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Measure of the Magic

Terry Brooks
Chapters (39)
  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Chapter One
  5. Chapter Two
  6. Chapter Three
  7. Chapter Four
  8. Chapter Five
  9. Chapter Six
  10. Chapter Seven
  11. Chapter Eight
  12. Chapter Nine
  13. Chapter Ten
  14. Chapter Eleven
  15. Chapter Twelve
  16. Chapter Thirteen
  17. Chapter Fourteen
  18. Chapter Fifteen
  19. Chapter Sixteen
  20. Chapter Seventeen
  21. Chapter Eighteen
  22. Chapter Nineteen
  23. Chapter Twenty
  24. Chapter Twenty-one
  25. Chapter Twenty-two
  26. Chapter Twenty-three
  27. Chapter Twenty-four
  28. Chapter Twenty-five
  29. Chapter Twenty-six
  30. Chapter Twenty-seven
  31. Chapter Twenty-eight
  32. Chapter Twenty-nine
  33. Chapter Thirty
  34. Chapter Thirty-one
  35. Chapter Thirty-two
  36. Chapter Thirty-three
  37. Dedication
  38. Other Books by This Author
  39. ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

The Measure of the Magic is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2011 by Terry Brooks

Published in the United States by Del Rey, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

DEL REY is a registered trademark and the Del Rey colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Brooks, Terry.
The measure of the magic : legends of Shannara / Terry Brooks.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-345-52921-3
1. Shannara (Imaginary place)—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3552.R6596M43 2011
813′.54—dc222011014440

Jacket design: David Stevenson
Jacket illustration: © Steve Stone

v3.1

Chapter One

HUMMING TUNELESSLY, THE RAGPICKER WALKED the barren, empty wasteland in the aftermath of a rainstorm. The skies were still dark with clouds and the earth was sodden and slick with surface water, but none of that mattered to him. Others might prefer the sun and blue skies and the feel of hard, dry earth beneath their feet, might revel in the brightness and the warmth. But life was created in the darkness and damp of the womb, and the ragpicker took considerable comfort in knowing that procreation was instinctual and needed nothing of the face of nature’s disposition that he liked the least.

He was an odd-looking fellow, an unprepossessing, almost comical figure. He was tall and whipcord-thin, and he walked like a long-legged waterbird. Dressed in dark clothes that had seen much better days, he tended to blend in nicely with the mostly colorless landscape he traveled. He carried his rags and scraps of cloth in a frayed patchwork bag slung over one shoulder, the bag looking very much as if it would rip apart completely with each fresh step its bearer took. A pair of scuffed leather boots completed the ensemble, scavenged from a dead man some years back, but still holding up quite nicely.

Everything about the ragpicker suggested that he was harmless. Everything marked him as easy prey in a world where predators dominated the remnants of a decimated population. He knew how he looked to the things that were always hunting, what they thought when they saw him coming. But that was all right. He had stayed alive this long by keeping his head down and staying out of harm’s way. People like him, they didn’t get noticed. The trick was in not doing anything to call attention to yourself.