Philippa Eilhart

A brilliant, ruthless sorceress and founder of the Lodge of Sorceresses, able to turn into an owl, and Radovid’s bitterest enemy.

Philippa Eilhart is one of the most gifted and most dangerous sorceresses in the North. A former star pupil of Tissaia de Vries, she became advisor to King Vizimir II of Redania and remained a power at court long after his death, which she very likely arranged herself. She is one of the few mages who have mastered polymorphy, and at will she turns into a large grey owl. Proud, cold and endlessly ambitious, she founded the Lodge of Sorceresses and never hid that she wants to rule.

Philippa in The Witcher 3
When the game begins, Philippa is blind and hunted by both Redania and Nilfgaard. She hoped to grow new eyes on gemstones, as Vilgefortz once did, and to rebuild the Lodge. Seeking shelter in Novigrad with her former lover Arthur de Vleester, she was tricked: he talked her into taking owl form and then locked a dimeritium band around her leg. After the witch hunters took him, the owl ended up as Zoltan’s pet, until he lost her in a card game to Dijkstra, her old lover and bitter enemy. In Blindingly Obvious Geralt and Triss find her after Dijkstra has removed the band, and Geralt has to stop her rampage. In return for an amnesty from Emperor Emhyr she joins the fight against the Wild Hunt, helps Geralt find the Sunstone and offers Ciri an equal place in the Lodge, which Ciri turns down. She even admits she hopes to replace Yennefer as Ciri’s advisor.

If Geralt joins the plot against King Radovid, Philippa, who spied on the conspirators in owl form, hands him Vizimir’s ring as bait. At the end of Reason of State she gets her revenge on the man who took her eyes: she blinds him with powder, stabs him in the back and flies off as an owl.

In the earlier games
In The Witcher 2 Philippa is part of Saskia’s circle in Vergen and helps Geralt through the magical mist, but then puts a spell on Saskia and takes her away. At Loc Muinne Radovid has her arrested and blinded, yet she escapes by turning into an owl.

In the books
In Blood of Elves she joins Dijkstra in Oxenfurt, tortures a merchant to find a way to reach Rience and then paralyses Geralt, letting Rience escape. On Thanedd Island she leads the coup against the mages who sided with Nilfgaard, and as an owl she claws Artaud Terranova as he attacks Ciri. The saga’s ending reveals that she later died under torture during the witch hunts and was eventually honoured as a martyr saint.

Across the games

In The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings, Philippa Eilhart, the former court sorceress of King Vizimir II of Redania, is staying in Vergen as a member of Saskia the Dragonslayer’s inner circle, though her motives are unclear. A rare master of polymorphy and an expert in curses and supernatural phenomena, she helps Geralt find his way through the magical mist and gives him the list of ingredients for an antidote to the poison afflicting Saskia.

When she arrives in Loc Muinne, Philippa is arrested by the Redanians and imprisoned to await the king’s judgment, and she is cruelly blinded during her first interrogation. Although she had previously betrayed Geralt’s trust, he has to rely on her again, since only she can lift the spell placed on Saskia. Seizing a moment when both of her guards are distracted, the blinded sorceress turns into an owl and flies out of Loc Muinne.