High druid of Shannara_ Jarka Ruus - Terry Brooks [153]
The picture shimmered bright and clear for a moment longer, then vanished as if it had never been, leaving them encased once more in mist and gloom. They stood looking off in the direction it had shown for a moment, savoring the memory, the promise, then looked at one another appraisingly.
“It’s not all that far,” Pen declared bravely, although in truth he had no idea how far it was. “We can make it.”
“Of course, we can,” Tagwen agreed, screwing up his worn countenance into a mask of resolve.
“It can’t be more than another day,” Khyber added, pocketing the Elfstones. “We can be there by sunset.”
They began walking, turning back into the trees and leaving the mist-shrouded bay and its dark memories behind. It was slow going, their passage obstructed by fallen trees, heavy brush, and endless stretches of swamp water. They had to be especially careful of the latter because many hid patches of quicksand that would have swallowed them without a trace. Pen used his magic once more, reaching out to the life of the swamp to discover what it was thinking and doing. Though he couldn’t see what he was hearing for the most part, he was able to detect the presence of small birds, rodents, insects, and even a smattering of water creatures. Each told him something of what was happening around them. He was able to discover more than once dangers that threatened. He was able to tell from moods and responses between species the paths they should follow and those they should avoid.
They walked all day, yet by sunset it felt as if they hadn’t gone anywhere. Everything looked exactly the same as it had hours earlier. Nor was there any apparent end in sight, the gloom and mist and wetlands stretching on endlessly in all directions. If anything, the swamp had thickened and tightened about them, stealing away a little more of the light and air, eroding their hopes that they might get clear soon.
When they stopped for the night, Pen used his compass a final time to check their direction. It seemed as if they were going the right way, but he was beginning to wonder if the compass was working. His concerns were fostered in part by the way in which the light seemed not to change in any direction, the gloom and haze so thick that it was getting harder and harder to tell which way the sun was moving through the hidden sky.
“We might be lost,” he admitted to them. “I can’t be sure any more.”
“We’re not lost,” Khyber insisted. “Tomorrow, we will be through.”
But Pen wasn’t convinced. He took the first watch and sat brooding while the others slept, replaying the events of the past few days in his mind, a nagging concern that he couldn’t identify tugging at his already dwindling confidence. Something wasn’t right about the way they were looking at things, but he couldn’t put his finger on it. As the darkness deepened and the minutes slipped by, he found himself going further afield with his thinking, working his way back through the entire journey, from the moment Tagwen had first appeared with news of his aunt’s disappearance. Remembering how he had been forced to flee his home triggered memories of his parents and made him aware of how much he missed them and wished they were with him. He had always been an independent sort, raised to be that way, but this was the farthest he had ever been from home. It was also the most threatened he had ever felt. He knew of the dangerous creatures that dwelled in the places he visited regularly on his skiff journeys, but most of those he was encountering now were entirely new. Some of them didn’t even have a name.
And just like that, he realized what was bothering him. It was his inability to account for what had become of the mysterious hunter that had chased him through the streets of Anatcherae on the night he had fled Terek Molt.
He took a long moment to think it through. His pursuer had come