Wards of Faerie: The Dark Legacy of Shannara (30 page)

Her destination was a hundred feet down a hall and three floors up to the highest room in the highest tower of Paranor. It took all her energy to get there, and she suffered a good deal of pain in the process. When she had climbed all sixty steps, she limped across the entry chamber to the ironbound wooden door that led into the cold room.

Even though the Ard Rhys had not found any trace of Bombax by using the scrye waters, Aphenglow thought she might have better luck. She was much closer to him than Khyber, more deeply invested. She might see things that others would miss or simply overlook. Reading the scrye waters was an art, and sometimes success was
achieved for intangible reasons. It was a better use of her time trying to discover if that were true rather than sitting around. Doing anything was better than doing nothing.

She released the latch and pushed open the heavy door to the cold room. The drop in temperature as she entered was immediately noticeable; on the walls condensation had turned to smears of ice, and she could see her breath when she exhaled. The chamber occupied the whole of the top floor of the tower, a surface area forty feet in diameter and fifteen feet high. It was empty save for a platform constructed of massive blocks of bluestone on which a broad basin rested. The shallow bowl of the basin was filled with greenish waters that looked to have the consistency of a thicker liquid, something approaching oil. The waters swirled in a clockwise motion, the movement barely discernible.

Aphenglow approached and looked down into the basin. Layered across its bottom were geographic features and strange symbols that represented the whole of the Four Lands and some places beyond. Anyone unfamiliar with Druid lore would not have been able to recognize what they were looking at; only a Druid could read the scrye waters. Grianne Ohmsford had built it that way using her considerable magic, back in the infancy of her rule as Ard Rhys, when she had been beset by enemies and disbelievers on every side and had felt keenly the need to monitor their uses of magic from afar.

If Bombax had used his magic at any time over the past few days, the scrye waters should reveal when and where and measure the potency of the use.

The scrye shimmered slightly as she passed her hands across its surface. She was careful not to touch the waters, allowing herself instead to trace their swirling patterns in the air above. There were no discernible disturbances. She took her time, reading them carefully, focusing first on the Borderlands and then allowing her search to radiate outward to the other lands, one after the other. She felt herself merge with the movement of the waters, traveling as they did, cutting across the lines of power that encircled the world, tracking each to places near and far.

Only once did she sense something. Far out in the wasteland beyond
the wall of the Breakline, in country where almost nothing lived, she encountered a disturbance unlike anything she had come across before. She lingered on it a moment, but it was brief and gone almost as quickly as it had come. She was able to tell that it had happened before but could not determine if it had produced any consequences.

In any case, it had nothing to do with Bombax.

She lifted her hands away and stood looking at the scrye waters in what amounted to an admission of defeat. There was no sign of Bombax; she had found no hint of where he was or what had happened to him.

She stepped away from the basin. Apparently her life mate had not found a need to use his magic since leaving Paranor, which was a good sign. If he were threatened, he would have done so. She had to accept that wherever he was and whatever he was doing, he was not in any particular danger.

That was what she told herself, but not what she believed in her heart.

Her damaged leg aching steadily now, she limped out of the room and made her way back down the stairs to her bedchamber. By the time Arlingfant and Cymrian returned from the tour of the Keep, she was back in bed and there was nothing to say that she had ever left.

In Arishaig, Drust Chazhul paused just inside the entry to his quarters and stared down at the piece of folded white paper lying on the floor.

Another one
.

He felt a twinge of fear and uncertainty as he reached down to pick it up, knowing right away what it was. Shielding his movements from the guards who stood at watch to either side of the doorway behind him, believing they would never dare to look, but cautious anyhow, he unfolded the paper and read the words printed on it.

I KNOW WHAT YOU DID

He was filled with helpless rage. Who was sending him these notes? Who could possibly have known what had happened in
Edinja’s chambers two nights before? No one had seen him come or go; no one but Edinja and her cat had been present. Yet this was the third of these notes in less than two days and still not a clue as to who was sending them.

Or why.

It was this question that bothered him most. Why were these notes being sent? What purpose did they serve? If someone wanted something from him because of what they believed he had done to Edinja, why didn’t that someone tell him what it was?

He turned back to the guards. “Did anyone come to see me while I was gone?” he demanded. “This morning, while I was in Council?”

The guards exchanged a hurried look. “No one, Prime Minister,” one answered.

“You’re quite sure of that?”

“Very sure. We were here all morning, both of us. No one even approached your chambers.”

He turned away and went into his rooms, closing the door behind him. Just like the other times. The notes appeared inside his rooms, but with no evidence of how they had gotten there. If he had not trusted Stoon so completely or had been able to conceive of any advantage the other might gain by doing this, he would have suspected him. After all, Stoon was the only one who had access to his quarters, the only one who could come and go without being seen.

There were the chambermaids, of course, but they had to pass the guards to get in to do their work. Besides, he had questioned them already, a thorough and not entirely pleasant examination that had yielded nothing. The women were dull and frightened, and he could detect no hint of duplicity in their responses.

No, this was someone else—someone with talent of the sort that Edinja had possessed.

But Edinja was dead, and he still had no idea who had killed her or why. Whoever thought he was responsible and hiding it was mistaken. But there was no way he could relay that information to his persecutor without knowing who it was.

Of course, once he found out, he wouldn’t waste five seconds trying
to explain anything. He would simply have Stoon remove the source of the problem.

Speaking of which, he was waiting now for his confederate to return with news of Edinja’s death. No one had reported it yet, not even after two days of her absence at the Council meetings. Surely retainers of some sort must have found the body. Why were they hiding it? Were they somehow involved with whoever was sending him the notes?

He felt his paranoia spiraling out of control and quickly tamped it down. He poured himself a glass of wine from the decanter, started to drink it to calm himself, and stopped. He studied the wine and then set it down again. He wasn’t ready to drink wine again quite yet.

Which made him wonder anew why the poison had affected Edinja and not him. Had it already been in her glass when she poured the wine? How could the killer have known which glass she would use?

He went over to the couch and lay down to nap. He felt on edge and irritable from everything that had happened since his meeting with Edinja, as if his life had somehow taken a wrong turn. He wished he had never asked for the meeting. He wished he had never gone.

He even found himself wishing she were still alive. He had wanted her dead, but not this quickly and not in a way that was out of his control.

He fell into an uneasy sleep, but woke instantly when he heard the panel in the wall slide back and Stoon appeared through the opening. He sat up at once, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

“What did you find out? Tell me.”

The assassin hesitated. “Edinja has disappeared.”

Drust stared at him. “What does that mean? She’s dead. How can she disappear? You mean someone took the body?”

“There isn’t any body. According to the retainers I spoke with there isn’t even any sign of a struggle.”

“No body? What about the cat?”

“Sitting there where she usually sits, I gather. I didn’t get inside for a look. This all comes from Edinja’s servants. They don’t know where she is, but apparently she isn’t there. Maybe she isn’t even dead.”

“No, she’s dead. I watched her die.” Drust rose and walked over to the table, picked up the glass of wine he had poured himself and handed it to Stoon. “Smell this.”

The assassin did and shrugged. “You believe it might have been poisoned?”

Drust snatched back the glass and set it on the table. He handed Stoon the note. “This came while I was in Council.”

Stoon glanced at it. “Same as the others. Did the guards see anything?”

“No. I have to find out what is happening, who is doing this. I have to put a stop to it. You didn’t learn anything? Anything at all?”

“Nothing. But that’s only because no one knows anything. Except for whoever is doing this.”

“I don’t understand it. What can anyone gain by this? Tormenting me for something I didn’t do? Suggesting that I am responsible and implying that I should be held accountable because of it? It’s madness!”

Stoon nodded. “It feels to me as if tormenting you is the whole point. Who would want to do that?”

Drust shook his head. “The line goes out the door and down the hall since I became Prime Minister. It’s the nature of the job. But no one has threatened me like this before. No one has deliberately made themselves my enemy. Not even Edinja did that. Nor Arodian.”

Stoon walked over to the table with the wine and sat down in one of the high-backed chairs. “Well, you should be pleased that with Edinja dead and gone, you only have one troublemaker left to dispose of. What shall we do about Arodian?”

Drust shook his head. “I have to think about it. Is there news about what’s happening at Paranor?”

“It’s the reason I’m here. The
Walker Boh
departed earlier today with what looks to be nearly a full complement of Druids and Troll guards. Our spies tell us the Ard Rhys herself is aboard. The airship flies west, but the destination is unknown.”

“West? Surely not to the Elves again?” Drust thought about it. “I’m guessing the King’s granddaughter remains. Her leg was broken in the attack at Arborlon. But maybe the rest have left.”

He paused, looking pointedly at Stoon. “This might be the opportunity we seek. If we act quickly, we might be able to rid ourselves of both the Druids and Paranor. But how …?”

He looked away a moment, and then back again. “We need to get inside Paranor. It would be better if we didn’t have to force our way in. Is it possible to arrange for someone inside to open the gates for us?”

Stoon, tall and lean, bent forward like a vulture eyeing prey. “Anything is possible, Prime Minister. Anything.”

18

A
PHENGLOW
E
LESSEDIL
’
S INSTINCTS ABOUT WHAT MIGHT
have happened to delay Bombax’s return to Paranor were not misguided. Far from it. His efforts to find help for the Druids in their quest for the missing Elfstones had not gone well. Rather, they had gone spectacularly awry.

He had flown south to the Borderland City of Varfleet, thinking to seek out someone with magic the likes of which the Druids did not possess. After all, if the Shade of Allanon felt the members of the order lacked sufficient talent to accomplish what was needed, it stood to reason they needed to find someone who possessed magic of a different sort. So that was what Bombax, never short of confidence and determination, meant to do.

In the course of his travels, he had heard of a man who could make himself disappear. He had heard of one who could shape-shift. He had been told of a woman who could transport herself instantaneously from one place to another. The sources of the stories were reliable, and the stories themselves had been repeated often enough that he had reason to believe at least one of them might be true. Finding even one such talented magic user would be invaluable in getting into heavily guarded or magic-warded places that the Druids might come across in their search. He would have preferred someone who could sense the presence of dormant magic—that would have been
extraordinary—but he had never heard of anyone who possessed such a talent.

Still, you never knew.

So he had gone to Varfleet, where most of the stories had originated, with certain preconceptions about the sort of people he was looking for.

Men and women gifted with powerful magic tended to be solitary and nomadic. They did not seek out lives involving families, friends, homes, spouses, and children. They were rootless by choice, keeping apart, hiding their talents, and living their lives behind walls of secrecy. They did so in order to protect themselves but also because they saw themselves as outsiders. When people close to you discovered you possessed extraordinary talent, it changed both their behavior toward and expectations of you. Druids avoided the fallout of this reaction by living in a community of magic users. Men and women came to the Druid order with raw, undeveloped talent and hopes for what they might achieve with training. They joined with an understanding that magic was to be used to help others and never for selfish reasons. They became one another’s friends and family.