The Wishsong of Shannara

Chapter Forty–Six

The silver light flared above the waters gathered in the basin of Heaven’s Well and an apprehensive Slanter stumbled back away once more. There was an explosion of shimmering brilliance, a radiance as intense and blinding as the cresting of the sun at dawn, reaching out through the fading of the night. It streaked through the cavern’s dark shadows, burst into shards of white fire, and was gone.

Wincing, Slanter looked back again at the stone basin. Standing worn and battered at its edge was Jair Ohmsford.

«Boy!» the Gnome cried, a mix of concern and relief in his voice as he rushed to meet the Valeman.

Jair slumped forward in exhaustion, and the other caught him about the waist. «I couldn’t bring her out, Slanter,” he whispered. «I tried, but the magic wasn’t strong enough. I had to leave her.»

«Here, here — just take a moment to catch your breath,” Slanter growled as the Valeman stumbled over his words. «Sit here by the basin.»

He eased Jair down against the stone wall, then knelt next to him. The Valeman’s eyes lifted. «I went down into the Maelmord, Slanter — or at least a part of me did. I used the third magic — the one that the King of the Silver River gave to me to help Brin. It took me into the light and then out of myself — as if there were two of me. I went down into the pit where the vision crystal had shown me Brin. She was there, in a tower, and she had the Ildatch. But it had changed her, Slanter. She had become something… terrible…»

«Easy, boy. Slow down, now.» The Gnome held his gaze. «Did you find a way to help her?»

Jair nodded, swallowing. «She was changed, but I knew that if I could just reach her, if I could touch her and she could touch me — then she Would be all right. I used the wishsong to show her who she was, what she meant to me… to let her know that I loved her!» He was fighting back the tears. «And she destroyed the Ildatch — she turned it to dust! But when she did, the tower began to crumble, and something happened to the magic. I couldn’t stay with her. I couldn’t bring her back with me. I tried, but it happened so quickly. I couldn’t even manage to tell her what was happening! She just… disappeared, and I was back here again…

He dropped his head between his knees, choking. Slanter gripped his shoulders with rough, gnarled hands and squeezed.

«You did the best you could for her, boy. You did everything you could. You can’t blame yourself for not being able to do more.» He shook his wizened face. «Shades, I don’t know how it is that you’re still alive! I thought you lost in the magic! I didn’t think I’d ever see you again!»

Then he hugged Jair impulsively to him and whispered. «You got more sand than I do, boy — a whole lot more!»

He pulled away then, embarrassed by his action, muttering something about no one really knowing what they were doing in all this confusion. He was about to say something more when the tremors began — a series of deep, heavy rumblings that shook the mountain to its core.

«What’s happening now?» he exclaimed, glancing back across his shoulder into the shadows that shrouded the passageway that had brought them in.

«It’s the Maelmord,” Jair replied at once, pushing himself hurriedly back to his feet. The wound in his shoulder throbbed and ached as he straightened against the basin wall, and he clutched at the Gnome for support. «Slanter, we have to go back for Brin. She’s alone down there. We have to help her.»

The Gnome gave him a quick, fierce smile in reply. «Of course, we do, boy. You and me. We’ll get her out. We’ll go down into that black pit and we’ll find her! Now here, put your arm about my shoulders and hold on.»

With Jair clinging tightly to him, the Gnome began to retrace their steps back through the cavern toward the stairway that had brought them in. Dusk had settled down across the land, and the sun had slipped behind the rim of the mountains. Small slivers of the dying light fell through crevices in the rock to mingle with the twilight shadows as the two companions stumbled resolutely ahead. The tremors continued, slow and steady, a grim reminder that time was slipping from them. Chunks of rock and dirt showered down about them, forming a haze that hung like mist in the still evening air. There was a low rumbling in the distance like the thunder of an approaching storm.

Then they were clear of the cavern once more, passing from its darkened mouth onto the ledge that ran down to the Croagh. In the east, the moon and a scattering of stars were already visible in the velvet sky. Shadows lay in dappled patterns across the ledge face, closing about the last patches of fading light like inkstains spreading on new paper.

In the midst of the shadows and the half–light lay Garet Jax.

Stunned, Jair and Slanter came forward. The Weapons Master lay back against a gathering of rocks, his black–clad form torn and bloodied, the slender sword still gripped in one hand. His eyes were closed, as if he slept. Hesitating, Slanter knelt beside him.

«Is he dead?» Jair whispered, barely able to make himself speak the words.

The Gnome bent close for a moment, then drew back again. Slowly, he nodded. «Yes, boy — he’s dead. He finally found something that could kill him — something that was as good as he was.» There was grudging disbelief in his voice. «He looked hard enough and long enough to find it, didn’t he?»

Jair did not answer. He was thinking of the times the Weapons Master had saved his life, rescuing him when no one else could. Garet Jax, his protector.

He would have cried if he had been able, but there were no tears left to shed.

Slanter came to his feet and stood looking down at the still form. «Always wondered what it would be that would finally kill him,” the Gnome muttered. «Had to be something made of the dark magic, I guess. Couldn’t be anything made of this world. Not with him.»

He turned and glanced about apprehensively. «Wonder what’s become of the red thing?»

Tremors shook the mountain, and the rumbling rolled out of the valley. Jair barely heard it. «He destroyed it, Slanter. Garet Jax destroyed it. And when the Ildatch was shattered, the dark magic took it back.»

«Could have happened that way, I guess.»

«It did happen that way. This was the battle he had been seeking the whole of his life. It meant everything to him. He wouldn’t have lost it.»

The Gnome glanced over at him sharply. «You don’t know that for sure, boy. You don’t know that he was a match for that thing.»

Jair looked at him then and nodded. «Yes, I do, Slanter. I do. He was a match for anything. He was the best.»

There was a long moment of silence between them. Then the Gnome nodded, too. «Yes, I guess he was.»

Again the tremors shook the mountain, reverberating out of the deep rock. Slanter caught hold of Jair’s arm and gently turned him away. «We can’t stay, boy. We have to find your sister right away.»

Jair glanced back at the still form of the Weapons Master one final time and then forced his eyes away. «Good–bye, Garet Jax,” he whispered.

Together, Gnome and Valeman hastened to the stairway of the Croagh and started down.

Brin ran through the dim and misted tangle of the Maelmord, free at last of the tower of the Ildatch. Deep tremors wracked the valley floor, shudders that rippled the peaks of the mountains all about. The dark magic was gone from the land, and with, its passing the Maelmord could not survive. The rise and fall of its breathing and the hiss that had whispered of its unnatural life were stilled.

Where am I? Brin wondered frantically, her eyes casting through the gathering shadows. What has become of the Croagh?

She knew that she was hopelessly lost. She had been from the moment that she had fled the tower. Nightfall lay over the whole of the valley, and she was deep within a graveyard where all signs appeared as one and no path showed itself. Through the webbing of limbs and vines overhead, she could see the rim of the mountains that ringed the valley pit, but the stem of the Croagh lay wrapped in darkness against their backdrop. The Maelmord had become an impossible maze, and she was caught within it.

She was exhausted, her strength drained by prolonged use of the wishsong and by her long journey down into the pit. She was lost, and the magic no longer gave her sight. And all about her, the tremors continued to shake the valley floor, forewarning of the destruction of the Maelmord and everything caught within it. Only her spirit remained strong, and it was her spirit that kept her moving now in search of an escape.

The ground sank sharply beneath her feet, giving way with a suddenness that was frightening. Brin stumbled and nearly went down. The Maelmord was breaking up. It was crumbling beneath her, and she knew now that she would be carried with it.

She slowed to a weary halt, gasping for breach. It was pointless to go on. She was running to no purpose, blind and directionless. Even the vaunted magic of the wishsong, should she choose to use it, could not save her now. Why had Jair abandoned her? Why had he gone? Despair washed through her at the terrible sense of betrayal — despair and unreasoning anger. But she fought back against those feelings, knowing that they were senseless and unfair. Jair would not have left her unless he had been given no choice. Whatever had brought him to her had simply taken him back again.

Or perhaps what she had thought was Jair was not and what she had seen and felt had not even been real. Perhaps it had all been something that in her madness she had dreamed…

«Jair!» she screamed.

The echo of her voice broke against the rumblings of the earth and then was gone. The ground sank further beneath her.

Resolutely, stubbornly, she turned and went on. She no longer ran, too wearied to run further. Her dusky face hardened with determination, and she brushed everything from her mind but the need to put one foot before the other. She would not give up. She would go on. When she could no longer walk upright, she would crawl. But she would go on.

Then suddenly a shadow bounded from the tangled dark, huge, lean, and ghostly. It came toward her and she cried out in fright. A massive whiskered face rubbed against her body, and luminous blue eyes blinked in greeting. It was Whisper! She fell against the moor cat in grateful disbelief, crying openly, wrapping her arms about the shaggy neck. Whisper had come for her!

The moor cat turned and started away at once, drawing her with him. She fastened one hand in the ruff of his neck and stumbled after. They slipped through the maze of the dying jungle. All about them, the rumblings grew and tremors shook the earth. Rotted limbs began to crash down about them. Steam smelling rank and fetid geysered from cracks that split the hardened earth. Boulders and slides broke away from the cliffs that walled the valley close and came tumbling through the dark.

Yet somehow they reached the Croagh, its coiled length materializing abruptly out of the gloom, rising from the valley floor into the night. The giant cat bounded onto the stairway with Brin a step behind. The Valegirl scrambled upward, groping her way uncertainly as the rumblings intensified. Massive tremors rocked the Croagh, one following close upon another. Brin was thrown to her knees. Beneath her, the stone began to crack and split. Whole sections of the stairway were breaking off and tumbling downward into the pit. Not yeti she screamed soundlessly. Not until I am free! Whisper’s deep roar lifted above the rumblings, and she struggled after the big cat. Below them, giant trees snapped apart like deadwood. The last of the failing twilight died as the sun slipped beneath the horizon and the whole of the land was wrapped in shadow.

And then the cliff ledge was before her again, and she stumbled onto it, crying out to the shadowy forms that closed about her. Arms reached for her, pulling her clear of the crumbling stairs, drawing her back from the precipice. Kimber was hugging and kissing her, her pixie face beaming with happiness and her eyes filled with tears. Cogline was muttering and grumbling, dabbing at her cheeks with a soiled cloth. And Rone was there, his lean, sun–browned face haggard and bruised, but his gray eyes were fierce with love. Whispering her name, he wrapped his arms about her and held her against him. It was then, finally, that she knew that she was safe.

Only moments later, Jair and Slanter came upon them, descending the Croagh from Heaven’s Well in their desperate search for Brin. There were astonished looks and exclamations of relief. Then Brin and Jair were clasping each other close once more.

«It was you who came to me in the Maelmord,” Brin whispered, stroking her brother’s head. She smiled through her tears. «You saved me, Jair.»

Jair hugged, her back to mask his embarrassment. Rone came over and hugged them both. «For cat’s sake, tiger — you’re supposed to be back in the Vale! Don’t you ever do anything you’re told?»

Slanter hung back tentatively, eyeing them all with studied suspicion, from the three who persisted in hugging and kissing each other to the spindly old man, the woods girl, and the giant moor cat stretched out beside them. «Oddest bunch I’ve ever come across,” he muttered to himself.

Then the rumblings from the floor of the valley rolled through the mountain rock like thunder, and the tremors shattered apart the whole of the Croagh. It tumbled into the pit and was gone. All of the little company that were gathered on the cliff ledge hastened to its edge and peered through the gloom. Shards of brightness from the moon and stars laced the darkness. In a rippling of shadows, the pit of the Maelmord began to sink. Downward it slipped, downward into the earth as if swallowed by quicksand. Soil, rock, and dying forest crumbled and fell away. The shadows lengthened and drew together until the moonlight could no longer show any trace of what had once been.

In moments, the Maelmord had disappeared forever.