The Gnome was nonplussed. “I care about staying alive. That’s what you’d care about, too, if you had any brains.”
Jair went rigid with indignation. He came halfway out of his seat, arms braced on the table. “Staying alive! Well, just exactly how are you going to do that when the Mord Wraiths poison the Eastland and then move west into the other lands? That’s what’s going to happen, isn’t it? That’s what you said! Where will you run to then? Plan on changing sides one time more—become a Gnome again long enough to fool the walkers?”
Slanter reached up and shoved Jair back. “You have a big mouth for someone who understands so little about life. Maybe if you’d been out in the world looking after yourself instead of having someone do it for you, you’d not be so quick to point the finger at others. Now, shut up!”
Jair lapsed into immediate silence. There was nothing to be gained by pushing the matter any further. Slanter had made up his mind not to help, so that was the end of it. He was probably better off without the Gnome anyway.
The two were still glowering at each other when Garet Jax returned a few moments later. He was alone, and he came directly to where they sat. If he noticed the tension between them, he gave no indication of it. He took a seat next to Jair.
“You’re to go before the Council of Elders,” he said quietly.
Jair shook his head slowly. “I don’t know about this. I don’t know if this is the right thing to do.”
The Weapons Master pinned him with his eyes. “You don’t have a choice.”
“What about Brin? And Allanon?”
“There is no news of them. Foraker checked, and they haven’t been to Culhaven. No one knows anything about them.” The gray eyes studied the Valeman intently. “Whatever help you’re to find in this quest of yours, you’ll have to find it on your own.”
Jair glanced quickly at Slanter, but the Gnome refused to meet his gaze. He turned back to Garet Jax. “When do I go before the Council?”
The Weapons Master stood up. “Now.”
The Dwarf Council of Elders had convened in the Assembly, a large and cavernous hail settled within the bowels of a squarish building that housed all of the offices governing the affairs of the village of Culhaven. Twelve strong, the members of the Council sat behind a long table on a dais at the head of the chamber and looked down upon rows of benches separated by aisles that ran back to a pair of wide double-doors leading in. It was through these doors that Garet Jax brought Jair and Slanter. Shadows cloaked all but the very forefront of the Assembly, where oil lamps cast their harsh yellow light across the dais. The three who entered made their way to the edge of the light and stopped. A gathering of others occupied seats on the benches closest to the dais, and heads lifted and turned at their approach. A haze of pipe smoke hung over the men gathered, and the pungent smell of burning tobacco filled the air
.
“Come forward,” a voice called.
They proceeded until they stood even with the foremost line of benches. Jair glanced around uneasily. The faces that stared back at him were not simply the faces of Dwarves. A handful of Elves sat immediately to his right, and half a dozen Bordermen from Callahorn far to his left. Foraker was there as well, black-bearded face dour and set as he leaned against the far wall.
“Welcome to Culhaven,” the voice spoke again.
The speaker rose from behind the table on the dais. He was a gray-bearded Dwarf of some years, rough-faced and bluff, skin browned and lined in the harsh light of the lamps. He stood centermost among the Elders at the Council.
“My name is Browork, Elder and citizen of Culhaven, First at this Council,” he informed them. His hand lifted and beckoned to Jair. “Come forward, Valeman.”
Jair came toward him a step or two and stopped, glancing at the line of faces that looked down at him. All were aged and weathered, yet with eyes still quick and alert as they studied him.
“Your name?” Browork asked him.
“Jair Ohmsford,” he replied. “Of Shady Vale.”
The Dwarf nodded. “What would you say to us, Jair Ohmsford?”
Jair glanced about. The faces all about him waited expectantly—faces he did not know. Should he reveal what he knew to them? He looked back at the Elder.
“You may speak freely,” Browork assured him, sensing his concern. “All gathered here are to be trusted; all are leaders in the fight against the Mord Wraiths.”
He sat down again slowly and waited. Jair looked about once more, then took a deep breath and began to speak. Step by step, he revealed all that had happened since the arrival of Allanon in Shady Vale those many nights past. He told of the Druid’s coming, of his warning of the Mord Wraiths, of his need for Brin, and of their departure east. He described his subsequent flight, the adventures that had befallen him in the highlands and the Black Oaks, his meeting with the King of the Silver River, and the prophecy foretold by the legendary King. It took him some time to tell it all. While he spoke, the men gathered about him stayed silent. He could not bring himself to look at them; he was frightened of what he might see in their faces. Instead, he kept his eyes fixed on the seams and hollows that molded Browork’s weathered countenance and the deep-set blue eyes that stared fixedly back at him.
When at last he was finished, the Dwarf Elder leaned forward slowly, his rough hands folding on the table before him, his gaze still holding Jair’s.
“Twenty years ago, I fought with Allanon to keep the Demon hordes from the Elven city of Arborlon. It was a terrible battle. Young Edain Elessedil—” He indicated with his hand a blond-haired Elf barely older than Brin. “—was not even born then. His grandfather, the great Eventine, was King of Elves. That was when Allanon last walked the Four Lands. Not since that time has the Druid been seen, Valeman. He has not come to Culhaven. He has not come to the Eastland. What say you to that?”
Jair shook his head. “I don’t know why he didn’t come this way. I don’t know where he has gone. I only know where it is that he goes—and my sister with him. And I know, too, that he has indeed been within the Eastland.” He turned toward Slanter. “This Hunter tracked him from the Maelmord west to my home.”
He waited for confirmation, but Slanter said nothing.
“No one has seen Allanon for twenty years,” another Elder of the Council repeated quietly.
“And no one has ever spoken with the King of the Silver River,” a third said.
“I spoke with him,” Jair said. “And my father also spoke with him. He helped my father and an Elf girl flee the Demons to Arborlon.”
Browork continued to study him. “I know of your father, youngster. He did come to Arborlon to aid the Elves in their fight against the Demons. It was rumored that he was the possessor of Elfstones, just as you have said. But you say that you took the Elfstones from your home and then gave them up to the King of the Silver River?”
“In exchange for magic I could use,” Jair affirmed quickly. “For a wish I could use to save Brin. For a vision crystal to find her. And for strength for those who would help me.”
Browork glanced now at Garet Jax. The Weapons Master nodded. “I have seen the crystal of which he speaks. It is magic. It did show to us the face of a girl—one he says is his sister.”
The Elf identified as Edain Elessedil came suddenly to his feet. He was tall and fair-skinned, his blond hair reaching to his shoulders. “My father has spoken to me of Wil Ohmsford many times. He has said that he is an honorable man. I do not think a son of his would speak anything but the truth.”
“Unless he mistook fantasy for truth,” one of the Council suggested. “This tale is difficult to swallow.”
“But the waters of the river are indeed fouled,” another pointed out. “We all know that in some way the Mord Wraiths poison them in an effort to destroy us.”
“As you say, common knowledge,” replied the first. “Hardly proof of anything.”
Other voices rose now, arguing the merits of Jair’s tale. Browork raised his hands sharply.
“Peace, Elders! Give thought to what we are about!” He turned back to Jair. “Your quest, if it be true, requires that we give you aid. You cannot succeed without that aid, Valeman. Armies of Gnomes lie between you and the thing you seek—this place you call Heaven’s Well. Understand, too, that none among us have ever been where you would go or seen the source of the waters of the Silver River.” He glanced about for confirmation; heads nodded and no one spoke in contradiction. “For us to help you then, we must first be certain of what we do. We must believe. How are we to believe a thing of which we have no personal knowledge? How are we to know what you tell us is the truth?”
“I would not lie,” Jair insisted, flushing.
“Not knowingly, perhaps,” the Elder mused. “Yet all lies are not intended. Sometimes what we believe to be truth is but a falsehood which deceives us. Perhaps that is what has happened here. Perhaps . . .”
“Perhaps if we waste enough time talking about it, it will be too late to do anything to help Brin!” Jair lost his temper completely. “I have not been deceived in anything! What I spoke of happened!”
The voices murmured in dissatisfaction, but immediately Browork signaled for quiet. “Show to us this pouch of Silver Dust that we might gain some measure of belief in what you say,” he ordered.
The Valeman stared at him helplessly. “It will not aid you. The dust appears as common sand.”
“Sand?” One of the Council members shook his head in disgust. “We are wasting our time, Browork.”
“Let us at least see the crystal, then,” Browork sighed.
“Or prove to us in some other way that what you say is true,” another demanded.
Jair felt his chance of convincing the Dwarves of anything slipping rapidly away. Few, if any, of the Council believed what he was telling them. They had seen nothing of Allanon or Brin; none of them had ever heard of anyone speaking with the King of the Silver River; for all he knew, they didn’t even believe that such a being existed. Now he was telling them he had given Elfstones for magic they could not even see.
“We waste time, Browork,” the first Elder muttered once more.
“Let the Valeman be questioned by others while we get on with our business,” another said.
Again the voices rose, and this time they drowned out Browork’s pleas for silence. Almost to a man, the Dwarves of the Council and those gathered with them called for the matter to be disposed of without further delay.
“I could have told you this would happen,” Slanter whispered suddenly from behind him.
Jair went crimson with anger. He had come too far and endured too much to be shoved aside now. Give us proof, they were telling him. Make us believe.
Well, he knew how to make them believe!
Stepping forward suddenly, he lifted his hands high, then pointed into the shadows of the aisle leading back from where he stood. So dramatic was the gesture that the voices went abruptly still, and all heads turned to look. There was nothing there, nothing but darkness . . .
Then Jair sang, the wishsong quick and strident, and a tall, black figure wrapped in cloak and cowl emerged from out of the nothingness of the air.
The figure was Allanon.
There was a sharp gasp from those assembled. Swords and long knives slipped from their sheaths, and men bounded from their seats to defend against this shade that had emerged from the dark. Within the cowl, a dark lean face lifted to the light, eyes fixing on the men of the Council. Then Jair’s song faded and the Druid was gone.
Jair turned once more to Browork. The Dwarf’s eyes were wide. “Now do you believe me?” the Valeman asked quietly. “You said you knew him; you said you fought with him at Arborlon. Was that the Druid?”
Slowly Browork nodded. “That was Allanon.”
“Then you know that I have seen him,” Jair said.
All assembled turned back now to stare at the Valeman, uneasy and shaken by what had happened. Behind him, Jair heard Slanter chuckle, a low nervous laugh. He caught a glimpse of Garet Jax from the corner of his eye. The Weapons Master had a curious, almost surprised look on his face.
“I have told you the truth,” Jair said to Browork. “I must go into deep Anar and find Heaven’s Well. Allanon will be there with my sister. Now tell me—will you help me or not?”
Browork glanced at the other Elders. “What say you?”
“I believe what he says,” one old man ventured quietly.
“But it could yet be a trick!” another said. “It could be the work of the Mord Wraiths!”
Jair glanced quickly about. A few heads were nodding in agreement. In the smoky light of the oil lamps, suspicion and fear clouded many eyes.
“The risk is too great, I think,” yet another Elder said. Browork rose. “We are pledged to give aid to any who seek the destruction of the Wraiths,” he said, blue eyes quick and hard. “This Valeman has told us he is allied with others of like mind and purpose. I believe him. I believe we should do what we can to aid him in his quest. I call for a vote, Elders. Give me your hands in support if you agree.”
Browork’s hand lifted high. Half a dozen more from the Council lifted with it. But the dissenters were not to be silenced so easily.
“This is madness!” one shouted. “Who will go with him? Are we to send men from the village, Browork? Who is to go on this quest to which you have so unwisely given your blessing? I call for volunteers if this is to be done!”
A scattering of voices muttered in support. Browork nodded. “So be it.” He looked about the chamber silently, his eyes shifting from one face to the next, searching, waiting for someone to accept the challenge.
“I will go.”
Jair looked around slowly. Garet Jax had come forward a single step, gray eyes expressionless as he faced the Council.
“The King of the Silver River promised the Valeman that I would be his protector,” he said softly. “Very well. The promise shall be kept.”
Browork nodded, then looked about the room once more. “Who else among you will go?” he called out.
Elb Foraker pushed away from the wall against which he was leaning and walked over to stand with his friend. Again Browork looked out among those gathered. A moment later there was a stirring from among the men of Callahorn. A giant Borderman rose to his feet, black hair and beard close-cropped about his long, strangely gentle face.