The High Druid of Shannara Trilogy

It seemed to Pen an odd comment coming from someone who looked vaguely like a walking tree stump, all bark and rough surfaces, as brutish and forbidding as anything that walked the Four Lands.

Kermadec must have thought the same. He looked at Atalan carefully. “Savages to us, but who are we to judge? In any event, I wouldn’t be too quick to dismiss them. Urdas have lived in this valley since the destruction of the Old World. This is their ancestral home, and they regard it as sacred. Especially Stridegate. They will fight to protect it from outsiders. Like the Spider Gnomes on Toffer Ridge, they worship the creatures that share their abode, a symbiotic relationship, however one-sided, that influences their attitude toward intruders like us.” He paused. “There are a lot of them down there, brother.”

“Not enough to stop us, brother,” Atalan replied, giving an edge to the last word that left no doubt about how he viewed the relationship. “We are the stronger force, no matter how few we are.”

There was a hint of anger in Kermadec’s eyes and a muttering among the other Rock Trolls. “You have never been down there,” the Maturen said quietly. “I have. It isn’t just trees and dirt. It isn’t just Urdas, either. It is darkness of a different sort. Too many who thought as you do have disappeared into that darkness. If we are careless, we could end up the same way.”

“Then we won’t be careless, will we?” Atalan declared. His eyes flicked from his brother to Cinnaminson and Pen. “Lucky we have just the little people to help us. A blind girl who sees and a boy who speaks with lichen. What have we to fear?”

He shouldered his way forward and started down off the ledge, not bothering to see who might follow. Kermadec watched him go for a moment, then glanced back at the rest of the company and motioned them ahead.

The descent into the Inkrim was accomplished without incident. The trail down was not steep, though it was narrow and twisting, and at times even Pen, who was among the smallest, was forced to hug the cliff wall. The twilight deepened steadily all the while, and as it did so the valley came alive. Hushed before the change of light to dark, it began to hum and buzz with insect life. Night birds called out, their cries piercing and shrill as they took to the air in shadowy flocks, and Pen could hear grunts from ground animals, some recognizable, some not. He listened carefully as he walked and tried to sort them out. He searched for what sounded familiar amid the cacophony and failed.

At the bottom of the trail, the company made camp in a stand of fir. Even though they had reached the valley floor, they were still several thousand feet above sea level, cradled by the peaks of the Klu, and the air was clear and cold and the sky brilliant with stars and moonlight. As on past nights, Kermadec would not allow a fire. “Tomorrow,” he promised. By then they would be deep enough into the territory of the Urdas that a fire would not draw Druid notice or, if spied, would not seem unusual to anyone searching for them. They would be risking discovery by the Urdas, of course, but that was a risk they were taking just by being there.

“The ruins of Stridegate lie much deeper in this valley, Pen,” he told the boy later, when dinner had been consumed and they were sitting alone at the edge of the encampment. His blocky features were inscrutable, but his eyes were intense. “Two more days at least, and that’s if we press ahead at a steady pace. I’ve been there, the one time I was in this valley before. I remember their look. It isn’t a sight you are likely to forget.”

“And the island?” Pen pressed. “The one that contains the tanequil?”

Overhearing their conversation, Khyber, Cinnaminson, and Tagwen had wandered over to join them. They sat down in a close circle, silent and attentive. Behind them, a pair of sentries had taken up positions just out of sight in the darkened trees. The rest of the Rock Trolls were settling in for the night, bulky forms lumbering through the darkness, the heavy clank and rasp of their weapons audible. Atalan was sitting not far away, hunched and unmoving, his back to his brother, his gaze directed into the forest dark.

“It is not an island of the sort you might imagine. It is surrounded not by water, but by a deep ravine choked with vines and trees. A single bridge spans its width, an ancient stone arch thousands of years old. It offers the only passage to the other side. But no one I know has ever crossed it.”

“Why not?” Khyber asked at once.

Kermadec shook his head. “I am not superstitious in the manner of the Urdas, but I know the nature of the things that live within the Inkrim and I respect the power they wield. A warding stone placed on the near side of the bridge forbids passage. I try to pay attention to such things, when I can.”