The Scions of Shannara

He continued ahead as daylight failed and darkness closed about. Shadows, where they could find purchase in the graying haze, lengthened in shimmering parody of their makers. Walker wrapped his cloak closer to his body, thinking through the words he would say to the Grimpond, the arguments he would put forth, the games he would play if forced to do so. He recounted in his mind the events of his life that the shade was likely to play upon—most of them drawn from his youth when he was discomfited by his differences and beset by his insecurities.

“Dark Uncle” they had called him even then—the playmates of Par and Coll, their parents, and even people of the village of Shady Vale that didn’t know him. Dark for the color of his life and being, this pale, withdrawn young man who could sometimes read minds, who could divine things that would happen and even cause them to be so, who could understand so much of what was hidden from others. Par and Coll’s strange uncle, without parents of his own, without a family that was really his, without a history that he cared to share. Even the Ohmsford name didn’t seem to fit him. He was always the “Dark Uncle,” somehow older than everyone else, not in years but in knowledge. It wasn’t knowledge he had learned; it was knowledge he had been born with. His father had tried to explain. It was the legacy of the wishsong’s magic that caused it. It manifested itself this way. But it wouldn’t last; it never did. It was just a stage he must pass through because of who he was. But Par and Coll did not have to pass through it, Walker would argue in reply. No, only you and I, only the children of Brin Ohmsford, because we hold the trust, his father would whisper. We are the chosen of Allanon . . .

He swept the memories from his mind angrily, the bitterness welling up anew. The “chosen of Allanon” had his father said? The “cursed of Allanon” was more like it.

The trees gave way before him abruptly, startling him with the suddenness of their disappearance. He stood at the edge of the lake, its rocky shores wending into the mist on either side, its waters lapping gently, endlessly in the silence. Walker Boh straightened. His mind tightened and closed down upon itself as if made of iron, his concentration focused, his thoughts cleared.

A solitary statue, he waited.

There was movement in the fog, but it emanated from more than one place. Walker tried to fix on it, but it was gone as quickly as it had come. From somewhere far away, above the haze that hung across the lake, beyond the rock walls of the ridgelines enfolding the narrow valley, a voice whispered in some empty heaven.

Dark Uncle.

Walker heard the words, tauntingly close and at the same time nowhere he would ever be, not from inside his head or from any other place discernible, but there nevertheless. He did not respond to them. He continued to wait.

Then the scattered movements that had disturbed the mist moments earlier focused themselves on a single point, coming together in a colorless outline that stood upon the water and began to advance. It took surer form as it came, growing in size, becoming larger than the human shape it purported to represent, rising up as if it might crush anything that stood in its way. Walker did not move. The ethereal shape became a shadow, and the shadow became a person . . .

Walker Boh watched expressionlessly as the Grimpond stood before him, suspended in the vapor, its face lifting out of shadow to reveal who it had chosen to become.

“Have you come to accept my charge, Walker Boh?” it asked.

Walker was startled in spite of his resolve. The dark, brooding countenance of Allanon stared down at him.



The warehouse was hushed, its cavernous enclosure blanketed by stillness from floor to ceiling as six pairs of eyes fastened intently on Padishar Creel.

He had just announced that they were going back down into the Pit.

“We’ll be doing it differently this time,” he told them, his raw-boned face fierce with determination, as if that alone might persuade them to his cause. “No sneaking about through the park with rope ladders this go-around. There’s an entry into the Pit from the lower levels of the Gatehouse. That’s how we’ll do it. We’ll go right into the Gatehouse, down into the Pit and back out again—and no one the wiser.”

Par risked a quick glance at the others. Coll, Morgan, Damson, the outlaws Stasas and Drutt—there was a mix of disbelief and awe etched on their faces. What the outlaw chief was proposing was outrageous; that he might succeed, even more so. No one tried to interrupt. They wanted to hear how he was going to do it.

“The Gatehouse watch changes shifts twice each day—once at sunrise, once at sunset. Two shifts, six men each. A relief comes in for each shift once a week, but on different days. Today is one of those days. A relief for the day shift comes in just after sunset. I know; I made it a point to find out.”