The Scions of Shannara

The pressure inside Par Ohmsford grew unbearable. He felt something drop away in the pit of his stomach. He was seeing the vision in his dreams come alive, the dark world of animal-like humans and Shadowen masters. It was seeing Allanon’s promise come to pass.

The pressure broke free. He screamed, freezing his companions with the sharpness of his cry. The sound took form and became words. He sang, the wishsong ripping through the air as if a flame, the magic lighting up the darkness. The Shadowen jerked away, their faces horrible in the unexpected glare, the lesions and cuts on their bodies vivid streaks of scarlet. Par stiffened, flooded with a power he had never known the wishsong to possess. He was aware of a vision within his mind—a vision of the Sword of Shannara.

The light from the magic, only an illusion at first, was suddenly real. It brightened, lancing the darkness in a way Par found strangely familiar, flaring with intensity as it probed the gloom. It twisted and turned like a captured thing trying to escape, winding past the stone wreckage of the fallen Bridge of Sendic, leaping across the carcasses of fallen trees, burning through the ragged brush to where a singular stone chamber sat alone amid a tangle of vines and grasses not a hundred yards from where he stood.

He felt a surge of elation race through him.

There!

The word hissed in the white silence of his mind, cocooned away from the magic and the chaos. He saw weathered black stone, the light of his magic burning into its pocked surface, scouring its cracks and crevices, picking out the scrolled words carved into its facing:



Herein lies the heart and soul of the nations.

Their right to be free men,

Their desire to live in peace,

Their courage . . .



His strength gave out suddenly before he could complete his reading, and the magic flared sharply and died into blackness, gone as quickly as it had come. He staggered backward with a cry, and Coll caught him in his arms. Par couldn’t hear him. He couldn’t hear anything but the strange ringing that was the wishsong’s residue, the leavings of a magic he now realized he had not yet begun to understand.

And in his mind the vision lingered, a shimmering image at the forefront of his thoughts—all that remained of what moments earlier the magic had uncovered in the mist and dark.

The weathered stone vault. The familiar words in scroll.

The Sword of Shannara.

Then the ringing stopped, the vision disappeared, and he was back in the Pit, drowning in weakness. The Shadowen were closing, shambling forward from all directions to trap them against the stone of the bridge. Padishar stepped forward, tall and forbidding, to confront the nearest, a huge bearish thing with talons for hands. It reached for him and he cut at it with the broadsword—once, twice, a third time—the strokes so rapid Par could barely register them. The creature sagged back, limbs drooping—but it did not fall. It barely seemed aware of what had been done to it, its eyes fixed, its features twisting with some inner torment.

Par watched the Shadowen through glazed eyes. Its limbs reconnected in the manner of the giant they had fought in the Anar.

“Padishar, the Sword . . .” he started to say, but the outlaw chief was already shouting, directing them back the way they had come, retreating along the wall of stone. “No!” Par shrieked in dismay. He could not put into words the certainty he felt. They had to reach the Sword. He lurched up, trying to break free of Coll, but his brother held him fast, dragging him along with the others.

The Shadowen attacked in a shambling rush. Stasas went down, dragged beyond the reach of his companions. His throat was ripped out and then something dark entered his body while he was still alive, gasping. It jerked him upright, brought him about to face them, and he became another attacker. The company retreated, swords slashing. Ciba Blue appeared—or what was left of him. Impossibly strong, he blocked Drutt’s sword, caught hold of his arms, and wrapped himself about his former comrade like a leech. The outlaw shrieked in pain as first one arm and then the other was ripped from his body. His head went last. He was left behind, Ciba Blue’s remains still fastened to him, feeding.