THE VOYAGE OF THE JERLE SHANNARA : Morgawr (BOOK THREE)

“Which is how I found you,” he finished, passing the aleskin back to Quentin, the pungent liquid warming his throat and stomach as he swallowed. “I don’t know how long I was out there, but my guide stayed just ahead of me the whole way, obviously leading me toward something, keeping me on track. I didn’t know where it was taking me, but after a while it didn’t matter. I knew who it was.”

“Truls Rohk,” his cousin said.

“That’s what I thought at the time, but now I’m not so sure. Truls is gone. He’s become a part of the shape-shifter community, and no longer has a separate identity. Maybe I just want to believe it was him.” Bek shook his head. “I don’t guess it matters.”

They were huddled in a shallow cave hollowed into the side of the mountain. Bek had started a fire, and it burned with little heat, but a steady, insistent flame that illuminated their faces. Grianne sat to one side, staring off into the night, unseeing. Every so often, Quentin looked at her, not quite sure yet what to make of having someone who had tried so hard to kill them sitting so close.

Bek watched Quentin take another deep swallow from the aleskin. The color was finally returning to Quentin’s frozen body. He had been nearly gone when he had stumbled upon Bek and Grianne. Bek had wasted no time wrapping him in his cloak and finding shelter for them all. The fire and ale had brought Quentin around, and they had spent the last hour exchanging stories about what had happened since the ambush in the ruins of Castledown. They didn’t rush it, taking their time, giving themselves a chance to adjust to the idea that the impossible had happened and they had found each other again.

“I never thought you were dead,” Bek told his cousin, breaking the momentary silence. “I never believed it was so.”

Quentin grinned, a hint of that familiar, cocky smile that marked him so distinctively. “Me either, about you. I knew when Tamis told me she had left you outside the ruins, that you would be all right. But this business about you having magic, that’s another matter. I still can’t quite believe it. You’re sure you’re an Ohmsford?”

“As sure as I can be after hearing everything Walker had to say.” Bek leaned back on his elbows and sighed. “I suppose I really didn’t believe it myself in the beginning. But after that first confrontation with Grianne, feeling the magic come alive inside me and break out like it did, I didn’t have the same doubts anymore.”

“So she’s your sister.”

Bek nodded. “She is, Quentin.”

The Highlander shook his head slowly. “Well, there’s something we’d have never guessed when we started out on this journey. But what are you supposed to do with her now that you know?”

“Take her home,” Bek answered. “Keep her safe.” He looked at Grianne a moment. “She’s important, Quentin. Beyond the fact that she’s my sister. I don’t know how, but she is. Walker was insistent on it, when he was dying and afterwards when he returned as a shade. He knows something about her that he isn’t telling me.”

“Big surprise.”

Bek smiled. “I guess that Walker keeping secrets isn’t unusual, is it? Maybe there aren’t any surprises left for you and me. No real ones, I mean.”

Quentin exhaled a white plume that lofted into the chilly night. “I wouldn’t be so sure. I’d thought that earlier, and then I found you again. You never know.” He paused. “What do you think the chances are that anyone else is alive? Are they all dead, like Walker and Patrinell?”

Bek didn’t say anything for a moment. All of the Elves were gone, save Kian and perhaps Ahren Elessedil. Ryer Ord Star might still be alive. The Wing Riders might be out there somewhere. And, of course, there were the Rovers.

“We saw the Jerle Shannara fly into these mountains,” Bek ventured. “Maybe the Rovers are still searching for us.”

Quentin gave him a hard look. “Maybe. But if you were Redden Alt Mer in this situation, what would you do—come looking for us or fly straight back to where you came from?”

Bek thought about it a moment. “I don’t think Rue Meridian would leave us. I think she’d make her brother look.”

His cousin snorted. “For how long? Chased by those Mwellret vessels? Outnumbered twenty to one?” He shook his head. “We’d better be realistic about it. They don’t have any reason to think we’re still alive. They were prisoners themselves; they won’t want to chance being made prisoners again. They would be fools not to run for it. I wouldn’t blame them. I would do the same thing.”

“They’ll look for us,” Bek insisted.

Quentin laughed. “I know better than to try to change your mind, cousin Bek. Funny, though. I’m supposed to be the optimist.”