The High Druid of Shannara Trilogy

She checked herself carefully to make certain she was all in one piece, and having done so, managed to get to her feet. Her dizziness and the sluggish feel of waking from a deep sleep had worn off, and her strength was beginning to return. She gave it a few more minutes, still puzzling through her situation, still trying to make sense of it. She couldn’t, of course. There was no way to do so without knowing both where she was and how she had gotten there.

She realized she was hungry, and she started to look for food. In her world, the one she had left behind that looked like this one but apparently wasn’t, there would have been berry bushes in a clearing near a stream not far from where she stood. While Ard Rhys, she had gone there from time to time to pick the fruit, a private, secret indulgence about which only Tagwen knew.

But it was unlikely that such sweet fruit grew anywhere in this world. Her hunger would have to wait.

She started to walk through the trees, looking for water. As she walked, she listened futilely for the sounds of other life. What sort of world was she in where there were no birds? Were there any people, any creatures at all? Was it possible that she was the only living thing there? The forest was empty and dead, smelling of its own decay. The gray light was unchanging and oppressive, and the sky remained empty of sun, moon, or stars. Even of clouds. The dark, ruined world felt incomplete, as if it were only a faintly cast shadow of the real world.

She found a stream finally, but the water looked so foul she decided against drinking it. She sat down again, her back against a blighted oak, and looked off into the shadowed trees, into the distance, reasoning out what had happened. Clearly, she hadn’t come on her own; someone had caused her to be transported. She could safely assume it had not been done for her benefit. Most likely, given the number of enemies she had made, it had been done to get her out of the way. Further, it had been done using magic, because there was no other explanation for how something so difficult could have been accomplished. Yet no one she knew possessed such magic. Not even she could transport people to other places.

So perhaps it had been accomplished by someone who was not of her world, but of another.

But what world would that be? Surely not this one.

She gave up thinking about it finally, deciding that she should walk to the edge of the bluff for a better look around. Something else must exist in the place, another creature, another life form. If she could find it, whatever it was, she might be able to determine where she was. If she could do that, she would have a better idea of how to get back to where she belonged.

The walk took her only a short time, though it left her winded and fatigued. She wasn’t herself yet, and she would have to be careful how she expended her energy until she was. Thin and diaphanous, her nightclothes billowed about her as she walked. They were warm enough for the moment, but totally inadequate for the task at hand. They would deteriorate quickly. Yet where would she find anything to replace them?

When she stood again upon the heights, close to the bluff edge and still in the shadow of the lifeless trees, she began a slow scan of the countryside, searching for movement that would identify life.

She was in the middle of this search, completely absorbed in her efforts, when the Dracha appeared. Her concentration was so intense that at first she didn’t even know it was there. But in its eagerness to reach her, it stepped upon some twigs and gave itself away. Even so, it was on her so quickly that she barely had time to react. At the last possible moment, she threw herself to one side as it lunged for her, leathery wings spread wide, jaws snapping. She managed to avoid the jaws, but one wing caught her a glancing blow and sent her spinning. The breath left her lungs as she slammed into a tree trunk, and the air before her eyes danced with dark spots.

A Dracha, she thought in disbelief. It can’t be. It’s not possible. They don’t exist anymore.

But there it was nevertheless, wheeling about to come at her again. It was big for a Dracha, fully twenty feet long from nose to tail and wing tip to wing tip, sinuous body heavily muscled and covered with glistening scales, back ridged with spines and razor-edged plates, legs crooked and claw-tipped.