Ellenroh once did, I ask for your support. I think we must go
out to meet the Federation army and deal with it as we deter-
mine best. I think we shall discover that there are others who
will help us. Hiding will gain us nothing. Isolating ourselves is
exactly what the Federation hopes for. We must not give them
the satisfaction of finding us frightened and alone. We are the
oldest people on the earth, and we must act the part. We must
provide leadership for the people of the other, younger Races.
We must give them hope.”
She looked at them. “Who stands with me? ”
Triss rose at once. Tiger Ty rose with him, looking decid-
edly awkward. Then, to her pleasant surprise, Fruaren Laurel,
who had not said a word the entire time, stood up as well.
She waited. Four stood, four remained seated. Of the four
who stood, only three were members of the High Council. Ti-
ger Ty was only an emissary of his people. If nothing changed,
Wren lacked the support she needed.
She turned her gaze on Eton Shart, then held out her hand
to him, a gesture at once conciliatory and challenging. He
stared at her in surprise, eyes questioning. He hesitated mo-
mentarily, undecided, then reached out to accept her hand and
rose. “My lady,” he acknowledged, and bowed. “As you say,
we must stand together.”
Barsimmon Oridio rose, too.’ “Better a gamecock than a
plucked chicken,” he grumbled. He shook his head, then
looked at Wren with something akin to admiration in his aging
eyes. “Your grandmother would have advised us in the same
way, my lady.”
Jalen Ruhl and Perek Arundel stood up reluctantly, casting
helpless glances at each other as they did so. They were not
persuaded, but they did not care to stand alone against her.
146 The Talismans of Shannara
Wren gave them a gracious nod. She would take what she
could get.
‘Thank you,” she said quietly. She squeezed Eton Shart’s
hand and released it. “Thank you all. Let us remember in the
days that come what we have committed to this night. Let us
remember to let our belief and trust in each other sustain us.”
She looked about the table, at each face, at the way their
eyes were fixed on her. For that moment, at least, she had
bound them to her, and she was indeed their queen.
XIII
Walker Boh deliberated for two days before he again
tried to escape the Shadowen siege of Paranor.
Perhaps he wouldn’t have gone even then, but he
found himself slipping into a dangerous state of mind. The
more he thought about various ways of breaking free, the more
it seemed he needed to consider further. Each plan had its
flaws, and each flaw became magnified as it was held up this
way and that for examination. Nothing he conceived seemed
exactly right, and the harder he worked at discovering a fool-
proof method of gaining his escape, the more he began to
doubt himself. Finally it became apparent that if he allowed
himself to go on, he would lose all confidence and in the end
be unable to act at all.
It was all part of a game that the Shadowen were playing
with him, he was afraid.
His first encounter with the Four Horsemen had left him
physically battered, but those injuries were not the ones that
troubled him. It was the psychological damage that refused to
mend, that lingered within like a fever. Walker Boh had always
been in control of his life,, able to manipulate events around
him and to keep intrusions at bay. He had accomplished this
mostly by isolating himself within the familiar confines of
Darklin Reach, where the dangers to be faced and problems to
be solved were familiar and within the purview of his enor-
mous capabilities. He had command of magic, intelligence
coupled with extraordinary insight, and other assorted abilities
that ranged from the intuitive to the acquired—all of which
147
148 The Talismans of Shannara
were far superior to those of anyone against whom he chose to
direct them.
But that was changed. He had crossed out of Darklin Reach