The Elf Queen of Shannara

They descended a second time for a brief rest at midafternoon, choosing a solitary island with wide, white-sand beaches and coves so shallow the water was a pale turquoise. Wren noticed that Spirit had not eaten all day and asked about it. Tiger Ty said the Roc consumed meat and hunted on its own. It required food only once every seven days.

“A very self-sustaining bird, the Roc,” the Wing Rider said with undisguised admiration. “Doesn’t ask much more than to be left alone. More than you can say about most people.”

They continued their journey in silence, both Wren and Garth beginning to tire now, stiff from sitting in the same position all day, worn from the constant rocking motion of the flight, and from gripping the knotted hand restraints until their fingers cramped. The waters of the Blue Divide passed steadily beneath, an endless progression of waves. They had been out of sight of the mainland for hours, and the ocean seemed to stretch away forever. Wren felt dwarfed by it, reduced by its size to something so insignificant she threatened to disappear. Her earlier sense of isolation had increased steadily with the passing of the hours, and she found herself wondering for the first time if she would ever see her home again.

It was nearing sunset when at last they came in sight of Morrowindl. The sun had drifted west to the edge of the horizon, its light growing soft, changing from white to pale orange. A streaking of purple and silver laced a long line of odd-shaped clouds that paraded across the sky like strange animals. Silhouetted against this panorama was the island, dark and misted and forbidding. It was much larger than any other landmass they had encountered, rising up like a wall as they approached. Killeshan lifted its jagged mouth skyward, steam seeping from its throat, slopes dropping away into a thick blanket of fog and ash, disappearing for hundreds of feet until they surfaced again at a shoreline formed of rocky projections and ragged cliffs. Waves crashed against the rocks, white foaming caldrons that threw their spray skyward.

Spirit flew closer, winging down toward the shroud of vog. A stench filled the air, the smell of sulfur escaped from beneath the earth where the volcano’s fire burned rock to ash. Through the clouds and mist they could see valleys and ridges, passes and defiles, all heavily forested, a thick, strangling jungle. Tiger Ty glanced back over his shoulder and gestured. They were going to circle the island. Spirit wheeled right at his command. The north end of the island was engulfed in driving rain, a monsoon that inundated everything, creating vast waterfalls that tumbled down cliffs thousands of feet high. West the island was as barren as a desert, all exposed lava rock except for a scattering of brightly flowering shrubs and stunted, gnarled, wind-blown trees. South and east the island was a mass of singular rock formations and black-sand beaches where the shoreline met the waters of the Blue Divide before rising to disappear into jungle and mist.

Wren stared down at Morrowindl apprehensively. It was a forbidding, inhospitable place, a sharp contrast to the other islands they had seen. Weather fronts collided and broke apart. Each side of the island offered a different set of conditions. The whole of it was shadowed and clouded, as if Killeshan were a demon that breathed fire and had wrapped itself in the cloak of its own choking breath.

Tiger Ty wheeled Spirit about one final time, then took him down. The Roc settled cautiously at the edge of a broad, black-sand beach, claws digging into the crushed lava rock, wings folding reluctantly back. The giant bird turned to face the jungle, and his piercing eyes fixed on the mist.

Tiger Ty ordered them to dismount. They released their harness straps and slid to the beach. Wren looked inland. The island rose before her, all rock and trees and mist. They could no longer see the sun. Shadows and half-light lay over everything.

The Wing Rider faced the girl. “I suppose you’re still set on this? Stubborn as ever?”

She nodded wordlessly, unwilling to trust herself to speak.

“You listen, then. And think about changing your mind while you do. I showed you all four sides of Morrowindl for a reason. North, it rains all the time, every day, every hour of the day. Sometimes it rains hard, sometimes drizzles. But the water is everywhere. Swamps and pools, falls and drops. If you can’t swim, you drown. And there’s nests of things waiting to pull you down in any case.”