‘They left no one?’
‘Nobody.’
‘Incomprehensible,’ Geralt shook his head. ‘I don’t understand it.’
‘And nothing happened,’ Yennefer cleared her throat, ‘to explain this?’
‘No,’ Ciri replied quickly, ‘nothing.’
She lied.
At first, she had tried to appear fine. Erect, proud, head held high and her face impassive, while being pushed into the gloved hands of the Black knights, while throwing bold and challenging looks and those helmets which made her so afraid. No one was touching her now, after the officer with the silver ornament on his helm growled at his officers.
She walked between two rows of soldiers who escorted her to the gate. Their boots stomped loudly, their chainmail clinked and their weapons rattled.
After advancing a few steps, she looked back for the first time, a little time later; she did it a second time. She would never see them again anymore, she suddenly realized with terrifying clarity.
Neither Geralt nor Yennefer. Never again.
That awareness, in one fell swoop wiped away her fake mask of courage. Ciri’s face contracted and contorted her eyes filled with tears, and her nose ran. The girl fought with all her might, but in vain. A wave broke the dam as the tears made an appearance.
The Nilfgaardians in salamander cloaks looked on silently. And amazed. Some had seen her on the stairs covered in blood, had seen her talking with the Emperor. A witcheress with a sword, who was defying the Emperor himself. And now they were stunned, seeing a simple girl crying and sobbing.
She was aware of their gazes. Their eyes were burning like fire, prickling her skin. She struggled, but to no avail. The more she tried to restrain herself, the more she cried.
She slowed and then stopped. The escort also stopped. But only for a moment. A grouchy officer grabbed her with iron hard hands under her arms. Ciri glanced over her shoulder again. She offered no resistance. But wailed louder, more desperate.
The Emperor, Emhyr var Emreis stopped, this dark man whose face had awakened strange and confusing memories. With a sharp order, he ordered he loose. Ciri sniffed and wiped her eyes with her sleeve. Seeing the Emperor approach he stifled a sob and proudly raised her head. Although at the time she realize how ridiculous she must look.
Emhyr watched her for a long time. Without a word. Then he approached and reached for her.
Ciri, whose reactions to such movements were to instinctively recoil, did not react this time to her surprise. Even greater was her surprise to find that the contact with this man was not distasteful.
He touched her hair, as if to count the snowy strings. He touched her cheek, his fingertips running along the old scar. Then he hugged her, cuddling her close to his chest, stroking the back of her head. And she, shaking and crying uncontrollably, let him.
‘A strange thing, fate,’ she heard him whisper faintly. ‘Goodbye, my daughter.’
‘What did he say?’
Ciri’s face clouded.
‘He said, Va Faill, luned. In the elder speech – Goodbye, my daughter.’
‘I know,’ Yennefer nodded. ‘What happened then?’
‘Then... Then he let me go, he turned around and walked away. He shouted orders. And they all left. They passed me, quite indifferently, stomping, pounding and rattling in their armor, out the gate. I heard neighing and galloping. I’d don’t understand. Although if you think about it...’
‘Ciri.’
‘What?’
‘Do not think.’
‘Castle Stygga,’ repeated Philippa Eilhart, looking out from under her long eyelashes at Fringilla Vigo.
Fringilla did not blush. IN the last three months she had been able to product a magic cream which acted on blood vessels. Thanks to that cream the blush on her face didn’t show, and no one could know that she was ashamed.
‘Vilgefortz was hiding in castle Stygga,’ Assire var Anahid confirmed. ‘It is in Ebbing on the shore of a mountain lake whose name, my informant, a common soldier, cannot remember.’
‘You used the past tense,’ Francesca Findabair said.
‘Correct,’ Philippa took control again. ‘Because Vilgefortz is dead, my dear colleague. He and his companions are dead. This service was provided by our good friend the witcher Geralt of Rivia. Obviously we underestimated him. We all do. We made a mistake. We all do. Some more than others.’
All the sorceresses as if on command looked at Fringilla, but the cream was working reliably. Assire var Anahid sighed. Philippa slapped her hand on the table.
‘Although it may seem like an excuse,’ she said dryly, ‘our activities associated with the war and the preparation of the peace negotiations and the fact that the Lodge was not involved with the case and final solution of Vilgefortz, have to be considered as a failure on our part. Something like this must not be repeated, dear ladies.’
The Lodge – except for Fringilla who was pale as a corpse – shook their heads.
‘At the moment,’ Philippa said, ‘Witcher Geralt is somewhere in Ebbing. Along with Yennefer and Ciri. We will need to consider how to find them...’
‘And the castle?’ Sabrina Glevissig interrupted. ‘Have you forgotten to do something about that, Philippa?’
‘No, I have not forgotten. If there is going to be a legend, one must have the proper version and one in our favor. I’ll entrust this task to you, Sabrina. Take Keira and Triss and take care of it. See that no trace is left.’
The explosion was heard in Maecht, the flash – because it happened at night – was visible even in Metinna and Geso. A series of earthquakes caused by the explosion were felt even further. In virtually all corners of the world.
CHAPTER TEN
Congreve, Estella Vel Stella, – The daughter of Otto of Congreve, married to the old Count Liddertal. Upon the death of the latter, rapidly recovered, managed her inheritance most judiciously, amassing for herself a not inconsiderable fortune. Enjoying the esteem of the emperor Emhyr var Emreis (sic), she was considered a person of great importance by the court. While she had no official duties, it was generally believed that the emperor was in the habit of paying considerable attention to her words and opinions. Because of her close personal relationship with the young Empress Cirilla Fiona (sic), whom she loved like her own daughter, she was jokingly referred to as the "Imperial mother-in-law". She outlived both the Emperor and the Empress, and died in 1331; as to her huge fortune, it fell to distant
relatives on the Liddertal side of the family, called the Whites; being stupid and short-sighted, they squandered every bit of their inheritance.
Effenberg and Talbot
Encyclopaedia Maxima Mundi, tome III
The man stealthily approaching the camp was very clever and cunning. His position changed quickly and he moved silently and swiftly so that his approach would not be noticed by anyone. Anyone but Boreas Mun. Boreas was very skilful in approaching maneuvers.
‘Show yourself, stranger,’ he called, making sure to make his voice sound confident and bold. ‘Your tricks won’t work on me. I can see you out there!’
One of the boulders on the hillside against the starry sky moved and turned into the silhouette of a human figure.
Boreas turned the spit roast as the meat was burning. Pretending to comfortably support himself, he put his hand on the handle of his bow.
‘My property is not worth much,’ he said in a calm tone with a thread of warning. ‘I only have a few things, but I do not intend to lose them. I will defend them to the death.’
‘I’m not a thief,’ said the deep voice of the man hiding among the rocks. ‘I am a pilgrim.’
The pilgrim was tall and robust, measuring about seven feet and Boreas noticed quite the stomach on him. He held a cane in his hand that was a thick as a pole carts and looked like an ordinary pilgrim stick. Boreas Mun wondered how suck a big, hulking man could move with such agility.
He became concerned. His bow, a composite bow with seventy pounds of
pressure, which could dispatch an elk at a hundred paces, suddenly seemed like a fragile child’s toy.
‘I am a pilgrim,’ the figure repeated. ‘I have no evil...’
‘The other one,’ Boreas interrupted sharply, ‘can come out too!’
‘What other...’ the pilgrim stuttered and stopped, seeing from the darkness on the opposite side of the fire, emerge a slim, noiseless shadow.
This time Boreas Mun was surprised. The other man was an elf – his expert trackers eye detected it right away by the way he moved. And being surprised by an elf had no shame.
‘I apologize,’ the elf said, his voice slightly hoarse. ‘I did not hide from the two of you out of malice, but out of caution. Um, I’d recommend you turn the spit a bit.’
‘He’s right,’ said the stranger, leaning on his cane and sniffing audibly. ‘The way the meat smells, it’s over done.’
Boreas turned the spit, sighed, cleared his throat and sighed again.
‘Gentlemen, please sit down,’ he said finally. ‘Wait a few minutes and the roast will be done. I say, it is a knave who refuses hospitality to pilgrims on the road.’
Grease dripped into the fire and the flame blazed brighter. The pilgrim whore a felt hat with a wide brim, which hid his face quite effectively in shadow. The elf wore around his head a colorful scarf, which did not hide his face. When they saw him in the firelight, the tracker and the pilgrim winced. They made no sound, just held their breaths at the sight of his face, which was once beautifully elven, but now was disfigured by an ugly scar that ran diagonally across his forehead, brow, nose and cheek to chin.
Boreas Mun grunted and turned the spit again.
‘The smell,’ he did not ask, but made a statement of fact, ‘is what attracted you to my camp.’
‘Indeed,’ said the pilgrim with the hat, ‘I don’t want to brag, but I smelled your roast at quite a distance. But I kept a proper vigilance. The fire, that I approached yesterday, the ragged savages were roasting a woman.’
‘That is true,’ said the elf. ‘The next morning I found human bones in the ashes.’
‘The next morning?’ the tall pilgrim repeated.
‘How long have you been following in my footsteps, my Lord elf?’
‘A long time.’
‘What kept you from revealing your presence?’
‘Caution.’
'The Elskerdeg Pass,' Boreas Mun said turning the spit and breaking the awkward silence, 'does not enjoy the best reputation. I have also seen bones in fires, corpses on stakes and hanging from trees. In the surrounding mountains are hidden outlaws, outcasts and the followers of perverted cults. And creatures who only see a man by himself as food. Supposedly.'
'Not supposedly,' said the elf. 'Definitely. And the further east you go into the mountains, the worse it gets.'
'Are you also headed east? For Elskerdeg? To Zerrikania? Or even further, to Haakland?'
Neither the pilgrim or the elf answered. Boreas Mun didn't really expect one. First, the question was indiscreet. Second, it was stupid. From where they were standing it was only possible to head east. Through the Elskerdeg Pass. Where he was headed.
'The roast is ready,' Boreas, with a deft movement, which was also intended as a warning, flicked open a butterfly knife. 'Come, gentlemen, don't be shy.'
The pilgrim took out a hunting knife and the elf a stiletto which was by no means a kitchen implement. All three, however, used their blades to cut the food. For some time all that could be heard was the crunch and crackle of eating and the sizzle of bones thrown into the fire.
The pilgrim belched dignified.
'Interesting animal,' the pilgrim said, looking at the shoulder that he had just cleaned as if he had spent three days in an anthill. 'The taste reminds me of lamb, but it was a tender as a rabbit... I do not remember ever having eaten anything like it before.'
'That was a skrekk,' the elf said while crushing a bone between his teeth. 'But it does not resemble anything I have ever eaten.'
Boreas quietly cleared his throat. The barely perceptible undercurrent of amusement in the elf's voice proved that he knew that he was eating a huge mountain rat, with blood red eyes and sharp incisors, whose tail measured one and a half cubits. The tracker was not going to catch the giant rodent, but shot it in self-defense. He then, however, decided to roast it.
He was a wise man, the thought coldly. He never would have eaten a rat that fed on garbage and waste. But the nearest community to the Elskerdeg Pass that was able to produce waste was over three hundred miles away. The rat - or the skrekk as the elf had called it - has been clean and healthy. It had no contact with civilization. Therefore it had not been dirty or carrying disease.
Finally they finished the last of the meat, the ribs and bones went into the fire. The moon rose over the jagged peaks of the mountains. The wind fanned the flames and sparks flew, they would die off between the myriad of twinkling stars.
‘Have you gentlemen been on the road long?’ Boreas Mun allowed himself another indiscreet question. ‘How long since you went through the Solveiga Gate?’
‘Long ago, or recently,’ said the pilgrim. ‘What does it matter? I passed through Solveiga two days after September’s full moon.’
‘For me it has been six days,’ said the elf.
‘Ha,’ the tracker said, emboldened by their answers. ‘I’m surprised that we did not met there, Because I was passing through at the same time. But I was on a horse.’
He paused, quenching gloomy thoughts and memories of his horse and its loss. He was sure that his casual companions had similar adventures. They could not have travelled the whole way on foot to catch him here in the vicinity of Elskerdeg.
‘I gather,’ he continued, ‘that you gentlemen started travelling just after the war and after the conclusion of the peace of Cintra. Naturally, I don’t care, but I dare to presume that you, gentlemen were not satisfied with the order of things established at Cintra.’
Silence reigned for a long time around the fire but was eventually broken by the distant howl. A wolf, probably, although around the Elskerdeg Pass you could never be sure of anything.
‘To be honest,’ the elf said unexpectedly, ‘I found after the peace of Cintra there was no reason why the world should love me. Or me the new layout.’
‘My own case,’ said the pilgrim, crossing his arms over his powerful chest. ‘was the same. Although I learned of it, as a friend of mine says, post factum.’
There was a long silence. The howling had ceased in the pass.
‘In the beginning,’ continued the pilgrim, although Boreas and the elf were convinced that he would not, ‘everything pointed to the fact that the peace of Cintra would bring changes for the better and set tolerable living conditions for this world. If not for all, at least for some...’
‘The kings,’ grunted Boreas, ‘travelled to Cintra in April, if I recall.’
‘Exactly, April second,’ said the pilgrim. ‘I remember it was the new moon.’
Along the entire wall located under dark beams within a gallery, hung a row of shields with the colorful figures of heraldic emblems and the coats of arms of the nobility of Cintra. One glance was enough to detect the difference between the old faded coats of arms of the nobility of Cintra and the newly promoted families from the reign of Dagorad and Calanthe. The latter had vibrant colors which had not yet faded and you could not detect the slightest sign of woodworm.
However, the most intense colors appeared on the shield that had been put up most recently, those with the coat of arms of the Nilfgaardian nobles. Those who had distinguished themselves during the conquest of the country and had proven themselves during the five-year imperial administration.
Once we again hold Cintra, thought King Foltest, we will need to ensure that these coat of arms are not destroyed in a fervor of restoration. Politics is one thing, aesthetics another. Changes to a regime do not justify vandalism.
So this is where it all began, thought Dijkstra, lo
oking around the large hall. The famous engagement feast, during which appeared an iron hedgehog demanding Princess Pavetta’s hand... And Queen Calanthe hired a witcher...
How amazing are the interwoven fates of humans, thought the spy, surprised by the banality of his own thoughts.
It’s been five years, thought Queen Meve. Five years ago, the blood and brains of Calanthe, the Lioness of Cintra, exploded on the flagstones of that courtyard, which I can see through this window. Calanthe whose portrait we saw proudly hanging in the foyer, the last of the royal bloodline. After her daughter, Pavetta drowned, she was left with only her granddaughter Cirilla. And if it is true that Cirilla also died...
‘Please,’ Cyrus Engelkind Hemmelfart the hierarch of Novigrad, waved his trembling hand, by virtue of his age, position and widespread respect he was to preside over the discussions. ‘To your places please.’
They sat at a round table, where the seats were identified by mahogany tablets. Meve, Queen of Rivia and Lyria. Foltest, King of Temeria and his vassal, King Venzlav of Brugge. Demavend, King of Aedirn. Henselt, King of Kaedwen. Ethan, King of Cidaris. The young King Kistrin of Verden. The Duke Nitert, head of the regency council of Redania. And the Earl Dijkstra.
We should seek to get rid of this spy and remove him from the table of discussions, thought the hierarch. King Henselt and King Foltest, and even young King Kistrin, have
already allowed themselves a few sour comments to our Nilfgaardian representatives. This Sigismund Dijkstra is a person of dubious origins with an unacceptable past and reputation. We cannot afford to have such a person distorting the atmosphere of the deliberations.
The head of the Nilfgaardian delegation, Baron Shilard Fitz-Oesterlen, who sat at the round table directly opposite Dijkstra, greeted the spy with a curt diplomatic bow. Seeing that everyone was already seated, the hierarch of Novigrad also sat. Not without the help of a few pages that held his trembling hands. The hierarch sat on a chair made years ago for Queen Calanthe. The chair had a beautifully carved backing, towering over the other chairs.