Terry Brooks - Witch Wraith

“What was that?” Skint asked him, as the others came over. “Where did you get that ring?”

“It was a gift from Aphenglow,” he answered quickly, trying not to look at Mirai. “It helps find things that are hidden or ways in and out of places when you don’t know them. She said I might need it.”

The Gnome and the Troll exchanged a quick look that suggested they had doubts, but then the latter shrugged it off and said, “Lead the way.”

They set off into the ruins with Railing in front. The thread was there inside his head now, an instinct that tugged him along in a strange but not unpleasant way. He set a brisk pace, moving through the rubble, picking his way over broken rock and around half-formed walls. He could tell already they were headed into the heaviest of the mist shrouding the ruins, the darkness before them steadily deepening.

When the mist was sufficiently thick that they could barely see a few yards ahead, Challa Nand said, “You’re sure about this, are you?”

“He’s sure,” Mirai answered for him, then moved up to his shoulder. “You are, aren’t you?” she whispered.

He gave her a quick glance and a smile, and she nodded and dropped back again.

A short while later the mist and shadows fell away, and they found themselves standing before a fully formed and undamaged wall draped with flowering vines and deep green ivy. It was such an astonishing transition that everyone just stopped and stared for a few minutes. Railing felt the tug of the thread within his mind, urging him on.

And then, abruptly, there was something else—a sort of presence. It wasn’t inside his mind; it was in the air he was breathing. It was close enough that he felt it brush against him. He took a step back in surprise, trying to decide what it was.

–Enter–

The voice came out of nowhere, but he knew at once it was the presence that had just touched him. He looked again at the wall. There was an arched entry that opened about twenty feet to his right. He started toward it at once, and the other three followed.

Once they passed through the arch, they were inside magnificent gardens. Iron trellises of flowering vines backed up against the stone walls, and rows of flowering bushes grew everywhere in neat, orderly rows. Beds of brilliant color spread away through statuary, fountains, ponds, and huge old hardwoods thick with leaves. The sun shone out of cloudless skies, bright and warm and unimpeded by mist or shadows. There had been no sign of such a place when they were in the air; nothing of what they were seeing had been visible from overhead. It was as if they had entered another country—as if by stepping through the arch, they had come into a place completely apart from the ruins they had passed through only moments before.

Railing looked about in disbelief, aware the others were doing the same. He had heard that the Meade Gardens in the Dwarf city of Culhaven were wondrous, but he couldn’t imagine they were more incredible than these.

Mirai was back beside him. “Who do you think tends these gardens?” she asked quietly.

He hadn’t thought of that. Someone must. The grounds were immaculate. Everything was pristine, with no sign of wilt or decay—and nothing growing that didn’t belong. He felt the presence brush him again. More than one, he realized suddenly. Surely they had something to do with how these gardens came to be protected when everything else had been destroyed.

–Come–

“Who are you?” he whispered into the air.

–She waits–

They were urging him on, but they would not answer his question. He looked around doubtfully, seeking reassurance from the ring’s thread, but it had quit prodding him. It was gone, he realized.

“What are you doing?” Mirai was standing close to him, her voice deliberately low.

He shook his head. “Something is calling to me. I can’t see what it is, but it’s there.”

“The aeriads?”

“I can’t tell. But I think so.”

They stood together, looking ahead into the gardens, listening. A few paces behind them, Challa Nand and Skint waited, watching them. A hush had settled over everything.

–Come–

The voices. An entire chorus now. “They’re calling again,” he said to Mirai.

He reached for her hand, took hold, and started away once more. They continued walking in the same direction, through the hedgerows and bushes and flower beds, through the statuary and fountains, bright sunlight splashing everywhere as they walked. The minutes passed, but the voices did not return. The gardens continued to stretch out ahead of them with no discernible end in sight. Railing began to wonder if they had made a mistake of some sort. But if they had, wouldn’t the voices say something?

“Railing,” Mirai said suddenly, her hand tightening on his.

As they slowed, he followed her gaze to something off to the left. It was a formation of some sort, and at first he couldn’t decide what it was. But as they drew a little closer, he saw it was a bridge—an arch constructed of ancient stone blocks reaching across a broad ravine to a stand of huge old-growth trees and jagged rock formations. The trees rose hundreds of feet toward the sky, the branches meeting overhead to cast dark shadows on the earthen floor. It was impossible to see much beyond the perimeter, even though the trees were widely spaced and passage through looked unimpeded.

When they got closer still, he saw that the ravine was so deep and shadowed he could not find its bottom. It seemed to encircle the stand of old growth as the sea surrounds an island.

–Cross–

He shook his head. Instinctively, he knew that was a mistake. Crossing over that bridge would change everything. Something dark and dangerous waited there. Maybe it was the tanequil and maybe it was something else. But it wasn’t anything he wanted to face.

–Cross–

Yet the voices demanded it, and if he wanted to discover the truth about what had become of Grianne Ohmsford, he would have to do as they asked. The answer was there. Both the King of the Silver River and the Grimpond had said so. He had come all this way believing he would find what he sought. He had come to help his brother, and any thought of turning back now was out of the question. Whatever the risk, he would have to take it.

He reached down and pulled a second thread from the ring, its slender strand sliding free, flashing swiftly and disappearing. He asked this time where Grianne Ohmsford could be found. It was the only way of reaffirming that she was in the same direction he was being led. Sure enough, he knew at once that he would find her on the forested island on the other side of the ravine.

He knew as well he would find the tanequil there.

He looked at Mirai. “I have to cross that bridge.”

“I know,” she said. “I guessed as much. I’m coming with you.”

“You can’t do that.”

She was suddenly angry. “I can do what I want, Railing.”

“No, I don’t mean it that way.” He glanced back at Skint and Challa Nand. They were watching them, but keeping their distance. “I can’t take you any closer because I don’t want the tanequil to think I might agree to trade you for Grianne. She’s there, somewhere in that forest, but so is the tanequil. I can’t take anything for granted. Remember what happened to Penderrin and Cinnaminson? The tree took her in exchange for the staff. That sort of exchange isn’t going to happen. Either I find Grianne and bring her out or I don’t. But no one stays behind like Cinnaminson did.”

“Maybe you won’t have a choice. What if the tree demands that you stay?”

He shook his head. “I’ll find a way. Grianne will do the right thing; she will come because I will make her understand it is the right thing to do.”