Терри Брукс - Jarka Ruus

But then, how old had his father been when he had sailed aboard the Jerle Shannara? How old, when he had crossed the Blue Divide to the continent of Parkasia? Not much older than Pen, and his adoptive parents, Coran and Liria Leah, had given him permission to go. Admittedly, the circumstances compelling their agreement had been unusual, but the principle regarding a boy's age and maturity was the same.

Well, that was then and this was now. He knew he couldn't compare the two. Bek Ohmsford had possessed the magic of the wishsong, and without it he probably wouldn't have survived the journey. It made Pen want to know how that felt. He would have liked to have the use of the wishsong for maybe a day or two, just to see what it was like. He wondered how it would feel to do the things that his father and aunt could do. Had done. He was curious in spite of himself, a natural reaction to the way things could have been versus the way they were. He just thought it would be interesting to try it out in some way, to put it to some small use. Magic had its attractions, like it or not.

His father talked about it as if possessing it wasn't all that wonderful, as if it was something of a burden. Easy for his father to say. Easy for anyone who had the use of it to say to someone who didn't.

Of course, Pen had his own gift, the one that seemed to have come out of nowhere after he was born, the one that allowed him to connect with living things in a way no one else could. Except for humans—he couldn't do it with them. But with plants and animals, he could. He could always tell what they were feeling or thinking. He could empathize with them. He didn't even have to work at it. He could just pay attention to what was going on around him and know things others couldn't.

He could communicate with them, too. Not speak their language exactly, but read and interpret their sounds and movements and respond in a similar way. He could make them understand the connection they shared, even if he clearly wasn't of their species.

He supposed that could be considered a form of magic, but he wasn't sure he wanted to designate it as such. It wasn't very useful. It was all well and good to know from gulls that a storm front was building in the west or from ground squirrels that a nut source was dwindling or from a beech tree that the soil that fed its roots was losing its nutrients. It could be interesting to tell a deer just by the way you held yourself that you meant no harm. But he hadn't found much point in all that. His parents knew about it, and they told him that it was special and might turn out to be important one day, but he couldn't see how.

His uncle Redden wanted him to read the seas when they went fishing, when they flew out over the Blue Divide. Big Red wanted to know what the gulls and dolphins were seeing that might tell him where to steer. Pen was glad to oblige, but it made him feel a bit like a hunting dog.

He grinned in spite of himself. There was that image again. A dog. The family dog, a hunting dog. Maybe in his next life, that was what he would be. He didn't know if he liked the idea or not, but it was amusing to think about.

The wind was whipping across the lake, snapping the line of pennants attached atop the trees bracketing the cove entrance to measure velocity, a clear indication that a storm was indeed approaching. He was just turning away to go inside when he caught sight of something far out on the water. It was nothing more than a spot, but it had appeared all at once, materializing out of the mist. He stopped where he was and stared at it, trying to decide if it was a boat. It took him several minutes to confirm that it was. Not much of a boat, however. Something like a skiff or a punt, little and prone to capsizing.

Why would anyone be out in a boat like that in such weather?

He waited for the boat to come closer and tried to decide if it was headed for Patch Run. It soon became apparent it was. It skipped and slewed on the roughening waters, a cork adrift, propelled by a single sail and a captain who clearly did not know a whole lot about sailing in good weather, let alone bad. Pen shook his head in a mix of wonder and admiration. Whoever was in that boat wasn't lacking in courage, although good sense might be in short supply.

The little boat—it was a skiff, Pen determined—whipped off the lake and into the cove, its single occupant hunched at the tiller. He was a Dwarf, gray–bearded and sturdy in build, cloaked against the wind and cold, working the lines of the sail as if trying to figure out what to do to get his craft ashore. Pen walked down to the edge of the water by the docks, waited until his visitor was close enough, then threw him a line. The Dwarf grasped it as a drowning man might, and Pen pulled him into the pilings and tied him off.

«Many thanks!» the Dwarf gasped, breathing heavily as he took Pen's hand and hauled himself out of the skiff and onto the dock. «I'm all worn out!»

«I expect so," Pen replied, looking him over critically. «Crossing the lake in this weather couldn't have been easy.»

«It didn't start out like this. It was sunny and bright when I set off this morning.» The Dwarf straightened his rumpled, drenched clothing and rubbed his hands briskly. «I didn't realize this storm was coming up.»

The boy smiled. «If you don't mind my saying so, only a crazy man would sail a ratty old skiff like this one in any weather.»

«Or a desperate one. Is this Patch Run? Are you an Ohmsford?»

Pen nodded. «I'm Pen. My parents are Bek and Rue. Are you looking for them?»

The Dwarf nodded and stuck out his hand. «Tagwen, personal assistant to your aunt, the Ard Rhys. We've never met, but I know something about you from her. She says you're a smart boy and a first–rate sailor. I could have used you in coming here.»

Pen shook the Dwarf's hand.. «My aunt sent you?»

«Not exactly. I've come on my own.» He glanced past Bek toward the house and outbuildings. «Not to be rude, but I need to talk to your parents right away. I don't have much time to waste. I think I was followed. Can you take me up to them?»

«They're not here," Pen said. «They're off on an expedition in the Wolfsktaag and won't be back for weeks. Is there something I can do to help? How about some hot cider?»

«They're not here?» Tagwen repeated. He seemed dismayed. «Could you find them, if you had to? Could you fly me to where they are? I didn't expect this, I really didn't. I should have thought it through better, but all I knew was to get here as quickly as I could.»

He glanced over his shoulder, whether at the lake and the approaching storm Pen couldn't tell. «I don't think I can find my parents while they're in the Wolfsktaag," the boy said. «I've never even been there. Anyway, I can't leave home.»

«I've never been there, either," Tagwen allowed, «and I'm a Dwarf. I was born and raised in Culhaven, and other than coming to Paranor to serve the Ard Rhys, I've never really been much of anywhere.»

Pen grinned in spite of himself. He liked the strange little man. «How on earth did you find your way here, then? How did you manage to sail that skiff all this way from the north shore? If you get out in the middle of Rainbow Lake on days like this, you can't see anything but mist in all directions.»

Tagwen reached into his pocket, fished around, and pulled out a small metal cylinder. «Compass," he advised. «I learned to read it at Paranor while exploring the forest that surrounds the Keep. It was all I had to rely on, coming down through the Dragon's Teeth and the Borderlands. I don't like flying, so I decided to come on horseback. When I got to the lake, I had to find a boat. I bought this one, but I don't think I chose very well. Listen, Pen, I'm sorry to be so insistent about this, but are you sure you can't find your parents?»

He looked so distressed that Pen wanted to say he could, but he knew his parents used the wishsong to hide their presence in dangerous places like the Wolfsktaag, the better to keep themselves and their passengers safe. Even if he knew where to begin to look, he doubted that he could locate them while they were using magic.

«What is this all about, anyway?» he asked, still unsure what the Dwarf wanted. «Why is all this so urgent?»

Tagwen drew a deep breath and exhaled so vehemently that Pen took a step back. «She's disappeared!» the Dwarf exclaimed. «Your aunt, three nights ago. Something happened to her, and I don't think it's something good. It hasn't been safe for her at Paranor for some time; I warned her about this over and over. Then she went into the Skull Kingdom with Kermadec to investigate some disturbance there, and when she came back, there was supposed to be a meeting with the Prime Minister—another snake in the grass—but sometime during the night, she just vanished, and now I don't know what to do!»

Pen stared at him. He didn't know who Kermadec or the Prime Minister were, but he could follow enough of what the Dwarf said to know that his aunt was in trouble. «How could she disappear from her own room?» he asked. «Doesn't she have guards? She told me she did. Rock Trolls, she said. Big ones.»

«They're all big.» Tagwen sighed. «I don't know how she disappeared; she just did. I thought that maybe your parents could help find her since I've done everything I can think to do. Perhaps your father could use his magic to track her, to discover where she's gone. Or been taken.»

Pen thought about it. His father could do that; he had done it before, though only once when Pen was with him, when their family dog disappeared in the Duln. His father probably could track Grianne, although only if she left a trail and hadn't just gone up in a puff of smoke or something. Where the Ard Rhys was concerned, anything was possible.

Tagwen rubbed his beard impatiently. «Is there anything you can do to help me or must I go alone to find them?»

«You can't find them on your own!» Pen exclaimed. «You wouldn't have one chance in a thousand! You barely managed to sail across Rainbow Lake in that skiff!»

Tagwen drew himself up. «The point is, I have to do something besides sit around hoping the Ard Rhys will show up again. Because I don't think she will. I've pretty much reconciled myself to it.»

«All right, but maybe there's another way, something else we can do.» Pen shrugged. «We just have to think of what it is.»

«Well, we'd better think of it pretty fast. I told you I don't have much time. I'm pretty sure I was followed. By Druids, I should point out, who don't want your aunt back, whether or not they're responsible for her disappearance in the first place. I expect they have decided I might be more trouble than I'm worth and would be better off 'disappeared' somewhere, as well.»

He paused dramatically. «On the other hand, it is possible that they don't care about me one way or the other, but are coming down here to see about you and your parents. They know about your father's magic, just as I do. You can decide for yourself what use they might choose to make of it, should they find your parents before I do.»

Pen was taken aback. He didn't even know those people, Druids with whom his family had not been involved even in the slightest. That was his aunt's world, not theirs. But it seemed that Tagwen believed the two were not as separate as Pen had believed.

He wondered what he should do. His choices were somewhat limited. He could either tell Tagwen that he was unable to help, confined to this way station by direct order of his parents, who had made it quite clear he was forbidden to go anywhere while they were away and made him promise he would remember that; or he could break his word. It might be in a good cause to chance the latter, but he didn't care for the odds of his explaining it to his parents if he was successful in helping the Dwarf find them. That's if nothing else happened on the way to doing so, which was far from certain given the distance he must travel and the dangers he was likely to encounter.