The High Druid of Shannara Trilogy

“No! What are you doing? Straken! It’s me!”


She looked up in time to see the Goblin pushing back the hood of his cloak to reveal his face. She peered at it out of a fog of exhaustion and uncertainty, watched it take shape, and struggled to make sense of what she was seeing.

“Weka Dart,” she whispered.

She stared at him, not quite believing he was actually there. She had all but forgotten about the little Ulk Bog. Once he had abandoned her and she had fallen into the hands of the Straken Lord, she had not expected ever to see him again. That he was standing there was almost incomprehensible.

“You should have listened to me!” he hissed. “Didn’t I tell you? Didn’t I warn you not to go on without me?”

His sharp features were scrunched into a knot, giving him the look of a demented beast. His hair was standing straight out from his head and neck, bristling and stiff. His sharp teeth flashed from behind his lips as he tried to smile and failed, and his fingers knotted on the bars.

Her mind cleared a bit further, and she pushed back against the urge to mewl and spit. “How did you find me?”

He stared at her as if she were mad. “You still don’t know anything, do you? What kind of Straken are you?”

She shook her head. “The worst kind.”

“You certainly look it.” Weka Dart laughed. “I found you by paying attention to the world around me, something you seem to have failed to master. But this isn’t your world, is it? This isn’t even remotely like it. So maybe you aren’t to blame for anything more than bad judgment.”

He was telling her something, but she couldn’t make sense of it. “Was it good judgment that brought you here, then?”

The Ulk Bog spit. “I am not sure what it was. I heard in my travels what had happened to you, and I admit that I thought it best to leave you to your fate. But then chance and inspiration intervened, so here I am.”

“Chance and inspiration?”

“I was crossing the Pashanon on my way to Huka Flats, the route I had chosen for myself and advised you to take as well. As I traveled, word reached me of your capture. Such things do not go unreported in this land, and I keep my eyes and ears open. It was easy enough to determine what had happened to you. The difficulty was in deciding what I should do about it.”

He puffed out his chest. “I will admit that at first I thought it best simply to go on. You had dismissed me, after all. What did it matter what became of you? You were rude to me. You insulted me. In the end, you ignored my good advice and brought disaster on yourself. I owed you nothing. No one could fault me if I chose to leave you to your fate.

“But then, I reconsidered. After all, it wasn’t your fault that you were a stranger to this country, one lacking in good judgment and common sense. You were to be pitied. I felt an obligation toward you. I thought it over and made up my mind. I would come find you. I would see how you were. If you were nice to me, I would decide whether you deserved a second chance.”

Even in her confused and debilitated state, of being not all of one thing or the other, she recognized that his words were lies. She could hear it in the way he spoke; she could see it in the rapid shifting of his eyes and body. As always, he was after something, but she had no idea what it was.

“How did you get down here?” she asked.

He gave a casual shrug. “I have my ways.”

“Ways that allow you to get past the demonwolves and the Goblins that serve the Straken Lord?”

He sniffed. “I am not without skills.”

She pulled herself into a sitting position and became aware for the first time in days how stiff and sore she was. She looked down at herself, first at the bruises and cuts on her arms and legs, then at the white shift she wore. She was much better dressed than when she had been taken to the arena. She glanced around. Her cell was cleaner, too.

Her focus narrowed sharply. Was she mistaken about the intentions of the Straken Lord? What was going on?

She looked at Weka Dart. “If you don’t stop lying to me and tell me the truth,” she said softly, “I might have to use my Straken magic on you, Ulk Bog.”

He grinned, showing all his sharp teeth. “That might be a little difficult, since you wear a conjure collar.”

He seemed to realize his mistake almost immediately, a change coming into his eyes and the self-satisfied look fading as his lips compressed in silent reprimand. “Conjure collars are not unknown to me,” he said quickly. “I’ve seen them before.”