Fyke Isle is one of the more unsettling areas in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. The island is teeming with drowners and houses an abandoned tower that once belonged to a mage of questionable intent. This tower happens to center around one of the game’s side quests — “A Towerful of Mice.”
To unlock this quest in The Witcher 3, the player must first complete “Wandering in the Dark” (and “Magic Lamp,” if the player agrees to help Keira). This will then trigger the quest “An Invitation from Keira Metz,” which prompts Geralt to return to Keira’s hut and talk to her. When the conversation ends, “A Towerful of Mice” will automatically start.
'A Towerful of Mice' in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
When talking to Keira, she explains that some sort of curse has fallen over the abandoned tower on Fyke Isle, and that the townsfolk fear the wraiths that dwell there. However, she herself can’t pinpoint the source of the curse. Neither could she travel there herself as the curse’s magic physically incapacitated her. So, she asks for the witcher’s assistance.
Supposedly, a mage by the name of Alexander lived in the tower. When the Nilfgaardians invaded, the lord of the surrounding lands — a man named Vserad — fled from his home and took refuge there. He brought his daughter, Anabelle, with him. According to the townsfolk, the people who survived the Nilfgaard siege were desperate for food, so they sailed to Fyke Isle to beg for food. When they arrived there, Vserad had them poisoned.
Geralt agrees to help Keira, who then hands him her magic lamp. The special device allows him to reveal spirits in the immediate vicinity and would come in handy when Geralt arrived at the tower. The quest then prompts the player to travel to Fyke Isle and enter the abandoned tower.
Finding Anabelle’s Ghost
Upon arriving on Fyke Isle, the player can activate the magic lamp and seek out the spirits within the structure. These ghostly visions reveal that the townsfolk were lying. They hadn’t come to Fyke Isle to ask for food, but to raid the tower. Exploring the tower more will reveal a hidden entrance to Alexander’s lab at the top. There, Geralt will also find a spirit — one he can communicate with. It’s the spirit of Anabelle, who claims she’s been trapped in the abandoned tower since her death.
Anabelle confirms that the townsfolks’ story was a farce. In reality, she and her father barely had enough food to share with them. She then recounts that, on the day of the raid, Alexander had given her a special potion and told her to hide. Anabelle followed his instructions, but when she heard her beloved — a peasant named Graham — calling out to her from outside the room, she threw the door open. Then the raiders were upon her, and Graham could do nothing to stop them.
It was then that Anabelle drank the potion. It was a powerful sleeping potion, and it ensured that she would not live through what the townsfolk did. However, when she awoke later, she was still paralyzed from the effects of the potion. By then, Alexander’s rats had swarmed the entire tower, and they ate her alive.
By now, the player can start asking Anabelle about the curse. One dialogue option, however, only becomes available if Geralt finds the fresh corpse on one of the tower’s lower floors. Geralt will ask if the tower is home to any other monsters. In response, Anabelle will mention that there are other wraiths in the tower, but that she isn’t sure what else there could be. Geralt will then press further, and Anabelle will explode at him, accusing him of being her tormentor.
True Love Prevails?
Eventually, Geralt concludes that Anabelle’s beloved may be the key to lifting the curse. Perhaps if Anabelle forgave Graham, her spirit would be freed. She then laments about how he abandoned her, but that she still walks across the isle’s shore to look at his village. Geralt quickly catches on to this and recalls that she had originally stated she couldn’t leave the tower. Anabelle quickly brushes this off, however, saying that she doesn’t remember what she said anymore.
Anabelle then requests that the witcher bring her bones to Graham. He is to bury them to prove that he regrets leaving her. The player can either agree or reject Anabelle’s request. The best ending, however, comes from rejecting it.
Rejecting Anabelle prompts Geralt to say that he doesn’t trust her. He’s vehement about there being a monster in the tower and that Anabelle is lying about it. This angers her, and it’s revealed that Anabelle’s spirit has become a pesta. After defeating her in combat, the quest then prompts the player to go to Graham.
Upon arriving in his hut, Geralt talks to Graham about the events at Fyke Isle. As it happens, Graham had agreed to go on the townsfolks’ raid as he believed it to be his only chance to run away with Anabelle. He knew that they would open the door for him because he sold them fish. However, things did not go as planned. And in true Romeo and Juliet fashion, Graham believed that her potion was a deadly poison, which is why he “abandoned” her. Though he clearly regrets what he did as he has a shrine to Anabelle in his hut as well as a noose hanging next to it.
Geralt then explains what really happened and has Graham accompany him back to the tower — to break the curse. There, Anabelle reappears in her monstrous form and demands that Graham prove his love to her with a kiss. Graham agrees, but as the two embrace, he dies. The two are then reunited in death, and the spell is lifted. Though Graham dies in both possible endings of the quest, this is seen as the better option as bringing Anabelle’s bones to Graham’s hut frees the pesta. Thus, Graham dies, and the monstrous ghost is free to spread plague and disease across the land.
Regardless of the final outcome, however, the quest showcases how Anabelle and Graham’s initially innocent romance spiraled into a horrific tragedy. Their unfortunate end is a reminder that The Witcher 3 isn’t afraid of dark themes. It’s also a reminder that players should utilize Geralt’s witcher senses, lest they get locked out of a quest’s best possible outcome.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is available now on PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One.
