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.”
“You have more faith in me than I deserve.”
“Do I?”
“Yes, if you consider that I wasn’t referring to an attack that might come from a third party.”
The conversation was clearly making the King uncomfortable. Good, Walker thought. I want you to remember how you left things between us. I want you to wonder if I might be a greater threat to you than the enemies you more readily fear.
They emerged from the gardens onto the Carolan, the sunlight illuminating the green expanse of the heights in bright trailers that spilled over into the forests below. Walker led the way to a bench placed under an aging maple whose boughs canopied out in a vast umbrella. They sat together, Druid and King, looking out over the heights to the purple and gold mix of shadow and light that colored the horizon west.
“I have no reason to want to help you, Allardon Elessedil,” Walker said after a moment.
The Elven King nodded. “Perhaps you have better reason than you think. I am not the man I was when last we spoke. I regret deeply how that meeting ended.”
“Your regret can be no greater than my own,” Walker replied darkly, keeping his gaze averted, staring off into the distance.
“We can dwell on the regret and the loss or turn our attention to what we might accomplish if we relegate both to the past.” The Elven King’s voice was tight and worried, but there was a hint of determination behind it, as well. “I would like to make a new beginning.”
Now Walker looked at him. “What do you propose?”
“A chance for you to build the Druid Council you desire, to begin the work you have sought to do for so long, with my support and blessing.”
“Money and men would count for more than your support and blessing,” the Druid remarked dryly.
The Elven King’s face went taut. “You shall have both. You shall have whatever you need if you are able to give me what I need in return. Now tell me of the map. Were you able to decipher its writings?”
Walker took a long moment to consider his answer before he spoke. “Enough so that I can tell you that they purport to show the way to the treasure of which your mother’s seer dreamed thirty years ago. As I said, the writing is archaic and obscure. Some symbols suggest more than one thing. But there are names and courses and descriptions of sufficient clarity to reveal the nature of the map. Travel west off the coast of the Blue Divide to three islands, each a bit farther than the one before. Each hides a key that, when all are used together, will unlock a door. The door leads to an underground keep that lies beneath the ruins of a city called Castledown. The ruins can be found on a mountainous spit of land far west and north of here called Ice Henge. Within the ruins lies a treasure of lifealtering power. It is a magic of words, a magic that has survived the destruction of the Old World and the Great Wars by being kept hidden in its safehold. The magic’s origins are obscure, but the map’s writings say it surpasses all others.”