Ilse Witch - Terry Brooks [110]
Bek nodded.
“Then you’re ready to go out to the airfield and have a look around. Come with me.”
They left the sleeping quarters and walked through the palace grounds, moving away from the city and out toward the south end of the Carolan. They passed any number of Elven Hunters and Home Guard on the way, but few regular citizens. No one paid them any attention. It was quieter where they walked than in the main sections of the city, less traveled by those who lived and worked there. On the backside of the Gardens of Life, they passed a pair of Black Watch guarding one of the entrances. The pair stood as if frozen, towering over everyone in their sleek black uniforms and tall hats, everything smooth and clean and trimmed in red. Within the gardens, birds darted and sang, and butterflies flitted from bush to bush, as bright as the flowers they touched upon, but the Black Watch might have been carved from stone.
Somewhere deep in the center of those gardens was the legendary Ellcrys. Even Bek, who had traveled so little, knew her story. The Ellcrys was a tree imbued with magic that formed a Forbidding to shut away the demons banished by the Word from the Faerie world centuries ago at the beginning of life. She had begun her life as an Elf, a member of an order called Chosen, and had transformed into the tree as a result of exposure to the Bloodfire. So long as she remained strong and healthy in her changed state, her magic would keep the Forbidding in place. When she began to fail, as she one day must, another would take her place. The need for replacement did not happen often, — the Ellcrys on average lived for a thousand years. But the order of the Chosen was kept filled and ready even so. Once, not so long ago, almost all had been slaughtered by demons that had escaped a weakened Forbidding. Only one had survived, a young Elessedil girl named Amberle, and she had sacrificed herself to become the present Ellcrys.
Bek thought of how Coran had told him that story when he was still very little. Coran had told him any number of Elven stories, and it had always seemed to Bek that the history of the Elves must be more colorful and interesting than those of the other races, even without knowing what they were. Seeing the Gardens of Life now and having passed through the Valley of Rhenn earlier, a visitor at last to the city of Arborlon, he could believe it was so. Everything had a feeling of magic and enchantment, and all that history imparted to him by Coran felt newly alive and real.
It made him think that coming on the journey was not such a bad idea after all, though he would never admit it to Quentin.
“Did Truls Rohk arrive?” he asked Walker suddenly.
Walker did not look at him. “Did you ask him to come?”
Bek nodded. “Yes.”
“Did he say he would?”
Yes.
“Then he’s here.”
Walker seemed perfectly willing to accept the shape-shifter’s presence on faith, so Bek let the matter drop. It wasn’t his concern in any case. Another encounter with Truls Rohk could wait. Walker had already moved on, talking about their plans for departure on the following morning, the airship fitted and supplied, its crew and passengers assembled, and everything in readiness for their journey. He was confident and relaxed as he detailed their preparations, but when Bek glanced over, he caught a distant look in the other’s dark eyes that suggested his thoughts were somewhere else.
Away from the buildings of the city, the Gardens of Life, and the Carolan, they passed down a well-traveled road through woods that opened onto a bluff farther south. Bek could hear the activity before he could see it, and when they emerged from the trees, an airfield and a dozen Elven airships were visible. Bek had never seen airships up close, only flying over the highlands now and then, but there was no mistaking them for anything other than what they were. They hung motionless above the earth as if cradled by