He paused, somber. “You always look for the challenges no one else wants. That’s part of what’s happening here. You see Walker and Wren walk away from this and right away you want to do just the opposite. That’s the way you are. You couldn’t give it up now if you had to.”
He cocked his head reflectively. “Believe it or not, I have always admired that in you.”
Then he sighed. “I know there are other considerations as well. There’s the matter of the folks, still under confinement back in the Vale, and us with no home, no real place to go, outlaws of a sort. If we abandon this search, this quest Allanon’s shade has given us, where do we go? What possible thing can we do that will change matters more thoroughly than finding the Sword of Shannara? I know there’s that. And I know
Par interrupted. “You said ‘we’.”
Coll stopped. “What?”
Par was studying him critically. “Just then. You said “we.” Several times. You said, that if “we” abandon this search and where do “we” go?”
Coll shook his head ruefully. “So I did. I start talking about you and almost before I know it I’m talking about me as well. But that’s exactly the problem, I guess. We’re so close that I sometimes think of us as if we were the same—and we’re not. We’re very different and never more so than in this instance. You have the magic and the chance to learn about it and I don’t. You have the quest and I haven’t. So what should I do if you go, Par?”
Par waited a moment, then said, “Well?”
“Well. After all is said and done, after all the arguments for and against have been laid on the table, I keep coming back to a couple of things.” He shifted so he was facing Par. “First, I’m your brother and I love you. That means I don’t abandon you, even when I’m not sure if I agree with what you’re doing. I’ve told you that before. Second, if you go...” He paused. “You are going, aren’t you?”
There was a long moment of silence. Par did not reply.
“Very well. If you go, it will be a dangerous journey, and you will need someone to watch your back. And that’s what brothers are supposed to do for each other. That’s second.”
He cleared his throat. “Last, I’ve thought it all out from the point of view of what I would do if I were you, go or not go, measuring what I perceive to be the right and wrong of the matter.” He paused. “If it were up to me, if I were you, I think I’d go.”
He leaned back against the poplar trunk and waited. Par took a deep breath. “To be honest, Coll, I think that’s just about the last thing I ever expected to hear from you.”
Coll smiled. “That’s probably why I said it. I don’t like to be predictable.”
“So you would go, would you? If you were me?” Par studied his brother silently for a moment, letting the possibility play itself out in his mind, “I don’t know if I believe you.”
Coll let the smile broaden. “Of course you do.”
They were still staring at each other as Morgan wandered up and sat down across from them, faintly puzzled as he saw the same look registered on both faces. Steff and Teel came over as well. All three glanced at one another. “What’s going on?” Morgan asked finally.
Par stared at him momentarily without seeing him. He saw instead the land beyond, the hills dotted with sparse groves, running south out of the barren stretches of the Dragon’s Teeth, fading into a heat that made the earth shimmer. Dust blew in small eddies where sudden breezes scooped at the roadway leading down. It was still beneath the tree, and Par was thinking about the past, remembering the times that Coll and he had shared. The memories were an intimacy that comforted him; they were sharp and clear, most of them, and they made him ache in a sweet, welcome way.
“Well?” Morgan persisted.
Par blinked. “Coll tells me he thinks I ought to do what the shade said. He thinks I ought to try to find the Sword of Shannara.” He paused. “What do you think, Morgan?”
Morgan didn’t hesitate. “I think I’m going with you. It gets tiresome spending all of my time tweaking the noses of those Federation dunderheads who try to govern Leah. There’s better uses for a man like me.” He lunged to his feet. “Besides, I have a blade that needs testing against things of dark magic!” He reached back in a mock feint for his sword. “And as all here can bear witness, there’s no better way to do so than to keep company with Par Ohmsford!”
Par shook his head despairingly. “Morgan, you shouldn’t joke...”
“Joke! But that’s just the point! All I’ve been doing for months now is playing jokes! And what good has it done?” Morgan’s lean features were hard. “Here is a chance for me to do something that has real purpose, something far more important than causing Leah’s enemies to suffer meaningless irritations and indignities. Come, now! You have to see it as I do, Par. You cannot dispute what I say.” His eyes shifted abruptly. “Steff, how about you? What do you intend? And Teel?”
Steff laughed, his rough features wrinkling. “Well now, Teel and I have pretty much the same point of view on the matter. We have already reached our decision. We came with you in the first place because we were hoping to get our hands on something, magic or whatever, that could help our people break free of the Federation. We haven’t found that something yet, but we might be getting closer. What the shade said about the Shadowen spreading the dark magic, living inside men and women and children to do so, might explain a good part of the madness that consumes the Lands. It might even have something to do with why the Federation seems so bent on breaking the backs of the Dwarves! You’ve seen it for yourself—that’s surely what the Federation is about. There’s dark magic at work there. Dwarves can sense it better than most because the deeper stretches of the Eastland have always provided a hiding place for it. The only difference in this instance is that, instead of hiding, it’s out in the open like a crazed animal, threatening us all. So maybe finding the Sword of Shannara as the shade says will be a step toward penning that animal up again!”
“There, now!” Morgan cried triumphantly. “What better company for you, Par Ohmsford, than that?”
Par shook his head in bewilderment. “None, Morgan, but...”
“Then say you’ll do it! Forget Walker and Wren and their excuses! This has meaning! Think of what we might be able to accomplish!” He gave his friend a plaintive look. “Confound it, Par, how can we lose by trying when by trying we have everything to gain?”
Steff reached over and poked him. “Don’t push so hard, Highlander. Give the Valeman room to breathe!”
Par stared at them each in turn, at the bluff-faced Steff, the enigmatic Teel, the fervently eager Morgan Leah, and finally Coll. He remembered suddenly that his brother had never finished revealing his own decision. He had only said that if he were Par, he would go.
“Coll...” he began.
But Coll seemed to read his thoughts. “If you’re going, I’m going.” His brother’s features might have been carved from stone. “From here to wherever this all ends.”
There was a long moment of silence as they faced each other, and the anticipation mirrored in their eyes was a whisper that rustled the leaves of their thoughts as if it were the wind.
Par Ohmsford took a deep breath. “Then I guess the matter’s settled,” he said. “Now where do we start?”
Chapter Seventeen
As usual, Morgan Leah had a plan.
“If we expect to have any luck at all locating the Sword, we’re going to need help. The five of us are simply too few. After all these years, finding the Sword of Shannara is likely to be like finding the proverbial needle in the haystack—and we don’t begin to know enough about the haystack. Steff, you and Teel may be familiar with the Eastland, but Callahom and the Borderlands are foreign ground. It’s the same with the Valemen and myself—we simply don’t know enough about the country. And let’s not forget that the Federation will be prowling about every place we’re likely to go. Dwarves and fugitives from the law aren’t welcome in the Southland, the last I heard. We’ll have to be on the lookout for Shadowen as well. Truth is, they seem drawn to the magic like wolves to the scent of blood, and we can’t assume we’ve seen the last of them. It will be all we can do to watch our backs, let alone figure out what’s happened to the Sword. We can’t do it alone. We need someone to help us, someone who has a working knowledge of the Four Lands, someone who can supply us with men and weapons.”