The Talismans of Shannara

Chapter Thirty-Four

The assault on Southwatch began with less than an hour remaining before dawn.

The approach was uneventful. Clouds continued to blanket the sky, shutting out the light of moon and stars, wrapping the earth below in a soft, thick blanket of gloom. Beneath the clouds, mist rose off the ground into the air and clung to trees and brush and grasses like wood smoke. The night was still and deep, empty of sound and movement, and nothing stirred on the parched and barren land that surrounded the keep. Walker Boh led the way, easing them down out of the high country and onto the flats, taking them through the mist and shadows, using his Druid magic to cloak them in silence. They passed as phantoms through the black, as invisible as thought and as smooth as flowing water. The Shadowen were not abroad this night, or at least not where the five humans and the moor cat walked, and the land belonged only to them. Walker was thinking of his plan. He was thinking that they would never have enough time to reach Par, free him of his bonds, and descend into the cellar. The Sword of Shannara would be needed to break the wishsong’s strange hold on him, and the Shadowen would be all over them the moment the Sword was used. What they needed was to bring Par out of his prison and down to the cellar before using the Sword. He was thinking of a way they might do that.

Coll Ohmsford was thinking, too. He was thinking that perhaps he was wrong in his belief that the Sword of Shannara could help his brother. It might be that the truth he sought to reveal would not free Par but drive him mad. For if the truth was that Par was a Shadowen, then it was of precious little use. Perhaps Allanon had intended the Sword for another purpose, he worried—one he had not yet recognized. Perhaps Par’s condition was not something that the Sword could help.

A step behind and to one side, Morgan Leah was thinking that even with all the talismans they carried and magics they wielded, their chances of succeeding in this venture were slim. The odds had been great at Tyrsis when they had gone after Padishar Creel, but they were far greater here. They would not all survive this, he was thinking. He did not like the thought, but it was inescapable, a small whisper at the back of his mind. He wondered if it was possible that after surviving so much—the Pit, the Jut, Eldwist, and all the monsters that had inhabited each—he might end up dying here. It seemed ridiculous somehow. This was the end of their quest, the conclusion of a journey that had stripped them of everything but their determination to go on. That it should end with them dying was wrong. But he knew as well that it was possible.

Damson Rhee was thinking of her father and Par and wondering if she had traded one for the other in making her decision to let Par go on alone in search of Coll when his brother had unexpectedly reappeared among the living. She wondered if the cost of her choice would be both their lives, and she decided that if her dying was the price exacted for her choice, she would pay it only after seeing the Valeman one more time.

At her side Matty Roh was wondering how strong the magic was that the Druid had given her, if it was enough to withstand the black things they would face, if it would enable her to kill them. She believed it was. She wore about her an air of invincibility. She was where she was meant to be. Her life had been leading to this time and place and a resolution of many things. She looked forward to seeing what it would bring.

Ranging off in the dark, a lean black shadow padding through the damp predawn grasses, Rumor thought nothing, untroubled by human fears and rationalizations, driven by instincts and excited by the knowledge that they were at hunt.

They passed through the gloom and came in sight of the dark tower, not pausing to consider, not even to look, but pressing on quickly so that it might be reached before fears and doubts froze them out. Southwatch rose out of the mist, faint and hazy, a dark wall against the clouds, looking as if it were something born of the night and in danger of passing back into it with the coming of dawn. It loomed immutable and fixed, the blackest dream that sleep had ever conjured, a thing of such evil that even the closeness of it was enough to poison the soul. They could feel its darkness as they approached, the measure of its purpose, the extent of its power. They could feel it breathing and watching and listening. They could sense its life.

Walker took them to its walls, to where the obsidian surface rose smooth and black out of the earth, and he placed his hands against the stone. It pulsed like a living thing, warm and damp and stretching upward as if seeking release. But how could this be so? The Dark Uncle pondered the nature of the tower again, then pressed on along its walls, anxious to find a way in. He reached out tendrils of his magic to seek the tower’s dark inhabitants, but they were all busy within and not aware yet of his presence. He drew back quickly, not wanting to alert them, cautious as he continued on.

They came to an entry formed by an arched niche that sheltered a broad wedge of stone that was a door. Walker studied the entry, feeling along its borders and searching its seams. It could be breached, he decided, the locks released and the portal opened. But would the breach give them away too quickly? He looked back at the others, the two women, the Highlander, the Valeman, and the moor cat. They needed to reach Par without being discovered. They needed to gain at least that much time before having to fight.

He bent close to them. “Hold me upright. Do not let me go and do not move from this spot.”

Then he closed his eyes and went out from himself in spirit form to enter the keep.

Within the dark confines of his prison cell Par Ohmsford sat hunched over on his pallet, trying to hold himself together.

He was desperate now, feeling as if another day within the tower would mark the end of him, as if another day spent wondering if the magic was changing him irreparably would unhinge him completely. He could feel the magic working through him all the time now, racing down his limbs, boiling through his blood, nipping and scratching at his skin like an itch that could never be satisfied. He hated what was happening to him. He hated who he was. He hated Rimmer Dall and the Shadowen and Southwatch and the black hole of his life to which he had been condemned. Hope no longer had meaning for him. He had lost his belief that the magic was a gift, that Allanon’s shade had dispatched him into the world to serve some important purpose, that there were lines of distinction between good and evil, and that he was meant to survive what was happening to him.

He hugged his knees to his chest and cried. He was sick at heart and filled with despair. He would never be free of this place. He would never see Coll or Damson or any of the others again—if any of them were even still alive. He looked through the bars of his narrow window and thought that the world beyond might have already become the nightmare that Allanon had shown him so long ago. He thought that perhaps it had always been like that and only his misperception of things had let him believe it was anything else.

He was careful not to fall asleep. He didn’t dare sleep at all anymore because he couldn’t stand the dreams that sleep brought. He could feel himself beginning to accept the dreams as fact, to believe that it must be true that he was a Shadowen. His sense of things was fragmented on waking, and he could not escape the feeling that he was no longer himself. Rimmer Dall was a dark figure promising help and offering something else. Rimmer Dall was the chance he dared not take—and the chance that he eventually must.

No. No. Never.

There was a stirring in the air where the door to his cell stood closed and barred. He sensed it before he saw it, then caught a glimpse of shadows passing across the night. He blinked, thinking it another of his demons come to haunt him, another vestige of his encroaching madness. He brushed at the air before his eyes in response, as if that might clear his vision so that he could see better what he knew wasn’t there. He almost laughed when he heard the voice.

Par. Listen to me.

He shook his head. Why should he?

Par Ohmsford!

The voice was sharp-edged and brittle with anger. Par’s head snapped up at once.

Listen to me. Listen to my voice. Who am I? Speak my name.

Par stared at the black nothingness before him, thinking that he had gone mad indeed. The voice he was listening to was Walker Boh’s.

Speak my name!

“Walker,” he whispered.

The word was a spark in the blackness of his despair, and he jerked upright at its bright flare, legs dropping back down to the floor, arms falling to his sides. He stared at the gloom in disbelief, hearing the demons shriek and scatter.

Listen to me, Par. We have come for you. We have come to set you free and take you away. Coll is with me. And Morgan. And Damson Rhee.

“No.” He could not help himself. The word was spoken before he could think better of it. But it was what he believed. It could not be so. He had hoped too many times. He had hoped, and hope had failed him repeatedly.

The stirring in the air moved closer, and he sensed a presence he could not see. Walker Boh. How had he reached him? How could he be here and not be visible? Was he become...?

I am. I have done as I was asked, Par. I have brought back Paranor and become the first of the new Druids. I have done as Allanon asked and carried out the charge given to me.

Par came to his feet, breathing rapidly, reaching out at the nothingness.

Listen to me. You must come down to where we wait. We cannot reach you here. You must use the magic of the wishsong, Par. Use it to break through the door that imprisons you. Break through and come down to us.

Par shook his head. Use the wishsong’s magic? Now, after taking such care to prevent that use? No, he couldn’t. If he did, he would be lost. The magic freed would overwhelm him and make him the thing he had struggled so to prevent himself from becoming. He would rather die.

You must, Par. Use the magic.

“No.” The word was a harsh whisper in the silence.

We cannot reach you otherwise. Use the magic, Par. If you are to be free of your prison, of the one you have constructed for yourself as well as the one in which the Shadowen have placed you, you must use the magic. Do it now, Par.

But Par had decided suddenly that this was another trick, another game being played by either his or the Shadowen magic, a conjuring of voices out of memory to torment him. He could hear his demons laugh anew. Wheeling away, he clapped his hands over his ears and shook his head violently. Walker Boh wasn’t there. No one was there. He was as alone now as he had been since he had been brought to the keep. It was foolish to think otherwise. This was another facet of his growing madness, a bright polished surface that mirrored what he had once dreamed might happen but now never would.

“I won’t. I can’t.”

He clenched his teeth as he spoke and hissed the words as if they were anathema. He swung away from the perceived source of the false hope, the voice that wasn’t, moving into deeper shadow, taking himself further into the dark.

Walker Boh’s voice came again, steady and persuasive.

Par. You told me once that the magic was a gift, that it had been given to you for a reason, that it was meant to be used. You told me that I should believe in the dreams we had been shown. Have you forgotten?

Par stared into the black before him, remembering. He had said those things when he had first encountered Walker at Hearthstone, all those weeks ago, when Walker had refused to come with him to the Hadeshorn. Believe, he had urged the Dark Uncle. Believe.

Use your magic, Par. Break free.

He turned, the spark visible again in the darkness of his hopelessness, of his despair. He wanted to believe again. As he had once urged his uncle to believe. Had he forgotten how? He started across the room, gaining a measure of determination as he went. He wanted to believe. Why shouldn’t he? Why not try? Why not do something, anything, but give up? He saw the door coming toward him out of the gloom, rising up, the barrier he could not get past. Unless. Unless he used the magic. Why not? What was left?

Walker Boh was beside him suddenly, close enough that he could feel him even though he was not really there. Walker Boh, come out of his own despair, his own lack of belief, to accept the charges of Allanon. Yes, Paranor and the Druids were back. Yes, he had found the Sword of Shannara. And yes, Wren had found the Elves as well—must have, would have.

Use the magic, Par.

He did not hear the admonition this time. He walked through it as if it wasn’t there, the only sound the rush of his breathing as he closed on the door. Inside, something gave way. I won’t die here, he was thinking. I won’t.

The magic flared at his fingertips then, and he sent it hurtling into the door, blowing it off its hinges as if it had been caught in a thunderous wind. The door flew all the way across the hall and shattered on the wall beyond. Instantly Par was through the opening and moving down the hall toward the stairs, hearing Walker Boh’s voice again, following the directions and urgings it was giving, but feeling nothing inside but the fire of the magic as it wheeled and crashed against his bones, released anew and determined to stay that way. He didn’t care. He liked having it free. He wanted it to consume him, to consume everything that came within reach. If this was the madness he had been promised, then he was anxious to embrace it.

He went down the stairs swiftly, leaving the magic’s fire in his wake, fighting to control the buildup of its power within. Dark shapes darted to meet him, and he burned them to ash. Shadowen? Something else? He didn’t know. The tower had come awake in the predawn dark, its inhabitants rising up in response to the magic’s presence, knowing they were invaded and quick to seek out the source of the intrusion. Fire burned down at him from above and from below, but he sensed it long before it struck, and deflected it effortlessly. There was a dark core forming within him, a dangerous mix of casual disregard and pleasure born of the magic’s use, and its coming seemed to generate a falling away of caring and worry and caution. He was shedding his humanity. He could do as he pleased, he sensed. The magic gave him the right.

Walker Boh was screaming at him, but he could no longer hear the words. Nor did he care to. He pressed on, moving steadily downward, destroying everything that came into his path. Nothing could challenge him now. He sent the fire of the wishsong ahead and followed gleefully after.

Walker Boh thrashed awake again, body jerking, arms yanking free. His companions stepped back from him quickly. “He’s coming!” he hissed, his eyes snapping open. “But he’s losing himself in the magic!”

They did not have to ask who he was talking about. “What do you mean?” Coll still gripped his cloak, and he pulled Walker about violently.

Walker’s eyes were as hard as stone as they met the Valeman’s. “He has used the magic, but lost control of it. He’s using it on everything. Now, get back from me!”

He shrugged free and wheeled away, put his hands on the stone door, and pushed. Light flared from his palms and streaked out of his fingertips into the seams of the massive portal, racing down through the cracks. Locks snapped apart and iron bars splintered. The time for stealth and caution was past. The doors shuddered and gave way with a crunch of metal.

They were inside at once, moving into a blackness even more intense than the night, feeling cold and damp on their skin, breathing dust and staleness through their nostrils. It wasn’t age and disuse they found waiting, but a terrible foulness that spoke of something trapped and dying. They choked on it, and Walker sent light scurrying to the darkened corners of the room in which they stood. It was a massive entry to a series of halls that passed beneath a catwalk high above. Beyond, through an arched opening, stood an empty courtyard.

Somewhere in the distant black, they could hear screams and smell burning and see the white flare of Par’s magic.

Rumor was already moving ahead, loping down the entry and through the opening to the courtyard. Walker and the others went after him, grim-faced and voiceless. Shadows moved at the fringes of the whirl of light and sound, but nothing attacked. They crossed the courtyard in a crouch, glancing left and right guardedly. The Shadowen were there, somewhere close. They reached the far side of the yard, still following the noises and flashes within, and pushed through into a hall.

Before them, a stairway climbed into the dark tower, winding upward into a blackness now stabbed with the bright flare of magic’s white fire. Par was coming down. They stood frozen as he neared, unsure what they would find, uncertain what to do. They knew they had to reach him somehow, had to bring him back to himself, but they also knew—even Matty Roh, for whom the magic was something of an enigma—that this would not be easy, that what was happening to Par Ohmsford was harsh and terrifying and formidable. They spread out on Walker’s silent command. Morgan drew free the Sword of Leah and Coll the Sword of Shannara, their talismans against the dark things, and when Matty saw this she freed her slender fighting sword as well. Walker moved a step in front of them, thinking that this was his doing, that it was up to him to find a way to break through the armor that the magic of the wishsong had thrown up around Par, that it was his responsibility to help Par discover the truth about himself.

And suddenly the Valeman came into view, gliding smoothly down the stairs, a phantom ablaze with the magic’s light, the power sparking at the ends of his fingers, across his face, in the depth of his eyes. He saw them and yet did not see them. He came on without slowing and without speaking. Above, there was chaos, but it had not yet begun to descend in pursuit. Par came on, still floating, still ephemeral, moving directly toward Walker and showing no signs of slowing.

“Par Ohmsford!” Walker Boh called out.

The Valeman came on.

“Par, draw back the magic!”

Par hesitated, seeing Walker for the first time or perhaps simply recognizing him, and slowed.

“Par. Close the magic away. We don’t have—”

Par sent a ribbon of fire whipping at Walker that threatened to strangle him. Walker’s own magic rose in defense, brushing the ribbon back, twisting it to smoke. Par stopped completely, and the two stood facing each other in the gloom.

“Par, it’s me!” Coll called out from one side.

His brother turned toward him, but there was no hint of recognition in his eyes. The magic of the wishsong hissed and sang in the air about him, snapping like a cloak caught in a wind. Morgan called out as well, pleading for him to listen, but Par didn’t even look at the Highlander. He was deep in the magic’s thrall now, so caught up in it that nothing else mattered and even the voices of his friends were unrecognizable. He turned from one to the other as they called to him, but the sound of their voices only served to cause the magic to draw tighter.

We can’t bring him back, Walker was thinking in despair. He won’t respond to any of us. Already he could sense the pursuit beginning again, could feel the Shadowen drawing near down the connecting halls. Once Rimmer Dall reached them...

And then suddenly Damson Rhee was moving forward, brushing past Walker before he could think to object, mounting the stairs and closing on Par. Par saw her coming and squared himself away to face her, the magic flaring wickedly at his fingertips. Damson approached without weapons or magic to aid her, arms lowered, hands spread open, head lifted. Walker thought momentarily to rush forward and yank her back again, but it was already too late.

“Par,” she whispered as she came up to him, stopping when she was no more than a yard away. She was on a lower step and looking up, her red hair twisted back from her face, her eyes filling with tears. “I thought I would never see you again.”

Par Ohmsford stared.

“I am frightened I will lose you again, Par. To the magic. To your fear that it will betray you as it did when you believed Coll killed. Don’t leave me, Par.”

A hint of recognition showing in the maddened eyes.

“Come close to me, Par.”

“Damson?” he whispered suddenly.

“Yes,” she answered, smiling, the tears streaking her face now. “I love you, Par Ohmsford.”

For a long moment he did not move, standing on the stairs in the gloom as if carved from stone while the magic raced down his limbs and about his body. Then he sobbed in response, something coming awake within him that had been sleeping before, and he squeezed his eyes shut in concentration. His body shook, convulsed, and the magic flared once and died away. His eyes opened again. “Damson,” he whispered, seeing her now, seeing them all, and swayed forward.

She caught him as he fell, and instantly Walker was there, too, and then all of them, reaching for the Valeman and bringing him down into the hall, holding him upright, searching his ravaged face.

“I can’t breathe anymore,” he whispered to them. “I can’t breathe.”

Damson was holding him close, whispering back that it was all right, that he was safe now, that they would get him away. But Walker saw the truth in Par Ohmsford’s eyes. He was waging a battle with the wishsong’s magic that he was losing. Whatever was happening to him, he needed to confront it now, to be set free of the fears and doubts that had plagued him for weeks.

“Coll,” he said quietly as they lowered Par to his knees and let him collapse against Damson. “Use the Sword of Shannara. Don’t wait any longer. Use it.”

Coll stared back at the Dark Uncle uncertainly. “But I’m not sure what it will do.”

Walker Boh’s voice turned as hard as iron. “Use the Sword, Coll. Use it, or we’re going to lose him!”

Coll turned away quickly and knelt next to Par and Damson. He held the Sword of Shannara before him, both hands knotting on its handle. It was his talisman to use, but the consequences of that use his to bear.

“Morgan, watch the stairs,” Walker Boh ordered. “Matty Roh, the halls.” He moved toward Par. “Damson, let him go.”

Damson Rhee stared upward with stricken eyes. There was unexpected warmth in Walker’s gaze, a mix of reassurance and kindness. “Let him go, Damson,” he said gently. “Move away.”

She released Par, and the Valeman slumped forward. Coll caught him, cradled him in his arms momentarily, then took his brother’s hands and placed them on the handle of the Sword beneath his own. “Walker,” he whispered beseechingly. “Use it!” the Dark Uncle hissed.

Morgan glanced over uneasily. “I don’t like this, Walker...”

But he was too late. Coll, persuaded by the strength of Walker Boh’s command, had summoned forth the magic. The Sword of Shannara flared to life, and the dark well of the Shadowen keep was flooded with light.

Wrapped in a choking cloud of paralyzing indecision and devastating fear, Par Ohmsford felt the Sword’s magic penetrate like fire out of darkness, burning its way down into him. The magic of the wishsong rose to meet it, to block it, a white wall of determined silence. Protective doors flew closed within, locks turned, and the shivering of his soul rocked him back on his heels. He was aware, vaguely, that Coll had summoned the Sword’s magic, that the power to do so was somehow his where it had not been Par’s, and there was a sense of things being turned upside down. He retreated from the magic’s approach, unable to bear the truth it might bring, wanting only to hide away forever within himself.

But the magic of the Sword of Shannara came this time with the weight of his brother’s voice behind it, pressing down within him. Listen, Par. Listen. Please, listen. The words eased their way past the wishsong’s defenses and gave entry to what followed. He thought it was Colls words alone at first that breached his defenses, that let in the white light. But then he saw it was something more. It was his own weary need to know once and for all the worst of what there was, to be free of the doubt and terror that not knowing brought. He had lived with it too long to live with it longer. His magic had shielded him from everything, but it could not do so when he no longer wished it. He was backed to the wall of his sanity, and he could not back away farther.

He reached for his brother’s voice with his own, anxious and compelling. Tell me. Tell me everything.

The wishsong spit and hissed like a cornered cat, but it was, after all, his to command still, his birthright and his heritage, and nothing it might do could withstand both reason and need. He had bent to its will when his fear and doubt had undermined him, but he had never broken completely, and now he would be free of his uncertainty forever.

Coll, he pleaded. His brother was there, steadying him. Coll.

Holding on to each other and to the Sword, they locked their fingers tight and slipped down into the magic’s light. There Coll soothed Par, reassuring him that the magic would heal and not harm, that whatever happened, he would not abandon his brother. The last of Par’s defenses gave way, the locks releasing, the doors opening, and the darkness dispelling. Shedding the last of the wishsong’s trappings, he gave himself over with a sigh.

And then the truth began, a trickle of memories that grew quickly to a flood. All that was and had ever been in Par’s life, the secrets he had kept hidden even from himself, the shames and embarrassments, the failures and losses he had locked away, marched forth. They came parading into the light, and while Par shrank from them at first, the pain harsh and unending, his strength grew with each remembering, and the task of accepting what they meant and how they measured him as a man became bearable.

The light shifted then, and he saw himself now, come in search of the Sword of Shannara at Allanon’s urging, anxious for the charge, eager to discover the truth about himself. But how eager, in fact? For what he found was that he might be the very thing he had committed against. What he found was Rimmer Dall waiting, telling him he was not who he thought, that he was someone else entirely, one of the dark things, one of the Shadowen. Only a word, Rimmer Dall had whispered, only a name. A Shadowen, with Shadowen magic to wield, with power no different than that of the red-eyed wraiths, able to be what they were, to do as they did.

What he saw now, in the cool white light of the Sword’s truth, was that it was all true.

One of them.

He was one of them.

He lurched away from the recognition, from the inescapability of what he was being shown, and he thought he might have screamed in horror but could not tell within the light. A Shadowen! He was a Shadowen! He felt Coll flinch from him. He felt his brother jerk away. But Coll did not let go. He kept holding him. It doesn’t matter what you are, you are my brother, he heard. No matter what. You are my brother. It kept Par from falling off the edge of sanity into madness. It kept him grounded in the face of his own terror, of his frightening discovery of self.

And it let him see the rest of what the truth would reveal.

He saw that his Elven blood and ancestry bound him to the Shadowen, who were Elven, too. Come from the same lineage, from the same history, they were bound as people are who share a similar past. But the choice to be something different was there as well. His ancestry was Shannara as well as Shadowen, and need not be what his magic might make him. His belief that he was predestined to be one of the dark things was the lie Rimmer Dall had planted within him, there within the vault that held the Sword of Shannara, there when he had come down into the Pit for the last time with Coll and Damson. It was Rimmer Dall who had let him try the Sword, knowing it would not work because his own magic would not let it, a barrier to a truth that might prove too unpleasant to accept. It was Rimmer Dall who had suggested he was Shadowen spawn, was one of them, was a vessel for their magic, giving him the uncertainty required to prevent the warring magics of Sword and wishsong from finding a common ground and thereby beginning the long spiral of doubt that would lead to Par’s final subversion when the possibility of what he might be grew so large that it became fact.

Par gasped and reared back, seeing it now, seeing it all. Believe for long enough and it will come to pass. Believe it might be so, and it will be so. That was what he had done to himself, blanketed in magic too strong for anything to break down until he was willing to allow it, locked away by his fears and uncertainties from the truth. Rimmer Dall had known. Rimmer Dall had seen that Par would wrestle alone with the possibilities the First Seeker offered. Let him think he killed his brother with his magic. Let him think the Sword of Shannara’s magic could never be his. Let him think he was failing because of who he might be. As long as he unwittingly used the wishsong to keep the Sword’s magic at bay, what chance did he have to resolve the conflict of his identity? Par would be savior of the Druids and pawn of the Shadowen both, and the twist of the two would tear him apart.

“But I do not have to be one of them,” he heard himself say. “I do not have to!”

He shuddered with the weight of his words. Colls understanding smile warmed him like the sun. As it had been for his brother when the Sword’s truth tore away the dark lie of the Mirrorshroud, recognition became the pathway by which Par now came back to himself. Had Allanon known it would be like this? he wondered as he began to rise out of light. Had Allanon seen that this was the need for the Sword of Shannara?

When the magic died away and his eyes opened, he was surprised to find that he was crying.