Terry Brooks - The Elfstones Of Shannara

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Elfstones of Shannara by Terry Brooks

The night sky brightened faintly in the east with the approach of dawn as the

Chosen entered the Gardens of Life. Without, the Elven city of Arborlon lay

sleeping, its people still wrapped in the warmth and solitude of their beds. But

for the Chosen the day had already begun. Their trailing white robes billowing

slightly with a rush of summer Wind, they passed between the sentries of the

Black Watch, who stood rigid and aloof as such sentries had stood for centuries

gone before the arched, wrought-iron gateway inlaid with silver scroll and ivory

chips. They passed quickly, and only their soft voices and the crunch their

sandaled feet on the gravel pathway disturbed the silence of the new day as they

slipped into the pine-shadowed dark beyond.

The Chosen were the caretakers of the Ellcrys, the strange and wondrous

tree that stood at the center of the Gardens-the tree, as the legends told, that

served as protector against a primordial evil that had very nearly destroyed the

Elves centuries ago, an evil that had been shut away from the earth since before

the dawn of the old race of Men. In all the time that had followed, there had

been Chosen to care for the Ellcrys. Theirs was a tradition handed down through

generations of Elves, a tradition of service that the Elves regarded as both a

coveted honor and a solemn duty.

Yet there was little evidence of solemnity in the procession that passed

through the Gardens this morning. Two hundred and thirty days of the year of

their service had gone by, and youthful spirits could no longer be easily

subdued. The first sense of awe at the responsibility given them had long since

passed, and the Chosen of the Elves were now just six young men on their way to

perform a task they had performed each day since the time of their choosing, a

task grown old and familiar-the greeting of the tree at the first touch of

sunrise.

Only Lauren, youngest of this year's Chosen, was silent. He lagged a bit

behind the others as they walked, taking no part in their idle chatter. His red

head was bent in concentration, and there was a deep frown on his face. So

wrapped up in his thoughts was he that he was not aware when the noise ahead

ceased, nor of the steps that fell back beside him, until a hand touched his

arm. Then his troubled face jerked up abruptly to find Jase regarding him.

"What's the matter, Lauren? Are you sick?" Jase asked. Because he was a

few months older than the rest, Jase was the accepted leader of the Chosen.

Lauren shook his head, but the frown did not leave his face entirely

"I'm all right."

"Something is bothering you. You've been brooding all morning. Come to

think of it, you were rather quiet last night, too." Jase's hand on his shoulder

brought the younger Elf about to face him. "Come on, out with it. Nobody expects

you to serve if you're not feeling well."

Lauren hesitated, then sighed and nodded. "All right. It's the Ellcrys.

Yesterday, at sunset, just before we left her, I thought I saw some spotting on

her leaves. It looked like wilt."

"Wilt? Are you sure? Nothing like that ever happens to the Ellcrys-at

least that's what we've always been told," Jase said doubtfully.

"I could have been mistaken," Lauren admitted. "It was getting dark. I

told myself then that it was probably just the way the shadows lay on the

leaves. But the more I try to remember how it looked, the more I think it really

was wilt."

"There was a disconcerted muttering from the others, and one of them

spoke. "This is Amberle's fault. I said before that something bad would come

from having a girl picked as a Chosen."

"There were other girls among the Chosen, and nothing happened because

of it," Lauren protested. He had always liked Amberle. She had been easy to talk

to, even if she was King Eventine Elessedil's granddaughter.

"Not for five hundred years, Lauren," the other said.

"All right, that's enough," Jase interrupted. "We agreed not to talk

about Amberle. You know that." He stood silently for a moment, pondering what

Lauren had said. Then he shrugged. "It would be unfortunate if anything happened

to the tree, especially while she was under our care. But after all, nothing

lasts forever."

Lauren was shocked. "But Jase, when the tree weakens, the Forbidding

will end and the Demons within will be freed..."

Side 1

Terry Brooks - The Elfstones Of Shannara

"Do you really believe those old stories, Lauren?" Jase laughed.

Lauren stared at the older Elf. "How can you be a Chosen and not

believe?"

"I don't remember being asked what I believed when I was chosen, Lauren.

Were you asked?"

Lauren shook his head. Candidates for the honor of being Chosen were

never asked anything. They were simply brought before the tree-young Eves who

had crossed over into manhood and womanhood in the prior year. At the dawn of

the new year, they gathered to pass beneath her limbs, each pausing momentarily

for acceptance. Those the tree touched upon the shoulders became the new Chosen,

to serve until the year was done. Lauren could still remember the mix of ecstasy

and pride he had felt at the moment a slender branch had bent to touch him and

he'd heard her speak his name.

And he remembered, too, the astonishment of all when Amberle had been

called...

"It's just a tale to frighten children," Jase was saying "The real

function of the Ellcrys is to serve as a reminder to the Elven people that they,

like her, survive despite all the changes that have taken place in the history

of the Four Lands. She is a symbol of our people's strength, Lauren-nothing

more."

He motioned for them all to resume their walk into the Gardens and

turned away. Lauren lapsed back into thought. The older Elf's casual disregard

for the legend of the tree disturbed him. Of course Jase was from the city, and

Lauren had observed that the people of Arborlon seemed to take the old beliefs

less seriously than did those of the little northern village from which he came.

But the story of the Ellcrys and the Forbidding wasn't just a story-it was the

foundation of everything that was truly Elven, the most important event in the

history of his people.

It had all taken place long ago, before the birth of the new world.

There had been a great war between good and evil-a war that the Elves had

finally won by creating the Ellcrys and a Forbidding that had banished the evil

Demons into a timeless dark. And so long as the Ellcrys was kept well, so long

would the evil be locked from the land.

So long as the Ellcrys was kept well...

He shook his head doubtfully. Maybe the wilt was but a trick of his

imagination. Or a trick of the light. And if not, they would simply have to find

a cure. There was always a cure.

Moments later, he stood with the others before the tree. Hesitantly, he

looked up, then sighed in relief. It appeared as if the Ellcrys was unchanged.

Perfectly formed, her silver-white trunk arched skyward in a symmetrically

balanced network of tapered limbs clustered with broad, five-cornered leaves

that were blood-red in color. At her base, strips of green moss grew in

patchwork runners through the cracks and crevices of the smooth-skinned bark,

like emerald streams flowing down a mountain hillside. There were no splits to

mar the trunk's even lines, no branches cracked or broken. So beautiful, he

thought. He looked again, but could see no signs of the sickness he had feared.

The others went to gather the tools they would use in the feeding and

grooming of the tree and in the general upkeep of the Gardens. But Jase held

Lauren back. "Would you like to greet her today, Lauren?" he asked.

Lauren stammered his surprised thanks. Jase was giving up his turn for

the most special of tasks, obviously in an effort to cheer him.

He stepped forward under the spreading branches to lay his hands upon

the smooth-skinned trunk, the others gathering about a few paces back to recite

the morning greeting. He glanced upward expectantly, searching for the first

beam of sunlight that would fall upon her form.

Then abruptly he drew back. The leaves directly above him were dark with

patches of wilt. His heart fell. There was spotting elsewhere as well, scattered

throughout the tree. It was not a trick of light and shadow. It was real.

He motioned frantically for Jase, then pointed as the other came

forward. As was their custom at this time, they did not speak, but Jase gasped

as he saw the extent of the damage already done. Slowly the two walked around

the tree, discovering spots everywhere, some, barely visible, others already

darkening the leaves so badly that their blood-red color seemed drained away.

Whatever his professed beliefs concerning the tree, Jase was badly

shaken, and his face reflected his dismay as he went back to confer in whispers

with the others. Lauren moved to join them, but. Jase quickly shook his head,

motioning to the top of the tree, where the dawn's light had almost reached the

uppermost branches.

Side 2

Terry Brooks - The Elfstones Of Shannara

Lauren knew his duty and he turned back again to the tree. Whatever else

was to happen, the Chosen must greet the Ellcrys this day as they had greeted

her each day since the beginning of their Order.

He placed his hands gently on the silver bark and the words of greeting

were forming on his lips when a slender branch from the ancient tree dipped

slightly to brush his shoulder.

-Lauren-

The young Elf jumped at the sound of his name. But no one had spoken.

The sound had been in his mind, the voice little more than an image of his own

face.

It was the Ellcrys!

He caught his breath, twisting his head to glimpse briefly the branch

that rested on his shoulder before turning quickly back again. Confusion swept

through him. Only once before had she spoken to him-on the day of his choosing.

She had spoken his name then; she had spoken all their names. It had been the

last time. She had never spoken to any of them after that. Never-except to

Amberle, of course, and Amberle was no longer one of them.

He looked hurriedly at the others. They were staring at him, curious as

to why he had stopped. Then the branch that rested upon his shoulder slipped

down to wrap about him loosely, and he flinched involuntarily with its touch.

-Lauren. Call the Chosen to me-

The images appeared quickly and were gone. Hesitantly; Lauren beckoned

to his comrades. They came forward, questions forming on their lips as they

stared upward at the silver-limbed tree. Branches lowered to clasp each, and the

voice of the Ellcrys whispered softly.

-Hear me. Remember what I tell you. Do not fail me-

A chill swept over them, and the Gardens of Life were shrouded in deep,

hollow silence, as if in all the world only they were alive. Images filled their

minds, flowing one after the other in rapid succession. There was horror

contained in those images. Had they been able, the Chosen would have turned

away, to flee and hide until the nightmare that possessed them had passed and

been forgotten. But the tree held them fast, and the images continued to flow

and the horror to mount, until they felt they could stand no more.

Then at last it was finished, and the Ellcrys was silent once more, her

limbs lifting from their shoulders and stretching wide to catch the warmth of

the morning sun.

Lauren stood frozen, tears streaming down his cheeks. Shattered, the six

Chosen faced one another, and in each mind the truth whispered soundlessly.

The legend was not legend. The legend was life. Evil did indeed lie

beyond a Forbidding that the Ellcrys maintained. Only she kept the Elven people

safe.

And now she was dying.

Far to the west of Arborlon, beyond the Breakline, there was a stirring in the

air. Something blacker than the darkness of the early dawn appeared, writhing

and shuddering with the force of some blow that appeared to strike it.

Momentarily, the veil of blackness held firm. Then it split wide, rent by the

force from within it. Howls and shrieks of glee spilled forth from the

impenetrable blackness beyond, as dozens of clawed limbs ripped and tore at the

sudden breach, straining toward the light. Then red fire exploded all about and

the hands fell away, twisted and burned.

The Dagda Mor appeared out of the dark, hissing with rage. His Staff of

Power steamed hotly as he brushed aside the impatient ones and stepped boldly

through the opening. An instant later, the dark forms of the Reaper and the

Changeling followed him. Other bodies pushed forward in desperation, but the

edges of the rent came together quickly, closing off the blackness and the

things that lived within it. In moments, the opening had disappeared entirely

and the strange trio stood alone.

The Dagda Mor looked about warily. They stood in the shadow of the

Breakline, the dawn which had already shattered the peace of the Chosen little

more than a faint light in the eastern sky beyond the monstrous wall of

mountains. The great, towering peaks knifed into the sky, casting pillars of

darkness far out into the desolation of the Hoare Fats. The Flats themselves

stretched westward from the line of the mountains into emptiness-a hard, barren

wasteland in which life spans were measured in minutes and hours. Nothing moved

on its surface. No sound broke the stillness of the morning air.

Side 3

Terry Brooks - The Elfstones Of Shannara

The Dagda Mor smiled, his hooked teeth gleaming. His coming had gone

unnoticed. After all these years, he was free. He was loose once more among

those who had imprisoned him.

At a distance, he might have passed for one of them. He was basically

manlike in appearance. He walked upright on two legs, and his arms were only

slightly longer than those of a man. He carried himself stooped over, his

movements hampered by a peculiar hunching motion-but the dark robes that cloaked

him made it difficult to tell the cause. It was only when close that one could

see clearly the massive hump that crooked his spine almost double at the

shoulders. Or the great tufts of greenish hair that protruded from all parts of

his body like patches of saw grass. Or the scales that coated his forearms and

lower legs. Or the hands and feet that ended in claws. Or the vaguely catlike

muzzle that was his face. Or the eyes, black and shining, deceptively placid on

their surface, like twin pools of water that hid something evil and destructive.

Once these were seen, there was no longer any question as to the Dagda

Mor's identity. What was revealed then was not man, but Demon.

And the Demon hated. He hated with an intensity that bordered on

madness. Hundreds of years of imprisonment within the black hold that lay beyond

the wall of the Forbidding had given his hatred more than sufficient time to

fester and grow. Now it consumed him. It was everything to him. It gave him his

power, and he would use that power to crush the creatures who had caused him so

much misery. The Elves! All of the Elves. And even that would not be enough to

satisfy him now-not now, not after centuries of being shut from this world that

had once been his hut into that formless, insentient limbo of endless dark and

slow, wretched stagnation. No, the destruction of the Elves would not be enough

to salve the indignity that he had suffered. The others must be destroyed as

well. Men, Dwarves, Trolls, Gnomes, all those who were a part of the humanity

that he so detested, the races of humanity that lived upon his world and claimed

it for their own.

His vengeance would come, he thought...just as his freedom had come. He

could feel it. He had waited centuries, posted at the wall of the Forbidding,

testing its strength, probing for weakness-all the time knowing that it must,

one day, begin to fail. And now that day was here. The Ellcrys was dying. Ah,

sweet words! He wanted to shout them aloud! She was dying! She was dying and she

could no longer maintain the Forbidding!

The Staff of Power glowed redly in his hands as the hatred flowed

through him. The earth beneath its tip charred to ash. With an effort he calmed

himself and the Staff grew cool again.

For a time, of course, the Forbidding would still hold firm. Complete

erosion would not take place overnight nor, quite possibly, for several weeks.

Even the small breach at he had managed had required enormous power. But the

Dagda Mor possessed enormous power, more power than any of those still trapped

behind the Forbidding. He was chief among them; his word ruled them. A few had

defied that word during the long years of banishment only a few. He had broken

them. He had made unpleasant examples of them. Now all obeyed him. They feared

him. But they shared his hatred of what had been done to them. They, too, fed on

that hatred. It had driven them into a frenzied need for revenge, and when at

last they were set free again, that need would take a long, long time to be

satisfied.

But for now, they must wait. For now, they must be patient. It would not

be long. The Forbidding would weaken a little more each day, decaying as the

Ellcrys slowly failed. Only one thing could prevent this-a rebirth.

The Dagda Mor nodded to himself. He knew well the history of the

Ellcrys. Had he not been present when she had first seen life, when she had shut

his brethren and himself from their world of light into their prison of dark?

Had he not seen the nature of the sorcery that had defeated them-a sorcery so

powerful that it could transcend even death? And he knew that this freedom could

still be taken from him. If one of the Chosen were permitted to carry a seed of

the tree to the source of her power, the Ellcrys might be reborn and the

Forbidding invoked again. He knew this, and it was because of this knowledge

that he was here now. He had by no means been certain that he could breach the

wall of the Forbidding. It had been a dangerous gamble to expend so much power

in the attempt, for, had he failed, he might have been left badly weakened.

There were some behind the wall almost as powerful as he; they would have seized

the opportunity to destroy him. But the gamble had been necessary. The Eves did

not realize the extent of their danger yet. For the moment, they believed

themselves safe. They did not think that any within the confines of the

Forbidding possessed sufficient power to break through. They would discover

Side 4

Terry Brooks - The Elfstones Of Shannara

their error too late. By then, he would have made certain that the Ellcrys could

never be reborn nor the Forbidding restored.

If was for that reason that he had brought the other two.

He glanced about for them now. He found the Changeling immediately, his

body undergoing a steady transition of colors and shapes as he practiced

duplicating the life he found here-in the sky, a searching hawk and a small

raven; on the earth, a groundhog, then a snake, a multilegged insect with

pincers, then on to something new, almost as quickly as the eye could follow.

For the Changeling could be anything. Shut away in the darkness with only his

brethren to model after, he had been denied the full use of his powers. There,

they had been virtually wasted. But here, in this world, the possibilities were

endless. All things, whether human or animal, fish or fowl, no matter their

size, shape, color or abilities-he could be any of them. He could assimilate

their characteristics perfectly. Even the Dagda Mor was not certain of the

Changeling's true appearance; the creature was so prone to adapt to other life

forms that he spent virtually all of his rime being something or someone other

than what he really was.

It was an extraordinary gift, but it was possessed by a creature whose

capacity for evil was very nearly as great as that of the Dagda Mor. The

Changeling, too, was of Demon spawn. He was selfish and hateful. He enjoyed

duplicity; he enjoyed hurting others. He had always been the enemy of the Elven

people and their allies, detesting them for their pious concern for the welfare

of the lesser life forms that inhabited their world. Lesser creatures meant

nothing to the Changeling. They were weak, vulnerable; they were meant to be

used by more powerful beings-beings such as himself. The Elves were no better

than the creatures they sought to protect. They either could not or would not

deceive as he did. All of them were trapped by what they were; they could be

nothing else. He could be whatever he wished. He despised them all. The

Changeling had no friends. He wanted none. None but the Dagda Mor, that was, for

the Dagda Mor possessed the one thing he respected-power greater than his own.

It was for that reason and for that reason alone that the Changeling had come to

serve him.

It took the Dagda Mor several moments longer to locate the Reaper. He

found it finally, not more than ten feet away, perfectly motionless, little more

than a shadow in the pale light of early dawn, another bit of fading night

hunched down against the gray of the Flats. Cloaked head to foot in robes the

color of damp ashes, the Reaper was almost invisible, its face careful concealed

within the shadow of a broad hood. No one ever looked upon that face more than

once. The Reaper permitted only its victims to see that much of it, and its

victims were all dead.

If the Changeling were to be judged dangerous, then the Reaper was ten

times more so. The Reaper was a killer. Killing was the sole function of its

existence. It was a massive creature, heavily muscled, almost seven feet tall

when it rose to its full height. Yet its size was misleading, for it was by no

means ponderous. It moved with the ease and grace of the best Elven

Hunter-smooth, fluid, quick, and noiseless. Once it had begun a hunt, it never

gave up. Nothing it went after ever escaped. Even the Dagda Mor was wary of the

Reaper, though the Reaper did not possess his power. He was wary because the

Reaper served him out of whim and not out of fear or respect as did all the

others. The Reaper feared nothing. It was a monster who cared nothing for life,

even its own. It did not even kill because it enjoyed killing, though in truth

it did enjoy killing. It killed because killing was instinctive. It killed

because it found killing necessary. At times, within the darkness of the

Forbidding, shut away from every form of life but its own brethren, it had been

almost unmanageable. The Dagda Mor had been forced to give it lesser Demons to

keeping it under his control with a promise. Once they were free of the

Forbidding-and they would, one day, be free-the Reaper would be given an entire

world of creatures that it might prey upon. For as long as it wished, it might

hunt them. In the end, it might kill them all.

The Changeling and the Reaper. The Dagda Mor had chosen well. One would

be his eyes, the other his hands, eyes and hands that would go deep into the

heart of the Elven people and end forever the chance that the Ellcrys might be

reborn.

He glanced sharply to the east where the rim of the morning sun was

rising rapidly above the crest of the Breakline. It was time to go. By tonight,

they must be in Arborlon. This, too, he had planned with care. Time was precious

to him; he had little to waste if he expected to catch the Elves napping. They

must not know of his presence until it was too late to do anything about it.

Side 5

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Terry Brooks - The Elfstones Of ShannaraElfstones of Shannara by Terry BrooksCopyright 1982IThe night sky brightened faintly in the east with the approach of dawn as the Chosen entered the Gardens of Life. Without, the Elven city of Arborlon lay sleeping, its people still wrapped in the warmth and s...

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