To Bait a Forktail – Witcher 3 Quest

This guide is a walkthrough of a main quest of the Witcher 3 in the area of Kaer Morhen. The guide is composed of a map, map legend, and walkthrough to show readers exactly where to go and what to do to complete the quest.

Map Legend

1 – Kaer Morhen
2 – Fast Travel Marker
3 – Scorpion
4 – Lil’ Bleater
5 – Forktail Lair

Background

You’ll trigger this quest when you arrive at Kaer Morhen (#1) during the quest Ugly Baby.

Walkthrough

For this quest, you’ll need to help Eskel kill a forktail. Of course, before you can do that, you’ll need to figure out where Eskel went. To that end, you should exit Kaer Morhen and turn on your witcher senses. Starting around the fast travel marker (#2), you’ll spot tracks from Eskel’s horse Scorpion.

The tracks will lead you south, where you’ll eventually find Scorpion by himself (#3). Nearby, you’ll spot more tracks — Eskel’s and a goat’s — continuing south. However, they’ll soon go over rocks, where you’ll lose them. Luckily, you’ll detect that the goat rubbed up against a nearby tree, and you’ll be able to follow its scent past the rocks and over to a grassy area where you’ll pick up Eskel’s tracks again. Eskel’s tracks will lead you to the goat, Lil’ Bleater, which you’ll find tied to a stake (#4).

When you approach the goat, Eskel will reveal himself, and you’ll learn that he brought the goat here as bait for the forktail. But before you can say much to Eskel, the forktail will show up and attack you. Forktails are draconids, so put some Draconid Oil on your silver sword and get to work. Once you’ve done enough damage to the forktail, it’ll flee, but it’ll leave a blood trail behind, which you’ll be able to track. The trail will take you to the forktail’s lair.

Inside the lair (#5), you’ll encounter the forktail again, and this time it won’t have anywhere to run. When you kill it, you’ll automatically loot Forktail Spinal Fluid from its corpse, but you should also manually loot the corpse for a Forktail Mutagen and some other monster parts.

When you exit the lair, Eskel will challenge you to a race. This is optional, but if you win and accept a reward, then you’ll receive a leveled version of Mountain Folk Boots, the diagram for Hanged Man’s Venom, and 200 xp. You can also refuse the reward, in which case Eskel will simply owe you a drink. If you lose the race, then you’ll owe Eskel a drink.

Regardless, when you return to Kaer Morhen, you’ll complete the quest and earn 600 xp.