The Scions of Shannara

Her eyes never left him. “No one knows but you. It is safer that way. If the Federation found out who I was, they would use me to get to him. Par, what you needed to know that night when I told you about my childhood was that I could never betray anyone after the way my family was betrayed to the Federation. That much was true. That is why my father, Padishar Creel, is so furious that there might be a traitor among his own men. He can never forget what happened to my mother, brother, and sister. The possibility of losing anyone close to him again because of someone’s treachery terrifies him.”


She paused, studying him intently. “I promised never to tell anyone who I really was, but I am breaking that promise for you. I want you to know. It is something I can give you that will belong only to you.”

She smiled then, and some of the tension drained out of him. “Damson,” he said, and he found himself smiling back at her. “Nothing had better happen to you. If it does, it will be my fault for talking you into bringing me down here. How will I face Padishar, then?” His voice was a soft whisper of laughter. “I wouldn’t be able to go within a hundred miles of him!”

She started laughing as well, shaking soundlessly at the thought, and she shoved him as if they were children at play. Then she reached over and hugged herself against him. He let her hold him without responding for a moment, his eyes straying to where Coll sat, a vague shadow at the other end of the hall. But his brother wasn’t looking. There had been friends and traitors mixed up in this enterprise from the beginning, and it had been all but impossible to tell which was which. Except for Coll. And now Damson.

He put his arms around her and hugged her back.

Moments later, the Mole returned. He came upon them so quietly that they didn’t even know he was there until the door began to open against them. Par released Damson and jumped to his feet, the blade of his long knife flashing free. The Mole peeked through the door and then ducked hurriedly out of sight again. Damson grabbed Par’s arm. “Mole!” she whispered. “It’s all right!”

The Mole’s roundish face eased back into view. Upon seeing that the weapon had been put away, he came all the way through. Coll was already hastening down the corridor. When he joined them, the Mole said, calm again, “The catwalk is clear and will stay that way if we hurry. But be very quiet, now.”

They slipped from the corridor and found themselves on a balcony that encircled a vast, empty rotunda. They moved quickly along it, passing scores of closed, latched doors and shadowed alcoves. Halfway around, the Mole led them into a hall and down its length to a set of iron-barred doors that opened out over the main courtyard of the palace. A catwalk ran across the drop to a massive wall. The courtyard had once been a maze of gardens and winding pathways; now there were only crumbling flagstones and bare earth. Beyond the wall lay the dark smudge of the Pit.

The Mole beckoned anxiously. They stepped onto the catwalk, feeling it sway slightly beneath their combined weight, hearing it creak in protest. The wind blew in quick gusts, and the sound it made as it rushed over the bare stone walls and across the empty courtyard was a low, sad moan. Weeds whipped and shuddered below them and debris scattered about the court, careening from wall to wall. There was no sign of life, no movement in the shadows and murk, no Shadowen in sight.

They crossed the catwalk quickly, once they were upon it, ignoring the creak and groan of its iron stays. They kept their feet moving, their hands on the railing, and their eyes focused carefully ahead, watching the palace wall draw closer. When the crossing was completed they stepped hurriedly onto the battlement, each reaching back to help the next person, grateful to be done.

The Mole took them into a stairwell where they found a fresh set of steps winding downward into blackness. Using the light of the stones Damson had supplied, they descended silently. They were close now; the stone of the wall was all that separated them from the Pit. Par’s excitement sent the blood pumping through him, a pounding in his ears, and his nerve endings tightened.

Just a few more minutes . . .

At the bottom of the stairwell, there was a passageway that ended at a weathered, ironbound wooden door. The Mole walked to the door and stopped. When he turned back to face them, Par knew at once what lay beyond.

“Thank you, Mole,” he said softly.

“Yes, thank you,” echoed Damson.

The Mole blinked shyly. Then he said, “You can look through here.”

He reached up and carefully pulled back a tiny shutter that revealed a slit in the wood. Par stepped forward and peered out.

The floor of the Pit stretched away before him, a vast, fog-bound wilderness of trees and rock, a bottomland that was strewn with decaying logs and tangled brush, a darkness in which shadows moved and shapes formed and faded again like wraiths.The wreckage of the Bridge of Sendic lay just to the right and disappeared into the gray haze.

Par squinted into the murk a moment longer. There was no sign of the vault that held the Sword of Shannara.

But he had seen it, right there, just beyond the wall of the palace. The magic of the wishsong revealed it. It was out there. He could feel its presence like a living thing.

He let Damson take a look, then Coll. When Coll stepped back, the three of them stood facing one another.