Lady of the Lake

by Andrzej Sapkowski

  'Which way, Yen?'

  The sorceress focused, closing her eyes.

  ‘This way. After these steps.'

  'Are you sure that's a good way to go?'

  'Yes.'

  More mercenaries attacked them from just behind the corner of the hallway, near an ornate archway. There were more than ten and they were armed with spears and halberds. And they were determined and stubborn. Despite this, they went down quickly.

  Yennefer immediately struck one in the chest with a ball of fire. Geralt spun in a pirouette and fell among the others, his Dwarven Sihil flashing and hissing like a snake. When four more had fallen, then others fled, clanging and clattering along the corridors.

  'All right, Yen?'

  'Could not be better.'

  Under the archway stood Vilgefortz.

  'I'm impressed,' he said quietly. 'I'm really impressed, witcher. You are hopelessly naive and stupid, but your technique is really impressive.'

  'Your underlings,' Yennefer said calmly, 'just took off and left you. Give us Ciri and we'll leave you alone.'

  'You know, Yennefer,' sneered the wizard, 'that is the second generous offer I've had today? Thank you, thank you. And here is my answer...'

  'Look out!' Yennefer screamed and jumped. Geralt also jumped to the side at the last minute. A pillar of fire roared from the wizard's hands and burst through the place Geralt stood a moment before, hissing and burning the area. The witcher wiped soot and the charred remains of an eyebrow from his face. He saw Vilgefortz again raise his hand. He dodged and ducked behind a column. The boom popped his ears. The whole castle shook on its foundations.

  Echoes of the vast boom rolled through the corridors, halls and rooms of the castle. The walls trembled and rafters creaked. With a loud crack, a portrait with a heavy gilt frame fell from the wall.

  In the eyes of the fleeing mercenaries was an unspeakable fear. Stefan Skellen mollified them with a threatening glare and called them to order with a stern look and voice.

  ‘What is it? Report!’

  ‘Mister Coroner...’ grunted one of them. ‘This is terrible! They are demons... Every arrow kills one of us... Every slash sprays red blood... Death is coming for us... He butchered everyone! We lost ten men... Maybe more... Do you hear that?’

  The boom repeated, the castle trembled again.

  ‘Magic,’ Skellen said through clenched teeth. ‘Vilgefortz... Well, now we’ll see who’s who.’

  He approached another soldier. He was pale and covered with debris. For a while he was unable to bring himself to speak, when he finally spoke his voice trembled.

  ‘There... there... is a monster... Mister Coroner... Big black bat... Tearing at people’s heads. Blood ran in streams! And he flew around and laughed... And his teeth!’

  ‘It could not carry the heads...’ someone whispered from behind the Owl.

  ‘Mister Coroner,’ Boreas Mun decided to speak. ‘There are ghosts. I saw... young Count Cahir aep Ceallach. And he is dead.’

  Skellen looked at him but said nothing.

  ‘Lord Stefan...’ Dacre Silifant mumbled. ‘Who are we fighting here?’

  ‘They are not men,’ moaned one of the mercenaries. ‘They are demons from hell! A force no human can hope to stand against...’

  The Owl crossed his arms and stared at the mercenaries with an authoritarian and determined look.

  ‘Then,’ he proclaimed loudly and clearly, ‘we will not meddle in the conflict between the forces of hell! Let the demons fight with demons, sorcerers with sorcerers and vampires can crawl out of their tombs. We won’t disturb them! We will stay here, quietly and await the outcome of the fight.’

  The faces of the mercenaries shone. The mood grew palpable.

  ‘These stairs,’ Skellen said in a strong voice, ‘is the only way out. We’ll wait here. Let’s see who tries to go down them.’

  From above came a terrible boom. They could smell sulfur and smoke even here.

  ‘It is dark in here!’ the Owl shouted, loud and clear, to give encouragement to his troops. ‘Move, get some torches! We need light to shine on those stairs! Light a fire in those braziers!’

  ‘We have no fuel, Sir!’

  Skellen wordlessly pointed to the artworks on the wall in the hall.

  ‘The artworks?’ a mercenary asked incredulously. ‘We are to burn paintings?’

  ‘Why not?’ said the Owl. ‘What are you looking at? Art is dead!’

  The frames were broken down to chips and the images shredded. The well dried wood and the cloth saturated with varnish immediately caught flame.

  Boreas Mun watched. Already fully committed.

  A thunderous noise, a flash and the column from where they were hiding a moment before, crumbled apart. The core broke; the decorated column crashed to the floor and crushed a terracotta mosaic. From the side flew a hissing ball of lightning. Yennefer stopped it, uttering spells and gesturing.

  Vilgefortz walked towards them, his cloak billowing out behind him like dragon wings.

  ‘I’m not surprised by Yennefer,’ he said walking. ‘She is a woman, so she is evolutionarily lower and ruled by her hormones. But you, however, Geralt, you’re not only a man who is inherently reasonable, but a mutant, exempt from emotions...’

  He gestured. Thunder. A flash. Lightning rebounded from Yennefer’s shield.

  ‘But despite your better judgment,’ continued Vilgefortz, passing fire from one hand to another, ‘you demonstrate a remarkable consistency and know nothing. You constantly want to paddle against the current and piss into the wind. It had to end badly. Know that today, here; in castle Stygga, you have pissed into a hurricane.’

  Somewhere on the lower floors was furious fighting, someone shouted, screamed and then groaned in pain. Something burned, Ciri could smell the burning smell and smoke, a gust of warmer air was blown into her face.

  Something banged with such forces that even the roof trembled on its support columns and stucco showered from the walls.

  Ciri cautiously peered around a corner. The corridor was empty. She went quickly and quietly, flanked on both sides by statues in the wall niches. She had seen those statues before.

  In her dreams.

  She left the corridor and came face to face with a man armed with a spear. She stopped short, ready to jump and spin. But then realized that this was not a man but a woman with grey hair, skinny and bent. And she was not carrying a spear, but a broom.

  ‘There is a prisoner here,’ Ciri said, ‘a black-haired sorceress. Where is she?’

  The woman with the broom was silent for a long moment, moving her mouth as if chewing something.

  ‘And how would I know, my dove?’ she mumbled finally. ‘I’m here to clean.’

  She turned her back to the girl and began to sweep.

  ‘I clean and I clean and I clean,’ she repeated to herself. ‘And every time it just becomes dirty again. Just look at this mess, my dove.’

  Ciri looked. On the floor, she saw a wide, winding bloody smear. It ran for a few steps and ended at a wall, under a dead man. Nearby lay two more dead men, one twisted in his death throws, the second with outspread limbs. Next to them lay crossbows.

  ‘There is mess again,’ she said taking a bucket and rag, dropping to her knees, she began to mop the floor. ‘Such filth. And I used to get it clean. Will it never end?’

  ‘No,’ said Ciri flatly. ‘Never. Such is the way of the world.’

  The old woman stopped mopping, but did not turn her head.

  ‘I clean,’ she said. ‘Nothing more. By you, my dove, you should go straight and then left.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  The woman bowed her head lower and again wearily began to mop.

  She was alone. Alone and lost in a maze of corridors.

  ‘Lady Yennefer!’

  So far she had kept silent, fearing that yelling would attract Vilgefortz’s people. But now...

  ‘Yennefeeeeeer!’

  It seemed to her tha
t she heard something. Yes, definitely!

  She ran into a gallery and then into a great hall with high porches. Again she smelt the burning smell.

  Bonhart emerged like a spirit from a niche and hit her in the face with his fist. She stumbled, and he jumped on her like a hawk, grabbing her by the throat and pushing her against the wall with his forearm. Ciri looked into his pale fishlike eyes and felt her heart drop low in her chest.

  ‘I would not have found you, if you were not calling out,’ he croaked. ‘And how wistfully you called. Do you long for me so, my darling?’

  Still against the wall, his hand slipped behind her neck. Ciri tossed her head. The Bounty hunter bared his teeth. He slid hi hand over her chest, squeezing her breast, and brutally grabbed her crotch. The he released her and pushed, she fell to the floor.

  He threw a sword at her feet. Swallow. And she immediately understood what he wanted.

  ‘I would have preferred the arena,’ he drawled. ‘As a culmination, the final to your fine performances. The witcheress verses Leo Bonhart! Eh, people would pay to see something like that! Come on! Lift the steel and draw it.’

  She obeyed. But did not draw the sword from its sheath, she slung the belt over her shoulder so that the hilt was in reach.

  Bonhart took a step back.

  ‘I thought,’ he said, ‘that my old eyes would be comforted by what Vilgefortz was going to do to you. I was wrong. I need to feel how your blood flows down my sword. To hell with vile sorcery and sorcerers, destiny, prophecies and the fate of the world, defiling elder and younger blood. What does all this divination and witchcraft mean to me? Shit! Nothing can compare with the pleasure...’

  He did not finish the sentence. She saw his lips move and his eyes flash ominously.

  ‘I’ll release the blood from your veins, witcheress,’ he hissed. ‘And then, before it gets cold, we will celebrate. You’re mine. All mine. Raise your weapon!’

  The castle shook from a distant rumble.

  ‘Vilgefortz,’ Bonhart announced gleefully, ‘is making mincemeat of your valiant rescuers. Well, darling, draw your sword.’

  Flee, she thought, paralyzed with fear, flee to another place, to another time, far away from him. She felt shame. Run? Leave Geralt and Yennefer to their mercy? But common sense told her, dead I can do nothing to help them...

  She concentrated, pressed her fists to her temples.

  Bonhart immediately understood what was going on and rushed to her. But he reacted too late.

  There was a flash and a murmur in her ears

  I did it, she triumphantly.

  She immediately realized that the triumph was premature. She realized that she could hear angry shouts and curses. The failure was probably caused by the evil, paralyzing aura of this place. She had transferred, but only a small jump. She had not even gotten out of sight of the opposite end of the gallery. She was not far from Bonhart. But she was still beyond his reach and his sword. At least temporarily.

  Dogged by his roar, she turned and ran away.

  She ran along long, wide corridors, the dead eyes of the statues followed her. She turned once, then a second time. She wanted to get lost and confuse Bonhart; moreover, she was headed towards the sounds of battle. Where it was being fought, were her friends.

  She entered into a large, circular room, in the middle of which stood a marble plinth sculpture representing a woman with a veiled face, probably a goddess. The room opened onto two corridors, both quite narrow. She picked one at random. She chose the wrong path.

  ‘The girl!’ roared one of the mercenaries. ‘We have her!’

  There were too many of them to risk a fight, even in a narrow corridor. And Bonhart was probably close. Ciri turned and ran to escape. She entered the room with the marble goddess. And froze.

  Before her stood a knight with a large sword, in a black coat and a helmet adorned with the wings of a bird of prey.

  The city was burning. She could hear the crackling of the fire, could see the undulation of the flames, she felt the heat of the fire and the neighing of horses, the screams of the victims... Suddenly, there appeared a black bird flapping its wings, covering everything... Help!

  Cintra, she realized, returning to reality. And Thanedd island. He caught up to me here. He’s a demon. I’m surrounded by ghosts and phantoms from my nightmares. Bonhart is behind me, and him in front.

  She could hear screaming and the pounding of boots.

  The knight in the helmet with the feathers made a sudden move. Ciri overcame her fear. Swallow was yanked out of its sheath.

  ‘Do not touch me!’

  The knight stepped back and to Ciri’s amazement she saw that his cloak hid a blond girl armed with a curved sabre. The girl slipped around Ciri and slashed with her sabre at a mercenary. The black knight, instead of attacking Ciri, swung a powerful slash and killed another mercenary. The other retreated into the hallway.

  The blond girl rushed to the door, but could not close it. She brandished her sabre threateningly and screamed, pushing the mercenaries from the portal. Ciri watched as one of the mercenaries stabbed her with a spear, she watched as the girl fell to her knees. She jumped forwards and swung Swallow, slashing the sword horrible across one the mercenaries, the Black knight ran forward. The blond girl, still on her knees, drew an axe from her belt and threw it, hitting one of the men in the face. Then she reached the door, slammed it and the knight bolted it.

  ‘Uff!’ said the girl. ‘Oak and iron! It will take them some time before they can get through that door!’

  ‘They will not waste the time, they’ll seek another way,’ said the black knight matter-of-factly, the frowned suddenly, seeing the blood seeping from the girl’s leg. The blond waved her hand, it was nothing.

  ‘We have to get out of here,’ the knight took off his helmet and looked at Ciri. ‘I am Cahir Mawr Dyffryn, the son of Ceallach. I came here with Geralt. To rescue you, Ciri. I know that it is unbelievable.’

  ‘I’ve seen unbelievable things,’ Ciri said. ‘You have come a long way... Cahir... Where is Geralt?’

  He stared at her. She remembered those eyes from Thanedd. Deep, blue, nice.

  ‘He is saving the sorceress,’ he said. ‘Here...’

  ‘Yennefer. Let’s go.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said the blond girl, knotting an emergency bandage around her thigh. ‘We have to kick a few asses! For Auntie!’

  ‘Let’s go,’ repeated the knight.

  But it was too late.

  ‘Run,’ Ciri whispered, seeing who was coming down the second passage. ‘It is the devil incarnate. But he wants me and will not chase you... Go. Help Geralt...’

  Cahir shook his head.

  ‘Ciri,’ he said mildly. ‘I’m surprised at you. I cross the whole world to see you, and now that I found you, to redeem myself, to save you and defend you. And you want me to run away now?’

  ‘You don’t know who you are dealing with.’

  Cahir tugged on his gloves, removed his coat and wrapped it around his left arm. He waved his sword and swung it until it whistled in the air.

  ‘I would know.’

  At the sight of the trio, Bonhart stopped. But only for a moment.

  ‘Oh,’ he said. ‘There was a rescue? Your friends, witcheress? All right. Two more or less, it does not make a difference.’

  Ciri suddenly thought of something.

  ‘Say goodbye to your life, Bonhart,’ she cried. ‘This is your end. Here is your match!’

  Undoubtedly she exaggerated. Bonhart caught the false note in her voice. He looked suspicious.

  ‘The witcher? Really?’

  Cahir swung his sword, standing in position. Bonhart did not waver.

  ‘Well, well, the witcher is younger than I believed,’ he hissed. ‘Look here, boy.’

  He opened his mail shirt. On his chest glistened three silver medallions – an eagle, a cat and a wolf.

  ‘If you’re a real witcher,’ the Bounty hunter gritted his teeth, ‘kno
w that soon your amulet will adorn my collection. And if you’re not the witcher, you’ll be dead before you can blink your eyes. It would be more sensible, in that case, to get out of my way and flee. I want this wench, I have nothing against you.’

  ‘Strong words,’ Cahir said calmly. ‘Let’s see what else you can do. Angouleme, Ciri, run!’

  ‘Cahir...’

  ‘Go,’ he said, ‘help Geralt.’

  They ran off. Ciri helped the limping girl.

  ‘You asked for it,’ Bonhart narrowed his pale eyes, as he did he twirled his sword.

  ‘Asked for it?’ echoed Cahir Mawr Dyffryn aep Ceallach dully. ‘No. It is my destiny!’

  They rushed towards each other and collided violently. The blades clattered against each other, the corridor carried the sound of steel banging on steel.

  ‘Not bad,’ Bonhart gasped when they moved apart. ‘Not bad boy. But you’re not a witcher, that little bitch wanted to deceive me. It’s your turn. Prepare to die.’

  ‘Strong words.’

  Cahir breathed deeply. The first encounter convinced him that his chances were slim. The old killer was too fast and strong. His only hope was that he rushed in order to chase Ciri, and clearly nervous.

  Bonhart attacked again. Cahir parried, cut, ducked, jumped, grabbed his opponent’s wrist, pushed him to the wall and put his knee is his groin. Bonhart grabbed him by the face and slammed the hilt of his sword into the side of his head, once, twice, three times. Cahir blocked the third strike. He saw the flash of the blade and instinctively parried.

  Too slowly.

  There was a strict adherence to family tradition in the Dyffryn house that the body of a fallen relative was to be housed in the castle armory and all the men in the family to visit and stay in an all day and night vigil. Women gathered in a remote wing of the castle, so as not to disturb the men, or distract them or interfere with their thoughts, with their sobbing and fainting spells.