The Elves of Cintra (Book 2 of The Genesis of Shannara)

Bear didn’t like being thought of as stupid. He didn’t like being called names and made fun of. Who does? But there wasn’t much he could do about it that didn’t involve crushing someone’s ribs, so he learned to live with the abuse. His parents had too much else on their minds to spend time worrying about him, let alone trying to protect him. So he was pretty much left to deal with things as best he could.

He dealt with them by choosing jobs that kept him apart from the others. Standing watch. Running errands. Engaging in heavy lifting for which only he, of all his siblings and cousins, was suitable. His father worked with him, and his uncles sometimes, and they didn’t make fun of him or call him names. Mostly. He wondered about that now and then, thinking back. It might be that they had, and he just didn’t want to remember.

Bear was smart, beneath his slow-moving, slow-talking, slow-acting veneer, and he knew how to pay attention. While others got along as best they could in a world they hated and a family that valued work over everything, Bear spent his time absorbing and remembering. He learned, and he didn’t forget.

Little things.

Big things.

Everything he could.

That’s how he knew how best to keep watch against the predators. That’s how he knew how to stay awake and not fall asleep in the slow, heavy hours of early morning when your most pressing need was to close your eyes. That’s how he knew that no matter what Panther or Sparrow or the others thought—even Hawk—it was his job to protect them all.

He glanced over to where his family lay sleeping on the ground, Candle and Sparrow in sleeping bags, the boys rolled up in blankets.

There was no fire, no warmth to be found other than from their own bodies. But the night air was mild, and there was only a little wind. Behind the sleeping forms, the shed in which Owl tended River and Fixit was still and black. On the dark ribbon of the highway, some hundred yards from where they were settled, nothing moved.

He shifted the weight of the Tyson Flechette from one thigh to the other with a slow, methodical movement. He glanced over to where the boy who had shot Squirrel lay curled up next to the north side of the shed, a small black puddle in the darkness. He didn’t like the boy, and if Owl had allowed it, he would have agreed to give him to Panther for disposal. But Owl wanted the boy unharmed and had charged Bear with seeing that he was left alone. Bear took this charge, as he took all charges that either Owl or Hawk gave him, very seriously. He didn’t have to like it. He just had to do what he knew was right.

Bear was a soldier; he understood orders and he responded to them. Not because he couldn’t think, but because he believed in order. He believed in a place for everyone and everyone in their place. He didn’t understand kids like Panther, who often did whatever they felt like. In a family, you survived by knowing your place and behaving in a consistent, orderly fashion.

You did what you were told to do. You did what was right.

When you reached a point where the two didn’t agree, it was time to move on.

He had found that out the hard way.

HE IS ELEVEN when the stealing begins. It isn’t anything important at first—a tool, a small sack of grain, a piece of children’s clothing, that sort of thing. One by one, they disappear, not all at once, but gradually. Bear thinks nothing of it, but his father and uncles take it seriously. Theft is an unpardonable offense in the world of his childhood. Too much has already been taken away to allow the taking of anything more. The older members of his family still remember the world as it was before everything was ruined or destroyed. There is bitterness and resentment at that loss, a rage at the inexplicable madness of it. Blame is easy to assess and difficult to fix. But the sense of deprivation is raw and festering, and theft is a reminder of how easily you can be dispossessed.

His father believes it is one of his children, perhaps going through a phase.

He questions them all. Rigorously. His brother, perhaps frightened at the intensity of the accusation, points to Bear. For reasons that Bear will never be able to fathom, his father believes his brother. Bear is convicted without a trial. None of the missing items is found. No one steps forward to say that they have actually seen him stealing. But he is different than they are, aloof and circumspect, his motives not entirely clear, and that is enough. He is not punished, but he is consigned to a back corner of their lives and watched closely.

He accepts this, just as he accepts everything else—stoically, resignedly, with a quiet understanding of how it will always be for him. But he thinks, too, that he should solve this puzzle. He doesn’t like being thought of as a thief. Someone else is doing the stealing, and he will find out who it is. Perhaps that will convince the others their behavior toward him has been wrong.

He waits for the theft to happen again. It does, although not right away. This time, it is a weapon, a small automatic handgun. An antique, by all reckoning, a relic in an age in which lasers and flechettes and Sprays are the norm.