Ilse Witch

Faced toward the Valley of Shale, he seated himself with his back against a huge slab of rock and dozed. Time slipped away without seeming to do so, and before he knew it, the night was almost gone. He rose and walked, moving steadily but cautiously over the loose rock, picking his way down the valley’s slope to its floor. He was careful not to trip and fall; the edges of the polished rock were razor sharp. Only the crunching of the rubble beneath his boots broke the silence of his descent. Starlight flooded the valley, and he made his way without difficulty to the edge of the lake by the hour before dawn, when the spirits of the dead might be summoned to reveal secrets hidden from the living.

There, a solitary figure silhouetted against the flat terrain, he stilled himself within to prepare for what would come next.

The waters of the Hadeshorn had taken on a different cast with his approach, shimmering now from just beneath the surface with light that did not reflect from the stars but emanated from some inner source. There was a sense of something stirring, coming awake and taking notice of his presence. He could feel it more than see it. He kept his focus on the lake, disdaining all else, knowing that any break in concentration once he began would doom his efforts and possibly cause him harm.

When he was at peace within and fully concentrated, he began the process of calling to the dead. He spoke softly, for it was not necessary that his voice carry, and1 gestured slowly, for precision counted more than speed. He spoke his name and of his history and need, motioning for the dead to respond, for the lake to give them up. As he did, the waters stirred visibly, swirling slowly in a clockwise motion, then churning more violently. Small cries rose from their depths, calling out in tiny, ethereal voices, whispers that turned to screams as thin as paper. The Hadeshorn hissed and boiled, releasing the cries in small fountains of spray, then in geysers that plumed hundreds of feet into the air. Light beneath the lake’s surface brightened and pulsed, and the valley shuddered.

Then a rumbling sounded from deep within the earth, and out of the roiling waters rose the spirits, white and transparent forms that climbed slowly into the air, linked by thin trailers of vapor, freed from their afterlife for a few precious moments to return to the earth they had left in dying. Their voices intertwined in a rising wail that made the Druid’s skin crawl and chilled the bones of his body. He held his ground against their advance, fighting down the part of him that screamed at him to back away, to turn aside, and to be afraid. They spiraled into the night sky, reaching for what was lost, seeking to recover what was denied. More and more of them appeared, filling the empty bowl of the valley until there was no space left.

Who calls? Who dares?

Then a huge, black shadow lifted from the waters and scattered the spirits like leaves, a cloaked form that took shape as it ascended, one arm stretching out to sweep aside the swarms of ghosts who lingered too close. The Hadeshorn churned and boiled in response to its coming, spray jetting everywhere, droplets falling on the Druid’s exposed face and hand. Walker lifted his arm in a warding gesture, and the cloaked figure turned toward him at once. Suspended in space, it began to lose some of its blackness, becoming more transparent, its human form showing through its dark coverings like bones exposed through flesh. Across the wave-swept surface it glided, taking up all the space about it as it came, drawing all the light to itself until there was nothing else.

When it was right on top of Walker, it stopped and hung motionless above him, cowled head inclining slightly, shadows obscuring its features. Flat and dispassionate, its voice flooded the momentary silence.

—What would you know of me—

Walker knelt before him, not in fear, but out of respect.

“Allanon,” he said, and waited for the shade to invite him to speak.

Farther west where the deep woods shrouded and sheltered the lives of its denizens as an ocean does its sea life, dawn approached in the Wilderun, as well. Within the old-growth trees, the light remained pale and insubstantial, even at high noon and on the brightest summer day. Shadows cloaked the world of the forest dwellers, and for the most part there was little difference between day and night. Long a wilderness to which few outsiders came, in which only those born to the life remained, and by which all other hardships were measured, the Wilderun was a haven for creatures for whom the absence of light was desirable.

The Ilse Witch was one such. Though born in another part of the Four Lands, where her past was bright with sunlight, she had long since adapted to and become comfortable with the twilight existence of her present. She had lived here nearly all of her life, which was to say since she was six. The Morgawr had brought her here when the Druid’s minions had killed her parents and tried to steal her away for their own use. He had given her his home, his protection, and his knowledge of magic’s us1es so that she might grow to adulthood and discover who she was destined to be. The darkness in which she was raised suited her, but she never let herself become a slave to it.