The Farseekers

Two years after the Misfits took over Obernewtyn, the hidden community of psychically gifted outcasts has grown into organized guilds: Healing, Futuretelling, Coercing, Beasting, Farseeking and Teknoguild. Rushton keeps up the story that Obernewtyn burned down in a firestorm, which holds the totalitarian Council at a distance. The Misfits know that the deception cannot last forever.

News arrives of a powerful new Talent and of a lost library somewhere beyond the mountains. Elspeth leads an expedition to find both, and the party travels disguised as a gypsy troupe. The passes will close with the coming of winter, so the search has a deadline.

The journey goes badly. Armsmen loyal to the fanatical Henry Druid capture Elspeth, and she is later left for dead. The Agyllians carry her to the highest mountain. There they begin to show her how far her destiny reaches.

She is meant to find and destroy the ancient weaponmachines. These caused the Great White, the catastrophe that ended the old world.

This is the second book in the Obernewtyn Chronicles by Isobelle Carmody. It is a dystopian fantasy with a psychic-powers setting, following Elspeth as she moves from a protected community into dangerous country and a much larger purpose.