SEASON OF STORMS
A stall carelessly nailed together from planks, manned by an old dear in a straw hat and as plump and ruddy-faced as a good witch from a fairy tale, stood at the very edge of the crowded marketplace. The sign above the old dear read: Come to me for joy and happiness. Gherkin complimentary. Geralt stopped and dug some copper pennies from his pocket.
“Pour me a gill of happiness, Granny,” he demanded gloomily.
He took a deep breath, downed it in one, and breathed out. He wiped away the tears that the hooch brought to his eyes.
He was at liberty. And angry.
He had learned that he was free, interestingly, from a person he knew. By sight. It was the same prematurely bald young man who he had observed being driven from the steps of the Natura Rerum osteria. And who, it turned out, was the court scribe.
“You’re free,” the bald young man had told him, locking and unlocking his thin, ink-stained fingers. “Someone came up with the bail.”
“Who?”
The information turned out to be confidential—the bald scribbler refused to give it. He also refused—rather bluntly—the return of Geralt’s confiscated purse. Which contained cash and bank cheques among other things. The Witcher’s personal property—he declared not without spitefulness—had been treated by the authorities as a cautio pro expensis, a down payment against court costs and expected penalties.
here was no point or purpose in arguing. On release, Geralt had to content himself with what he had in his pockets when he was arrested. Personal trifles and petty cash. So petty no one had bothered to steal it.
He counted the remaining copper pennies and smiled at the old dear.
“And a gill of joy, please. I’ll decline the gherkin.”
After the old dear’s hooch, the world took on a more beautiful hue. Geralt knew it would quickly pass so he quickened his step. He had things to do.
Roach, his mare, had fortunately escaped the attentions of the court and wasn’t included in the cost of the cautio pro expensis. She was where he’d left her, in the stable stall, well-groomed and fed. The Witcher couldn’t accept something like that without a reward, irrespective of his own assets. The stableman received at once a few of the handful of silver coins that had survived in a hiding place sewn into the saddle. Geralt’s generosity took the man’s breath away.
The horizon over the sea was darkening. It seemed to Geralt that he could see flashes of lightning there.
Before entering the guardhouse, he prudently filled his lungs with fresh air. It didn’t help. The guardswomen must have eaten more beans than usual that day. Many, many more beans. Who knew, perhaps it was Sunday.
Some of them were eating, as usual. Others were busy playing dice. They stood up from the table upon seeing him. And surrounded him.
“The Witcher, just look,” said the commandant, standing very close. “’e’s up and come here.”
“I’m leaving the city. I’ve come to collect my property.”
“If we lets you.” Another guard prodded him with an elbow, apparently by accident. “What will ’e give us for it? You’ll have to buy yourself out, sonny, buy yourself out! Eh, lasses? What’ll we make him do?”
“Kiss all our bare arses!”
“With a lick! And a dick!”
“Nothing of the kind! He might infect us with something.”
“But he’ll ’ave to give some pleasure, won’t ’e?” Another one pushed her rock-hard bust onto him.
“He can sing us an air.” Another one farted thunderously. “And fit the tune to my pitch!”
“Or mine!” Yet another one farted even louder. “Mine’s more full-blooded!”
The other women laughed so much they clasped their sides.
Geralt made his way through, trying hard not to use excessive force. At that moment, the door to the deposit opened and an elderly gentleman in a grey mantle and beret appeared. The attendant, Gonschorek. On seeing the Witcher he opened his mouth wide.
“You, sir?” he mumbled. “How so? Your swords…”
“Indeed. My swords. May I have them?”
“But… But…” Gonschorek choked and clutched his chest, struggling to catch his breath. “But I don’t have the swords!”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I don’t have them…” Gonschorek’s face flushed. And contorted as though in a paroxysm of pain. “Them bin took—”
“What?” Geralt felt cold fury gripping him.
“Bin… took…”
“What do you mean, taken?” He grabbed the attendant by the lapels. “Taken by whom, dammit? What the bloody hell is this about?”
“The docket…”
“Exactly!” He felt an iron grip on his arm. The commandant of the guard shoved him away from the choking Gonschorek.
“Exactly! Show us the docket!”
The Witcher did not have the docket. The docket from the weapon store had been in his purse. The purse the court had confiscated. Against the costs and the expected punishments.
“The docket!”
“I don’t have it. But—”
“No docket, no deposit.” The commandant didn’t let him finish. “Swords bin took, didn’t you ’ear? You probably took ’em. And now you’re putting on this pantomime? Want to con something out of us? Nothing doing. Get out of here.”
“I’m not leaving until…”
The commandant, without loosening her grasp, dragged Geralt away and turned him around. To face the door.
“Fuck off.”
Geralt shied away from hitting women. He didn’t, however, have any reluctance when it came to somebody who had the shoulders of a wrestler, a belly like a netted pork roast and calves like a discus thrower, and on top of that who farted like a mule. He pushed the commandant away and smashed her hard in the jaw. With his favourite right hook.
The others froze, but only for a second. Even before the commandant had tumbled onto the table, splashing beans and paprika sauce around, they were on him. He smashed one of them in the nose without thinking, and hit another so hard her teeth made a cracking noise. He treated two to the Aard Sign. They flew like rag dolls into a stand of halberds, knocking them all over with an indescribable crash and clatter.
He got hit in the ear by the commandant, who was dripping sauce. The other guard, the one with the rock-hard bust, seized him from behind in a bear hug. He elbowed her so hard she howled. He pushed the commandant onto the table again, and whacked her with a haymaker. He thumped the one with the smashed nose in the solar plexus and knocked her to the ground, where she vomited audibly. Another, struck in the temple, slammed her head against a post and went limp, her eyes immediately misting over.
But four of them were still on their feet. That marked the end of his advantage. He was hit in the back of the head and then in the ear. And after that in the lower back. One of them tripped him up and when he fell down two dropped on him, pinning him down and pounding him with their fists. The other two weighed in with kicks.
A head-butt in the face took out one of the women lying on him, but the other immediately pressed him down. The commandant—he recognised her by the sauce dripping from her. She smacked him from above in the teeth. He spat blood right in her eyes.
“A knife!” she yelled, thrashing her shaven head around. “Give me a knife! I’ll cut his balls off!”
“Why a knife?” yelled another. “I’ll bite them off!”
“Stop! Attention! What is the meaning of this? Attention, I said!”
A stentorian voice, commanding respect, tore through the hubbub of the fracas, pacifying the guards. They released Geralt from their grasp. He got up with difficulty, somewhat sore. The sight of the battlefield improved his humour a little. He observed his accomplishments with some satisfaction. The guard lying by the wall had opened her eyes, but was still unable even to sit upright. Another, bent over, was spitting blood and feeling her teeth with a finger. Yet another, the one with the smashed nose, was trying hard to stand, but kept falling over, slipping in a puddle of her own beany vomit. Only three of the six could keep their balance. So he could be satisfied with the result. Despite the fact that had it not been for the intervention he would have suffered more serious injuries and might not have been able to get up unaided.
The person who had intervened, however, was an elegantly attired man with noble features, emanating authority. Geralt didn’t know who he was. But he knew perfectly well who the noble-looking man’s companion was. A dandy in a fanciful hat with an egret feather stuck into it, with shoulder-length blond hair curled with irons. Wearing a doublet the colour of red wine and a shirt with a lace ruffle. Along with his ever-present lute and with that ever-present insolent smile on his lips.
“Greetings, Witcher! What do you look like? With that smashed-up fizzog! I’ll split my sides laughing!”
“Greetings, Dandelion. I’m pleased to see you too.”
“What’s going on here?” The man with the noble looks stood with arms akimbo. “Well? What are you up to? Standard report! This moment!”
“It was him!” The commandant shook the last of the sauce from her ears and pointed accusingly at Geralt. “He’s guilty, Honourable Instigator. He lost his temper and stirred up a row, and then began brawling. And all because of some swords in the deposit, what he hasn’t got a docket for. Gonschorek will confirm… Hey, Gonschorek, what are you doing curled up in the corner? Shat yourself? Move your arse, get up, tell the Honourable Instigator… Hey! Gonschorek? What ails you?”
A close look was enough to guess what ailed him. There was no need to check his pulse, it sufficed to look at his chalky white face. Gonschorek was dead. He was, quite simply, deceased.
*
“We will institute an investigation, Lord Rivia,” said Ferrant de Lettenhove, instigator of the Royal Tribunal. “Since you are lodging a formal complaint and appeal we must institute one—the law so decrees. We shall interrogate everyone who during your arrest and trial had access to your effects. We shall arrest any suspects.”
“The usual ones?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Nothing, nothing.”
“Indeed. The matter will certainly be explained, and those guilty of the theft of the swords will be brought to justice. If a theft was really committed. I promise that we shall solve the mystery and the truth will out. Sooner or later.”
“I’d rather it were sooner.” The Witcher didn’t care too much for the instigator’s tone of voice. “My swords are my existence; I can’t do my job without them. I know my profession is adversely perceived by many and that I suffer as a result of this negative portrayal caused by prejudice, superstition and xenophobia. I hope that fact won’t influence the investigation.”
“It won’t,” replied Ferrant de Lettenhove dryly, “since law and order prevail here.”
After the servants had carried Gonschorek’s body out, the instigator ordered a search of the weapon store and the entire cubbyhole. Predictably, there wasn’t a trace of the Witcher’s swords. And the commandant of the guard—still annoyed with Geralt—pointed out to them a filing spike where the deceased had kept the completed deposit slips. The Witcher’s was soon found among them. The commandant searched through the stack, thrusting it under his nose a moment later.
“There you go.” She pointed triumphantly. “It’s here in black and white. Signed Gerland of Ryblia. Told yer the witcher had bin here and took his swords away. And now ’e’s lying, no doubt to claim damages. Gonschorek turned ’is toes up thanks to ’im! His gall bladder ruptured from the worry and ’is heart gev out.”
But neither she, nor any of the other guards, elected to testify that any of them had actually seen Geralt collect his weapons. The explanation was that “there’s always someone ’anging around ’ere” and they had been busy eating.
Seagulls circled over the roof of the court, uttering ear-splitting screeches. The wind had blown the storm cloud southwards over the sea. The sun was out.
“May I warn you in advance,” said Geralt, “that my swords are protected by powerful spells. Only witchers can touch them; others will have their vitality drained away. It mainly manifests in the loss of male potency. I’m talking about sexual enfeeblement. Absolute and permanent.”
“We shall bear that in mind.” The instigator nodded. “For the moment, though, I would ask you not to leave the city. I’m inclined to turn a blind eye to the brawl in the guardhouse—in any case, they occur there regularly. The guards are pretty volatile. And because Julian—I mean Lord Dandelion—vouches for you, I’m certain that your case will be satisfactorily solved in court.”
“My case—” the Witcher squinted his eyes “—is nothing but harassment. Intimidation resulting from prejudice and hatred—”
“The evidence will be examined—” the instigator cut him off “—and measures taken based on it. That is what law and order decrees. The same law and order that granted you your liberty. On bail, and thus conditionally. You ought, Lord Rivia, to respect those caveats.”
“Who paid the bail?”
Ferrant de Lettenhove coldly declined to reveal the identity of the Witcher’s benefactor, bade farewell and headed towards the entrance to the court, accompanied by his servants. It was just what Dandelion had been waiting for. Scarcely had they exited the town square and entered a narrow street than he revealed everything he knew.
“It’s a genuine catalogue of unfortunate coincidences, Geralt, my dear. And unlucky incidents. And as far as the bail is concerned, it was paid for you by a certain Lytta Neyd, known to her friends as Coral, from the colour of the lipstick she uses. She’s a sorceress who works for Belohun, the local kinglet. Everybody’s racking their brains wondering why she did it. Because it was none other than she who sent you down.”
“What?”
“Listen, will you? It was Coral who informed on you. That actually didn’t surprise anyone, it’s widely known that sorcerers have it in for you. And then a bolt from the blue: the sorceress suddenly pays your bail and gets you out of the dungeon where you’d been thrown because of her. The whole city—”
“Widely known? The whole city? What are you saying, Dandelion?”
“I’m using metaphors and circumlocution. Don’t pretend you don’t know, you know me well enough. Naturally not the ‘whole city,’ and only certain well-informed people among those close to the crown.”
“And you’re one of them, I presume?”
“Correct. Ferrant is my cousin—the son of my father’s brother. I dropped in to visit him, as you would a relative. And I found out about your imbroglio. I immediately interceded for you, you can’t possibly doubt that. I vouched for your honesty. I talked about Yennefer…”
“Thank you very much.”
“Drop the sarcasm. I had to talk about her to help my cousin realise that the local witch is maligning and slandering you out of jealousy and envy. That the entire accusation is false, that you never stoop to swindle people. As a result of my intercession, Ferrant de Lettenhove, the royal instigator, a high-ranking legal executive, is now convinced of your innocence—”
“I didn’t get that impression,” said Geralt. “Quite the opposite. I felt he didn’t believe me. Neither in the case of the alleged embezzlement, nor in the case of the vanished swords. Did you hear what he said about evidence? Evidence is a fetish to him. The denunciation will thus be evidence of the fraud and Gerland of Ryblia’s signature on the docket is proof of the hoax involving the theft of the swords. Not to mention his expression when he was warning me against leaving the city…”
“You’re being too hard on him,” pronounced Dandelion. “I know him better than you. That fact that I’m vouching for you is worth more than a dozen inflated pieces of evidence. And he was right to warn you. Why do you think both he and I headed to the guardhouse? To stop you from doing anything foolish. Someone, you say, is framing you, fabricating phoney evidence? Then don’t hand that someone irrefutable proof. Which is what fleeing would be.”
“Perhaps you’re right,” agreed Geralt. “But my instinct tells me otherwise. I ought to do a runner before they utterly corner me. First arrest, then bail, and then right after that the swords… What next? Dammit, without a sword I feel like… like a snail without a shell.”
“I think you worry too much. And anyway, the place is full of shops. Forget about those swords and buy some more.”
“And if someone were to steal your lute? Which was acquired, as I recall, in quite dramatic circumstances? Wouldn’t you worry? Would you let it slide? And buy another in the shop around the corner?”
Dandelion involuntarily tightened his grip on his lute and his eyes swept around anxiously. However, none of the passers-by looked like a potential robber, nor displayed an unhealthy interest in his unique instrument.
“Well, yes,” he sighed. “I understand. Like my lute, your swords are also unique and irreplaceable. And what’s more… What were you saying? Enchanted? Triggering magical impotence… Dammit, Geralt! Now you tell me. I mean, I’ve often spent time in your company, I’ve had those swords at arm’s length! And sometimes closer! Now everything’s clear, now I get it… I’ve been having certain difficulties lately, dammit…”
“Relax. That impotence thing was nonsense. I made it up on the spot, hoping the rumour would spread. That the thief would take fright…”
“If he takes fright he’s liable to bury the swords in a muck heap,” the bard noted, still slightly pale. “And you’ll never get them back. Better to count on my cousin Ferrant. He’s been instigator for years, and has a whole army of sheriffs, agents and narks. They’ll find the thief in no time, you’ll see.”
“If the thief’s still here.” The Witcher ground his teeth. “He might have run for it while I was in the slammer. What did you say was the name of that sorceress who landed me in this?”
“Lytta Neyd, nicknamed Coral. I can guess what you’re planning, my friend. But I don’t think it’s a good idea. She’s a sorceress. An enchantress and a woman in one; in a word, an alien species that doesn’t submit to rational understanding, and functions according to mechanisms and principles incomprehensible to ordinary men. Why am I telling you this, anyway? You know it very well. You have, indeed, very rich experience in this matter… What’s that racket?”
Aimlessly wandering through the streets, they had ended up in the vicinity of a small square resounding with the ceaseless banging of hammers. There was a large cooper’s workshop there, it turned out. Cords of seasoned planks were piled up evenly beneath an awning by the street. From there, the planks were carried by barefoot youngsters to tables where they were attached to special trestles and shaped using drawknives. The carved staves went to other craftsmen, who finished them on long planing benches, standing astride them up to their ankles in shavings. The completed staves ended up in the hands of the coopers, who assembled them. Geralt watched for a while as the shape of the barrel emerged under the pressure of ingenious vices and clamps tightened by screws. Metal hoops hammered onto the staves then created the form of the barrel. Vapour from the large coppers where the barrels were being steamed belched right out into the street. The smell of wood being toasted in a fire—the barrels were being hardened before the next stage in the process—drifted from the courtyard into the workshop.
“Whenever I see a barrel,” Dandelion declared, “I feel like a beer. Let’s go around the corner. I know a pleasant inn.”
“Go by yourself. I’m visiting the sorceress. I think I know which one she is; I’ve already seen her. Where will I find her? Don’t make faces, Dandelion. She, it would seem, is the original source and cause of my troubles. I’m not going to wait for things to develop, I’ll go and ask her directly. I can’t hang around in this town. If only for the reason that I’m rather skint.”
“We shall find a remedy for that,” the troubadour said proudly. “I shall support you financially… Geralt? What’s going on?”
“Go back to the coopers and bring me a stave.”
“What?”
“Fetch me a stave. Quickly.”
The street had been barred by three powerful-looking bruisers with ugly, unshaven and unwashed mugs. One of them, so broad-shouldered he was almost square, held a metal-tipped club, as thick as a capstan bar. The second, in a sheepskin coat with the fur on the outside, was holding a cleaver and had a boarding axe in his belt. The third, as swarthy as a mariner, was armed with a long, hideous-looking knife.
“Hey, you there, Rivian bastard!” began the square-shaped man. “How do you feel without any swords on your back? Bare-arsed in the wind, eh?”
Geralt didn’t join in the discourse. He waited. He heard Dandelion arguing with a cooper about a stave.
“You’re toothless now, you freak, you venomous witcher toad,” continued the square-shaped man, clearly the most expert of the three in the oratory arts. “No one’s afraid of a reptile without fangs! For it’s nothing but a worm or a slimy lamprey. We put filth like that under our boots and crush it to a pulp so it won’t dare to come into our towns among decent people no more. You won’t foul our streets with your slime, you reptile. Have at him, boys!”
“Geralt! Catch!”
He caught the stave Dandelion threw to him, dodged a blow from the club, smashed the square-shaped man in the side of the head, spun around and slammed it into the elbow of the thug in the sheepskin, who yelled and dropped the cleaver. The Witcher hit him behind the knees, knocking him down, and then, in passing, struck him on the temple with the stave. Without waiting until the thug fell down, or interrupting his own movement, he ducked under the square-shaped man’s club and slammed him over the fingers clenched around it. The square-shaped man howled in pain and dropped the club, and Geralt struck him in turn on the right ear, the ribs and the left ear. And then kicked him hard in the crotch. The square-shaped man fell over and rolled into a ball, cringing and curling up, his forehead touching the ground.
The swarthy one, the most agile and quickest of the three, danced around the Witcher. Deftly tossing his knife from hand to hand, he attacked on bent legs, slashing diagonally. Geralt easily avoided the blows, stepped back and waited for him to lengthen his strides. And when that happened he knocked the knife away with a sweeping blow of the stave, circled the assailant with a pirouette and slammed him in the back of the head. The knifeman fell to his knees and the Witcher whacked him in the right kidney. The man howled and tensed up and the Witcher bashed him with the stave below the ear, striking a nerve. One known to physicians as the parotid plexus.
“Oh, dear,” said Geralt, standing over the man, who was curled up, retching and choking on his screams. “That must have hurt.”
The thug in the sheepskin coat drew the axe from his belt, but didn’t get up from his knees, uncertain what to do. Geralt dispelled his doubts, smashing him over the back of the neck with the stave.
The fellows from the town guard came running along the street, jostling the gathering crowd of onlookers. Dandelion pacified them, citing his connections, frantically explaining who had been the assailant and who had acted in self-defence. The Witcher gestured the bard over.
“See that the bastards are tied up. Persuade your cousin the instigator to give them a hard time. They either had a hand in stealing the swords themselves or somebody hired them. They knew I was unarmed, which is why they dared to attack. Give the coopers back their stave.”
“I had to buy it,” admitted Dandelion. “And I think I did the right thing. You wield a mean plank, I can see. You should pack one all the time.”
“I’m going to the sorceress. To pay her a visit. Should I take the stave?”
“Something heavier would come in useful with a sorceress.” The bard grimaced. “A fence post, for example. A philosopher acquaintance of mine used to say: when visiting a woman, never forget to take a—”
“Dandelion.”
“Very well, very well, I’ll give you directions to the witch. But first, if I might advise…”
“Yes?”
“Visit a bathhouse. And a barber.”
