Ilse Witch

by Terry Brooks

  It was fully dark by the time they reached Panax’s cabin, a small, neat shelter built of logs and set back in a clearing near the crest of the foothills, well out of sight. A stream ran nearby, one they could hear but not see, and the trees formed a sheltering wall against the weather. Panax left them standing outside while he went into his home, then reappeared almost immediately carrying a sling looped through his belt and a long-handled double-edged battle-ax laid comfortably over one shoulder.

  “Stay close to me and do whatever I tell you,” he advised as he came up to them. “If we’re attacked, use your weapons to defend yourselves, but don’t go looking for trouble and don’t become separated from me. Understood?”

  They nodded uneasily. Attacked by what? Bek wanted to ask.

  They left the cabin and the clearing behind, hiked through the trees to the lower slopes of the mountains, and began to climb. The way was unmarked, but Panax seemed to know it well. He took them in switchback fashion through clumps of boulders, stands of old growth, and shadowy ravines and defiles, steadily ascending the Wolfsktaag’s rugged slopes. The night sky was clear and bright with moon and stars, and there was sufficient light to navigate by. They climbed for several hours, growing more alert as the trees began to thin, the rocks to broaden, and the silence to deepen. It grew colder, as well, the mountain air thin and sharp even on this windless night, and they could watch their breath cloud before them. Shadows passed overhead in smooth, silent flight, night hunters at work, secretive and swift.

  Bek found himself thinking of his own life, a past wrapped in vague possibility and shrouded in concealments. Who was he, that a Druid had brought him to Coran Leah’s doorstep all those years ago? Not just the orphaned scion of a relative with a family no one had ever heard anything about. Not just a homeless child. Who was he, that the King of the Silver River would appear so unexpectedly to give him a phoenix stone and a warning of dark and hidden meanings?

  He found himself remembering all the times he had asked about his parents and had his questions deflected by Coran or Liria. Their actions had never seemed all that important before. It was bothersome sometimes not to be given the answers he sought, to be put off in his inquiries. But his life had been good with Quentin’s family, and his curiosity had never been compelling enough to persuade him to insist on a better response. Now he wondered if he had been too accepting.

  Or was he making something out of nothing, his parentage no more than what it had always seemed—an accident of birth of no consequence at all, incidental to his upbringing at the capable hands of his stepparents? Was he looking for secrets that didn’t exist, simply because Walker had appeared in Leah so unexpectedly?

  The night deepened and swelled with cold and silence, and their efforts to climb higher slowed. Then a gap opened in a cliff face, and they were passing through a deep defile into a valley beyond. There the forest was thick and sheltering, and what lived within could only be imagined. Panax continued on, his thoughts his own. The defile opened into a draw that angled down onto the valley floor. Beyond, the peaks of the Wolfsktaag rose in stark relief against the moonlit sky, sentries standing watch, each a little more misted and a little less clear than the one before.

  Within the valley’s center, Panax called an unexpected halt in a small clearing hemmed in by towering elm. “We will need to wait here.”

  Bek glanced around at the encroaching shadows. “How long?”

  “Until Truls notices we’ve come.” He laid down his ax and moved toward the shadows. “Help me build a fire.”

  They gathered deadwood and used tinder and flint to strike a spark and coax a flame to life. The fire built swiftly and threw light across the open space of the clearing, but could not penetrate the wall of shadows beyond. If anything, it seemed to emphasize how isolated the travelers were. The burning wood crackled and popped as it was consumed, but the surrounding night remained silent and enigmatic. The Dwarf and the Highland cousins sat in silence on the ground, backed up against each other so that they could share the warmth and watch the shadows. Now and again, one of them would add fuel to the blaze from the small pile of wood collected earlier, keeping the clearing lit and the signal steady.

  “He might not be in the valley tonight,” Panax said at one point, shifting against Bek so that the youth was bent forward under the weight of his stocky frame. “He might not return until morning.”

  “Does he live here?” Quentin asked.

  “As much as he lives anywhere. He doesn’t have a cabin or a camp. He doesn’t keep possessions or even stash his food for when he might have need of it.” The Dwarf paused, reflecting. “He isn’t anything at all like you and me.”

  He let the matter drop, and neither Quentin nor Bek chose to pursue it. Whatever the cousins were going to learn would have to await the other’s appearance. Bek, for one, was growing less and less certain that this was an event he should anticipate. Perhaps they would all be better off if the night passed, morning arrived, and nothing happened. Perhaps they would be better off if they let the matter drop here and now.

  “I was just twenty when I met him,” Panax said suddenly, his gruff voice quiet and low. “Hard to remember what that was like now, but I was young and full of myself and just learning that I wanted to be a guide and spend my time away from the settlements. I’d been alone for a while. I’d left home young and stayed gone, not missing it much, not thinking I should have reconsidered. I was always apart from everyone else, even my brothers, and it was probably a relief to everyone when I wasn’t there anymore.”

  He glanced over his shoulder at Bek. “I was a little like you, cautious and doubtful, not about to be tricked or misled, knowing enough to take care of myself, but not much yet about the world. I’d heard the stories about the Wolfsktaag and decided to go there to see for myself. I thought that lying as it did across the backbone of the Eastland it would have to be crossed frequently enough that a guide could earn a living. So I tied in with some men who did this, but who didn’t know as much as they pretended. I made a few crossings with them and lived to tell about it. After a year or two, I struck out on my own. Thought I’d be better off alone.

  “Then one day I got myself so lost I couldn’t find my way out. I was exploring, trying to teach myself how the passes connected, how the crossings could best be made. I knew something of the things that lived in the Wolfsktaag, having learned of them from the older guides, having seen most of them for myself. Some, you never saw, of course—unless you were unlucky. Most could be avoided or driven off, at least the ones made of flesh and blood. The ones that were spirit or wraith you had to stay clear of or hide from, and you could learn to do that. But this time I forgot to pay attention. I got lost and desperate, and I made a mistake.”

  He sighed and shook his head. “It hurts to admit it, even now. I backtracked into a stretch of land I knew I shouldn’t go into, thinking I could do so just long enough to get clear of the mess I was in. I fell and twisted my ankle badly enough that I could barely walk. It was almost nightfall, and when it got dark enough, a werebeast came for me.”

  The fire snapped loudly, and Bek jumped in spite of himself. Werebeasts. They were something of a legend in the Southland, one half believed in by most, but seen only by a few. Part animal, part spirit, difficult even to recognize, let alone defend against, they fed off your fear and took shape from your imagination and almost nothing could stand against them, not even the great moor cats. The possibility that they might encounter one here was not comforting. “I thought they only lived in the deep Anar, farther east and north.”

  Panax nodded. “Once, maybe. Times change. Anyway, the werebeast attacked, and I did battle with it for most of the night. I fought so long and so hard I don’t think I even knew what I was doing in the end. It changed shape on me repeatedly, and it tore me up pretty good. But I held my ground, backed up against a tree, too stubborn to know that I couldn’t possibly win that sort of contest, growing weaker and more tired with every rush.
”

  He stopped talking and stared off into the dark. The cousins waited, thinking him lost in thought, perhaps remembering. Then abruptly he came to his feet, battle-ax gripped in both hands.

  “Something’s moving out there—” he started to say.

  A fleet, dark shape hurtled out of the night, followed by a second and then a third. It seemed as if the shadows themselves had come alive, taking form and gathering substance. Panax was knocked to the ground, grunting with the force of the blow he was struck. Quentin and Bek rolled aside, the shadows hurtling past them, dark shapes with just a flash of teeth and claws and deep-throated growls.

  Ur’wolves! Bek snatched his long knife from its loop at his belt, wishing that he had something more substantial with which to defend himself. An ur’wolf pack was even capable of bringing down a full-grown Koden.

  Panax had recovered and was wielding the two-edged ax, shifting his weight left and then right as the shadows flitted all around him at the edges of the light, looking for an opening. Every so often, one would launch itself at him, and he would meet the attack with a sweep of his curved blade and find nothing but air. Bek shouted at Quentin, who had tumbled away from the fire and was struggling to climb back to his feet. Finally Panax moved to aid him, but the moment he shifted his gaze to the Highlander, an ur’wolf slammed into him, knocking him flat and sending the battle-ax spinning away.

  For an instant, Bek thought they were lost. The ur’wolves were coming out of the darkness in a rush, so many the Dwarf and the Highlanders could not have stopped them even had they been ready to do so. As it was, Panax and Quentin were both down, and Bek was trying to defend them with nothing more than his long knife.

  “Quentin!” Bek screamed in desperation, and was knocked flying by a sleek form that materialized out of nowhere to catch him from behind.

  Then the Highlander was beside him, the Sword of Leah unsheathed and gripped in both hands. Quentin’s face was bloodless and raw with fear, but his eyes were determined. As the ur’wolves came at them, he swept the ancient weapon in a wide arc and cried out “Leah! Leah!” in challenge. Abruptly, his sword flared white-hot, threads of fire racing up and down its polished length. Quentin gasped in surprise and staggered back, almost falling over Bek. The ur’wolves scattered, twisting away frantically and disappearing back into the dark. Quentin, shocked by what had happened, but exhilarated, as well, impulsively gave chase.

  “Leah! Leah!” he called out.

  Back came the ur’wolves, attacking anew, sheering off at the last moment as the sword’s fire lanced out at them. Panax was back on his feet, astonishment mirrored in his eyes as he retrieved his battle-ax and moved to stand next to the Highlander.

  Magic! Bek thought as he rushed to join them. There was magic in the Sword of Leah after all! Walker had been right!

  But their problems weren’t over. The ur’wolves were not breaking off their attack, just working around the edges of the defense that had been raised against them, waiting for a chance to break through. They were too wily to be caught off guard and too determined to give up. Even the sword’s magic could do little more than keep them at bay.

  “Panax, there are too many!” Bek shouted above the din of the ur’wolves’ howls and snarls. He snatched up the cold end of a burning brand to thrust into the jaws of their attackers.

  Half-blinded by ash and sweat, the three put their backs to the fire and faced out into the darkness. The ur’wolves flitted through the shadows, their liquid forms all but invisible. Eyes glimmered and disappeared, pinpricks of brightness that taunted and teased. Unable to determine where the next attack would come from, Bek swept the air before him with the long knife. He wondered suddenly if he should use the magic of the phoenix stone. But he couldn’t see how it would help them.

  “They’ll rush us soon!” Panax shouted. His voice was raspy and filled with grit. “Shades! So many of them! Where have they all come from?”

  “Bek, do you see, do you see?” Quentin was laughing almost hysterically. “The sword is magic after all, Bek! It really is!”

  Bek found his cousin’s enthusiasm entirely unwarranted and would have told him so if he could have spared the strength. But it was taking everything he had to stay focused on the movements of their attackers. He had no energy to waste on Quentin.

  “Leah! Leah!” his cousin howled, darting out from their little circle, faking a strike at the shadows, then quickly retreating. “Panax!” he cried. “What are we supposed to do?”

  Then something even darker and quicker than the ur’wolves crossed in front of them, trailing shards of cold wind in its wake. The three defenders shrank from it instinctively. The night hissed as if steam had been released from a fissure, and the ur’wolves began to howl wildly and to snap at nothing. Bek couldn’t see them in the darkness, but he could hear the sounds they were making, sounds of madness and fear and loathing. A moment later, they were in full flight, gone back into the forest as if swallowed whole.

  Bek Rowe held his breath in the ensuing silence, crouching so far down he was almost kneeling, his long knife extended blindly toward the trees. Beside him, Quentin was as still as carved stone.

  Suddenly the darkness shifted anew, and a huge, tattered form that was not quite human, but not quite anything else, rose against the flicker of the firelight. It came together in a slow gathering of shadows, taking shape but not assuming identity, never quite becoming anything recognizable, formed of dreams and nightmares in equal parts.

  “What is it?” Quentin Leah whispered.

  “Truls Rohk,” Panax breathed softly, and his words were as chill and brittle as ice in deep winter.

  FIFTEEN

  Hunkered down in the sprawling, treacherous tangle of the Wilderun, Grimpen Ward was ablaze with light and suffused with sound. Patrons of the ale houses and pleasure dens overflowed into the dirt streets, celebrating nothing, as lost to themselves as to those who had once known them. Grimpen Ward was the last rung on the ladder down, a melting pot for those who had no other place to go. Inquiries of strangers were as apt to get your purse stolen or your throat cut as your questions answered, fights broke out spontaneously and for no particular reason, and the only rule of behavior that mattered was to keep your nose out of what didn’t concern you.

  Even Hunter Predd, a veteran of countless reckonings and narrow escapes, was wary of those who lived in Grimpen Ward.

  Once, Grimpen Ward had been a sleepy village catering to trappers and hunters seeking game within the vast and little explored expanse of the Wilderun. Too remote and isolated to attract any other form of commerce, it had subsisted as an outpost for many years. But there was little money to be made in hunting game and much to be made in gambling, and slowly the nature of the village began to change. The Elves shunned it, but Southlanders and Rovers found that its location suited their needs perfectly. Men and women seeking escape from their past, from pursuers who would not let them be, and from failed dreams and constant disappointment; men and women who could not live under the constraints of rules that governed elsewhere and who needed the freedom that came with knowing that being quickest and strongest was all that mattered; and men and women who had lost everything and were hoping to find a way to begin anew without having to be anything but clever and immoral; eventually all such found their way to Grimpen Ward. Some stayed only a short time and moved on. Some stayed longer. If they failed to stay alive, they stayed forever.

  In daylight, it was a squalid, sleepy village of clapboard buildings and sheds, of rutted dirt roads and shadowed alleyways, and of a populace that remained inside and slept, waiting for nightfall. The forests of the Wilderun closed it about, ancient trees and choking scrub, and it was always on the verge of being swallowed completely. Nothing of what it was seemed permanent, as if everything had been thrown together on a whim, perhaps within a few desperate days, and might be torn down again by the end of the week. Its populace cared nothing for the town, only for what the town had to offer. There w
as a sullen, angry cast to Grimpen Ward that suggested a caged and malnourished animal waiting for a chance to break free.

  Hunter Predd walked its streets cautiously, staying back from the light, keeping clear of the knots of people crowded about the doorways and porches of the public houses. Because he was a Wing Rider, he preferred open spaces. Because he was a sensible man who had been to Grimpen Ward and places like it before, he knew what to expect.

  He slowed and then stopped at the entrance of an alley where three men were beating another with clubs, already pulling at his clothes, searching for his purse. The man was pleading with them not to kill him. There was blood on his face and hands. One of his attackers looked over at Hunter Predd, feral eyes bright and hard, assessing his potential as an adversary. The Wing Rider did as he had been instructed. He held the other’s gaze for a moment to demonstrate he was not afraid, then turned aside and walked on.

  Grimpen Ward was not a place for the faint of heart or those seeking to redress the wrongs of the world. Neither could survive in the claustrophobic atmosphere of this breeding ground of cruelty and rage. Here, everyone was either prey to or hunter of someone else, and there was no middle ground. Hunter Predd felt the pall of hopelessness and despondency that shrouded the village, and he was sickened by it.

  He moved out of the central section of the village, away from the brighter lights and louder noises, and entered a cluster of hovels and shacks occupied by those who had fallen into a twilight existence of drug-induced escape. The beings who lived here never emerged from their private, self-indulgent worlds, from the places they had created for themselves. He could smell the chemicals burning on the air as he passed through. He could smell the sweat and excrement. Everything they needed to escape life was free, once they forfeited everything they had.