Terry Brooks - Ilse Witch

“Well, from you in particular, but since Bek is here, as well, I’ll ask it of you both.” He glanced past them to the fire. “Can we sit while we talk? Do you have something to eat? I’ve come a long way today.”

As if arrived at a truce, they left the darkness and moved into the light, taking seats on the ground around the fire. Bek studied the Druid carefully, trying to take his measure. Physically, he was forbidding—tall and dark-featured, with long black hair and beard, and a narrow, angular face that was seamed by sun and weather. He looked neither young nor old, but somewhere in between. His right arm was missing from just above the elbow, leaving only a stump within a pinned-up tunic sleeve. Even so, he radiated power and self-assurance, and his strange eyes registered an unmistakable warning to stand clear. Although he said he had come to find them, he did not seem particularly interested now that he had. His gaze was directed toward the darkness beyond the fire, as if he was watching for something.

But it was his history that intrigued Bek more than his appearance, and the boy found himself digging through his memory for bits and pieces of what he knew. The Druid lived in the Keep at ancient Paranor with the ghosts of his ancestors and companions dead and gone. He was rumored to be Allanon’s successor and direct descendant. It was said he had been alive in the time of Quentin’s great-great-grandfather, Morgan Leah, and the most famous of all the Elf Queens, Wren Elessedil, and that he had fought with them in the war against the Shadowen. If that was true, then the Druid was more than 130 years old. No one else from that time was still alive, and it seemed strange and vaguely chilling that the Druid should have survived what no ordinary man could.

Bek knew a lot about the Druids. He had made it his business to know about them because of their long-standing connection to the Leah family. There had been a Leah involved in almost every great Druid undertaking since the time of the Warlock Lord. Most people were frightened of the Druids and their legacy of magic, but the Highlanders had always been their advocates. Without the Druids, they believed, the people of the Four Lands would be living much different lives at a cost they would not have cared to pay.

“You said you came far today?” Quentin broke the momentary silence. “Where did you come from?”

Walker’s dark gaze shifted. “The Dragon’s Teeth originally. Then from Leah.”

“That was your Roc,” Bek blurted out, suddenly able to speak again.

Walker glanced at him. “Not mine. Obsidian belongs to a Wing Rider named Hunter Predd. He should be along in a minute. He’s bedding down his bird first.” He paused. “You saw us, did you?”

“Saw your shadow, actually,” Quentin said as he worked on laying out strips of smoked fish in a pan. He had coated them with flour and seasonings, and was adding a bit of ale for flavor. “We were boar hunting.”

The Druid nodded. “Your father told me so.”

Quentin looked up quickly. “My father?”

Walker stretched his legs and braced himself with his good arm as he leaned back. “We know each other. Tell me, did you have any luck with the boar?”

Quentin went back to his fish, shaking his head to himself. “No, he was frightened off by you. The Roc’s shadow spooked him.”

“Well, my apologies for that. On the other hand, getting you back here to speak with me was of more consequence than seeing you bag that boar.”

Bek stared. Was he saying that he had spooked the boar deliberately, that the Roc’s passing hadn’t been by chance? He glanced quickly at Quentin to catch his cousin’s reaction, but Quentin’s attention had shifted at the sound of someone else’s approach.

“Ah, here is our friend, the Wing Rider,” Walker said, rising.

Hunter Predd trooped into the firelight, a lean, wiry Elf with gnarled hands and sharp eyes. He nodded to the Highlander and his cousin as they were introduced. He took a seat across from the Druid. Walker spent a few minutes talking about Wing Riders and Rocs, explaining their importance to the Elves of the Westland, then asked Quentin for news of his family. The conversation continued as the Highlander prepared the fish, some fry bread, and a clutch of greens. All the while, Bek watched Walker carefully, wondering what the meeting was all about, what sort of favor the Druid could want of them, how he knew Coran Leah, what he was doing with a Wing Rider, and on and on.

They had eaten their meal, washed it down with cold stream water, and cleaned up the dishes before Walker provided Bek with the answers he was seeking.

“I want you to come with me on a journey,” the Druid began, sipping at the ale Quentin had poured into his cup. “Both of you. It will be long and dangerous. It may be months before we return, maybe longer. We have to travel across the Blue Divide to a land none of us has ever seen. When we get there, we have to find a treasure. We have a map, and we have instructions written on the map about what we need to do to find this treasure. But someone else is after it, as well, someone very dangerous, and she will do everything she can to prevent us from reaching it first.”

There were no preliminaries, no buildups, and no small talk to lead into all this. The explanation was casual; they might have been talking about taking a rafting trip down the Rappahalladran. Bek Rowe had never ventured outside the Highlands, and now someone had appeared who wanted him to travel halfway around the world. He could scarcely believe what he was hearing.

Hunter Predd was the first to speak. “She?” he asked curiously.

Walker nodded. “Our nemesis is a very powerful sorceress who calls herself the Ilse Witch. She is the protégé of a warlock known as the Morgawr. The names derive from a language used in the world of Faerie, most of it lost. Hers means singer . His means wraith or something like it. They reside in the Westland, down in the Wilderun, and seldom venture far from there. How the Ilse Witch found out about the map and our journey, I don’t know. But she is responsible for the death of at least two people because of it.” He paused. “Do you know of her?”

Bek and Quentin glanced at each other blankly, but the Wing Rider was shaking his head in dismay. “Enough to keep clear,” he snapped.

“We don’t have that option.” Walker crossed his legs in front of him and leaned forward. “One of the dead men is Allardon Elessedil, the Elven King. If the Ilse Witch was willing to kill him to prevent us from seeking out the treasure described by the map, she will certainly not hesitate to kill us, as well. Forewarned is forearmed, I’m afraid.”

His eyes shifted to Quentin and Bek. “The other dead man is the map’s bearer, a castaway Hunter found floating in the Blue Divide a little more than a week ago. The hunt I’m proposing begins with him. He was Allardon Elessedil’s older brother, Kael, one of a company of Elves that undertook a search similar to ours thirty years ago. All of them disappeared. No trace of them or their ships was ever found. The map our castaway carried suggests their search might have yielded something of great importance. It is up to us to find out what that something is.”

“So you intend to sail all the way across the Blue Divide to search out this treasure?” Quentin asked dubiously.

“Not sail, Highlander,” the Druid replied. “Fly.”

There was a moment’s silence. The wood burning in the fire pit crackled sharply. “On Rocs?” Quentin pressed.

“On an airship.”

The silence resumed. Even Hunter Predd seemed surprised. “But why do you want us to come?” Bek asked finally.

“Several reasons.” Walker fixed the boy with his dark gaze. “Bear with me for a moment. Aside from the three of you, I have told this to no one. Most of it, I have determined only very recently, and I am still in the process of deciphering quite a bit more. I need to have someone with whom I can discuss my thinking, someone I can trust and in whom I can confide. I need someone of sharp mind and willing spirit, of ability and courage. Hunter Predd is one such. I think you and your cousin are two more.”