He did not cry, he was all done crying. But he was hollowed out and bereft, and he felt a bleakness that was so pervasive it threatened to undo him completely.
Dawn was breaking when he stood again, finished at last. He reached down for the Sword of Leah where he had cast it away at the end of his battle, and picked it up again. The bright, dark surface was unmarked save for streaks of blood and grime. He wiped it off carefully, considering it as he did so. It seemed to him that the sword had failed him completely. For all its magic properties, for all that it was touted to have accomplished in its long and storied history, it had proved to be of little use to him here in this strange land. It had not been enough to save Tamis or Ard Patrinell. It had not even been enough to enable him to protect Bek, whom he had sworn to protect no matter what. That Quentin was alive because he had possession of it was of little consolation. His own life seemed to have been purchased at the cost of others. He did not feel deserving of it. He felt dead inside, and he did not know how he could ever feel anything else.
He put the blade back into its sheath and strapped it across his back once more. The sun was cresting the horizon, and he had to decide what he would do next. Finding Bek was a priority, but to do so he had to leave the concealment of the forest and go back into the ruins of Castledown. That meant risking yet another confrontation with creepers and wronks, and he did not know if he could face that. What he did know was that he needed to be away from this place of death and disappointment.
So he began walking, watching the shadows about him fade back into the trees as sunlight seeped through the canopy and dappled the forest floor. He dropped down from the hills surrounding Castledown to the level stretches he had abandoned in his flight from the Patrinell wronk two days earlier. Walking made him feel somewhat better. The bleakness in his heart lingered, but something of his loss of direction and purpose disappeared as he considered his prospects. There was nothing to be gained by standing about. What he must do, no matter what it took, was find Bek. It was Quentin’s insistence on making the journey that had persuaded his cousin to come with him. If he accomplished nothing else, at least he must see Bek safely home again.
He believed that Bek was still alive, even though he knew that many others in the company had perished. He believed this because Tamis had been with his cousin before she found Quentin and because in his heart, where instincts sometimes gave insights that eyes could not, he felt nothing had changed. But that didn’t mean that Bek wasn’t in trouble and in need of help, and Quentin was determined not to let him down.
Some part of him understood that his intensity was triggered by a need to grasp hold of something to save himself. He was aware that if he faltered, his despair would prove overwhelming, his bleakness of heart so complete that he would be unable to make himself move. If he gave way, he was lost. Moving in any direction, seizing on any purpose, kept him from tumbling into the abyss. He didn’t know how realistic he was being in trying to find Bek, all alone and unaided by any useful magic, but the odds didn’t matter if he could manage to stay sane.
He was not far from the ruins when he caught sight of an airship flying out ahead of him, distant and small against the horizon. He was so surprised that for a moment he stopped where he was and stared at it in disbelief. It was too far away for him to identify, but he decided at once that it must be the Jerle Shannara searching for the members of the company. He felt fresh hope at this and began walking toward it at once.
But in seconds the airship had drifted into the haze of a massive bank of clouds coming out of the east and was lost from view.
He was standing in an open clearing, trying to find it again, when he heard someone call. “Highlander! Wait!”
He turned in surprise, trying to identify the voice, to determine from where the speaker was calling. He was still searching the hills unsuccessfully when Panax walked out of the trees behind him.
“Where have you been, Quentin Leah?” the Dwarf demanded, out of breath and flushed with exertion. “We’ve been hunting for you all yesterday and last night! It was pure luck that I caught sight of you just now!”
He came up to Quentin and shook his hand warmly. “Well met, Highlander. You look a wreck, if you don’t mind my saying. Are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” Quentin answered, even though he wasn’t. “Who’s been looking for me, Panax?”
“Kian and I. Obat and a handful of his Rindge. The wronk tore them up pretty thoroughly. The village, the people, everything. Scattered the tribe all over the place, those it didn’t kill. Obat pulled the survivors together up in the hills. At one point, they were planning to rebuild their village and go on as before, but no longer. They’re not going back. Things have changed.”
He stopped suddenly, taking a close look at Quentin’s face, finding something in it he hadn’t seen before. “Where’s Tamis?” he asked.
Quentin shook his head. “Dead. Ard Patrinell, as well. They killed each other. I couldn’t save either one.” His hands were shaking. He couldn’t seem to stop them. He stared down, confused. “We set a trap, Tamis and I. We hid in the forest by a pit and let the wronk find us, thinking we could drop it in. We used a decoy, a trick, to lure it over. It worked, but then it climbed out, and Tamis . . .”
He trailed off, unable to continue, tears coming to his eyes once more, as if he were a child reliving a nightmare.
Panax took Quentin’s hands in his own, steadying them, holding on until the shaking stopped. “You don’t look as if you escaped by much yourself,” he said quietly. “I expect there wasn’t anything you could have done to save either that you didn’t try. Don’t expect too much of yourself, Highlander. Even magic doesn’t always provide the answers we seek. The Druid may have found that out himself, wherever he is. Sometimes, we have to accept that we have limitations. Some things we can’t prevent. Death is one.”
He let go of Quentin’s hands and gripped him by his shoulders. “I’m sorry about Tamis and Ard Patrinell, truly sorry. I expect they fought hard to stay alive, Highlander. But so did you. I think you owe it to them and to yourself to make that count for something.”
Quentin looked into the Dwarf’s brown eyes, coming back to himself as he did so, able to form a measure of fresh resolve. He remembered Tamis’ face at the end, the fierce way she had faced her own death. Panax was right. To fall apart now, to give in to his sadness, would be a betrayal of everything she had fought to accomplish. He took a deep breath. “All right.”
Panax nodded and stepped back. “Good. We need you to be strong, Quentin Leah. The Rindge have been out exploring since early this morning, before dawn. They went into the ruins. Castledown is littered with creepers, none of them functioning. The fire threads are down. Antrax, it seems, is dead.”
Quentin stared at him, not comprehending.
“Well and good, you might say, but look over there.” The Dwarf pointed east to a steadily advancing cloudbank, a huge wall of darkness that stretched across the entire horizon. “What’s coming is a change in the world, according to the Rindge. They have a legend about it. If Antrax is destroyed, the world will revert to what it once was. Remember how the Rindge insisted that Antrax controlled the weather? Well before that time, this land was all ice and snow, bitter cold and barely habitable. It only turned to something warm and green after Antrax changed it eons ago. Now it’s changing back. Feel the nip in the air?”