Terry Brooks - Witch Wraith

Nor was he recovered physically. If anything, he was feeling worse than ever. He was keeping it to himself, but something very troubling had happened to him when he had combined the magic of the crimson Elfstones and the wishsong to destroy the Catcher and his minions. His body had been left hollowed out and his strength diminished in a way that suggested he had suffered at least a part of the fate of the creatures he had emptied of their lives. He knew enough of the ways of magic to understand there was always a price exacted for its use. The more powerful and destructive the magic, the higher the cost.

The crimson Elfstones might have stolen away the mortal substance of their victims, but it felt as if they had stolen some of the same from him, as well.

Still, there was nothing to be done about it. He had saved their lives, and so there could be no regrets now about how he had accomplished it. Nor was there any point in worrying about healing himself until he found Railing again. All he could do was keep going and remember what was at stake.

He clutched the box with the Elfstones to his chest, aware of the irony implicit in doing so. Even though their magic had damaged him, he held on to that box as if he would never let it go. Only the crimson stones were elsewhere, still shoved down inside his pant pocket. He had thought many times to return them to their designated space, but each time he started to do so he changed his mind.

Because beneath his fear of what it meant to use them again was another fear, one that was even more overpowering.

If he did not have them, he could not protect himself or his companions. If he did not have them, they could still all be killed. Or they could be imprisoned, as he had been before. They could be caged and left to die. He would never see his brother or his mother or Mirai or any of his friends again.

He could hardly bear even to think on it.

They walked for hours through the gloom and emptiness, searching for a town or a village where they might find an airship. Walking was too slow and wearing. They were already close to exhaustion. Redden in particular, but even Tesla Dart, who never seemed to tire, was showing signs of weariness. She no longer darted ahead or scurried about like a bug. She mostly stayed next to her companions, her wizened face taut, her eyes searching everywhere at once. In part, Redden thought, it was the effect of the land—an unfamiliar place to which she was not yet accustomed. She was more cautious, less certain of herself, more inclined to hang back and stay watchful.

Oriantha set the pace, the Ulk Bog matched it, and the boy did the best he could to keep up, even when what he wanted most was to sleep.

When they finally stopped to rest, sometime much deeper into the night—the blackness still vast and complete and the countryside still a vague and shadowy place all about them—he felt like he might never be able to rise again.

“You look terrible,” Oriantha noted, bending close to study his face.

He shook his head. “I’m fine. Just tired.”

“You might be tired, but you are not fine. Something is wrong. It’s using the Elfstones like you did, isn’t it? That did something to you.”

He nodded, not trusting himself to speak. Tesla Dart moved over as well, looking interested.

“You used them when you shouldn’t have,” the shape-shifter declared, not accusatorily, but in sympathy. “Only an Elf is supposed to use them, and you are not an Elf. You are of mixed blood, and the magic doesn’t work for you like it would for a full-blooded Elf. Am I right?”

“I suppose so. But it’s not as if anything can be done about it now. It’s over and done with.”

“But it hurts?” Tesla asked.

He shook his head. “I don’t feel right, but I think it will pass. I just have to give it time.”

“Meanwhile,” Oriantha said, “give me that.”

She took the case with the Elfstones out of his hands before he could think to tighten his grip. “Hey!” he protested.

“I can carry them as easily as you. There is no immediate need for them. You need to conserve your strength. Let me keep the case for now. You can have it back again in Arborlon.”

He started to object and then decided against it. What was the point? She was right to think that relieving him of the case would help.

“We should start walking again,” Oriantha said abruptly, rising.

They set out once more, Oriantha taking the lead and carrying the case with the Elfstones, Tesla Dart close behind her, and Redden trailing. He thought Oriantha was right, and the effects of using the Elfstone magic were not a consequence of using it with the wishsong, but rather using it at all. He knew from his family’s history that only Elves could use Elven magic safely. Having some Elven blood was not enough to protect him. It was Wil Ohmsford’s use of Elfstone magic centuries earlier that had brought about a change in his genetic makeup, resulting in the birth of the wishsong in his children and in the generations thereafter, right down to today. It was not so difficult to think that maybe his own use was causing similar changes within him, changes that would not manifest themselves until he had children of his own.

History repeating itself, he thought. Lessons learned long ago so often needed to be learned all over again in the present. It might true here, and he might be the student who was being taught.

But he did not dwell on it, putting the matter aside and thinking instead of Railing and home, of Mirai and Sarys, of better days behind and more ahead. This would be ended soon, the Straken Lord defeated and sent back into the Forbidding and his old life restored. Things would return to how they had been.

Just so long as he didn’t think about those who had died inside the Forbidding.

Or forget that the Druid order was decimated.

Or assume that Railing would be waiting for him, safe and whole.

Oriantha came to a stop, peering ahead. “There are lights less than a mile off. A cluster of them. Maybe we’ve found the help we need.”

And she picked up the pace.

Railing Ohmsford hooded the parse tubes sufficiently to slow the Quickening to a crawl as they came out of the darkness into the first light of the new day just north of the entrance to the Valley of Rhenn. Below and as far south as they could see, hordes of creatures were massed across the open grasslands, pressing toward the pass that led into the valley. The size of the Straken Lord’s army seemed limitless—a vast sprawling migration that darkened the plains like a tidal wave threatening to inundate the entire Westland.

Everyone aboard—save Railing and Mirai standing in the pilot box, and the Ilse Witch crouched by the foremast—gathered at the ship’s railing and stared down at the invading army, trying to make sense of what they were seeing. Austrum and his Rovers, Skint, Challa Nand, and even Woostra—but no one was saying anything. There were no words for something like this.

Mirai, standing close to Railing, whispered, “Shades! How can there be so many?”

He didn’t know. Those hundreds of creatures he had fought against in the Fangs seemed like a mere handful compared with the seething maelstrom roiling below them. What chance did the Elves have of turning back so large a force?

For that matter, what chance did Grianne Ohmsford have, Ilse Witch or not? She was still only one, and they were millions.

“Railing, look!” Mirai said suddenly.

To the east, still far distant, a fleet of airships was approaching. Railing snatched the spyglass from its rack and trained it on the newcomers. There were a handful of fighting vessels, but mostly hundreds of skiffs pulling flatbeds crammed with soldiers.