The First King of Shannara - Terry Brooks [19]
Bremen reached into his robes and withdrew a small leather pouch. “Within is a special dust,” he told his friend. “If the Warlock Lord should come within these walls, throw it across the Druid Histories, and they will be sealed away. The dust will hide them. The dust will keep them safe.”
He handed the pouch to Kahle, who accepted it reluctantly. The wizened Druid held the pouch out in the cup of his hand as if to measure its worth. “Elf magic?” he asked, and Bremen nodded.
“Some form of faerie dust, I suppose. Some form of old-world sorcery.” He grinned mischievously. “Do you know what would happen to me if Athabasca found this in my possession?”
“I do,” Bremen replied solemnly. “But he won’t find it, will he?”
Kahle regarded the pouch thoughtfully for a moment, then tucked it into his robes. “No,” he agreed, “he won’t.” His brow furrowed. “But I am not sure I can promise I will use it, no matter what the cause. I am like Athabasca in this one matter, Bremen. I am opposed to involvement of the magic in the carrying out of my duties. I deplore magic as a means to any end. You know that. I have made it plain enough before, haven’t I?”
“You have.”
“And still you ask me to do this?”
“I must. Who else can I turn to? Who else can I trust? I leave it to your good judgment, Kahle. Use the dust only if circumstances are so dire that the lives of all are threatened and no one will be left to care for the books. Do not let them fall into the hands of those who will misuse the knowledge. That would be worse than any imagined result of employing magic.”
Kahle regarded him solemnly, then nodded. “It would, indeed. Very well. I will keep the dust with me and use it should the worst come to pass. But only then.”
They faced each other in the ensuing silence, all the words spoken, nothing left to say.
“You should reconsider your decision to come with me,” Bremen tried a final time.
Kahle smiled, a brittle twist of his thin mouth. “You asked me to come with you once before, when you chose to leave Paranor and pursue your studies of the magic elsewhere. I told you then I would never leave, that this is where I belong. Nothing has changed.”
Bremen felt a bitter helplessness creep through him, and he smiled quickly to keep it from showing. “Then goodbye, Kahle Rese, my oldest and greatest friend. Keep well.”
The small man embraced him, hands gripping the old man’s slender frame and holding fast. “Goodbye, Bremen.” His voice was a whisper. “This one time, I hope you are wrong.”
Bremen nodded wordlessly. Then he turned and went out the library door without looking back. He found himself wishing that things could be different, knowing they could not. He moved swiftly down the hallway to the door that opened into the back stairs passageway that had brought him. He found himself looking at the tapestries and artifacts as if he had never seen them — or perhaps as if he would never see them again. He felt some part of himself slipping away, just as it had when he left Paranor the first time. He did not like to admit it, but this was still more home to him than any other place, and as it was with all homes, it laid claim to him in ways that could not be judged or measured.
He went through the door into the near darkness of the landing beyond and found himself face-to-face with Risca and Tay Trefenwyd.
Tay came forward immediately and embraced him. “Welcome home, Druid,” he said, clapping the old man on the back.
Tay was an Elf of unusual height and size, lanky and rather awkward-looking, as if he were constantly in danger of tripping over his own feet. His face was decidedly Elven, but his head seemed to have been grafted onto his body by mistake. He was young still, even with fifteen years of service at Paranor, his face smooth and clean-shaven. He had blond hair and blue eyes, and always bore a ready smile for everyone.
“You look well, Tay,” the old man replied, giving the other a quick smile in return. “Life at Paranor agrees with you.”
“Seeing you again agrees with me more,” the other declared. “When are we leaving?