“You hunt those who use magic. Any use-even by you-is
forbidden!”
Rimmer Dall smiled. “So the Federation has decreed. But
has hasn’t stopped you from using your magic. Par? Or your uncle
Walker Boh? Or anyone who possesses it? It is, in fact, a foolish
decree, one that could never be enforced except against those
who don’t care about it in the first place. The Federation dreams
of conquest and empire-building, of uniting the lands and the
Races under its rule. The Coalition Council schemes and plans,
a remnant of a world that has already destroyed itself once in
the wars of power. It thinks itself chosen to govern because the
Councils of the Races are no more and the Druids gone. It sees
the disappearance of the Elves as a blessing. It seizes the prov-
inces of the Southland, threatens Callahom until it submits, and
destroys the wilful Dwarves simply because it can. It sees all
this as evidence of its mandate to rule. It believes itself omnis-
cient! In a final gesture of arrogance it outlaws magic! It doesn’t
once bother asking what purpose magic serves in the scheme of
things-it simply denies it!”
The dark figure hunched forward, the arms unfolding. “The
fact of the matter is that the Federation is a collection of fools
that understands nothing of what the magic means, Valeman. It
was magic that brought our world to pass, the world in which
we live, in which me Federation believes itself supreme. Magic
creates everything, makes everything possible. And the Feder-
ation would dismiss such power as if it were meaningless?”
Rimmer Dall straightened, looming up against the strange
light he had created, a dark form that seemed only vaguely hu-
man.
“Look at me. Par Ohmsford,” he whispered.
His body began to shimmer, then to separate. Par watched in
horror as a dark shape rose up against the shadows and half-
light, its eyes flaring with crimson fire.
“Do you see, Valeman?” Rimmer Ball’s disembodied voice
whispered with a hiss of satisfaction. “I am the very thing the
Federation would destroy, and they haven’t the faintest idea of
it!”
The irony of the idea was wasted on Par, who saw nothing
beyond the fact that he had placed himself in the worst possible
danger. He shrank from the man who called himself Rimmer
Dall, the creature who wasn’t in fact a man at all, but was a
Shadowen. He edged backward, determined to flee. Then he
remembered the Sword of Shannara, and abruptly, recklessly,
changed his mind. If he could get to the Sword, he thought
fiercely, he would have a weapon with which to destroy Rimmer
Dall.
But the Shadowen seemed unconcerned. Slowly the dark
shape settled back into Rimmer Dall’s body and the big man’s
voice returned. “You have been lied to, Valeman. Repeatedly.
You have been told that the Shadowen are evil things, that they
are parasites who invade the bodies of men to subvert them to
their cause. No, don’t bother to deny it or to ask how I know,”
he said quickly, cutting short Par’s exclamation of surprise. “I
know everything about you, about your journey to Culhaven,
the Wilderun, the Hadeshom, and beyond. I know of your meet-
ing with the shade of Allanon. I know of the lies he told you.
Lies, Par Ohmsford-and they begin with the Druids! They tell
you what you must do if the Shadowen are to be destroyed, if
the world is to be made safe again! You are to seek the Sword,
Wren the Elves, and Walker Boh vanished Paranor-I know!”
The craggy face twisted in anger. “But listen now to what
you were not told! The Shadowen are not an aberration that has
come to pass in the absence of the Druids! We are their succes-
sors! We are what evolved out of the magic with their passing!
And we are not monsters invading men, Valeman-we are men
ourselves!”
Par shook his head to deny what he was hearing, but Rimmer
Dall brought up his gloved hand quickly, pointing to the Vale-
man. “There is magic in men now as there was once magic in
the creatures of faerie. In the Elves, before they took themselves