I had been searching for."

He paused, his brow wrinkling. "And more, Kinson. Much more, and none of it good."

"But he was there?" Kinson pressed anxiously, his hunter's face intense, his eyes glittering.

"He was there," affirmed the Druid quietly. "Shrouded by his magic, kept alive by his use of the Druid

Sleep. He does not use it wisely, Kinson. He thinks himself beyond the laws of nature. He does not see

that for all, however strong, there is a price to be paid for what is usurped and enslaved. Or perhaps he

simply doesn't care. He has fallen under the sway of the Ildatch and cannot free himself in any case."

"The book of magic he stole out of Paranor?"

"Four hundred years ago. When he was simply Brona, a Druid, one of us, and not yet the Warlock

Lord."

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Kinson Ravenlock knew the story. Bremen himself had told it to him, though the history was familiar

enough among the Races that he had already heard it a hundred times. Galaphile, an Elf, had called

together the First Council of Druids five hundred years earlier, a thousand years following the devastation

of the Great Wars. The Council had met at Paranor, a gathering of the wisest men and women of all the

Races, those who had memories of the old world, those who retained a few tattered, crumbling books,

those whose learning had survived the barbarism of a thousand years. The Council had gathered in a last,

desperate effort to bring the Races out of the savagery that had consumed them and into a new and

better civilization. Working together, the Druids had begun the laborious task of assembling their

combined knowledge, of piecing together all that remained so that it might be employed for a common

good. The goal of the Druids was to work for the betterment of all people, regardless of anything that

had gone before. They were Men, Gnomes, Dwarves, Elves, Trolls, and a smattering of others, the best

and wisest of the new Races risen from the ashes of the old. If some small wisdom could be gleaned from

the knowledge they carried, there was a chance for everyone.

But the task proved a long and difficult one, and some among the Druids grew restless. One was called

Brona. Brilliant, ambitious, but careless of his own safety, he began to experiment with magic. There had

been little in the old world, almost none since the decline of faerie and the rise of Man. But Brona

believed that it must be recovered and brought back. The old sciences had failed, the destruction of the

old world was the direct result of that failure, and the Great Wars were a lesson that the Druids seemed

determined to ignore. Magic offered a new approach, and the books that taught it were older and more

tried than those of science. Chief among those books was the Ildatch, a monstrous, deadly tome that had

survived every cataclysm since the dawn of civilization, protected by dark spells, driven by secret needs.

Brona saw within its ancient pages the answers he had been seeking, the solutions to the problems the

Druids sought to solve. He resolved to have them. His course of action was set.

Others among the Druids warned him of the dangers, others not so impetuous, not so heedless of the

lessons history had taught. For there had never been a form of power that did not evoke multiple

consequences. There had never been a sword that did not cut more than one way. Be careful, they

warned. Do not be reckless. But Brona and those few followers who had attached themselves to him

would not be dissuaded, and in the end they broke with the Council. They disappeared, taking with them

the Ildatch, their map of the new world, their key to the doors they would unlock.

In the end, it led only to their subversion. They fell sway to its power and became forever changed. They

came to desire power for its own sake and for their personal use. All else was forgotten, all other goals

abandoned. The First War of the Races was the direct result. The Race of Man was the tool they

employed, made submissive to their will by the magic, shaped to become their weapon of attack. But

their effort failed in the face of the Druid Council and the combined might of the other Races. The

aggressors were defeated, and the Race of Man was driven south into exile and isolation. Brona and his

followers disappeared. It was said they had been destroyed by the magic.

"Such a fool," Bremen said suddenly. "The Druid Sleep kept him alive, but it stole away his heart and

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soul and left him a shell. All those years, we believed him dead. And dead he was, in a sense. But the

part that survived was the evil over which the magic had gained dominance. It was the part that sought

still to claim the whole of the world and the things that lived within it. It was the part that craved power

over all. What matter the price that reckless use of the Sleep demanded? What difference the changes

exacted for the extension of a life already wasted? Brona had evolved into the Warlock Lord, and the

Warlock Lord would survive at all costs."

Kinson said nothing. It bothered him that Bremen could condemn so easily Brona's use of the Druid

Sleep without questioning at the same time his own. For Bremen used the Sleep as well. He would argue

that he used it in a more balanced, controlled way, that he was cautious of its demands on his body. He

would argue that it was necessary to employ the Sleep, that he did it so that he would be there for the

Warlock Lord's inevitable return. But for all that he might try to draw distinctions, the fact remained that

the ultimate consequences of the use were the same, whether you were Warlock Lord or Druid.

One day, it would catch up with him.

"Did you see him, then?" the Borderman asked, anxious to move on. "Did you see his face?"

The old man smiled. "He has no face or body left, Kinson. He is a presence wrapped in a hooded cloak.

Like myself, I sometimes think, for I am little more these days."

"That isn't so," Kinson said at once.

"No," the other quickly agreed, "it isn't. I keep some sense of right and wrong about me, and I am not

yet a slave to the magic. Though that is what you fear I will become, isn't it?"

Kinson did not answer. "Tell me how you managed to get so close. How was it that you were not

discovered?"

Bremen's eyes looked away, focusing on some distant place and time. "It was not easy," he replied

softly. "The cost was high."

He reached again for the aleskin and drank deeply, the weariness mirrored in his face so heavy it might

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have been formed of iron links dragging against his skin. "I was forced to make myself appear one of

them," he said after a moment. "I was required to shroud myself in their thoughts and impulses, in the evil

rooted within their souls. I was cloaked in invisibility, so that my physical presence did not register, and I

was left only with my spirit self. That I cloaked in the darkness that marks their own spirits, reaching deep

within myself for the blackest part of who I am. Oh, I see you question that this was possible. Believe

me, Kinson, the potential for evil lodges deep in every man, myself included. We restrain it better, keep it

buried deeper, but it lives within us. I was forced to bring it out of concealment in order to protect myself.

The feel of it, the rub of it against me, so close, so eager, was terrible. But it served its purpose. It kept

the Warlock Lord and his minions from discovering me."

Kinson frowned. "But you were damaged."

"For a time. The walk back gave me a chance to heal." The old man smiled anew, a brief twist of his thin

lips. "The trouble is that once brought so far out of its cage, a man's evil is reluctant thereafter to be

contained. It presses against the bars. It is more anxious to escape. More prepared. And having lived in

such close proximity to it, I am more vulnerable to the possibility of that escape."

He shook his head. "We are always being tested in life, aren't we? This is just one more instance."

There was a long moment of silence as the two men stared at one another. The moon had moved across

the sky to the southern edge of the horizon and was sinking from view. The stars were brightening with its

passing, the sky clear of clouds, a brilliant black velvet in the vast, unbroken silence.

Kinson cleared his throat. "As you said, you did what was required of you. It was necessary that you get

close enough to determine if your suspicions were correct. Now we know." He paused. "Tell me. Did

you see the book as well? The Ildatch?"

"There, in his hands, out of my reach, or I would surely have taken it and destroyed it, even at the cost

of my own life."

The Warlock Lord and the Ildatch, there in the Skull Kingdom, as real as life, not rumor, not legend.

Kinson Ravenlock rocked back slightly and shook his head. Everything true, just as Bremen had feared.

As they had both feared. And now this army of Trolls come down out of the Northland to subdue the

Races. It was history repeating itself. It was the First War of the Races beginning all over again. Only this

time there might not be anyone to bring it to an end.

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"Well, well," he said sadly.

"There is more," the Druid observed, lifting his eyes to the Borderman. "You must hear it all. There is an

Elfstone they search for, the winged ones. A Black Elfstone. The Warlock Lord learned of it from the

Ildatch. Somewhere within the pages of that wretched book, there is mention of this stone. It is not an

ordinary Elfstone like the others we have heard about. It is not one of three, one each for the heart, mind,

and body of the user, their magic to be joined when summoned. This stone's magic is capable of great

evil. There is some mystery about the reason for its creation, about the use it was intended to serve. All

that has been lost in the passing of time. But the Ildatch makes deliberate and purposeful reference to its

capabilities, it seems. I was fortunate to learn of it. While I clung to the shadows of the wall in the great

chamber where the winged ones gather and their Master directs, I heard mention of it."

He leaned close to the Borderman. "It is hidden somewhere in the Westland, Kinson--deep within an

ancient stronghold, protected in ways that you or I could not begin to imagine. It has lain concealed since

the time of faerie, lost to history, as forgotten as the magic and the people who once wielded it. Now it

waits to be discovered and brought back into use."

"And what is that use?" Kinson pressed.

"It has the power to subvert other magic, whatever its form, and convert it to the holder's use. No matter

how powerful or intricate another's magic might be, if you hold the Black Elfstone, you can master your

adversary. His magic will be leached from him and made yours. He will be helpless against you."

Kinson shook his head despairingly. "How can anyone stand against such a thing?"

The old man laughed softly. "Now, now, Kinson, it isn't really that simple, is it? You remember our

lessons, don't you? Every use of magic exacts a price. There are always consequences, and the more

powerful the magic, the greater that consequence will be. But let's leave that argument for another time.

The point is that the Warlock Lord must not be allowed to possess the Black Elfstone because

consequences matter not at all to him. He is beyond the point where reason will hold sway. So we must

find the Elfstone before he does, and we must find it quickly."

"And how are we to do that?"

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The Druid yawned and stretched wearily, black robes rising and falling in a soft rustle of cloth. "I haven't

the answer to that question, Kinson. Besides, we have other business to attend to first."

"You will go to Paranor and the Druid Council?"

"I must."

"But why bother? They won't listen to you. They mistrust you. Some even fear you."

The old man nodded. "Some, but not all. There are a few who will listen. In any case, I must try. They

are in great danger. The Warlock Lord remembers all too well how they brought about his downfall in

the First War of the Races. He will not chance their intervention a second time-even if they no longer

seem a real threat to him."

Kinson looked off into the distance. "They are foolish to ignore you, but ignore you they will, Bremen.

They have lost all touch with reality behind their sheltering walls. They have not ventured out into the

world for so long that they no longer are able to take a true measure of things. They have lost their

identity. They have forgotten their purpose."

"Hush, now:" Bremen placed a firm hand on the tall man's shoulder. "There is no point in repeating to

ourselves what we already know. We will do what we can and then be on our way." He squeezed gently.

"I am very tired. Would you keep watch for a few hours while I sleep? We can leave after that."

The Borderman nodded. "I'll keep watch."

The old man rose and moved deeper into the shadows beneath the wide-boughed tree, where he settled

down comfortably within his robes on a soft patch of grass. Within minutes he was asleep, his breathing

deep and regular. Kinson stared down at him. Even then, his eyes were not quite closed. From behind

narrow slits, there was a glimmer of light.

Like a cat, thought Kinson, looking away quickly. Like a dangerous cat.

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Time passed, and the night lengthened. Midnight came and went. The moon dropped below the horizon,

and the stars spun in vast, kaleidoscopic patterns across the black. Silence lay heavy and absolute over

the Streleheim, and on the emptiness of the plains nothing moved. Even within the trees where Kinson

Ravenlock kept watch, there was only the sound of the old man's breathing.

The Borderman glanced down at his companion. Bremen, as much an outcast as himself, alone in his

beliefs, exiled for truths that only he could accept.

They were alike in that regard, he thought. He was reminded of their first meeting. The old man had

come to him at an inn in Varfleet, seeking his services. Kinson Ravenlock had been a scout, Tracker,

explorer, and adventurer for the better part of twenty years, since the time he was fifteen. He had been

raised in Callahom, a part of its frontier life, a member of one of a handful of families who had remained

in the Borderlands when everyone else had gone much farther south, distancing themselves from their

past. After the conclusion of the First War of the Races, when the Druids had partitioned the Four Lands

and left Paranor at the crux, Man had determined to leave a buffer between itself and the other Races.

So while the Southland reached as far north as the Dragon's Teeth, Man had abandoned almost

everything above the Rainbow Lake. Only a few Southland families had stayed on, believing that this was

their home, finding themselves unwilling to move to the more populated areas of their assigned land. The

Ravenlocks had been one of these.

So Kinson had grown up as a Borderman, living on the edge of civilization, but as comfortable with

Elves, Dwarves, Gnomes, and Trolls as with Men. He had traveled their lands and learned their customs.

He had mastered their tongues. He was a student of history, and he had heard it told from enough

different points of view that he thought he had gleaned the most important of the truths that it had to offer.

Bremen was a student of history as well, and right from the beginning they had shared some common

beliefs. One of these was that the Races could succeed in their efforts to maintain peace only by

strengthening their ties to one another, not by distancing themselves. A second was that the greatest

obstacle to their success in doing so was the Warlock Lord.

Even then, even five years earlier, the rumors were already being passed around. There was something

evil living in the Skull Kingdom, a collection of beasts and creatures like nothing ever seen before. There

were reports of flying things, winged monsters scouring the land by night in search of mortal victims.

There were stories of men going north and never being seen again. The Trolls stayed away from the

Knife Edge and the Malg. They did not attempt to cross the Kierlak. When they traveled in proximity to

the Skull Kingdom, they banded together in large, heavily armed groups. Nothing would grow in this part

of the Northland. Nothing would take root. As time passed, the whole of that devastated region became

shrouded in clouds and mist. It became arid and barren. It turned to dust and rock. Nothing could live

there, it was said. Nothing that was really alive.

Most dismissed the stories. Many ignored the matter entirely. This was a remote and unfriendly part of

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Terry Brooks - Shannara 0 - The First King of Shannara

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