Brooks, Terry - Shannara Heritage 1 Scions Of Shannara

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Scions Of Shannara

Heritage of Shannara vol. 1

Terry Brooks

The old man sat alone in the shadow of the Dragon's Teeth and watched the coming

darkness chase the daylight 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 of deadwood 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

creature 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

2 The Scions of Shannara

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 Scions of Shann^ "

The powder expl^d skyward with a strange light that

brightened the air ab^t tlim 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 rcflected gtow. He rocked

back and forth slight^ and for a ""oment felt young again.

Then a shadow ap^"^ ^dd^Y m 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," tfc^ 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— . , • ., r r.

The voice was a rf^hisper 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 c^""01 command me!"

—I do not comma^-1 "^"^t- Listen to me- You are a11 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 fne' , , ,, ,

—A part of you wil1 ^ways be what once you would not have

questioned. The ma^ stavs within you. Always. Help me. I

send the dreams an<^ Ae Shannara children do not respond.

Someone must go to ^em- Someone must make diem see. You-

" Not me' I have ^ved BP^ from ±e races for years now- 1

wish nothing more ^ d0 with their roubles!" The old man

straightened his stick f0™ 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,

4 The Scions of Shannara

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

The Scions of Shannara 5

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 mat 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.

Far 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

The Scions of Shannam 7

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-

8 The Scions of Shannara

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

giri, 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

The Scions of Shannara 9

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

10 The Scions of Shannara

magic because it had not yet been discovered but of the old

world before its destruction in the Great Wars and the tellers

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