one. Why just one?
He gained the stairs and scrambled up. The trapdoor was a
faint silhouette above. He wondered suddenly if others might
be waiting above, if he was being driven into a trap. Should he
stand his ground and face the one rather than allow himself to
be herded toward the others? But it was all speculation, and
besides there wasn’t time left to decide. He was already at the
trapdoor.
He shoved upward against it. The trapdoor did not move.
Shafts of fading daylight found their way through gaps in
the heavy wooden boards and danced off his sweat-streaked face,
momentarily blinding him. Lowering his head, he shoved up-
ward a second time. The door was solidly in place. He squinted
past the light, trying to see what had happened.
Something large and bulky was sitting atop the front edge
of the trapdoor.
In desperation, he threw himself against the barrier, but it
refused to budge. He backed down the steps, casting a quick
glance over his shoulder. His heart was beating so loudly in his
ears he could barely manage to hear the muffled voice that
called his name.
“Par? Par Ohmsford?”
A man, someone he knew it seemed, but he wasn’t sure. The
voice was familiar and strange all at once. The speaker was still
back in the tunnels, lost in the darkness. The gristmill cellar
stretched low and tight to the dark opening, dust motes dancing
on the air in the gloom, a haze that turned everything to shadow.
Par looked at the trapdoor once more, then back again at the
cellar.
He was trapped.
The line of his mouth tightened. Sweat was running down
his body in the wake of his exertion and fear, and his skin was
crawling.
Who was back there?
Who was it who would know his name?
He thought again of Damson, wondering where she was,
what had become of her, whether she was safe. If she had been
taken, then he was the only one left she could depend upon.
He could not let himself be captured because then there would
be no one to help her. Or him. Damson. He saw her flaming
red hair, the quirk of her mouth as she smiled at him, and the
brightness of her green eyes. He could hear her voice, her
laughter. He could feel her touching him. He remembered how
she had worked to save his life, to keep him from the madness
that had claimed him when Coil had died.
The feelings he experienced in that instant were overwhelm-
ing, so intense he almost cried them out.
Anger and determination replaced his fear. He reached back
and started to draw free the Sword of Shannara, then let it slip
back into its sheath. The Sword was meant for other things. He
would use his magic, use it even though it frightened him now,
an old friend who had turned unexpectedly strange and unfa-
miliar. The magic was unreliable, quixotic, and dangerous.
And of questionable use, he realized suddenly, if what he
faced was human.
His thoughts scattered, leaving him bereft of hope. He
reached back a second time and pulled free the Sword. It was
his only weapon after all.
A shadow appeared at the mouth of the tunnel, breath hiss-
ing softly in the sudden silence, a cloaked form, dark and fea-
tureless in the failing light. A man, it looked, taller than Par and
broader as well.
The man stepped clear of the dark and straightened. He
started forward and then abruptly stopped, seeing Par crouched
on the cellar stairs, weapon in hand. The long knife in his own
hand glinted dully. For an instant they faced each other without
moving, each trying to identify the other.
Then the intruder’s hands reached up slowly and slid back
the hood of his dusty black cloak.
CHAPTER
24
TRISS STRAIGHTENED, his movements leaden and stiff.
They stared wordlessly at one another, the Captain of
the Home Guard, Wren, and Garth, faceless in Mor-
rowindl’s vog-shrouded night. They stood like statues
about the crumpled form of Dal, as if sentinels set at watch,
frozen in time. They were all that remained of the company of