They conferred a moment more, agreeing on what they
would do if time and circumstance allowed. Morgan scanned
the countryside and then pointed west to where a bluff fronting
the lake looked out across the surrounding land. From there he
would be able to see anything coming to or going from
Southwatch. If nothing happened in the time between, that was
where they would find him when they returned.
He walked back with them to the skiff and retrieved sup-
plies sufficient to last him a week. Then he embraced them
hesitantly. Damson first, then Matty. The tall girl held him
tightly against her, almost as if to persuade him of her reluc-
tance to leave. She did not speak, but her hands pressed into
his back, and her lips brushed his cheek. She looked hard at
him as she broke away, and he had the feeling that she was
leaving something of herself behind with him in that look. He
started to give her a reassuring smile in reply, but she had al-
ready turned away.
When they were gone, faded into the mist that had settled
over the river, he turned west toward his selected watch post
and trudged into the growing dark. The clouds blanketed the
skies from horizon to horizon, and the air had begun to cool.
A wind had sprung up, gusting across the flats, sending dust
and silt swirling into his eyes. Par west, the rain was a dark
curtain moving toward him. He pulled up the hood of his for-
est cloak and lowered his eyes to the ground.
He had just reached his destination when the rain arrived, a
downpour that swept across the plains in a rush and covered
everything in an instant’s dme. Morgan burrowed deep within
the shelter of a broad-limbed fir and settled down against the
278 The Talismans of Shannara
base of the trunk. It was dry and protected there, and the storm
rolled past leaving him untouched. The rain continued for sev-
eral hours, then turned to drizzle, and finally stopped. The
thunderheads passed east, the skies cleared, and the sunset was
a red and purple blaze in the fading light.
Morgan left the shelter of the fir and found a stand of broad-
leaf maple that allowed him to remain hidden while at the
same time giving him a clear view of Southwatch and the
Mermidon east, a large stretch of the Rainbow Lake south, and
a cut through the hills below the Runne that funneled any land
traffic that might approach the Shadowen keep from the north
and west. It was an ideal position to observe everything for
nearly a dozen miles. Good enough, he decided, and settled in
to await the night.
He ate a little of the food he had brought and drank some
water. He wondered if Damson and Many had attempted a
crossing of the Rainbow Lake before the storm had struck or
if they had decided to wait. He wondered if they were camped
somewhere along the river looking back across at him.
The light faded to gray, and the stars began to appear. Mor-
gan stared down at Southwatch and wished he could see in-
side. He tried not to think too closely about what might be
happening there. Too much imagination could be a dangerous
thing. He studied the plains east, barren and stripped of life, a
wasteland of brown earth and gray deadwood that radiated out
from the tower of the Shadowen like a stain. The fringes, he
noted, were already darkening as well, infected by the poison
as it spread. Trees rotted and grasses withered. The bluff on
which he sat was an island already at risk.
He unstrapped the Sword of Leah from his back and cradled
it in his arms. A talisman against the Shadowen, Many Roh
had called it. But it was power, too, that stole your soul, and
there was little that could be done to protect against it. Each
time he used the magic, a test of wills resumed, his own and
the Sword’s, both fighting for supremacy, struggling for con-
trol. Three hundred years ago Allanon had answered Rone
Leah’s desperate, angry plea by bestowing a tiny part of the