Baptism of Fire

by Andrzej Sapkowski

  The Nilfgaardian fell into the water as if struck by lightning, and began to bob in the tide. His black cloak began to puff out like a balloon.

  ‘There, it is done,’ Milva put down her bow. ‘But it is already too late for him to learn.’

  ‘The other troops behind us,’ Cahir pointed to the right bank. ‘I assure you that they will not cease in their pursuit. Not after Milva shot their officer. The river meanders, at the next turn the current will bring us to the shore again. They know this and will wait...’

  ‘We have nothing but bad trouble,’ said the ferryman rising from his slain assistant. ‘The current will drive us back to the right shore. Where we will be between two fires... Because of you, lady and gentlemen! This blood will fall on your heads...’

  ‘Shut up and grab the spars!’

  On the left bank, closer now, near the edge of the river stood a line of riders Dandelion had identified as the Lyrian guerrillas. They shouted and waved their hands. Geralt saw among them a rider on a white horse. He was not sure, but it seemed to him that the rider was a woman. A blond woman in armor, but without a helmet.

  ‘What are they shouting?’ Dandelion had his ears pricked. ‘Something about the queen, or so?’

  The shouting on the left bank intensified. They clearly heard the clanking of iron.

  ‘The battle,’ Cahir evaluated in two words. ‘Look. The imperials in the forest. The Northerners are fleeing from them. And now they are trapped.’

  ‘The solution to this trap,’ Geralt spat into the water, ‘was this ferry. They wanted it, I think, to save the queen and the elders by transporting them by ferry to the other side. And we seized the ferry. Oh, they do not like us, now they do not like...’

  'Well they should,’ Dandelion said. ‘The ferry would have done them no good, but carried them straight into the hands of the Nilfgaardians on the right bank. We should also avoid the right bank. The Lyrians can be negotiated with, but the Black ones would kill us without mercy...’

  ‘It carries us faster and faster,’ Milva assessed, spitting into the water and watched the rejected sputum. ‘And we are sailing in the middle of the river. We may be able to out run both. The turns are smooth, the banks are low and covered with only reeds. We could sail down the Yaruga and they could not catch up with is. Soon they would get bored.’

  ‘Like hell,’ moaned the ferryman, ‘in front of us is Red Binduga! There is a sand bank and a bridge goes over it! The ferry will get stuck... If we continue to go this way, they’ll be waiting...’

  ‘The Nordlings will not overtake us,’ Regis pointed to the left bank. ‘They have their own worries.’

  Indeed, on the left bank a bloody fight was unfolding. The heart of it was hidden in the woods and was hinted at by the cries of war, but in many places fighting took place on the shore and the bodies of Black ones and Nordlings fell with a splash into the Yaruga River. The clash and screech of steel died away, as the ferry quickly floated down the river.

  They sailed down the middle of the river. On both sides it was quiet. Geralt was beginning to hope that everything would end well when he saw before them a wooden bridge that connected the two banks. The river flowed under the bridge, between sand banks and islets. One of the pillars of the bridge was supported on one of the islands. On the right bank was Binduga - where they saw piles of trunks and wood.

  ‘There is a little shallow,’ whispered the ferryman. ‘Just in the middle that can be passed on the right hand side of the island. The current will take us past there, but hold on to your spars, we may become stuck...’

  ‘On the bridge,’ Cahir said, shading his eyes with his hands, ‘is an army. On the bridge and on the shore...’

  They all could see it. And everyone saw that suddenly from behind the army, emerging from the woods, was a squad of men on horseback in green and black layers. They were close enough to hear the sounds of battle.

  ‘Nilfgaard,’ Cahir said dryly. ‘Those who chased us. Which means those are the Nordlings on the bridge...’

  ‘The spars!’ cried the ferryman. ‘While they are fighting, we can slip by!’

  They did not slip by. They were already very close to the bridge when it suddenly started banging with the sound of running soldiers boots. The running soldiers wore white adorned with a red diamond. Most had crossbows, which they rested on the railing and pointed at the ferry approaching the bridge.

  ‘Do not shoot, by the gods!’ Dandelion shouted with all the force of his lungs. ‘Do not shoot, we are your people!’

  The soldiers did not hear. Or did not want to listen.

  The salvo of crossbow bolts was devastating. Among the people the only one hit was the ferryman, still trying to steer with his spar. The bolt went through him from side to side. Cahir, Milva and Regis hid behind the rail just in time. Geralt reached for his sword and deflected a bolt, but there were still many more bolts. Dandelion, still shaking his hands and yelling, was not hit by some inexplicable miracle. However, the actual slaughter the hail of bolts cause was among the horses. The gray was pierced by three bolts and fell to its knees. It fell kicking its legs and struck Milva, and Regis’s bay stallion. Roach shot in the withers reared up and jumped overboard.

  ‘Don’t shoot!’ Dandelion shouted. ‘We are your people!’

  This time he succeeded.

  The ferry, carried by the current, crashed to a halt against the bank. Everyone jumped onto the island or into the water, escaping the hooves of the horses kicking in agony.

  Milva was the last, for her movement suddenly became frighteningly slow. She was hit with a bolt, thought the witcher seeing the girl drag herself overboard with effort, and then fall limp onto the sand. He jumped towards her, but the vampire was faster.

  ‘Something has torn in me,’ she said very slowly. Her hands were pressed to her lower abdomen. Geralt saw the legs of her wool trousers darken with blood.

  ‘Pour this onto my hands,’ Regis handed him a bottle drawn from his bag. ‘Pour it onto my hands, quickly.’

  ‘What is happening?’

  ‘Abortion. Give me a knife; I have to cut off the clothing. And go away.’

  ‘No,’ said Milva. ‘I want him to stay with me...’

  A tear run down her cheek.

  Above them the bridge resonated with the boots of soldiers.

  ‘Geralt!’ Dandelion cried. The Witcher, seeing what the vampire was doing to Milva, turned his head in embarrassment. He saw soldiers in white jackets rushing along the bridge. On the right bank, from Binduga, yelling could still be heard.

  ‘They are fleeing,’ Dandelion gasped, running over and tugging at his sleeve. ‘The Nilfgaardians are almost at the bridge! They are still fighting hard, but most of the soldiers have gone over to the left bank! Do you hear? We also need to run!’

  ‘We can’t’ he said gritting his teeth. ‘Milva miscarried. She will not be able to walk.’

  Dandelion swore disgustingly.

  ‘We will need to carry her,’ he said. ‘It is our only chance...’

  ‘Not our only,’ Cahir said. ‘Geralt, to the bridge.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Let’s halt the flight. If the Nordlings can hold the right side of the bridge, we can get Milva to the left bank.’

  ‘How do we stop them fleeing?’

  ‘I have led soldiers before. Climb the pillar onto the bridge!’

  Once on the bridge Cahir showed that he indeed had experience in controlling panic among the troops.

  ‘Where are you going, you sons of bitches! Where, you motherfuckers!’ he roared, emphasizing each word with a blow of his fists, on the boards of the bridge. ‘Halt! Stand your ground, you fucking scoundrels!’

  Some of those fleeing – far from all – stopped at the terrifying roars and the sight of Cahir waving his bright sword. Others tried to sneak behind his back. But Geralt also drew his sword and joined the show.

  ‘Where are you going?’ he cried, clutching a soldier and throwing him back in plac
e. ‘Where are you going? Stop! Turn around!’

  ‘The Nilfgaardians, sir!’ cried the Landsknecht. ‘It’s a bloodbath! Let us pass!’

  ‘Cowards!’ Dandelion cried, climbing onto the bridge and emitting a voice Geralt had not heard before. ‘Unworthy cowards! Rabbit hearts! You flee to save your skin? To live with indignity and baseness?’

  ‘There are too many, sir knight! We cannot face them!’

  ‘The Centurion is dead...’ moaned another. ‘The Decurion had vanished! Death is coming!’

  ‘Raise your heads! Your comrades,’ Cahir shouted, shaking his sword, ‘still fight at the shore and on the bridge! They are still fighting! Shame on him who does not go to their aid! Follow me!’

  ‘Dandelion,’ the Witcher hissed. ‘Go back to the island. You have to help Regis get Milva to the left bank. Why are you still standing here?’

  ‘Follow me, lads!’ Cahir yelled, brandishing his sword. ‘Follow me, those who believe in the gods! For Binduga! Kill, kill!’

  Several soldiers shook their arms at took up the cry, their voices expressing very different degree of resolve. Several of those who had already fled, shamed, turned back to the bridge and joined the rest of the army. The army suddenly led by the Witcher, stood against Nilfgaard.

  Perhaps the real army would have marched to the shore, but typically, at the entrance to the bridge appeared dark men on horseback. The Nilfgaardians had pierced the defenses and had come to the bridge, the boards rattled under the horseshoes. Some of the soldiers turned and ran again, others stood still and indecisive. Cahir cursed. In Nilfgaardian. But no one realized except the witcher.

  ‘What you started, you need to finish,’ Geralt growled, clutching his sword in his hand. ‘Let’s go to them! You have to get the troops fired up for battle!’

  ‘Geralt,’ Cahir stopped, and looked at the Witcher uncertainly. ‘You want me to kill... My countrymen? I can’t...’

  ‘I shit on this war,’ The Witcher clenched his teeth. ‘This is for Milva. You joined the company. Make a decision. You are with me or you are on the side with the Black ones. Quickly.’

  ‘I’m going with you.’

  And so it happened that the Witcher and the Nilfgaardian shouted wildly waved their swords and rushed forward without hesitation, the two comrades, two friends and companions, to meet a common enemy in an unequalled battle. This was their baptism of fire. A baptism of a common struggle, rage, madness and death. They went to their death, they, the two companions. Or so they thought. They could not possible know that they would not die that day, on this particular bridge, slung over the Yaruga River. They did not know that it was intended for them a different death. In another place and at another time.

  The sleeves of the Nilfgaardians had silver embroidery depicting a scorpion. Cahir slashed two with swift strokes of his long sword. Geralt also struck two with Sihil. Then he jumped onto the railing of the bridge, running along it and attacking another. He was a Witcher, maintaining his balance was for him a trifle, but the acrobatic feat amazed and surprised the Nilfgaardian attackers. They died, amazed and surprised by the dwarven blade which cut through their mail like wool. Blood soon made the boards and planks of the bridge slippery.

  Observing the advantage of their armed commanders over the numerically strong army on the bridge, the defenders raised a chorus, a bellowing, in which could be heard the returning of morale and fighting spirit. And so it was that those who had recently been deserting in panic, rushed over the Nilfgaardians like ravenous wolves, cutting with swords, axes, stabbing with spears and bludgeoning with clubs and halberds. The railings on both sides of the bridge cracked, the horses flew into the river along with their riders on their black cloaks.

  The uproarious army pushed onto the opposite shore, howling and pushing Geralt and Cahir, the accidental commanders, not letting them do what they wanted to do. Which was to withdraw stealthily, back to Milva and move her to the left bank.

  The battle raged on. The Nilfgaardians surrounded and cut off the soldiers on the bridge who had not escaped, yet defended themselves fiercely from behind barricades built of cedar and pine logs. At the sight of the impending siege of the handful still defending themselves a joyful shout was raised. A little too hastily and prematurely. A compact wedge of reinforcements had pushed and driven the Nilfgaardians from the bridge, but now, at the entrance of the bridge, a counter attack fell on their flank. If not for the barricades and the pine logs, inhibiting both the escape and the momentum of the cavalry, the infantry would have been scattered in the blink of an eye. Covered by the wood piles and logs, the soldiers began a fierce fight.

  For Geralt, this was something he did not know a lot about, a whole new battle. There was no fencing or fancy footwork, it was just a chaotic and constant raining of blows, which were flying in from all sides. Still, he benefited of the very well-deserved privilege of being a commander – the soldiers surrounded him, covering his flanks and protected his back for him, making a place in front where he could strike and sow death. But the crowd was getting bigger. The Witcher and his army, without knowing how, fought shoulder to shoulder with a handful of bloodied and fatigued defenders at the barricades, mostly dwarven mercenaries. They fought in a ring.

  And then came the fire.

  One of the sides of the barricade, located between Binduga and the bridge, was a big, spiny hedgehog pile of boughs and branches, an invincible obstacle for horses and infantry. Now the pile had caught fire – someone had thrown in a torch. The defenders retreated, driven by the heat and the smoke. Whirling, blinded, hindering each other, they began to die under the blows of the Nilfgaardian attackers.

  The situation was saved by Cahir. Having experience with war, he led his troops around the barricade. They had separated from Geralt’s group, but now returned. He had won a horse with black trapping and swung his sword around him, striking the flank. Behind him, yelling fanatically came, halberdiers and spearmen in doublets with red diamonds.

  Geralt arranged his fingers and hit the burning pile with the sign of Aard. Not counting on a great result, since it had been weeks without his witcher’s elixirs. But there was a result. The pile exploded and disintegrated, squirting sparks.

  ‘Follow me!’ He yelled, slashing the temple of a Nilfgaardian who had rise above the barricade. ‘Follow me! Through the fire!’

  They followed after him. Throwing spears of burning branches with their bare hands at the Nilfgaardian horses. A baptism of fire, thought the witcher, frantically slashing all around him. I had to pass through a baptism of fire to save Ciri. And now I go through a fire in battle, that generally I do not care about. Which in general I don’t understand. The fire, which was to purify me, simply burns my hair and face.

  The blood that was splattered hissed and steamed.

  ‘Forward, by the gods! Cahir! To me!’

  ‘Geralt!’ Cahir pulled another Nilfgaardian from his saddle. ‘To the bridge! Protect the bridge! We must tighten the defense...’

  He did not finish because out of the smoke came a galloping horseman in a black breastplate, without a helmet, his hair bloodied and disheveled. Cahir parried a blow from his long sword, but fell off of his horse’s rump. The Nilfgaardian stooped to nail him to the ground. But he did not finish the move. On his forearm shone a silver scorpion.

  ‘Cahir!’ he cried in amazement. ‘Cahir aep Ceallach!’

  ‘Morteisen...’ Cahir, stretched on the ground, said in a voice no less astonished.

  A dwarven mercenary, who ran alongside Geralt, dressing in a doublet that was burned and charred, lost no time in amazement at all. With a flourish he thrust his spear into the belly of the Nilfgaardian, pushing the pole in far then yanked it out. Another came and pressed his heavy boot onto the breastplate of the fallen and stabbed a spear into his throat. The Nilfgaardian issued a gasp, vomited blood and scratched the earth with his spurs.

  At that moment the witcher was hit in the back with something very heavy and hard. His knees
buckled under him. He fell and heard a great roar of triumph. He saw the riders in black cloaks flee into the forest. He heard the bridge rumble under the hooves of the horses approaching from the left bank, cavalry, carrying a flag with an eagle surrounded by red diamonds.

  And so ended the great Battle for the Bridge on the Yaruga, a battle that in latter chronicles, of course, does not even get the slightest mention.

  ‘Do not be troubled, noble sir,’ said the surgeon, while massaging and tapping the witcher’s back. ‘The bridge was demolished. We chased the enemy to the opposite shore. Your friends and the lady are also safe. Is she your wife?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Oh, I thought... It is terrible, my lord, when war harms the pregnant...’

  ‘Be silent, not a word about it. Whose are these banners?’

  ‘You do not know for whom you fought? Surprise, surprise... This is the army of Lyria. You see the black eagle of Lyria and the red diamonds of Rivia. Well, I’m finished. It was just a contusion. Your back will hurt for a while, but it’s nothing serious. You’ll recover.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘It’s me who should be thanking you. If you had not defended the bridge, Nilfgaard would have exterminated us to the last; we would have been thrown into the river. We would not have had time to escape persecution... You saved the Queen! Farewell, my lord. I’m going, other wounded need my help.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  He sat on a tree stump, tired, sore and uncaring. Alone. Cahir had disappeared somewhere. Between the piles in the middle of the broken bridge the Yaruga flowed green and gold, gleaming in the glare from the sunset.

  He raised his head, hearing steps, the clatter of hooves and armor.

  ‘That’s him, Your Majesty. Let me help you down...’

  ‘I’m fine.’

  Geralt raised his head. The woman who stood before him in armor had very fair hair, almost as white as his own. He realized that the hair was not white, but gray, but the woman’s face showed no signs of aging. Maturity, yes. But not old age.