He shook his head. How foolish he had been, how naive his thinking. The disparities between nations and races were too great for any single body to overcome, let alone any single man. His predecessors had realized that and acted on it accordingly. First bring strength to bear, then reason. Power commanded respect, and respect provided a platform from which to enjoin reason. He had neither. He was an outcast, solitary and anachronistic in the eyes of almost everyone. The Druids had been gone from the Four Lands since the time of Allanon. Too long for anyone to remember them as they once were. Too long to command respect. Too long to serve as a catalyst for change in a world in which change most often came slowly, grudgingly, and in tiny increments.
He exhaled sharply, as if to expel the bitter memory. All that was in the past. Perhaps now it could be buried there. Perhaps now, unwittingly, he had been given the key to accomplishing what had been denied him for so long.
The Gardens of Life rose ahead of him, sun-streaked and vibrant with springtime color. Members of the Black Watch stood at their entrances, rigid and aloof, and he passed them by without a glance. Within the gardens grew the Ellcrys, the most sacred of the Elven talismans, the tree that kept in place the Forbidding, the wall conjured in ancient times to close away the demons and monsters that had once threatened to overrun the world. He walked to where she rooted on a small rise, set apart from the rest of the plantings, strikingly beautiful with her silver limbs and crimson leaves, wrapped in serenity and legend. She had been human once. When her life cycle was complete and she passed away, her successor would come from among the Chosen who tended her. It was a strange and miraculous transition, and it required sacrifice and commitment of a sort with which he was intimately familiar.
A voice spoke at his elbow. “I always wonder if she is watching me, if by virtue of having been given responsibility over all of her people I require her constant vigilance. I always wonder if I am living up to her expectations.”
Walker turned to find Allardon Elessedil standing beside him. It had been many years since he had seen him last, yet he recognized him at once. Allardon Elessedil was older and grayer, more weathered and careworn, and the robes he wore were pale and nondescript. But he carried himself in the same regal manner and exuded the same rocklike presence. Allardon Elessedil was not one of the great Elven Kings; he had been denied that legacy by a history that had not given him reason or need to be so and by a temperament that was neither restless nor inquisitive. He was a caretaker King, a ruler who felt his principal duty was to keep things as they were. Risk-taking was for other men and other races, and the Elves in his time had not been at the forefront of civilization’s evolution in the Four Lands.
The Elven King did not offer his hand in greeting or speak any words of welcome. It remained to be seen, Walker judged, how their meeting would conclude.
Walker looked back at the Ellcrys. “We cannot hope to know what she expects of us, Elven King. It would be presumptuous even to try.”
If the other man was offended, he did not show it. “Are you rested?” he asked.
“I am. I slept undisturbed. But at first light, I felt the need to walk here. Is this a problem?”
Allardon Elessedil brushed the question off with a wave of his hand. “Hardly. You are free to walk where you choose.”
Yes, but not to do as I please, Walker thought. How bitter he had been on leaving all those years ago. How despairing. But time’s passing had blunted the edges of those once sharp feelings, and now they were mostly memory. It was a new age, and the Elven King was growing old now and in need of him. Walker could achieve the result that had been denied him for so long if he proceeded carefully. It was a strange, exhilarating feeling, and he had to be cautious to keep it from showing in his voice and eyes.
“Your family is well?” he asked, making an effort at being cordial.
The other shrugged. “The children grow and take roads of their own choosing. They listen to me less and less. I have their respect, but not their obedience. I am more a father and less a King to them, and they feel free to ignore me.”
“What is it you would have them do?”
“Oh, what fathers would usually have children do.” The Elven King chuckled. “Stay closer to home, take fewer chances, be content with the known world. Kylen fights with the Free-born in a struggle I do not support. Ahren wanders the north in search of a future. My sons think I will live forever, and they leave me to be ruler alone.” He shrugged. “I suppose they are no different than the sons of other fathers.”
Walker said nothing. His views would not have been welcomed. If Allardon Elessedil’s sons grew up to be different men than their father, so much the better.
“I am pleased you decided to come,” the King ventured after a moment.
Walker sighed. “You knew I would. The castaway elf—is he Kael?”
“I assume as much. He wore the bracelet. Another elf would have carried it. Anyway, we’ll know tomorrow. I hoped the map would intrigue you sufficiently that you would be persuaded. Have you studied it?”
Walker nodded. “All night before flying here yesterday.”
“Is it genuine?” Allardon Elessedil asked.
“That’s difficult to say. It depends on what you mean. If you are asking me whether it might tell us what happened to your brother, the answer is yes. It might be a map of the voyage on which he disappeared. His name appears nowhere in the writings, but the condition and nature of the hide and ink suggest it was drawn within the last thirty years, so that it might have been his work. Is the handwriting his?”
The Elven King shook his head. “I can’t tell.”
“The language is archaic, a language not used since the Great Wars changed the Old World forever. Would your brother have learned that language?”
The other man considered this for a moment, then shrugged. “I don’t know. How much of what it says were you able to decipher?”
Walker shifted within his dark robes, looking out again toward the Carolan. “Can we walk a bit? I am cramped and sore from yesterday’s journey, and I think it would help to stretch my legs.”
He began moving slowly down the pathway, and the Elf King fell into step beside him wordlessly. They walked in silence through the gardens for a time, the Druid content to let matters stay as they were until he was ready to speak to them. Let Allardon Elessedil wait as he had waited. He turned his attention to other things, observing the way in which the gardens’ plantings flowed into one another with intricate symmetry, listening to the soft warble of the resident birds, and gazing up at the clouds that drifted like silk throws across the clear blue of the spring sky. Life in balance. Everything as it should be.
Walker glanced over. “The guard you assigned to watch me appears to have lost interest in the job.”
The Elven King smiled reassuringly. “He wasn’t there to watch you. He was there to let me know when you awoke so that we could have this talk.”
“Ah. You sought privacy in our dealings. Because your own guards are absent, as well. We are all alone.” He paused. “Do you feel safe with me, then?”
The other’s smile was uneasy. “No one would dare to attack me while I was with you.”