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

He stared at her a moment, and then laughed. “You’ll say anything, won’t you?”


She shook her head. “I can always tell when there are bad things near. The voices warn me. There really is something. Just ahead.”

He looked in the direction she was pointing, hands on hips.

“What are you talking about? I don’t see anything.”

“It doesn’t matter if you see it. It’s there.”

“I’m supposed to believe this?” He paused. “What do you mean, you hear voices?”

She tried to think what to say. “I can sense things. It’s a gift. I can always tell. We can’t go that way.”

“We can’t, huh? I suppose we have to go back? Is that it?”

She ran her hands through her mop of red hair and said, as firmly and bravely as she could manage, “We can’t go that way.”

“Do I look like I’m stupid or something?” he asked abruptly. “What sort of idiot do I look like? Can’t go that way. What crap!

You’ll go any way I tell you to go, like it or not. So stop playing games with me.”

“I’m not playing games.”

He shook his head, glanced at the night sky, and sighed.

“You know what? I don’t know what you’re doing. Making me crazy, mostly.”

She took a deep breath. “I’m not going with you any farther.”

“You’re going wherever I want you to go, you little Freak.”

She dropped down on the pavement in a heap. This time she couldn’t help it; she began to cry. “Please let me go,” she begged.

“Get up!” He stood right over her, his words cutting at her like razors.

She cried harder and shook her head. “I won’t!”

He began to drag her by the neck, the cord cutting into her skin, harsh and burning as it choked her. She grasped at the cord in an effort to ease the suffocating pain, fighting for breath. But she refused to get to her feet. The boy with the ruined face turned back and kicked her in the ribs.

She curled into a ball, sobbing. “Stop,” she pleaded.

“Get up or I’ll kill you!” he screamed at her.

Suddenly there was a piece of broken glass in his hand, a shard retrieved from the roadway, its sharp edge glittering in the moonlight.

He thrust it at her, inches from her face. She squeezed her eyes shut and quit breathing.

“Do you know what it feels like to have your face cut?” he hissed.

She shook her head without answering, curling tighter.

“If I cut your throat, you’ll bleed to death. How would you like that?”

She shook her head again.

“Get up or I’ll do it!”

She shook her head once more. “No. I want to go home!”

“I’m warning you!”

Hurry! You have to get out of here right now! The fresh premonition of the danger she had sensed earlier returned in a silent scream.

The voices were frantic, a palpable presence, and she knew that if they didn’t do something quickly, they were going to be killed.

“We have to hide,” she whispered.

She was aware of the boy moving away, his attention drawn elsewhere. She risked opening her eyes, and she saw that he was looking off toward some buildings to their left.

“There is something,” he said softly, almost to himself. He stared in the direction of the buildings a moment longer. “Something big.”

He looked down at her then, and a change came over his face. “You know what? You’re too small and puny to bother with. I don’t need you.”

He reached down and used the shard of glass to cut the cord around her neck. “Go back, if you want,” he said, pointing to the way they had come. “Runaway, little scaredy-cat.”

She stared at him. “You should hide,” she said.

He shook his head. His single eye glittered in the moonlight. “I’ve got better things to do. Get out of here before I change my mind. I’ve had enough of you.”

He started to set off, and then wheeled about. “They won’t come for you, you know. Your family. You think they will, but they won’t. No one ever comes for you once you’re gone.”

Without looking back, he moved swiftly down the highway and into the darkness, and then he was just a shadow. Candle watched him a moment longer before climbing to her feet and scurrying down off the road and into the drainage ditch that ran parallel, away from the danger she sensed. She followed the ditch for a short distance, staying low and quiet as she moved, like Sparrow had taught her. Then she climbed out again and slipped into a stand of grasses beyond. The grasses were so tall they were over her head, and she couldn’t see anything beyond. She worked her way through them until she was well back off the highway before hunkering down. The premonition was still with her, hard and certain. She didn’t know what else to do. She should try to get farther away, but she was exhausted.

She sat all the way down, hugged her knees to her chest, closed her eyes, and waited.