cing over. “Some did better with it than others.”
“Some adapted,” Walker said. “But many could not, though
they tried. And some of those in the Pit were men who had
The Talismans of Shannara 433
been drained of their small magics by the Shadowen, the weak
subverted by the strong. Remember how the Shadowen kept
trying to come into you and become part of you? Like the
woodswoman and the child on Toffer Ridge? ”
Like Rimmer Dall, Par thought to himself but did not say
so.
‘They needed to feed to survive, and they fed where and
when the need arose. They used up the humans around them
as well as the earth that sustained them. If the magic was
strong, the lure to steal it was stronger still. When the
Shadowen had drained the magic away, it drove mad the crea-
tures it had been drained from. Or in some cases, it drove the
Shadowen mad to feed on it. It was a very destructive subver-
sion. The Shadowen never understood. The power they sought
was forbidden to them. The power that gives life to the earth
and its creatures is too dangerous to tamper with.”
Rumor padded in from out of the shadows, singed and
bloodied in a dozen places, patches of fur torn off in a dozen
more. He seemed not to notice. His muzzle was wet from hav-
ing drunk from a spring found somewhere back within the
trees. His luminous eyes surveyed them briefly, then he wan-
dered over to Walker, sat down, and began to lick himself
clean.
Par picked at a wildflower growing near his feet. “Rimmer
Dall wanted to drain the magic of the wishsong from me,
didn’t he? ”
“He wanted more than the magic. Par.” Walker had shifted
to a more comfortable position, and Rumor looked over to
make certain he wasn’t leaving. “He wanted you as well. He
wanted to become you. This is difficult to understand, but the
Shadowen had discovered how to leave their bodies and sur-
vive as wraiths early on. The old magic let them do that; the
earth magic gave them the power to be anything they wished.
But they lacked identity that way, and they craved to be some-
thing more than smoke. So they used the bodies of humans,
discarding them when they were ready to be someone or some-
thing new.”
He leaned forward slightly. “But Rimmer Dall was First
Seeker, the strongest of the Shadowen, and he hungered to be
more than the others. He settled on being you. Par, because
434 The Talismans of Shannara
you gave him youth and power unlike that possessed by any
other human. The wishsong was evolving; he knew that. More
than that, he recognized the direction that evolution was taking.
Your Elven blood was bringing the magic back around to what
Brin Ohmsford had inherited from her father, the magic born
of the Elfstones. Remember how she had struggled to keep it
from destroying her? Rimmer Dall understood the nature of
this magic. It was Elven, but it had its Shadowen side, too. If
he could gain control of it, he could turn it to his own use. But
this was not something he could do unless you helped him.
The magic was too strong, too protective, to let you be sub-
verted forcibly. He needed to trick you into helping him. It was
what destroyed him in the end, his obsession with claiming
you. He gave himself over to it, spending his time on finding
a way to satisfy it, telling you that you were already a
Shadowen, suggesting you were the very enemy you sought,
letting you think you killed Coil and then bringing Coil back
to life, chasing you about, harrying you into believing that
without his help you would go mad.
“His cause was strengthened by his discovery that Allanon
had sent you in search of the Sword of Shannara. He knew of
your magic from Varfleet, but now he saw a way to make you
his ally against his most dangerous enemy. He needed to keep
close to you to make certain you did not discover the truth,